"When?"
I think back. Try to remember.
"Three weeks ago," I say. "Maybe four. I had it. I'm regular. I've always been regular."
"Was it normal?"
The question stops me.
Was it normal?
I remember being surprised by how light it was. How short. One day instead of my usual four or five. I'd attributed it to stress. To the upheaval of my new life. To everything happening with my father and Gianna and Bruno.
"It was..." I swallow. "It was different. Shorter. But I had it. I definitely had it."
Nora's expression doesn't change.
"Sometimes," she says slowly, "what we think is a period isn't actually a period. Sometimes it's implantation bleeding. It can look similar. Feel similar. But it's not the same thing."
The words don't make sense.
They can't make sense.
"No." I shake my head. "No, no, no. I'm not—I can't be?—"
"Antonella."
"We've been careful." The lie tastes bitter on my tongue. We haven't been careful. "I mean, we haven't been careful, but I've been tracking my cycle and?—"
"Tracking doesn't always work."
"I'm not pregnant."
But even as I say it, doubt creeps in.
The exhaustion I've been feeling. The nausea that comes and goes. The way certain smells make my stomach turn. The strange period that wasn't really a period.
Oh God.
Oh God.
"I can't be pregnant," I whisper.
Kristen's hand stills on my back.
Nora just watches me.
And I stand there, gripping the sink, trying to convince myself that the world isn't about to change completely.
Bruno
"Two weeks," Valentino says. "Then I need to return to Sicily."
I grip the bars tighter. "How long?"
"Few days. Maybe a week." He shifts against the wall. "My mother needs me for something. She won't say what over the phone."
"Family business?"