Page 50 of The Way We Score

Scrubbing my forehead, I don’t know what to do. Hunger is a good sign, right?

I go to the refrigerator, and a luscious bosc pear sits on the top shelf taunting me. I’d bought a bag when I got home as a treat, and the first three were so juicy and delicately sweet.

I take it off the shelf and bite into the buttery soft skin. The cool juice is soothing to my dehydrated lips, and I’m loving it so much, when all of a sudden, my stomach twists like a sponge. It feels like it’s turning itself inside out.

Dropping the brown pear in the sink, I run to the guest bathroom, barely making it to the toilet in time before the bite of pear shoots back out of my mouth.

“Ugh!” I sob, flopping onto my butt on the cold tile floor. “Why is this happening?’

I continue to vomit for three straight days—still no fever, no weird foods. Staring at my phone, I decide it’s time.

Picking up the receiver, I dial my old GP’s number and leave a message.

“Congratulations, you’re pregnant.”Dr. Beck stands in front of me scribbling in large, messy handwriting on a pad of paper. “Here’s a prescription for prenatal vitamins, and I’ll get you a prescription for Diclegis?—”

“Stop!” My chest is tight as I shake my head. “Just stop right there for a minute.”

Dr. Beck is an older fellow with a pretty decent sense of humor and a great bedside manner.

He sits back frowning at me. “What?”

“I’m sorry, but I amnotpregnant. You’ve made a mistake.”

“I have?” He says it in a tone that suggests he’s wondering when I got my medical degree.

“Yes.” I hold up both hands like he pulled a gun. “My ex-husband and I tried for two years to get pregnant until we were finally told it wasn’t going to happen. I can’t get pregnant. We have…hadfertility issues.”

The good doctor’s eyes narrow, and he presses his lips together, nodding slowly. “Did your OB happen to say what kind of fertility issues you had? It could’ve been a situation where only one of you was the problem, say if your ex-husband had a low sperm count.”

“I don’t remember that part.” I’m sure the doctor told us, but I’d gone into a kind of daze when he’d saidnever get pregnant.

It was the final nail in the coffin of my mistake, and I was already more than a little depressed and feeling stuck in a commitment I never should’ve made.

“I see.” He glances down at the prescription pad, clicking his pen.

Somehow, I get the feeling he doesn’t see.

“We can do this the old,old-fashioned way and order a blood test if you’d prefer.” He glances at his notes. “Still, these days a urinalysis is almost 100 percent accurate.”

My head is light. I can literally feel the blood draining to my toes, and I don’t dare try to stand at the moment.

“We have to test again.” It’s barely above a whisper.

Hours later, I’m pacing my bedroom, arms crossed over my waist as I try to wrap my head around what happened. My stomach is in knots, and for the first time in days, the nausea is giving me a break—probably because of the prescription.

Dr. Beck said I’m somewhere between six to eight weeks along, and the only person I’ve had sex with, over and over, in all the positions, is more than eight hundred miles away.

It’s Thursday night, and I walk over to pick up the remotefor my large, flat-screen television. Flipping it on, I bypass the streaming services and head straight to Live TV. It only takes a few clicks for me to find the game. It’s a long shot, but there it is. His team is playing tonight against some other team out of Ohio.

I don’t know how they decide which games to put on television. There must be a million teams—some states have more than one. I guess it has something to do with popularity or chances of going to the playoffs.

Two years ago, Logan and Garrett were the dream team. Even though it’s only Garrett there now, they must still be pretty good for ratings. It’s a testament to how popular they were.

Standing in front of the monitor, I chew on the side of my nail watching the players on the sidelines, straining my eyes for him. Damn these cameras focusing on the quarterbacks and the running backs.

It’s just like Garrett to have a massively important role that people don’t even realize is there.

Finally the cameras flicker to the sidelines, and I see him towering over most of the guys. I can’t help a smile, a flush of emotion, of… something more.

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