Page 58 of Stella is Starting Over

‘I mean, she was pretty cut up. She came over last night, when she first worked out that her period was late, and then we couldn’t even look at the test. We went to bed and we didn’t even look at it until the next morning.’

‘What?’ I say, a sunrise of hope starting in my chest. ‘You didn’t look at the test for eight hours?’

‘More like twelve,’ he says. ‘What? Why are you smiling?’

He is such an idiot.

Dominic

Stella looks at me like I’m the stupidest man in the entire world. ‘Did you read the test instructions before you took it?’

‘Obviously we didn’t read the instructions, it’s a pregnancy test. One line means pregnant, two lines means not pregnant.’

Stella sighs. ‘How strong was the line?’

‘Really light,’ I say, not wanting to relive it all. ‘I could hardly see it, but it’s there.’

‘You realise it could be an evaporation line?’ Stella says, like she’s pulling a rabbit out of a hat.

‘A what?’

She sighs. ‘You have to read the test within five minutes, otherwise the result is invalid. Was it a blue dye test or a pink dye test?’

She sounds absolutely insane. ‘How would I know?’

‘Were the lines on the test blue or pink?’

‘How could that possibly matter?’

She stops the pram, abruptly. Rose giggles. Stella does not. ‘Dominic, I spent two hours a day on the fertility and pregnancy testing forums when I was planning to get pregnant with Rose. I know everything there is to know about pregnancy tests and I’m telling you that it makes a difference. Blue dye is way, way more likely to run and cause an evaporation line.’

I’m too dazed to really process this. ‘Uh. Blue. The lines were blue.’

‘Go and find her,’ she tells me. ‘And take another test. Pink dye. Superdrug or Boots own-brand are the most reliable. Go on!’

We reach the station and I carry the pram up one set of stairs, then go back down, around and stand on the platform at the other side. We face each other, both sort of half laughing at the awkwardness of it. The sun’s starting to slowly set. She must be cold, wearing a summer dress and no jacket. I watch as she pulls the blanket over Rose and think how much I’d like to pull a blanket over Stella, on a beach or by a campfire in the woods or somewhere like that.

Her train arrives. She whips the pram around and reverses it on, then waves at me through the window. And then she’s gone.

I take the train to Peckham and then get an Uber to the bit of Camberwell where Florrie lives with all her friends. Then, feeling like a bit of a stalker, I ring the doorbell. One of her friends, who is either called India or Octavia, answers. ‘Is Florrie in?’ I ask, once again feeling like a complete stalker.

India/Octavia seems bemused but leads me through the dark hall with patterned tiles into the garden, where they’re sitting outside on kitchen chairs, drinking bottles of San Miguel.

‘Dom!’ Florrie says, getting up. ‘I didn’t know you were coming?’

‘I messaged you,’ I say, trying not to sound defensive.

‘Sorry,’ she apologises, stubbing out her cigarette. ‘I just needed a bit of a break from my phone so I turned it off.’

‘Sure,’ I say. ‘Can we have a quick chat?’

I follow her up the many, many stairs to the top of her house where she has the attic bedroom. It’s a really great place, with a sloping ceiling and huge windows looking out over the gardens of Camberwell, but we don’t spend much time here because she’s (gloriously) loud in bed and her housemates don’t always appreciate it.

‘I think we need to take another test,’ I say, trying not to sound out of breath from the stairs. ‘Apparently, sometimes, if you don’t read it quickly enough, it can be a false positive.’

She shakes her head. ‘No, I don’t. I took a bunch more when I got home; they were all negative. It must have been an evaporation line.’

‘How does everyone else in the world know about evaporation lines apart from me?’ I say, louder than I intended and drowning in a confusing cocktail of relief and something that feels a tiny bit like disappointment. ‘Why didn’t you tell me?’ I ask. I know I shouldn’t make this about myself but I can’t help feeling like this is information I probably could have been given, over a WhatsApp if nothing else.