Nochelle - Our Stories

S A T U R D A Y

"Not your fault, don't apologize. We've been through this."

"Noah, can you please take your shirt off?"

"Richelle, I hate to kill the mood, but I don't think that's the solution we should -"

"It stinks", she groans. "Please. You used too much laundry soap, or something. It's all I can smell."

"Well, your nose is weird." He frowns, but dutifully pulls the gray t-shirt over his head, rolling the item to a ball and throwing it out the door towards their bedroom. "There. How are you feeling now?"

The headache is the same, but the acute sickness has sunk back to the lurking—but stable—nausea she's sensed for days now. Irritating, but more manageable.

"That's better."

"Not like you're going to throw up again?"

"I don't think so."

Her husband hums, playing with a sling of hair that's escaped her tight ponytail while she rests her head on his shoulder. "You want to try drinking some water? Carefully? I can make you some ginger tea, if you want."

"Yeah." She manages a smile, temporarily distracted by his thoughtfulness. Whether it's the aftermath of a panic attack, a bad hangover or some odd kind of stress reaction like this must be—she never gets sick—Noah remains the unchallenged master of making her feel better, always seeming to know the perfect cure. "Yeah, that'd be nice."

He kisses the top of her head and tells her he'll be three minutes, tops. With the nausea under control, she's confident now would be a great time for those painkillers, so starts looking through the cabinet.

She finds ibuprofen and antihistamine, but no paracetamol. Huffing in frustration, she decides to search in the cabinet below the sink instead. Noah might have taken some for a bad hangover and thrown the package down there without thinking. There are plenty of cleaning products, a box of tampons and pads, a bunch of band-aids and equipment for easier wound dressing, but no blessed little boxes of painkillers as far as she can see.

Just as Richelle was about to close the cabinet doors and go for the ibuprofen even though she finds paracetamol better for headaches, she spots another pink and white package hiding close to the wall.

Early Result Pregnancy Test, the white text teases her, and she weighs the carton in her hand for a moment before ripping it open.

Truly, she's not expecting anything. It's a harmless safety check. She's not sure how punctual her period has been, but it's acted up in times of stress before and always shows up eventually, and sure, they agreed a couple months ago if it happens, it happens but there's been no active trying and they've both been swamped with work lately. Surely it's nothing.

Nevertheless, she reads the instructions with thorough concentration.

~~~

"Okay, so it took me forever to find that tea, but I did it and I'm very proud—what are you doing?"

She's dug out an old toothbrush cup, downed some water and is twisting the unused plastic stick between her fingers when Noah returns, mug in hand.

"I'm going to take a pregnancy test."

"You're going to take a what exactly did you say there now?"

"Pregnancy test," Richelle repeats matter-of-factly. "I really don't think it's going to say anything." she assures him when his eyes seem to pop out of his skull and his mouth is opening, closing and opening again in lieu of an answer. "We've barely tried. I'm checking so I can rule it out."