Again.
She sat on the closed toilet lid with the test in her hand and laughed once, sharp and miserable and terrified.
When Ethan found out that night, it was because she had hidden the test badly and he had gone looking for infant Tylenol.
He stood in the doorway holding the stick between two fingers like it contained explosives.
“Hannah.”
She closed her eyes. “Yes.”
He sat on the edge of the bed slowly. “Is it mine?”
The hurt in the question hit them both at once.
She opened her eyes. “There hasn’t been anyone else.”
Something flashed through his face then. Shock, yes. Fear, definitely. But underneath both, unmistakable wonder.
His voice came out rough. “Are you okay?”
There was something so Ethan about that being his first question that Hannah almost cried.
“I don’t know,” she admitted. “I just had twins. I’m living in my ex-boyfriend’s house. Your mother wants me erased. And now I’m pregnant with your baby. So no, not really.”
He nodded once. “Fair.”
She waited for him to say this was too much. Too fast. Too complicated. She braced for reason disguised as kindness.
Instead he said, “Then we figure it out.”
Just like that.
As if life were a thing people could repair if they loved hard enough and showed up on time.
“Ethan…”
“I mean it,” he said. “I want this. I want you. I want Noah and Ellie and this baby and the whole impossible mess.”
She stared at him.
He leaned forward, elbows on his knees, the pregnancy test loose in his hand.
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