Total pages in book: 210
Estimated words: 203847 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 1019(@200wpm)___ 815(@250wpm)___ 679(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 203847 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 1019(@200wpm)___ 815(@250wpm)___ 679(@300wpm)
I finish my business and shove the stick up my sleeve. I’m alone, no one is here, but I’m hiding it anyway.
Then, like a totally rational human being, I shove it in my knicker drawer and slam it shut.
Shit. I’m even saying ‘knicker’ now.
And I pace. To the front door. To the kitchen. To the sofa. To the bath. To the spare room. To Angus’s food bowl.
To my bedroom.
I sit on the bed and stare. At the drawer. Accusingly. Tapping my foot. Sighing. Chewing my nail. Flicking my hair. Rocking my legs.
Has it been three minutes yet?
I don’t know.
I’m too afraid to look.
I stay sitting and count to sixty in my mind. I rationalize that it’s surely been three minutes by now. Surely.
Deep breath, Liv.
Deep breath.
I open the drawer and pull the test out. My eyes are screwed shut. Aw, hell. Where are my lady balls?
Mind you, if I had balls, I wouldn’t be staring at a stick covered in my urine.
Okay. Shit. Time to look.
I open my eyes and look at that motherfucking hourglass, which is flipping itself up and down, up and down.
“You bitch,” I hiss.
That had to have been three minutes! If not, it was sure as shit the longest two of my life.
“Change. Change.” I chant, over and over, staring at the tiny screen. “Change you fucking—ooooh shit. Oh. Shit.”
Pregnant. 3+.
I drop the stick like it’s giving me herpes.
No no no no no no fucking no!
I have the implant. How is this possible? I didn’t actually think I would be.
Shit.
There’s a person inside me.
A real-life person.
A tiny baby that is part me and part Tyler.
That will cry at me and poop on me and spit up all over my Louboutins.
Fuck. No.
I must have read that wrong.
I grab the stick and look again, but no. I was right. Pregnant, 3+. That’s five weeks… Over a month. Which means I got pregnant almost immediately. When we weren’t even in a real relationship.
I hold out my left arm and stare at the place where my implant is. All that pain getting it fitted, and for what? For it to give in and get me knocked up six months before it gets taken out?
Shit. I have to call the doctor. I need this thing removed.
I look between my arm and the test. I have to get the implant removed. There is no other option.
Yes, Tyler and I are fucked up. Yes, our relationship isn’t the healthiest. Yes, we both have our issues.
But this baby? It didn’t ask for that. It doesn’t deserve to be punished for what we suffer from. That’s for me and him to deal with.
I look down at my stomach. Fifteen minutes ago I was joking about ballooning, putting weight on, getting stretch marks… Now I’m scared.
I’m petrified.
I pull up my top, lie down, and settle my hand over my lower stomach.
I never thought I’d ever be a mom. I never imagined, not even for a second, that I would find someone I would be comfortable enough and safe enough with to contemplate having a family with.
Only I didn’t decide this. It was chosen for me. For some bizarre reason, this baby was picked when I didn’t want it to be.
Crap. That sounds so bad. Like I don’t want this baby.
I do. I don’t. Maybe I do. Maybe I don’t.
I don’t know what to feel right now. All I know is I have to call my doctor and get this bit of metal out of my arm because this baby deserves more than failing hormones being pumped into my body.
Then I can come to terms with it. Then I can accept the hand I’ve been dealt, deal with my demons, and look forward.
With Tyler.
Because there’s no way I can’t tell him.
I just need to accept it myself before I do.
I wince as the doctor cuts a small line down my arm despite the fact that I can’t feel any pain. When I called and told her about my test results, she got me in during her next appointment to remove it.
The whole time, she’s been telling me how unfortunate it is I got pregnant on the implant, and how I’m in the tiny two percent of people who will. She’s also been telling me that I should have been using a condom as well as the implant to practice safe sex.
The whole time, I’ve been sitting here like, “Dude. I had the implant. You think I wasn’t practicing safe sex?”
Regardless, she pulls the device from my arm and puts me back together. I leave the office with an appointment for two weeks’ time, a prescription for folic acid, and a pregnancy booklet to read.
Fantastic.
I also leave with a heavy secret and a lead weight upon my heart.
The second I walk through the door of my apartment, I dive beneath a blanket on the sofa and turn on The Big Bang Theory.