Page 44 of Blackout

“I’m sorry,” she murmurs. I wonder if we’ll ever stop apologizing to one another. If we’ll ever just accept our flaws and allow ourselves to be loved like we deserve. “I guess I worked myself up so badly that I made myself physically sick.”

“Maybe,” I tell her as my gaze wanders to her stomach. When Reina first threw the pregnancy test at me, I felt like the floor had dropped from under me. Now, not twenty minutes later, I’m realizing I’ll be disappointed if Lacey isn’t pregnant.

“Maybe not,” I continue, lifting my eyes back to her. “I called Reina after you fell asleep.” The groggy smile falls from her lips the second the words leave my lips. “Don’t look at me like that, Lace. You’ve never gotten physically sick during…well…” I pause as I try to choose my words carefully. I don’t know how to classify what happened to her today if it was an episode with her maker or a panic attack.

“So, instead of giving me time to come out of whatever was dragging me down, you thought you’d call my step-mother because she’s a bonafide expert in crazy,” she snaps, crossing her arms over her tits.

“I may have jumped the gun,” I admit. “But, Lace, playing your favorite song and dancing with you in the dark wasn’t going to make you feel better. Not this time,” I say, tearing my eyes away from her face. I swipe the box from the nightstand and turn back to her. “I ain’t sorry I called Reina, baby, because she brought this.”

Glancing at the pregnancy test in my hand, she uncrosses her arms and blinks slowly as if she doesn’t quite register what I’m saying or recognize what I’m holding.

“That’s a pregnancy test.”

The ends of my lips quirk at the disbelieving tone of her voice.

“Yeah,” I confirm softly.

Extending her hand, she taps her finger against the box and lifts her eyes to mine.

“You think I’m pregnant?”

“I didn’t until Reina threw this at me,” I admit, raising the box between us. “You can touch it, it won’t bite,” I tease, grabbing her hand and wrapping her fingers around the box. “It says you should take it in the morning, but we can argue that you just woke up.”

“What if it’s positive?”

“Isn’t that what we’re hoping for?”

“Yes, but…” her words trail off as she clutches the box tightly. “I’m a mess, Blackie. I lost it today…”

“You had a bad day,” I tell her. “Everyone has them, Lacey. Just because we’ve got our shit, don’t mean we’re not entitled to have our off days too. We’re human.”

I think we forget that.

I think we’re quick to blame everything on her mental illness and my disease but there doesn’t always have to be a reason. We break like everyone else.

Whether she agrees or not, she glances down at the test and the faintest of smiles spreads across her lips.

“I do have to pee,” she says, staring at me from the fringe of her lashes. Lifting my hands, I cup her cheeks and lean forward, touching my forehead to hers.

“Then what’re you waiting for, girl? Take the test,” I murmur, tipping my head to press my lips to hers. “Go,” I urge. “I’ll be right here.”

Drawing in a deep breath, she clutches the box and scrambles off the bed. She pauses as she reaches the bathroom and glances over her shoulder at me. There’s so much hope in her eyes, so much fucking happiness that she’s trying to hide. It doesn’t matter what the results of the test are, I know as long as I live, I’ll remember this moment. I’ll remember her face.

Smiling at her, I nod towards the bathroom and she disappears inside, not bothering to close the door behind her. Getting out of bed, I pace the room while Lacey takes the test. Before she emerges, I take a seat on the foot of the bed and brace both hands on my knees. Her eyes find mine and I hold my breath as I try to read her expression.

“Well?”

“I didn’t look,” she says, drawing her lip between her teeth. Crossing the room, she sits next to me and I instantly drape my arm across her shoulders, bringing her close. “Do you remember the day you took me to see my father in jail? I was a hopeless teenager with a serious crush.”

“Yeah, I remember.”

How could I forget? That was the day she started calling me Leather and forced me to drink a chocolate milkshake. It was there, in a cage, slurping shakes on our way to a federal penitentiary, that I learned to smile again.

“I laid in bed that night thinking I would marry you one day and have your babies,” she reveals, laughing in between words. “Two boys and a girl. Dominic, Jackson and Evelyn.” She pauses and I smile, repeating the names over in my head.

“You still sold on those names?”

“Well, the boys… yes. I would love for my sons to be named after the two greatest men I’ve ever known. What about you? Can you picture us with a little Junior?”

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