day off and the scheduled appointment with the
doctor to see if the insemination took. Bryce was going to meet her
there from the office. Besides a few hellos and goodbyes they hadn’t
spoken much over the past couple of weeks and despite her resolve to
keep calm, Lateisha was nervous. Butterflies assaulted her stomach as
she entered the office, her eyes immediately finding Bryce.
Pretending to be calm she walked up to him and sat down, a seat
between them, and nodded in his direction.
“Hello, Lateisha,” Bryce said properly. Lateisha noticed
his newly short hair cut and freshly shaved jaw. The old Bryce was
back, Mr. Prim and Proper. For some reason that made her sad.
“Hi,” she mumbled, looking down at her phone so she
wouldn’t have to talk to him.
After several minutes of awkward silence, the nurse called her back
to take a pregnancy test. She had to pee in a cup and get blood
taken; the blood draw to confirm the results of the pee test.
Afterwards, she waited in an exam room. Glad to be out of Bryce’s
scrutiny, she opened her email and began to search through job
listings. Frustration built and she decided to close the web browser
after a few minutes of finding nothing. Maybe nursing wasn’t
for her? Nothing about the job was appealing and she mentally kicked
herself for wasting four years in college and accruing countless
student loan debts on a career she didn’t want. Lateisha’s
mom was a nurse and told her it would be a great, well paying and
stable job for her. Unfortunately Lateisha hated it and would have
much rather went to culinary school, but her mother told her that was
a bad idea. Of course she ended up working with food anyway, in the
crappiest way possible.
The door creaked open and pulled Lateisha from her thoughts.
Assuming it was the nurse her heart sped up. Despite all that would
happen if she was pregnant, she wasn’t hoping it was negative
and that scared her a bit. But it wasn’t the nurse, it was
Bryce.
“Hey,” she said, waving weakly.
Bryce smiled, but it didn’t reach his eyes and sat down in the
chair next to the exam table.
“Lateisha, I…” he started.
Lateisha held up her hand to stop his sentence. “It’s
okay, Bryce. I’m fine. I don’t really feel like talking
right now.”
Bryce sighed heavily and looked away, running a hand through his
hair. Lateisha almost laughed because he messed up his perfectly
gelled hair and a short lock fell over his eye. Without thinking she
reached over and brushed it away. Bryce gasped, grabbing her wrist as
he did. That was the first time they had touched since the night they
had sex in his office. Lateisha’s breathing picked up, the spot
where he held her arm throbbing with awareness. Electricity sizzled
between them and for a long while they stayed like that, staring each
other in the eye. Lateisha wasn’t sure what this feeling was,
or why Bryce was the one that evoked it in her but she knew it was
dangerous. If they kept up this way, dancing around one another only
to fall again and again into the passion, they would break each other
in the end. It was too much, and too intense. But if that was true,
why did Lateisha not want to let him go? Not now and not after she
had his baby.
*****
Bryce looked at his hand wrapped around Lateisha’s dainty
wrist. He longed to bring her hand to his mouth and kiss the palm.
But that would be a disaster. It would only lead to what happened
that night in his office and Bryce wasn’t sure that was a good
idea. They were from different backgrounds, they had different goals,
it wasn’t meant for them to be together. If that was the case,
why did everything feel so right with Lateisha? Sighing with
frustration, Bryce finally let go of Lateisha’s wrist and
leaned back into the chair. He could see her chest rise and fall in
panting breaths and knew his own mirrored it.
“Lateisha,” he said again; not sure what he was going to
say but knew he needed to say something.
She shook her
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