Chapter 18 - Elisa
ELISA
Afew weeks later
The test sits on the edge of the sink while the second line decides whether it exists.
The bathroom is quiet except for the radiator.
I stare until my eyes blur and the color comes into focus.
Two lines.
Clear as a bell.
I sit on the closed lid of the toilet and press my palms to my thighs like I'm bracing for a turn I did not plan to take.
This, coupled with the weapon Nico tried to give to me… I smile bleakly at the air.
I knew what was possible. I also believed the old math.
Years ago, a doctor told me my cycles were irregular and I might have a harder time.
I built a life around that like it was a fact.
Now my chest feels tight and open at the same time.
I laugh once.
I cry once.
I run water until the mirror fogs, then I put the test in a drawer because I can't throw it out and I can't keep looking at it.
I don't call Nico.
I send him a message about my shifts and a picture of a lopsided loaf I baked before dawn.
He sends me a photo of his tie badly knotted and asks me to fix it later.
I stare at the screen until it goes dark.
Work does not care about my news.
The shift rolls over me from the first minute.
Vitals.
Pain scale.
Blood sugar.
A cut that needs three clean stitches and patience.
At ten the nausea hits like a bad wave.
There is no warning.
My mouth floods and my stomach pulls tight.
I make it to the staff bathroom in time.
It's fast and not dramatic, but the smell of antiseptic turns against me and I have to sit on the tile and count my breaths.
Rizzo finds me rinsing my mouth and passes me a sleeve of crackers.
“Keep one in your cheek,” she says. “Like the old movies.”
Her eyes study my face and then move on.
She does not say anything else.
I could hug her for that.
The rest of the morning is a negotiation between my stomach and my job.
I eat small bites of saltines and sip water.
I chart standing up because sitting makes the floor tilt.
Around noon, Rizzo taps my shoulder and says we are going outside.
I argue for a second and then I let her win.
The air hits my face and I feel human again.
She takes me to a bistro two blocks down where the tables are small and the servers move like they have a second life somewhere else.
We sit by the window.
She orders soup and I ask for toast.
The room smells like butter and rosemary.
It's fine until a server comes out with a plate from the next table and the truffle oil blooms in the air.
My stomach tightens so fast I have to stand.
“I’ll be right back,” I tell Rizzo.
She nods and slides her soup toward me as if the bowl could hold me steady.
I make it to the sidewalk and bend over the planter until the sharp edge passes.
Footsteps stop beside me.
I don't need to look up to know who it is.
The way the street goes quieter around him is its own introduction.
“Elisa,” Nico says.
He keeps his voice low. “Why are you avoiding me?”
I straighten and wipe my mouth with the back of my hand.
The air tastes like cold and old coffee.
He is dressed in a dark coat with the collar turned up.
His eyes take in everything.
My hands.
My face.
The door behind me.
“I’m on lunch,” I say. “I need to get back.”
“That is not an answer.”
His hand hovers near my elbow.
He does not touch me.
He waits.
I try to find a line that is true and does not open the door I'm not ready to walk through.
“I'm tired,” I say. “Work has been ugly. I'm trying to be smart.”
He holds my eyes for one count, two.
He knows I'm skirting.
He also knows better than to push me in the street.
“Come by later,” he says. “We will eat. You can sleep.”
“I have a late finish,” I say. “I will text.”
He nods once.
His face is set in that careful line he uses when he is carrying more than he will say.
He looks past me into the bistro and then back.
“Do you need a ride?”
“I’m fine,” I say. “Go.”
He waits one more second, then does what I ask and walks away.
I watch his back until the crowd folds around him.
My stomach loosens.
I go inside and tell Rizzo it was the smell.
It's not a lie.
At the end of the shift, my feet hurt and my head feels like it sat under a loud light for hours.
I walk home because the cold helps.
The dark SUV is parked a block down with the engine off.
I have seen the same shape twice this week.
It does not move when I pass.
It also does not leave.
I unlock my door and stand inside the threshold until my heart slows.
Mom calls just as I hang up my coat.
Her voice is the sound of Sunday kitchens and a hundred small instructions.
“I’m downstairs,” she says. “I brought soup. Buzz me up.”
She does not wait for me to argue.
I buzz her in and clear the table.
She comes in carrying a paper bag and a pot wrapped in a towel.
The smells of chicken and lemon fill the apartment.
She kisses my cheeks and sets the pot on the stove.
She looks around like she is checking a hotel room, then nods.
“Sit,” she says. “You look pale.”
I sit.
She ladles soup into a bowl and brings it to me with a plate of toasted bread.
I take a spoonful.
It tastes like when I was sick and my uncle told me the ovens would cure me faster than any medicine.
I don't realize I'm crying until my mother’s hand is on my wrist.
“What is it?” she asks. Her voice is gentle and sharp at once. “Tell me now.”
I have been rehearsing silence for weeks.
The words come out anyway. “I took a test,” I say. “I’m pregnant.”
She exhales and reaches for the chair across from me.
She sits down hard and then reaches over to grip my hand.
“Are you sure?” she asks. It's automatic. I nod.
“I thought it would be hard,” I say. “The old news. The irregular cycles. The cyst. I didn’t think it would be here without my seeing it coming.”
She squeezes my hand and then lets go.
She wipes under my eye with her thumb and stands to stir the soup even though it does not need stirring.
“How far?” she asks.
“I don’t know, exactly,” I say. “A few weeks. I have not told anyone.”
“You have not told Nico,” she says. She uses his full name after that. “Nico Riccari.”
So, the word is definitely out on the street.
I shake my head.
My throat is tight.
“I'm not ready. I don't know what it means in his world. I don't want to be a story he has to use to move a room. I don't want to be leverage. I don't want to bring a child to a table with ledgers and guns.”
She listens.
She takes a breath and pours herself tea from my kettle like she has lived here all her life.
“You can't hide a child,” she says. “Not from the father. Not from yourself. You know this already.”
“I know,” I say.
I look down at the soup so I don't have to see my own face reflected in it. “I'm afraid of his reaction. I'm afraid of what it makes us.”
“It makes you parents,” she says.
“That is not a costume he can put on for the Council. That is not a headline. Don't keep this from him. That is not how you were raised.”
Her voice is not angry.
It's steady.
It cuts through the noise in my head.
She reaches across the table again and takes my hand.
“Be careful,” she says. “Be smart. Don't go anywhere alone if you can help it. And don't lie to Nico about the most important thing you will ever say.”
I nod.
The tears come again and then stop.
I eat more of the soup.
She packs the rest into containers and labels them with tape because she can't help herself.
She kisses my forehead and tells me to sleep.
At the door, she looks back once more. “Call your doctor,” she says. “Tomorrow. Do it before work.”
After she leaves, the apartment feels too quiet.
I wash the bowl and set it to dry.
I look at my phone and put it face down.
I tell myself I will call Nico after I sleep.
I put the test back where I hid it and close the drawer like that will hold everything in place.
Morning comes fast.
I dress for the early shift and pull on my coat.
The air in the hallway is cold.
When I step onto the street, the sky is still gray.
I lock the door and turn toward the avenue.
The dark SUV is back.
Same lot, same angle, one block down with the lights off.
If I were anyone else, I could call it a coincidence.
I stand for a full count of ten and watch the windshield.
No movement.
No door.
Just the shape of a car that has nowhere better to be.
I pull my hood up and start walking.
My phone buzzes in my pocket.
I don't look yet.
I keep the SUV in the corner of my eye and count my steps to the corner, slow and even, the way I do when I need a patient to breathe.
At the bodega, Mr. Leon is dragging crates of oranges onto the sidewalk.
He is shorter than the stack and twice as stubborn.
His radio plays old love songs in Spanish.
He sees me and squints at my face the way grandfathers do when they don’t want to use the word worried.
“You are too pale,” he announces. “You need ginger. I have ginger.”
“I do need ginger,” I say.
My voice sounds better when I use it for errands. “The chews you keep near the gum.”
He points with a chin. “Second shelf. The ugly ones work better.”
I step inside, the bell doing its tired jingle.
The fluorescent hum is a comfort I didn’t know I needed.
I find the chews, grab two little bags, and add a bottle of water because I believe in rituals.
Mr. Leon rings me up, slower than necessary, and then reaches under the counter to slide a small paper bag toward me.
“For your mother,” he says. “She likes the sesame cookies.”
“She will ask why I didn’t pay,” I say.
“You can pay in stories,” he says. “Tell her I asked if she is still shouting at the television.”
“She is,” I say.
He smiles like that was the correct answer.
When I step back outside, the street looks the same and not the same.
The SUV is still there, angled like a foot in a doorway.
A man with a knit cap stands at the bus stop pretending the schedule will change if he stares long enough.
Another man ties his shoe at the corner for a length of time that suggests he forgot how laces work.
Maybe these are just men.