His eyes slowly widened. I couldn’t gauge what he was thinking.
So I continued. “It made me feel like I was not only doing something to protect my future fertility but to also help someone.”
Sebastian blinked a few times. “Wow. That’s . . . certainly an honorable decision for someone so young to have made.”
“Yeah. I mean . . . I didn’t want to ever have to do it again. I figured since I was going through all the trouble, if there was ever a time to make that kind of decision, that was it. So I bit the bullet.” I shook my head. “Anyway, I don’t even know why I was so compelled to admit this to you now. It’s just . . . you asked me about the scar, and I felt like this was the right time to let you know.” I looked into his eyes. “I hope you don’t think any differently of me because of my decision.”
The seconds that passed where he didn’t immediately say anything were excruciating.
Then he cupped my face. “I would never judge you for making a decision that helped someone else. Don’t ever think that. It’s definitely . . . surprising . . . but not something that makes me think any differently of you, Sadie. If anything, I admire you even more for doing that.”
I let out a long, relieved breath. Not sure why I expected that to be harder than it was. I supposed I didn’t have to admit anything to him at all, and he would have never known about that decision I made all those years ago. But deep down, I think it would have bothered me to not know how he might have felt about it or whether he would have looked at me differently.
“So . . . these eggs . . . ,” he asked. “Did they go to different people?”
“No. I didn’t want that. I wanted them to all go to one person in need—a cancer survivor like my mother. And I didn’t want to know who that person was. It was important to me that there be no contact at all. I just wanted to help someone. So I made sure it was all anonymous. To this day, I have no idea whether anything took . . . whether there was a baby who came from it.”
“Wow. Okay.” He squeezed my side. “Thank you for opening up to me. I know you didn’t have to do that.” Then he stared off for a bit.
We lay in a sort of awkward silence after my admission—until Sebastian got out of bed abruptly and said, “How about I order us some lunch?”
I sat up against the headboard. “That sounds great.”
“Why don’t you take a hot shower? I’ll go pick something up so that it’s ready for when you get out.”
Things were seeming brighter by the second. I smiled and lifted myself off the bed. “Okay.”By the time I got out of the long shower, though, while the hot Thai food was waiting in containers on the table, Sebastian made an unexpected announcement.
He looked upset. “I have to head to the restaurant. The chef called in sick and the substitute has never worked with us before. I have to make sure he knows what he’s doing, oversee things.”
“Oh no. Does that happen often?”
“Only a few times before. It always works out in the end, but it’s nerve-racking.”
This sucked.
“Okay . . . um, well . . . can I do anything?”
“Birdie isn’t supposed to be home for a while. But you can hang out here or head home. Whatever you prefer.”
“Will you let me know if you need me to head back here for her or something if you can’t make it back in time for her tomorrow?”
“Absolutely. Thank you for offering to do that.”
After he left, I couldn’t help wondering if there was more to his departure than the story he had given me. I knew that was probably ridiculous paranoia. It just seemed like the entire mood changed after I admitted to him that I’d donated my eggs. I could see how that might freak someone out. I remember watching stories on the news about sperm donors whose children came to find them years later. One guy had, like, twenty kids. My situation was different, of course. I didn’t do it for money. It was to honor my mother and help one family in need. But still, maybe he’d had some sort of a delayed reaction to my admission.
Anyway, I was probably reading into it too much. I tried to put it out of my mind for the rest of the day.CHAPTER 25
SEBASTIAN
I was being ridiculous.
Right?
To suspect such a thing would be absolutely crazy.
It had honestly taken a while for my mind to conjure up the wild theory that Sadie’s news brought about. First, it shocked me to hear what she’d been through, how scared she’d been, and how it led her to make that very bold decision to harvest her eggs at such a young age. But it wasn’t until she mentioned the egg donation that the alarms started going off inside me.