Page 111 of Nine Month Contract
“I cope with animals,” I state softly, my eyes welling with tears.
“But are animals really enough?” she asks seriously. “Seems kind of lonely to me.”
“Animals can’t disappoint me the way humans can,” I reply honestly.
“Well, preferring loneliness over rejection or disappointment won’t work forever. You’re hurting yourself under the guise of protection, but it makes no sense because all you’re doing is literally hurting yourself. It’s a pointless cycle. And you’re missing out on life, girl. Being human. Having human experiences and splashes of pain. I never went to therapy for this. Probably should have. I could word all this shit better, but Jesus, Trista, we didn’t go through our shitty lives just to turn intoscared little pussies. If you want more, you have to take it because no one will give it to you.”
Tears spill down my cheeks as I think of the exception to that comment. Wyatt has given me so much—a home, a bed, daily breakfasts…himself. He’s constantly giving, and I’ve been begrudgingly taking because of how utterly broken I am inside. And now he wants to give more of himself to me, and I just keep pushing him away to save myself from future pain. But being away from him, all I feel is pain.How did that happen? These feelings?And why did I lie to him and say this was only a job?
I hold my stomach, allowing myself to consider the possibility of more at the end of all this, and my thoughts are thwarted when a strange sensation rumbles through my belly. I inhale sharply and drop my phone as a tumbling sort of ripple that’s foreign and unnatural vibrates inside me. When I move my hands lower to follow the stirring, I realize what’s happening.
I move Reginald off my lap, ignoring my sister calling out to ask if I’m still there. Heart racing, I pull my shirt up to look down at my flesh, swollen more obviously now, and I nearly squeal when I see the vibrations reflecting on the surface of my skin.
“Holy shit…is that you, Goat Turd?” I gasp, awestruck as the motion stops briefly. When it picks back up, I can’t help but place my hands over it, savoring every second of it like my life has been in black and white until this very moment when I’ve been hit with a burst of color.
The flip-flopping is insane as this baby has what feels like a party inside me. It’s as if someone is rolling a textured ball over my belly but from the inside. The magical sensation causes a warmth to spread through me.
“You definitely feel bigger than a goat turd now,” I croak, the tears falling freely over my smiling lips. This feels like the most perfect gift. Like a private, wonderful experience that only I get to have. I could want for nothing for my entire life just for having experienced this miraculous thing.
I sniff loudly and say without thinking, “I can’t wait for your dad to feel this.” And that one sentence spoken out loud hits me like a ton of goat turds.
WeeksPregnant:24
AnimalsontheMountain:10
“Calder wanted to parachute out of a plane and release a smoke bomb over the mountain to reveal the gender,” Everly says, squinting under the hot August sun as she sets a gender-neutral sheet cake on the picnic table.
“Yes!” Ethan cheers, swiping his finger into the frosting. “I want to go on the plane with Uncle Caldy!”
“My man.” Calder thrusts a finger at our nephew and then closes his hand for a fist bump that Ethan obliges.
“I said a low-impact reveal with a zero percent chance of damage to a person or property.” I pinch the bridge of my nose, already hating all the fuss happening outside of my home.
“Relax, Papa Bear,” Calder says, patting me on the back. “The reveal will be very chill, very calm, very boring…very…you.”
I exhale a small breath of relief but then glance around because this shower setup doesn’t look chill. Red checkered picnic tables are scattered in front of my cabin, with rustic wood slab centerpieces that I had to chop for Everly. She set Mason jars with baby’s breath on top of them and hung jars and floating lanterns from the nearby trees. A caterer delivering enough barbecue to feed all of Jamestown justleft, and now I see a frickin’ acoustic guitar player setting up on my upper-level deck.
“Everly, is that a children’s inflatable playhouse?”
“Yes, but it’s totally chill!”
“You stuck to my guest list, right? Just our immediate family coming? Is that giant thing all for Ethan?”
She winces slightly. “Well…I invited a few more people.”
“What’s a few?” I seethe.
She counts off on her fingers. “Judy from the Mercantile is coming and a few of the townies, plus some of Max’s friends—that way, there are other kids here for Ethan to play with. And my friend Claire is coming with Josh and Lynsey, so their three girls are coming too.”
“Fuck me,” I grind out, hoping like hell the townies she invited don’t include the assholes we brawled with a couple of weeks ago. I already apologized to Judy about the fight, and she assured me the whole town was not wondering who the father was. But she did ask for permission to tell everyone about the surrogacy situation to try to tamp down the rumors. It’s small-town bullshit, but I said yes because I don’t want to give Trista any more reasons not to want to stay here on the mountain.
My plan is simple…I’m playing the long game with her. We’re only halfway through this pregnancy, so I’m going to use these next few months to show her that what we had was more than a sexuationship. I’m going to show her what being part of a family looks like. I’ll continue to show up for her with my daily breakfast drops. I’m even going to embrace the new fucking cow that suddenly showed up in my barn when we got back from the hospital last week. Honestly, if she wants to bring more animals up on the mountain, I’m game. I’ll take a flock of chickens if she needs that to feel safe with me. With us. I’m going to be her friend because I don’t give a shit what was in her past. I give a shit about what is in her future.
And in the end, if she still decides motherhood and family life are not what she wants, I’ll accept that. It will crush me. But I’ll have a baby I need to be strong for, and my family will be there for all the support I’ll need.
But damn, do I miss the hell out of her already. I miss watching her sleep and waking up in a stressed-out rush because she’s late for work. I miss counting the beauty marks on her face. I miss her excited eyes when she sees what breakfast I brought for her. I even miss her narrating what Reginald’s responses would be to all the questions she asks him while doing chores.
And I especially miss the way she touches her belly when she thinks I’m not looking.
