That evening, she simply cannot fall asleep.
The meeting had run long, and she'd noticed Jack attempting to make his way over to her office afterwards, but she'd yawned a little too enthusiastically and claimed fatigue as her escape route. He'd simply given her a long, uncomfortable look before he wished her goodnight even as she was moving past him and towards the door. She hadn't been able to face him before, when it'd simply been a single mistake, but now... now she couldn't help but feel the anxiety pooling in her gut every time she was around him.
On her way home she'd stopped for donuts and three home pregnancy tests; she'd managed to eat three quarters of the box of pastries before she'd even stepped through her door. After a marathon of water and juice she'd waited impatiently to see the results one three tiny plastic sticks.
All positive.
This alone, however, didn't really prove anything. Though she'd been attempting to eat less of the cheesy Mexican delights that had caused her false pregnancy tests the first time around, it was possible that enough of the lovely bull testosterone had entered her system and caused everything to go all wonky on her.
A voice at the back of her head, whispering incessantly, is what keeps her awake. It's different this time... some part of her murmurs conspiratorially, and she can't help but listen.
Three days later, she ducks out of a meeting with Toofer and Frank to head down to her doctor's office. He'd called and left a message for her to come back in and "have a chat". When she'd heard that carefully worded statement, she knew it wasn't the same as last time. This wasn't Sabor de Soledad induced. This was the real thing.
He knocks once on the door and then enters, smiling at her as he comes into the room. She still has her jacket on and is clutching at her purse, knuckles white with anticipation and nerves.
"Congratulations, Elizabeth," he tells her, grinning all the more. "You are pregnant."
She simply nods, unable to even form the sounds for the single syllable yes.
He continues, undeterred by her continuing silence. "Everything looks good at the moment, you're probably about seven to eight weeks along. I'll get you to meet up with my receptionist; she can schedule you in for follow-ups as well as an ultrasound in the next few weeks. Do you have any questions at this point, Elizabeth? I've got some standard information here in a package for you; it covers dietary needs, lifestyle changes, risk factors, and so on."
She manages to pull it together long enough to attempt a lopsided smile that doesn't quite reach her eyes. "Th-thank you, Doctor Morena. I, uh, I think I'll just take the package for now, I still need to wrap my head around this whole baby situation," she says, gesturing vaguely down towards the direction of her abdomen.
He smiles at her and hands her the package, as he takes her hand in his and wishes her congratulations yet once more. She smiles back at him on autopilot, while her mind races away to a flashback of that night eight weeks ago, when he'd pulled her close and kissed her warmly, holding her in his arms as he made his way further and further down-
She shakes her head abruptly, banishing those thoughts to the deep recesses of her mind. She grabs her purse and thanks the doctor once again, making sure to stop in the reception area to make the necessary arrangements for future check-ups and appointments. The receptionist smiles at her in that cutesy, loving way that comes with the announcement of a pregnancy, and Liz can't help but cringe, knowing that this and more is what eventually awaits her at 30 Rock.
She goes back to work that afternoon, saying nothing to anyone, constantly tortured by the vision of a blue eyed baby with dark hair and pale skin, smiling up at her from her own arms.
Two days after the confirmation of her impeding motherhood, she's summoned to a meeting on the 52nd floor by Jonathan, who scowls at her in his customary way. She barely spares him a glance, her heart beating faster and faster as she approaches the door. She'd been up here a few times in the last two months, although frequently accompanied by Pete under the guise of needing someone for artistic and creative support. She'd managed just fine then, avoiding discussions of anything outside of their professional relationship, all the while attempting to ignore the frustration in his eyes.
This time, however, is the first time she will have seen him since learning of her so-called "delicate condition". She knows that she is a fairly terrible liar, and can't help to hope against hope that he simply doesn't see right through her.
Taking a breath, she raps her knuckles against the polished wood of the door, and waits to hear an acknowledgement of her presence. She hears a muffled "Come in" from the other side of the barrier, and she turns the knob with her heart in her throat.
She enters the room quickly, leaving the door open behind her. He doesn't say anything about it, which makes her feel a little better. Door open means work conversations. Work conversations mean little to no personal life discussions. Which means she can run away from this for yet another day.
'Would you mind closing the door, Lemon?" he asks her, not looking up from the paperwork on his desk.
Nertz. Spoke too soon.
She closes the door somewhat reluctantly, and then makes her way over to his desk. When he still doesn't look up from his paperwork, she sits down at the chair opposite his own, and tries to make herself comfortable.
"So," he says, without looking up from his papers, "how are we going to deal with this?"
Immediately, her stomach sinks. "Deal with what? The show? Yeah, I know, Tracy's been flubbing his lines lately, but we've got Grizz on it, he's worked out a sort of Pavlov's Bell situation, where Tracy gets rewarded with a piece of candy every time he gets a line right, so I mean that's-"
"Elizabeth," he interrupts sharply, and she shuts up at both his tone and the use of her full first name.
He looks up at her then, his blue eyes peering deeply into her own. "It's been two months. I want to make sure you're okay."
In the morning, she'd woken up to find him passed out beside her, face down in her bed. Her head still swimming, she'd looked over at the clock and remarked the early hour (5:14am), which was (unfortunately) way too early for her to start to her day. But she knew she couldn't face being here with him, with both of them awake, in the light of a full morning and in the face of total sobriety. So she'd stumbled over to the pile of clothes in her bathroom and picked out a few items, trying her best to stay quiet while she fumbled with the buttons on her cardigan and zipped up her jeans.
She'd ducked out of the apartment and headed to work extremely early that morning (the bus was remarkably free of somewhat unsavoury characters for once), and made a point of being tied up in meetings for the rest of the day (and the day after that, and the day after that...)
She brings herself back to the present moment, finally faced with a reality she'd been trying so hard to avoid. "I'm fine."
He only stares at her.
"I mean, it's all good. It's – it was – just a mistake. We can pretend it never happened! Like the time Frank slept with Jenna. Oh boy. I should not have brought that –"
"Liz," he says softly, and once again, she falls silent. "I am very sorry. I should not have come over like that. We are boss-employee, mentor-mentee, and I took advantage of that. Perhaps, with time, we can come back to the same working relationship we had before and –"
"I'm seeing someone," she blurts out, completely out of left field. The stress of the moment had finally gotten to her, and she had to do something, to avoid this newfound path of reconciliation he seemed determined to put them on. Plus, it wasn't a total lie, she was "seeing" someone new – except the someone in question was a ball of quickly dividing cells located in her uterus. But, hey, isn't that just semantics?
"Oh," he says softly, after a brief silence. "Well, my congratulations, Lemon. Is it someone I know?"
I guess you could say that, she thinks to herself, but out loud she replies with a firm "No."
A long, heavy quiet settles in between them, and eventually she grows so anxious that she finds herself rising to her feet. "If that's all...?" she asks, still avoiding full eye contact.
"That's it," he replies, a neutral expression having returned to his face.
She's at the door before he finishes speaking, rushing out past Jonathan and out towards the elevator in a matter of seconds. Groaning to herself, she slumps against the back of the empty elevator car, covering her face with her hands. First a more-than-real baby and now a completely-fabricated-boyfriend. What next?
(And yet, all she can really think about is the fleeting look on his face when she'd unceremoniously announced her involvement with someone else, the way his eyes had shifted and his usually composed exterior had faltered, all too briefly...)