Lilly looks away, conceding.
“I haven’t been myself in a long time,” I admit, grieving, belatedly, for the girl I was before I was entangled in Trevor’s toxic web. “I’ve been weak. So weak I couldn’t even try to save myself.”
“But this?” Lilly looks at me pleadingly. “Is this saving yourself?”
“I don’t know. I know it’s complicated. No—messy. But what Idoknow, Lilly, is that for the first time in a long time, I’m happy. In a rough, confusing kind of way. But happy nonetheless. It’s more than I can say for my life before.”
Lilly finally crosses back to me and sits down, biting her bottom lip. It’s a testament to just how much she loves me that my hotheaded, easily outraged, overprotective best friend is even trying to understand how I’ve gone from captive to willing participant.
“Happy,” she repeats. “How the hell did that happen?”
I shrug, cheeks heating. Lilly’s eyes find me, searching, prodding. A long moment of investigative silence falls between us. Until she says what I can’t possibly.
“You’re in love with him,” Lilly whispers, her voice threadbare. “Oh, my God, Emma.”
I look away, face burning. “I don’t know if I am. Or if I’m even ready to consider that as a possibility. But I know this. He needs a child, Lil. That’s why he took me.”
“For…the mafia, you mean? That’s what he does, isn’t it? He and his driver were being really discreet and all, but it’s pretty obvious.”
I nod.
“And he knows? You know, about you?” Lilly’s eyes dart to my belly, her expression wrought with guilt.
I nod again.
“So, he has to let you go. If you can’t…” She looks away, unable to wound me, even with the truth.He has to let you go, because you can’t possibly give him what he needs.
“That’s the thing, Lilly.” I take a deep, steadying breath, touching a palm to my stomach. “I think…I think I might be pregnant.” I cut her off before she can exclaim something, probably an expletive. “But I can’t say anything yet. I need a test, first of all. And even if I am, who’s to say I’ll make it full term? It’s still so early. It’s only been a few weeks.”
“Oh, my God, Emma. That’s—I mean, do you…want to? Make it full term with his baby?”
I wait for my mind, my conscience, to screamno!But it doesn’t. After a long, agonizing moment, I admit to Lilly what I haven’t been able to admit to myself. “Yes.”
She touches her mouth with her fingertips, eyes wide. “Oh, my God.”
“I know it’s not ideal.”
“Ideal is, like, the last word I’d use.”
“But I think this could work, as insane as it is.” As I say it, I begin to realize this is my truth. A truth I’ve been swallowing and burying since the first time I felt the sickness inside of me. “And if it can work, Lil, I think I want it to. I think I could be happy with him.”
Lilly’s eyes are bright with tears. This time, she wraps me in her arms and holds me close. “OK. OK. I don’t get it. And I don’t know all of the details. But I know that I love you, and that you’re smart, and if this is what your crazy brain wants, Em, I’ll support you.” She draws back, smiling sadly. “But if he hurts you, I’ll fucking rip his heart out.”
I say the words, realizing as I say them, I mean them. Truly. “I don’t think he will.”
Lilly takes one more lengthy moment to study me, searching, really searching. She must remember that I can be very stubborn, because she finally concedes. “OK. OK. Jesus. New game plan, I guess.” She takes a deep breath, composing herself. “Em, we need to get you to a doctor.”
16
Malcom
Adoctor.
I don’t turn to look at her as she addresses me in the parlor. Her friend came and went, and another night passed that we didn’t eat together, speak together—sleep together. I’ve been keeping my distance, trying to figure out exactly how to move forward.
“Why?” I ask, without turning.
“I’ve been feeling sick,” she says, her voice very soft, and very earnest. I finally turn and face her, leaning against the window casement. Today she wears a long cobalt skirt and a loose white blouse. Through the pale fabric, I can see the traces of a lace bra. I know she hasn’t done it purposefully, but it drives me crazy nonetheless. “You might know that if you stopped avoiding me.”
