Chapter 1
“I’m pregnant.”
Those words took my breath away. “What? Why? How?” I sputtered.
“The usual way, I guess.” She’d only been married to Dex Truitt for what, a year? Two years? I’d lost track of time since I got way too drunk at Bianca and Dex’s wedding and had gone home in a Lyft before the party ended.
I felt the burn of envy in the pit of my stomach and wished that I didn’t feel anything. I wasn’t the kind of woman who spent years fantasizing about her own wedding with a Pinterest board and everything, but I was a sucker for parenting magazines even though I didn’t have any kids. Somehow doctors kept them in their waiting rooms. Maybe I wasn’t the only one who liked looking at pictures of babies.
I was single and childless by choice. Mostly.
“Congratulations,” I choked out, even as I thought about asking for the check. I wasn’t one of the 22-24-26 girls with whom I’d gone to college back in Indiana. There were women who had their life plan set up to graduate and marry at 22, have a first child at 24, and have a second kid by age 26. I’d been more focused on my own little startup, which was just now getting to the point where I felt like I could afford casual dinners like this instead of eating some boiled ramen over a sink at home and not worry about running out of money before the end of the month. My paycheck was paid by me to me on the first business day of every month.
“Dex has been insatiable.” Bianca was blushing prettily. When I blushed, I looked like an over-boiled lobster. She already had that pregnancy glow that everyone talked about, which was noticeable even though she had gleaming skin on a normal day. I hadn’t seen it until she came out with her news, but she was already walking down a road I might never go down. I hadn’t dated in years, too busy with my company to have time for men and the stupid back-and-forth that came with online dating. And now my friends had kids and the number of single people who could come out for a happy hour drink was dwindling to the people who were adamant about being child-free. I didn’t understand the child-free movement since I loved babies, but to each their own. Bianca and Dex hadn’t talked about their future plans much, so Bianca’s news came as a shock to me.
“But enough about me. How’s work? How’s the business?”
“Doing fine.” I smiled stiffly. “I’ve finally got it off the ground now. My parents have been getting louder about seeing me, so I’m flying home for my thirtieth birthday.”
“To Indiana?” Bianca wrinkled her nose.
“Hey, don’t knock it. We have the best corn in the world.”
Bianca giggled. “I’ll take your word for it.” She looked down at her watch. “I’ve got to run. Dex wants me to check out some different styles of cribs before we have our kiddo.”
“Seriously?”
“Yup, he bought baby books and everything. You’d think that our baby would come out of the womb already reading. That man has bought so many board books just for our little jelly bean.”
The waiter came by and ran our cards.
“Talk to you soon,” Bianca said before going out the door. Nowadays, she still loved to wear her sexy heels. I imagined that she’d be opting for flats soon if she was pregnant. Didn’t your center of gravity shift? I didn’t know very much about it. I sighed. Soon I’d be back in Indiana; my parents would make pointed remarks about my child-free life and how many nice young men lived in Indiana. I was used to it to some extent; I’d always said that I had to get my money’s worth out of my Harvard MBA.
Chapter 2
I stepped off the plane in IND and checked my purse for my wallet and phone, like I always did. One time, my cell phone fell out of my purse while I was still on the plane, so I had a habit of checking both before going through the security checkpoint. I could smell the scent of freshly popped Indiana popcorn in the airport.
I was only back for a little while anyway. It was weird to be sleeping in my childhood bedroom with my mom and dad just a wall away. I had my ten-year high school reunion two years ago, but I hadn’t bothered to attend. Nothing in my wardrobe looked like it had when I was a teenager wearing t-shirts and jeans. The glittery midnight blue top that I wore attracted looks in Indianapolis that it wouldn’t in NYC. I was too dressed up for the Midwest.
I got an Uber to get to my parents’ house in Carmel. My dad was talking to our landscaping guys and waved his hand as I got out of the cab. I was close enough to my parents to call home on a weekly basis. Dad didn’t want to sit in the cell phone parking lot when I could easily grab an Uber or Lyft home at the right time. I packed light for a girl, so there had been no need to wait around for my luggage. Once, I had watched a Youtube video with a designer who described putting together specific looks and only packing the components of different outfits. I was home for only a week. I was going to make the most of my vacation. I had an e-reader full of to-be-read books that I hadn’t gotten around to reading for years. I wasn’t even checking my work email, trusting my assistant to keep things running for a week. She had firmly banned me from lifting a finger for a week, saying that I needed to relax.
It was weird to be home. I knew somewhere around here, that old heartbreaker Logan Simpson was still around. We’d broken up when I went to IU and he went to U of M in Ann Arbor. Romi Anderson had gone to Michigan, too, and I’d seen their shotgun marriage and their baby pictures on Facebook. The last I heard, Logan was single and bringing up their daughter with primary custody. I was looking forward to a week without much digital stuff, though. I needed a digital cleanse in the worst way. Cal Newport wrote Digital Minimalism, which I heard about from people who were eager to evangelize the message. I had already read Deep Work and So Good They Can’t Ignore You. I liked how thought-provoking his works were, even though he took his conclusions to illogical extremes. There were people who evangelized about a simpler lifestyle. I was already getting itchy without the perma-present pressure of emails.
After hugging my mom, I geared up to go to the new Kroger on Michigan Road. I’d grown up going to the Marsh there and hadn’t really gone shopping in Kroger yet. There was one near my old prep school Brebeuf Jesuit. I used to shop at Krogucci when I was at IUB. I loved my parents a lot, but ever since my dad had gotten diabetes, they had zero junk food in the house besides pork rinds. If I wanted snacks, I had to hunt for them on my own. I called the Enterprise closest to the house to get a rental car at a better rate than what I’d get at the airport. The Enterprise man showed up with my car, had me sign some things, and let me drive my week-long rental to the closest Kroger. I pushed my way past Indiana apples and picked up corn. Then I saw a little kid inspecting the apples from her dad’s arms.
“Logan Simpson,” I called out, waving.
Chapter 3
The kid yelped as her dad held her closer. He looked up and saw me.
“Candace Beauclaire,” he said in a sports announcer voice. He always teased me about saying his full name.
“What are you doing here?” asked both of us at the same time. Annabelle was sucking her thumb, quietly watching the interaction.