Page 62 of Triplet Babies
Fear clamps down hard. If Alex has found me, if he’s really here in Greenwich, then nothing is safe. Not my future. Not the babies. Not even Yarik. I don’t know what Alex wants, but if he finds out I’m pregnant—or figures out who the father is—he’ll use it against me, or he’ll kill me and the babies. I don’t want to drag Yarik into that, but keeping this from him might be even worse. I’m too panicked to think clearly, and instinct kicks in. “We need to go. Now.”
I grab Nina’s arm and pull her toward the car, the ultrasound folder clutched against my chest. My phone stops ringing, then immediately starts again. Yarik’s name flashes on the screen, but I can’t answer in my current state.
Nina doesn’t argue. She unlocks the car and we both get in quickly, locking the doors behind us. As she starts the engine, my phone buzzes with a text message.
Where are you? Is everything okay?
Another message follows immediately:Sarah, please answer me.
I open the text thread and start to type something. Maybe just, “I’m okay,” or, “We’ll talk later.” My fingers hesitate above the screen, and the words won’t come. Nothing feels right. My thoughts are jumbled, moving too fast to catch and focus on just one. I just want to get home. I need walls around me, locked doors, and all the lights on. I back out of the message, press the power button, and shut off the phone instead. Holding it in my palm feels like control, even if it is only pretend.
Nina drives, and I keep glancing at the side mirrors, half-expecting to see someone still there in the parking lot, watching us leave. The shopping bag with the three onesies and blankets sits in my lap, a tangible piece of the future I want to believe is possible. The fear that Alex has found me makes everything uncertain again. I touch the folder in my purse, thinking about the ultrasound images of our three children.
“Talk to me,” Nina says as we pull into our apartment complex. “What’s going on?”
“I thought I saw Alex.”
She goes completely still, her hands gripping the steering wheel. “Are you sure?”
“No. Maybe. I don’t know.” I lean my head against the window, exhaustion suddenly overwhelming me. “It was just a feeling, but it was so strong, like someone was watching me.”
“We should call the police.”
I shake my head. “And tell them what? I saw a shadow that looked like my ex-boyfriend? They’ll think I’m paranoid.”
She shuts off the engine and turns toward me. “If that really was Alex, you have to tell Yarik.”
I shake my head. “I don’t know if I can.”
She gives me a sharp scowl. “Why not?”
“Because he’s still engaged and trying to hold his world together to avoid a war, and I just...”
She watches me closely before prompting, “Just what?”
“He’s never chosen me,” I say in a sudden outburst. “Now I’m asking him to do so because there are three babies in the middle of it, and maybe a man out there who used to hurt me for fun. I don’t want our relationship to be on those terms or from those stressors.”
She looks like she wants to argue, but she doesn’t. She just opens her door and comes around to stand beside me when I get out. I’m steadier than I’d expected but limp as a dishrag. Clutching the shopping bag, I follow her up the stairs, my mind looping in every direction.
Upstairs, once safely in my apartment behind the locked door, with all locks engaged, I set the shopping bag on my bed and pull out one of the tiny onesies. I hold it up by the shoulders and just stare. It’s so small, designed for tiny infants. I bought Preemiesize almost automatically, obviously realizing they will be tiny when they are born. Tiny and completely defenseless. I can’t protect them like this. I don’t even know if I can protect myself.
My phone buzzes with another message from Yarik, but I don’t read it. Instead, I place the ultrasound folder on my nightstand and continue holding the onesie. Three babies. His babies. The truth gradually seeps into my brain as my normal is fractured and rearranged to resemble something new.
Nina appears in my doorway with two cups of tea, her expression neutral. “You know you can’t avoid him forever.”
“I’m not avoiding him.” The lie comes easily, though we both know better. “I just need time to process this.”
“Process what? That you’re having his children or that Alex might have found you?”
I set down the onesie and accept the tea. “Both. All of it. I don’t know how to separate what I want from what’s safest for everyone involved.”
She settles on the edge of my bed, her voice gentle but firm. “What you want matters, Sarah, so don’t think I’m dismissing that, but what’s safest for those babies matters too. It matters more than anything else right now. Hiding from Yarik doesn’t protect anyone.”
“I know.” I can’t argue with her logic, but I’m still not in a headspace to embrace being logical when there’s a strong possibility Alex is out there, hunting me again. Best case scenario, it was just paranoia and the fear that’s lived in my bones since I fled New York with nothing but a bag, a half-baked plan, and Nina.
Either way, the babies growing inside me deserve more than a mother paralyzed by what-ifs and maybes. I can’t do this alone, but until I can think clearly, I can’t do anything, trapped in the moment of fear, spiraling into hopelessness and despair.
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