by Magan Vernon
“Yeah. I just need some time to think.”
She put her hand on mine. “Do you want me to cancel my appointment? I can call my doctor, we can set up a meeting.”
I shook my head, slowly pulling my hand back. “I think I just want to be alone for awhile. I need to think.”
“Oh. Okay. I understand. It’s a lot to take in.” She patted my shoulder. “Call me if you need anything, okay?”
I nodded and licked my lips. “Yeah, just do me a favor and don’t tell anyone, okay? I need to figure things out first.”
“Definitely.”
I barely even registered saying goodbye. My mind was completely in a fog as I stepped onto the street. A woman walked by pushing a stroller. She seemed to move in slow motion. The tiny little baby was wrapped up in a blanket, sleeping soundly. Nothing in the world around her little pink bundle bothered her.
My hand went to my stomach before I even thought of it. Did whatever was inside of me have a heartbeat? Was it sleeping soundly, oblivious to all the craziness around?
No. No. No I couldn’t associate my stomach with a baby. I couldn’t handle any of this right now. I pulled my phone out of my purse and texted Nate, telling him I was going to go see a doctor and might not be back.
I was probably going to be fired. But I would have been anyway if I didn’t take care of things. This is what I had to do. This was the only answer.
***
The clinic was crammed. Suffocating. Everything about it made me claustrophobic. The frumpy nurse behind the counter handed me the clipboard like she had done it a million times. I was just another face in the crowd.
Sitting down in the uncomfortable orange chair, I kept fidgeting, looking everywhere but the papers I was supposed to fill out. Every little movement made me look up. I had to zone out, so I grabbed my headphones and put them into my phone, putting my music on shuffle.
Finally. Some peace.
So I thought.
“Slide” by the Goo Goo Dolls came on.
Instead of reading what was on the form in front of me, I focused on the words. I never really paid attention to them, but I heard Johnny Reznik’s message loud and clear for the first time.
The tears slid down my cheeks as the chorus picked up. I couldn’t do this. What was inside of me wasn’t an “it”. It was my baby. Mine and Trey’s baby.
All those years I’d sat and said I was pro-choice, thought about woman’s rights. I was still pro-choice, but my choice had completely changed now that it was mine.
I was going to keep this baby, no matter what.
I didn’t even look back as I dropped the paperwork to the floor and ran out of the clinic, past the protestors and down the street. Trey’s office was only a few blocks away and I had to tell him. Tell him that I was having his baby and there was no way in hell that I was giving it up.
Chapter 3
Trey
Working on a campaign was a lot more of a jumble than I ever thought. When my father ran things with his advisors it always seemed so organized and meticulously thought out. I learned real quickly that they made it look that way on the outside, but behind the scenes it was a war zone.
Rows of desks lined the small rental space with different college volunteers manning the phones or social media to ask for donations and get the word out about my dad and voting. I would have probably been one of them for a few years if my father wasn’t the governor. But I don’t think I’d be as dumb as some of these kids were.
“Mr. Chapman! Mr. Chapman!” I was trying to head to my office after my lunch break when a high-pitched voice called me back.
I turned to see a petite blonde holding a notebook. She didn’t look like the type of volunteers we usually got, meaning, she wasn’t a young man dressed in a suit and trying to impress us. She was one of about two female volunteers and I wasn’t exactly sure that she was in it for the right reasons with how low her dresses always were.
Okay, that was a terrible thing to say. I knew I couldn’t judge a girl by what she was wearing but all morning I’d seen her at the desk of every other volunteer except the other female. She would laugh, toss her hair back and bend over so that their cleavage was right in their face. Not that I was staring at her particularly. I was supposed to be in charge of all of them. The guy that was straight out of college was supposed to round up all the college kids. My father said it was a great career opportunity and that I could relate to them better than anyone else. That, and it had one of the best salaries on the campaign staff so I couldn’t complain.
“Yes, Miss...” her last name escaped me.
“It’s Chastity,” she said, swaying from side to side and tossing her long blonde hair behind her shoulder.
“Miss Chastity, how can I help you?”
She giggled. “No, Chastity is my first name. No need for formalities.”
“This is a professional job. I’d prefer that we use last names,” I said, straightening my tie. The girl was obviously flirting. Granted it had been awhile since a girl actually flirted with me since the whole world knew I had been with Monica for forever, but I knew flirting when I saw it.
“Okay, Mr. Chapman.” She pouted out her bottom lip. “I was just going to see if I could go over some of the Twitter stuff we’re posting. I was thinking maybe we could change up some of the verbiage. You know, make it a little bit more fun, relatable.”
I raised an eyebrow. The only person who really ever challenged the norms around me was Monica and she definitely not some volunteer that was trying to get a good mark on their resume. “Those tweets have been meticulously crafted by the Governor’s social media team. If you think you can do better, than you can consider joining their ranks as a volunteer, but their offices are in DC.” I put my hand on the door to my office. “I can email you their information if you want it.”
Before I could open the door her hand was on my bicep, her fingers trailing down my arm way too sensuously as she let go. “No, I’m sorry. I don’t want to leave this position. It was just an idea. Sorry if I offended you, Mr. Chapman,” she cooed.
I pulled my arm away, harder than I thought because she gasped. I glanced around before leaning in and lowering my voice. “Look, I see what you’re doing here, Chastity, and frankly it’s a little sad and a lot of old. I’m not going to be one of those bosses that screws the volunteers nor is that how you want to get ahead in life. You’re a bright young women who obviously got this position because someone saw something in you, so please don’t squander it by trying to hit on an engaged man.”
“I-I-I wasn’t trying to do anything, Mr. Chapman. I just had a question.”
“Well, you got your answer. I have some work to do. Have a good day.” With that I opened my door and quickly closed it behind me before she could get another word in.
As soon as my back was against the door I let out a deep breath. I realized my heart was racing and a bead of sweat had formed on my upper lip. I quickly brushed it off. I usually tried to keep a cool demeanor but this last month, working on the presidential campaign had been hell. Not only was I always working and dealing with the press, but I barely got to spend any time with Monica and after our conversation this morning I was really feeling the full effects of it.
I walked over to my desk and slumped down in my leather chair. I stared at the framed picture of Monica and me. It was from the Republican National Convention. The night my dad was announced as the republican Presidential nominee and the night I proposed. We both had so much hope that night. A new chapter in our life was beginning. She was moving in, I was starting a new job, and I was ready to move forward with her. That was before she applied for every job under the sun only to settle for working in a coffee shop in some hotel and I found myself working twelve hour days just to catch up. Now the reality of life was fully hitting me.
I picked up the picture and ran my thumb over Monica’s smile. The smile that I rarely saw now. Was I not making her happy anymore? Was I just some shadow of my forme
r self that would spend all of his days in his office and only seeing her when it was convenient between meetings? I shook my head, setting the picture down. I didn’t want to be that man. Ever.
Pulling my phone out of my pocket, I had her number pulled up before I even thought about it. She should have been on lunch break, if they gave her a lunch break, so it couldn’t hurt to send a quick text.
Seeing how your first day of work is going. Let’s get dinner tonight. That little cafe up the road that you’ve been begging for me to go to.
I sent it before I even thought about what I wrote. Just sending it made my heart beat a little slower than the rapid convulsions it was having when I first got into my office. I set my phone down and opened my inbox, trying to take my mind off of things. I thought she would respond pretty quickly, even while at work, but after two hours I was starting to wonder.
I glanced at the clock. It was a little past noon and I hadn’t eaten. I usually just had one of the interns grab me something or I ordered in, but maybe it was time to get out of the office and take a stroll down to a coffee shop. Monica’s coffee shop.
I didn’t even look behind me as I closed my computer and bolted out of my office. I didn’t want to stop and get distracted by work—that had happened for far too long. This time I actually had to put Monica first.
It was a warm afternoon and the sidewalks were packed with businessmen and women barely paying attention to anything other than their cell phones as they walked to the various cafes and shops downtown. Add in the tourists who stopped every five seconds to look up at the buildings and it was like a giant traffic jam. It should have only been a ten minute walk but it ended up being twenty. So much for hoping I could even possibly by Monica lunch.
The lobby of the hotel was everything grandeur and not something I’d expect Monica to be impressed by at all.
Once inside it didn’t take me long to find the coffee shop where a spiky haired guy with giant holes in his ears and full sleeves of tattoos stood behind the counter. Not Monica. I approached the counter and he quickly shoved his phone in his pocket before greeting me.
“Hi, what can I get for you today?”
I glanced around the tiny space, wondering if there was a back room Monica would be in or maybe just sitting at a table. But I’d recognize her gorgeous head of red hair anywhere and it definitely wasn’t in the vicinity. “I’m actually just here to see my fiancée, Monica Remy. It’s her first day of work and I thought I’d pop in to surprise her for lunch.”
“Oh, sorry, dude. She went home early. She was upchucking all morning and after lunch she went home.”
I tried not to cringe at the man’s vocabulary or the fact Monica had left and didn’t tell me a thing. “Okay. Thank you,” I said, nodding and tapping the counter before walking out toward the lobby.
I pulled my phone out of my pocket and stared at the text I’d sent her. Still no answer. Maybe she was back home in bed and too sick to answer the phone. That was what it had to be. I walked out of the building and stopped at a small diner, ordering chicken noodle soup to go and homemade bread. I wasn’t much for being a caregiver, in fact I was actually terrible at it. Monica was usually the one who was better at knowing people’s feelings and what they needed.
No wonder things were so distant between us. I had to step up. The light rain had started to pick up, which ended up being a full down pour so I hailed a cab. I made my way back to our apartment, fully expecting her to be in bed, but when I got to the bedroom, no one was there. No one had been there. The bed was still made from that morning and nothing was out of place. I poked my head into the bathroom, no sign of her there either. Slowly, I set the bag of food down and walked into the living room, thinking maybe I missed her on the couch, but that was empty as well.
I took my phone out of my pocket and before I could look at my texts a call came through from one of the interns. I answered.
“This is Trey.”
“Hey, Trey, um your fiancée is here and in your office. She’s been here for awhile. I thought she would have called to tell you that she was waiting or that you wouldn’t have been gone for an hour, but yeah...” The girl’s voice cut off after her rambling.
“Okay, I’ll be right there.”
The cold rain water hit my face and soaked through my dress shirt as soon as I stepped outside. I tried to hail a cab but after a few minutes of no one stopping, I decided just to run as fast as my loafers could carry me.
By the time I got to the office and opened the door I was completely soaked. All of the volunteers and interns turned toward me, their eyes wide and their mouths open. I knew it wasn’t the best impression to make, but the damage was already done. I walked past them to my closed office door, throwing it open to see Monica curled up in my desk chair, staring at three little objects on the desk. I couldn’t make them out at first. They looked like thermometers, which was very strange. Maybe she just had a very high temperature?
“Monica, are you okay?”
She looked up, her face tear stained. She didn’t take her eyes off of me as her bottom lip trembled. She looked like she was going to speak, but instead she pushed the three objects toward the other end of the desk, closer to me.
I looked down. They weren’t thermometers at all, but three pregnancy tests, all with the words “pregnant” staring back at me. Every hair on my body stood on end and I swallowed hard trying to figure out my words. When her tattooed co-worker said she was sick, this wasn’t the “sick” I was expecting. Did he know too?
“Are these yours?” I whispered, picking up one of the tests.
“Yes,” she croaked, a sob escaping her lips. “I’m pregnant.”
Chapter 4
Monica
I couldn't believe the words even as I said them out loud. Obviously Trey didn't either.
He didn't say anything. For the first time ever he just stared at me, blinking slowly.
I didn’t know what I was supposed to say either. The words just flew out of me. I rehearsed this whole spiel on what I was going to say on the way to his office. Then as I waited for him I panicked. I thought maybe I should have left. Should have waited until we were home.
But I knew that wasn’t possible. I couldn’t hold it in and obviously neither could my stomach.
I grabbed the trashcan under his desk, making it just in time to spill the contents of what little I was able to eat that day.
A cold hand pressed against my neck, pulling my hair back. Before I knew it, Trey was crouched down beside me, rubbing one hand on my back while the other held back my hair.
I wiped my mouth. "You don’t need to do that," I whispered. He never had to hold my hair while I puked. We never drank so I was never one of those girls that came home to pray to the porcelain god and I rarely got sick.
"Yes, I do. This is what you’re supposed to do when you love someone."
I sat back, looking into his green eyes. I couldn't tell what he was thinking. He had the best poker face of anyone with his statuesque face. "Hold their hair when they puke?"
He smiled, which brought out his dimples even more. He then wrapped his arm around my waist, helping me to stand. "No. You take care of them. Not just you, but..." His words trailed off as he moved his hand from my hair to my stomach, splaying his fingers across it. "All of us."
The tears pricked my eyes and I wasn’t sure if it was from emotional exhaustion, hormones, or because it was one of the sweetest things anyone had ever said to me. I put my hand on top of his and looked into his eyes. Every single word was sincere. At that moment I didn’t want to worry about what other consequences we would face or how the hell we were going to do it all. I just knew that he loved me. All of me. And we were going to figure it out together.
***
Trey hailed us a cab to take us home. He took his laptop knowing he still had to work, but I think both of us knew he wasn’t going to be doing anything of the sort.
We didn’t say anything during the entire r
ide. Trey just held my hand and I stared out the window. There was so much going through my head and I didn’t want to think about any of it. I just wanted to get lost in the scenery of people walking down the street, going on with their daily lives like it was just any other day. For them it probably was. They didn’t have their entire world rocked like I just had.
When we got home, we still stayed silent. We were together but like two different waves in the ocean. Just going with the motions. I plopped down on the couch, letting out a deep puff of air as I put my feet up on the ottoman. Trey sat next to me, his hand still clasped on mine, his thumb running along the bridge of my knuckles.
Finally he cleared his throat. “So, where do we go from here?”
I shook my head. “I don’t know. I was hoping you’d have some sort of answer.”
He turned toward me. “Usually I feel like if I don’t know the correct response I can at least fake it. I’ve been doing political jabs all my life and always feel comfortable going with whatever topic it is and stating my opinions in a manner that makes sense. I’ve always convinced myself that whatever I said was right, but in this situation I have absolutely no idea.”
I bit my lip. “I don’t know either. This is all new territory for me. It’s like my own body doesn’t feel like it belongs to me. Like when I even think about it, I think ‘That can’t be me. This person can’t be inside of me.’ It’s just crazy.”
He moved his hand from mine and to my stomach. “I can’t even begin to tell you that I know what that feels like. I’ve spent half my life listening to people argue about these kind of choices and fighting over my dad’s contraceptive bill and now all of this is happening and it’s real. It’s in our faces and when faced with all of it head on, it’s really different. I don’t think I could ever make that choice for you, but whatever steps we plan on taking next, I want to make sure that we do them together.”
