The Perfect Combination

Two months had passed since that night in New York and Natalia and Sergio’s friendship had somehow continued to remain normal. Well as normal as two people, who were best friends, that had slept together, could be.

Natalia had been so busy with her fashion label and Sergio on football, that the issue of insemination had taken a back seat for now. A decision on whether a third round of insemination was yet to be decided but Natalia somehow knew that would not be necessary if the little stick she was holding right now wrote “pregnant” on it.

Yes, right now Natalia Ramirez was sitting in the bathroom of Sergio’s abnormally large house peeing on six different sticks. Hoping on one side that she was indeed “with child”, but on the flip side hoping she wasn’t.

Don’t get her wrong she was still eager to have a baby and still have Sergio play sperm donor to that. But somehow the way this baby was created made her feel uneasy. Her and Sergio sleeping together had been a mistake, that much was true but this baby definitely was not, but somewhere during the all night rendezvous, something in her changed. It was like in that moment everything in her head clicked and she wanted nothing more than to be in his arms forever.

Snorting at that thought, she checked the time to see she still had an excruciatingly long minute to wait before she knew the results. That got her thinking about whether that little blob she hoped was in her, would be a boy or a girl, how they would look, if they’d take after her or if they’d look like Sergio. Her train of thought was interrupted by her rather loud alarm going of, announcing that her three minutes where up.

With a deep breath and a silent prayer, she looked down to see the results on the sticks

———————-

"Gosh finally", Sergio rambled, "I was about to come up there myself to see if you were OK. So what are the results?" he asked hurriedly.

Natalia just took a seat opposite the rather flustered footballer and kept quiet.

"Natalia, are you OK?" Iker asked after she said nothing. He had come over to (snoop) support his two friends who had told him everything about Natalia’s quest to have a baby.

He’d secretly hoped that when Natalia found out she was pregnant it would magically make her fall in love with Sergio and never leave again but that dream was soon distinguished when Sergio began a casual relationship with a certain model called Selma Rodriquez.

Shaking himself out of his daze, he watched her carefully to see if her eyes gave away any clues as to what those little sticks upstairs said, and the minute she made eye contact with him, he knew what the results were.

“Congrats Nati”, he said as he jumped to hug her, “your gonna make the best mom ever”. “Wait, how did… I didn’t even…” she stammered as she struggled to put together a coherent sentence.

"Oh cutie, San Iker always knows", answered sweetly, "Now about baby names, have you thought about what you’re gonna call it if its a boy?" he began to sit back in his seat as he asked this.

"Uhm Iker…" she began but was interrupted by Sergio.

"So you are pregnant?" he asked tentatively," We are… I mean you are gonna have a baby? My baby?" he inquired while trying to digest the news himself.

"Well yeah I’m pregnant with your baby but its technically not yours Sergio remember?" she answered quietly. Hoping he had not changed his mind about the deal they had in regards to the raising of the baby.

"Yeah of course I didn’t mean my baby as in I’m the father, I mean I am the father but not like that. And its not like I want it anyway" he explained lamely.

Iker watched this exchange with interest as he could have swore he saw Natalia’s eyes drop when Sergio said the last part. “Yeah” was all she could say back before silenced descended on the group.

"So", Iker tried to liven the mood, "we should celebrate your big news" he suggested.

"Not yet", Natalia objected.

"Why not?" Sergio asked this time, "you are finally getting everything you want. We should celebrate that"

"We will I promise. Its just I want to have a check up and make sure everything is OK before I start making any big plans" she reasoned.

"That’s a good idea" Iker said as he began to stand up off the couch and walk into the kitchen. Once Iker was out of earshot Sergio turned to Natalia, "do you mind if I come with you? I just want to make sure you and the baby are healthy" he justified to her.

"Sergio are you sure? I don’t want you getting to attached and then hating me when I take the baby away" she answered back.

"I’m pretty sure I’m already gonna hate you for leaving period", he teased, "but trust me I wont get attached. You can’t love something you don’t want right?!" he replied confidently, not sure if he was trying to convince himself or her of this.