Chapter 5 #2
Then I hear it—a sharp intake of breath, followed by something that sounds almost like a sob.
"You're... what?"
"Pregnant," I repeat. "About five weeks, they think. It must have happened at the motel. Before you dropped me off."
"Oh my god." His voice is shaking.
I've never heard Garrett sound like this—not when I overdosed, not when I stole from his sister, not even when he dropped me off at this facility and had to walk away.
This is something different. This is hope and terror and disbelief all tangled together.
"Vanna. Oh my god."
"I know." The tears are falling now, streaming down my cheeks unchecked. "I know, Blood. I don't know what to do. I've been pumping poison into my body for years, and now there's a baby, and I don't know if it's going to be okay, and I'm so scared—"
"Hey." His voice cuts through my spiral, firm and steady. The same voice he uses when he's talking me down from a ledge, when he's pulling me back from the brink. "Hey, listen to me. We're going to figure this out. Together. Whatever happens, we're going to figure it out."
"But what if the baby's not okay? What if I already hurt them? What if—"
"Then we'll deal with it. But we don't know that yet, do we?"
"No," I admit. "They said it's too early to tell. They're going to do an ultrasound next week."
"Then we wait. We take it one day at a time, just like everything else." I can hear him breathing, deep and deliberate, like he's trying to calm himself down.
Trying to be strong for me when he's probably just as terrified as I am. "When can I see you? I need to see you, Van. I need to be there with you."
"I don't know. I'll have to ask. They have visiting hours, but I'm not sure—"
"Ask," he says. "Please. As soon as you can. I need to hold you. I need to..." His voice breaks, and I hear him swallow hard. "I need to be there. I can't do this from four hours away. I can't sit here knowing you're pregnant and scared and I'm not there to—"
"I'll ask today," I promise. "I'll call you as soon as I know."
"I love you." The words come out fierce, almost desperate. "I love you so much, Vanna. And I'm going to love this baby too, no matter what. You hear me? No matter what happens, no matter what the tests say, I'm going to love both of you with everything I have."
"I love you too." I whisper. "I'll call you soon."
I hang up and slide down the wall until I'm sitting on the floor, my knees pulled up to my chest.
The hallway is empty—everyone else is in group therapy or individual sessions—and I let myself fall apart in the silence.
Pregnant.
I'm pregnant.
And somewhere in Morgantown, Garrett is probably falling apart too.
Patricia finds me an hour later, still sitting in the hallway.
She doesn't ask what's wrong—Dana must have told her already.
She just settles down on the floor next to me, her back against the wall, and waits.
"I don't know how to do this," I finally say. "I don't know how to be a mother. I can barely figure out how to be a person."
"Nobody knows how to be a mother before they become one," Patricia says. "It's not something you learn from a book. It's something you figure out as you go."
"But what if I fuck it up? What if I relapse? What if I'm holding my baby and all I can think about is finding a needle?"
"Those are valid fears." Patricia's voice is calm, non-judgmental. "Recovery is hard enough on its own. Adding pregnancy to the mix makes it even harder. But it's not impossible."
That word again. Not impossible. Like it's supposed to be comforting.
"I want to see my husband," I say. "I need to see him."
"We can arrange that. Visiting hours are on Saturdays and Sundays. You're past the initial phase, so you're eligible for visits now."
"This Saturday?" It's Wednesday. Three days away.
"If he can make it, yes."
Three days. I can survive three days.
I've survived worse.
"There's something else we need to talk about," Patricia says, her voice gentle. "Your treatment plan may need to change now that you're pregnant. Some of the medications we've been using aren't recommended during pregnancy. We'll need to work with the medical team to adjust your protocol."
The words send a spike of fear through my chest. "What does that mean? Am I going to feel worse?"
"Not necessarily. There are pregnancy-safe alternatives for most of what you're taking.
But it's a process, and we'll need to monitor you closely to make sure the transition goes smoothly.
" Patricia pauses, choosing her next words carefully.
"There's also the question of cravings. Some women find that pregnancy intensifies their urge to use.
The hormonal changes, the stress, the fear—it can all pile up and make the addiction voice louder. "
"Great," I mutter. "Because I needed another thing to worry about."
"I'm not telling you this to scare you. I'm telling you because knowledge is power. If you know what to expect, you can prepare for it. You can reach out when the cravings get bad instead of trying to white-knuckle through them alone."
I nod, even though the words barely register.
All I can think about is Saturday.
Three days until I can see Garrett.
Three days until I can feel his arms around me and believe, even just for a moment, that everything is going to be okay.
"I want to do whatever's best for the baby," I say. "Whatever it takes. If that means changing medications, doing extra therapy sessions, whatever—I'll do it."
Patricia smiles—a small, warm smile that doesn't quite reach her eyes.
"That's a good start, Vanna. That's exactly the right attitude.
But I want you to remember something, too.
Taking care of the baby means taking care of yourself.
You can't pour from an empty cup. If you run yourself into the ground trying to be the perfect pregnant woman in recovery, you're going to crash. And a crash is when relapses happen."
"So, what do I do?"
"You find balance. You push yourself, but you also rest. You fight the cravings, but you also ask for help when they get too strong. You focus on the baby, but you don't forget that you're a person too—a person who's been through hell and is still climbing out."
It sounds so simple when she says it.
Balance. Rest. Ask for help.
But I've never been good at any of those things.
I've always been all-or-nothing—either completely consumed by addiction or completely consumed by the desperate attempt to escape it.
Finding middle ground feels like learning a new language.
I put my hand on my stomach again, pressing gently against the place where my baby is growing.
It's too early to feel anything, too early to even see anything on an ultrasound.
But I know they're in there.
A tiny spark of life that Garrett and I created in the middle of the worst time of my life.
Maybe that means something.
Maybe this baby is a sign—a reason to keep fighting, even when the fight feels impossible.
A reason to stay clean, not just for myself or for Garrett, but for the little person who's counting on me to get this right.
Or maybe it's just one more thing I'm going to fuck up.
I guess I'll find out soon enough.
I call Garrett that evening, during my regular phone time.
The phone bank is in a quiet corner of the residential wing—three payphones mounted on the wall, with little privacy dividers between them.
Most evenings, there's a line, but tonight I'm lucky.
I get the first phone and dial Garrett's number with trembling fingers.
"Saturday," I tell him when he answers. "Visiting hours are from ten to four. Can you come?"
"I'll be there at nine-fifty-nine," he says without hesitation. "I'll bring Aunt Ellie too, if that's okay. She's been wanting to see you. She's been driving me crazy, actually—every time she comes by, she asks if there's been any update, if you're doing okay, if there's anything she can send."
Aunt Ellie.
The thought of her warm, solid presence makes something loosen in my chest.
She's always been more of a mother to me than my own mother ever was—at least, more than my mother was capable of being once the drugs took over. "That would be good. I'd like that."
"How are you feeling? Really? And don't give me the 'I'm fine' bullshit. I want the truth."
I consider lying.
Telling him I'm fine, that I've got everything under control.
But I'm so tired of lying.
I've spent the past twelve years lying—to Garrett, to myself, to everyone who ever tried to help me. And look where it got me.
"Scared," I admit. "Overwhelmed. I keep thinking about all the ways I could mess this up."
"You're not going to mess it up."
"You don't know that."
"I know you." His voice is warm, certain. "I know the woman you are underneath all the shit you've been through. And that woman? She's going to be an amazing mother."
I want to believe him.
I want to believe that the woman he's describing actually exists, that she's not just a fantasy he's been holding onto all these years.
But I've given him so many reasons to doubt me.
So many broken promises.
So many nights when I chose the needle over him.
"What if I relapse?" I ask, voicing the fear that's been eating at me all day. "What if I'm doing fine, and then something happens, and I throw it all away? What happens to the baby then?"
"Then we'll deal with it," Garrett says. "But Van, you're not going to relapse. I can hear it in your voice—you're different this time. Something's changed."
"The baby changed it," I say quietly. "When Dana told me I was pregnant, it was like... I don't know. Like everything suddenly had a point. Like all the suffering I've been doing in here actually meant something."
"It always meant something. You just couldn't see it before."
Maybe he's right.
Maybe I needed something outside myself to fight for.
Something small and innocent and completely dependent on me making the right choices.
It's terrifying. But it's also, somehow, clarifying.
"I'm going to do this," I say, and for the first time, I actually believe it. "I'm going to stay clean. I'm going to finish the program. And I'm going to come home and be a mother to our baby."
"Our baby." I can hear the smile in his voice. "God, Van. I never thought I'd hear those words."
"Me neither." I'm crying again—happy tears this time, or maybe just overwhelmed tears. It's hard to tell the difference anymore. "Saturday. I'll see you Saturday."
"Saturday," he confirms. "I'll be counting the hours."
I hang up and stand there for a moment, my hand still resting on the phone.
The other residents are starting to line up for their turn, so I step aside and make my way back to my room.
I sit on my bed and stare at the wall, my hand pressed against my stomach.
Three days.
In three days, I'll see my husband.
I'll let him hold me and promise me that everything's going to be okay.
And maybe, just maybe, I'll start to believe it.
The road ahead is long and uncertain.
There are going to be challenges I can't even imagine yet—medical complications, cravings, the everyday struggle of staying clean in a world that's constantly trying to drag me back down.
But for the first time in a long time, I feel like I might actually make it.
Not because I'm strong.
Not because I've got everything figured out.
But because I have something to fight for now.
Something bigger than myself.
I lie back on the bed, staring at the ceiling, and let myself imagine a future.
Not the future I've been afraid of—the one where I relapse and lose everything—but a different future.
A better one.
A future where I'm holding a healthy baby in my arms.
Where Garrett is beside me, smiling, finally at peace.
Where the scars of my addiction are still there, but they're scars, not open wounds.
Where I've become the woman he always believed I could be.
It's just a fantasy. I know that.
The reality is going to be messy and hard and full of setbacks.
But for the first time, the fantasy feels possible.
And that's enough to get me through the next three days.
One hour at a time.
One day at a time.
That's how you build a future.