Chapter 3 #2
*Everything under control,* I typed.
I deleted it before hitting send. Then I typed: *Swamped with work. I’ll call you Sunday.*
That was a line I could maintain.
In the pantry, there was a box of pain relievers, teas Priya bought when she stayed over, and a bag of crackers that had been open since Christmas.
I found the pregnancy test behind the coffee filters, right where I’d tucked it on Tuesday after stopping at the pharmacy.
I’d bought two. That was reasonable. Verifying data before making a decision was completely reasonable.
Holding it like it was a live wasp was not.
I carried it into the bathroom. I focused on the dingy grout between the white tiles and the gray hand towel hanging crooked on the ring.
I straightened the towel and made a mental list of cleaning supplies to bleach the grout.
Anything was better than looking at the pregnancy test resting on the edge of the sink.
I’d made plans that Saturday morning, sitting on the edge of Cole Callahan’s mattress while he slept with his back to me.
No, that wasn’t accurate. I’d made those plans long before that.
On Saturday, I’d just picked up the calendar right where I’d left it: slip out before sunrise, leave nothing behind, and don’t turn a man who knows how to make toast into a variable in my life.
The test had nothing to do with Cole until two lines forced me to admit it did.
I read the instructions. I read them again. Downstairs, the trumpet cut out. The building fell quiet behind the door.
I waited the three minutes sitting on the closed toilet lid, hands tucked between my knees.
On the shelf above the sink sat a jar of face cream, a dry-cleaning ticket, and the claw clip I used when I went for runs.
I counted the wall tiles. Twenty-four at eye level.
I counted them again and found twenty-five.
The timer went off.
Two pink lines.
My first instinct was to look for the error.
Expiration date. Amount of liquid. Wait time.
I dug the box out of the trash, checked the stamped lot numbers, and flicked on the brighter vanity light.
The lines were still there. Neither one especially dark or faint.
Side by side, so utterly ordinary it made my teeth grind.
We’d used a condom. I had no memory of it slipping or breaking. That data point was true, and it didn’t change the lines.
I braced my hands on the basin. The porcelain edge was cold under my palms.
I didn’t cry. My body stayed motionless while my brain opened filing folders: health insurance, maternity leave, the board calendar, the name of an OB/GYN Priya had mentioned once, whether I should call the bank or a clinic first, whether nine months could even fit into the roadmap I’d just defended in front of Diane.
Then I caught my reflection in the mirror.
My hair was up, my blue button-down fastened to the collar, and a pregnancy test rested on the sink. I looked like a woman about to deliver a corporate strategy. Not a woman who could be pregnant by a stranger who’d called her trouble while making toast at three in the morning.
The trumpet started back up. This time the neighbor managed two clean notes in a row, holding them until they cracked.
I laughed. A short, ugly sound that escaped before I could choke it back. Then I pressed a hand over my mouth.
There was nothing funny about it.
I looked back at the lines.
“All right,” I said.
The words dropped into the bathroom air and accomplished nothing.
I opened the second test. The wrapper crinkled. I repeated the procedure with a precision any lab would have approved. I waited on my feet this time, because sitting down felt like conceding that this deserved ceremony.
Two pink lines.
This time, my stomach dropped straight through the floor. I didn’t sink to my knees or break anything. I sat on the toilet lid because my legs stopped holding up their end of the bargain.
My phone was still on the kitchen counter. Through the cracked bathroom door, I saw the screen light up. Another email. Another ping. My life organizing itself without consulting me.
I didn’t think about my mother until I did.
The afternoon Danny was born, I was six years old, and my father hadn’t come home in two days.
My mother told me everything was fine while stuffing clothes into black trash bags.
Months later, when he called on my birthday, she explained that some men just don’t know how to handle surprises.
I’d used that line as a rule. As if understanding the risk could keep it away.
Cole wasn’t my father. Cole was a man with an excellent kitchen, taped wrists, and a smile I hadn’t asked to remember. I didn’t have the right to write the rest of the script for him before I’d said a single word.
I couldn’t pretend he didn’t exist, either.
I clicked my watch clasp open. The snap sounded too loud. I unfastened it and set it next to the hand cream.
In the kitchen, my phone showed three notifications: a budget thread, Priya asking if I’d eaten dinner, and an automated reminder to confirm my dentist appointment. I tapped the contact I hadn’t touched since leaving his house.
Cole (No).
I stared at the name. I’d saved it with zero intention of ever calling. The parentheses had been an inside joke with myself. A safety latch. A door with too many deadbolts.
I hit dial.
The first ring felt like a mistake. The second felt like a decision I could still undo. Before the third, I hung up.
I leaned back against the counter. Outside the window, the lights of Capitol Hill flickered on one by one. Shower steam drifted up from the apartment building across the alley. Downstairs, the trumpet had given way to a wet cough.
The phone buzzed in my hand.
Cole.
I didn’t answer. I watched it vibrate until it stopped. Almost immediately, a text popped up.
Cole: *Kate?*
No exclamation point. No accusation. Just my name, sent by a man who wasn’t supposed to have my number, but whom I’d just called.
I sat down at the kitchen table with the test between my hands. The tabletop had a faint water ring from a mug I’d never managed to buff out. I opened the keyboard. Closed the keyboard. Typed: *Hi.* Deleted the word. Typed: *I need to talk to you.* Deleted that too.
I didn’t need to draft an executive deck. I needed to tell the truth before I could organize anything else.
I hit dial again. This time, I pressed the phone to my ear before I could change my mind.
“Kate?” Cole said.
His voice came through over the background sound of a door clicking shut and running water. He didn’t sound annoyed. That made it worse.
“It’s Kate,” I said, because apparently my brain had decided to reset to the beginning. “From March.”
There was a brief pause. I heard a dull clink—maybe a glass hitting a counter.
“I know who you are.”
I covered my eyes with my free hand. The test sat on the table beside an electric bill. Two pink lines under an expiration date.
“I’m pregnant.”