Page 87 of Mismatched

“I want to!” I gasp for air. “But I don’t think she’ll want me there.”

“What? Why the fuck not?”

“Because she didn’t want the baby!” I roar, my whole face stinging. “She only went along with it because it’s what I wanted.” I choke. “And because I made her feel like she wasn’t enough.”

Seth sits back on his heels and stares at me, his face so haggard it crosses my mind he might be as worried as I am. “Look, Anton, I’ve known Lydia a long time. Since I was a sixteen-year-old kid. And I’m sorry, I know you love her, but sometimes you are so fucking wrong.”

“You don’t understand?—”

“Just shut up and listen.” He grips my knees. “You two went about this whole thing the stupidest way possible, as usual. I don’t doubt Lydia had reservations, or that she was scared. But I know her—she’s been a sister and a mother to me. And there is no way she would’ve gone along with this if she didn’t want a baby at all.”

I meet his eyes, and they’re hard and earnest. Because Seth only ever says what he truly believes. But there’s something else shining in his eyes—something I recognize immediately.

Fear.

He’s afraid for Lydia. For me. And for himself, because he loves her too. Because even though he spent the last five years caring for our mom, weathering her decline and dealing with her death like a fucking soldier, we still lost her.

And if we’ve learned anything over the course of our lives, it’s that there’s always more to lose.

CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR

The ride in the ambulance feels both hours long and only like a minute. The paramedics are kind, keeping me talking the whole time, distracting me from the mental loop my brain is stuck in, playing the accident over and over. The look of despair on Anton’s face at the traffic light. The black sky. Headlights gleaming on the ice.

Everything gets chaotic again once we reach the emergency room. My reassuring paramedics hand me off to hurried doctors and nurses. Another ambulance arrives at the same time with a man who is screaming and covered in blood, and by comparison I am clearly fine—aren’t I? But they wheel me into a room where a lone nurse starts asking me questions while the other guy is rushed down the hall by a crowd.

“I hope he’s okay,” I murmur as she tags me with a plastic bracelet and takes my blood pressure.

She looks at me like she’s not sure who I’m talking about, and I realize I’m not sure either. “Welcome to Black Friday in the ER,” she says with a shrug.

I answer many of the same million questions I’ve already answered. Giving my medical history, details of my pregnancy, describing what happened. I saw the blood; there was only a little. The nurse gives me more fluids, someone comes and takes labs, a doctor ducks in to shine a light in my eyes and ask if I’m having any cramping, which I’m not. I feel remarkably okay, considering what our cars looked like when the ambulance drove off. My neck is a little stiff, and I’m sure I’ll be sore in places tomorrow, but I don’t seem to have any injuries.

So why am I filled with a sinking sense of dread?

They want me to go to the bathroom, which is great because I haven’t gone since Ohio. The nurse unhooks me from several cords and monitors, and guides me across the hall. But as soon as I pull down my underwear, I start shaking. The paramedics had me put on a pad to see if I was going to bleed more, and it’s soaked in a bright smear of new blood.

I close my eyes, tears spilling down my cheeks. I need Anton here; I need to hold his hand. Look into his eyes. Hear him say it will be all right. But then his question, his face before the crash, comes flying into my head like an accusation.

Do you not want the baby?

I sink to the floor, curling into a ball. All I can think about is the little peach-sized life tucked inside me.

The life I’m supposed to keep warm and safe. Protected. Because I’m its mother.

I want to be its mother.

I’m staring at the wall, waiting on an ultrasound when Caprice storms in. She’s not who I was expecting to see at whatever hour this is past midnight, but when her eyes find mine, the relief on her face mirrors my own. She crosses the room and folds me directly into a hug.

“Anton said you were in an accident?—”

“You talked to him?” My lip trembles. “What did he say?”

“He’ll be here. Thank God you’re okay,” she breathes into my hair. But after a moment, she pulls back, taking in the IV, the hospital gown, the monitors beeping in the corner. “Are you okay?”

I look at her, my lip trembling, so comforted to see her, to have someone by my side that I love. And so fraught with guilt about what I have to explain.

I shake my head. “I’m—” I bite my lip, tears spilling down my face. “Caprice, I’m pregnant.”

She takes both my hands in hers, sinking to a chair next to the hospital bed.

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