No response and it’s just now that I remember he’s out with his brothers.
I head straight for my room, strip out of my scrubs, and immediately get in the shower. For a few minutes, I manage. I wash and condition my hair. I wash my body. But when my hand hits my lower abdomen, that’s when the tears start.
I don’t even know what kind of tears these are.
The last few months of my life have been one thing after another.
No break.
Just one major life changing event quickly followed by the next. Tony. Knocking on the wrong door and then moving in with Carter. Sleeping with Carter. Having a seizure at work and now this. Never in my life have I felt so unsettled and just plain old scared about what my life and my future are going to look like.
What happens to my residency?
I don’t even have a real place to call home.
I’m squatting at my boss-turned-lover’s house.
Being pregnant only adds confusion to everything.
Christ, I haven’t even told my parents Tony and I are no longer engaged because I haven’t talked to them in months. Never have I needed a mother’s advice more than I do now, but I can’t go to mine and I sure as hell can’t go to Octavia Fritz.
Carter and I are too new for this. If we were ever going to work before, I don’t see how that can happen now. What if he doesn’t want this baby? What if he doesn’t want me the way I hope he does? What if I fucked us up? I’ve been so afraid of jumping into this thing with him and now here we are and… What if in my attempt to pump the breaks I wounded his pride, and all he’ll ever want from me is sex until he grows bored and moves on?
No. Carter wouldn’t abandon a baby. His baby.
But where does that leave us?
I sit on the shower floor, knees drawn up, head in hands, crying until the water runs cold. Until I’m shivering and wrecked and exhausted and done. Just so fucking done with everything.
I can’t even call Oliver because he’s Carter’s freaking brother. Oliver will be an uncle to this child. I take comfort in that. In knowing this baby will have a clan. A Fritz clan who are fiercely loyal and endlessly loving. Regardless of what happens or doesn’t happen between Carter and me, this baby will have a dad who loves it, uncles and aunts and cousins and grandparents too.
And no matter what, I’ll be okay because I have no choice but to be.
I throw on an old tank top and a pair of boy shorts and crawl in bed, tucking myself deep under the covers. Tears continue to fall like my body doesn’t know how to stop them. And I toss and turn. No position is comfortable, and I can’t just lay here.
I have to do something to stop these thoughts.
Clamoring out of bed, I throw the blankets off and storm down the long hallway into the kitchen. I flip on the lights and then slam open cabinet after cabinet. Crunchy peanut butter. Oreos. Fluff for sure. Popcorn. Definitely need popcorn. And where the fuck are the gummy worms I’ve been hiding?
If Carter threw them out, I will… found them. Crisis averted.
I pop the bag of popcorn in the microwave and while that’s popping up to crunchy buttery perfection, I head for the fridge. Leftover sesame noodles with spicy chicken. Absolutely. Oh, and lemonade. That’s for sure.
Once the popcorn is done, I dump it into a bowl and then survey everything I have littered on the countertops. No way I can carry all that all the way down to the media room. Especially when there is a huge TV in his family room that is right there.
It takes me four trips plus one to the bathroom before I’m able to start up the movie.
Knocked Up isn’t an option. I mean, let’s face it, they make my entire profession look like bumbling, stupid idiots. And What to Expect When You’re Expecting can go fuck itself sideways. No one wants to be mocked by a stupid romcom when their life is in so much upheaval. So Juno truly is my only option. If a sixteen-year-old girl can figure her shit out when she’s pregnant and the adoptive mother decides to raise the baby alone then surely I’ll be fine.
I’m halfway through the movie, gummy worm a half beat from my lips when the door opens and Carter comes strolling in. He glances around until he spots me, sitting on the sofa with an orgy sized pity-party of food.
“Hey,” he says, a smirk dancing on his lips. “Rough night with Margot?”
A mirthless laugh bursts from my chest, but I can’t form words, any words.
He saunters over to me, his eyes slightly glazed, and I know he’s had a few drinks tonight. I can’t tell Carter he’s going to be a father when he’s drunk. That’s a sober conversation if ever there was one and suddenly my stay of execution is granted.
I look down at the candy in my hand and then back up to the television. Juno is meeting with the prospective adopting couple, and guilt swarms through me. I can’t meet Carter’s gaze, though I can feel him desperately trying to get me to look at him.
He removes the empty bowl of popcorn from my lap, setting it down on the table. His body slides in beside mine on the couch and before I know what the hell is happening, he’s slapping the gummy worm from my hand.
“Hey,” I snap but then he’s on me, his lips all over mine as he pushes me onto my back.
“I can’t kiss you if you’re going to eat that disgusting crap and right now Grace, I have to kiss you.”
His tongue slides in my mouth, the taste of whiskey and something spicy heating my blood to desperate degrees. My stomach dips as he shifts my leg to wrap around his waist, his thumb brushing my inner thigh. He grinds into me and goose bumps bloom across my skin, flushing my cheeks from the inside out. I shouldn’t do this. I mean, I need to tell him what’s going on.
But in this moment, I can’t.
Tomorrow, everything for us is going to change.
I’m so afraid this will be gone, never to return. He’s a little drunk and I’m a big coward and I need to feel him. Know he’s real, here, with me. Whether it stays that way or not.
My tank top meets the floor and Carter’s gaze drags heatedly up my body. Eyes clouded by such surprising emotion, it makes me nervous. Does he already know?
He rips his shirt over his head and then he’s back on me, chest to chest, skin to skin. He leans forward and kisses me again. Hungrier. Dirtier. His lips are unforgivably fierce as they punish mine only to switch things up as he lifts me off my back, sits up, and forces me to straddle his hips.
Strong hands dive into my hair, holding me, caressing down my back, but his eyes are steadfast on the place where our bodies meet. His hard length, trapped behind his dark slacks. My boy shorts, nothing but a terrible nuisance that needs to be eliminated. But to remove either of them, we’d have to stand up. Shift. Adjust.
Instead, Carter unbuttons and then unzips his pants, freeing himself. Cotton is shoved aside, cool air hitting my wet heat, and then he’s inside me.
“Don’t move,” he rasps, his jaw clenched tight. “I want to look at you like this.”
And look, he does. He stares at my face. My swollen lips. The blue of my eyes. Down the column of my neck to my breasts, swollen and achy for his touch. Past my still flat stomach and when they reach the spot just below my navel, I bite my lip, quivering.
He sticks his thumb in his mouth and then rubs the moistened digit along my exposed clit, watching with rapt attention at what that does to me. The feel of his large cock inside of me. The spike of pure pleasure he’s supplying externally.