“You have to sit up by Math’s family. And Hue.” Mia looked toward the front of the church.
Following her gaze, she saw the back of Hue’s head sitting beside her brother. His hair was shorter than it had been a few weeks ago. He must have gotten it cut for the baptism. She wanted to run her fingers through it, see if it felt different shorter, but she knew she couldn’t. He was over her.
“Can I sit with you for a while?” she said, depression finding its way back into her heart.
“Yes.” Mia led her to the pew Mia’s family always sat in, and so far, her parents weren’t there yet.
Hue turned around and looked at her the moment she stepped into the sanctuary, as if he could sense she was there. Their eyes met for a moment before he turned back to the front. The look said he was over her… if he had ever been into her at all.
“You haven’t called,” Mia whispered.
“I haven’t needed to yet.” Amanda told the truth. If she made it to Tuesday, she would be thirty weeks. She knew she should be calling her former boss, Dr. David Bennett, who was a specialist in high-risk pregnancies.Tuesday, she promised herself, hoping that this week she would have the courage make that call. Unlike every other week before.
“That’s good, isn’t it?” Mia questioned with a hand squeeze.
“Just making it harder in the end.” Amanda admitted, a truth she had known since the beginning, so many months before.
“Hey, you two. I need to talk to you in Natalie’s escape hatch,” Hazel Abbot said to them in a church whisper, which was barely quieter than her actual voice, and walked away. The cousins exchanged a look and got up without another word, following the younger woman. Hazel was recently married to the preacher, who would be baptizing the baby today. When they got to the room in the basement where, over the previous summer, their friend Natalie had shimmied out the only window. All in order to run off on her wedding.
Today Natalie was the only one beside Hazel who was there, though Amanda assumed the entire book club was coming. Both Natalie and Hazel were leaning against the lone table in the room, a prime location, given there were no chairs in it. Amanda longed to be sitting again; her back had been bothering her for a few hours today. A new symptom of her pregnancy she had never experienced before.
“You’re still in here?” Mia teased the tall black-haired woman who was younger than Amanda by over a decade.
“Ha ha, I have only gone out that window once. And never again,” Natalie said with a smile. A big smile, because on her next wedding day, which was already in the planning, there was no way she was leaving.
“We’ll see at the next wedding,” Amanda couldn’t not it say, but everyone in the room knew there was no way she was leaving Sam behind.
Ruth came rushing in, still wearing her winter jacket. “Am I late?”
“No, Tess isn’t here yet,” Hazel said, finally sliding up on the table to sit, causing nothing but jealousy from Amanda.
“What are we doing? Kidnapping the baby?” Amanda had no idea why they were needing to meet, and her feet joined in on her back’s protest of being on her feet.
“No, we’re having a meeting,” Natalie said.
Tess rushed in the door and closed it. “I am here.”
“Finally.” Natalie jumped off the table. “We need to toast the baby.”
“The baby isn’t here,” Mia pointed out.
“Okay, we are toasting another big celebration of the group. To not let these times go by without celebrating, even if it is just a little. I think we have to get together before each one and just have a group hug,” Hazel said.
“You are so sweet, Haze.” Mia sniffed back a tear and hugged the blonde woman.
“So, in honor of this being an event in Tess’s life, Hazel and I went with Vodka,” Natalie said.
Everyone laughed. It was Tess’s drink of choice. Which was not a surprise with her family’s Russian roots.
Hazel started handing out shot glasses of clear liquid to everyone. Except Ruth, who she gave a shot of some kind of juice because of her pregnancy.
“Should you be drinking, Tess?” Ruth asked, knowing her friend was breastfeeding.
“I think one little shot will be okay. Need to build up her tolerance for the stuff anyway. Just don’t tell my nurse about it.” She winked at Amanda and, suddenly, Amanda missed them being close.
Looking at the glass in her hand, she swirled it around as the group chatted for a minute. She had to drink it. She didn’t want to drink it. It wasn’t that much. She had been so careful since she found out.
“To the book club.” Natalie held up her glass and everyone joined in.