Whirlwind

46

[Riley]

"Les just go and look at the damn things." I gritted into the mouthpiece of my headphones as my annoyance hit an all-time high. 

To say that I was a good friend is an understatement. I was a damn good friend; one who literally sat on the other end of the phone, listening closely as I struggled to bite my tongue and not speak up for the last hour. Initially I had no problem lending an ear, mostly because I was focused on trying to grab a few groceries out of the supermarket and prior to that, search for at least three outfits suitable for this evening. Now that I was back at my complex, struggling to grip every bag handle and close the trunk of my car, this rant and emotional roller coaster Leslie was riding on was far from ideal.

"Leslie..."

"Stop rushing and give me a minute!" she shouted into my ear, causing brows to furrow as my face screwed up. Here I was giving her my services for free in return, rather than an 'I'm sorry for talking your precious ears off, thank you Riley.', I get attitude.

"Um, excuse me, bitch." I sassed back, trying to squeeze between the tight spaces and yellow solid lines on the pavement. "I've given you sixty. It's time you've done us both a favor by shutting up and taking a look at them for goodness sake!"

"First of all, watch your mouth or else you'll get this hand work next time I see you. Second of all, fine." Now the line was finally quiet alike to me earlier and that alone left me awaiting the second Leslie backtracked as she had repeatedly done every fifteen minutes or so.

I guess I somewhat understood why she was so wired right now, but at the same time all the bragging she had been doing about the amount of effort her and her husband were putting in these days for this particular moment to happen, I figured she would be a bit more excited. Leslie was tough. She was also that bolt of energy everyone looked forward to and never had a 'down' phase in her life, but right now she was...she was me. And quite honestly, I wasn't sure how to handle it. Leslie was easily allowing what her doctor told her weeks, almost a month ago to scare her shitless.

"Sooo, what do they say?"

"I-I don't kno—"

"Know what, Leslie?" I questioned as I reached the door of the parking garage and stumbled inside to begin my hike up two flights of stairs. "There are four expensive pregnancy tests sitting around your sink and there is no way those bad boys are wrong. They're all waiting for you to determine whether or not they were a waste of money. On them reads your destiny, so go. Now!"

"Okay, okay." she muttered.

In the background all I could hear were the heels of her shoes knocking against the floor as she trailed back into her bathroom, right before a pause of silence stretched along the line yet again. Because she didn't immediately utter one word or shriek as I hoped she would, but instead released an exhale that was laced in nothing but exhaustion, I knew what the results were. I could sense it, and just as my heart dropped I could feel her chest clench as the brim of her eyes burned from the tears threatening them just as mine were. I envisioned her dropping her head down in defeat just as I shook my own.

This feeling was all too familiar.

I knew what it was like to keep pushing, to keep trying for something only to come up short every time. I knew that during the long and tedious process you begin to feel useless and as if something is wrong with you as a whole. You also lose faith and you become tired. I knew that this was the same case for Leslie. Until this day we were both very optimistic. We were both sure that the third, maybe even fourth time would be the charm, but yet we met another dead end. Now we both were overwhelmed with this fear that maybe, just maybe this wasn't meant to be, but a single solid line or the word negative was.