KATE
“Be prepared to get your eat on!”
“Please, oh please, tell me you didn’t actually say that?” I turn to my best friend, her face blank and confused. I can’t help the moan that escapes my lips at that fact. “You’ve been hanging out with your three boys too much.”
She only laughs, nodding because she knows as well as I do that truer words have never been spoken. “So maybe I have, but despite how much I feel like strangling them sometimes, I’m kind of attached.”
I smile at her and plop down onto the couch, tucking my feet beneath me. We haven’t gotten together as frequently as either of us would have liked due to my dance schedule, but when we were growing up, Jazzy and I would routinely have sleepovers. It’s evolved past the root beer floats and pizza to wine and sushi- just a couple of our absolute favorites since we became old enough to eat and drink what we pleased without listening to the wrath of our parents’ disapproval.
Unfortunately, I haven’t had the heart to bring up the fact that I’m pregnant yet and am not able to really eat any of that stuff. My eyes felt as if they were about to bulge out of my head when I saw her pulling bag after bag of sushi takeout from the backseat of her car.
Jazzy and I are both sushi fiends, so I know that this pregnancy is going to test my restraint. Except for the crunchy rolls; thank goodness they’re baked, so I can, and will, eat every last tasty morsel that’s put in front of me.
“Can we talk?” I ask her mid-scoop as she piles her plate with unagi and various other assorted sashimi. My plate is sitting in front of me completely empty, along with my bone-dry wine glass.
“Uh oh.”
She sets her plate on the coffee table and plops down beside me, wiggling her body until she’s firmly settled sideways and facing me head on. I toy with the tips of my brown hair to distract me from meeting her intense gaze that I feel boring into me.
“How different would my life be right now if I hadn’t gone through with the abortion?” It’s hard to keep the pain out of my words because even though I’m once again pregnant, it doesn’t eliminate the heartache that came with that burden, or the burden I had placed upon her.
“I don’t know, Kay. I really don’t. I mean, you’d have a 10-year-old son or daughter. You probably would have ended up with Ayden, Yuck.” She cringes. “I just can’t picture it. It was so long ago, I’ve kind of gotten used to things being this way, just you and Wes.” She smiles sympathetically, knowing her words were polite yet somewhat harsh at the same time.
“Yeah, so have I.” I mumble. “Things aren’t going to be staying the same, though, and I think that’s what’s going to take some getting used to. For everyone.”
Jazzy looks at me, squinting her eyes and hanging on my every word. “What’s going on, Kate?”
Jazzy rarely ever uses my real name, but considering we rarely bring up my abortion, it isn’t a surprise to see her suspicion. There’s no beating around the bush. I drop the tips of my hair, the dark wavy strands falling gracefully to my shoulders.
As if on instinct as well as on purpose, my right hand rests on top of my stomach. I can feel my eyes glossing over as I try with all my might to think of the proper way to phrase the next words about to escape my lips. Jazzy’s eyes follow my every move and it’s when I see the light bulb click in her head that I know I don’t even need to say anything.
She’s figured it out on her own. Jazz read me like the goddamn book that I am.
“How?”
One word, but one that holds so much question and I honestly don’t even have the answer for it. The fact that I’m pregnant mystifies even me.
Jazzy was there. She lived through what I did and knows just how real and traumatic an event it was. She heard the same words fall from the doctor’s lips. This wasn’t ever supposed to be my reality.
I shake my head as clear, salty tears spill from my eyes. “I don’t know.” I reach my free hand up and wipe away the tears at the same time she leans over, squealing and squeezing me tightly. Her abruptness nearly makes my pointer finger poke into my eye, which only puts both of us into a fit of giggles.
“You’re having a baby?” she asks, as if she really doesn’t believe me. Not that I blame her. I didn’t believe it myself. I can only nod at her, a wide smile slipping across my lips. “Ohmyfuckinggod.” Her words blur together into one big word and we both laugh even harder.
She leans over and rubs my belly, then cups her hands and, as quiet as humanly possible, whispers to my stomach,
“Oh, no. Not you too,” I whine, secretly loving the attention that the baby and I are getting. But she doesn’t need to know that.
“Let me guess.” She winks at me. “Wes?”
“Ugh. Yes. Every night before we go to sleep, he talks to my stomach and kisses it. It’s weird. I’ve tried telling him that the baby is the size of a gummy bear on crack and that it probably can’t hear him yet, but he laughs and brushes it off.”
“Zip it. Love is love and I have no doubt your little gummy bear can feel it.” She plops back into the pillows behind her, staring at me before a wicked Cheshire Cat grin spreads over her face. “So... Weston is a Tootsie Pop huh?”
“What?”
“Hard on the outside, but a massive softy on the inside. I knew it. Nothing gets past me.”
“And tasty to boot.” I wink.
Jazzy covers her eyes and screams. “I so could have done without that mental image. He’s like the annoying older brother I wish I never had.”
I shrug. I’m not ashamed in the least for my attraction to him. He’s straight up mouthwatering and, although he could charm the panties off of any random girl, he remains faithful and loyal.
I’ve never felt so loved.
I won that lottery with flying colors.
“So back to the baby because the last thing I want to hear about his your fiancés family jewels.” I smirk at her imagery but don’t say anything. “How far along are you?”
I glance down at my phone and pull up the baby app. I don’t do numbers very well whatsoever, so when I googled pregnancy by week and saw it come up in the search results, it was a done deal. I downloaded it right away.
“I’m just past my 14-week mark.” I look up at her, rolling my eyes at her newly painted-on surprise. All she can do is look me up and down in awe.
“Stand up.”
“You won’t see anything. I’m not showing yet.”
“Well, don’t mind me, but I think I need to see this for myself. Lift your shirt.”
“What? Why?” I growl but her expression remains the same. Jazzy isn’t budging.
“It isn’t like I haven’t already seen you naked. Do you not remember church camp?”
She just had to bring up the time we snuck out after curfew to play truth or dare with some boys from the soccer camp down the road. We were 13 and hormones were raging; every boy looked cute to us back then. Then Bobby Ghouring dared me to skinny dip. I almost chickened out, too; that is, until he started mocking me and telling everyone that the preacher’s daughter was afraid.
So I skinny dipped.
And yet... Not a stitch of shame followed.
“Fine.” I hiss before lifting my shirt, frustration coursing through me. “See? Nothing. No baby bump.”
“Turn sideways.” So I do what she says. “I think it’s only fair that, since I was as big as a house when I was 14 weeks with the twins, I at least see some kind of bump on you. Mission accomplished. You, my psycho best friend, actually have a bump. I am so proud.” She smiles and instant frustration comes over me.
“You’re blind. I see myself every day, I think I would know if I suddenly started getting fatter.”
“It’s very tiny, but there is one there, Kay. Scouts honor.”
“You were never a Girl Scout.” I say, trying my damnedest not to laugh at her, but failing miserably.
“True, but I am being honest. Would I ever lie to you?”
“Do you want me to seriously answer that?” I ask her, pulling my shirt back down and finally grabbing my plate and towering pieces of a crunchy roll with a side of eel sauce on top.
“You suck.” she growls.
“You know, Wes says the same thing to me all the time. And by all the time, I mean all the time.” I wiggle my eyebrows suggestively. She cringes dramatically at the same time I pop a piece of sushi into my mouth. Savoring the flavor, my taste buds feeling as if they are slowly exploding like a firework.
The room grows quiet while we cuddle up beneath a blanket with our plates in our laps.
“Can I be honest with you, Jazzy?”
“Of course, Kay.”
I sigh quietly, mulling over the way my train of thought decided to travel.
“Remember when you told me about Carson and Carlisle?” She nods, toying with her rubber-banded cheater chopsticks. “I was so upset at you for being pregnant, for having the ability to conceive.”
“You never told me.”
“I never told you because there was nothing for you to say. You couldn’t apologize, because it wasn’t your fault; you didn’t do a damn thing wrong. You couldn’t do anything to change the fact that I had had my chance and blown it. There was nothing you could have done to make it easier on me and it would have been incredibly selfish of me to ruin such a happy moment in your life just because I was jealous.” I clear my throat, forcing myself to not turn into a blubbering mess. “I was jealous that you were getting everything I’d wanted with Weston. You got not one, but two babies.”
“I’m sorry, Kate.” A tear slips down her cheek and I feel like complete crap for making her cry.
“Don’t you dare feel bad or feel the least bit guilty. You are my best bitch in the entire world.”
Jazzy starts laughing hard, but it doesn’t last for long. I can see an air of seriousness hang over her head like a storm cloud waiting to release havoc on the world below it. “I’ve wanted this for you, Kay. It broke my heart knowing that, by the time you realized you wanted it, you couldn’t ever have it.”
“But Weston and I will have it now. That’s all that matters, right? I want to let go of all those feelings I’ve kept bottled up for so long. I want to focus on all the good that this miracle baby is going to bring into our lives. Weston and I are getting our happily ever after. I’m getting my second chance.”
I lean forward and set my empty plate on the table, then lean back, resting my head on her shoulder.
“I just can’t wait for you to get really, really fat so I can make fun of the way you waddle. Karma is a fucking bitch.”
Now I’m regretting all those comments I made while she was pregnant.
This shall be fun.
Not.
~*~
I stand in front of my full-length mirror in my matching pink lace bra and boy shorts.
“Honey, I’m home.” I hear the garage door close behind Wes, followed by some rustling in the kitchen.
In minutes, Weston walks into our bedroom and eyes me with a whistle. “I can get used to this kind of homecoming.”
I wink at him before turning back to the mirror in frustration. I want to see what Jazzy sees, a tiny bump, any little sign to let me know that our child is growing perfectly and safely within me. But I don’t. Sure, I see a little bulge, but I did just finish eating three full crunchy rolls, so...
“Do you see it?”
“What?”
I can’t help the massive sigh that leaves my lips at his obvious man response.
So perceptive that one is.
“Never mind.” I walk past him to grab my yoga pants, but he stops me, pulling me into his arms for a quick kiss before dropping to his knees. “I see it, Katie Kat.” He looks up at me from beneath his long eyelashes then turns back to my midsection. “I would never not notice your stomach slowly beginning to grow as it carries our lovechild.” He flutters small kisses on my belly, sending heat to my core.
“Did you just say ‘lovechild’?”
“Do you always have to question me? Can’t you just take a compliment?”
“How was that a compliment, Weston?” I glower down at him.
“Kate.” He warns before rising to his feet and once again towering over my small frame. “You are so fucking radiant and I know you don’t even see it, but this baby is making you lighter.”
“Is this a backhanded comment about my weight?” I question.
His head hangs momentarily before his small chuckle breaks into a deep laugh. “I would never dare to insult your growing weight. You’d fucking castrate me, love.”
“Okay then. As long as we’re clear on that, go on.”
“By lighter, I mean happier, Katie Kat. Our baby is helping you to let go of the weight on your heart from your past indiscretions. God, I am so fucking proud of how strong you are. I admire you.”
I brush a strand of his long hair out of his face and rest my head beneath his chin.
“Weston, I should probably put some clothes on.” I giggle, realizing he’s fully dressed and I’m basically almost naked.
“Hey. I’m not complaining.” He lifts my chin and our eyes lock firmly on each other’s. “In fact, I think I’m wearing a little too much, wouldn’t you say?”
I bite my lip trying incredibly hard not to show how excited I am at his comment. He’s right though, far too much clothing.
Forget fried Oreos and crunchy rolls... Just give me Weston any day.
“I may or may not be in agreement with you, my love.” I wink, beginning to rid my sexy, rugged fiancé of the large amount of clothes he’s wearing.
Clothes are far too overrated anyways.