Chapter 35
When Merritt looked back at the pictures from the baby shower, it seemed like it went pretty well—a living room full of women talking, laughing, eating, and bombarding Olivia with love.
She had absolutely zero memory of any of it, though.
Olivia also had a dazed, distant expression at first, but by the end, she was grinning from ear to ear, eyes shining with tears.
She sat on the toilet, seat down, her head in her hands, a soft buzz filling her brain until she was startled by a knock on the door.
The party went so long into the evening that their mother actually made it before it was over.
Olivia burst into tears as soon as she walked in the door, and Merritt fought not to do the same at her reaction.
When everyone else had finally gone home, Merritt refused their offer of help with the cleanup, shooing them upstairs to rest and talk without her—which was probably for the best on a number of levels.
She moved through the house robotically, putting wrapping paper in a trash bag, gathering stray balloons, and stacking dirty plates in the sink, her mind moving in a million directions at once.
Of course she had to tell him.
But then she’d be the worst cliché of an unstable ex, popping back up with an unexpected pregnancy. She had no doubt he’d do the honorable thing: move back to a place where he saw no future, return to a relationship he’d already moved on from, for the sake of a child he didn’t want.
She couldn’t have this baby. She couldn’t.
So why did the thought of ending the pregnancy fill her with the kind of preemptive loss she’d never felt for a moment with her first one? Her heart ached at the prospect of severing her last link to him, the proof that she’d had him and loved him, if only for a brief moment.
That’s not a good enough reason, she reminded herself. A child is not a Band-Aid, or a souvenir.
She pulled out her phone and stared at it for a long moment.
Maybe she should wait to do anything until she’d confirmed that last 1 percent.
Once the dishwasher was running and all the stray clutter was picked up, Merritt stood in the center of the living room, feeling like something vital had melted down in her brain, leaving her unable to move.
Eventually, she found herself drifting toward the soft voices upstairs.
Olivia’s door was open, and she and her mother were sitting side by side on the bed.
Merritt wasn’t sure what she’d expected, but she was relieved to see Olivia laughing.
They both looked up at the sound of her footsteps, and Olivia held out her arm in a wordless invitation.
Merritt met her mother’s eyes and hesitated.
This wouldn’t change anything between them. But she only had one mom, and right now, she happened to be there exactly when she needed some comforting.
Merritt curled up on her mother’s other side, something she hadn’t done since she was a little girl.
“Can I have back scratches?” she murmured, a request she also hadn’t made in decades, her voice high and small, like she really had traveled back through time to ask.
She didn’t contribute to their conversation much, just lay there listening, eyelids drooping, the exhaustion of the day crashing over her, lulled into a sleepy trance by the familiar sound of their voices and her mother’s nails gently grazing up and down her back.
Luckily, she had to wait only a few days before she could get in with her gynecologist in Silverton. She sat on the table, Band-Aid in the crook of her arm, shivering in her backless gown and jumping every time she heard footsteps in the hall.
After what felt like hours, there was a knock at the door, and her doctor came striding in, a tall, broad, no-nonsense woman whose straight-to-business style Merritt generally appreciated.
“Well, we got the results from your blood test,” she said, flipping through Merritt’s chart, “and it looks like you’re not pregnant.”
Today was the one day that Merritt could’ve used a slightly gentler bedside manner.
She’d known she’d felt conflicted about the pregnancy, but she hadn’t realized how conflicted until the first emotion that crashed over her was grief, so powerful it took her breath away.
As it ebbed, though, the relief she’d been expecting took its place—mostly because now she didn’t have to make a decision either way.
It was really over, then.
“How?” she asked, once she was able to. “I thought false positives were rare.”
“They are,” said the doctor. “You were pregnant. You likely had what’s called a chemical pregnancy, which is essentially a very early miscarriage.
The embryo is only implanted for less than a week, but it takes a little longer for the hormones to get out of your system.
They’re extremely common, especially in women your age.
You probably wouldn’t have even realized you were pregnant if you hadn’t taken the test when you did.
Your next period might be a little heavier and more painful than you’re used to, though.
” She looked back at Merritt’s chart. “I usually offer to prescribe something for that, if you want it, but since your chart says you can’t have benzodiazepines or narcotics, the best I can do is extra-strength ibuprofen. ”
Merritt politely declined, finishing her appointment and walking back to her car in a haze. Before she knew it, she was pulling into Olivia and Dev’s driveway.
Thankfully, Olivia was sitting alone in the kitchen when she walked in.
“I’m not pregnant,” she said, and immediately burst into tears.
She felt Olivia’s arms around her, pulling her as close as she could, stroking her back until Merritt’s sobs turned into slow, hiccuping gasps.
“How do you feel?” Olivia asked, once they separated. Merritt went to the fridge, pulling out a can of seltzer and pressing it to her heated cheek.
“Confused.” She popped the tab and took a sip, then headed toward the living room.
Olivia followed, settling in the armchair with the same deep sigh that escaped her every time she stood up or sat down now.
Merritt sat cross-legged on the sofa, looking down into her can. “Do you think I’d be a good mom?”
Olivia studied her. “Is that something you want?”
“Answering my question with a question, probably not a good sign,” Merritt said with a rueful laugh.
“I didn’t think I did. Or, it wasn’t something I could see for myself.
Like, literally, when I would try to picture it, it would be like, ‘Footage not found.’ But now…
” She swallowed. “I can see it. I still don’t know if it’s right for me. But…I can see it.”
“And…is Niko part of these visions?” Olivia asked, her expression unreadable.
Merritt met Olivia’s eyes for a beat, then nodded slowly, her face heating again. “I’ll get over that, though.” The words rang hollowly through her, even though she knew, objectively, they were true. Or they would be, one day—although right now she couldn’t imagine how, or when.
She cleared her throat, standing up with a start. “Anyway. More importantly. Are you ready for your baby shower present? I was waiting for Mom to leave before I gave it to you.”
Olivia frowned. “I thought you got me that diaper subscription?”
“That was just for the party.” Merritt ducked into her room, bringing out her laptop. “I didn’t want to do this in front of everyone.”
She pulled up a video and struggled valiantly for a few minutes to get it to stream on the TV while Olivia gave her instructions. Finally, she got it working.
On the screen, a shaky shot of a recording studio came into focus, a group of men chatting and laughing and messing around on their instruments between takes, the image hazy from both age and the cigarette smoke in the air.
When one of the men laughed offscreen, loud and unmistakable, Merritt heard Olivia’s sharp intake of breath next to her.
“Is that—?”
She could already hear the tears in her sister’s voice. Merritt nodded, choking up, too.
“Where did you get this?” Olivia asked.
Merritt told her about going to the studio in LA, seeing the picture on the wall, tracking down the filmmaker who had been there, and asking if he still had the raw footage. Miraculously, he had it archived, and he had put together a highlight reel for Merritt for a very reasonable price.
They returned their attention to the screen, their father leaning into the frame with an exaggerated expression of annoyance.
“Listen, if you guys don’t stop messing around, we’ll never get out of here,” he said, faux-stern. “I need to get home to my girls.”
“Here he goes again,” said a voice from offscreen with a groan, but he was already digging his wallet out, showing the camera a picture of toddler Merritt and Olivia, their outfits matching but their demeanors opposite—the same picture currently tacked to their fridge.
“We can never show this to Jamie,” Olivia said between sobs, and Merritt burst out laughing, despite her tears.
There was about thirty minutes of footage total, and by the time it was over, Merritt’s head ached from crying. At the same time, she felt calmer than she had in weeks.
“He would’ve been so proud of you,” Olivia said softly, once Merritt shut her laptop screen. “It’s hard to believe that he never got to see any of it.”
Merritt pressed her lips together, her eyes filling with tears again. “Sometimes I’m glad he didn’t. He never had to see me struggling, either. He wasn’t around for me to hurt.”
“That’s what I mean,” said Olivia, still sniffling. “I think he would’ve been prouder of who you are now than of any of that other stuff. You’ve worked so hard to get here.”
Merritt gave up on trying to hold in her tears, which were coming faster than she could wipe them away. “Stop it. We’re going to need IV hydration soon.”
“No, seriously,” said Olivia, although she was smiling through fresh tears, too.
“I shouldn’t have said any of that to you the other day.
You have grown up. The fact that you’ve been going through all this and still pulled off that baby shower…
it means so much to me. And Mom told me what you did to get her here.
I don’t think many of the past versions of you could’ve kept it together like that.
” She paused, dabbing her eyes. “Plus, there was a time when you definitely would’ve set my hair on fire for saying half of those things. ”
Merritt let out a choked half laugh, half sob. “Not while you’re pregnant. Give me a little credit.”
“You do deserve way more credit than I’ve been giving you. I’m sorry…I’m sorry that it’s hard for me to see it sometimes.”
Merritt swallowed, her throat raw and dry. “Thank you,” she whispered. “I get it. It’s hard for me to see it sometimes, too.”
“Is that why you let things go with Niko?”
Merritt cast a sidelong glance at her sister. “I let things go with him because he wanted to leave.”
Olivia scoffed. “Yeah, I’m sure Mr. Crested Peak was just dying to start a new life in Arizona. Did you ever talk about him staying?”
“Sort of.”
“What did he say?”
She closed her eyes. “He said…he said he was looking for something real to build his life around.”
When she opened them, she saw Olivia looking at her earnestly, her face still red and puffy. “Are you going to tell him?”
“Tell him what?” Merritt sniffled. “ ‘I was pregnant with your baby for five minutes but now I’m not, how’s Tucson?’ ”
“You could ask how Tucson is first,” Olivia offered.
Something about that struck Merritt as so funny that she immediately burst out laughing, giddy and hysterical and contagious, Olivia joining in, tears finally streaming down their faces for a different reason.
Once Merritt was able to breathe again, she took a long drink from her seltzer, then glanced at her sister. “You spent the last six months trying to keep us apart, and now that we’re broken up, you’re trying to get us back together?”
Olivia grimaced. “I know, I know, I’m sorry. I was wrong. I knew it as soon as I saw what you were like with him.”
Another lump formed in Merritt’s throat. “How was I?”
Olivia raised a shoulder, then lowered it. “You just seemed really…alive, I guess. In a way I don’t think I’ve ever seen you. And happy. Really, really happy.”
“I was,” Merritt confirmed, her voice raspy.
She pressed the heels of her hands into her eyes, taking a deep, shaky breath.
When she dropped them to her lap, she met Olivia’s gaze.
“He’d be proud of you, too. Dad, I mean.
It takes a lot of strength to be the stable one. The one keeping us all together.”
Olivia didn’t say anything, just reached over and squeezed Merritt’s hand, her eyes going misty yet again. “Thank you.” After a long silence, punctuated only by their sniffles, she pointed at the remote. “Now please, for the love of god, can we finally watch the Bottoms Up finale?”
When Merritt returned to her room at the end of the night, her head was still spinning.
Every cell in her body ached to pick up the phone and call him. But her ever-present voice of doubt persisted: how was this any different from the countless other relationships she’d impulsively and intensely thrown herself into?
As familiar as the voice was, she was startled to hear another one—newer, louder—rejecting it. Just because it was telling her the thing she feared most didn’t mean it was telling the truth.
This was different.
It was different because she was different.
Not perfect. But better every day, and maybe that was enough.
Seeing herself through the not-quite-mirror of her sister’s eyes, she finally understood it. She’d spent all summer telling herself that she’d be holding Niko back from his next chapter, never letting herself acknowledge the idea that his next chapter could be her.
That she might be able to give him the thing he craved most of all, the one thing she never thought she could provide in a relationship—stability.
That her love for him might not be a burden, but an anchor.
Maybe this was the next step on her endless journey of self-acceptance: having faith in her future. In the quiet, everyday miracle of what she and Niko had together. In her own capacity to protect it.
Her eyes drifted to the pouch on her nightstand containing the tarot deck Daniela had given her.
She slid the cards out, shuffled, cut the deck, and flipped over the top one.
As soon as she saw the card, she knew what she needed to do.