I showed up at the girls house I had been dating. In fairness, we had actually broken-up at the end of November and while I was in New York for two weeks in December, she texted me often about “missing me” and how much she “looked forward to seeing me when I got home.” So it had been roughly two weeks that we were exploring the option of dating again.
I should point out that I’m terrible to date. After my second divorce seven years ago, I swore that I would make myself virtually “un-marryable.” I think that I figured if I never got in another serious relationship again, I would never be married again and that’ would be the one true way to guarantee I’d never be divorced again. Sound, but lonely logic. So seven years of “one night stands” and “friend with benefits.” I’ve truly loved many incredible woman over these last seven years, I have been lucky beyond words, but I’m sure I haven’t been “in love.” For some reason, this girl at this time, would ignore all that. She would be patient and over the last 12 months that we had connected and dated, she would be above all, diligent. In that regards, I am lucky and to receive the news I did on New Year’s Eve, I am especially lucky it wasn’t one of the strippers, bar girls, or groupies that I’ve also had the pleasure (and sometimes curse) of meeting over the last seven years.
As I came over to her house on New Year’s Eve, I was greeted at the door by an unready, somewhat disheveled girl, who looked like she had a seen a ghost. “Why aren’t you ready?” I thought. I was late, as always, and we had a big night of casino parties and hotel rooms ahead of us. We had big plans: we were to be buzzed by 10 PM, blitzed by 11, giddy by Midnight, and naked by One. It was to be the start of a grand new year. As I followed her into her room, she turned and without hesitation said, “I’m pregnant.”
“Like pregnant, pregnant?”
“Like I ‘peed-on-a-stick’ pregnant.”
She walked me into her bathroom and handed me her pregnancy test. It had two-dark pink lines. Tough to miss, but I made sure to take a good long look at it: Two lines Pregnant, One line Not-Pregnant.
“I wanted just to make sure before we went out drinking,” she said.
And that would be the beginning of one of the strangest New Years ever, at least for me. We had dinner. I had a couple beers. But this was not the rockstar New Year’s I had come to expect. We shared a very small New Year’s toast at midnight, and were in bed by 12:30 AM in our expensive resort hotel room. We didn’t speak much that night. We were mostly in shock. Occasionally I’d blurt out something like, “How far along do you think you are?” or “When could this have happened?”
Unfortunately, the shock hasn’t faded and it’s been nearly 10 days.
