Chapter 33 Sara
CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE
Sara
I last approximately fourteen minutes before I regret insisting on coming in to work today.
The elevator doors open on the floor and the air already smells wrong. Too filtered, too still.
The whole office might as well be holding its breath.
I smooth a hand over my stomach. The bump isn’t much yet. Just enough to make my jeans a war crime and enough for my bra to feel like it’s punishing me for my sins.
But to anyone who’s been watching closely?
Yeah. They might be able to see.
Shit.
“Are you sure about this?” Nick asked this morning, arms crossed, voice lined with concern he tried to hide behind logic. “You could log in from home. Or not at all.”
“I’m pregnant, not dying,” I told him. “I need to feel normal.”
And now, standing here, I’m wondering if I overestimated how much I care about normal.
Because I step off the elevator and the whispering starts before I make it past the glass conference room. Quick glances. Broken eye contact. The subtle hush of conversations folding like cheap lawn chairs.
I walk faster.
“Morning, Sara,” Tina chirps the second I reach my desk, appearing from behind a filing cabinet with something roughly the size of a twin mattress in her arms.
“What is that?”
“It’s lumbar support. Technically for third trimester, but why wait?” she half-whispers so no one else can hear, shoving it against the back of my chair with alarming efficiency. “You’re a precious resource now. We guard precious resources.”
“I’m not a Fabergé egg, Tina.”
“You’re carrying triplets. You’re basically a Fabergé egg full of more eggs.”
She beams. I sigh.
To her credit, Tina is discreet in the way only an HR director who’s seen six scandals, three divorces, and a minor embezzlement attempt can be. She’s the one person who needs to know, so she can set up my medical benefits and keep a lid on things until I’m ready.
Which I’m not. Not even close.
“Can I get you anything else? Crackers? Ice chips? A blood oath from Facilities to install a footrest?”
“I’m fine, Tina.”
She narrows her eyes. “Drink your water.”
I hold up the bottle she refilled thirty seconds ago.
“Good. And if anyone says anything inappropriate, you tell me. Or Nick. We need to take care of you.”
I nod, half listening as I open my inbox and try to pretend I don’t hear two junior associates whispering near the supply closet.
Did I just hear something about “all that time off?”
Oh god.
I don’t like this. Not one bit.
My throat tightens.
I turn back to my screen, focus narrowing to the inbox as I scroll as if it might hold something sharp enough to cut through the weight pressing behind my ribs.
Ten new emails.
Three flagged “high priority.”
One from legal, two from marketing, and a follow-up from a client I forgot to respond to the last time I was here.
Perfect. Work. Glorious, mind-numbing, soul-sucking work. I click open the spreadsheet attachment as my life raft.
I can do this.
I have done this. On two hours of sleep. On no sleep. Once with food poisoning and a deadline from hell.
I’ve done it with a broken heart, a broken printer, and, once memorably, a broken heel that snapped halfway through a pitch deck to a room of board members who all resembled the Monopoly man if he’d discovered crypto.
This should be easy.
But ten minutes pass and I’ve reread the same email five times. My brain keeps hiccuping. I try to update a client tracker and find myself staring at a blank cell, blinking wildly.
I shift in the chair, trying to find a position where my spine isn’t crying and my ribs aren’t arguing with the underwire that’s now compressing a solid third of my soul.
“Focus,” I whisper under my breath, dragging the cursor back to where I left off. I can feel my heartbeat in my gums.
Behind me, a laugh bubbles up from someone’s desk. Too loud. Too close.
“You think it’s true?” someone says.
Another voice answers, low and conspiratorial. “Come on. You’ve seen the way he looks at her.”
The air leaves my lungs and I deflate.
I don’t turn around. I don’t need to. The smile I plaster on is brittle, teeth clenched just tight enough to keep from cracking.
I minimize the spreadsheet. Open Slack. Start a message to myself just so I have somewhere to type.
Reminder: They don’t matter. You’re doing your job. You’re allowed to exist here.
It helps. For exactly seven seconds.
Then another message pings in from Courtney in Creative.
Hey! Can I ask you something? (Totally random lol)
No. No, you may not.
I don’t answer. I click out of the chat, shove away from my desk, and head toward the bathroom before I snap.
The restroom is blessedly empty. I lock the door, lean against the cool tile, and breathe. In, out. In, out. Hands braced on the sink.
I catch my reflection in the mirror. My face looks… the same. Mostly. A little paler. A little softer around the jaw. There’s a smudge of mascara under one eye and the beginnings of something that might turn into a second trimester glow if I squint hard enough.
I touch my stomach. It doesn’t feel real yet. Not entirely. I might as well be wearing a secret under my skin that the rest of the world is only just starting to notice, and I don’t get to control when or how they do.
I’m not used to being looked at in this way.
Not like I’m a person.
But a headline. A whisper.
A rumor wrapped in a cardigan and trying not to puke.
I don’t want to cry. I hate crying at work. Especially in public bathrooms with motion-sensor sinks that don’t care if you’re having a breakdown, they just blink their red eyes and dribble lukewarm water as if your tears aren’t their business.
So I dry my hands. Smooth down my hair. Open the door.
And keep walking.
Past the kitchen. Past the conference room. Past the hallway that smells of toner and overpriced lavender hand soap.
I duck into the stairwell, press my back to the cool wall, and pull out my phone. I scroll through my contacts, hesitating for exactly half a second before tapping Laura’s name.
She picks up on the second ring.
“Tell me you’re calling to say you’ve finally decided to fake your own death and open a waffle truck with me.”
“I’m hiding in a stairwell.”
“Not no, then.” She chuckles. “What happened?”
I exhale, the sound catching. “I think people know.”
There’s a pause, the kind only your best friend can fill without saying anything. Then…
“Sara. You’re three months pregnant with Nick freaking Ashford’s triplets. You’re not a secret. You’re a limited edition collector’s item.”
“Laura.”
“I mean that with love.”
I press a hand to my mouth to smother the laugh that threatens to escape. “I just… I didn’t think it would be so obvious.”
“Sweetheart, your boobs announced it three weeks ago.”
“They did not.”
“Oh, they absolutely did. I saw you in that gray sweater the other day and nearly sent a sympathy card to your underwire.”
Despite myself, I snort. “You are the worst.”
“I’m the best, and you know it. Now tell me what’s really going on.”
I slide down the wall until I’m sitting on the cold concrete step, knees pulled up, one hand still resting over the barely-there curve of my stomach.
“I don’t know. People are whispering. Courtney messaged me with a ‘random question,’ which means she definitely has a theory. Someone in Legal looked at me like I was a live feed of a royal baby reveal. And two junior associates practically fainted when I walked past the Keurig.”
“Okay,” Laura says, her voice slipping into that firm, take no bullshit register she uses when I spiral.
“First of all, didn’t half your office gossip for three weeks when Rob from accounting switched to oat milk?
You think they’re not going to lose their minds over you and a billionaire breeding like a fertility myth? ”
“Wow. That sentence was…”
“Accurate?”
“Deeply unsettling.”
“Look,” she continues, “you don’t owe them anything. Not your story. Not your timeline. Not even your eye contact if you don’t feel like giving it. You are allowed to take up space. Especially right now. You are literally growing three humans. That’s, like, elite-level multitasking.”
“I don’t feel elite. I feel like a lumpy balloon in business casual.”
“You feel human. And you’ve spent the last decade pretending to be bulletproof. That kind of shift doesn’t happen overnight. It’s going to feel raw. But that doesn’t mean you’re not handling it.”
“I’m hiding in a stairwell.”
“Which is both dramatic and sensible. Iconic, really.”
I breathe again, fuller this time. The knot in my chest loosens by a millimeter. “You’re very annoying.”
“And yet deeply beloved.”
I close my eyes. “True. Thank you.”
“Always. Now get out of that stairwell before someone thinks you’re trying to unionize.”
I let out a laugh. “What would I do without you?”
“You will never have to find out, because as you know, I’m not going anywhere.”
My throat tightens again, but this time it’s not from panic. It’s from that strange, overwhelming kind of comfort that only comes from someone who’s seen you through every version of yourself and never once flinched.
I smile into the phone. “I love you.”
“I know. Now hold your head up high, will you? Kick some ass.”
When I step out of the stairwell, I feel… better. Not invincible, not fixed. But steadier. Like I’ve found solid ground beneath the wobble.
I can do this.
I will do this.
I have to.