Being on the birth control pill meant that I knew exactly what day my period was supposed to start. It wasn’t rocket science. The hormones were regulated, and my body knew what to do and when to do it.

Except, it wasn’t doing what it was meant to do. I had started stressing about it over the weekend. It was supposed to have started on the Friday before I’d gone to the White Room to check up on him. It hadn’t. It was Monday now, and my time of the month was still MIA.

I couldn’t be pregnant. There was no way I could be pregnant. We used condoms. A lot of them. Sure, they weren’t foolproof; they sometimes broke. I had taken sex ed in high school so I knew these things. But, we hadn’t had any sign of any of them breaking— not that there was always a sign.

Plus, anyway, I took my pill religiously. There had only been that one time. Oh, God. When had I missed it? I couldn’t remember exactly when it had been, but I’d missed a pill because I’d been so busy. I had doubled up the next day. That was supposed to help, and I’d done it before without incident.

The Pill had never failed me and I’d been on it since I was sixteen. I hadn’t ever been super strict about taking it because I sometimes got forgetful or busy. But what if this time, doubling up after I forgot it that one time hadn’t helped? What if the Pill had failed me— or I had failed it— and a condom had failed, too? That would be just my doubly bad luck. What if I was pregnant?

My stomach turned to stone. I sat down on my bed, feeling like the world shifted beneath me. If I was pregnant, then what?

No. I wouldn’t think like that. I got up. I hadn’t wanted to sleep with Hanson on Saturday at the hotel, despite his advances, because I’d suddenly realized how very deeply I’d fallen for him. It couldn’t be just hook ups here or there when my heart had gotten attached. He obviously didn’t feel the same way so I finally listened to common sense and said no.

Plus, I was convinced I was going to get my period, since it was due, and I hadn’t wanted to be embarrassed if I had gotten it right then and there. I figured that my body was trying to tell me to listen to my head and run away from Hanson. But then my period hadn’t come, and now I might be pregnant.

I could be pregnant? With his baby? He was the only person I’d slept with since I met him, and I had certainly had my period before I met him so he would be the only candidate.

If there was one thing in life I was terrified of, it was getting pregnant. I couldn’t have a baby. I didn’t want one now. I didn’t want one ever. My dad had created the perfect form of birth control. His self-righteousness toward the world and his cowardice toward his own family had persuaded me to never take the same route.

If I was pregnant, I had no idea what to do.

I was suddenly nauseous. Morning sickness? It couldn’t be.

I was working myself up into a state because I was panicking. All I had to do was get a home pregnancy test and put my mind at ease. There was no way I was going to make it through a day at work feeling the way I did. I was so stressed, I could barely think straight. Having to deal with Hanson and his inappropriate sexual advances made me feel like throwing up.

I picked up the phone.

“Chuck,” I said. “I’m not going to be able to make it into the office. I feel extremely sick.”

It wasn’t a lie. I felt like I was going to faint.

“Are you alright?” he asked.

“I think it’s a bug I caught over the weekend. With luck, I’ll be in again tomorrow.”

“You do what you need to do,” he said. I was relieved. “Let me know how it goes.”

I thanked him and hung up. Without work to worry about, I could relax. I could think it all through and calm myself down.

I got back into bed and breathed, trying to talk myself through it. One pill wasn’t going to make a difference. Not when I’d taken it perfectly on time, every day, all the other days since I’d started the pill at sixteen.

When I couldn’t calm myself down enough or talk sense into my own head, I got out of bed again and got dressed. A pregnancy test would answer all my questions, and I would be able to relax again. There was nothing to worry about. I just had to confirm that.

I went to the closest convenience store and stood in the aisle with the pregnancy tests. They were right next to the condoms and diapers. Were they trying to be ironic? I picked up a test and read the back of the box. I glanced at the shelf and pushed all of them in my basket. There were four of one make and three of another.

When I reached the register, the cashier looked at me. She was on the larger side, with curly hair and eye shadow that was too heavy for her light complexion. 

“You and your husband trying for a baby?” she asked, ringing up the tests one by one.

“I’m not hoping for a positive result,” I said.

She glanced at all the tests she had scanned through.

“Honey, from experience, if you’re buying this many, you’re worried enough that it might be.”

I shook my head. I didn’t want to hear that. I just wanted peace of mind, dammit. I paid and left the store with my treasure. When I returned home, I drank water. Lots of water. I drank until I felt sick all over again. I needed to pee as soon as possible. I needed to get these tests out of the way so I could carry on with my life.

Five glasses of water and half an hour later found me in the bathroom. I took all the tests. Overkill? Yeah. But I was stressing.

I had to wait a while for the results to show. It felt like forever. I tried to read while I was waiting. Or to watch TV. I couldn’t concentrate on anything. In the end, I watched the seconds tick by until my time was up.

I closed my eyes and took a deep breath before I looked at the first test.

Two lines.

I read the leaflet again. That was a positive.

Shit.

I had more. I went through them one by one. Two lines, every time.

Two lines.

Two lines.

Two lines.

Shit. Shit. Shit.

None of them were negative. Not one of them could give me a little bit of hope that this might just be one mistake, that my body was betraying me. I was pregnant. I was pregnant with a baby I’d never wanted, with a man who would never want me.

What was I going to do?

I felt like I wanted to cry. My world was suddenly crumbling around me. I had been independent and strong all my life, but now, I felt like I was falling apart. How was I going to do this? I couldn’t be a mother. I couldn’t do to my child what my father had done to me.

Not to mention Hanson. There was no way I could tell him. If this came out at all, it would ruin his reputation. He had just managed to pull himself together, now. He didn’t need a pregnant woman, his PR Manager, no less, to fuck up what he’d built for himself.

And what would Chuck say? I could hardly boast about my record of representing people if I’d gotten pregnant by one of them. This was Hanson’s career, his life, my career, my life.

And there was nothing I could do about it. An abortion wasn’t an option for me. I had to play the hand I’d been dealt. I climbed into bed for the second time that day and pulled the covers over my head like a child, wishing it would all go away. I could schedule an appointment with a doctor, but I felt like it would be futile. I would only build false hope, and they would tell me the one thing I’d known all along. I was going to have a baby, whether I liked it or not.

I’d grown up knowing that I had to fend for myself, that I would always be alone, and the only way to survive it was to accept it. From a very young age, I hadn’t needed anyone. I was strong and independent, I could take care of my myself, and I didn’t need anyone to help me.

For the first time since I was a kid, I felt the loneliness acutely. I didn’t want to do this alone. I didn’t want to do this at all. What choice was I going to have? I had to do this, and the fewer people that knew about it, the better. For Hanson’s sake, at least, if not for my own.

For the first time in a long time, I wished I wasn’t alone. But shit happened, and this was the life I had chosen. I would have to face the music. There was no choice.

I looked at the pregnancy tests that I’d dumped in my sink again. Two lines.

How the hell had this happened to me?