Page 30 of Made for Us

“About time you showed up,” Xavier pipes up, coming into the room from the gym, his chest heaving up and down. “You said you were coming straight here.”

“I had to drop the kids off,” Dylan explains, entering the room and giving me a chin up when he sees me.

Xavier comes and sits next to me, slapping my knee. “You look good. Been working out, I see.”

I laugh. “A bit,” I say, looking around, seeing everyone sitting down and not wanting to move much.

“How was everyone’s summer?” I ask, and Xavier puts his head back and groans.

“Don’t ask,” Michael states, sitting down next to Dylan, who just glares at him. “It’s been eventful.”

“I don’t know what the big deal is,” Wilson says as he gets up to get a water bottle from the fridge.

“It’s a huge deal,” Dylan retorts, and I look over at Xavier, hoping he can fill me in on what everyone is talking about. “She’s like a baby.”

“She’s not a baby,” Xavier cuts in. “She’s an adult.”

“What is going on?” I finally ask, and Michael just looks at me, shaking his head, almost as in a don’t do it way.

“What’s going on?” Dylan repeats, his voice going louder. “My sister is having a baby!”

I just look at him, my heart starting to speed up in my chest. “Gabriella?” I ask him, and there is nothing, and I mean nothing, that could have prepared me for what was going to come next.

There in the middle of the locker room, the little bit of my heart that wasn’t broken shattered. “Not Gabriella. Abigail is the one who is pregnant.” All hope I had that we would get together is now gone, knowing she is having a baby with someone else.

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

ONE MONTH LATER

ABIGAIL

“Abigail Stone,” the nurse calls me, and I get up from the waiting room and walk back to the examining room. “This must feel strange to you,” the nurse says when she sees me in my scrubs.

“Definitely on the other side of things now,” I tell her as she points at the exam table.

“Have a seat while I ask you some questions.”

I sit down on the black bed covered with the white paper that crinkles when you sit down while she looks at the computer. “So it says your last period was May.” I nod.

“Yes, I was on Linessa,” I tell her of the birth control, “and I get my period usually every two to three months, depending. I was on Zithromax before I went on vacation, and when they say it takes one time.” I hold up my hand with my finger pointed up. “They were not kidding.” I try to calm my heartbeat down so when she takes my blood pressure it won’t be high. I blink away the tears that are stinging my eyes

“It says the date of conception was July seventh.” I nod, the nerves from my stomach now moving to my throat. “No allergies.”

“None that I’m aware of,” I tell her, and she smiles at me.

“Your due date is going to be…” she starts telling me, and I can’t help but smile.

“March thirtieth,” I declare.

“You are fifteen weeks,” she informs me, and my hand goes on my little baby bump. She stands up, looking at me. “The doctor will be right in.”

“Thank you,” I tell her as I sit on the exam table. I take a deep breath in as I try not to shed a tear. The last month has been a roller coaster of emotions for not only me but the family. After getting not two but a total of twenty-seven positive tests, I finally called someone who got me into the doctor. I had my blood drawn, and they confirmed I was pregnant. I wish I could say it was an easy time, but it was not.

I have never felt more alone in my whole life, even though I had Gabriella beside me throughout the whole thing. I felt like I was missing the biggest piece, and that was Tristan. I must have picked up the phone seven times a day to call him and tell him. I must have pulled up his number to text him over a thousand times, but each time, I chickened out. I couldn’t do this to him. He already regretted the night we spent together. The last thing I wanted him to do was resent the baby we created. I don’t think my heart could have survived if he told me that he didn’t want me to have it. I wanted to remember our night as the best night I’ve ever had and this was a gift. So I took the coward’s way out and kept it my secret.

Breaking it to my family, well, that was another adventure. My parents handled it well or as well as you could think they would. Dylan, on the other hand, was planning the wedding until I told him that I didn’t know who the father was. Of course, I don’t think anyone believed me. I said he was a random hookup, and we never exchanged names. My uncle Matthew came to see me with my uncle Max. I should have known them coming to see me was a clue that something was coming.

They showed up with a man who was holding a leather briefcase. I sat down next to them as they explained this man was going to draw a picture of the man I spent the night with, and then we’d put it up on social media. Like a wanted photo. They even thought about doing a billboard in Times Square and running an ad in the local papers. What surprised me even more was that Michael and Dylan thought it was the best idea ever invented.

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