Chapter 24: The End of the Road

I looked at the two pink lines for a long time.

I could not make a single word come out.

"Say something," Deirdre said.

"I'm trying."

"Try faster. I've been holding this for two hours."

"You've known for two hours?"

"I bought three tests at a drugstore in Barstow and didn't use them. I used one today."

I took the stick out of her hand and held it in both of mine.

My hands were shaking.

"I had the reversal done, and I bled for two days," I said.

"I thought I'd done it for nothing."

"You didn't."

"I did it for a woman who couldn't."

"I know," Deirdre said. "And I'm not her."

"I know that too."

"I'm not going to hide it in a drawer, Jasper. I'm not going to wait for you to ask. I'm telling you to your face, on a pier, in front of a hot dog."

I started laughing.

It was not a careful laugh.

I put the stick down on the bench and picked her up off the boards and held her until she swore at me to put her down.

"Careful," she said. "Careful. I'm fragile now."

"You've never been fragile in your life."

"I'm going to be unbearable about it."

"I'm counting on it."

She wiped her face with the heel of her hand.

"Don't ask me to marry you tonight," she said.

"I wasn't going to."

"Good."

"I'm asking you tomorrow."

"Then I'll have a different answer," she said, and her mouth shook.

We slept that night in a motel two blocks from the water.

The clerk at the desk said, "Checkout is at eleven."

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