He Banned a Baby in Our Contract, Then Found His Daughter novel · Chapter 24 of 24
Chapter 24: Clause Seven, Struck
I told him on the first Sunday of July, in the kitchen of the yellow house, at the counter where I had once asked for a pen.
He stood at the kettle with his back to me, in his shirtsleeves, waiting for the click.
Nan was due at eight to take Sadie to Mass and keep her till noon, and the house was still.
"Lorcan," I said.
"Mm," he said.
"I'm late."
"Late for what?" he said.
He turned round with the cup in his hand, and then he saw my face, and he put the cup down.
He did not put his fingers to his throat.
I watched for it, and he did not.
"How late?" he said.
"Four weeks. I did the test in the Co-op bathroom on Thursday. I did two more on Friday because I didn't believe it."
"And?"
"And it's yes," I said.
He sat down on the kitchen floor.
He did it quite slowly, with his back against the cupboard, and his long legs out in front of him.
I knelt in front of him and took his face in my hands.
"One in two," I said. "I know. I counted it in the bathroom. You can be afraid for ten minutes."
"I'm not afraid."
"Lorcan."
"I'm not," he said, and his eyes were full. "Millie. I want this one. I want it so much I can't see."
I laughed and cried together.
He got up off the floor and went to the drawer under the telephone, where the lawyer's letter had once lain.
He took out the contract, creased in thirds, with his line through clause seven and my sentence written under it.
He unfolded it on the counter and smoothed it with his palm.
"I'm going to read it to you," he said.
"All right," I said.
"Should pregnancy occur," Lorcan read, in his level voice, "this agreement ends that day, and the Principal will bear the cost of ending it."
He picked up the pen.
He crossed out the word ends, hard, with two strokes, and the nib went through the paper and into the counter.
Above it he wrote begins.
He crossed out ending, and wrote keeping.
"Should pregnancy occur," he read, "this agreement begins that day, and the Principal will bear the cost of keeping it."
The rest of this chapter is part of the paid portion of the series. Chapters 1–6 of He Banned a Baby in Our Contract, Then Found His Daughter are free to read — start from the beginning, then unlock the rest with coins in the app.
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