Chapter 3
Chapter Three
Lexi
I get to the studio early the next day.
I’m a little tired this morning, but that’s because Zaan and I were up half the night talking and making love and talking some more.
He’s so excited about the baby. Probably more than I am.
Of course, he’s not the one who’s going to have to deal with the physical changes to his body or potentially put his career on hold.
I can sing, no matter how big I get, but performing live will be something else entirely.
Our shows are exciting, with a lot of acrobatics and wardrobe changes and stage diving.
I can’t do that once my belly starts to show.
And I’m a little nervous to tell the guys.
They’re amazing human beings, and Tyler, Ford, and Stu all have kids now too. But it’s different for me because they’re men. They weren’t the ones who were pregnant or having to recover from weight gain and the physical stress of labor.
And I honestly don’t know how I’m going to manage.
“Hey!” Tyler calls out to me as soon as I walk into the studio.
“Hi.” I wave and drop into the seat next to him. “Are we first?”
“Yup. Ford’s on his way, and Stu has to bring the baby because Lindsay’s in court this week.” Our guitarist, Stu Killorn, is married to my best friend. She’s an attorney who divides her time between here in Las Vegas, where we all live, and Los Angeles, where she works.
“How’s that going to work?” I ask.
He laughs. “Headphones and a Pac-n-Play.”
“And Ariel’s on tour?” I ask, referring to his wife, pop star Ariel Fox.
He nods. “Yup.”
“With the baby?”
He nods again but cocks his head slightly. “Everything okay? Why are you so interested in all the baby info?” He squints and then his eyes widen. “Lex, are you…?”
I nod. “We just found out. And I’m really worried about the tour.”
He reaches over and gives me a hug. “You shouldn’t worry about the tour—I know how concerned you guys were that you’d never conceive. Congratulations.”
“Thanks.” I look up as Stu comes in, his daughter in his arms.
“Can someone hold the wee beast while I go get the rest of her stuff?” he asks in his distinct Scottish accent.
“Of course.” I stand and quickly take the baby from him. “Are you being a wee beast today?”
Sixteen-month-old Flora nods and gurgles, immediately grabbing a fistful of my hair.
“Ouch,” I pretend to complain. She immediately releases my hair and we both laugh.
“You’re a natural,” Tyler says under his breath. “We’ll come up with a plan and everything is going to be okay.”
“Hey, hey!” Ford Malone, our rhythm guitarist, comes in holding a bag from McDonald’s with our drummer, Declan “Bash” James, right behind him.
“We got the fries!” Bash says, looking at me.
I meet his gaze and the weirdest feeling rolls through my stomach.
I thrust the baby at Tyler and then I’m running for the nearest trash can, where I puke up my breakfast.
What the fuck.
I hear the guys murmuring amongst themselves and then there’s a hand behind me. Someone is holding my hair and putting a cool cloth on the back of my neck.
“I’m back! What’s—” As if from a great distance, I hear Stu’s voice as he cuts himself off. “Lex, you okay?”
I pull in a shaky breath. “Yeah. Just need a minute.”
Fuck.
I hadn’t planned for them to find out this way.
“Give me a minute,” I say, hurrying toward the nearest bathroom.
Dammit.
I’ve been fine until now.
Am I subconsciously nervous about telling the band?
I rinse my mouth and dig a mint out of my purse.
Then I stare in the mirror.
I look the same.
My face, my stomach, everything looks exactly the same as it did before I found out I was pregnant.
I splay my fingers on my still-flat stomach and try to imagine what this little person is going to look like. Zaan and I are both blond, and we’re both tall, especially him.
We made a baby that’s growing inside me, something I honestly had started to believe would never happen.
And of course, now that it has, it’s at the worst possible time.
Shit.
Well, time to face the music.
I walk back into the hallway to find all four of my bandmates pacing restlessly.
“You okay?” Tyler asks.
“Do you need anything?” Bash asks. “I can run to the store.”
“Do you need us to call Zaan?” Stu asks.
“Geez, guys. I’m pregnant—not dying.” I try to crack a joke because they’re all far too serious for my liking. “And no, under no circumstances are you to call Zaan.” I give Ford a stern look because he has his phone in his hand. He sheepishly puts it away.
“How far along?” Stu asks.
“Almost nine weeks.”
They all look at each other and I can practically read their minds.
“I know,” I say miserably. “I fucking know. Believe me, no one is more upset about the timing than I am.”
“Have you been to a doctor?” Stu asks.
“Yeah—can we talk about this in the lounge and not in the middle of the hallway?”
We all move in that direction and sit on the couches.
They’re all fidgeting, like little kids called to the principal’s office, and I hate this. It’s not our typical dynamic, and I really don’t want things to change.
“Look, I don’t know what’s going to happen,” I say. “I’ve been told since I was sixteen that getting pregnant would be difficult for me. Zaan and I stopped using protection about a year ago, thinking it probably wouldn’t happen unless we did IVF or something. This came as a huge shock to us.”
“We’re happy for you,” Tyler says, smiling. “For real. But we have big decisions to make.”
“I emailed Sasha and asked her to stop by,” I say, “because I figure she has to be part of this conversation. But she’s not coming until lunchtime.”
Sasha Petrov is our manager. She’s married to Anton, who is one of Zaan’s teammates.
“That’s actually better,” Ford says. “This is a band decision first, then a business decision. She can help us make the business decisions, but we need to make the band decisions alone.”
We’re all quiet, looking at each other.
“I want to go on tour,” I say. “I feel great. Honestly, that was the first and only time I’ve had any kind of morning sickness, and I think a lot of it was nerves about telling you.”
“You were nervous about telling us?” Bash asks in surprise.
“Well, yeah. This is our first freakin’ headlining tour, and now we have no idea what’s going to happen with our lead singer.”
“Our lead singer can still sing sitting on a stool,” Stu says. “Right?”
“Absolutely! I just don’t know how things will go. If I’ll start falling asleep at eight o’clock or not have the energy to get on stage every night. Right now, if I didn’t know I was pregnant, I wouldn’t know anything was different. Three months from now, it could be a different thing.”
“What do you want?” Bash asks. “For real. Like, in your heart of hearts, what do you want?”
I give them a wobbly smile. “I want to go on tour and rock the fuck out of our audiences.”
“We’ll make sure we have plenty of insurance,” Tyler says, “and then we’ll sit down and count backwards from your due date. I think we should end the tour before you hit thirty-two weeks and—”
I cut him off. “I’m going to tour as long as my body—and the baby—are healthy. Thirty weeks, thirty-two, or forty, for that matter. I don’t need to sit at home waiting for the baby to come.”
“You might,” Bash suggests. “You’re going to want to set up a nursery… and what about a shower? Doctor visits, all that stuff.”
I hadn’t considered how I would see my doctor.
“I don’t know,” I say after a moment. “I think I can see Dr. Diaz virtually, but I guess there will be certain things I need to do in person. I have to think about it and talk to her. I can pay out of pocket for ultrasounds wherever we’re going to be and just have the results sent to her.
Then I might have to fly home for other things. ”
“You and Zaan will want to be together if you’re going to find out the sex,” Tyler adds.
I hold up a hand.
“I just found out. I need a week or two to wrap my head around everything and make those kinds of plans. For now, can we just continue business as usual? At least until we talk to Sasha and figure out our Plan B? As long as I’m healthy, I want to go on tour.”
“Then that’s what we’ll do,” Tyler says quietly. He looks around. “Right, guys?”
“Absolutely.” The guys all nod and for some reason that makes me tear up.
Stu gets up and hands me a tissue.