Page 62 of I Wanna Be Your Lager

Jake enters the living room. The recliner glides forward as he leans against the back. “How was your non-date date?”

“Good,” Eve replies.

“Great,” I say at the same time.

He waits for us to elaborate, but all we give him is silence. “Thanks for sparing me the details.” He pushes himself to his full height. “I’m going to jump in the shower and go to bed.”

“Okay. Good night,” Eve says.

Both of us track Jake as he exits the living room. Once he’s out of sight, my shoulders deflate. I turn my head to face Eve. “Another close call.” She nods. “What did you want to say earlier? Before Jake came home.”

“Oh. Um.” She sits up on the couch, lifting her legs onto the cushion and crawling toward me. She glances over the back of the couch to make sure Jake isn’t standing there. When she’s next to me, she stops and clasps her hands across my cheeks and presses her lips to mine in a soft kiss. She backs away a fraction of an inch. “I wanted to say thank you for the most amazing date.”

“You’re welcome. The next one will be for real.” As long as I can tell Jake, I might possibly be, a tiny bit, in love with his sister. Fuck me.

THIRTY

DAMN YOU, TWO PERCENT

Eve

People say your life flashes before your eyes when you’re in a life-or-death situation. I’m going on record to say the same thing happens while you’re waiting on the results to confirm a pregnancy. The only difference is instead of a flash, you get a several-minute montage of everything you did wrong in your life, and somehow, you need to teach your child not to make the same mistakes. It’s not very encouraging. Especially as I lay on the cold vinyl pad with paper that crinkles every time I breathe.

Sofia, the middle-aged obstetrician with sleek black hair cut at her shoulders, glances up at me. “The urine test says you’re pregnant, but let’s do a transvaginal ultrasound to confirm.”

My heart jumps to my throat. The home pregnancy tests I took told me I’m pregnant, except for the rogue one, which I was secretly hoping was the one telling the truth. Lach and I have always used protection. But the box says they’re only ninety-eight percent effective. Damn you, two percent.

“Will you be able to tell how far along I am?”

“The ultrasound will give us a clearer picture of what’s happening.” She passes me a paper gown. “I need you to changeinto this. You can keep your shirt on but remove everything else. I’ll be back in a few minutes.”

I nod. She exits the room, and the door clicks shut behind her. I strip out of my pants and underwear and tie the gown around my back. I hoist myself onto the exam bed. The paper crinkles under my weight. Glancing around the room, posters of babies and fetuses fill my vision. I wish Lach was here with me right now, holding my hand and reassuring me everything will be okay. My head snaps up when there’s a knock, and Sofia returns.

“Are you ready?”

“Yes.” The nervousness in my voice is palpable.

I watch as she turns a machine on, and it springs to life. She holds a white wand in the air and rolls a condom down its length. When it’s secure, she squirts gel on the shaft and rubs it around. “This might be a little cold.”

I flinch as she inserts the wand. It is nothing like Charlie Cumming. Can’t they put that shit in the microwave or something? They make warming lube; surely, they can make warming gel. There’s a slight pressure as she moves the wand around. Then I hear it. A steady, whooshing sound fills the room. I roll my head to the side. All thoughts of Sofia between my legs with a wand shoved up my vagina dissipate. The grainy black-and-white screen shows a tiny, kidney-bean-shaped baby. My baby. I’m going to be a mom.

“It looks like you’re about twelve weeks.” Sofia continues to stir the wand inside me.

Quickly, I do the math in my head. Twelve weeks. That’s three months. Son of a bitch. I count and recount the weeks in my head because I don’t want the math to be mathing. A lead weight drops in the pit of my stomach. It’s not Lach’s. I’ve only known him for almost two. There were only two times we gotcaught up in the moment and didn’t use a condom, and one of those times was right before leaving for Florida.

“Is everything okay?” Sofia asks. She must have noticed my body tense or my expression gave it away.

“Yeah. Just nervous. It’s a lot to take in right now.” I’m on the verge of a slight panic attack because Lach is not the father. Bag of Dicks is.

“That’s understandable.”

Her warm smile does nothing to soothe the five-alarm freak-out I’m having inside.

Sofia continues to talk, but I’m not listening. I can’t listen. There are too many thoughts racing through my mind, mostly that I’m pregnant with Fuckface’s baby. My former boss. My married ex-boyfriend. Shit’s going to get messier than an explosive dirty diaper. I have to tell Lach, the man I’ve fallen head over heels for, that I’m pregnant with someone else’s baby. He has every right to leave because who wants to be with a woman who’s pregnant with another man’s baby? Tears well up in the corners of my eyes. Thoughts of him leaving rush through my head and slam into my heart like a freight train. I blink to keep them from falling. On top of telling Lach, I need to tell Jake. I don’t know whether to be disappointed or relieved. I’m disappointed that I have to tell Lach it’s not his, and on the other hand, I’m relieved I don’t have to tell Jake I’m pregnant with his best friend’s child. But telling him I’m pregnant with my cheating asshole ex’s child isn’t any better. The entire situation is a hundred times worse.

I finish the appointment and schedule another ultrasound for twenty weeks. Sofia said I should hear in about twenty-four hours if there are any concerns. From the clinic back to the house, I’m on autopilot. I knew things were going to be hard, but this puts hard to shame. I park my car at the back of the house, and zombie walk inside. If anyone was home and spoke to me, Iwouldn’t have noticed. When I reach my room, I close the door and flop down on my bed. Is it too much to ask for the universe to stop shitting on me for five minutes? Every time I take a step forward, life pushes me back ten. And each time it gets harder and harder to claw myself back.

I can’t string Lach along now that I know for sure, especially since it’s not his. It’s not fair to him. Jake’s working the closing shift tonight, and Lach should be home in a couple of hours. That gives me one hundred and twenty minutes to stew on how I’m going to tell him. I sit on the couch, my knee bouncing a mile a minute. I check the time on my phone for the fiftieth time. It’s 6:24 p.m. The drive from Porter’s to here is only about ten minutes. The backdoor creaks open, the sound barely audible over the thumping in my ears. I jump to my feet and spin around. With a hand still on the doorknob, Lach glances up, and our eyes connect. He drops his hand, and instead of going to the basement, he struts into the living room.

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