Naomi laughed. “You’re not wrong about that,” she said. “Good luck!”
I nodded, grabbed my files, and rushed to the conference room. The meeting went about as well as I expected—the soon to be ex-wife tried to swing on her ex’s lawyer for suggesting that they split the real estate 50-50—but at least it was easy to let go of my own paranoid fear while dealing with them.
When the meeting was over, I told Brady that I would email him my notes and practically ran from the room. It was late enough that I could take a lunch break without being suspicious.I should go talk to my men, I thought, but if I was just being paranoid, why worry them? I could go, grab a pregnancy test from the CVS on the corner, and take it before I ever had to worry them.
Plan made, I took the elevator, which I was getting pretty good at riding on my own, down to the street level and waved to security as I went out onto the sidewalk. As I walked to the pharmacy, I tried to think back to my last period. I was almost six weeks late at this point. Between school and work and the men, I had completely let it slip my mind. I was such amoron.
I had never bought a pregnancy test before, never even had a scare, and although the cashier barely batted an eye as I pushed the bubblegum pink box at her, I wanted the world to open up and swallow me whole. “Hope it goes the way you want,” the girl said, and I forced my lips into a smile.
“Thanks.”
I thought about going straight into the pharmacy’s bathroom but decided to go back to the office instead. There were plenty of private bathrooms on the 42nd floor, but I picked the one the farthest from the bank of partners’ office suites. I couldn’t even explain why to myself. I just... didn’t want the possibility of running into my men.
What would I even say?
Shutting myself in the bathroom, I opened the box and read the directions. Taking the test was only a little humiliating, and I waited for the results as I washed my hands. Three minutes had never stretched on for so long before.
The alarm on my phone sounded, and I reached for the test with shaking fingers. I held it up. Two pink lines. My vision narrowed. My chest went tight. It couldn’t be right. The pink box had two tests in it, and I grabbed the second, praying that the first test was defective.
But five minutes later, I had a second positive test. “Shit,” I said. “Shit, shit, shit,shit.”
I hadn’t given a thought about motherhood. It was always one of those far-off, nebulous things that would probably happen at some point. But to be faced with not one, but two tests that proved that motherhood was just on the horizon for me... my blood felt frozen in my veins.
I touched my stomach and tried to picture life growing just behind what I could feel. Besides the nausea, I couldn’t tell the difference. I still felt like my body belonged to me. “Are you in there?” I asked aloud and then rolled my eyes. I was talking to a lump of cells at this point.
All of my options rolled out in front of me... and before I even considered anything else, I knew that the tiny lump of cells would be sticking with me. I didn’t know what my men might say about it, but I knew what I would do, with or without them.
I shoved the used tests back into the box and did my best to hide it in the trash can. When I opened the bathroom door, I came face to face with Naomi. She smiled and shimmied past me. “How was the meeting?”
I tried to shrug casually, but my mind was on the pink box in the trash. “It was a screaming match from start to finish. Security had to escort out the ex-wife.”
Naomi snorted. “No surprise there—” I knew before she said a word that she’d seen it. Of course, she had. Naomi had eyes like a damn hawk. “Tell me that’s not yours,” she said, pointing to the box, which was only visible by the corner, but any woman who’d had to buy one of those damned tests would know what it was instantly. When I didn’t say anything, she shrieked, “Alex!”
I clapped my hand over her mouth. “Shush!”
Naomi nodded behind my hand, and I let her go. “Oh, my God, Alex,” she squealed, though marginally quieter this time. She took my hands in hers. “Were you trying? I didn’t even know you were seeing someone.”
I laughed, and it was a bitter sound, even to my ears. “I wasdefinitelynot trying,” I said. “It just... happened.”
My friend laughed. “Babies usually happen that way,” she said with a nod. “Does your boyfriend know?”
I shook my head. “Not yet.”
Her eyes sparkled. “Is it someone here at work? Or someone you met at school?” Naomi’s questions seemed innocent enough, but I could see the lawyer in her. She was gently pressing for information. I wasn’t even sure whether she knew that she was doing it. There were just some things that became second-nature after you did them long enough.
Naomi had been my friend from the moment I met her in the legal library. I’d helped her with countless projects and helped her get into fighting shape in the courtroom. If I couldn’t share the things in my life with her, who could I? Besides Tinsley, I didn’t have any girlfriends, and she had been a little... preoccupied as of late. Not that I blamed her. I had been similarly busy myself.
“If I tell you, would you promise to keep it to yourself?” I asked. “People would misunderstand if it got around.”
Naomi nodded. “Of course,” she said. “You can trust me.”
“I’ve been dating more than one person,” I said. “They know about each other, and they’ve approved of the dynamic... they love me.”
Her eyes grew round. “Are you telling me that you’re polyamorous?”
I shook my head. “Polyandrous, really,” I corrected. “They’re dating me, and only me, but they aren’t involved with each other. They’re best friends, and they want to see me happy, and being together makes all of us happy.”
It was a lot of information to take in, and she blinked a few times. “So... you’re saying that you have several men—”