Out On a Limb(26)

“Let’s get you home.” Sarah throws her arm around my shoulders and guides me toward the back door.





CHAPTER 10





I had to leave work early to make it to the ultrasound on time. Thankfully, the café’s owner, Lisa, is unquestionably high most days and doesn’t particularly care about any of her staff’s personal lives, interests, or—quite often—names. She didn’t bother to ask what the nature of my appointment was when she sent me on my way.

I’ve been working at the café long enough that I’ve earned that level of trust. Enough to bail on the end of my shift, at least. I’m not technically a supervisor, but I’ve picked up a few extra tasks here and there when asked.

I make the schedule, mostly so I can control who closes the night before I open. I also train the new employees when Lisa’s not around. But I don’t want the title of assistant manager, though she’s offered it to me a few times. That title comes with expectations of sticking around. It was never supposed to be a permanent position. I’ve had one foot out the door since I started. Not that I’ve done anything to get two feet out.

Snow has just started falling when I get off the bus and begin walking toward the big blue medical building across the street. Walking through the front doors, I spot Bo in the lobby. He’s standing under a directional sign, looking down at his phone. I make a quick note that the ultrasound office is on the second floor before looking at him as I make my way over.

He’s wearing a brown suede coat and blue jeans. Much more casual than his outfit from last week at the café, but still more put-together than me in my black yoga pants and a teal sweater I knit last winter zipped under my knee-length puffy purple jacket and far-too-long scarf that I’ve nearly suffocated myself under.

Have I mentioned I hate winter?

“Well, fancy meeting you here,” I chime, unwinding the scarf from around my neck.

When Bo looks up, he’s already smiling. “Hey, you.” He slips his phone into his back pocket. “We’ve got to stop bump-ing into each other like this,” he says, awfully proud of himself.

“Really? Bumping?” I raise a brow.

He shrugs, his cheeky grin far too wide for his face. His stupidly handsome face.

“Ready?” I ask, tilting my chin toward the stairs.

He nods, immediately following me as I start walking toward the second floor. “Oh, wait,” Bo says urgently, reaching for my hand. He tugs me closer by my wrist, and I huff in a breath at the surprise of being pulled to an abrupt stop.

“Sorry. Before I forget.” He pulls his phone back out of his pocket and holds it up in front of us, turning his camera around so he and I fill up the small screen. “Three, two…” Click.

I smile automatically when presented with my own reflection, but I’m still questioning why we just took a photo together in the middle of the lobby when Bo places his phone into his pocket and starts walking toward the stairs as if nothing odd happened at all.

“What was that?” I ask, my tone half amusement and half confusion.

Bo pouts disingenuously, as if to say oh, you poor thing. “A cell phone, honey.”

“Yes, thank you. I’m familiar. But why did you take our photo?” And you probably shouldn’t call me honey. It does things to my stomach. Like what I’d expect a cartwheel in space to feel like.

“I’m documenting! We’re about to meet our kid. I don’t want to forget anything.”

“Okay.” I smile, despite my eyes narrowing in on this strange, strange man. “Fair enough.” I charge up the steps, making it to the first landing before dread sets over me, realising Bo’s half a staircase behind, walking at his own, necessary pace.

I fight the urge to apologise and draw more attention to our difference in speed, and instead decide to act as if I’m fascinated by the shitty mural on the landing until Bo’s once again next to me. Then I walk slower, matching his pace until we reach the ultrasound office.

I give my name and identification to the receptionist before we’re seated in a waiting room alongside a very pregnant woman and her partner. The room has bright blue walls and awful fluorescent lighting. Decals of butterflies and forest animals half-cling to the walls, and there’s a small selection of magazines in the corner, which the far-more-pregnant lady is rifling through.

She looks… smug. Rubbing her belly like it’s a fortune teller’s crystal ball. Smiling with a pointed-up nose as if she, and she alone, is keeping the human species from extinction.

“First one?” she asks, her voice like spun sugar as she points toward my stomach. She snaps that finger back into place, raising her shoulders with giddy amazement.

I nod, wearing a polite, thin-lipped smile.

“Your first is so special. Oh, but you must be really scared,” she pouts insincerely.

No shit.

“Poor thing,” she coos, frowning.

Did I answer her that time? I check with Bo, who’s suddenly fascinated by the nonexistent lint on his jeans, picking at his knee. His subtle side-eye matched with his tilted smirk tells me he’s also hearing how ridiculous fertile-Myrtle is being. Though, based on her tone, she might prefer Mother Mary as her nickname.

“This is probably our last scan.” She places a hand with a diamond ring so large on her stomach that I worry about the load-bearing weight of her placenta. “We’re thirty-nine weeks.” She places her other hand on her husband’s shoulder. He’s beaming at her with pride, his eyes glued to her. He looks distinctly like Ned Flanders, with a bushy moustache and a golly-gosh way about him.