Total pages in book: 33
Estimated words: 31116 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 156(@200wpm)___ 124(@250wpm)___ 104(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 31116 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 156(@200wpm)___ 124(@250wpm)___ 104(@300wpm)
Epilogue
NAOMI
Thirteen Months Later
Getting in and out of the air-sled gets more and more difficult with every month that I’m pregnant. To think that I’ve still got one or two to go. By the time this baby comes, I’m going to have to be strapped on the hood instead of in one of the seats. Groaning, I turn to the side, pushing the control sticks out of the way as I get to my feet. Once upright, I give my back a moment to adjust, put a hand under the heft of my belly to support it, and waddle toward the custodial office.
“Oh my god, look at how big you are!” a familiar voice squeals when I cross the street. “You get bigger every time I see you.” Martina clasps her hands in front of her chest, beaming at me as I make my way. “You’re as big as a house.”
If I wasn’t so big, I think I’d cheerfully murder her for pointing that out. As it is, all I can do is smile politely and pat my belly. It’s true. I’m an absolute house. Not just a house. A mansion. A palace. A happy one, though. I rub my belly. “I am definitely growing a full-sized person in here.”
“How are things going?” she asks, eyeing my belly with envy. “You and your sweetheart are together every time I see you. You look so great together.”
“Ainar is wonderful,” I agree. “How are things with you?”
Her expression fades a bit. “Oh, you know. Just living the single life.” She brushes a lock of hair back from her face and gazes wistfully at my belly. “What’s it like being so pregnant? Miserable?”
“Actually, I kind of love it?” I give my huge belly a pat. “I mean, yeah, my ankles swell up like balloons and my belly is covered in so many stretch marks I look like a zebra, but gosh, it’s wonderful. I feel amazing and so connected to this little person.”
As if my baby girl is agreeing with me, she gives my belly a kick.
“I’m really happy for you,” Martina says, her eyes full of emotion. “You’re so lucky you found Ainar just as you were thinking about trying a fertility shot.”
“Yup. Isn’t that timing incredible?” I say. She doesn’t know the truth of how the two of us met. She definitely doesn’t need to know that I met Ainar when I showed up at the port office, begging for someone to impregnate me. As far as she knows, it was just the right place at the right time. “So crazy how the universe just threw him in my path.”
Martina eyes me with interest. “So what brings you into town this morning? Running errands?”
“Pie,” I admit. “I came in for pie. Lucy promised to send one in to the office with Rektar and I can’t stop thinking about it.” Have I put on weight this pregnancy? Far too much. Do I care? Not in the slightest. Ainar loves my spreading thighs and my huge belly, and if he’s happy with them, I’m happy with them too.
I love being pregnant. Love everything about it. The food cravings, the changes in my body, all of it. Most of all, I love the connection with the baby growing in my stomach. I’ve been lucky in that it’s been a breeze. I know people that have been sick for the entire pregnancy or had health problems, but it’s been easy for me, as if the universe is finally throwing me a bone.
We chat for a few more minutes about nothing at all. Martina looks good despite her broken heart. Her praxiian boyfriend came back only to rob her of her credits and then took off again. Now she’s got no baby, no boyfriend, and no savings. But she keeps her chin up, because if there’s one common element of Risda women, it’s that we’re survivors. We take the shit the universe dishes out at us and we keep on going. Martina will be just fine. We make a lunch date for next week, and then I head into the Port Custodial Office to say hello to my boyfriend and get myself some pie.
The moment I step through the door, I see all of the consulting tables at the front office are busy. Rektar is talking with a pair of newcomers and showing them vids of a sample farm. Sinath is writing notes on his data pad as Lettie complains about the slow response time of her farm bots. Paxon walks out with another woman, strapping on a protective plas helmet that I’ve seen the men use for insect infestations.
And at another table in the corner, my sweet Ainar sits with his shoulders hunched and a slim tool in his hand, his eyes narrowed in concentration as he works on repairing a data pad for a weepy-looking Christine, who probably dropped hers again. (Ainar tells me she’s broken all the equipment at her farm at least once. She’s a bit accident prone.)