22. BAILEY
Chapter twenty-two
BAILEY
By the third morning, when the smell of coffee turns my stomach, I’ve used up all of my excuses.
Bad sleep.
Holiday-season exhaustion.
Too many shifts stacked too close together.
A hospital cafeteria that treats expiration dates like gentle suggestions.
Stress.
That one is broad enough to cover almost anything, which makes it useful. Stress can explain nausea, headaches, weird appetite, and the fact that I cried in my car yesterday because someone on the radio talked about adopting senior dogs.
I don’t even have a dog.
Still cried.
Stress is a beautiful diagnosis when a woman is trying very hard not to know something.
But I’m a nurse.
I know too much about bodies to ignore when mine starts sending up flares.
We can tell ourselves we’re being dramatic because we’ve seen too much and our brains like to punish us with worst-case scenarios.
But we know.
I know when my period is late enough that I’ve stopped using the word late in my head because it implies a temporary delay, and this no longer feels temporary.
By noon, I’ve stepped into the supply room, pressed one hand to my stomach, and I’m breathing through another wave of nausea.
Enough to make my brain go quiet in the way it does when the evidence is clear and it’s just waiting for me to stop being stubborn.
I close my eyes.
No.
This can’t be happening.
My phone buzzes in my pocket, and I pull it out with one hand.
Finn: How’s your day going, Sutton?
I stare at the screen.
I type back, then delete it.
Type again.
Delete again.
Finally, I send: Busy. Yours?
His response comes a minute later.
Finn: Just headed onto the ice for practice. Coach said it’s time for some character-building, which usually means suffering.
A laugh tries to slip out of me, but it doesn’t quite make it.
I tuck the phone away and go back to work.
The rest of the shift passes in pieces. Vitals. Meds. A discharge that takes twice as long as it should. The smell of someone’s chicken soup from a visitor’s bag makes my stomach roll so hard I have to turn away and pretend I’m checking the hand sanitizer dispenser.
By the time I clock out, I am no longer pretending I don’t know what I need to do.
The drugstore is too bright.
That is my first thought when I walk in.
Too bright. Too clean. Too full of normal people buying toothpaste and greeting cards and cough drops while I stand in front of the pregnancy tests feeling like the entire aisle has been lit specifically for my personal undoing.
I grab two boxes.
Then a third.
At the register, the cashier scans them without looking up. She also scans the ginger ale and crackers I added, like those purchases make this a less obvious emotional emergency.
“Have a good night,” she says.
“Thanks,” I answer, like my life hasn’t just narrowed to three boxes in a plastic bag.
At home, I put the bag on the bathroom counter.
Then I wash my hands and stare at myself in the mirror.
I look the same.
I should look different. There should be some visible warning. Some sign that the ground under me has already started shifting. Instead, I look tired. Pale maybe. Hair pulled back too tightly. Mascara slightly smudged beneath one eye.
A normal woman after a long shift.
A normal woman who might be pregnant.
I open the first box.
My hands are steady. Calm in a crisis is an important nursing skill. It’s useful when patients crash, when families panic, when alarms go off, and everyone looks for the person who knows what to do next.
It is less useful in my own bathroom when the crisis is mine.
I take the test, set it on the counter, and wash my hands again.
Then I leave the bathroom because standing there watching it feels like begging the universe for an answer I’m not ready to receive.
Three minutes.
I walk to my bedroom and back, check the time.
One minute.
I sit on the edge of the bathtub. Stand up. Sit back down.
The timer on my phone goes off, sharp and awful.
For a few seconds, I don’t move. Then I look.
Two strong lines.
Not faint enough to bargain with. Not ambiguous enough to blame on bad lighting or exhausted eyes.
Two lines.
My hand goes to the counter.
“Oh,” I whisper.
That’s it. One tiny sound. Not a sob. Not a scream.
Just a small, stupid syllable that has nowhere else to go.
I take the second test because it could be a false positive.
Same process.
Two blue lines.
I take the third because the part of my brain that handles emergencies has fully separated from the part of my brain that is standing barefoot on cold tile, trying not to fall apart.
Positive.
Three tests on the counter.
Six lines total.
I sit on the closed toilet lid and press both hands over my mouth.
Pregnant.
I’m pregnant.
The word doesn’t feel real at first. It feels like something I chart for someone else. Something I ask about during intake. Any chance you could be pregnant? First day of your last period? Are you currently using contraception?
My own answers come too fast.
My last period was before San Francisco, before the wedding, before Finn in that hotel room.
My body goes cold even though the bathroom is warm.
Date three was too recent, so the timing points back to the wedding.
The one night I kept trying to label as temporary insanity has apparently decided to become very, very permanent.
I stand too fast and grip the sink until the room steadies.
Finn.
The thought of him arrives like a hand pressing against my chest.
Finn, holding my hand under a Thanksgiving table.
Finn, telling Carter that not every offer is a trap.
Finn, who learned too young not to count on anyone and somehow keeps showing up like he’s trying to prove he can be counted on.
My eyes burn.
No.
Not yet.
I can’t cry in the bathroom beside three pregnancy tests like a cliché I would roll my eyes at if it were happening to someone else.
Except it’s happening to me.
I put the tests back on the counter, then immediately pick them up and shove them under a washcloth because I can’t stand looking at them. I take them out again because hiding them doesn’t make me less pregnant.
My phone is in my bedroom. I go get it, then stand there with it in my hand, thumb hovering over Finn’s name.
I’m not ready to call him.
Not because he doesn’t deserve to know. Of course he does. But I know Finn. I know enough of him now to be scared of the exact wrong thing.
He’ll show up.
He’ll say all the right things. He’ll be kind. He’ll be steady. He’ll tell me we’ll figure it out.
And I won’t know if it’s because he wants this, or because a baby means he has to.
That thought nearly breaks me.
The possibility that Finn’s choice could get tangled up with obligation so tightly that I won’t know the difference.
So, I do the next best thing. I call Emerson, and she answers on the second ring.
“Hey,” she says. “You okay?”
I try to answer, but nothing comes out.
“Bailey?”
“I need to come over.”
Her voice changes immediately. “Come.”
“I don’t know what to do.”
“Come over,” she says again, steady and soft. “We’ll start there.”
Twenty minutes later, I’m standing on Emerson and Knox’s porch with my coat wrapped too tightly around me and the tests zippered into a pocket in my purse like they might somehow escape.
Emerson opens the door before I knock.
She takes one look at my face and pulls me inside.
She leads me to the couch, gets me water, sits beside me, and waits until I can breathe enough to speak.
“I’m pregnant,” I say.
Emerson’s eyes widen, then soften. “Oh, Bailey.”
That is all it takes. My face crumples, not completely, just enough for the careful wall I’ve been holding up since the drugstore aisle to crack. She sets the water on the coffee table and pulls me against her, and I let myself fold into her for a few seconds before I force myself upright again.
“I’m sorry,” I say, wiping my face with both hands.
“Don’t apologize.”
“I’m not even crying properly.”
“There’s no performance standard for this.”
A shaky breath slips out of me, almost a laugh, but not quite. Emerson reaches for my hand and holds it between both of hers.
“Are you sure?”
“I took three tests,” I say. “And I did the math.”
Her expression shifts because she understands before I say it.
“The wedding?” she asks quietly.
I nod.
“Not date three?”
“Too soon.”
“Okay,” she says, soft and steady, like one small word can hold the room together while I completely unravel.
“I have to tell him. I know I do, but what if he stays because he thinks he has to?”
Emerson’s hand squeezes mine.
“What if he looks at me and I can’t tell the difference between love and responsibility?” I whisper. “What if he does everything right because that’s what a good man would do, but not because he would’ve chosen me without this?”
Emerson is quiet for a second because she knows me well enough not to hand me an answer too quickly.
“Bailey,” she says gently, “Finn was choosing you before this.”
I look down at our joined hands. “Before this, choosing me didn’t come with a baby.”
“No,” Emerson says. “It didn’t. But he was already showing you that he wanted to be with you.”
“I’m scared,” I say.
“I know.”
“I like him.” My voice catches, and I look at her because there’s no point pretending with Emerson. “I think I might love him.”
Her expression softens. “I know.”
I press my palm harder against my stomach, as if I can hold this whole impossible future in place a little longer.
“I need him to choose because he wants to,” I whisper. “Not because he’s afraid of being the man who leaves.”
Emerson reaches up and brushes my hair back from my face.
“Then tell him the truth,” she says. “And give him the chance to show you which one it is.”
I nod once and take a deep breath.
Outside, December rain taps softly against the windows. Inside, Emerson sits beside me, steady and warm, while I hold one hand over my stomach and try to wrap my head around the truth.
Two lines.
One future I didn’t see coming.
And Finn, standing at the center of all of it.