“So,” she said as I started the truck, “there’s a chance we might get to know the gender today.”
My heart stuttered. “There’s a lot of stuff we’ll get to know today.”
“Are you nervous?” she asked. I didn’t know how she’d figured it out, but she always did.
“Terrified.”
She blew out a breath. “Yeah, me too. A lot of people wait until after this point to tell family and friends, but I didn’t get so lucky.”
“Fucking Brooke.”
She let out a sigh. “Yeah. Brooke is a piece of work.”
“Have you heard from her?”
“Nope. Not at all. Is it bad that I’m grateful?”
“After what she did, no.”
“I stillfeelbad, though. She’s my only remaining family.”
“That doesn’t change the fact that she’s a terrible person.”
“I know,” Grace said quietly. “I really wish she wasn’t. It would be nice to be able to share all of this with her and have her care about it, but she’s just not that kind of person. She never was.”
“You can share it all with me.”
“I know. It’s good to have a friend who cares.”
Friendswas exactly what we should have been. It was what we’d stay.
But I fucking hated that word.
I was cracking at the seams. Living with her was a terrible idea, and yet I knew I’d never leave.
“Do you wanna find out the gender today?” I asked. All of this had been so vague in my mind. I knew that there was a baby coming. I was working hard because of it, yet I still hadn’t wrapped my mind around it.
“That’s what I wanna ask you. We’re doing this as a team, right?”
“We are.” Just the thought of being a team filled me with a feeling I couldn’t describe. I’d been the one to start this and it still hit me hard. “I’m not sure, but it would help to figure out the gender so we have ideas for our nursery.”
The room I’d been staying in would eventually be one. I hated the idea of not living with Grace anymore, but maybe it was a good thing for me to be forced out.
“Right,that.” She let out a sigh. “I still haven’t cleared the room out, and getting a crib? Baby furniture? That sounds overwhelming.”
I turned to her. “I can?—”
“Just in the last week, you cleaned out my gutters andworked on the front porch. You’ve done enough. Don’t make me lock you out of the house.”
“Well, at least it would be safer than you leaving the door unlocked for me all the time.”
“I left the door unlocked all the time before. It’s not just you.”
I blinked. “Do you not lock the front door?”
“I live in the country.” She shrugged. “No one locks up their stuff.”
“That’s so unsafe.”