Chapter 19
Anna
I woke up from a restless, dreamless sleep. I felt disoriented, and for a moment I wasn’t sure where I was. Something was wrong, something nagged at the back of my mind, but I couldn’t put my finger on it straight away. When I turned my head to the side, I noticed Luke had already gotten up. I spread out my arms and lay across the entire double bed.
As if the information had only been lagging until I was awake, it slapped me in the face. I was pregnant. I had taken the test yesterday, and it had been positive. I suddenly felt worse. That explained everything. It explained how bloated I had been feeling, how sore my nipples were, how tired I had been all the time. When my period had been late, I had asked Luke to drive me to Dillon with the excuse that I had bought the wrong tampons. I hadn’t been able to talk to him about what I had found out. I had no idea what to do. I was worried about how Luke would react, and I was worried about my future which looked like a big black hole, now.
Luke was a great guy, and when everything was set out, it worked like clockwork. But not everything was planned. Having a baby hadn’t been a part of the picture, and I was scared Luke would be angry with me for some reason. I couldn’t cope with that right now. My emotions were already all over the place. I wish I had someone I could talk to. It was in times like these that I wished I had known my mom, that I still had her around to speak to. I had a photo of her, and she had the same dark hair and dark eyes I had. I had imagined what kind of person she would be like for a long time, but now I wished it had all been true. I wished I’d had the opportunity to meet her.
Now, I didn’t have anyone I could talk to. Lizabeth was in a different place in her life, and I doubted she would be able to give objective advice. Besides, she was a hundred miles away, and I needed to see my best friend face to face for this. I needed someone to be able to guide me, talk me through it, to tell me what I should do. I had no idea which way to turn. When I tried to think about keeping the baby, I thought about Luke and where our relationship might go. Our romance had been born out of tragedy and suspense. I wasn’t sure that what we had would hold up in real life at all, and if I was going to have a baby, I needed to.
Another alternative was to raise the child by myself. I knew I was independent, and I would probably be able to pull something like that off, but every child started off with two parents as a rule. There was a reason for that. The child needed both his mom and his dad. If Luke and I didn’t stay together, it would very strongly affect the future of my unborn child.
The more I thought about it, the more my head started hurting and I felt depressed. I had no idea what to do. I felt lonely and lost with no one to turn to.
Finally, I climbed out of bed and changed into warmer clothes. When I walked into the living room, Luke was looking out of the window again.
“Is everything fine out there?” I asked. “Did the lion come back?”
Luke shook his head. “It looks like everything is all right, now. The mountain lion hasn’t come back, yet. Let’s hope it stays that way.”
I nodded and walked to the couch where I pulled up my legs and tucked my feet underneath me. We were silent for a while. Luke had been catching onto my mood, commenting about how I was acting and how distant I was. I knew I was behaving different toward him, but I was struggling to sort out my emotions. Not only was I on an emotional rollercoaster ride because I had just found out I was pregnant, but my emotions were also all over the place. Of course, it was a symptom of early pregnancy, but I hated it. I was usually a stable person and now everything was haywire. Luke was suspicious, but I could chalk it up to being on my period. Even though it wasn’t true, many of the early symptoms of pregnancy were the same as the symptoms of having a period, and I doubted Luke would know any better. He was a man who lived in the mountains, isolated from almost everything, including women. How much could he really know?
While the two of us were stranded here in the cabin, both of us running, I could pretend the pregnancy wasn’t real. But what happened when I needed to leave? What was I going to do? I didn’t know if I was going to keep the baby, and if I was would I be hiding it from him forever. I didn’t know if I was even going to keep in contact with Luke. I would have liked to, but realistically, I didn’t know if it was possible.
I didn’t even know if I would leave the cabin as my father’s prisoner or as a free woman. I felt lost and confused and scared to talk to Luke about it. I was terrified he would be upset with me and turn his back on me instead of being there for me the way he had been all this time. Even though I was hiding something from him now, I wasn’t ready to risk going through all this alone. Luke had been so attentive and so caring, helping me get through the trauma of running from my dad and being stuck in a snowstorm with him. If he found out about the baby and he was upset, he might shun me, and I couldn’t cope with that. It was easier not to tell him, to keep giving him excuses than to lose him.
“How are you feeling today?” Luke asked, walking to the couch and sitting down next to me.
I shrugged. “I’m feeling all right. A little under the weather, but I think it might be because I’m not used to this weather.”
It was a silly excuse, but Luke nodded slowly.
“I guess that could play a role in how you feel,” he said.
Luke tried to make a little more conversation, but I was short with him. I didn’t feel like making conversation. I didn’t feel like answering his questions truthfully, and I didn’t feel like lying to him, either. I knew I was wrong about how I acted. I should have come out and told him exactly what was going on. But I couldn’t help it, not now. I felt like shit, and I was so stressed out I could barely eat. My stomach was nauseous consistently, and that only made me crabbier. I knew it wasn’t fair to Luke. On top of everything that was happening in my personal life, my dad could arrive at our front door any minute. I didn’t know how he would find me, but I knew he didn’t stop until he got what he wanted. I didn’t only fear for what he would do to me when he found me, what my future would entail if he dragged me back home. I also feared for Luke.
If my father found out I had been living with the stranger all this time, having a romantic affair with him, he would kill Luke. And I wasn’t talking about the metaphor, either. I was terrified he would end Luke purely because he had been with me. My dad was very controlling, extremely possessive, and he had access to all the bells and whistles of the underground world. Luke would be no match for him no matter how much he wanted to protect me.
I wondered if I should have told Luke about who my dad was and what he was risking by giving me a place to stay. I had been keeping it a secret from him from the start, but I wasn’t sure I could come clean about it, now. Again, I was worried I would push Luke away and he would be angry with me. The only thing worse than everything I was going through right now, was having to go through all of this without Luke. I had started to rely on him, to lean on his strength when I had none. If I lost him now, not only would I be heartbroken, but I didn’t know if I would be able to pull through.
“Don’t you want to tell me what’s wrong?” Luke asked, and I realized he had been watching me while I had been trying to rationalize everything in my mind.
“It’s just my period,” I said. “My cramps are really bad.” How long would I be able to keep riding this excuse? I felt bad about lying to Luke.
“Here, let me get you something,” Luke said and stood up. He walked to the bedroom and reappeared a while later with Tylenol and a heating pad. I was surprised. It turned out he knew a little more about periods than I had thought.
“Thank you so much,” I said, and I really meant it. Luke surprised me with his gallantry every time. Every time I thought he had reached the limit of how kind he could be to me, he surpassed it. I felt terrible about lying to him when he was this good to me, but I was still terrified of the alternative.
“I’m going to lie back down,” I said after I took the Tylenol. Luke nodded without saying anything. I didn’t know what he was thinking, and I was a little nervous to ask. I had the feeling that I had been a disappointment to him because I had been struggling with my own things so much.
“Let me know if you need anything else,” he said.
“I will,” I said. I walked to the bedroom and lay down on the bed with the heating pad on my lower stomach in case Luke came in. I didn’t have cramps, but the heating pad made me feel better for some reason. Maybe it was the warmth.
I couldn’t believe I was pregnant. How was this possible? Luke had shown me the condoms we had used. I didn’t understand how I could have fallen pregnant after only having sex once or twice. I had to be the unluckiest girl in the world.
I thought about the wine we’d had the night before and guilt shot through my chest. How much wine had I had? Three glasses? Four? I shouldn’t have been drinking while I was pregnant, but I hadn’t known, then. I wondered if it hurt the baby. If I had, it was more guilt to add on top of everything else. Guilt about lying to Luke, guilt about keeping the pregnancy a secret, guilt about drinking wine. Perfect.
It all became too much to bear and tears rolled down my cheeks. I wished I had someone to talk to about this, to unload what was bothering me even if I didn’t get any advice in return. I felt like I was completely and utterly alone in this, and I hated it.