Anne came to her, grabbing her hands. “Listen to me, you can cancel him. Just tell him whatever you need to for him to give you some space. Then we’ll get a test on the way home and we’ll see if it’s even anything to worry about. It may be completely nothing, but there’s no need to stress about anything, is there?”
“I don’t … I don’t know.”
“You don’t have to worry about a thing.” Anne stroked her hair back from her face. “Please, just try to relax.”
“It’s kind of hard to relax when I feel I’m spending every single waking moment freaking out.”
“Take deep breaths. Long, deep breaths. It’s fine. We don’t know anything yet and we can make a decision as and when we do.”
Robin nodded. She was calming down. She was fine. Nothing was going to go wrong.
****
“Are you avoiding me?” Preacher asked.
“No. No, of course I’m not avoiding you. We’ll talk, I promise. I just don’t feel so great right now.”
“What about Bethany? Do you need me to come and look after her for you?”
Why was he being so sweet? She couldn’t handle this. She hadn’t even told him about her suspicions, and he was offering to take care of her baby. He was … everything. And she was a horrible person.
“No, it’s fine. We’ll talk tomorrow or when I’m feeling better, if that’s okay.”
“Yes. I’ll be here waiting for you, always.”
“Okay.” She hung up the phone after saying goodbye, feeling awful.
“I put Bethany down for a nap after she ate. She’s growing up so fast,” Anne said. She held the small box within her grasp and seeing it made Robin feel a little woozy.
“I don’t know if I can do this.”
“You can do whatever the hell you want to do to.” Anne sat down in the bedroom beside her bed. “There’s no pressure here.”
“It sure feels like it.”
“Only because you’re putting it on yourself.” Anne placed the box down. “See, you don’t have to take it. Nothing bad will happen. All you’ll be doing is prolonging the answer, and believe me, that’s no biggie.”
Robin didn’t make a move to pick it up. She kept debating with herself what she should or shouldn’t do. To not take the test would mean she didn’t have to worry about any of the answers. If she took the test, it would be a struggle to know and how to deal with it. She put a hand across her stomach, wondering what the hell to do.
“Why aren’t you forcing me to take this test and to stop being a baby?” she asked.
“It’s not my job to do this, Robin. I’m your friend. Your best friend, I don’t want to force you to do anything.” Anne sat there. “You know, when I took my first test, Elijah wasn’t even there for me.”
“He wasn’t?”
“Nope. He made me take the test all on my own. He told me to come over if it’s a yes, and if I didn’t turn up, he’d know we were in the clear.” Anne laughed.
“You married this man?”
Anne snorted. “Yeah, I married him. I was young, stupid, and I really thought I was in love with him. We’d been together forever and well, I guess I thought he was the one. I’m such a loser, right?”
“You’re not a loser. If I’m being totally honest, I thought Bishop would’ve been the guy I settled down with. There are times I wish we didn’t lose our friendship, you know, but the more I think about it, it wasn’t a real friendship. Bishop thought he owned me be
cause of what was expected of us. You can’t build anything on that, and when our friendship was tested, he pushed me away.” She shrugged. “He failed epically.”
“He’s not the only friend you’ve got, Robin. Not anymore.”
Robin sighed. “I need to know the answer. I need to know what to do.”