Heartbeats (om hold)

Chapter Two

1 week later

Liz was coming over to my apartment today.

            She made her decision, but she wanted to say it in person to me.

            I was nervous. My hands were sweaty, my legs wouldn’t stop shaking, and I couldn’t sit down and watch TV without needing to get up and pace my living room. I couldn’t think straight. I tried reading a book, but I kept finding myself reading the same sentence over and over again. My eyes darted to my phone, hoping Liz would call again. I jumped at the slightest sound and I’ve hardly slept all week. Man, I needed coffee.

            I glance at the clock. 12:07. I glanced at the calendar. March 19th. I checked the Missed Alerts on my phone. You have no missed alerts. I groaned in frustration. This was one of the only weekends I didn’t have any papers to write or homework to do. I actually wished I had some right now. And that’s totally unlike me.

            Liz wouldn’t be here till five o’clock, when she got off work. I needed to find something to occupy myself.

            Briiing! Briiing!

            “Hello?”

            “Hey, Ty!”

            I hadn’t talked to Becca since she told me she was pregnant.

            I’ve always wanted to have child, to be a dad. But I wanted that to happen with Liz, not Becca. But unless Becca has a miscarriage, gives a stillborn birth, or the baby dies after it’s born, etc., it was going to happen (Liz is going to school to be a doctor, she likes to bore me to death with details), whether I liked it or not. I’m going to be there for Becca. Well, not so much Becca, but I will be there for my child. I probably won’t enjoy being around Becca, but I’ll love being with my child. I promised myself that. I’m still not sure about what will happen during the rest of Becca’s pregnancy, or when the baby comes, and that scares me.

            I’m not sure what to expect. I’ve never exactly been around a pregnant woman before. I’m the youngest child and grandchild in my family. My older brother, Aaron, has a one-year-old daughter named Samantha, but I was only around him and his wife, Madison, two or three times when they were expecting Sammy. Liz’s younger sister was born two years after we became friends, but I was to little to remember her mom being pregnant. So, yeah, never really been around a pregnant woman.

            “What is it, Becca?” I sighed.

            “Well, I have my first ultrasound today,” she explained, “and since you’re the father, I would figure you’d want to go.”

            “I –”

            “I mean, you don’t have to, but I’d like a little support in this! It takes two to tango, you know. You were a part in this too.”

            Oh God! Were these the hormones? Already? Oh, man, I was in going to be in hell till this baby came. Did hormones really start this early in pregnancies? 

            “Right! Yeah, of course I’ll go!” I really didn’t want to go. But I decided to go for two reasons. 1) I didn’t want Becca’s hormones to drive me crazy and 2) This would keep me occupied for a while.

            “Great! Pick me up in an hour! I can’t wait to see our baby!”

            Click!