Page 122 of Empty Net

She sets her donut down and reaches across the table, taking my hand in hers. “I think you know better than anyone I can relate to the whole parents-not-really-knowing-love thing. I mean, look at my relationship with my mother. It’s about as convoluted as yours. So, I get it. I understand your hesitation. I wish more than anything I could sit here and say you’re never going to hurt Fox or he’s never going to hurt you, but I can’t guarantee that. Nobody can. Is opening yourself up to another person scary? Every damn day. But what’s life without taking a little risk?” She smiles, and I have no doubt she’s thinking of thebig risk she took with Hutch. “What does being with Fox make you feel like?”

“I don’t know. Good.”

“Good? That’s it?”

“Well, what do you want me to say?” I toss my hands into the air. “Do you want me to tell you he makes me laugh over the most ridiculous things? He’s the first person I want to tell a funny story to? The person who makes me feel calm after a chaotic day? Should I say I think about him when he’s not around and I want him around all the time? My heart literally aches thinking of life without him, and even though the thought of marriage still scares me, it doesn’t sound as scary if it’s with him? How ’bout I tell you how every time I look at him, I swear I lose my breath a little? If I lose him, I’m going to feel like I’m losing a piece of myself? I am so impossibly and irrevocably in love with him that I can’t think straight? Is that what you want to hear?”

I take a breath for the first time in what feels like minutes, and Auden stares at me, her lips twitching at the edge, a piece of donut stuck there, but I don’t think she cares.

I care, though. It’s annoying how she’s just watching me.

“What?” I snap when she doesn’t say anything.

It just makes her smile wider.

“Stop it.”

“I can’t.”

“Can too.”

“Fine. Then I don’t want to.” Her lips pull back over her teeth even more. “And yes.”

“Yes?”

“Yes, that’s what I wanted to hear. But more than that, I think it’s what youneededto say.”

My immediate reaction is to refute her words, but I think…I think she’s right. I did need to say it. Idoneed to.

“I love him, Auden.”

“I know you do.”

“I love him so much and I’m so scared and I don’t know what to do with my hands and I?—”

She grabs my hand once again, pulling me back from the ledge I’m so ready to jump over. “Breathe, Lilah. Just breathe. This is the exact same reaction I had when I found out I was preg?—”

She pauses, and my eyes flash to hers.

“Shit,” she murmurs, squeezing her eyes shut on a wince.

“You’re pregnant?”

She peels her eyes open one by one and nods slowly. “I’m pregnant.”

“What?! How? Well, not how, I know how and I really don’t need the details considering Hutch is basically like a brother to me, but… When? When did you find out? How did you find out? I—oh my god, you’re pregnant!”

I’m out of my chair, flying around the table to her. I haul her into my arms and hug her tightly. When we part, we’re both a crying messagain.

She laughs, wiping at the tears under her eyes. “We found out around Valentine’s Day. I’ve been dying to tell you, but I know you’ve had so much going on with your mother and the engagement party and all this stuff with Fox, so I didn’t want to add this on top of all that. Plus, they say you should wait to tell people, and I didn’t want to jinx it.”

“Auden…I would have been there for you no matter what else was going on. You know that.”

“I know. I do. I don’t know. Maybe I was just trying to get used to it myself.”

“And have you? How are you doing? I know you always told your dad he was never going to be a grandfather.”

“I meant it too. I didn’t want kids. I truly didn’t. Then we found out, and well…” She shrugs. “It happened, so we’re doing it.”

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