Chapter 1 – Desiree
“What’s wrong?”
I didn’t want to answer. I was a little watery-eyed. It was a state I was in a lot of the time nowadays. My stomach was growing, and it had become a good resting spot for my nervous hands as I looked out the window. The view was different, but the things that ran through my head were the same. All I could think about was the next couple of weeks and what was going to happen. I knew that everything was going to change, and I still wasn’t sure if I was ready for it.
“Nothing, Fran. I’m just thinking.”
“You sit at this window all of the time.”
I knew that I worried her, both because of the baby and my newfound need to sit at the window. It made me feel a little less cramped in the new three-bedroom apartment we had just moved into. I’d had to get away from the old place, even though it was rent controlled and closer to town. But at least here I didn’t have to worry about Greg popping up, as he had done several times before the move.
“I know I do. I’m just thinking. I can’t do a lot because I get tired so easily. So I sit here and think.”
“Well, you need to get out of this apartment and get some fresh air. You have done enough thinking for the day.”
I hadn’t told her why I was so resistant to leaving the house. I was so afraid that fate would push me into Greg, and I knew that I wouldn’t be able to handle a meeting. I knew that if he saw me big and pregnant, I would see the truth in his eyes. He didn’t want me like that. He wanted me as his assistant to play with at work. I knew what I was to him. It didn’t matter that I loved him and wanted him so badly.
“I don’t know. It looks kind of chilly.”
She just shook her head and pulled me up. I didn’t have a choice. I never did with her. “Fine, but just for a little while.”
Fran agreed, but I knew that once we were out, she was going to make sure I stayed out. And she did; she dragged me out for some shopping and then to a diner to have a meal. After a while I was starting to feel better about being out. I only ducked once when I saw a man who looked a lot like Greg from the back. Everywhere I went I was afraid I would see him.
“You’ve got to stop looking over your shoulder. You’re starting to make me paranoid.”
I smiled back at her and tried to relax. The small diner was close to another store that Fran wanted to go to, and by then I was feeling a little less nervous about the whole excursion. It had been too long since I had been out in the middle of the day with no doctor’s appointment or destination in mind. Everything had changed since my last time with Greg. It was like seeing the world out of fresh eyes.
“I’m glad you brought me out today, Fran. I was sitting in the house too much. It’s just strange. Everything is different. We had that house on Elm for so long that I can’t get used to the new neighborhood.”
She didn’t call me out on the real reason that we’d left Elm Street and I was staying inside so much now. She had gotten her way, and she was never one to gloat. I was enjoying the sunshine, and I started to think that things were going to turn around.
We were almost back to the apartment when I was caught off guard by a familiar face. It wasn’t Greg, the man I was worried about seeing, but it was almost as bad: Tommy, his old assistant. I didn’t know if they still worked together, but I was sure that they still kept in touch. Tommy’s eyes zeroed in on my burgeoning stomach and I groaned inwardly. He had seen me and there was no way I was going to get away without saying hi.
“Well, I haven’t seen you for a long time, Desiree. How have you been?”
His eyes couldn’t look past my stomach. I waited for him to realize that he was staring. “I’ve been good, Tommy. How have you been?”
“Good. Everything got a little crazy there for a while, but Greg fixed everything. Now it’s even better than before.”
“I heard about the new company.” I hadn’t wanted to ask him about Greg, but at the same time I’d been kind of hoping that he would come up. Now that his name was in the air, I couldn’t help but try to get more information about the man I was still in love with.
“Yes, it’s working out quite well. It’s nice to have Don out of the picture.”
“So are you still working with Greg?”
His eyes focused on me for a moment, and all I wanted to do was shrink away so he couldn’t look at me with those eyes.
“Yeah, I never stopped.”
The rotund man looked like he was going to say more, but then he thought better of it. I felt the same way. I wanted to ask more questions, but the stronger feeling was that I just needed to get out of there. Tommy had seen enough, and if Greg hadn’t known what was going on with me, he would now. The thing was, though, I didn’t know if he should know, or if he would even really care. His words still played in my head every time I got the urge to come clean about everything. Now it didn’t look like I was going to have a choice in the matter. I was definitely pregnant, and Tommy was definitely going to tell Greg about it.
“Well, it was good to see you, Tommy, but I have to get going.”
“Okay, Desiree. Take care of yourself.”
I smiled, but I knew that it didn’t reach the rest of my face. It was not a happy meeting. He was going to mess up my life; he just didn’t know it yet. But what I did know about Tommy was that he loved gossip and he was very close to Greg.
“Who was that?”
“Greg’s assistant.”
Fran’s face said the same thing that mine did. “I’m sorry, Desiree. I really didn’t think that we’d run into anyone that knew him around here. Do you think he’s going to tell Greg?”
I nodded my head, not giving a vocal answer. I didn’t need to. Tommy was going to run right to his boss. As I watched him get into a cab, I saw him get on his phone. I had a sinking feeling that Greg was going to know even sooner than I’d thought. Maybe I was just being paranoid, but I couldn’t shake the feeling that we needed to leave. I didn’t want to be there if Greg did show up all of a sudden.
“Come on, Fran. I’m getting tired and I’m ready to go home.”
Again she just let me go with it. We both knew that it had nothing to with how tired I was.