Unsuitable

Alone, Audrey pulled the kit’s packaging from the garbage and scanned the fine print for an error rate. In the other room the TV went on. There was a logical way to work through this, she only had to find the threads and pull them together.

“Home kits are ninety-eight percent accurate.” Merrill was back.

“That can’t be right.” She couldn’t be pregnant.

“Joe did the research. ”They’re almost as accurate as a lab test.”

“Well, maybe this one was left in the sun or something.” She picked up the stick and shook it, as if that might set things right.

“It wasn’t left in the sun, Aud. It’s one of mine. You’re pregnant.”

The plus sign was still there. “I can’t be pregnant.”

“You are and I’m not.” Merrill folded her arms tight around her.

“I don’t want to be.”

“No. How fair is that? Everywhere I look there’s a pregnant woman and now you, and you don’t want another baby.”

“Merry, I can’t explain this, but I’m not pregnant.” Merrill was so angry she was unlikely to listen even if Audrey could explain a miracle.

“You’re tired all the time. You’re tits are huge for you. You’re eating like there’s a food shortage. You’re buying ice cream. You had two pieces of cake. You slept with Reece and you weren’t careful enough, you let this happen, and now you have everything I want.”

“It’s not the same as with Mia.”

“Who says it has to be the same?”

They stared at each other. Merrill was furious. Audrey felt sick. She made it to the bathroom in time to get to her knees and throw up in the toilet.

What if she was pregnant? How would she cope? This new job wasn’t designed around the need for maternity leave or the stress of a baby, a second child. She was on probation as far as the promotion was concerned. A new baby could trash her career. Not to mention what it might do to her health. Of course she didn’t have to have it. Women made the decision not to be pregnant all the time and yet Merrill and Joe wanted nothing more than their own child. She gripped the edge of the porcelain and threw up again. It was Reece’s child and she could never harm something they’d created together.

“Mum is sick.” Audrey put her arm out to stop Mia coming any closer.

Merrill caught Mia by the shoulders turned her away from the bathroom. “Go and watch Nemo. I’ll look after Mum.” She knelt behind Audrey and wrapped her arms around her. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to lose it with you.”

Audrey coughed into her hand to try to clear her throat. “How could you not.” Her face was hot and her chest burned. The tiles were hard on her knees and she wanted Reece’s arms around her, Reece’s words comforting her. There could be no comfort from Merrill.

“I’ll stand by you whatever happens, but I can’t pretend not to be jealous, not to wish it was me.”

Audrey let Merrill help her up. She washed her face and cleaned her teeth while Merrill packed an overnight bag for Mia. She went to the kitchen. The blood test she’d had would confirm if she was pregnant or not, and there was no point getting upset or making plans until she knew for sure.

“You need to tell him.”

Audrey had made a second pot of tea. She poured for Merrill. “There’s nothing to tell him.”

“That’s not true, Aud, and it’s not fair.”

“What am I going to say? Hey, remember me, your former employer, you know the one who abused her position of authority and slept with you when she was half out of her brain after nearly dying? And you know how we used protection and I wasn’t ovulating? Surprise. I might be pregnant because I’m eating lots of ice cream and I peed on a stick and it flashed a plus sign.”

“Yes, tell him that. He’s entitled to know. This is not just about you.”

“He would want me to keep it.”

Merrill choked and turned away. But she had to have known that was an option. She recovered to say, “And if he does and you don’t, what next?”

Audrey sat on a kitchen stool. She had an appalling need to hug Mia, to take her and go find Reece, to tell him she’d made a mistake, that their lives were worth less living without him, but if she did that, and she was pregnant, she’d be trapping him into fatherhood with a women who sent him away for doing everything he could to love her.

It was bad enough one of them was trapped. And for all she knew Reece had gotten over her and moved on.