Chapter 2
Scott's betrayal had left me utterly disillusioned with love.
Maybe, as Dexter said, settling for companionship was all I could expect now.
"Go home and think it over. No need to rush your answer," Dexter said.
Dexter could see I was wavering, so he spoke more gently.
"Here's Steven's number. Maybe you two can meet up and chat a bit," he added, handing me a slip of paper.
Before I knew it, I'd taken it from him.
That weekend, I arranged to meet up with Steven.
We sat together in a quiet café.
He was still the same, tidy, silent, with a touch of aloofness.
We talked for ages.
Honestly, I did most of the talking, and he just listened.
Finally, Steven looked at me, his eyes serious.
"Do you understand what my dad said?" he asked.
I nodded.
"I can't have kids," he said, matter-of-factly. "So you won't have to deal with the usual expectations from a family.
"If you're alright with that, we can see how it goes."
He looked genuinely sincere.
There was no pity or judgment, just calmly accepting me for who I am.
I gave it some thought and said yes.
Nobody else wanted me anyway. Guess this was as good as it got for me.
A week later, we went to City Hall and registered our marriage.
When I held the marriage certificate in my hands, it didn't even feel real.
Just like that, I, Naoimi Moore, found myself married.
To a man I'd only met twice.
All because neither of us could have kids.
Life with Steven after marriage was dead calm, like water with no ripples.
He moved into the tiny apartment I got from work.
We slept in separate rooms.
He left early every morning and came home late, and we hardly spoke.
Truth be told, we were more like two roommates sharing a place than an actual couple.
The only real change was the arrival of Lily Miller, my mother-in-law.
The day after we got our marriage certificate, Lily showed up with loads of bags and moved in without hesitation.
She claimed she was here to "take care of us," but honestly, it felt like she wanted to be around.
Lily was tough, always looking at me with a critical eye.
She always complained that my cooking was too greasy, not light enough for her taste.
She criticized my laundry, saying it wasn't clean enough.
And she even complained that I was wasting electricity by reading at night.
I didn't bother responding to any of it.
After all, this marriage was a matter of convenience. I had no reason to try to win her over.
Steven seemed oblivious to everything going on.
The house was eerily quiet.
Things stayed the same until one morning, three months later.
I'd just gotten out of bed when a wave of nausea hit me.
I rushed to the bathroom and threw up as if my life depended on it.
Lily stood at the door, frowning.
"What's going on? Did you eat something bad?" she asked.
I rinsed my mouth, but my stomach was still in turmoil.
Maybe it was just a stomach bug.
"You're young, but your health is already falling apart," Lily scoffed, curling her lip in obvious disgust.
Over the next few days, the morning sickness kept getting worse.
I threw up everything I ate. Even just the smell of cooking made me nauseous.
I dropped a whole size.
Lily looked more and more annoyed.
She grumbled, "You're always moping around, bringing bad luck.
"We wanted a daughter-in-law, not an invalid."
I didn't bother arguing with her. I just took a day off and went to the hospital alone.
I went to see a gastroenterologist.
The doctor asked me a ton of questions, then told me to get an ultrasound.
I lay back on the table, the cold gel and ultrasound wand gliding over my stomach.
The doctor, a young woman, stared at the monitor for what felt like an eternity.
Her face went from calm to surprised, and then to shock.
She checked the screen again and again before finally looking up at me.
"You thought this was just a stomachache?" she asked.
"Yeah, I've been feeling nauseous and throwing up," I said, my voice weak.
She pushed up her glasses, her expression odd as she pointed at the screen.
She said, "This is not a stomachache.
"This is morning sickness."
My heart skipped a beat.
"What?" I blurted out.
"Congratulations!" The doctor grabbed a tissue and wiped the gel off my belly, sounding genuinely amazed.
"You're having triplets. You're about twelve weeks along, and all the heartbeats are strong," she said.
"You need to take care of yourself. Three babies at once is no joke."
I slowly sat up, feeling like the whole world was spinning.
Triplets?
Wasn't I unable to have kids?
The doctor handed me the ultrasound report.
I stared at the three tiny dots on the paper, just three little black spots, quietly nestled inside me.
My hands started shaking uncontrollably.
I gripped the thin ultrasound report as I walked out of the hospital.
The sunlight was blinding, but I couldn't feel a hint of warmth.
My mind was a mess.
I was pregnant.
Triplets.
The face of the doctor who insisted I couldn't have kids flashed through my mind.
Was it a misdiagnosis?
But that misdiagnosis had changed everything for me.
I threw away five years of love, tossed aside like trash.
And then, like some item nobody wanted, I was bundled up and married off to Steven, another so-called damaged goods.
And now, I was actually pregnant.
This marriage, built on the fact that neither of us could have kids, suddenly felt pointless.
I didn't know how I was supposed to face Steven, or Lily, his picky mother.
My phone buzzed in my pocket.