He was looking at her like he was waiting for her to tell him what to do. Because she always knew what to do. She was always the one with the plan.
“I’m pregnant,” Emma said. Fingers curled over the edge of the counter. Gaze on the cheap vinyl tile. Were those meant to be roses in the corners? They looked like splotches of mildew.
“What?”
Her eyes flicked up. He stared at her, mouth slack, hair falling boyishly over one eye. Dark hair, blue eyes, a small scar on his chin she liked to set her thumb against right before she kissed him. They’d met at a coffee shop, back when she couldn’t even afford internet, so she’d hidden herself in the corner away from the baristas’ annoyed glances and ordered plain black coffee and nothing else for hours at a time as she worked. He’d been sitting at the table next to hers. When he bought her a chocolate croissant, she tried to wave him off, but he said it was for his sake, since her growling stomach was distracting him.
She took the croissant. And the latte that followed. It was a week before he actually asked her out, to a mediocre movie and good Italian food, and kissed her a gentlemanly kiss good night at her doorstep before she slid her hand into his hair and pulled him to her hungrily, drew him inside the tiny studio, undressed him in the dark.
He told people he’d fallen in love with her over pastries and coffee, but when they were alone he confessed it had been that night with her teeth against his neck, the certainty of her, the hard edges that she had hidden so well.
She told him she’d fallen in love with him with the taste of butter on her lips that first morning, but it was just a story. She had no idea when she’d fallen in love with him. But people needed stories to make sense of things, and she had learned to give them what they needed.
Now his face was pale. His lips shut. That face that couldn’t hide anything failing to hide his unhappiness. “You’re on the pill,” he said.
“It happens,” Emma replied helplessly. She’d missed a pill here or there when she was sick, distracted, traveling. Far from perfect use. “You want children.” That was the point of the house, with its extra bedrooms.
“I do. Of course I do. It’s just—now—” His throat convulsed. “If I can’t find a job … We won’t even have a place to live in a few weeks. We can’t.”
“What are you saying?” she asked.
Nathan wanted children, and she had said yes, okay, someday, because she wanted to be the person who could want that. Now, though, it was his face that had taken on a gray pallor. His eyes that dropped to the table. “It’s not the right time. Maybe things work out. But what if they don’t? And I wouldn’t want to wait, and then—when it’s further along—”
Emma put her hand against her abdomen. Still flat, no outward sign at all, and she realized she had already made a decision.
“I’m keeping it,” she said.
His brow creased slightly, as if puzzled. Sometimes, she thought, she underestimated how well he knew her. He said we want kids, but maybe he knew that he wanted kids, and she said okay. “We’re out ten thousand dollars, and that was all we had. The down payment was supposed to be another loan. I’m unemployed. We’re getting kicked out at the end of the month. How are we supposed to raise a kid right now?” he asked.
“I don’t know.” Her hand became a fist against her belly.
He sat back in his chair, a look of consideration on his face. “What about your parents’ house?” he asked, and there was something odd in his tone—like he’d been waiting to bring it up all along.
“What about it?” Emma asked, instantly wary. Her stomach tightened with a feeling like dread.
“Well, we own it, don’t we?” he asked, eyebrow raised.
“Technically, we don’t own anything. The trust does. You know I can’t do anything with the house unless Daphne and Juliette both agree.” They were the names of strangers in her mouth. “We can’t take out a mortgage on it or sell it or anything like that by ourselves.”
The way the trust had been set up, they hadn’t been able to do anything with the house until Daphne turned twenty-one. By then, none of them had spoken to one another in years. It was easier to go on ignoring one another’s existences. Ignoring the house, and the horrors it held.
“I’m not saying sell it—not yet, anyway. But there’s nothing to stop us from living there,” Nathan said. He looked excited. Here it was: the perfect solution to all of their problems. Emma’s heart was rabbit-quick. He stood. He crossed the floor, put his hands on her arms.