NICOLA STARED AT her computer screen without really seeing it. So far she’d only been over to NYC Memorial two times in the last three weeks. And both of those times, she’d snuck in and out by doors she didn’t usually use. It felt stupid, but seeing Kaleb under these circumstances would be unbearable.
She hadn’t been able to believe he’d asked to marry her because of the baby. Because of their parents.
To be fair, she hadn’t asked him if he loved her. But they say if you have to ask...
Who are “they”? And what kind of data are “they” using to come to that conclusion?
Conclusion.
How did someone come to a conclusion?
Well, she knew how she normally did. And it wasn’t by sitting around and moping and wishing things were different.
So why not do what she was good at? What she’d trained herself to do?
Taking out her sketchbook, she opened it to the first blank page. Then she got to work, drawing her boxes and meticulously labeling each of them. Then using the data from things she knew to be true, she began to draw her lines. Phrases that were said. Experiences that were had. Each thing made her line slide to one of two possible conclusions at the bottom of her page.
She touched her belly when it growled. Someone was getting hungry. “I know, sweetie. But there’s just something I have to do first.”
Tapping her pen on her chin, she went day by day, remembering little things. It wouldn’t be an exact diagnosis because there was no blood test known to man that could measure what she was looking for. No MRI that could find and pinpoint the truth. This would be purely circumstantial evidence that wouldn’t hold up in any court of law. But it would be enough to draw an inference from.
Two more lines trailed down to their spots on the chart. Three more. Ten. And an hour later, when she was done, she tallied them up and wrote her conclusion—a single word—at the very bottom of her page and underlined it three times.
Then she closed her sketchbook and held it tight to her chest, fear and hope warring with each other. Until one of them won out. She climbed to her feet in her little work area and tidied up her desk...straightened her chair. If she was right, this would be the last time she would sit here.
And if she was wrong?
Well, she wasn’t handing in her notice—again—quite yet.
Turning around so that she could walk to the exit, she staggered to a stop when she spotted someone striding toward her. A phantom who had haunted her days and nights ever since she’d walked out of his house. The person she’d been getting ready to go see.
“Kaleb?”
He’d called her repeatedly, but she hadn’t been able to bring herself to answer. Not until this very moment.
He approached her. “Hey.”
“Hey.”
“I’ve been trying to reach you.”
“I know.”
God, why did they have to go through all of this stupid small talk in order to get to what was really important. What would make or break the next seven months of her pregnancy.
He took a step closer, seeming encouraged when she didn’t walk away from him. “Is there somewhere we can go to talk?”
“Yes. Let’s go to the courtyard out back.” Leading the way to an area that was more of a paved outdoor faculty lounge than a garden, she found a table at the farthest side of the small space, and laid her sketchbook on top of the melamine surface.
“Nic. I owe you an apology. A big one.”
“You do?”
He nodded, starting to reach for her hand before evidently thinking better of it. “I never should have asked you to marry me the last night we were together.”
Shock went through her system. And horror. Maybe she’d been wrong. Maybe she should tear that page out of her book and put it through the shredder before he or anyone else saw it. “You shouldn’t have?”
“No. Not until I understood what was really driving the question.”
She pulled air into her lungs in rhythmic intervals so she wouldn’t pass out. “And you think you understand it now?”
“I know I do. And I hope you’ll hear me out.” This time, he did take her hand, lacing his fingers through hers. “I love you, Nic. The way I’ve never loved anyone before.”
She blinked. Tried to process what he’d just said.
“But you said... You told me you wanted to marry me for all that other stuff. Stuff that has nothing to do with love.”
“I know.” He let out a sigh. “I’d been down that road—meaning love—a couple of times before, and it always ended disastrously. I thought if I could just be analytical about it this time and give it a name other than love, then maybe it would work. Because I desperately wanted it to work, Nic. I still do.”
“You do?” Shock turned to laughter, the sound pealing forth until tears streamed down her face, even as he tried to scoot his chair around to console her. She shook him off with a hiccup. “Oh, God, Kaleb. Do you want to see what name I came up with when I tried to be all analytical about it?”
“I’m not sure at this point.”
She riffled through her sketchbook until she came up with the right graph and flipped it open so he could see. “Look.”
Watching as he worked his way across the page, slowly moving down and reading the words, box by box. Finally, when he’d studied it for what seemed like hours, his fingers traced the lines down to their final resting places and the underlined conclusion.
“Love.” His gaze came up and speared her. “You love me?”
“I didn’t do the graph to figure out how I felt. Read the name at the top.”
He looked at where she pointed. “It’s my name.”
“Yes. I already knew what my feelings were, but I didn’t know about you. And your marriage question that night wandered around so much, that it made me wonder if the word you were so afraid of using lay smack-dab in the center.” She squeezed his hand. “I was right. Wasn’t I?”
“You were. Hell. I can’t believe I put both of us through that. But I thought if I said the word love, I might jinx it, just like I did those other times.”
“You didn’t jinx it. Those other times just weren’t meant to be. But I think we are. I think what you sensed about my parents was right, as well. They saw it before even we did.”
He leaned his cheek against hers, breathing deeply. “Don’t throw that page away, Nicola. I want to keep it. Frame it. I want it on the wall in our bedroom so that through the bad times and the good, we’ll see those lines leading from where we were to the spot we both want to be.” He tapped the word she’d written in the box at the bottom. “Love. That’s where I want to stay. With you. Forever.”
She cupped his face and looked into his eyes. “I do, too, Kaleb. I never want to step outside of that box. But if either of us does, all we need to do is follow those lines, until they lead us back to this place. Back to where we belong. Those lines will lead us all the way home.”
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