Chapter 10 #3
The bathroom door closes behind me with a soft click that sounds too loud in the empty house.
I set the test on the counter with hands that won't stay steady no matter how many deep breaths I take.
Rip into the packaging with fingers that fumble and catch on the cardboard.
Glance at the instructions even though I already know what to do, how long it needs to sit, what the results mean.
Three minutes to know if my life ends completely or if I still have some slim chance of escape.
I take the stick to the toilet, pulling up my skirt and sliding my panties down with movements that feel mechanical, disconnected from my body.
Sit. Tear the wrapper off, uncap the test. Relax until I feel the urge start to come.
Put the stick in my stream, trying not to make a mess because even now I'm worried about making a mess like some kind of trained animal.
When I'm done I recap it carefully and set it on the back of the toilet so I can wipe.
After I'm done I walk back to the counter with the stick held carefully level—as if tilting it might somehow change the results—and push start on the timer and wait.
I stare at it the whole time. Three minutes feels like three hours.
Three lifetimes. Three eternities compressed into one hundred and eighty seconds that tick past with excruciating slowness.
I don't want to bring a baby into this marriage.
Not with him. I wanted a big family once—back when I was that naive girl from Nebraska who believed in love and happy endings and building a life with someone who would cherish me.
Before I saw who my husband really was beneath the expensive suits and charming smile.
Before I realized I'm just hanging on day by day until he eventually loses control completely and kills me.
The word Pregnant appears in the little window like a verdict. Like a death sentence.
I want to cry but the tears won't come. Shock has me frozen in place, staring at those eight letters that change everything.
That trap me here forever because Daniel would never let me take his child away from him.
Would hunt me to the ends of the earth if I tried.
Would use every resource at his disposal—and as District Attorney of San Diego County, he has considerable resources—to find me and destroy me and take his baby back.
The timer still has one minute left. Maybe it will change, my desperate brain suggests. Maybe it will switch to Not Pregnant and this will all be a mistake. I know better but I can't stop hoping anyway because hope is the last thing left to die.
The timer goes off but I don't move. It keeps ringing through the bathroom, that cheerful digital beeping that sounds obscene against the reality of what just happened. I stand frozen until I snap out of it and hit stop with a shaky finger.
I stare at the test for another long moment, as if looking at it harder might change the results.
Then I put it back in the box carefully and shove it to the bottom of the bathroom trash can where Daniel won't see it when he comes home.
Wash my hands with water so hot it almost burns, scrubbing with soap that smells like lavender and normalcy.
Stare at my reflection—pale and hollow-eyed and pregnant with an abuser's child.
A baby. Growing inside me right now. Part Daniel, part me, all innocent and unaware it's being born into hell.
I leave the bathroom to get dinner started before he gets home and finds me not working and decides I've been wasting his time.
The clock on the microwave says 5:47—he'll be home by 6:30 at the latest. I have forty-three minutes to pull myself together.
To bury this knowledge deep enough he can't see it on my face.
The potatoes need peeling. I grab them from the pantry along with the vegetable peeler, my hands moving mechanically through routines I could perform in my sleep.
Peel in long strips that curl off the blade.
Rinse under cold water. Quarter with the chef's knife, the blade thunking against the cutting board in steady rhythm.
Drop into the pot. Fill with water. Set on the stove over high heat.
Pork chops next. I pull them from the fridge where I defrosted them this morning, season them with salt and pepper from the grinder Daniel prefers.
Heat oil in the cast iron skillet until it shimmers and threatens to smoke—just the way he likes them cooked.
I lay each chop in carefully, the sizzle and pop of meat hitting hot oil filling the kitchen with sounds and smells that make my stomach turn.
My mind races while I cook, hands working on autopilot.
Pregnant. With Daniel's baby. Trapped forever in a marriage that's slowly killing me. No escape. No hope. No way out that doesn't end with me dead or in prison or losing my child to him anyway.
I flip the chops, watching the browned crust form perfectly. Set the timer. Stir the potatoes. Everything is normal. Everything is fine.
Everything is… ending.