Page 28 of The Hideaway

The second line appeared almost immediately. Not a faint line; a strong, blazing stripe, just like it had been with Marcus and Elodie.

She closed her eyes, wrapped her arms around her head; held back a sob.

How could I have done this?The latest in a catalogue of careless, thoughtless actions. Making mistakes at work – arriving at the wrong time for her shift, twice in a row. Forgetting appointments at her children’s school. Miscalculating her cycle, not believing it was worth taking emergency contraception after her ill-judged one-night stand. Organization had always been Naya’s strong suit, but it had been starting to feel like everything was slipping away from her these past months.

She did a quick calculation: she was probably about sixweeks pregnant – maybe seven. She racked her brains to try to remember when her last period had been, but they’d been so out of whack over the past year. Her best friend Suzanne thought it was down to stress; Naya had convinced herself she was going into early perimenopause. She wasn’t sure that theory was up to much now.

So here she was, lost in a remote jungle with a potential killer on the loose – and pregnant after a regrettable one-night stand that she didn’t bother using protection for, so convinced was she that she couldn’t get pregnant. Already with two young kids at home, dependent on her for their every move. How the hell would she cope with a baby?

I want to go home.She picked the test up again, stared at it. Just to be sure. There was no mistaking it: she was pregnant. What the hell was she going to do? Her life was spilling over the edges already without adding pregnancy sickness and sleepless nights into the mix, another child to worry about and care for.

Andlove.

Did she even have any love left to spare?

You have options.The thought flashed through her mind, unabashed. She didn’t have to go through with this, to have this baby, to go through all this alone, again. She could make another choice.

A branch snapped behind her.

‘Naya? Are you all right?’

She whipped her head around, held her torch up in the direction of the voice, tried to stuff the pregnancy test back in her pocket.

Mira was standing over her, torch turned towards theground, a look of deep concern etched across her delicate features.

Merde. She’d been so absorbed by her thoughts, she’d not heard Mira approaching through the foliage. How had she not seen the glow from her torch?

‘I’m fine,’ said Naya, wiping the back of her hand across her eyes. ‘I was just taking a moment alone – after everything today, I just needed to...’ She tailed off, noticing Mira’s eyes flicking towards the pocket of her shorts where she’d just shoved the pregnancy test. She looked down, realizing that half of it was still hanging out of her pocket.

‘I’m sorry I disturbed you,’ said Mira. ‘You’d been gone for a while, and I was worried you’d hurt yourself or something was wrong, so I followed your track through here. Is that...’ Her voice turned soft. ‘Is that a pregnancy test?’

So, Mira had seen it. Was there any point in hiding what she’d been doing, then – and its outcome?

In normal circumstances, back home in her everyday life, Naya wouldn’t have wanted to mention anything so early on. She didn’t know how she felt about it yet, or what she was going to do; and what might Mira think of her, if she knew how it had happened, how irresponsible she’d been?

But here... here, with everything so terribly broken, sowrong. Her usual ideas no longer seemed to apply. And she felt she could trust Mira – she had shown such vulnerability with them all today, been so honest about her cancer and her recovery. Of all the people who could have stumbled across her here, surely Mira was the one she’d want to talk about this with the most.

She pulled it back out of her pocket, held it up towards Mira, said simply: ‘Yes.’

Mira turned her torch in the direction of Naya’s outstretched hand, stared at it for a moment.

‘Oh,’ she said. ‘And the two lines – does that mean positive? Sorry if that’s silly to ask, I’ve never taken one myself.’

Naya nodded. Fresh tears welled behind her eyes; she willed herself tojust hold it together, please. She didn’t want to fall apart; especially not now she knew there was a life beginning to take shape inside of her.

She had to marvel at the irony: she’d come here partly as an escape from the toll motherhood was taking on her, an attempt to remember who she had been before she had her children and given herself over to them.

But even here, thousands of miles from home, motherhood had followed her.

‘Yes,’ she said, not meeting Mira’s eyes. ‘I’m pregnant.’

There was silence for a moment. Naya listened to the evening chorus of the rainforest, waited for Mira to say something. Finally, Mira moved towards her, put a hand on her shoulder, lowered herself down onto her knees next to her, and picked up her hand.

‘Mazel tov,’ she murmured, and then: ‘Though perhaps you don’t feel like celebrating?’

Naya laughed sadly. ‘I’m not sure I do. This wasn’t something I...’ She let her words hang.

‘I understand,’ said Mira. ‘It sounds like you have enough on your plate.’

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