Pregnant For The Alpha

Sienna "You have the eggs of a forty five year old woman." I stare at Dr. Patel and wait for her to laugh. To tell me she mixed up my file with someone else's. To say anything that makes this make sense. She just looks at me with those careful sorry eyes and says nothing else. "I am twenty nine," I say slowly. "I know." "So what exactly are you telling me right now?" She folds her hands on the desk. "I am telling you that if you want to have a baby Sienna, you need to do it now. Before your next cycle. After that I cannot promise you anything." "My next cycle is in four weeks." "Yes." Four weeks. I have wanted to be a mother my entire life. I grew up in the Silverbrook Children's Home with no parents and no family and I promised that little girl a long time ago that she would have something real one day. A baby. Someone who was completely and entirely hers. I have been trying to make that happen with Derek for two years. I thank Dr. Patel. I take the leaflets. I walk outside and stand on the pavement breathing cold Silver Ridge air until my legs remember how to work properly. Then I go home to tell Derek. I am already planning what I will say as I climb the stairs. We will figure this out together. That is what two years means. I put my key in the lock and push the door open and stop dead. A pair of shoes on the floor just inside the entrance. Red. Strappy. Expensive. Brooke's shoes. My best friend Brooke's shoes sitting right there in my apartment like they belong. I set my bag down quietly. I walk toward the bedroom and the sounds I hear through the door turn my entire body cold. I press my palm flat against the wood and I stand there and I listen. "She actually thinks you want a baby with her." Brooke's voice. Light and breathless. Derek laughs. That warm familiar laugh I hear every morning. "She is never getting pregnant. I have made absolutely sure of that." "What do you mean?" "Her coffee." He sounds almost proud. "Every single morning for two years. She thanks me for it. She has no idea." I look down at my hands. Every morning for two years Derek has been up before me moving around the kitchen with that easy smile handing me my mug kissing my temple while I tracked my cycle and took my vitamins and broke my own heart every month when nothing worked. He knew exactly why it was not working. I walk to the kitchen. I stop under the smoke detector. I press the test button down hard and hold it there. The alarm explodes through the apartment. The sprinkler system kicks in immediately, water pouring from the ceiling in a freezing sheet across every room. I step to the one dry spot in the hallway and fold my arms and wait. Scrambling. Shouting. Something falling. Derek comes out first, soaking wet, and the second he sees me standing there dry his face does something I have never seen it do before. For just a moment before the charm slides back into place I see something cold and calculating underneath it. "Sienna." His voice is already warm again. Already working. "What happened?" Brooke appears behind him in his shirt, wet hair plastered to her face, and when her eyes find mine she goes completely pale. "I heard everything," I say. Quiet. Steady. "Every single word." Nobody moves. "Sienna listen to me" Derek starts forward. "What did you put in my coffee." He stops. "What did you put in it Derek." I look straight at him. "Two years. Every morning. What was it." His jaw tightens. "I don't know what you're talking about." "I was at the doctor today." My voice does not shake and I am surprised by that. "She told me my fertility looks like it has been damaged over a long period of time. She could not explain it." I pause. "Now I can." Something moves behind his eyes. Still not guilt. Something much colder. "You cannot prove anything," he says quietly. Not a denial. Just a calculation. I look at Brooke. She is staring at the floor. "He makes you coffee too doesn't he." It is not a question. "I would stop drinking it if I were you." She looks up. Something flickers across her face. "Get out of my apartment," I tell them both. "Tonight." I pick up my bag. Derek steps toward me. "Do not touch me." The words come out so sharp he actually steps back. The version of me he knew, the soft patient trusting one, is gone. I can feel it. Like something that has been switched off permanently. I walk out. I get to the street before I stop. I stand there in the cold staring at Dr. Patel's leaflets still crumpled in my hand and I think about four weeks and no money and doing this completely alone and the shaking that I held back this whole time finally starts in my hands and moves all the way up my arms. I pull out my phone and call the only person left. It rings twice. "Sienna?" Nadia's voice is warm and familiar and it is the thing that cracks me open completely. "Nadia." My voice breaks. "Something happened. Something really bad and I need you and I don't know what to do." Silence for just a second. Then she says quietly, "Tell me where you are." "Outside my apartment." "Don't move. I'm coming." A pause. Then softer. "Sienna whatever it is we will figure it out okay? You are not alone." I press my hand over my mouth and nod even though she cannot see me. I am not alone. Nadia is coming. We will figure it out. What I do not know yet, standing on that cold pavement in the dark, is that by this time tomorrow my life will have changed so completely that I will look back on this moment as the last simple thing that ever happened to me.