Page 99 of Single Dad's Fake Bride
"Oh, honey," she said, settling onto the floor beside me. She pulled my hair back from my face and rubbed small circles on my back the way she used to when I was sick as a child.
"I think I might be coming down with the flu," I said weakly.
Mom was quiet for a long moment. Then she said, "Sadie…" I knew that tone. She was chiding me because she knew better.
I wanted to deflect, to maintain the fiction that had kept me functioning for the past few weeks. But sitting on this bathroomfloor with my mother's hand warm on my back, I felt all my defenses crumble and tears welled up.
She nodded slowly. "Have you taken a test?"
"Yes."
"And?"
I closed my eyes. "Positive."
My mother sighed, but it wasn't disappointment. It was understanding, tinged with happiness.
"You haven't told him, I suppose." Mom was callous at times, even harsh, but despite her rough exterior, she really loved me deeply.
It wasn't a question. She knew me well enough to recognize the particular brand of isolation I wore when I was carrying a secret too big to handle alone.
"I don't know how," I admitted. "Everything is so complicated already. With the will being contested and the school board and everyone watching our every move…"
"Sadie." Her voice was firm but not harsh. "I spent twenty years knowing the right thing to do and not doing it. I told myself I would quit drinking tomorrow, next week, next month. I told myself I had time to fix everything later. That waiting was okay."
She helped me sit up, leaning back against the bathroom wall. Her eyes were clear and serious.
"You know what all that waiting got me? Cirrhosis. Nearly killed me. Nearly destroyed the only relationship that mattered." She took my hands in hers. "You're stronger than I ever was, sweetheart. Don't torture yourself the way I did."
Her words settled in my chest with uncomfortable truth. I had been waiting, hadn't I? Or procrastinating is more like it—for the right moment, for our situation to stabilize, for some magical time when adding a pregnancy to our already complicated arrangement would feel manageable.
But there would never be a perfect time. And every day I waited, every day I carried this secret, I felt more isolated from the man who'd become so much more than a convenient arrangement.
Mom squeezed my hands. "He loves you, Sadie. I see it in the way he looks at you, the way he listens when you talk. This news might be scary, but it won't be unwelcome."
I wanted to believe her. But fear had taken root in my chest, growing stronger every day I kept this secret. Fear that Harrison would feel trapped, that he would see the pregnancy as another complication in an already complex situation. Fear that I was reading too much into gentle gestures and accidental touches.
After Mom went to bed and Eloise finished her homework, I stood in the master bathroom holding a second pregnancy test. I'd bought it that afternoon I took the others, but I hadn't used it yet. But I needed confirmation, needed to be absolutely certain before I made any announcements.
And when I finally looked down at it, two pink lines appeared immediately. The answer was clear and unmistakable.
I sank onto the edge of the bathtub, test in my hands, and thought about my mother's words. About all the years she had lost to fear and procrastination. About the life we could've had if she had faced her demons sooner.
I thought about Harrison, probably tucking Eloise in, assuming I was dealing with a stomach bug. I thought about Eloise, going to sleep in her room, trusting that the adults in her life knew how to keep her world stable.
I thought about the tiny life growing inside me, already changing everything whether I acknowledged it or not.
My mother was right. I was stronger than this. I had survived poverty and uncertainty and years of watching someone I loved slowly destroy herself. I could survive one honest conversation with my fake husband.
I folded the test carefully in a tissue and stood up. My reflection in the bathroom mirror looked pale and frightened, but determined.
It was time to find Harrison.
29
HARRISON
Isat on the foot of the bed with my head buried in my hands, staring at the carpet between my bare feet. I'd been in the middle of changing to pajamas when the exhaustion of emotional toll finally caught up with me and I sank down here, and now I didn't feel like moving at all.
