1. Olly
ONE
OLLY
Three minutes. Two lines. Two little blue lines, and my whole life was fucked.
I sat on the toilet and curled into myself, banging my knees with my fists until I was hit with a gargantuan wave of nausea.
I dropped to the floor and voided the rest of my breakfast into the porcelain bowl.
I took the pill at the same time every day and used a condom every time Shepard and I were together.
I got no argument from him on that. He was as freaked by the idea of an accidental pregnancy as I was.
And now here I was, fifteen minutes out from a meeting with Jeff Stevens, the chief information officer at Rose Financial.
My hose had runs in them from my compulsive picking while waiting those awful three minutes, and my skirt looked like it had gone to battle multiple times on the floor in front of the toilet.
I was sure I looked like a walking advertisement for misery from the stray tears laced with mascara falling down my cheeks.
Even my hair had betrayed me, coming loose from its neat bun and now frizzy in the humidity that somehow persisted through the canned air in the office building, so I resembled nothing more than a despairing, goth, redheaded mess.
Why on earth had I thought it a brilliant idea to run to the pharmacy on my lunch break and do this at work?
I figured that was the same me that thought this strange, new reality was utterly impossible.
That I just had a stomach bug. That the night when Shepard and I whipped out the good tequila and the condom broke was no big deal even though I had been taking antibiotics for the leftovers of a chest infection, making my birth control pill useless.
Well, fuck. If we hadn’t been drinking so much, perhaps that little detail wouldn’t have slipped by.
I suppose at the time, with boxed wine and tequila making the decisions that night and the next morning, it hadn’t seemed like a big deal.
Yeah, well, it turned out to be a huge fucking deal.
But you already knew this, deep down inside, didn’t you, Olly?
This pregnancy was written in your stars.
I gritted my teeth and refused to listen to the voices which clamoured in affirmation, a stark reminder of the pictures I’d doodled during a bus commute last week that depicted a woman with long curly red hair and a bulging belly.
I had tried to convince myself that I was drawing the time I got knocked up in high school, but since when did I ever draw the past? Never, that was when.
At least up here in Rose Financial’s Information Complex at a shiny, new tower in Halifax, Nova Scotia, the company didn’t skim on amenities.
Each bathroom was its own little fancy room, not just a stall.
I sat on the padded chair in front of the mirror, brushed down my skirt, and decided to make the best of it.
Then came a knocking on the door, and a familiar voice with a light but unmistakable Newfoundland lilt floating in from the other side.
“Do you need some help in there, love?” I let out a huge sigh of relief and thanked the universe for sending Gemma Diaz to me.
She was a research librarian at the company, and we gelled ever since the day I had headed to the staff lounge to heat some leftovers, only to find her there, reading my favourite romantasy series.
Who needed so-called “literature” all the time when there were freakin’ dragons, intrigue, magics, and book boyfriends or girlfriends to gab over?
“Yes!” I croaked and tried to get to my feet, regretting the three-inch heels I was sporting.
I kicked the purple pumps off and used the top of the vanity as leverage to stand.
“I’ll be right there,” I called, my voice feeling more like my own.
I quickly splashed my face with cold water and then opened the door, resisting the urge to pull Gemma into a huge hug.
She took command as she walked into the bathroom, shutting and locking the door behind her.
She was dressed in her usual vintage office chic, and bravely committing to it by having her shiny black hair in a style that strongly resembled “The Rachel” from the late nineties.
Overall, Gemma was short but mighty, and utterly comfortable in her own skin.
Despite our budding friendship, Gemma was a wee bit of an unknown to me.
I swear I once overheard that she was formerly in the Canadian Security Intelligence Service, and I knew from my role as a records manager that we did have files on her background related to some kind of operation in Honduras—but the records had been fudged somewhere down the line, because the dates on them were impossible.
I could guarantee that Gemma Diaz was not romping through the jungle on behalf of the government when she would have been of kindergarten age.
I also knew, based on their classification, I wasn’t allowed to know about those records—and the company probably wasn’t even supposed to have them—so I hadn’t read them in any level of detail despite my intense curiosity.
I had discovered them when I first started working at Rose, using some of my hacker skills.
There was fallout, of course. I was pulled into Jeff’s office and told that while my ability to work around traditional guidelines was valued in certain situations, I was either done digging through files above my clearance level without prior authorization or I was done with Rose.
It was an easy decision to make, especially since I was being given a second chance.
I had expected termination on the spot after being sloppy enough to get caught.
Gemma took me in with a quick inspection, and the first thing she said was, “You look like you’ve seen a ghost!
Let’s get you fixed up, hmm?” I nodded, but she was already reaching for the drawer where the makeup removal wipes and other such paraphernalia were kept.
Immediately, the atmosphere in the room felt lighter, and an encroaching sense of peace was replacing some of my panic.
“Well, it’s not as bad as I thought,” I mumbled, as I gazed into the mirror, almost provoking another round of crying. “I have an appointment with Jeff in…ten minutes, now.”
“Do you need me to use what clout I have with him and see about rescheduling?” she asked, and I hiccupped for the last time, vehemently shaking my head.
“No! Cancelling on Jeff is bad enough, but I heard Mr. Barkhouse might be there, too. We’re discussing my ‘future.’ Which makes this an awesome time to find out I’m pregnant.
Pregnant! Me! Oh fuck.” I kicked as hard as I could and, instead of hitting air, I hit the solid wooden side of the vanity, and howled in pain, tearing up immediately.
Gemma put her hand on my shoulder and gently turned me to face her, and said matter-of-factly, “Pregnant. Okay, we can deal with this, hear me?” I nodded and swallowed down a sob that tried with all its might to wrench forth.
“Do you think you can hold back the waterworks and the throwing up long enough to get through this meeting? There’s no shame in saying you need to tap out, even if Robert Barkhouse himself is at the meeting.
I will personally walk down there right now and explain you had a pressing situation come up, and you had to leave early. ”
“That’s kind of you, but please don't,” I said. I would much rather show up to the meeting looking like I'd been through the nine hells than not show at all. Gemma nodded her approval and took my chin in her hand as she gently finished wiping away the eye makeup and its tracks left down my cheeks.
“Next, we get those stockings off you.” I complied, and within moments, the ruined pantyhose was balled up and disposed of.
I didn’t mourn them. I hated wearing the things, which had to be the invention of minions from the depths of hell.
I only wore them at all because the ancient employee handbook said the dress code was “business professional,” which meant a jacket and tie for men, and for women, below-the-knee skirts, closed-toe shoes, and pantyhose.
Pantyhose! I’d often considered myself almost a different species from the type of person who would be comfortable in most of the clothing guidelines for women, plus I thought some sort of concession could be made for me based on my gender identity.
But that would mean going to human resources and disclosing my identity, and as I loved my job, I had decided that it was best to go with the flow of others’ expectations, instead of asking for special consideration just because I was nonbinary.
That was probably the stupidest excuse someone made up to justify staying in the closet, but it was, after all, just pantyhose.
Sort of. Okay, not really. I started humming “Do You Hear the People Sing?” as I imagined leading a revolution against the old-fashioned, binary gender-based dress code.
“Okay, stand up, and while you are putting your hair into a ponytail, I have a trick to help out the skirt.” Quick as lightning, Gemma was misting something onto my skirt’s dark fabric.
I combed out my riotous red hair as fast as humanly possible with my fingers and pulled it back into a fresh pony as instructed.
My saviour said, “Now shimmy! Just a bit to help the fabric fall. That was an anti-wrinkle spray, which they keep in the middle drawer. There. You look perfectly acceptable. Put on your shoes, and I am going to text Robert that I held you up and you'll be five minutes late, so they’ll expect you then. That way you don’t have to run and risk falling.
” She gave me a little playful shove as I leaned in toward her.
“No time! We can hug it out later. And I’m here for you if you need to talk about your situation.
I don’t have kids, but I know what it’s like seeing those two lines when you aren’t expecting them. ”