She was pregnant. Merry was pregnant.
That meant I was going to be a father. It was a lot, and we needed to talk about it. But first I needed to make sure she was going to be okay after my stupid comment. Merry looked so terrified, completely falling apart and sobbing as she sat there on my floor. I hated to see her like that, to watch her curl up into herself and hold her knees to her chest as she cried. There were so many thoughts and emotions happening in her, but it was obvious one of them was fear. Not fear because she was pregnant, but fear because she had just told me. She didn’t know how I was going to react to what was going to happen, and it was upsetting her to the point it looked like she was about to fall apart.
I got to my feet and dressed as quickly as I could. Not bothering to put my shoes on yet, I collected her clothes and helped her into them. Taking her by her hands, I got her to her feet and led her over to the couch again. We sat down, and I looked over at Rosie. My puppy had been patient and quiet, barely making herself known up until now. It was what I’d asked her to do, and she was being such a good girl, but now I needed her to go back to her bubbly, adorable puppy self.
“Rosie,” I called. “Come here, puppy. Come see Merry.”
She scrambled over and jumped up on the couch. This was a puppy who didn’t need to be asked twice for affection. I patted Merry’s lap, and Rosie immediately bounced into it, lifting her little head to lick Merry’s face. She circled around a few times, then licked Merry again and again. Merry was still sniffling, but the tears had slowed, and she smiled at the affection from the puppy.
“How long have you known?” I asked.
“A few weeks,” she admitted. Her head dropped down for a second before she looked at me again. “I know I should have told you as soon as I found out. You should have been the first call I made, and I should have just been honest with you from the beginning. But I didn’t know how. I had no idea how I was supposed to have that conversation with you.”
She was obviously struggling to force the words out through the tears that were falling fresh again as she seemed to realize the impact of her holding back the information from me. I reached out and wrapped my arms around her, hugging her tight. It pinned Rosie between us, but she was happy to be able to lick both of us at the same time.
“How did you find out?” I asked.
“You remember when I took a couple of days off?” she asked.
“Yes,” I said, reaching up with one hand to brush tears away from her cheeks.
“I was feeling sick. Just tired and queasy, then when I smelled strong food odors or tried to eat much, I got really sick. I thought I just had a stomach bug or a virus of some kind. With everything that had been going on and all the upheaval and change in my life, I honestly wasn’t even paying attention. It didn’t even occur to me that I’d missed my period. Then I mentioned it to Olivia. She’s the one who recognized the symptoms. Her sister and sisters-in-law have been pregnant several times, and she’s been there for all of them. She said I sounded just like what her sister felt. So, I asked her to get a test.”
“So, she knows?” I asked.
I didn’t mean it in a negative way, but she squeezed her eyes closed and looked away again.
“I’m sorry,” she said. “I know you should have been the first one to know, but she was there and encouraged me to take the test to see if that’s what was happening.”
“No,” I said. “Don’t apologize. I’m glad she could be there for you. That’s not something you should have gone through by yourself, and it makes me happy to know you had her.”
“She’s the only one who knows,” she told me. “I haven’t told anybody else. Even Brandon. I didn’t want anybody else to know until I figure it out how to tell you.”
I held her close to me again, kissing the top of her head and stroking her hair. This wasn’t enough. We needed to really talk about this. Not sitting on the couch in my office while the workday went on around us. I wanted to bring her home, to my home. I wanted to tuck her into bed and curl up beside her so we could cuddle and really talk. But first there was something that couldn’t wait.