We go to dinner in the hotel. Brick walls, soft lights, menus on paper. Talia orders a glass of something sparkling and tells a story about a Malibu pool guy versus a Henderson pool guy, like it’s a sports rivalry. Salem heckles from the end of the table. Houston blushes. Knox pretends not to hear the worst adjectives.
“To indecision,” I say, lifting my water as if it were wine, because the smell of actual wine pinches my nose and turns my stomach in a way that feels unfair. I set the glass down and that’s that. The table keeps talking. The room spins one notch. I breathe through it.
It doesn’t pass. I excuse myself with a hand on my mouth and speed-walk to the bathroom. The stall is clean enough. I throw up, and it leaves me weak and annoyed.
Someone in the next stall knocks. “Sorry to bother you after that. Do you have a tampon?”
“Sorry, no,” I say, voice hoarse.
She grumbles and leaves. I sit there longer than I need to, blinking at my knees, doing math I haven’t done in too long. I haven’t needed tampons for a while now. I’ve been busy and stressed and traveling and in love and working and—count it, Lou.
The numbers don’t make sense unless they do. My stomach sinks, and I’m nauseous all over again.
I stand up too fast, and the room tilts. I wash my face and stare at myself, water dripping off my chin. My mouth says a word I can’t hear over the sound of the sink.
The door swings open and Talia steps in like she owns the place. “Baby? You alright?”
I can’t keep it to myself. I’m good at keeping things to myself. Not this. It just comes out, unbidden. “I think I’m late. I think I might be?—”
“Pregnant,” she says for me, hands already on my upper arms, eyes bright. She doesn’t flinch. She smiles as if I’ve handed her a present.
“I don’t know. I don’t know. I haven’t tested. I haven’t?—”
She hugs me like I’m not made of glass, just a person who needs a hug. “No matter what the boys say,” she says into my hair, “I will be here for you and my grandbaby. If there is a grandbaby. And if there isn’t, I will be here for you anyway. Understand?”
“I don’t know how to feel. Or what they’ll say. Or what to do. Or?—”
“You don’t have to know. We can just be confused and happy and scared and then finish dessert.” She steps back, checks my face, fixes my hair, and then ruins it again because she likes messy, and takes my hand. “Come on. Tell them. They’re not made of sugar.”
But I freeze. “I can’t.”
“You can. I’ll stand there with you and smile and nod and then threaten to steal the baby and run away to Tahoe if anyone says a word I don’t like.”
I laugh because I can’t help it. She leads me back to the table. The guys look up at the same time with that same worry, triple guilt, bandleader face they do. I stand at the end of the table andhold on to the chair back like it’s the only stable object left in the city.
“I think I’m pregnant.” The words sound like I stole them from someone else’s mouth.
For a heartbeat, no one moves. Then the noise is joy. Not show joy. Real joy. Houston’s eyes spill water. Knox says “okay” like a man who just changed a plan and likes the new plan better. The smile sells it. Salem goes very still, then laughs once, loud, and then not. They stand, unnecessary, and crowd me without crowding me. Talia claps.
People look. I wouldn’t know how to care.
“Really?” I ask because my brain is slow and my heart is faster, and I need confirmation that I’m not about to get blamed for rearranging someone’s life.
“Yes, really,” Houston says, hand on my face, voice gone soft in that way he gets when he can’t fit the feeling into his chest.
Knox kisses my forehead because he does old-fashioned. “We couldn’t be happier,” he says, and I believe him because he sounds relieved in some way.
Salem is the one who surprises me. He looks at my stomach like it’s already a person and then at my face like he’s waiting for me to tell him what to do. “I’m so fucking happy,” he says, voice rough in a way I’ve never heard. “I didn’t know I’d be this happy.” His eyes shine.
Talia wipes my eyes even though I didn’t know I was crying. The server appears with bread, and I devour it, because it smells holy. My stomach makes a tiny decision to cooperate. The roomsteadies. The table shifts from panic to planning in under ninety seconds because that’s who we are.
“Doctor,” Knox says. “Tomorrow morning. We’ll find a clinic.”
“You like those ginger candies you’ve been devouring on the bus.” Houston pats his pocket like he already has them. “I grabbed some just in case, so let me know if you need them.”
“Saltines,” Salem says. “Sprite. A bucket. I’m kidding. Kinda.”
Talia fans herself with the menu. “Names. We need names.”
