“But you like him,” Lainey states. Not even questioning me as she opens her bottle of green juice.
“What the hell is that?” Jenna gestures to the green liquid Lainey is chugging down.
She swallows her drink and shows the label. “It looks like grass, made up of mostly seaweed, but tastes like bananas.” She offers a sip but Jenna grimaces, instead shoveling a Twizzler into her mouth.
“I’ll pass. Thanks.”
“How are clinicals going, Lain?” I ask, hoping for a change in conversation. I set my phone on the bench beside me, tapping the screen to see if I have any incoming texts, butterflies working their way up my throat when I see none.
Lainey’s head falls back on the bench, and she stretches her legs out in front of her. “They’re fine. Good, I guess. I’m doing a rotation in the nephrology clinic right now. I’ve always had a love-hate relationship with clinicals, even in nursing school. It’s such a fine line of wanting to take charge and prove yourself, but also having to ask your preceptor first to make sure it’s okay. I have more freedom now than we did in nursing clinicals, but I just want to be done. I want to be an NP and on my own.”
I remember those days. Feeling like such an idiot sometimes, not wanting to bother the nurse you were assigned to because they are busy enough, but wanting to help out so you weren’t just standing around bored.
“How many more months until you are done?”
She takes another swig of her lawn juice. “Three more.”
“Have you thought about where you want to apply after?” Jenna asks, finishing off one packet of Twizzlers and reaching for the other. She offers it to me and Lainey, who both shake our heads no, before breaking into it. With her eyes focused on the candy, I double tap my phone again to see if Jim texted back. Nothing.
“Actually,” Lainey starts, sitting forward and turning to face us. “Ryan and I have been throwing around the idea of eventually starting our own clinic. One that would be specifically for older adults who are low-income. We would have to apply for all the licensing and grants, or maybe fundraise. It might not be open full-time to start with unless we had other doctors work with us, but he kind of threw out the idea one night thinking it’d be crazy, but we find ourselves going back to it.”
Jenna and I both stare at her, slack-jawed.
“I’ll probably start out in a family practice clinic,” she continues. “Get my feet wet and get some experience under my belt so I’m more confident when the time comes. But yeah, we want to be able to do something for our community, for people that don’t have private health insurance. We all know how backwards the healthcare system is. Elderly people often have the most health conditions but rely on Medicare or Medicaid which is the most restrictive when it comes to coverage.”
“Good Lord, girl, that’d be amazing.” Surefire way to guarantee your admission to heaven. Wow. “This probably makes me sound like an asshole, but isn’t one of the reasonspeople become doctors or practitioners for the cash? How do you pay yourselves if it’s a free or low-income clinic?”
She shrugs. “Yes and no. I mean we’d have to make some money, obviously. But we don’t see ourselves starting a family or having kids to raise, so we want to put our efforts elsewhere.”
We’ve been down that road with Lainey before. It seems like the second someone gets married, everyone and their brother comes out of the woodwork and asks when they are having kids. Every time Lainey and Ryan say that they aren’t interested in having kids of their own, strangers become uncomfortable with that. Like there is something wrong with them if they don’t have kids.
For one, I just think they are too obsessed with each other to want to have to split their attention.
We like to tease them that they’re too busy sucking face to come up for air and make a rational decision, but we all know that if they did decide to start a family, they’d likely choose fostering or adopting. Because that’s the kind of thoughtful assholes they are.
“Speaking of kids,” Jenna prompts, swallowing her last bite of Twizzlers. “I’m pregnant.”
Lainey squeals, leaning over to wrap her arms around Jenna’s shoulders. “Oh my gosh! How are you feeling? How far along are you?”
“Ten weeks.” She runs a hand over her non-existent baby bump. “I wanted to wait to tell you guys until we were officially past the twelve-week mark...but um…well it’s twins. We’re having freaking twins so I’m probably going to start showing soon and will need a sling and a wheelbarrow to carry my belly around by the time they’re ready to exit.”
“Holy shit,” I mutter, still frozen in my seat. “Twins?” My heart thumps for Jenna. She and Emmett have been so baby-focused the last few years it was bound to happen again, but mymind immediately goes to the stress. “Isn’t your house already loud and obnoxious?”
“Oh yeah,” she laughs. “It’s a damn circus most of the time. It’s always loud and crazy. Someone spilled juice on the couch. Someone stole someone else’s whatever. It’s never clean, never quiet, the laundry is never done.”
“Don’t you ever miss your alone time?”
She’s quiet for a second, thoughtfully chewing on her thumbnail as she thinks. “No, not really. I spent the majority of my life before Emmett alone. I already know what it’s like to come home after school or work to a quiet house, to no one greeting me with a hug or asking how my day was. I know what it’s like to spend boring weekend days trying to occupy myself, wishing I had siblings or a friend to play with. And I know someday it’ll be quiet like that again. It’ll just be me and Emmett and we’ll wish we had loud kids to give us headaches. But for now, I want my house to be as loud and warm as possible. I want my kids to have multiple siblings to talk shit about me to, to call in the middle of the night to dig them out of trouble. I want them to have permanent best friends that’ll be there long after I’m gone.”
“Damn, girl.” I reach over to wrap an arm around her neck. “I’m sorry if I sounded like a bitch. I’m happy you have the family you’ve always wanted. The family you fucking deserve.”
A weird feeling fills my chest and zips down to my belly. Almost like…jealousy? No, that can’t be right. I have Jackson, and one kid is stressful enough. I don’t need two. Or like in Jenna’s case, I don’t need four. But seeing Jenna and Emmett together with their kids is special. Maybe it’s because I never knew my biological dad. And Jackson will likely never know his. In fact, the closest Jackson has ever had to a dad is Jim.
No…don’t even start that.
That’s the problem with Jim hanging around. I’m getting attached. Then Jackson will get attached. Then Jim will eventually start dating someone else, and I will have two broken hearts to heal. It’d be better off if I just cut ties with Jim now, save us all the heartache.
“Did you know,” Lainey starts, pausing to finish off her jungle juice. “Jim has made it to every single one of Jackson’s T-ball games?”
