Page 22 of The Difference Between

I have no idea how I’ll handle not working for three months, but that almost makes me smile.

I give Trish until end of business on Friday to beg me to come back to work or for me to talk myself out of this plan; neither happen.

I schedule my appointment with the Fontain fertility clinic then fly to North Carolina Saturday morning.

Six

“Wait a sec—” Rue blows her bangs out of her eyes only for them to fall right back. “You got fired for working too much?” She takes a sip of her lunch wine. “I didn’t even know that was possible.”

“That is pretty impressive,” a man’s voice calls from around the corner.

Nash, Rue’s husband, strolls into Mom’s kitchen wearing a ridiculously patterned button-up shirt—American flags with smiley faces of all things. Between his shirts and her overalls, they are complete eyesores. And they both must be blind because they can’t keep their hands off each other.

He sets a dirty dish in Mom’s old farmhouse sink then pauses behind Rue to rub her shoulders.

Around us, Mom’s familiar kitchen is filled with clutter and life. Mismatched vases of plant cuttings and basil in a pot on the windowsill. The cabinets are red, the walls are wallpapered in a blue toile pattern, and the dinged-up wood floors are covered in rugs. She and Rue run Old Vines, an antique store, and my mother’s house looks like the overflow inventory came here to die.

“First off,” I say, “I didn’t get fired, I’m on sabbatical.”

“Forced,” Rue corrects.

“I didn’t know forced sabbaticals were a thing,” Nash chimes in.

“Because your wife—” I cut my eyes from Rue to Remy, who’s mid-bite of sandwich. “And her sister, couldn’t stop texting me during my meeting.”

“Uh-uh,” Remy says around her food. “Don’t blame this on us. We were keeping you updated about our mother who was having brain surgery that you’re too important for.”

I swallow a tinge of guilt with a sip of my sparkling water. As much as I need wine to cope with these morons, the book Healthy You, Healthy Baby that I read on the flight, said alcohol is off the table until this baby gets here.

“It doesn’t matter whose fault it is,” I snark. “They wanted me to take a break, and I didn’t have a choice, so here I am.”

Their too-loud laughs annoy me.

“Shh!” I hush. “You’ll wake Mom.”

She was already home and in bed by the time my flight landed. Other than peeking in on her, we haven’t talked. The discharge papers said to expect a lot of sleeping—I already knew this from my research—and these two laughing at my collapsing life isn’t going to help.

“Well, since you think this is all so funny, there’s something else you should know.” I do not want to do this. “I’m having a baby.”

Rue says, “What the hell?”

Remy drops the crust of her sandwich on her plate.

And Nash says to Rue, “Told you we aren’t too old.”

When we all gape at him, he pecks Rue on the head and says, “I have to go get the kids.”

The kids, meaning Bennie, his and Rue’s daughter, and Nora and Luke, Remy’s kids, who were with a babysitter all morning while they brought Mom home from the hospital.

“Too old?” I ask Rue when he’s gone. “What the hell does that mean?”

She gives us a sheepish look. “Nash wants a baby.” She spins her glass. “We’re kind of trying.”

“Who cares about that,” Remy says, wide-eyed, staring at my clearly not pregnant midsection. “Who are you pregnant by?”

“I’m not exactly pregnant yet.” I clear my throat and lift my chin. “But I might have been told I don’t have a life outside of work and said that I’m on a path to impregnation via donor.”

“You what?” Rue tables her wine. “You’re getting pregnant by a sperm donor?”