Page 64 of Under Their Protection

“Hi, Anika,” Annie says happily as she hugs me.

“Hi,” I smile.

“For the record, I told her you’d call and tell her that we didn’t need to come here,” Theo says as he hugs me next.

“I told you they’d all show up,” Rowan laughs.

“I made dinner,” I tell everyone. “I also already took the test.”

“Wait. What did it say?”Mia asks.

“I don’t know. Haven’t checked. You people interrupted me,” I say. Mia gasps and turns to run to the master bedroom. I grab her hair by the root and pull her back to me.

“God dang, woman. Don’t turn me on just yet,” she says with a smile as everyone laughs.

“My bad. It was a reflex. I will go look. You people are being creepy over my pee stick,” I say with a smile.

“Awe. I wanna look too,” Mia pouts.

“Jesus. Fine. Come on,” I tell them. Everyone follows me to the back bedroom. When we walk in Max tosses the test at me and I catch it.

“Beat ya to it. It’s negative,” he smiles and kisses me.

“Damn it, Max,” Mia huffs.

“She wanted to look first,” I laugh.

“Mom is going to be so disappointed,” Rowan laughs.

“You would look so cute pregnant,” Emma smiles.

“First time for everything,” I say without thinking.

“What?” Theo says as he turns to me.

“Fuck,” I say as I back away from Theo laughing. “I didn’t mean it like that.”

“Yes, you did. That’s the third time in the last hour you’ve said something bad about yourself,” Rowan says.

“Oh really?” Theo asks.

“Mhmm,” Max says. “Twice was over what she was going to cook for dinner. She made two separate comments about not needing to eat because she said it would make her “fatter than I already am”. I told her I’d tell you and she said it didn’t count because you weren’t here.”

“On what planet are you living where that doesn’t count, Anika?” Theo asks. “Did you say that?”

“I plead the fifth,” I laugh and back up more.

“What’s going on?” Theo asks.

“Nothing. I’m okay,” I say.

“Really?” Rowan deadpans.

“Yes, really. I’m okay,” I say.

“So, the nightmare last night didn’t have you waking up sobbing uncontrollably?” Max asks.

“It’s the first nightmare in two weeks. It’s not that big of a deal. It wasn’t even bad,” I lie as I turn to walk away. Theo catches me and backs me against the wall, boxing me in.

---