Late...by 12 days

Meetings, presentations, power lunches, weekend get-togethers, friends, movies, long drives.... her life was a whirlwind of all things bright and beautiful. Working super-hard, playing harder.. or as was her case, hard to get... she seemed to have it all. High profile job, beautiful sea-facing apartment, sexy investment banker live-in boyfriend... the world was her playground.

So caught up was she in life that she did not realise it at all. Only when she noticed the red dot on the 24 on her calendar, did it sink in that she was late. Late by not a day or two but 12 days. This had never happened to her. For a split second, she felt her body hit rigor-mortis and then she was out of it. Now was not the time to fall apart.

She tried to recollect when her last period had ended. She reminded herself that she had never had sex without protection. Well, almost never. But then she had been on the pill ever since he had moved in with her 8 months back. So there was no need to panic. It was, but a minor aberration. Shaking herself out of the stupor she had momentarily subsided into, she drove to the Hilton to meet a client over drinks.

At the traffic junction, she looked up to see a hoarding advertising 'I-pill' and smiled. Irony or just coincidence? While driving, she felt as if the world was full of children. They seemed to be everywhere, on hoardings, at street corners, in cars, walking or being pushed around on prams on Marine Drive, playing cricket at the Gymkhana grounds, just about everywhere.

As the valet at Hilton took her keys from her, he offered her a hand to step out of the car. She stiffly refused but wondered why he had done it. Did he think she was pregnant? Did she look pregnant? She quickly glanced at her reflection in the mirror at the lounge and felt reassured when she sw her svelte self looking back at her. How would she look pregnant?

She nodded the thought out of her head as her client walked in to the lounge. He asked for a whisky on the rocks, she was surprised to hear herself say "Just orange juice!" instead of the usual martini or gin. Thorough professional that she was, she quickly attributed it to a decision not to drink in a meeting. Anyways, being careful never harmed anyone.

Driving back to her apartment, she thought about her life. She liked it the way it was. There was no place for a kid in it. He would not be very accepting to the idea either. They had high-flying jobs. Where would a child fit in? And she was only 29. Time was still on her side. She would have plenty of opportunity later. Then there was also the big M, marriage. It was all well and good to live in with the guy you loved but did she have it in her to have a child out of wedlock. Would he or she be legit?

She grinned as she smelt the familiar smells of a cappucino brewing in the kitchen. He was home. She found him in the shower and stepped in, surprising him. An hour and a half later, she lay in bed, her face snuggled into his arms Closing her eyes, she blurted it out. "Don't be silly", he said. "Get one of those home-pregnancy thingies and check for yourself", was all he could offer as a suggestion before he sat at his work-desk, the Do-not-disturb expression on his face.

She curled up on the settee on the window sill overlooking the sea, thinking what she should do. What if she was pregnant? Would she keep the baby? Could she afford to? What is he refused to have anything to do with it? Did she need him to have the baby? What about her job? Her promotion? Her parents? The vacation she had planned 4 months on would have to be cancelled. She would have to cut down on drinking, on eating out, on travelling.

It was all so restrictive. Most importantly did she even like kids? She liked her cousins' kids, also the ones who played cricket in the building compound. But none of them were her responsibility. She did not even know their names. Would she be able to care wholeheartedly for another human being, her own flesh and blood?

His small barely-there fingers curled into around her index finger. He yawned delicately as she held him. He smiled as his eyes registered her presence. All her friends and family was there. He was there, holding a banner with "Love you Mom" painted on it. Pale blue walls, white cradle, J&J gift packs, baby bath, his first step, his first 'Ma' . "Yes, baby!", she whispered as she woke up in a sweat. She had fallen asleep on the window sill. She looked at the rising sun and felt a strange calm come over her. She was ready. If she was pregnant, so be it. She would make the necessary changes. She had to find out. Now.

She quickly changed and walked to the neighbourhood medical shop. Walking back into the house, she kept the pregnancy test on the counter and brewed herself a cup a coffee. As she sat reading the instructions, she thought about how she would tell everyone. And then she felt it. And then she knew.

Sometime later, as she cuddled upto him, he held her close. "We will take care of it. Dont worry.", he said softly, still half asleep. She kissed him on the forehead and cried into his shoulders. Tears of relief, of disappointment, of guilt, of helplessness. There was nothing to take care of. Anymore.