“Me too.” He swung our hands together. “But our baby would be cuter.”
I groaned and then stopped when I saw the sign for Dr. Kim outside of a door. Okay, I was doing this. Women did it all the time. I could do this. “This is the kind of thing that girls get taken to by their moms a lot. I mean not all girls, obviously. But some. I guess.”
He nodded. “I hate that you have to go through so many things alone.” He was quiet for a second. “Do you think she would have accepted this? You with us?”
Wow. That was a good question. I hadn’t thought about that at all. The door was flung open and a beautiful Asian woman stood in the threshold. “There you are, Altheia.” I didn’t know her, but clearly she knew me. It was so weird that everyone hereknew me already. “I’m Lynda Kim. Come on. I thought maybe you got lost, but now I see that you just found Jeremy. Stop making my patient late. I know it’s your fault. Whatever you’re doing. Don’t tell me.”
He nodded. “Yes, ma’am.”
She pointed at him. “And come by this week and see Joel.” I didn’t know what that was either. With a nod, she turned to me. “Jeremy and Joel used to play together as kids. Back when Rosalind used to bring them here a lot. Come on, then. No one likes doing this. I know. But you’re being very good getting it done.” She closed the door on Jeremy. “Oh and because I’m going to go all doctor on you and forget to say this later, I wasn’t born in the Life. You’re new to it too. If I can help, let me know.”
Everyone was so nice and helpful here. It would be so easy to just give in and love it. But Dina’s words floated in my head. There was always the other side of the lake. They’d killed children and taken Phoenix. Their granny didn’t trust it here. I would believe in Dr. Kim. But I was still reserving judgement on a person-by-person basis.
I leftin a little bit more pain than when I’d entered. After talking to me for an hour, she had determined that for multiple reasons I needed an IUD. And she had one to put in me right then. So that had sort of sucked but at least it was over.
No babies. Maybe it would sort out my period. She thought it would.
I was glad it was done. I came out to find all four Lents waiting for me. They looked up from their phones in unison.
“What were they doing to you in there?” Jules smiled. “I thought maybe I would need to call a rescue team.”
Was there such a thing? “It took some time. I’m not going to get pregnant now and hopefully I’ll have some kind of regular period. Hurts right now but that is supposed to stop soon.”
Phoenix winced and they all sort of groaned and grimaced. Finally, the youngest spoke. “I’m sorry you’re in any pain. Let’s get you home.”
I leaned into him. “I need to make those calls and then honestly I might be an old woman and nap until dinner.”
“Sounds like a plan. I seem to fall asleep a little bit every day, like in the middle of the day, like I did yesterday here. I can’t seem to help it right now.”
“Well.” Jeremy shook his head. “I’m not an expert but, low key, that might stop if you stopped staying up all night. Just sayin’.”
His youngest brother shoved him gently. “Last night I was helping our girlfriend.”
“And all the other nights you were playing video games.”
Phoenix laughed. “Yes, I was. But last night I wasn’t, and I’ll go to bed tonight because I get to sleep next to Alatheia.”
“Hold on,” Julian called before I could step outside and he rushed to the car, coming back with a black coat. “Try this.”
I caught my breath. “Thank you for this. I know Barrett said you would, but I’m sure you had better things to do this morning than coat shop for me.”
I put it on and it fit, which earned me a Julian grin. “Never anything better than taking care of you.”
“Oh, the cheese.” Jeremy grinned. “He always wins at the cheese. Oh, wait, Princess, you had something you wanted to tell me. Do you want to talk alone?”
All four sets of eyes were on me right then. I swallowed. “No, it’s probably better all together.” I hadn’t said anything about this yet. “Um, when they took me.” I swallowed through the lump in my throat. “They ripped the pearls from my neckand demanded the sapphire earrings. Those were so thoughtful. My favorite things ever. Not that things matter. They’re small. I know that quite well. But, I am so sorry. You gave them to me, and they’re gone.”
Phoenix hugged me before Jeremy could, he was closer. I closed my eyes for a second. “They took them at the school?”
“Yes.” I breathed him in.
“I can’t imagine how terrified you must have been. I don’t give a shit about the jewelry. Just that you got hurt. There will be more jewelry. Better jewelry.”
Jeremy took his turn to hug me. “So much jewelry. You looked beautiful in those pearls, but I can do better than that. You’ll see.”
The idea was terrifying. “No. Don’t buy me any more jewelry. I’ll never survive losing it. Okay? Something will happen and it’ll just be gone. I can’t.”
And by that of course I didn’t mean simply the jewelry. I couldn’t lose them or anything else that represented them.
