Harper and I stood there, staring at the pregnancy test. Neither of us said anything as the seconds slowly ticked by. I had the thing facedown, because I couldn’t bear watching it slowly show me what my future was going to be.
Was I ready to be a mother? I didn’t think so. Not at all. But if I was pregnant, I had no other choice. I didn’t want to be a mother, wasn’t even close to being ready, but I was going to be anyway.
“Well?” Harper asked.
“Give it another minute.”
“Check it, Avery. Come on, the box said it only needed thirty seconds.”
“Let’s just wait.”
She sighed. “Listen. Whatever it says, I’m here for you. We’ll get through this together. I promise.”
I bit my lip and suddenly wanted to cry. But no, I wasn’t going to start sobbing like a child. If I had a baby growing inside me, I was going to have to grow up pretty fast, or else.
I reached out, heart racing, and picked up the pregnancy test. Harper looked over my shoulder.
“Oh fuck,” she said.
I was pregnant.
“Hold on,” Harper said. “Let me make sure.” She grabbed the box and compared the little symbol on the test with the symbol on the box.
“Fuck,” she said again, and put the box back down. “Fuck.”
I cringed. “Stop saying that,” I said.
“Okay. Sorry. It’s just, holy shit, Avery. You’re pregnant.”
“Fuck,” I said, and closed the toilet lid before sitting down on it. “I’m pregnant.”
Harper crouched down next to me and threw her arms around me, hugging me tightly. “Maybe it’s wrong.”
“Don’t,” I said. “Don’t say that. These things are basically always right. I knew something was wrong the second I missed my period. And my freaking boobs are tender.”
Harper couldn’t help but giggle. “I hate that,” she said.
“Yeah, me too. Harper, what the hell am I going to do?”
“I don’t know,” she said, “but I promise we’ll figure it out.”
We sat there in silence together, Harper hugging me tightly. As far as I knew, my entire life was about to change in a way I couldn’t possibly understand.
Sitting on the toilet in my tiny apartment with my best friend, I couldn’t even begin to picture what my future would look like a year from now. I’d have a baby, a child that would depend on me for everything.
And yet I was still a baby myself. I was barely twenty-one and hadn’t even graduated from college yet. I didn’t know how to take care of myself, let along how to take care of an infant.
“What about Gibson?” Harper asked finally.
“Fuck,” I groaned again. “I was trying not to think about that.”
“I’m sorry,” she said, “but you need to tell him.”
“I know. But can it wait?”
“Yeah, sure,” she said. “You can tell him tomorrow.”
“I’d suggest we drown my sorrows in wine, but I guess I can’t do that anymore,” I said.
“Good thing we’ve been really boring since that party,” Harper said.
“Yeah, seriously.” I sighed and shook my head. “How am I going to do this, Harps?”
“We’ll figure it out. Come on. Let’s get off this toilet and sit on the couch.”
I nodded. “Okay. Fine.”
I let Harper lead me over to the couch. She wrapped me in a blanket and put on some bad reality TV, the exact sort of thing I needed to keep my mind off the baby growing inside me.
Gibson Evans’s baby. I had no clue how this could happen or what we were going to do. Gibson was a huge star, a famous football player. He was supposed to have a huge future ahead of him. There was no way he was going to take responsibility for some random one-night stand’s baby.
I had no clue how to tell him any of this anyway. I didn’t know him, didn’t even have his number. After that night, I left him with my cell number, but he never bothered calling me. I wasn’t really surprised or even all that upset, considering his reputation as a player and a bad boy. But still, it would have been nice for him to at least acknowledge me.
Instead, he practically disappeared. Or maybe he just returned to how things used to be back before we even knew each other. One night was all we were supposed to have, but now things were so different.
I was pregnant. As I sat there quietly watching TV, cuddling with Harper, I could barely get over that fact. I’d gotten pregnant by a guy I barely knew, some asshole football star. I had no interest in having this guy’s baby, let alone being in his life.
There was nothing I could do, though. I had to tell Gibson, and tell him right away. I couldn’t keep this from him, not something so serious.