Infinite

The first pregnancy test I ever took lied to me. The one little line was in sharp contrast with the following six despite its fading color, and the false sense of relief washed over me cruelly. Heather lined them up on the counter, four little sticks with two messages, one blaring at me a strange, unrecognizable joke, while the others showed me a stark reality – the truth of what my future would be and the narrowing window of possibilities. Reality felt more like a dream, a jest, someone’s idea of a laugh.

The blonde daycare worker carefully rested her hands on my shoulders, her fingers pushing my hair out of the way. I was bent over the sink, staring at the tests, trying to determine if I passed or failed, and Heather motioned for me to turn around. When I didn’t, she twisted my shoulders towards her, bringing my eyes reluctantly to hers.

“Atticus, it’s all right,” she said calmly, putting a reassuring and comforting smile on her face when I gave her a look that suggested otherwise, “It may seem like the end of the world now, but it’s just a baby.”

“Just a baby,” I repeated, wondering how she couldn’t hear how ludicrous that sounded to me. A baby was never ‘just’ a baby. A baby was a lifestyle change. An accident, a mistake, an eighteen-year commitment to keeping something alive.

“Should I send him a picture?” I asked, grabbing one of the positive tests and moving past her towards my bedroom.

She followed. “Send whom a picture of what?” she questioned. When she realized what I meant after a few moments, her expression showed her horror and she pulled the stick from my fingers, already searching for my cell phone to take it away also. “No,” she answered definitely, “You have to think about this, Att, you can’t just spring it on him like that. You’ll have to work up to it softly.”

“It was sprung on me ‘like that’,” I replied almost bitterly, watching the mother as she watched me, “He’ll handle the news in his own way.”

Heather set the pregnancy test and my cell phone down on the edge of my nightstand and gently sat down beside me, angling her body to face me. “Just to clarify,” she said cautiously, “We’re talking about Ronnie, right?”

My lips parted. “Yes, we’re talking about Ronnie!” I shouted, in disbelief that she would think that there was anyone between us when I could’ve possibly gotten pregnant. “I don’t make a habit of having sex with other guys, Heather.”

She nodded, unfazed by my outburst. “Sorry, I had to ask. I wasn’t sure how long this thing with Chance has been going on. There are two sets of advice depending on which person is the father and I want to make sure I give you the right one.”

“This was the first and only time,” I answered, then got sidetracked by her other words, “Wait, why different advice?” I crossed my arms and stared at her, waiting for an explanation.

“Ronnie and Chance are two very different people with two very different lives,” she answered as though it was obvious. And while that statement was, the fact that she had two different plans wasn’t. I couldn’t see how there could be more than one option here, but obviously Heather saw more than I did.

“The thing with Chance won’t happen again,” I said, moving the subject along and past the ‘two sets of advice’ hump we’d gotten stuck on, “Especially not now.”

“Do you want it to happen again?” Heather asked, her tone absent of any judgment, just honest curiosity, “Today kind of makes it seem like you like him more than you’re letting on.”

I shrugged, biting my bottom lip between my teeth as Heather scrutinized me, searching my noncommittal actions for any sense of honesty. “That’s irrelevant now,” I answered, meeting her blue eyes, “I need to focus on all of this right now. I can’t run around all tied up over a guy when I need to get my life in order.”

“He’s part of your new life, Att,” she answered, bringing out the future child-psychologist in her, “Having a baby doesn’t mean you have to sacrifice your social or romantic life. You just have to learn how to incorporate it in and work around it.”

I could feel all the stress building back up. All the worries and concern and ‘too-complicated’ questions that I was trying desperately to sort through in my mind. Heather was bringing up more than I could handle. I was singularly focused now, picking a path and sticking with it, even though it’d been picked for me by some twisted turn of fate.

“I can’t ever consider being with anyone right now, Heath,” I answered, wondering how she didn’t see how wrong it was, “I’m going to have Ronnie’s baby. Chance was right – I can’t date or have sex with anyone else while I’m pregnant with Ronnie’s baby. Possibly never again.

“Someday I’ll be raising kids with different fathers. If I ever get married and have another child, this one is going to wonder where its dad is. It’ll have to learn to accept that it will never have a dad who is going to live at home and cook breakfast and be there for every birthday and holiday, even the stupid ones. This child, this one that those tests say is actually in side of me, is going to grow up with a rockstar, instead of a father. How can I do that to my own child? How can I do that to our future?”

Heather looked utterly surprised by my monologue and she took a moment to compose herself and her thoughts. When she finally spoke, she ran her fingers through her hair and sighed, as though it were far too complicated a subject to get into this early. But when she answered, she sounded sincere and sure.

“Atti, it’s your life,” she said, “Your child will love you and adore his or her life because I know you’ll do your best, no matter what, to make it the best it can be. No matter who you end up with, your child is going to love you and you’re going to love this baby, and he or she will never feel like something is missing, because you’ll love him so much that he won’t have room for anyone else to love him like that.”

She shot me a small smile and then continued, “I know that it’s terrifying and you feel entirely alone right now, but there are more people standing behind you than you even realize.”

I nodded. I knew that I would always have my family there to back me up, but when it came down to it, the person that I needed most had the very real option to walk away. He could walk right back into the life he created for himself and out of the one that we created together. Our life was an accident; it meant nothing to him yet. It was everything that I was trying so hard to stop him from realizing too early.

It was something that I wanted, that I wanted to keep from him to preserve everything that he’d worked for up until now. But sitting here in my room with six little pink lines determining my fate, I hoped that somehow we could band together to save both of our futures.

“I just need Ronnie to be on my side,” I answered, dark eyes moving to the floor as I pictured the outcomes of this situation, “I’m terrified that there’s something more out there for him. I know there is. I’m so scared that he’ll lose all that, but I’m so scared that he’ll chose it over me – over us.”

I pressed my face into my hands. It was the first time I’d really admitted all of that out loud and this time it wasn’t precautionary: it was reality. This time there was so much more to lose.

Heather wrapped her arm over my shoulders. “I know you feel like you can’t win,” she whispered, tucking my hair back out of my face, “But Ronnie’s a big boy, Atticus. You expect him to pick which one means more to him and stick to it, but I know Ronnie. I know that he’ll figure out a way to make it work. He loves you.”

I nodded, gathering myself together. I wasn’t sure if her words were the truth. I was sure of anything at this moment, but I listened to her, deciding that Heather was going to be right every time. “How do I tell him?” I asked, turning my dark eyes to hers, “How do I tell anyone?”

“Stick with telling Ronnie first,” she answered, fingers pressing comfortingly into my spine, “I think you should tell him soon if the two of you still want to keep your options open, which means you should probably call him.”

“I can’t call him,” I rebutted, looking at her incredulously, “What if it’s too much of a surprise and he dies?”

“I think that’s something you’ll need to worry about no matter how you tell him, Sweetheart,” she answered blankly.

I glared at her smile. “That’s not funny.”

“Then don’t be ridiculous,” she countered, “He might be shocked, but he’s not going to die. Men don’t die from pregnant women, at least not from their words.”

“A heart attack is very possible,” I argued, “He’s prone to hurting himself. What if I kill him because I messed up and got pregnant? Then what? I can’t do this by myself.” My easy admittance surprised me. It came from a place of fear and I was quickly realizing that my subconscious wasn’t as bogged down by wanting to keep Ronnie far away and oblivious. Underneath it all, all I really wanted was him right by my side.

“You just have to tell him soon,” Heather repeated, “You both have some really big decisions to make and you have to start talking about it before it’s too late. I can make you an appointment at your gynecologists if you want, that way you can get the ball rolling.”

“I don’t have one,” I answered stubbornly, gasping my phone from the nightstand and unlocking it.

“Then I’ll make you one at mine,” she answered, patting my leg, “She’s amazing. You’ll love her. Nothing to worry about.”

I nodded but she was already heading downstairs despite my answer and I turned my attention to the familiar, memorized number. I glanced at the time as it rang, wondering if he could be on stage. When he didn’t answer after the next ring, I hung up, deciding that taking some time to figure out what I was going to say wasn’t such a bad idea.

I dropped the phone onto my bare bed and followed Heather downstairs, another set of frantic questions arising as I thought about the little boy that I’d openly and willingly invited into my life. It seemed that the universe decided it was two for one day in my life and the thought of caring for a baby seemed much more difficult than feeding and hanging out with Arch, who was already such a little adult.