Evidently, Peyton could. “Seriously?” She folded her arms against her chest. “That’s how you want to play this? You know, I’m every bit as scared as you are. It’s not like I planned for this to happen. But it is, we’re here, and it’d be a hell of a lot easier if you…”
She glanced down where the indicator sat on the sink and her shoulders slumped.
Oh shit. Positive. This was happening. We were about to be parents.
I stared at my reflection and firmed my jaw. It was time to man up.
“Okay.” My voice was rough and I coughed to clear it. “I’ll find your Dad. I can tell him, or we can do it together…” I stopped talking when Peyton raised her head, eyes filled with tears, but a smile of relief on her face.
“It’s negative.” She grabbed the stick, fisting it like it would run away or suddenly change responses, and said, “I’m not pregnant. Holy cow, I’m not pregnant!”
The stone walls echoed her scream and she slapped her free hand over her mouth, laughing and crying at the same time. “Can you believe it? It was a false alarm. Maybe… maybe it was just stress from exams? Oh, who the hell cares, I’m not pregnant!”
The tackle hug took me by surprise and my back slammed against the wall.
“Thank you,” she said, wrapping her arms around my waist. “Thank you for being here. I couldn’t have done it alone. I was up half the night, wondering what we’d do, how I’d tell my parents.” Another laugh escaped and she leaned her head back to look at me. “What a relief, right?”
I nodded in agreement. I’m pretty sure I even smiled. My limp arms slid around her shoulders as the words “not pregnant, she’s not pregnant,” repeated over and over in my mind.
What the hell was wrong with me?
Why wasn’t I laughing like a maniac, too, or squeezing Peyton tight in celebration? We narrowly escaped a fate neither of us wanted. And here I was, standing like a zombie.
Peyton slid her arms to my chest and pushed back, studying me again. “You’re okay, right? I mean, this is good news… isn’t it?”
“Oh, yeah, awesome news,” I replied, trying to snap myself out of it. “I guess I’m just in shock. But yeah, definitely good news.” And now I was a robot zombie.
Worry replaced joy as she watched me and she said, “Today’s only a half-day. Just a bunch of B.S. assemblies and weepy goodbyes. If you want, we can skip… maybe grab some breakfast and hit up a movie?”
“Nah. The team has a meeting after school, so I should hang around.” I took her hands in mine, gave them a gentle squeeze, and then pushed away from the wall. “But maybe later, yeah?”
Peyton nodded, face blank of emotion, and I knew it was my fault. I was acting bipolar, but hell if I could help it. My head was a mess, my chest felt like a block of ice, and I suddenly wanted to punch my fist through a wall. I wanted to talk to my grandparents, but they were long gone. The only other person I could talk to now stared at me like I had two heads.
I had to get out of here.
“Listen, I’m glad you’re all right,” I told her, grabbing my backpack from the floor. “There’s something I have to do before school starts, but let’s talk after, okay?”
Then, like Satan himself was after me, I bolted from the room.
***
“Hey, gorgeous, you gonna miss me this summer?”
Sometime between January and now, Lauren Hays’s voice became like nails on a chalkboard. Chills, and not the good kind, crept down my spine whenever she stopped to say hi, or stalked my locker to flirt, like she was doing now. It was annoying as hell, but, ready to get my ass out of here, I put on a fake smile.
“You know it, beautiful. But you know what they say, absence makes the heart grow fonder.” With a disgusted grimace, I shoved a binder in my backpack.
This was why I needed to go home. I’d been saying dumb shit all day. My brain clocked out right around the time we got the results, and now, a shot of Dad’s tequila was seriously calling my name.
First step, getting past Lauren.
“Well, hopefully your heart’s already fond because guess who’s gonna be your Diamond Doll next year?” She bounced on her toes with a huge grin, and when I didn’t jump to answer, she did it for me. “Me! I thought we made an awesome team this year, so I requested to keep you as mine.”
The territorial smirk was straight out of Fatal Attraction. It creeped me the fuck out, but the point was to get out of here so I just nodded and stuffed a wad of junk in my bag. How did all this shit accumulate in one year? It was disgusting. Forgotten protein bars, ripped-out notes, and sweat-stained socks. Lauren peeked inside and wrinkled her nose.
A loose paper was lodged in the corner and as I yanked on it she asked, “Anything I can do to help you today?”