Page 98 of My Favorite Lost Cause
He frowns. “I didn’t want your dogs either, but I seem to have adjusted.”
It isn’t enough. He’s trying, but it isn’t enough. “I don’t want you to just go along with this, Charlie. I had a father who felt like he was tricked and took off almost immediately. I’m not doing that to my kid.”
“Ourkid,” he corrects. “Ours. Look, hon, you’re exhausted and I need to process this, so go to sleep and maybe by the time you wake up, we’ll be in a better place. I love you. I just need a minute to adjust, okay?”
“Okay.” Something settles inside me. Nothing he’s saying means he’s enthusiastic about this…but I can at least believe hewillbe. So we’ll try it and see. And if he changes his mind, I’ll deal with it. I’ve dealt with it before. “I can’t believe you came all the way here because you were jealous of Andrew.”
He hitches a shoulder. “I like Barcelona. If you’d gone to Siberia, I might’ve tried to figure it out over the phone first.”
“You’d still have come for me in Siberia.”
“I’d still have come for you, no matter where you went,” he says, his lips close to my ear. “Even if you’d gone to the underworld.”
Under other circumstances,we might have stayed in Spain a bit longer. I’d have dragged him into all kinds of museums he wasn’t interested in, and he’d have demanded sex in exchange. But…other issues are more pressing.
We need to see a doctor. We also need to admitwe’re together.Ifwe’re together. Charlie is saying the right things, but I haven’t seen a smile on his face that wasn’t forced since the second he learned the news. A good night’s sleep didn’t do much for either of us.
We get on the next flight back to NYC and go straight to my doctor. A blood test confirms that I am, indeed, very pregnant, and an hour later, she’s sliding a sonogram wand over my abdomen.
Charlie squeezes my hand. I see nothing on the screen, but then…there’s a flicker.
“Huh,” says the doctor.
Charlie’s hand tightens. “Is something wrong?”
The world begins to cave in on us both. His worst predictions are already coming true.
She glances at him, then me. “Here’s the heart,” she says, pointing to a flickering little light. “That’s the first baby.”
I swallow. “First?”
“Right,” she says, grinning. “And over here, this is the second baby.”
“Twins,” Charlie says blankly as the color drains from his face.
Twins. Wow. When we get pregnant by accident, wereallyget pregnant by accident.
“Your worst fear,” I tell him. “So, is it worse than being murdered?”
He’s white as a sheet. “I don’t know,” he says. He forces yet another smile. “I’ve never been murdered. But yes, I assume it’s worse.”
I’m not sure he’s joking.
I let Marais & Wolfe know that my measurements are changing and that I will definitely be gaining a lot of weight as we ride back to his apartment. Charlie is utterly silent the entire way.
Once inside, he’s kind and he’s considerate. He asks me what I’d like for dinner and suggests I stay off my feet, as if I’m already in labor. But what he isn’t ispleasedorenthusiastic. And that’s the only thing I really need from him right now.
I fall asleep early, and when I wake at three AM, he’s no longer by my side.
We’re supposed to be telling the family at dinner, sixteen hours from now. I no longer think we should. Charlie’s doing his best not to be like my dad, not to act like a guy who got tricked into a situation he wants nothing to do with.
He just can’t quite pull it off.
44
CHARLIE
I’m ruining this.
