Page 66 of Once Upon A Small Town Secret
The air shifts cooler as the ground drops, and we fall into step like we’ve done this a thousand times.
It’s awkward at first, the kind of silence that isn’t empty so much as it’s too full. I shove my hands in my jacket pockets because I have the urge to lace my fingers with hers.
Every time we pass a streetlight, her profile flicks into relief—brow set, mouth soft, the kind of determined that looks a hair’s breadth away from vulnerable if you know what you’re looking for.
“How are you?” she asks finally, eyes on the path.
The honest answer is a mess, so I take a breath and try to simplify it. “Coping,” I say, and wait for her to flinch at the nothingness of it.
She doesn’t.
“It’s… a lot. It’ll take some getting used to.” I swallow. “I’m in. Hundred percent. That part’s clear in my head.”
She nods once, like she’s been holding her breath for that sentence, and just lets it go. “Okay.”
We walk. A night fisherman’s lantern glows downriver like a fallen star. The path dips; her shoe slides on loose gravel, and I reach out without thinking. My hand closes around her elbow. She steadies herself and doesn’t make a thing of it, which somehow makes it a thing in my mind.
“Ben,” she says. “About my family.”
I almost laugh maniacally because that’s been bouncing around in my head since last week when she told me.
“I know you didn’t want Jason to know about… us,” she says, voice careful but not accusatory. “But we can’t really avoid it now.”
She glances at me and away. “Usually people wait a couple of months before telling anyone. I’m over six weeks, so we could wait longer if you want to. If that’s—”
My first instinct is yes. Wait. Hide in the tall grass. Let statistics be the excuse I need. I feel the word climb my throat—
—and I shove it back down.
Coward.
“No,” I say out loud, and the word surprises both of us with how sure it sounds. “We have to tell your family. We just… need to figure out the best way to do it.”
My hands come out of my pockets. They don’t find hers. “Do you think we should tell everyone together? Or your parents and Jason separately?”
She huffs a breath that might be a laugh if any of this were funny. “I should probably tell you something before we make a plan.” She looks sheepish, actually sheepish, which is an expression I’ve never seen on her face. “My mom already knows we slept together.”
I blink at her. “She… what?”
“I couldn’t keep it from her.” She shrugs, small. “It came up when she dragged me to lunch, and I just—she’s my mom. She doesn’t know about the pregnancy, though.”
I stare at the dark shape of the river and force my shoulders down. “Okay,” I say, because it is okay. It has to be.
“Then maybe we should tell her first. See what she thinks about how to approach Jason and your dad.” I try on the idea and, weirdly, it fits.
Gwen has been my triage nurse since I was a kid; letting her triage this doesn’t feel like a betrayal. It feels like not being an idiot. “If she’s already halfway inside the door, she’ll know how to keep the hinges from blowing off.”
Paige nods, relief loosening her mouth. “I thought the same. She might… soften the ground a little.” She flicks a glance at me. “I’m not saying we make her do it for us. Just… guidance.”
“Yeah.” I can hear Gwen already: Benjamin, you’re both going to look me in the eye while you say it. And then we’re going to breathe. “When?”
“Soon,” she says. “Tomorrow, if she’s free. I don’t want to spend day after day fighting off the urge to throw up from anxiety.”
“Tomorrow,” I repeat, and the word scares me. “You text her. Tell me when and where, and I’ll be there.”
We come around a bend where the trees open, and the river up against the bank looks like moving glass. A train horn moans far off, the sound sliding along the water until it reaches us.
There’s a flat rock that makes a natural bench. She sits. I stay standing for a beat, then fold down beside her, careful to leave space in case she doesn’t want my touch.
