CHAPTER ONE: MARIE
1493 Words
Marie stood in the bathroom, a pregnancy test stick held between two fingers, she was visibly shaking, as she waited what seemed to be the longest 3 minutes of her entire life,
The symptoms from the other week were too obvious; the nausea, the throw-ups, the high temperature, and early morning sickness, but she had dismissed them as stress or hormonal fluctuations right before her monthly visitor, last night, when she had this throbbing pain in both n*****s, her mind struck; pregnancy?
She had quickly swiped her phone to her monthly flow record, her eyes widened when she saw she was five days past, and no period yet. The rest of the night had become restless, she couldn't wait for morning, to get herself checked, she thought about checking Jessie's room for a pregnancy test stick but that would be ratting herself out.
She had joined the queue at the drugstore as early as 7am, her hands in the pockets of her hoodie jacket and sunglasses covering her eyes, she can't risk making headlines, Claret Valenti's daughter's topic would definitely be a hot cake for gist-hungry bloggers.
Her knees weakened, like they couldn't carry her any longer, then she carefully sat onto the closed toilet seat, elbows resting on her thighs as she stared at the stick, then she shut both eyes.
She didn't want to see the result, she felt she could run away at this point, Her entire body shook.
She opened one eye. No, she couldn't bring herself to stare at the truth, she shut it again.
Then she forced herself to look, no one was going to help her out, and she didn't rush off to that drugstore that early to have her eyes shut for the whole day.
Her eyes landed on it. A small, bright yellow smiley face that shows positive.
Her heart sank, her head spun. Her hands grabbed the bathroom door for support, her knuckles turned white. Her eyes moistened, blurring her vision, and she almost fell on her knees before catching herself.
“No, no, no… this can't be…he used protection that night” she whispered, voice shaking as her eyes moistened up.
She dragged herself to her room, both hands on her dressing table as she sat on the stool, she raised the stick that had caused her doom up to the light, maybe it would be clearer and she'd see it was a negative after all.
It was still there, hot tears flooded her face in a minute, she cupped her mouth with her hand, she couldn't afford to make a sound, her world was crashing before her, but here she was swallowing hard, feigning strength when all she wanted was to scream out loud,
What was she going to tell her Mom? That she was pregnant for a married man? Or that she had a one-night stand with a stranger? Or maybe walk up to her and tell her “Mom, I only know his first name and have never been to his house”, She knew what this could cost the entire family and family business.
Her mother’s room was just next door, Marie had never had to bother about sharing a wall with her, she was barely around, her life was all about business. Marie and Jessie, her younger sister, had always had the mansion to themselves, but last night, she had walked in unexpectedly, after being away for weeks.
She threw the stick at the wall as anger burned up her stomach. It hit the wall and fell to the floor. The sound of the crashing plastic filled her ears, Her tears now flowed freely, hot and loud.
She glanced at the clock on her bedside table… It was well past 9am.
She had to get out. She needed answers from a doctor. Someone to tell her it wasn’t what she thought. Someone to tell her there was something wrong with her system or that she was probably overthinking things.
She jumped up, wiped her face with her sleeve. She rushed into the bathroom again, brushing her teeth with shaky hands, spitting quickly into the sink, splashing cold water on her face until her cheeks flushed. She grabbed a knee-length fur jacket from her wardrobe and threw it over her shoulders even though it wasn’t cold.
Crying doesn't solve things, Solution does, she told herself.
She reached for her car keys on the bedside table but swept everything to the floor with her frantic movement; lip gloss, hairbrush, books, everything, yet she didn’t stop to pick them up. She didn’t even notice what fell. There was no space left in her mind for anything except the thought of that tiny smiling symbol.
Her hair…normally styled, shiny, perfectly falling over her shoulders…stayed in the loose messy bun from last night. She didn’t care. She didn’t even remember it was there.
The elegant and strict Claret Valenti, her mother, stood by the upstairs window with a glass of water in her hand. Her face tightened when she saw Marie driving out of the compound like something was chasing her.
That wasn’t Marie, she thought to herself, if it had been Jessie then she could understand it, Jessie had always been the wild, reckless one.
Her Marie never drove like that. Marie had done some things to annoy her in the past but she was never reckless, Claret had always blamed herself for not knowing how to be a good mother, maybe if she had been, then Marie would have turned out better.
Claret stepped away from the window, dragging her slippers softly across the floor as she made her way toward Marie’s room.
The door was slightly open.
“Marie?” she called out to her softly, tapping the door with her fingertips. No response. She pushed it open and stepped inside.
Her eyes scanned the room. Something was wrong.
Claret knew all wasn't well, with the clothes scattered all over the floor, the hairbrush lying carelessly on the floor, Marie didn't treat her things that way.
“Marie?” she called again, louder this time.
Still nothing.
Concern and confusion written all over her face, she walked around the bed. That was when she noticed something small and white near the wall. She leaned down, picking it up with two fingers.
It was the pregnancy test. The tiny smiley stared at her.
Her hand froze. Her lips parted in shock. She blinked once, twice…stunned, confused, as if her brain refused to accept what her eyes were seeing. Her heart skipped, then began to race, pounding in her chest.
Marie? Pregnant again?
Her thoughts ran wildly…fear, anger, and confusion mixing all at once. What would society say? Who is she even pregnant for? She never knew Marie was seeing someone again, and now, pregnancy?
Why was Marie so terrified that she ran out of the house like she was on fire? That explains it!
She lowered herself slowly onto her daughter’s bed, the test stick in her hand shaking. She looked around the room again…everything scattered, everything out of place. It was beginning to make sense.
This wasn’t something she could pretend she didn’t see, but this could be scandalous if it gets out, Marie Valenti, Heiress to the Valenti empire, pregnant out of wedlock? Her mother had covered her past mistake, how is she going to handle this?
Marie’s hands hadn’t stopped trembling since she hit the road. She and Ricardo had used protection that night, or so she thought, eyes wide, a mix of fear and hope written over her face, just maybe, the doctor would tell her the stick was wrong.
She needed answers. She needed help.
She needed to hear one sentence that could fix everything:
“It’s not pregnancy.”
Her fingers tightened around the steering wheel.
But the thought she kept fighting kept creeping back into her mind, steady and cold.
What if it was?
Her throat clenched.
She had lost a child, her lover had taken him away from her, she had stepped out two months after having Nathan, but she got back to a ransacked and scattered house, with Nathan’s baby bag gone.
She wasn't ready to have another child or to even lose another child, that incident had kept her away from relationships but now, here she is, driving recklessly to find her truth, tears blurring her vision.
But no matter how fast the car went, her fear stayed right beside her, enough to ground her and swallow her up.
And behind her, her mother sat on her bed, holding the small plastic stick like a bomb that had just been dropped into their lives, she moved to the wall and dropped the stick in the same spot she had picked it, and shut the door.
Back in her room, she picked up her phone, manicured finger clicking over it, and dialed a number, putting the phone to her ear.
- Writer
