Been there myself, unfortunately.
Also, pregnancy hormones suck.
If I’m this worried about a man I barely know, how am I going to react when it’s my own baby who doesn’t answer me when I call for them in the house? Or text me back fast enough when they’re on the bus home from school? Or when they get a driver’s license and miss curfew? Or when they leave for college and don’t call at all for weeks on end, then move to Europe?
Breathe, Ziggy. Breathe.
Is this level of anxiety normal in pregnancy?
Or is this level of anxiety normal when the man you’re house- and dog-sitting for ghosts you?
I’m tossing and turning long after midnight when Jessica growls low and deep from her doggy bed on the floor beside me. I moved her into the bedroom with me after she wouldn’t stop whining outside the door the first night.
“What’s wrong?” I whisper to her.
She growls again.
I grab my phone and flip on the flashlight.
Her little ears are back flat, and she’s glaring at my bedroom door.
Is it my bedroom door?
Or is it the crooked closet doors beside the bedroom door? I usually shut them. Forgot to close them tonight, apparently.
And that’s when I hear it.
Noise.
Downstairs.
Someone’s in the house.
Jessica leaps to her short little legs, barks like she’s a German Shepherd, and takes off for the door, snarling all the way.
“Jessica!” I whisper-shriek. “Come back!”
Call someone.
I need to call someone.
Her ferocious bark echoes in the stairwell.
Phone.
Call.
I know how my phone works.
It’s a thing where I push buttons.
But it won’t turn on.
It won’t turn on.
Why won’t it—oh.
Upside down.
