Page 92 of Recklessly, Wildly Yours

Screaming like a banshee.

With her lifeblood draining from her.

And suddenly, all I can do is laugh.

God bless the driver of our car. He stands at the back door of the car waiting for us with a perfectly straight face. He shows not one sign of recognition that we’re screaming and laughing like we’ve been possessed.

Well, I mean, I think I’ve been possessed.

By a baby.

And then, at that thought, the air whooshes out of me and I have to grab Leigh to steady myself because I think I might fall otherwise.

I’m going to be a mother.

“Maddie,” Leigh says with concern. “Are you okay? What’s happening? Talk to me.”

At that, tears leak from my eyes and within seconds, they’re streaming down my cheeks and I’m blubbering, “You sound like Ethan. He says stuff like that.”

Leigh’s eyes are wide. “I don’t think we need a pregnancy test. Not when you’ve just gone from zero to one hundred, screaming, laughing, and then crying, all in the space of like, two minutes.” She nods like she’s just solved the greatest mystery of the world. “Yup, I think you are most definitely a raging, hormonal, pregnant woman.”

“Okay,” I agree. “We don’t need a test.”

She blinks like I just said the dumbest thing she’s ever heard. “Of course, you need a test.”

“You just said I don’t and I agree with you.”

“Why would you listen to anything that a woman who is currently taking one for the team says?”

“Taking one for what team?” I frown.

“Oh my god, keep up. Remember in our texts, I said that?”

I commence crying again and at Leigh’s furrowed brows, I say in between sobs, “Ethan can never understand my texts.”

Leigh takes a deep, deep breath and looks to the heavens before looking back at me. “It’s going to be a long nine months, isn’t it?”

I’m still sobbing. “You have to be nice to me.”

She throws her head back like she’s going to scream again, but instead she yells out, “I can’t be nice when I’m running on half my lifeblood!”

It’s at this point that my phone sounds with text notifications and I don’t think I’ve ever checked my texts faster.

Ethan: Maddie, I fucked up. I’m sorry. Please call me.

That one came in while I was still in New York, sitting on the plane waiting for it to take off. I’d switched my phone off, though. That was after I ignored Ethan’s phone call.

I don’t feel good about ignoring his call, but I had nothing inside me to give to a conversation, so I decided it would be best to turn my phone off and wait until after the flight when I’d had time to think. Well, it’s after the flight now and I still don’t know what to say to him.

I read the texts he sent after that one.

Ethan: Okay, so you’re on the flight now and waiting to talk with you is excruciatingly painful.

Ethan: I wish I could have a do-over of that conversation, Miller. You caught me at a bad time and my head was all fucked up over stuff Dad said to me. I know that I let you down in a moment when you really needed me. Please call me when you land in London. I’ll stay up and wait for your call.

I read his last two texts a few times, trying to figure out whether I think he’s going to end our relationship or not. It’s one thing to apologize and admit he let me down, but nowhere in his messages has he said anything about his feelings over a pregnancy. Over a baby.

Ethan is such a good man, so I know he won’t avoid his responsibilities toward a child, and that’s what I think he’s saying in those texts. He would never want to let me down, but that doesn’t mean he would want to jump fucking fast with me.

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