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I nodded. My cheeks burned as she guided me back to my bed where the linens had been blessedly changed.

I clutched the towel to that tender place beneath my navel as that stretching and burning sensation amplified. An odd sort of nausea rose within me, my stomach clenching as if I were about to vomit. “I…I think I’m going to be sick.”

Bitty aided me to the bed, phone in one hand as she swiped her thumb without even watching what she was doing—skills. Mad skills.

She held the phone to her ear and spoke, words too fast and brief for me to process. And almost immediately she was on the phone again, paying me no mind. I appreciated it, honestly, so when she tapped my shoulder and drew my attention, I glanced up at her with fear knotting in my stomach.

“Jess and Mesmer are on their way. Jess is getting Zeke so he doesn’t drive in a panic.” I sighed in relief as I clutched the towel and waited for the next wave of heaving nausea to twist my gut.

“At least I know I didn’t piss myself this time.” I huffed a sharp laugh as I tugged at the towel to stare at the growing stain of pink soaking down the terry cloth surface.

“That didn’t happen.” Bitty waved her hand dismissively. “I refuse to acknowledge it.”

“Why? You tease me mercilessly about everything else.” I huffed as the blossom of nausea started low in my belly, growing slowly.

“Yeah, but there’s certain things that just cross the lines. That was like… you almost—” She huffed and shook her head. “We don’t talk about it.”

I nodded, and the very act of dipping my head made my stomach flip and that horrid nausea peak as I bent forward, choking as the sensation didn’t fully rise, only lurched something deep in my stomach. “F-fuck.”

Bitty sat beside me and rubbed my back, nervously glancing over with big brown eyes full of concern as she moved the towel and frowned. “This isn’t as cute as I imagined.”

“Imagine how I feel.” I choked through the sensation as my towel grew wetter and my belly knotted up tight, the muscles within, burning as things felt like they were stretching and twisting.

“Yeah, but like, you’re doing this because you wanted to be pregnant. I’m helping because—well… We all know why.” She tucked the towel back into place and lifted my shirt, making a curious noise.

“Because you think it’s hot?” I huffed.

“Not really. It’s like those pimple popping videos. It’s neat. Weird neat. Glad it’s not me.” She pressed on my chest and yelped as a spurt of milk went in several different directions like a showerhead crusted with calcium deposits. “Ugh, you know? Syl was right. Baby juices.”

A distant, exaggerated cry of protest told me Syl was listening in.

“Sorry, dude,” I shouted out, wincing at the sensation of trying to force air through my lungs.

Another shout of angst, no acceptance or apology. No commiseration. “It smells so weird!”

I sniffed. “Yeah. It does.”

Bitty nodded sagely.

The air pressure changed as distant clattering told me someone had arrived. Footsteps traveled the house, and Zeke’s familiar panicked pant interrupted my silence. “Dear heart?”

I turned my head to the doorway and smiled, wincing as he took a tentative step forward and let Jess whip around him, bag slung over her shoulder with all the things she’d collected in preparation for it. “Guess who finally got a response from Warwitha Calvin!”

I glanced up hopefully, and she stuck her tongue out. “That would have been great, wouldn’t it have?”

I swore under my breath and let her do as we’d talked about, tucking a towel into my lap as she pulled the other towels away and inspected my pouch line. She sucked her teeth and eyed my belly before sliding on a pair of gloves and touching along the split, each prod drawing a wince from me as it burned. “Interesting. It just slides open under gentle touch, like a cut that hasn’t quite healed.”

I hated that analogy and groaned as she dipped a finger inside the slit, my insides flinching as she did so. Still, she explored. “Almost no blood, either.”

Zeke, who’d not said a word, climbed onto the bed and sat behind me, unfolding himself to spread his lean legs on either side of me. “Is it gross?”

“Yep,” Jess said, not missing a beat.

“I dunno, it’s kinda neat. If I turn my head this way, it kinda—” Bitty tilted her head and squinted. I shot her a glare before she could finish that sentence. I didn’t want to hear it.

“Just think about all the baby stuff we have. What little outfit you’ll put him in first, the little cradle. The baby room we didn’t finish.” Zeke laughed, but to me, finishing a baby room before the child was born was almost tempting fate, something I’d been conditioned not to do.

In my culture, we didn’t even buy baby things until they were born, and even then, it was the bare minimum until they were a few weeks old. But then that brought about the talk about circumcision…and I wasn’t certain where I stood on that.