“You’re not getting any better.”
“That’s very observant of you.”
A quiet scoff escapes him, but he doesn’t snark back at me like I expect him to. Instead, he moves a bit closer, and his tone softens fractionally. “You’ve been off, Mila. Why didn’t you say something before looking like you have one foot in the grave already?”
“Because it’s nothing,” I mumble, wishing he’d just drop it so I can go back to suffering in silence. “And I don’t need you monitoring me every five minutes like you are now.”
“Maybe I’d have to monitor you less if you’d just tell me what’s wrong so I can help.”
“Like that would stop you.”
Ivan doesn’t say anything for a moment, then I take a deep breath, punctuating the bitter silence between us. Then his voice cracks it.
“Could you be pregnant?”
I freeze, and the question almost knocks the wind out of me. Blinking, I glance at him like he just slapped me personally. “What? Of course not.”
He hardly looks convinced as he stands there, studying me and looking for cracks. “You’ve hardly stomached anythingin days. You can’t stand without getting dizzy, and you’ve been walking around like you don’t know what a good night’s rest is. I have a very pregnant sister currently…I know the signs.”
The words feel scalding to digest, but I keep my gaze sharp, as if that might scare off the possibility. “We used protection. You made sure of it.”
“I know,” Ivan says, relaxing his arms to a less defensive stance while he scrubs a hand over his mouth. “But protection isn’t a guarantee, and you’re obviously not well. When was your last period?”
Something painful twists in my stomach as I try to think about it, but with the days blurring into each other, it’s impossible to tell. Shaking my head, I try to keep myself calm. To remind myself that this isn’t real, and he’s just speculating. “I don’t know. It’s hard to keep track here.”
He watches me carefully with that crease between his brows, lost in his own thoughts for a moment. “Then we should check, just to rule it out.”
It feels more like he rammed a blade through my chest than anything else, and I feel myself clam up. “No.”
He sighs. “Mila.”
“No. No way,” I repeat, still shaking my head as I grip my loose joggers tighter than I mean to. “I’m not doing it.”
“You’re doing it tomorrow morning,” Ivan says firmly, not taking no for an answer. “We both need to know, and the sooner we do, the better.”
Anger cuts through me before I can temper it. “You don’t get to decide that.”
Ivan takes a slight, deliberate step closer. “If you’re pregnant, it affects everything. We aren’t putting this off.”
Feeling like I’ve been gutted, not wanting to even acknowledge that this could be a possibility, I let that silence fester long enough to feel oppressive again.
Finally, Ivan’s sigh breaks the tension. “Take the test. If it’s negative, then we move on. If it’s positive…we’ll deal with it.”
Deal with it.
The implications wrap around my throat, making it nearly impossible to form words. Every instinct in me wants to run and pretend like none of this is happening, and to bask in the safety of ignorant bliss. But my stomach turns, and as much as I don’t want to admit it, I do need to know.
“Fine,” I mutter, averting my eyes in favor of looking at the rug. “One test.”
***
I half expect Ivan to leave me to it and to come back when it suits him to find out for himself, but he doesn’t leave me alone while I go through the motions.
Instead, he stands just outside the bathroom door, then steps in once I place the test on the counter and put space between myself and the device. The box sits there like a specter to me, like it’s waiting to either confirm or deny my misery.
“Three minutes,” I murmur to myself, well aware of how much my hands are shaking.
Ivan nods, looking at me only briefly before setting a timer on his phone.
