AllFreeNovel
Share Us
“No, I’m fine. Pregnant people work all the time and don’t complain. I can do this,” I respond, getting ready to wash my face and brush my teeth.
“Have you made an appointment to see the doctor?” Nick asks, standing with his back against the counter, his feet crossed at the ankles.
“I haven’t. I plan to call tomorrow. Is it weird that I’m nervous?” I ask, drying my face off, wrinkling up my nose when I look over at Nick.
“Nervous about what?”
“Nervous to tell the doctor’s office I’m pregnant. The last time I was in I told them I wasn’t sexually active. That shit changed really fast.”
Nick laughs. “I’m just glad to know you weren’t sleeping with anyone on the regular while I was gone. I know we broke up and all, but shit, I hate the thought of you with another guy.”
“Seriously, Nick? You sound so…I don’t know, alpha male and that is not you. And by the way, you think I like thinking about you with all those ski bunnies throwing themselves at you?”
“Just for your reference, I didn’t have any ski bunnies throwing themselves at me. I barely had time to breathe. Training for the Olympics is full-on, babe.”
“I’m sure it is,” I pause, my mind wandering to our unfinished conversation, the one that we keep coming back to but are never able to fully make a decision on. “Nick, are we really going to do this?”
“Do what, Lis? This?” he stops, motioning between us. “I think we already are and yes, we are going to do this.”
I feel my eyes well up with tears, pushing them away with a swipe of my hand, I shake my head. “I’m sorry, I’m just really emotional. I’m sure it’s the pregnancy.”
“You don’t have to apologize. This is a lot. I don’t think either of us ever thought we’d be here,” Nick says, stopping to pull me to him, wrapping his arms around me.
“I wished for it for so long,” I admit, sniffing back the tears. “But in my dream, it was completely without complications. We just lived happily ever after and that was it.”
“We can do that,” Nick says, dropping a kiss to the top of my head.
“And what, Nick, live in your parents’ house while I work at Badger Creek, and you teach lessons to rich assholes when you have so much more talent than that.”
I can hear the anger in my voice. It wasn’t supposed to be like this. He was supposed to get the happily ever after and I was supposed to be here thinking about how amazing it is that he got out, that he made it. And I certainly wasn’t supposed to end up pregnant.
I hate that I go back and forth, cycling through being happy and then being sad and then angry. It’s such a mess, and it’s a mess that I wish had an easy solution.
“Lis, it’s going to be okay and if I have to teach lessons to support us, then I’ll do that. I don’t care as long as I’m with you.” I want to believe him, but I also worry he’ll look back on all this one day and have massive regrets, regrets that he takes out on me or worse, the baby.
I shake my head, clearing my thoughts because that isn’t Nick. He would never hold it against me, and I need to keep telling myself that. But I also know he wouldn’t be happy teaching lessons, not that it’s below him or anything; it’s just his caliber of expertise is not in teaching tourists to hit the bunny slopes without falling.
“I want you to go back to the team and try to make it work,” I finally say out loud. “I want you to live your dream. I want you to be happy.”
Nick lets out a hard sigh, his chest rising and falling as my body moves with him. “Elissa, you are my dream, this little family we have created, it’s my dream. I’m not happy when I’m not with you.”
“Then what are you going to tell your coach?”
“I’m going to tell him that I’m not coming back,” Nick says with finality. “It’s not what’s best for us, for our family.”
I’m shocked at Nick’s immediate response, not even giving it a second thought, but rather doing what he thinks is best for the family. We haven’t even discussed him staying here, even if that’s exactly what I want.
I take in what he’s just said, wondering if it’s as easy as him just saying he’s done. He has to be under contract with the team and all his sponsorships. The money he was bringing in was insane and now we’re just supposed to go to my manager’s salary at Badger Creek and living in the house I own with my mom?
“Do you think they’ll just let you go that easily?” I ask, letting the question out instead of allowing it to fester in my mind.
“What can they say?” he asks, sounding far more casual than I expect. “They’ll replace me before I can even finish telling them. Don’t you think there are millions of talented jumpers out there looking to make the US team and possibly train for the Olympics?”
“I’m sure there are, but you’re under contract, right?”
“Lis, you’re worrying about this way too much. I’m just a business transaction to them, and I’m not making them any money right now. They can’t wait to unload me,” Nick says, trying to reassure me, but all it does is make me feel bad that he’s going to have to have this conversation with them.
But he’s right, he is just a business transaction to them. It’s about money. It’s always about money. Just like raising a baby costs money.
