Chapter 20 Lucy
Lucy
So. Much. Vomit.
Lucy rested her head against the porcelain god which had become her new best friend these past two months.
Sweat beaded on her neck and her hair stuck to it like putty.
The inside of her nose stung, a wretched feeling like she dived into the deep end and chlorine shot up her nostrils.
She hurled again, then felt gentle hands sweep her hair away from her face and snug it into a firm grip.
Lucy was too sick to even be surprised that someone had walked into her home without her knowledge.
‘Whoever said morning sickness ended after the first trimester is a liar on every level.’ She gasped as she stood on wobbly legs, grabbed a rag from the linen closet, and ran it under cold water.
The wetness against her cheeks and neck cooled the heat from the nausea. ‘I didn’t even hear you come in.’
‘Couldn’t hear me over the hurling, huh?’ Jade filled a glass with water and handed it over, their routine over the last two plus months since becoming a couple.
Some new couples went wine tasting and tried out new restaurants. In their dynamic, Jade rubbed Lucy’s feet and ran to the store when Lucy ran out of Tums.
‘Aren’t you still in your first trimester, though?’ Jade asked. ‘You only peed on a stick like, what, two and a half months ago?’
‘No, I’m in the second trimester.’ Lucy gargled and spat.
‘Because we did IVF, they considered me two weeks pregnant when I left the office the day of implantation.’ She added toothpaste to the toothbrush and grinned at Jade’s tilted head.
‘So, when I took the pregnancy test three weeks later, I was considered five weeks when it showed positive.’
Jade scrunched her eyebrows, then slowly shook her head. ‘Nope. What do my teen clients say? The math isn’t mathing. I know you’re the numbers person, but that literally makes no sense.’
Pregnancy and timelines and inception and all the other stuff that Lucy had studied over the last year didn’t make sense to her either.
Who knew that everything revolved so closely around weeks.
Everyone wanted to know how many weeks she was, how many weeks until birth, how many weeks along could she be if something happened with the foetus and it needed to come out early.
‘We’ll discuss later after my urge to puke goes away. ’
Jade washed her hands and studied Lucy in the mirror. ‘You have that glow. You know, the one pregnant women have.’
Lucy looked at her puffy, flushed face, unsure whether to laugh or cry – which had become a common emotion combo these past few months. ‘That’s only because my cheeks are red from being nauseated.’
Jade gave her a playful smack on her butt. ‘Oh my God, stop. I’m serious.’
‘Do you still think I’m the sexiest woman alive?’ Lucy asked through a mouthful of toothpaste.
Jade laughed. ‘The absolute sexiest. Lesbian scout’s honour.’ She held up a peace sign. ‘Besides, your boobs look amazing.’
Lucy tugged her shirt tight. ‘They do, don’t they?’
One unforeseen side-effect of pregnancy for Lucy was she really did feel sexy when she wasn’t nauseated.
She felt powerful, invincible, but also sometimes fragile, and the blend made her realise her body could do more than she ever thought possible.
She even couldn’t wait for her belly to pop out more than its current state, which only looked like she ate one too many eclairs at the holiday party.
Lucy followed Jade out of the bathroom as Chucky trotted next to them.
These days, she relied on Jade more than she ever thought she would.
Man, did she really, really rely on her.
The first few weeks of their newfound relationship, they were inseparable.
Jade took days off work, they spent hours in the bedroom, shower, kitchen, living room – and once they tried to play out Lucy’s high-school fantasy of getting freaky on the car’s backseat.
As spacious as the Prius (‘Starlight’ as Lucy maintained and Jade had yet to adopt) was, Jade’s six-foot frame just couldn’t make it work, and Lucy laughed from the depths of her soul at the clunky failed sexual encounter.
Last week, they exchanged holiday gifts, Jade gifting Lucy a tiny gold charm bracelet and a blanket imprinted with Chucky’s face, while Lucy got Jade a monthly home box subscription from a gourmet vegan cheese and crackers shop.
And two nights ago, they spent New Year’s Eve in, playing Pictionary and charades with Drew and Mason, and downing several bottles of sparkling apple cider while Lucy whined that she couldn’t have any of the salted meats on the charcuterie platter.
Lucy knew every part of Jade, from the sprinkling of angel kiss birthmarks directly below her left hip, to the curve of her backside, to that tiny scar on her ribcage from a childhood playground accident.
She knew Jade’s sweet spot, the dip right behind her ear lobe that made Jade squirm, how much pressure to use, how deep, for how long, when to move, and when to remain perfectly still. They were totally in sync.
But their relationship was more than the phenomenal sex.
When Drew and Mason took a weekend trip last month, Lucy had some scary spotting.
Jade rushed her to the ER and waited for hours until they got the ‘false alarm’ and ‘this is normal’ thumbs-up from the doctor.
When her dad – and apparently Jade’s new best friend as they hit it off immediately – needed a hand on the farm and refused to let Lucy do any heavy lifting, Jade helped.
The initial rush of being in a new relationship had settled, and a few months in, Lucy was happy. Even more, she was content. For the first time in her life, she had a real, live, honest-to-goodness girlfriend and it was awesome. Relationships were so much easier than she thought they’d be.
‘Want something to drink?’ Lucy asked as she scoured the fridge.
‘Nah, I’m good.’ Jade sank onto a barstool and rubbed Chuck’s head. ‘There’ll be plenty tonight.’
Tonight? What’s tonight? Lucy shut the door with her hip and faced Jade.
Jade’s chin dipped. She ran her fingers through her mermaid-blue hair, a short pixie cut Lucy was still getting used to, and exhaled loudly through her nose. ‘You forgot, didn’t you?’
Ever since getting pregnant, Lucy felt like the foetus amoeba was chomping away at her brain.
She was in a state of perpetual brain fog, with only sporadic moments of clarity.
She felt like she was living between being severely undercaffeinated, a head cold, and not getting enough sleep.
Drew, who was reading What to Expect When You’re Expecting, had mentioned this, but she wasn’t fully ready for this.
He offered her the book, but she declined.
Other than wanting to be a good house for Drew and Mason’s kid, she had very little desire to know what was happening inside.
‘No, I didn’t, uh, forget.’ Lucy guzzled back a ginger ale.
She seriously needed to think about buying stock in this wonder drug.
Ginger ale, saltines, and plain noodles were the only things she could keep down.
Buying time, she chugged back a bit more.
Tonight, tonight. What was tonight? Oh no!
‘The bookstore.’ She slammed her hand against her mouth.
A queer, woman-owned bookstore and bakery had opened on the west side of town.
She and Jade had planned on going tonight to the opening night.
Ugh, such a fail. Jade had been so excited.
After being cooped up for a year without much of a social life she wanted to experience all these things, she told Lucy a few weeks ago. And Lucy had gone and forgotten.
Jade drew in her bottom lip. ‘Yes. Doors open in a half hour.’
‘So sorry. With me working offsite today, it totally slipped my mind.’ True and not true.
Having a Q1 kick-off party right after work was definitely a distraction.
The holidays were always so busy for the bank, and the company waited until the first week of January to celebrate.
Every year Lucy loved it. There was usually some terrible karaoke, free-flowing drinks, delicious appetisers.
But today, being surrounded by the smell of buffalo chicken wings, bacon-stuffed dates, and garlic-stuffed mushrooms had pushed her over the edge.
She sat at the corner of the bar, powered through, and chomped on celery.
Jade leaned against the counter and crossed her arms. ‘You didn’t respond to any of my messages.’
Lucy bristled slightly at the tone – one that she had heard a few times now.
A sort of ‘I’m irritated but don’t want to make you feel bad’ tone.
‘What? I didn’t get any messages from you.
’ And now Lucy really wasn’t appreciating the glare Jade was angling her way.
Lucy ripped her phone from her purse and held it out to prove it. ‘Here.’
‘Lucy.’ Jade exhaled a very annoyed, very exasperated sigh. ‘Your phone is on do-not-disturb.’
What? Lucy fumbled and turned off the do-not-disturb.
A rainstorm of messages popped onto the screen.
A few from Jade reminding her of tonight, her co-worker sharing New Year’s party gossip about two tellers caught making out in the bathroom, Drew checking in, and a doctor appointment confirmation of Lucy’s ultrasound next week.
How had she forgotten to take it off the do-not-disturb setting?
Not once all damn day. And not only that, she hadn’t even noticed.
Her lip trembled.
‘Whoa, whoa. What’s happening here?’ Jade met Lucy’s gaze.
A flash of panic crept up Lucy. ‘I’m not even halfway done yet with this thing, and is this how I’m going to be from here on out?
’ She was only fourteen weeks along, not even close to the halfway mark; it wasn’t even 6:30 p.m. yet, and all she wanted to do was crawl into bed and sleep forever.
Was the entire next year going to be like this?
‘Hey, hey.’ Jade held Lucy’s shoulders. ‘It’s totally fine. Seriously. I almost forgot about it, too.’
No, she didn’t. But Lucy needed this win to not feel like crap.
‘I’m so scattered. I don’t even understand how I forgot about tonight.
’ She was hot and cold, mad and sad, wanted to hit something and wanted to sleep.
Her body twisted in every way, and her shoulders shook.
‘I’m so sorry … but I just can’t. I’m so freaking tired and feel like poop and my back hurts and—’
Jade pulled her in. The cedar bergamot scent rising from Jade was the only thing that didn’t make Lucy nauseated. She rested against her chest as Jade stroked her hair.
Jade pulled back and planted a kiss on Lucy’s forehead. ‘It’s no big thing. We can go some other night.’
‘Other nights will not be opening night.’ Lucy had really wanted to show her support.
The community was friendly and open, but it wasn’t filled with queer shops like San Francisco, LA, or Seattle.
And the more they could rally, the more queer-friendly shops would open.
And now she wanted to cry again. ‘I think I cried ten times in my life up until I got preggo, and now I feel like I’m crying every day.
What’s wrong with me?’ Her belly rolled, low and uncomfortable.
She pulled away and dug in the cabinet for saltines.
‘Isn’t this normal? Aren’t pregnant women like …
extra all the time?’ Jade accepted a cracker and split it in half.
She chewed in silence for a bit, breaking off a tiny piece for a whiny Chunky.
‘So, listen, since we’re not going to the opening tonight, I think I’ll just head home and do some paperwork. ’
Great, so now her girlfriend – her smoking-hot girlfriend – with her black skinny jeans and off-the-shoulder black sweater and freshly applied make-up wanted to leave for the night.
Lucy hated that she was kind of relieved.
She wanted a snuggle buddy but had limited energy for much else.
They hadn’t been intimate for almost two weeks and Lucy’s pyjamas superseded sexy time with Jade.
Twenty-year-old Lucy hated herself right now.
The saltines stuck against the roof of her mouth, and she nearly gagged again. ‘Did you have time to break everything down by quarter?’
Jade shook her head and crouched down to Chucky.
Was she avoiding eye contact? Lucy tried not to butt in too much with Jade’s salon business, but some things Jade did made Lucy want to pull her hair out.
She didn’t properly look at quarterly, or even monthly trends, which was so important for business owners.
Lucy had this talk almost weekly when she spoke to small business owners at the bank.
No matter what your business – wine, jewellery, specialty bakery, porn shop, whatever – it was imperative to study the numbers so that you could learn how to maximise profits.
But anytime Lucy tap-danced even around the subject, Jade clammed up.
Lucy didn’t want to say it … okay fine, it was kind of, well … irritating! Jade could make her business so much more successful if she just spent a tiny bit more time on logistics and less on doing hair. ‘Why do you keep putting it off?’
Jade’s face flashed red. She adjusted the shoulder on her sweater and stood from petting Chucky.
‘Because,’ she sighed, ‘after working all day, dealing with customers and manager shit, I’m tired, too.
’ Jade’s feet smacked against the floor as she grabbed her coat draping the kitchen stool.
‘Hey, I’m just gonna head out. I’ll call you tomorrow. ’
‘Okay, cool.’ Lucy followed her and nearly sobbed when Jade shut the door. Yes, they had been friends for months before they got together. But once they did, they had never once parted without a kiss.
Until now.