Test
I'm coming to find you. I'm already in CA. I've got something to tell you.
Lorona sent the text from a bathroom stall in McDonald's. They'd stopped for a bathroom break and she couldn't wait any longer. The tension inside her head felt like it was enough to make her ears expand to touch the sides of the stall.
“Blue, blue, blue…” she muttered, holding the stick behind her back. If she chanted it long enough, maybe the test would listen to her.
The hormones inside the test wand should understand that she couldn't be pregnant. She couldn't possibly have a baby. She and Kestrin had used protection every single time, and it wasn't like they'd had a lot of time to make a mistake.
Then, in a pendulum swing of white hot anger, Lorona desperately wanted to be pregnant. The thought of triumphing in one small way over Amanda, of taking something of Kestrin's with her, sounded perfect to her. Then the responsibility and loneliness of being a single mother pounded into Lorona's forehead and she moaned. She pressed a sweaty palm to her face, anything to stop the explosion. Had it been five minutes yet? She looked at her watch. Ninety seconds.
She sang to herself. It was a nursery rhyme, the first thing that came to her head. “Hush-a-bye, don't you cry. Go to sleep you little lady. When you wake, you shall have, all the pretty little horses—” she choked. A baby's lullaby. Determined to think of nothing baby-related, she counted furiously in twos up to 200, then in threes, then in fours. Finally, she thought of all the prime numbers in ascending order between one and 1000. She was sure she was making errors after a while, but it didn't matter. She gloated in the success of her own self-distraction and fiddled with her anklet clasp that kept coming loose. Finally the five minutes had passed.
She inched the test stick slowly in front of her. Her left eye contact was dry. She blinked rapidly, trying to smooth it, to focus clearly on the pink window in front of her. When her vision cleared, the window was still pink.
“It's a false positive. It has to be.” Lorona threw the stick into the garbage. “We used protection, we…” She left the stall and tried to straighten her spine in front of the chipped red countertop and mirror as she gripped its edge and assessed her haggard reflection. Unbrushed hair, flushed cheeks, no makeup.
What a perfect, epic romance. Lorona shook her head. Why do I keep envisioning myself as a character in a love story? I'm not the princess waiting for her knight, so why do I keep thinking I should look like her?
Kestrin needed someone who he could trust and who would trust him, not a stoic skeptic who hadn't cried since she was ten.
And what I need is…is… Lorona ran for a stall and vomited. She washed her face at the sink and smoothed down the top layer of frizzy hair. She decided, shaking and shivering in the McDonald's bathroom, that she would keep the baby and name her Vivian—Vivi for short. It didn't matter what Kestrin decided about them. Somehow, looking in the mirror and imagining raising Kestrin's child gave her a scrap of peace. It wouldn't last for long, but it was nice.
She thought of the look on Amanda's face when she heard the news.
“Take that, bitch. I'm pregnant and it's his.” For the first time in days, Lorona smiled a real smile.
…The third in the life within. If this pregnancy, and climbing the wall of his apartment, and the perfume incident were all signs, and there was an equally large chance that they weren't, Lorona couldn't see how these would help Kestrin figure anything out. Besides, she wasn't going out and getting a tattoo, and there was still one sign left and not much time before she'd see him.
None of this is my problem. If Kestrin believes so much in fate, it can finish the job.
Kestrin stared at Lorona's text for half a second, then dropped the phone like Kryptonite. How long had it been since he'd talked to Heidi? Five minutes? Enough time to brush his teeth from the bad taste Heidi had left in his mouth. The next moment, Lorona was saying she was on her way to find him. Did she really know where he was? He swallowed. She was smart enough. She could have found a way.
He rummaged in the kitchen until he found the ingredients he needed. Carlina already had everything. The lemon juice stung his fingers where it seeped into the new hangnails he'd made over the past twelve hours. He'd made Carlina a restaurant-sized supply of Caesar salad dressing. The activity had quieted his mind while the stinging in his fingers made him feel more alert. He didn't rinse off the lemon juice. As long he was conscious of his pain, Kestrin knew he wouldn't do something stupid like call Heidi a third time.
Kestrin remembered the safe that his aunt kept in the guest bedroom. It could be programmed with a custom code. Kestrin tossed his cell phone inside and punched a random series of numbers without looking. Now only his aunt, who carried the master key in case anyone locked themselves out, would be able to get his phone for him.
Carlina and Kahlil were nowhere to be seen. Kestrin returned to the kitchen, cleaned up his mess, and grabbed a bucket for harvesting grapes.
The trick is to keep me occupied.
If he didn't keep himself busy, he felt he'd do something dangerous, like break the other urn in Carlina's set. He opened the sliding glass door and stepped out. The dry grass crunched beneath his sandals. He filled his bucket with grapes and returned to the house. All the while he heard and saw nothing but the wind and a few dark clouds. The sun was already painting the trees deep orange with blue-black shadows. Still no Kahlil or Carlina.
In the distance, thunder rumbled. Right before he reentered the house, he noticed a faint trail of smoke curling up from the forest below. His eyes narrowed. Whether natural or manmade fire, there was a burn-ban in effect and any flame was dangerous. He heard laughter and excited shouting coming from the same direction as the smoke. Chances were that the smoke was coming from a man-made bonfire.
Kestrin eyed the dry grass surrounding the house, went inside, grabbed his jacket, and changed from sandals to running shoes.
As he was about to leave through the front door, he found a note taped to it. Kahlil and I went to the general store. I had a feeling I needed to stock up on some first aid supplies with two boys running around my house. Be back soon.
xoxoxox Aunt Carlina.
As he trotted briskly down the road, the moon peeked over the horizon in the early lavender of twilight. Though the fire was close enough to hear the people around it, the bluff rising up from the valley where the house and the vineyard nestled didn't grant easy access to the forest. Kestrin would have to walk around to the road and enter through one of the trails. He'd find the fire-starters, tell them to put it out, and leave the fire department out of an unnecessary call.
Tires screeched as a vehicle braked somewhere down the road. A car door slammed.
He could tell by the pitch of the boys' voices and the giggles of the girls that the fire was attended by a group of rambunctious high schoolers. They hooted and howled in the gathering darkness. More smoke, in a thicker and wider column, snaked up from the forest canopy. A large flake of ash from a charred piece of paper drifted skyward in an updraft. The amount of smoke implied a good-sized fire. The laughter grew more chaotic and disorganized. Kestrin's chest tightened. They're getting out of control.
Even with the distraction of fulfilling his civil duty and stopping a possible forest fire, as Kestrin jogged through the open night air with nothing between him and the moon, the thought of Lorona still managed to eclipse everything else.
