Page 75 of Best Offer Wins
When I’m done, I sink to the bathroom floor, the gray porcelain tile chilling my bare legs. I tuck my knees into my ratty, oversize Nats T-shirt—an old one of Ian’s—like I used to do as a kid. The blank stick is in my hand, but I already know the result. I feel it in every cell.
After three minutes, the two pink lines make it official.
No house. Shitty husband. A baby who’ll have to sleep in the closet.
The tears come fast and unrelenting. We are prisoners here. And now our baby will be, too. After all these months, she is right on time for her mother to completely fail her.
I wake up shivering, curled into a ball, still on the bathroom tile. The positive test lies next to me. As I drag myself up from the floor and into the kitchen, my stiffened joints pop and crack.
It’s after five now. I snag a cold piece of leftover pizza from the refrigerator and take it into the living room, not bothering with a plate or even a paper towel, because nothing fucking matters anymore. In front of the floor-to-ceiling window, still only in a raggedy T-shirt and underwear, I stuff the slice of pepperoni and black olives into my puffy face—an image sure to haunt the dreams of anyone unlucky enough to look up from the sidewalk below.
As the procession of after-work commuters begins to swell, I wonder if any of them are planning to bid on the house. That guy with his earbuds in, talking with his hands, could be going over the details of an offer with his agent. The couple waiting at the crosswalk, hunched over one of their phones, looking way too fucking happy, might be scrolling through the listing photos. They look like the types who could win it easily. Brooks Brothers. Weekends in St. Michaels. Parents who taught them to ski. Maybe they’ll get hit by a car.
A speck of red coming down U Street catches my attention—Ian’s bike helmet. I’ve always worried about him getting hurt, riding home during rush-hour traffic like this, but now I couldn’t care less. In fact, an old-fashioned tumble over the handlebars, or maybe a meet-up with a carelessly opened car door, sounds like decent entertainment.
Alas, he reaches the corner unscathed, gliding up onto the sidewalk, swerving around pedestrians. As he gets closer to our building’s entrance, the rear, curbside door of a black sedan parked out front flies open. It has a Lyft sticker on the windshield.
A girl in a cutoff denim miniskirt, with messy, dark-brown hair, steps out. Ian sees her at the same moment that I do.
Alex.
He brakes hard, then climbs off his bike. He walks it briskly toward our building, extending a palm in her direction, shaking his head angrily, clearly telling her to stay away. But she ignores him.
She runs up and pulls on his sleeve, mascara streaking her face, throwing a tantrum like a child in the candy aisle. People walking past turn and stare. She’s a wreck.
Ian puts down his kickstand and grabs hold of Alex’s shoulders, keeping her at arm’s length while she sobs. He’s saying something—but not yelling, otherwise I would probably be able to hear at least some of it—his eyes darting around nervously.
When she takes a small step backward, he tries again to leave, but she’s too quick. She lurches forward, clinging to his shirt, her expression frantic. Ian closes his eyes and waits for her to finish talking. He only opens them again once her mouth finally stills.
Whatever he’s saying to her now appears to be calming her down.
She smiles.
She is fucking smiling.
When he’s done, she nods, then walks back to the Lyft. Ian glances around one more time, then pulls up his kickstand and disappears into our lobby.
Pain builds behind my eyes. What the fuck did I just witness? My pulse whooshes in my ears; then the ringing sound overtakes it, louder than ever, like an entire surround-sound speaker system melting down. I race to the bathroom before Ian can walk in.
I turn on the shower and lock the door. I snatch the positive pregnancy test up from the floor and shove it back into the First Response box, back behind the drainpipe under the sink.
“Margo?”
He’s calling me from the kitchen.
I freeze on the other side of the locked door. I need to think, but the throbbing behind my eyes is all-consuming. I strip off theold T-shirt and get into the shower, cranking up the temperature. The hot water on my skin melds into the rage, pure and scalding, coursing just beneath it. My vision is turning fuzzy, my balance is off. An imaginary wave swells beneath me, sending me stumbling backward. Groping along the tile to keep myself steady, I lower myself to the shower floor, squeezing my eyelids shut, then stretching them back open, in a lame attempt to reboot my vision.
I see only static, followed by light. White and blinding. Flooding everything. Impossible to tell if it’s inside of me or outside. As it burns brighter and brighter, it ratchets up the pain in my skull and the screeching in my ears. The noise grows so deafening that it drowns out the running water.
How long am I like this, crouched like a closed fist, the water pooling around me? Maybe only seconds. Maybe several minutes. And then—the light is just gone.
The patter of the shower returns gradually, as if someone’s turning up the volume. I blink open my eyes and see water beading on subway tile. The throbbing in my brain dissolves, like soapsuds swirling down a drain.
I feel warm all over—but not burning, not scalding—it’s pleasant. I place a hand over my belly, and a sensation that’s at first hard to recognize overcomes me.Peace.
As usual, I’ll have to be the one who figures it all out for us. But why would I have expected anything different? Whatever it takes to solve this, I’ll do it. Certainly not for Ian. But for my baby. And for me. For the life the two of us are owed.
Ian knocks on the bathroom door. “Margo? Everything okay in there?”
