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I want to reach out to her when she walks closer, but I take a step to the side so she can grab several smaller bowls from the shelf on the wall behind where I’m standing.
“You didn’t mention being infertile. I’m so sorry, Ads.”
She scoffs as she turns back to her work.
She has a routine. It wouldn’t matter about the topic we were discussing, she’d be working either way. She doesn’t keep her back to me because she’s avoiding the subject. She has a certain amount of time to get everything ready for the day. The deal is that I can be here, I just can’t get in the way.
“Want to explain that weird noise you just made?”
I fight the urge to cross my arms over my chest and take an indignant stance.
“I haven’t had any tests done, but I don’t think I’m infertile.”
I stare at the back of her head, confusion making me tilt my head. “IVF is for infertility, right?”
“Or women who want to get pregnant without a man.”
The news hits me like a semi-truck skidding uncontrollably on black ice.
Without a man.
I never pictured Adalynn Tate as the type of woman who wanted to be a single parent. She’s more of the white picket fence with a yard full of kids, waiting for her husband to get home so they can all sit down at the table and talk about their day type of woman.
Maybe I’ve gotten it all wrong. Maybe her reason for not dating much is different from the fantasies in my head that tell me every once in a while that she wants me and wouldn’t settle for anyone else.
“Are you a lesbian?”
The icing spatula clanks onto the table when it falls from her hand, but she doesn’t pay any attention to the mint green mess she’s made before turning back around to face me.
“Excuse me?”
I don’t repeat myself because I know it’s a rhetorical question.
“Do you honestly think that a woman has to be a lesbian in order to want IVF?”
I hold my hands up in mock surrender. “Don’t bite my head off. I’m just asking questions here.”
“I was looking into IVF because I want a baby. I’m not dating anyone. If I went about getting pregnant the normal way, it would be years before it would be appropriate, with the whole dating-marriage timeline.”
“You said it probably won’t happen. Why?”
She takes a deep breath as she turns back around. The way she starts whipping the icing in the bowl is an indication of her annoyance.
“It’s expensive.”
“How expensive?”
I know she sank a lot of her savings into opening this bakery, and as popular as her cupcakes and other sweet treats are, she doesn’t charge enough to get rich off the townsfolk. Even charging that little extra to the tourists doesn’t make much of a difference.
“The range is between nine to twenty grand, depending on where you have it done.”
I choke on a cough. That’s a crazy amount of money. I know for a fact that if she did do it, even on the low end, it would leave her incapable of paying for anything else.
“And that’s why,” she says, reacting to my response, “I said it probably won’t happen.”
“I could help you pay for it,” I offer, the words like sandpaper on my tongue.
I’d do anything for this woman, even if it means watching another man’s baby grow inside of her.
