The First Rule by Nicole S. Goodin

5

Darcy

The water spraysheavily against the tiled floor of the shower, yet I’m still bone-dry, sitting on the closed lid of the toilet.

I have no idea how much time has passed as I’ve sat here, thinking through the colossal fuck-up I’ve just made.

I slept with Ryan.

I slept with my brother-in-law.

Only he’s not my brother-in-law and he never will be, but that’s not the real problem here, the problem is that I liked it.

I slept with another man on what was meant to be my wedding night, and I liked it.

Fuck.

I squeeze my eyes shut, trying to shove away the hazy memories from my mind.

The agreement.

The sex.

The passion.

The very real consequences of what might result from last night.

My stomach lurches and I fly off the toilet, only just getting the lid up in time to throw up noisily into the bowl.

I wipe my mouth with the back of my hand as angry tears fill my eyes. I’m so angry at myself for being this stupid… this reckless.

I close my eyes and let my head fall back against the wall behind me as my forehead pounds from the alcohol I consumed last night.

I don’t know what the hell is going to happen from this moment on. Nothing is the same as it was yesterday, but I do know one thing. I can’t sit on the floor of this hotel bathroom forever.

* * *

Eight weeks later

I wishI could say I hadn’t seen this coming, but the two pink lines staring back at me have been waiting to be confirmed for the past month and a half.

I’ve been sick, moody, my boobs have been killing me and I can smell everything.

The universe is one cruel bitch when it really comes down to it. Jacob and I tried for just over a year to have a baby… and nothing. I slept with Ryan once and I couldn’t be any more knocked up.

“Two lines means negative, right?” Freya asks with a grimace as she waves the pregnancy test around before glancing at it again to confirm what we both already knew.

I huff out a humourless laugh.

On the one hand, I’m beyond excited that I’m going to be a mother. It’s literally all I’ve wished for since I was a little girl, but I wanted the family experience, not the single mother with a questionable baby daddy package.

This is all kinds of complicated, and a big part of me was holding onto hope that maybe I was having all these symptoms out of stress, rather than it being due to a foetus holed up in my uterus. It’s been a brutal eight weeks – not only have I grieved the loss of my relationship, but I’ve stressed about the choice I made that night.

That’s the reason I waited this long to pee on a stick. In fact, I only went through with it today because Freya finally lost her patience with me and demanded that I ‘just do it already’.

So here I am, officially pregnant.

“Sorry I’m late, did you check it yet?” Steph calls out as she flies through the door of Freya’s apartment in a rush, the door slamming shut behind her.

Freya rolls her eyes at Steph. “I don’t know why you even apologise for being late anymore.”

“Because it’s the polite thing to do.” She tosses her bag onto the table as she crosses the room towards us.

“The ‘polite thing to do’ would be turning up on time,” Freya mutters as Steph plucks the test from her hand.

“I told you.” She points her finger at me as she takes in the positive result.

I don’t answer, just sink further into the couch I’ve been sleeping on for the past eight weeks and cover my face with a pillow. “What a mess.” I groan. “What the hell am I doing with my life?”

“Oh, here we go again.” I can hear Steph’s disapproving look through her tone. “Pity party for one.”

I throw the pillow in the direction of her voice.

“My husband ran out on me at the altar, I have no house, no money and now I’m knocked-up to his fucking brother!” I yell at her.

She throws the pillow back at me. “Get some new stories,” she says with a grin. “We’ve heard those ones already.”

I bite back a laugh. Nothing about it is funny really, but that’s the beauty of Steph; she can make me feel better about my depressing life in her own way.

I don’t know what I would have done without the two women in front of me during all of this.

“So... when are you going to tell him?” Freya asks.

“Well… I was thinking... never?” I reply weakly.

“You can’t not tell him, D.”

“Technically I could.”

“Shut up, we all know you’re not going to have this man’s baby and not tell him, so cut the bullshit and let’s make a plan.”

“I don’t even know how to find him,” I argue.

“Lies. You Googled him three weeks ago. You know exactly where to find him.” Freya looks at me with a no-bullshit expression written all over her face.

“How do you know that?” I demand, shocked.

“You borrowed my laptop, sweetie. Google search history is a thing.”

I narrow my eyes, glaring at her. “Fine.” I groan. “I know where to find him. Down at the bar. Jacob never told me that Ryan actually owns R&R’s. I thought he just worked there.”

“I think there’s other things you should be considerably more worried about that Jacob wasn’t telling you,” Steph quips.

I flip her off with another bit-down grin. Again, it’s not funny, and I’m still so hurt over what Jacob did to me, but what I never expected was to feel relieved… like I can finally drop the act that I’ve realised my life had become. I feel more like me than I have in years.

“Okay, so you’re going to just head downtown to his bar and tell him. Easy.”

“Oh yeah, that’ll be a real barrel of laughs… ‘Oh, hi, Ryan, you remember that time we wrote a contract on a page ripped out of a bible? Yeah. I’d like to enforce that. Oh, but I’ve already broken rule three, and rule two is irrelevant’.”

“Hold up, on a page of a bible?” Freya demands at the same time that Steph laughs and mutters, “no wonder you’re having bad luck.”

I silence them both with a death glare.

“What?” Freya raises a brow at me. “That’s loose, just sayin’.”

I sigh heavily. “What’s even the point of telling him? He didn’t want to be a dad, he just wanted me to be a mum.”

“And you’re not telling him he has to be a dad. But you can’t bring a human into the world that shares his DNA and not tell him about it. It’s just not right. He’s a good guy, he deserves to know.”

She’s right. I know she is. There’s no way I’d do that to Ryan. He is a good man, and I’d never lie to him about something like this or withhold that type of information.

I’ve been mulling this over for weeks – another reason I’ve been so reluctant to take a test, because now it’s all real and I have to do something about it.

Sure, this baby in my belly was just as real yesterday as it is today, but yesterday I still had the luxury of possibly being wrong about it. Today has taken that from me.

“I’ll tell him,” I confirm. “Would have been great to have a couple of glasses of liquid courage before I did, but that’s obviously off the cards now too.” I roll my eyes.

“Can we just put aside the slightly odd predicament you’ve found yourself in for a second and talk about how much that little baby is going to love its favourite aunty,” Freya says excitedly.

“His favourite aunt Steph you mean?” Steph says, brow raised.

“Her favourite aunt Freya,” Freya corrects.

“I’m glad you’re both so excited, but can we maybe not count our chickens before they hatch? There’s a long time between a positive pregnancy test and a baby, you guys.”

“You’re right.” Steph nods. “Of course… you’re right. Let’s be sensible… But I’m going to buy him his first pair of kicks,” she blurts out.

I roll my eyes. Steph and sensible don’t really go together in the same sentence.

“Didn’t you say you had a meeting this afternoon?” Freya questions.

Steph glances at the watch on her wrist, which may as well not even go, given how utterly useless she is with checking the time.

“Shit. I’m late. Gotta go.” She flies out of her chair and kisses me on the cheek. “You’re going to be the best mum in the world.” She’s so sincere it almost brings a tear to my eye.

Steph might be a hot mess, but she’s the best friend a girl could ask for.

“How are you feeling?” Freya asks me as we watch Steph exit in much the same manner she entered.

“Scared, excited… sick.” I grimace.

I can’t tell if the nausea swirling in my stomach is morning sickness, or dread over the fact that I have to see Ryan again – that I have to tell him I’m carrying his baby.

The scary thing is, I already know what he’ll say. I can picture the tender look in his eyes. He’ll wear the same expression he did that night.

If I’m being honest with myself, it’s not just telling Ryan I’m pregnant that scares me, it’s what happens after that. I haven’t stopped thinking about the night we shared; I can’t forget the way he made me feel.

I can’t stop myself from wanting to do it again.

“You really will be great, D, and we’ve got your back, you know that, right? With anything.”

I do know that. The lengths that the three of us would go to for each other is immeasurable. The two of them having my back is the only thing I know for certain these days.

I smile at her, tears of gratitude blurring my vision.

“Do you want me to come with you to talk to him?”

I shake my head. I appreciate the offer, but this is something I know I have to do on my own.