Page 98 - In Five Years

She shakes her head.
Bella was pregnant once before. A guy named Markus, whom she loved as
much as he loved cocaine. She never told him. We were twenty-two, maybe
twenty-three. Our first stumbling, dazzling year in New York.

“I missed my period,” she says. “I sort of thought maybe I’d get it, but I
haven’t. My stomach feels weird, my boobs feel weird. I’ve been putting it off,

but I think . . .” She trails off.
“Did you tell Aaron?”
She shakes her head. “I wasn’t sure there’d be anything to tell.”
“How long ago was your missed period?”

She takes another sip. She looks at me. “Eleven days ago.”

We go to the store as we are—she in the nightgown with a sweatshirt thrown
over, me in my running clothes. There is no one at the small-town drugstore but

the woman who works there, and she smiles when we hand over the test. It
always surprises me that we’re old enough to receive smiles now, have these
moments be blessings, not curses.

When we get back, the house is still quiet, asleep. We crouch in the
downstairs bathroom, just the two of us, sitting nervously on the edge of the tub
stealing glances at the counter.

The timer dings.
“You look,” she says. “You tell me. I can’t do it.”
Two pink lines.

“It’s positive,” I say.
Her face falls into a sea of relief so powerful I have no choice. My eyes fill
with tears.

“Bella,” I say. Stunned.
“A baby,” she mouths.
We close the space between us, and she is in my arms—my Bella. She smells

like talcum powder and lavender and all things dewy and precious and young. I
feel so protective over these two beating hearts in my arms that I can barely
breathe.

We pull apart, misty-eyed and incredulous and laughing.