I wrestled with these thoughts for an hour, never coming up with answers and debating how our conversation about the draft would go. Sleep wasn’t coming easy, and I blame that partly for the thought-stopping epiphany that hit my nerve endings with the jolt of a lightning bolt.

Sprinting from my bed, I flung my desk lamp on and flipped frantically through the pages of my day planner. I wrote everything down in that planner. Most people liked to keep their calendars on their phones or iPads, but I always had to have mine in writing. Writing it down always helped me remember, or so I thought. I flipped to the current week and rubbed my eyes, hoping they weren’t focusing. When a second and third look confirmed what I saw, I sunk to the floor, my heart beating at the speed of a hummingbird’s wing.

I was four days late.

Nolan

The Internet is a scary thing at 3 a.m. Like a fortuneteller, it tells you what you think you want to hear. Or, in my case, what I desperately wanted to prove wrong. I sat there for hours with my iPad, flipping through site after site about the signs of pregnancy, and how long before you could tell. I was pretty sure I could pee on a stick at this point and know for sure. But I also liked living in the 50/50. Peeing on the stick could mean 100-percent certainty. And I only wanted that if it meant I wasn’t pregnant.

It’s funny how your body and mind can operate on autopilot. I didn’t move from that spot on the floor until the sun rose. I didn’t sleep, and I was sliding my feet to the resource center in the middle of campus for a few morning sessions with some of my students. I didn’t register a single word my students read during our sessions. I heard muffled sounds that resembled words, I smiled, I nodded and I encouraged. I was getting good at poker faces.

Autopilot took me to Sarah’s apartment next. When I didn’t see Calley’s car in the parking lot, I pushed forward up the steps, knowing she’d likely gone to work, leaving my friend at home alone. By the time she answered the door, I must have lost my ability to bluff, because the tears started to come, and words evaded me.

“Jesus, Nolan. What’s wrong?” Sarah asked, pulling me inside and slamming the door behind me. She grabbed my hand and led me to the couch, pushing me down and kneeling in front of me with a truly confused look on her face.

I just shook my head back and forth, trying to form words with my lips but not even knowing where to begin.

“Okay, you’re going to have to speak. Is it Reed? Did that ass**le cheat on you?” she was grabbing my shoulders now, clearly going from her zero-to-sixty, friend-ready-to-defend-you mode.

I just shook my head no, fighting to slow my breathing down. After a few seconds, I slumped my shoulders, defeated, and looked up at her.

“I’m late,” I said, twisting the side of my mouth to show her how helpless I felt.

She just blinked at me in return, taking her time to register what I’d said. Her eyes grew wider when it settled in. “You mean, like…late, late?” She kept a firm grip on my shoulders while she questioned me.

I nodded yes slowly, never blinking, and staring her in the eyes without really looking at anything.

“Oh…shit,” Sarah said, not able to hide her emotions. I suppose that’s why I came to her. I needed someone to freak out for me, to think quickly on her feet. Sienna was the practical one. But Sarah, she would go bat-shit crazy with me. And this revelation? Well, it called for bat-shit crazy.

“We need to go to the drug store, Noles. Like now. You have to know for sure,” she said, pushing her feet into her shoes and rummaging around her kitchen counter for her purse and keys. I didn’t move until she was standing right in front of me, my own feet dug deeply into the carpet and my legs unwilling to move.

“I…don’t know if I want to know,” I looked at her, my eyes pleading. Just then, my phone buzzed. Autopilot again, I pulled it from my purse and saw a text from Reed.

Miss you, baby. Have a late dinner tonight with family friend to talk about that thing we’re going to talk about. Someone in the business. Call you after, K? Love you.

His message was short and sweet, but I took my time reading it, almost as if it was a full five-page essay. I didn’t budge until I felt the weight of Sarah plop down next to me and felt her shove my arms down to get my phone screen out of my face.

“Noles, snap out of it. You HAVE to find out. You can’t live in between,” she said, standing and pulling at my armpit to lift me from the couch. She was right, but that didn’t stop me from craving the blissful ignorance of right now.

The drugstore was only a block or two from Sarah’s apartment. And unfortunately, our walk to get there didn’t take us nearly as long as I would have liked. The rows were filled with appealing colors. I tried to drag us down the nail polish aisle, thinking maybe a new color on my toes would be nice. Yank. Sarah tugged my arm. I tried again for the candy aisle, thinking maybe a big bag of M&Ms would soothe me, but YANK. No such luck.