Total pages in book: 58
Estimated words: 55599 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 278(@200wpm)___ 222(@250wpm)___ 185(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 55599 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 278(@200wpm)___ 222(@250wpm)___ 185(@300wpm)
“Has he left his girlfriend?” she says after a pause.
I sit opposite her, summoning my courage. If there was ever a time for me to put my big girl pants on, it’s now. “He never had a girlfriend, Mom.”
Her eyes narrow. I can see her calculating, trying to think of worse options, even darker possibilities. If she lied about him having a girlfriend, how bad is the reality? I can see that question scrolling through her mind like the text at the bottom of a newscast.
“Explain,” she says shortly.
“He’s…” I press my hands together. It’s like there’s something lodged in my throat. Eric isn’t even here. He’s upstairs. Mom wanted to talk to him separately. “Do you remember the hockey game?” I say after a pause.
Mom’s eyes look like they’re going to burst out of her skull. She grips the arms of the chair, leaning forward. “Wait a second… Are you saying?”
“Dad was in his room. It was just me and Logan. We… I don’t know what happened. We just got carried away. It was so romantic. It was so magical. It was everything I wished my first time would be.”
“Oh, yes. I’m sure he made it feel very magical and romantic for you!”
I flinch. “What’s that supposed to mean?”
“Celebrities and their young women, Emma. That’s what it’s supposed to mean.”
“Mom, you need to stop. Don’t start down that road. Seriously. You do not have all the facts.”
Mom sits up at my tone with a look of genuine regret on her face. She knows she can be a hothead sometimes, as much as I can be. When I was younger, we used to get into fights—nothing crazy, hardly any yelling, but usual daughter-mom stuff.
That seems so silly now, so immature. Now, we’re able to share a smile. She nods. “Fair enough. Then why don’t you explain it? You can understand my reaction, though.”
I think about what Logan said in the hotel room. The world will always brand him a cradle robber and assume I’m a gold digger. They’re going to whisper behind our backs, maybe spread gossip. So my question becomes, what am I going to do about that? Crumble?
“It’s not what you think. It was a one-night stand, fine, but it was romantic. He didn’t push me or anything. I wanted to do it. I know I shouldn’t have.”
Mom frowns. “Your father and Logan are friends. Or they were.” How could you? she almost says. I’m sure of it, or something similar, but she pulls it back at the last moment.
“I know,” I whisper. “I feel like a terrible daughter. Every day since it happened, I’ve felt that way. That’s why he ghosted Dad. I tried to bury it, pretend it never happened, but then I found out I was pregnant.”
“You’re smiling,” Mom says softly.
I adjust my expression.
“Do you always smile when you talk about it? Think about it?”
I nod. “There’s this glow inside of me. It sounds weird, but I feel it, my baby. I feel a glow when Logan talks about them riding their bike or the house we’ll have, or…”
Mom narrows her eyes. “You talk to Logan?”
“He visited,” I say, finally understanding what people mean when they say a weight’s been lifted. It’s not all the weight. It’s not all the doubt and the pain, but some of it is drifting away. “Two weeks ago. He left his team the night I called and told him I was pregnant. He came here that night. He wants to be a father. He wants to retire and raise the baby with me. We’re going to be a family.”
Jeez, I’m crying now. I’ve been searching online recently about pregnancy hormones, and apparently, this is normal—the swinging moods, the heightened sense of tragedy that comes so potently, so suddenly. I think I’d be crying anyway.
Mom walks across the room and opens her arms. I stand and lean against her. She lets me cry myself out, clutching onto her sides. “Oh, Emma. It’s okay.”
“I wanted to tell Dad. I’ve felt so bad, Mom.”
“Did Logan say all those things?” Mom asks. “About the baby?”
“Yeah.” I lean back in her arms, and she wipes the tears from my cheeks. We share another fleeting smile. “We’re serious, Mom. If it wasn’t for Dad, I don’t know. I think we’d be married or at least engaged.”
Mom gasps. “He said that?”
“No,” I mutter. “Not that part, but I love him, and he thinks he might love me, too. We haven’t said it yet.”
Mom sits me down on the couch, clasping my hands. She looks at me sternly. “You’re an intelligent young woman. You’ve always been an old soul, watching the world, trying to bring it to life in your wonderful stories, but love can blind people. You have to think, too. So think. Are you certain he wants to do the right thing and stand by you?”