Page 39 of Please Open Me
She nodded once.
“How about this?” I gestured to the hammock swing.
“Mhm,” she hummed. “But I don’t think you could try it. You’re too big.”
“Oh, hush,” I muttered, offering her a playful scowl as I extended my hand.
She eyed it like it might bite. Instead of taking it, she squirmed further into the safety of her cocoon.
“Mae,” I said gently, fishing in my pocket until I found the plastic-wrapped test. “You need to take this.”
I held it out to her, but she didn’t reach for it.
Instead, her hand drifted up to her hair. At first, I thought she was just playing with it, twisting a strand or tucking it behind her ear. Stimming? I think that’s what Lucian called it, and he seemed to be the Mason whisperer.
After a second, I realized what she was doing.
She was pulling. Small, slow tugs. And, while I knew they were meant to soothe her, I also knew they hurt.
My chest ached for her.
Without a word, I sank to my knees in front of her and wrapped my hands around hers. I tried to keep my touch gentle but firm, like Luce showed me to do when she spiraled.
She didn’t pull away. That felt like a small victory.
“What’s got you all out of sorts, pretty girl?”
A slight squeak exited her chest, and I guided her hands up to my hair instead. Slowly, she started to wind the strands around her fingers, and I leaned into her touch. She was far kinder to us than she was to herself, and it felt nice to have her play with my hair.
She exhaled like she could finally breathe again, and after a minute, she spoke.
“Sophia was being very persistent after you left, and I did not like it.” Her words came out mechanical, almost as if they’d been prerecorded.
Her hands stilled, and her breathing shallowed.
“She just…” Mason swallowed hard before she resumed stimming. “She kept asking where you went. Over and over. And I didn’t want to lie. But I didn’t want to tell her the truth either.”
“You don’t want anyone to know you’re pregnant, do you?” I asked softly, finally daring to look up.
A look of mock anger twisted her fae-like features—but it was betrayed by the pink flush rising in her cheeks and the wet sheen in her eyes. My sweet girl was embarrassed.
“I’m not pregnant!” she protested, her voice thick with tears she refused to shed. “I just—I’m being cautious. Because I want—I want to d-drink. And better safe than sorry.”
Mason hardly ever drank. She didn’t like the taste, and even now, breastfeeding Rosie, she was cautious to a fault.
I rested my hand on her thigh and rubbed my thumb gently back and forth.
“You don’t have to explain. No matter what, I’ll be here,” I said softly. “You’re allowed to be scared. And you’re allowed not to want to know. But, Sweetpea… we gotta know.”
Her lip wobbled. Then she nodded.
“But I don’t want to walk right now,” she whimpered. “If I stand up, I’ll cry. Or throw up. Or die.”
“You’re not gonna die.”
“I am!”
I pressed my lips into a thin line, fighting the urge to laugh—not at her, but at how hard her brain worked to be mean to itself. She was overwhelmed, and that wasn’t something I could fix with logic.
