Christen sat on the toilet, head in her hands, staring down at her feet. She wondered how long she could sit here, staring at her toes, before she had to acknowledge the truth of the four little white sticks next to her, taunting her from the edge of the bathtub. She'd been sitting there for at least twenty minutes, unmoving, almost lifeless. She should probably be feeling something. Probably. Didn’t women usually feel something? Fear? Happiness? Despair?
Christen felt nothing. Numb. Could one feel numb or were they just simply numb? Christen didn’t know. She should be getting ready for her date though, not contemplating the complexities of language.
Ha.
Her date. Her date with Tobin. She was supposed to be going to Tobin’s apartment for their date. Their first real, official date. She was meant to bring the wine. Maybe she could bring the wine and the cup of pregnancy tests.Hi, Tobin. I know you were only expecting me but I’ve brought someone else along. I don’t really have a choice in the matter. By the way, I won’t be drinking the wine that I offered to bring, seeing as I can’t.
Christen let out an empty laugh that quickly turned into a sob, burying her face in the palm of her hands as she cried. Why had she chosen to look at the tests tonight? Why hadn’t she waited until after her date? She had only confirmed what she already knew, but at least before she could pretend that nothing had changed.
Christen had known for almost a week now. She had known. Of course she had. Christen had lived in her body for sixty years. She had noticed the change immediately, had recognised that something was different right away. And she knew exactly what was causing the change, she had known the reason. But she stayed in blissful denial for six days, pretending nothing was different. However, she’d woken up this morning unable to go another day ignoring the inevitable, deciding as she was bent over the toilet that she had to stop running from the truth. That decision had triggered another wave of nausea and caused her to lose the contents of her already empty stomach. And so here she was six hours later, in her bathroom yet again, bawling into her hands.
God, how could she have allowed this to happen? She wasn’t an idiot. She knew how this worked. Penis + vagina = baby. It was simple. She knew this, and yet… She'd gotten caught up. For the first time in so long, she had been happy, carefree. Untouched by all the ugly things of her past, by all the demons that had haunted her for most of her life. Tobin had taken that all away. She'd helped Christen forget. She'd made her happy. And Christen had been careless in that happiness, blinded by love and joyful feelings and Tobin.
She'd been stupid. And now she was pregnant. How was she going to break this to Tobin? She had just started dating the woman. Hell, technically they weren’t even dating. Tonight, the dating was going to begin. How was she going to tell her? How was Tobin going to react?
Christen took a deep breath, swallowing back her tears as she forced herself to calm down. There was no sense in overthinking this. She would just get up, get ready, go to Tobin's With the pregnancy test in hand, and tell her. She'd tell her. That’s what she’d do. And then she’d have the emotional breakdown later.
Christen stood, going to the sink and turning on the tap. She let the cool water run over her shaking hands for a moment before cupping a bit of water and splashing it on her cheeks. She then turned off the faucet, reached for a towel, and dried her face.
Christen looked at herself in the mirror. She looked like shit, but at least she wasn’t crying anymore. The puffiness and redness would go away by the time she got to Tobin’s. She took a deep breath and walked over to the bathtub, breath hitching in her throat the second she spotted the cup with the white sticks protruding from the top. Tears formed in her eyes again and no matter how hard she tried to fight it, they spilled over onto her cheeks. Christen reached out a trembling hand and grabbed the cup, closing her eyes as she grabbed the tests (four, in total) and dumped the liquid into the toilet. She then tossed the cup and flushed, mentally preparing herself to look at the pregnancy tests again. She had broken down the first time she’d looked. And the second. She knew what they said. This time would be different.
