11. Sophie
CHAPTER 11
Sophie
“ Y ou know this is cruel,” I grumbled, pouring Merlot into Becks’ empty glass. “Like worse than that time I sprained my ankle and had to watch you and Caleb jumping on the trampolines at Sky Zone like crazy monkeys.”
Becks laughed and fell back onto the sofa, her hot pink skirt billowing around her waist.
She smoothed the pleats and shook her head. “It wasn’t me that got you pregnant.”
Setting the bottle aside, I turned to face her and held up the glass of wine, smelling it as a connoisseur would. Three small sniffs to embrace the fruity notes of black cherry.
Pregnant meant no wine, no sushi, and apparently no deli meats. There was a whole horde of things to do and not to do, books and books filled with instructions, and an internet full of unsolicited advice. The only way I was coping was by ignoring everything.
For now, at least.
“If you were my best friend, you’d drink tea with me,” I added.
“I am your best friend,” laughed Becks. “And therefore, you can’t possibly force me to drink tea . Especially after the day I had. Do you know how difficult it is to get vomit out of scrubs?”
I pulled a face—since vomit-stained scrubs were nothing compared to the massive problem I was facing—and walked my cup of tea and the glass of wine to the living room. Becks scooted forward and reached for her glass. “I still can’t believe the guy you slept with was Vicki’s fiancé,” she said, taking a sip, her eyes rolling back briefly in her head as she savored the taste—a clear exaggeration meant to irk me even more. “The chances of that happening are, like, really low . . . Although maybe not that low. Caleb seems to think it wasn’t all that weird that you two met at a medical conference, considering you’re both in the medical field. Something about statistical probabilities.” Becks blew out a breath. “Sometimes it’s hard to be married to an actuary.”
“At least you’re not pregnant,” I quipped, eyeing the glass in her hand. The problem wasn’t even that I loved wine, or drank it often, but rather that my life had changed suddenly and without my consent. All because I’d been far too absorbed in Alex to remember about a condom.
And now I had an itty-bitty baby growing inside me—a baby I couldn’t even imagine raising, but would never consider giving up.
“It’s weird to imagine that Vicki was once engaged,” said Becks, ignoring my comment, “let alone to someone as hot as Alex. I mean, don’t get me wrong, Vicki is cute. She’s got those big blue eyes going for her, but Alex . . . ” Becks fanned herself with her free hand as if it were a hundred degrees inside. “He’s a hottie. Which kind of makes me feel worse about you sleeping with him.”
“Gosh, thanks.”
Becks laughed and patted my knee. “Alex is obviously the one who ended things with her . It’s normal to feel sorry for the person who got dumped.”
“What makes you think that?” I asked. Out of all the information zooming about in my head, that was the last thing I had thought of—Alex dumping Vicki.
Becks shrugged. “I don’t know. Call it a gut feeling. I just feel so sorry for her. Like today, when she was going on and on about the precautions after a patient’s surgery, I swear I didn’t hear a thing. I kept imagining Vicki on the floor, crying hard and ugly over Alex when he declared their relationship was over.”
“How do you think I feel?” I snapped, a little too harshly, and then buried my face in my hands. Seeing Vicki, talking to her as if I hadn’t slept with her ex-fiancé in a work seminar, as if I wasn’t fighting morning sickness, as if everything was fine and dandy, had been exceptionally hard over the last two days.
“Horrible,” said Becks plainly. “Like the worst person in the world.”
“Exactly,” I exclaimed, blinking tears out of my eyes.
I wasn’t crying. Not in the conventional sense. I was angry instead of sad, annoyed instead of disappointed, but these damn hormones were making me emotional.
Becks turned to face me, pressing her legs together and leaning sideways against the sofa’s backrest. She kept her hand on my knee and patted me. “Technically you shouldn’t have to feel bad, Soph. It’s not like you knew. If it’s anyone’s fault, it is Vicki’s.”
I shook my head, in awe of Becks' ability to rationalize things. “How exactly is it her fault?”
"Vicki literally shares nothing about her life," replied Becks, her face still deadpan. "You and I don't even know how old she is or if she's got a cat—she seems like a cat person—or where she was born or if she likes to kill people in her spare time. If we'd known she was dating hottie Dr. Roberts from Santa Rosa, you'd probably never have slept with him."
“Of course, I wouldn’t have.”
“Well, there you have it. You’re a good person.” Becks squeezed my knee once more and then stood up, heading to the kitchen. “Have you got any snacks, Soph?” she asked as she went.
“In the cabinet to the left of the sink,” I said, following her into the kitchen.
Becks ripped open a packet and grabbed out a handful of salty chips. “So,” she asked, her brows raised, her dark hair toppling over her shoulders. “What are you going to do?”
“You keep asking me that,” I muttered and rounded the island. I still had no clue what I was going to do about the whole thing.
“Only because you keep changing the subject,” said Becks, shoving two large chips in her mouth and chewing briefly before she added, “Are you still living in ‘delulu’ land? Thinking you’re not pregnant when I literally saw you scrunch up your nose at a grilled cheese sandwich when I know you love cheese?”
The sandwich had made my stomach churn, but Dr. Google said morning sickness usually started at six weeks and I was barely at five. “I am not delusional. I’ve even booked an appointment with the gynecologist in two weeks, it just . . . ” I cut myself off, closed my eyes, and imagined I was standing on a beach, water rippling around my ankles, the sound of seagulls in the air. A meditation trick I’d picked up last night from a book I’d borrowed from Danny– though it wasn’t exactly helping. Instead of seagulls squawking, I heard babies crying.
When I opened my eyes again, Becks was frowning deeply. “What was that about?”
“Nothing,” I said quickly and carried on with what I had intended to say. “I guess I wasn’t expecting to have kids until I was at least thirty-five. You know, when I had my life sorted out.”
“And what exactly does it look like to have your life sorted?”
I stuck a finger in her direction.
Becks had done everything in the correct order. Fell in love in college, got married a few years later, bought a house and then a dog, and in a few short years they’d probably start trying for babies.
“Like you and Caleb. You’re married. You’ve got a house—”
“A mortgaged house that we’re praying we can pay off considering Caleb’s still a junior at work. The grass doesn’t always look greener on the other side, Soph. Besides, life doesn’t have to look a specific way. It’s different for everyone.”
“Since when did you get so annoyingly wise?”
“Since I turned thirty-one,” laughed Becks. “Don’t worry, you’ve still got plenty of time for that—”
The doorbell rang.
I shot a look toward the front door as if I had X-ray vision and could see who was standing on the other side.
“I thought I was your only guest for the evening.” Becks frowned.
“Danny said he wanted to stop by,” I replied and ambled over to the front door, hoping Danny had shown up with the jelly beans I had asked for—I’d had a weird craving for jelly beans last night and who knew if it would come back around.
“You know, I’ve always liked your brother. He’s very . . . um . . . honest.”
“He’s rude,” I replied when I reached the door. I checked the peephole—I wasn’t paranoid, but in this day and age, you couldn’t open the door without knowing for sure who was there—and my heart suddenly lunged into my throat.
Standing on my front porch was Alex, looking all broody and moody and just fucking gorgeous.
Shocked, I snapped my head in Becks’ direction and just managed to swallow the lump in my throat down enough to mutter, “It’s him.”
“Who?”
“Alex,” I replied softly, not sure why Becks was suddenly incapable of reading my mind when she had a reputation for knowing everything I was thinking. “He’s out there right now.”
“Oh shit,” she knocked back the last of her wine, set the glass aside, and rushed to the door. Standing on her toes, Becks gazed through the peephole. Before I could figure out a way to pretend we weren’t at home, she opened the door. “Alex, so good to see you again. Come on
in.”
Alex walked in. He was wearing jeans and a simple blue T-shirt—a casual look I hadn’t expected, but it somehow highlighted every part of him. Strong biceps stretched the short sleeves, and the shirt fit just right, showing off his chest and those big broad shoulders.
A hot flash I was quite sure wasn’t related to pregnancy suddenly washed over me, and I was reminded of that night, of his strong hands, lithe body, the way he had kissed me so hard and so completely I had forgotten the most important thing.
The fucking condom.
“Hi Becks,” he said, a soft, polite smile playing on his lips.
“Alex. Isn’t this a surprise?” Instead of closing the door behind him, Becks shuffled back into the living room, grabbed her handbag, and waved goodbye. “I’ll see you tomorrow.”
Alex and I watched the door click shut behind her.
With no other options left, I turned to face him. “How are you feeling?” I asked to be polite, but also to know if I could run away without him chasing after me when he brought up the pregnancy topic.
“Back is a lot better, thanks.”
“Good,” I replied at the same time a thought hit me. Frowning, I folded my arms tightly over my chest, wondering if I should be bothered by Alex’s stalking ability. “How did you know I lived here?”
He bit his lip and gazed guiltily at the doorway.
Of course, Becks gave him my home address.
Traitor.
“I went to the hospital today to pick up one more box of my things.”
“You did?” I asked, surprised.
He nodded. “You were busy with a patient. Vicki asked Becks to give the box to me, and well . . . She talks a lot. Don’t be mad at her though, I was the one who asked her where you lived.”
Of course, she answered. I was going to kick her butt first thing at work tomorrow. The audacity. Not only did she betray me—it was a definite betrayal to go behind my back—, but she also didn’t think it important to tell me that significant detail while she was sitting on my couch, drinking my nice bottle of red wine.
Silence followed. A hard, heavy silence that sat like an elephant in the room. All I wanted was for Alex to leave, for this one-night stand not to be mentioned, so that tomorrow I could go back to work and look Vicki in the eye instead of avoiding her gaze like she was going to shoot lasers out of her eyes.
“Can we talk?” Alex asked, gesturing toward the living room.
I had every intention of showing him the door and politely asking him never to come back again. Instead, I led the way to the couch and sat down.
He settled for a spot far too close for my liking. It was a full-length couch, yet Alex sat so close that his right knee was barely two inches from mine. Heat pooled in my cheeks. I reached for the cup of cold tea I’d left on the coffee table and brought it to my lips, anything to distract my brain from the rush of flapping butterfly wings in my stomach. It seemed every time I was near him, my body was reacting weirdly.
“I’ve been thinking about it . . . about you and the . . . ”—he looked down at my stomach, which still looked as flat as a pancake (I’d checked this morning), and back up again to my face—“I know it's your decision whether you want to keep the—”
“I’m going to keep the baby,” I blurted out. The decision wasn’t set in stone yet. I was only halfway through the list of pros and cons of having a baby—eighty percent were cons—but now, hearing Alex wonder whether or not I was going to keep the baby, somehow that answered those loaded questions.
This baby was mine—unexpected, yet undeniably mine.
“Okay,” Alex muttered. He took a deep breath in, his shoulders dropping as if a weight had been lifted, and then gave a curt nod. “Good.”
“Is that why you came?” I asked, itching for Alex to leave. “To find out if I was keeping the baby?”
He shook his head and gave a resigned sigh. “I guess so . . . But more importantly, I want you to know that I want to be a part of the baby’s life.” His words hit me like a downpour on a clear day.
Not that they should. It wasn’t exactly a shock.
At the hospital, when Alex had found out I was pregnant, he had looked stunned but there had been no sign that he had wanted to bail, to flee from the news.
Quite the opposite, actually.
“I . . . I really don’t want to have to think about this right now . . . I need some space, Alex,” I said, rising to full height.
If Alex wanted to be a part of this baby’s life, not only did we have to see each other again, and again and again, but we’d have to tell Vicki. Worst case scenario, this could be a way for Alex to get back with her.
None of those options sounded particularly appetizing.
I was at the door, opening it before Alex could say anything else. When he reached me, standing so close I could feel his warm breath on my cheeks, I noticed three freckles on his nose I hadn’t seen before and a cloud of desperation in his eyes. A part of me didn’t want him to leave.
“Call me, okay?” he said, holding my gaze for a few seconds longer. “You’ve got my number.”
“I will,” I said, meaning it.
As soon as Alex stepped out into the evening air, a hue of lavender making its way into the sky above him, I closed the door behind him and slumped against it.