It is getting easier and easier to say yes and stay the night at Rick's apartment, and the fact that they haven't discussed anything about it makes Amanda uneasy. She doesn't have a lot of dating experience to compare this to, not after only one serious college boyfriend and then living with Luke. The part that makes her feel less uneasy is that he looks so damn happy every time they wake up together.
She stayed last night, too, not just the Monday night he asked for. Her body still has the languid aftereffects of sex before sleep, and her mood is definitely better than it usually would be for a day of desk duty. No one comments, although she does get a couple of side glances from patrolmen as they leave after the morning meeting. Shrugging it off, she settles into a day of paperwork and monitoring her people from a distance.
"Hey, Shepherd. Can you rustle me up the paperwork for amending duty for Leslie Subramanian?" Amanda looks up from her computer to see Bob Lamson smiling at her. He's got the slightly sweaty sheen of someone returning indoors from patrol. It might be the latter part of September, but it's Atlanta. Humidity is just part of the package.
"Sure. Why are we amending duty?" she asks, already navigating to the form menu on the computer.
"Modified for pregnancy. She's going to shift over to evidence until after her maternity leave. Boyce is going to take her spot on patrol until then. Already cleared it with Lerner."
"I didn't realize she was expecting." Filling in the form is automatic, even as Amanda thinks of the other female officer, the only one in their precinct except for the lieutenant. Subramanian is two or three years older than Amanda, but she turned down the option to try for sergeant.
"She's sixteen weeks along. Wanted to stay on patrol until the duty belt and vest became a problem, and that's this week, apparently."
Amanda thinks it's fairly lucky that Subramanian is one of Bob's officers, because the sergeant seems very matter-of-fact about the whole process. Not all the ranking male officers want to actually follow the department handbook that pregnancy is to be treated like any other injury or disability. Luckily, the city's police department is big enough to have light duty spots so that Subramanian doesn't have to go on short term disability leave like some small rural departments require.
Hitting print, she passes the paperwork to him. "Speaking of kids, how are yours doing?" she asks. Years as his partner means it sometimes seems like she knows Bob's kids as well as her own nieces and nephews.
"Cameron is applying to colleges. His school counselor says he's got a good shot at scholarships, too, without having to go JROTC and commit to the military." Bob grins like any other proud dad. "Lily made first chair for clarinet, which is pretty good for a sophomore in the first semester."
"I can't picture them both almost out of high school." It's not that the Lamson kids were tiny when Amanda first met them, but they were still in elementary school back then. Now one's about to graduate and the other halfway through high school. Time is definitely going by too fast.
"You and me both." He shrugs, scanning the paperwork and tucking it into a folder he's carrying. "How long are you on desk duty? Everything still okay from the shooting?"
"Right now, another week and a half, unless my physical therapist says otherwise. Ribs are healing correctly as of my last x-ray." Amanda smiles to reassure him. The ballistics had come back finally on the shooting, and she's just grateful that it wasn't her rookie who fired the fatal shot that day. She's less glad that it was the training officer, feeling like as the sergeant that's a burden she should carry, but at least it wasn't the rookie.
"How about you come for dinner Friday night? Maria's been asking about you, although I should warn you that her brother just moved back to town."
"I don't think that matchmaking is gonna work out anymore than it did before," she replies, making Bob smile ruefully. Humoring Maria once by going out on a blind date with her younger brother was one thing, not long before she met Luke. But there had been no chemistry between her and Victor back then, and she can't imagine it appearing now. "Besides, it probably wouldn't be appropriate."
"Oh." Bob doesn't inquire further, not at work, but she can see the hint take root. "Come for dinner. You can fill me in then, and I'll tell Maria to lay off inviting her kid brother by."
Happy to agree, Amanda lets Bob head on his way before turning to motion the next person up to assist them. She doesn't think much of Leslie Subramanian's pregnancy until she actually encounters the woman in the women's locker room, changing out of her patrol uniform. The dark color of the shirt hides the growing swell of belly well, but clad in nothing but the white undershirt, there's no mistaking the woman's pregnant.
"Congratulations." Saying the words surprises Amanda a little, but it outright startles Subramanian.
The other woman blinks at Amanda for a moment before smiling and running a hand over the stretched fabric of her undershirt. "Thanks. We waited until Caleb was done with his residency. Figured it wasn't smart to have our schedules so completely insane and toss kids into the mix. But he's got a job in one of the big pediatric clinics now, so his hours are less crazy."
Amanda had actually forgotten Subramanian's husband was a doctor until now. Her fellow officer getting married three years ago mostly meant a change of her name plate, nothing more to Amanda, anyway. "A double congratulations, then, on him finishing up training." She stuffs her uniform shirt into her gear bag, buttoning a pastel blue shirt over her own undershirt to cover the belt holster she's wearing instead of her duty belt while going off duty. The uniform pants aren't as distinctive as the shirt, so she'll wear those home.
Fully expecting the other woman to finish changing in silence, the same way they always have in the cramped locker room that she suspects was a supply closet before female officers joined the department, Amanda is a little surprised when Subramanian speaks again. "You still married to the job?"
Her first instinct is to stiffen and take offense, but when she meets the petite woman's eyes, she sees only a teasing curiosity. It's a reminder that Subramanian was Bello, back when Amanda first started, and one of the few female officers who didn't get hung up on trying to be more of a hardass than the males just to get by. She'd been kind to Amanda in her rookie days. "Mostly. I don't see wedding bells in my future, but there is someone who understands the work now."
"Yeah? I'm glad to hear that. It's like finding a damn unicorn, finding a man who thinks being a cop isn't crazy with a capital C. Hell, I married Caleb so fast his mama swore I had to be knocked up." Zipping her bag closed, the shorter woman hoists it over her shoulder. "You cleared for driving yet?" Amanda shakes her head. "How about I give you a ride home then? It's on my way."
It actually sounds better than snagging one of her own officers to drop her off at her apartment, so Amanda agrees readily. The short ride passes with light chatter, mainly about whether or not working in evidence will be tedious or interesting, and by the time Amanda exits the car, they've left surnames behind. There really are too few female officers to put up false barriers, she thinks as she tosses her gear bag on the couch and goes to pour herself something to drink from the bottle of cranberry juice in her fridge.
Not being at the apartment for four days in a row means that the fridge is nearly bare, and housework is more than a bit behind. The idea of vacuuming sounds impossible, but making a shopping list is enough. Lori's offered to do shopping for her while she can't drive, so she might as well humor her sister-in-law. But since she's asking someone else to shop, she is more thorough than usual, and a foray into the bathroom shows that she's nearly out of body wash and shampoo both.
Taking inventory in the bathroom also reminds Amanda of a very important fact that makes her freeze in place. She's four days late.
"It's nothing," she mutters to herself, pulling out her phone and doublechecking the stupid little period tracking app to find her mental math was correct. "It's probably just the emergency pill."
Google tells her it's possible for her cycle to be off track, even with the type she'd used that wasn't a huge dose of hormones. Still, she can't stand the uncertainty, and there's a drug store within walking distance. Within the hour, she's back in her tiny bathroom, staring at the traitorous plastic stick laying on the side of her bathtub.
The second pink line is pale, but not so pale that she can swear it's not there at all. It's telling her something she didn't want it to say, and she curses the fact that the store down the road had been out of the digital type. She should have bought the other brand, too, the one with the damn plus sign, just for a second opinion.
Amanda's most likely pregnant, and she isn't even in a real relationship with the baby's father. It's always possible that the test is wrong, because her roommate in college had one test positive when it wasn't. But the parallel with her own mother churns in her gut, and she thrusts herself to her feet, fleeing the too small bathroom to pace in the living room. She gets her phone out repeatedly, torn between calling Rick or at least texting, but in the end, it's her gynecologist's office she calls instead, barely getting through before they close for the day.
"I'm sorry, Miss Shepherd, but Doctor Carson's booked solid for this week and next. If you don't mind seeing one of the partners, I can work you in next Wednesday." The receptionist's calm tone shows she's used to panicky women calling at the last minute. She'd make a good cop, with that soothing tone. "But you are correct that home tests can be prone to false positives sometimes. It's always best to have a full exam done."
"No, I want to stick with my own doctor." The idea of seeing a perfect stranger makes Amanda's skin crawl. Carson's been her gynecologist since she was a teenager and first encountered her complete inability to take any sort of hormonal birth control. "I don't work Mondays, but I could probably make a four o'clock appointment the rest of the week."
"How about the ninth? Doctor Carson has an opening for four fifteen that day."
"I'll be there." Hanging up, Amanda enters the appointment reminder into her phone and runs a hand through her hair. She'll figure it out then, and once she knows, she'll tell Rick. There's no point in them both being worried for the next two weeks, right? Even if she is pregnant, there's nothing that says she has to continue the pregnancy, either.
Not telling Rick is easier said than done, accomplished mostly by staying at her own apartment for three nights running. He seems more confused than upset, but by Saturday, her excuses run out since they do have an enormous amount of financials and paperwork to comb through, courtesy of Eugene's computer wizardry. After promising during their lunchtime phone call that she'll be by after supper with her family, she makes good on the alibi.
Pulling up in front of the multiple story building that's titled 'retirement village' instead of the apartment building it actually is, she thanks the Uber driver and gets out. Checking in with the security guard, she heads for the elevator and the seventh floor.
They'd been lucky, thirteen years ago, that Mama McGinley beat the odds with her cancer. Since she'd given up her small rental house to stay at the nursing home through the worst of the treatments, the elderly woman had moved into the income-based-rent building and lived here happily ever since. Every time Amanda visits, she is a little amused at how the tiny one bedroom seems so much larger than her own. It's just a side effect of anywhere Mama McGinley lives.
When her adoptive mother opens the door, the scent of fried chicken wafts out into the hallway, even as Amanda finds herself wrapped in a warm embrace. She grew taller than the older woman by the time she was eleven, but it doesn't matter. Somehow Mama McGinley still has a hug that can outdo Merle's best bear hug, and she always seems to know when it's needed.
Except this time, it's soft and gentle, reminding Amanda that she hasn't come by since the shooting. They usually have a Saturday supper together the end of every month, so she'd figured she could wait, but as she's ushered inside, guilt curls in the back of her mind. It doesn't matter that it's an hour's trip out here. She should have come sooner, not just called.
Somehow she isn't surprised to see that the entire meal is her childhood favorites: fried chicken, baked mac and cheese, green beans, and biscuits. It's heavy fare she wouldn't eat anywhere outside her mother's domain, but she'll indulge here.
It doesn't take long to trade all the family gossip while eating, but there's a sense of something pending that lingers even as Amanda washes dishes while her mother puts the food away. Half will go home with Amanda, and half will probably be passed off to the neighbor's adult grandson when he visits his mother after church tomorrow. The nice part about promising to go to Rick's is that she can gift Carl with the leftovers.
"So, you're certainly talking circles around the most important thing going on in your life right now, aren't you, pumpkin?"
The sweetly spoken words make Amanda freeze with the half clean saucepan in her hands. "What?" Her mind goes instantly to the positive pregnancy test, but there's no way for her mother to know that.
"Sophia and Carl came by last Saturday for a good, long visit." The knowing smile she gives Amanda makes her start putting the pieces together, especially combined with those two names. Daryl, Merle, and their wives would probably leave it to Amanda to share what's going on with Rick, but the teenagers? Hell, no.
"They told you that I've been dating Rick." Even though she's tried not to stay overnight when Carl's there, the boy's not ignorant. He's figured it out, especially since he's encouraging everything.
"Carl's quite excited about it, you know. He thinks you're quite perfect for his dad." Taking the finished pot, her mother rinses it and places it in the drain rack. It's the last of the dishes, so Amanda drains the sink and dries her hands.
"I'm not sure how perfect works out in the end." Her voice trembles, which means she's led to the small two-seater sofa and settled next to the woman who's raised her since she was four years old.
"Honey, there's no such thing as perfect. You know that without me telling you. The trick is finding the person whose imperfections mesh well with your own, like I did." Mama's husband died three years before Amanda came to her home, and as a pair, they'd been foster parents since their mid-twenties, never having any children of their own.
"I'm not sure it would work out like that for us. We come from very different worlds."
The soft chuckle her mother gives as she pats Amanda's hand is soothing. "You think I don't know who that boy's mama is? The important part is the world he chooses to be in, not the one he comes from. It's the same as it is with your brothers. Money just makes it a little more confusing."
Amanda swallows hard, taking comfort from her mother's closeness. "Sometimes getting free of your past is harder than it should be." Because she's sitting here, proof of how not everyone escapes their past, or she wouldn't be waiting out the days to her doctor's exam like it's a prison sentence instead of something joyful. "I think I might be pregnant," she blurts out, suddenly needing to say it out loud to someone, before it claws its way right out of her head.
"I'm guessing you aren't happy about it, sounding like that. What's wrong, Mandy?"
Taking a deep breath, Amanda spills out all the confusion she has about Rick. It's hard to be fully honest, with avoiding the issues of the investigation that overlap everything, but she does her best. "Every future plan he seems to have is about Carl being grown, not starting all over with a new family, Mama. He doesn't want more kids."
"Maybe you're right, and he's not inclined to be a father again at his age. It doesn't mean you can't be a good mama all on your own."
When Amanda turns to protest, the knowing smile on her mother's face makes the words halt. This is the woman who, while widowed, decided to adopt two kids and raise them as her own despite all the challenges their backgrounds of extreme neglect, and in Daryl's case, outright abuse, entailed. "I don't want to do it all on my own."
It's that statement that tells her that the decision she wasn't sure about before, whether she would even keep the baby, is made. It might have been smarter for her mother to have had an abortion or to have given Amanda up for adoption at birth instead of being forced into it four years later, but the thought of ending this possible pregnancy doesn't sit well with her.
"Well, if that man can't bring himself to start over, then you've just got to remember you aren't on your own, and you aren't a fifteen year old girl. You're an educated woman with plenty of savings and a good job. As for being on your own, do you think either of your brothers would do anything less than support you every step of the way? If there's really a little one coming, it won't lack for father figures, you know that."
Amanda knows she's right, because there's no way in this world that Daryl wouldn't step up to be her child's father figure if it didn't have one in the picture. Even Merle, for all his grump and bluster, would be right there, too. "I don't know for sure. Home tests can be wrong, sometimes."
"When's your appointment?"
"The ninth."
Mama hums slightly before getting up to make a note on her calendar that hangs over the tiny table in her kitchen. "I'll meet you there, so you don't go in there all alone."
"You don't have to."
"No, I don't, but I'm going to be there." She comes back to sit down beside Amanda. "But you should have a talk with Rick, and soon. He deserves to know what's going on, especially if you are pregnant."
"If I'm not pregnant, it's creating a lot of stress for nothing."
"You didn't manage this all by yourself, so I'd say he deserves his fair share of the stress, Mandy."
"No." At the stern look on her mother's face, Amanda shakes her head again. "I mean it, Mama. I don't want him knowing until there's something to know." It's only eleven more days of uncertainty.
"Alright. I won't mention it again, as long as you promise me that no matter what answer you get in that doctor's office, you sit down with Rick and have a serious discussion about what sort of relationship you two are actually in."
With that settled, Amanda visits for another half hour before assuring herself that her mother has everything she needs. Between the services offered by the retirement village, plus all three of Mama McGinley's children, the elderly woman is usually well supplied and prepared. She bids her farewell when her phone app tells her the Uber driver she scheduled is arriving.
It's funny how a two-hour visit settled all the fear and trepidation right out of her mind. Her mother is right, and no matter what happens at the gynecologist's office, she's not alone. She's not a fifteen-year-old girl with no support system that's too desperate for anyone to love that she's keeping a baby she can't take care of. If she's pregnant, then she'll figure out what to do next, with or without Rick in the picture.
In the darkened backseat of the Uber car, she lets herself wonder for the first time what it would be like if she's really pregnant and Rick's happy about it. Could they actually manage to pull together a family from their wobbly not-relationship and raise a child together? The part of her that's more attached to Rick already than she wants it to be yearns for that answer to be yes.