AllFreeNovel
Share Us
“Oh, shit. Are you…” she asks.
I shake my head. “I don’t know. I mean…probably not, but I didn’t even realize I might’ve missed a period until I saw that stick in your hand, and—”
“There are extra tests in my box. Take one. I won’t need them for nine months anyway, and by then they’ll be expired.”
I shake my head. “No. I’m not. I don’t think I am, anyway. It’s just the birth control shot or the stress…or something.” I’m talking myself out of it being pregnancy.
It can’t be.
She jumps up and leaves the room, and she returns a beat later with the box. “Take it. I don’t need it anyway. Go take the test now. Maybe we can go through this together.”
Shit.
I don’t want to go through this together, though I’m not exactly in the right position to tell her that. “I’ll take one later,” I say, turning the box over in my hand as I stare down at it.
I get up and toss it on my bathroom counter, and then I sit with Kelly, and we talk about what this means.
She agrees she has to tell him, and we even discuss strategies for what she can say since she isn’t sure she wants him around. She’s certain she wants to keep the baby, and she’s also certain she’ll figure out how to make this all work.
And then she throws out the thing that breaks my heart but might just be the right choice for her. “I don’t even know how to say this to you, but…I think I’m going to move back to Louisiana to be closer to my parents as I navigate this.”
I don’t blame her, though tears pinch behind my eyes. “You should, Kel. But what am I going to do without you?”
“You’ll never be without me. Instead of long talks on the couch, we’ll have long talks on the phone.” Her voice wavers a little at the end, and I start to cry, too. “It’s just the right time, I think. If I’m going to move, I’d rather do it in the summer than once the new school year gets underway.”
“I don’t blame you. And it’s absolutely the right choice. But I’m right here if you ever want to come back, okay?”
“I don’t want to leave,” she whimpers.
I reach over and squeeze her to me, and we both cry as we consider what a future might look like where we’re no longer roommates and where we no longer even live in the same town.
We sit on the couch reminiscing about the day we met and all the adventures we’ve had together. It’s dinnertime when my phone dings with a text.
Grayson: Will you be home for dinner?
I stand and stretch. “I should get home. Do you want to come over for dinner?”
She shakes her head. “No. I need to do some research about jobs by my parents and maybe make an appointment to make sure everything is okay in here.” She pats her stomach, and the slightest twinge of something rushes through me. It’s not quite jealousy, not quite fear, but some weird combination in the middle.
I should take that test.
I know it’ll be negative. Of course it will be. But I also have this strange feeling like maybe ignorance is bliss, and I kind of want to live in ignorance a while longer.
I call Grayson on my way to his place.
“Hey,” he answers.
“Hey. I’m on my way, and I haven’t eaten.”
“I haven’t, either. Want to meet somewhere?” he asks.
“Sure.”
He wants Mexican, so we pick a place not far from home, and I pull into the parking lot at the same time he does. On my way there, I decide I’m not going to tell him Kelly’s news. It’s not my news to share, anyway.
“You’re quiet,” he astutely observes after we order.
“Kel’s going through some things. She’s thinking about moving back to Louisiana to be closer to her mom and dad,” I say.
