Chapter 112

A week later and I was driving my new car. It had made a dip in my savings, but it was worth it. I got home and sank down at my kitchen table. I was still tired and I didn’t get it. I loved working in my bakery and it wasn’t that taxing. I really shouldn’t be this tired. Was I coming down with the flu after all? But I didn’t have a fever, or cough or anything like that. Maybe a cup of coffee would do the trick so I could stay up a couple of more hours. I walked over to the cabinet and took out the jar with ground up coffee. I opened it and a wave of unease hit me. No, that would not do. I wouldn’t be able to drink that. I put it back and took stock of the situation. Anthony’s teasing words from Saturday played in my mind. But I couldn’t be pregnant. Hunter and I had always been careful, and it had been too long since we had sex for me not to notice something amiss. Then I froze. The bathroom in the courthouse. I tried to think back, had we used a condom? I didn’t remember that we had. But then, that day was a little blurry in general. The more I thought about it, the more certain I became we hadn’t used one.

“Fuck, fuck, fuck,” I muttered as I googled for the closest pharmacy that would be open at this hour. I grabbed my car keys and ran out the door. At the pharmacy I stood in front of the shelf with the pregnancy tests and wondered which one I would get. In the end, I grabbed eight different brands and walked over to the register. The girl that helped me gave me a smile as she saw the pile in front of her.

“Good luck,” she said as I paid.

“Thanks,” I mumbled as I walked out and drove home. I peed in a plastic cup and dipped the tests in it. Then I sat down on the toilet and stared down at the timer ticking down on my phone. How could I have been this stupid? I wondered. This was why Hunter and I had gone our separate ways. And now, here I was, forcing him into a situation he didn’t want. I was so confused about what I was hoping to see when the timer went off. I knew I should hope for negative results. Everything would be better if it was negative. But a small part of me hoped for a positive result, and it made me feel like a total asshole. I knew Hunter didn’t want this, so how could I be hoping for it? The timer went off and despite me staring at it, I jumped. I took a deep breath and picked up the test that was done. I looked at it.

“Fuck!” I said and compared it to the box as if it would change the clear positive line. “It’s okay. It’s just the first one. It can be a false positive. I have seven more to go,” I told myself out loud. Cuddles miaow from the living room. It sounded strangely like he was telling me I was deluding myself. What did he know? He was a cat. Five minutes later, I had eight positive tests and even I had to admit the chance of eight false positives was almost nonexistent. I took a deep breath and looked at myself in the bathroom mirror. “It’s okay. You know what you need to do,” I said. I saw the pain in my eyes as I felt it in my chest. I was a firm believer in a woman’s choice. But I didn’t want to terminate my pregnancy. I knew it was the only logical thing to do. I wasn’t in a place to raise a child, and I couldn’t force Hunter to become a father against his will. So it had to be done. My first instinct was to call Hunter, but I couldn’t do that. Instead, I called the only person I trusted.

“Hey, babe. What’s up?” Wictor answered.

“Hi, um do you have time to talk?” I asked.

“I’ll be there in ten minutes,” He said, his voice changing.

“What? No, it’s okay, I was just making sure I wasn’t disturbing you. You don’t need to come over.”

“Hana, I haven’t heard that tone in your voice since you were married to the scumface. I’ll be right there,” he told me and hung up. I looked at my phone and wondered what I would do while I waited. The knock on my door came sooner than I was expecting and when I opened the door for him, Wictor pulled me into a tight hug. “Whatever has happened, we will fix it and get through it,” he told me. All I could do was to cling to him and nod. I didn’t want to cry. I always cried, and it made me feel weak. I didn’t want to be weak. I needed to be strong. We sat down on the couch. “Now, what’s wrong?” he asked. I handed him one of the pregnancy tests.

“It’s positive,” I told him. He looked at the test and then at me.

“Is it one of those home tests for covid?” he asked. It took me a moment to register what he had said.

“No, you idiot, it’s a pregnancy test.”

“Eww, you gave me a stick with your pee on it?” he asked and flung the test away from him.

“It’s not on the plastic part. I dipped it and then put the cap back on. Relax,” I told him. He glared at me and then he froze and looked at me.

“Positive? Are you? Are you sure?” he asked.

“Eight sticks worth of sure,” I told him.

“That is amazing! Congratulations!” he shouted and embraced me. I hugged him back. “Wait. This is good news. Why do you have that voice?” he asked.

“What voice?”

“The one you only have when you have accepted that life is shit and you think the best thing to do is to resign to it,” he said.

“I can’t keep it,” I told him.

“What? The baby? Why not? Is something wrong?” I shook my head.

“Hunter doesn’t want to be a father and I don’t want to force him into having to accept it,” I said.

“So it’s Hunter’s baby?” he asked. I slapped him on the shoulder.

“Of course it’s Hunter’s,” I told him.

“Hey. How am I supposed to know? I saw that handsome man with the little pink girl flirting with you on Saturday. Maybe you two had a quick thing. I’m not judging,” he said.

“Who? Mr Smith? Now you are delusional. I called you because I needed a sane person to talk to.” He laughed.

“Okay, okay. So it’s Hunter’s. I get that he doesn't want to be involved, but does it mean you can’t have the baby?”

“I can’t have a baby on my own. I can’t just shut down the bakery, how will I support the two of us? What happens if I get sick? It’s a baby! They are hard to care for at the best of times. No survival instincts at all. Have you seen the videos of what babies do? I can’t manage one of those and run a business and remain sane,” I told him. I felt the panic rise in me at the thought.

“Marry me.”