Seven

I knew I was pregnant. Month after month I had thought I was pregnant, and I was always wrong. But this time I didn’t think … I knew. And I was too scared to take a test, as if taking a test would make it all untrue.

So I waited and waited, over a whole week, which was a long time for me, someone with the patience of a chihuahua. It was a Wednesday when I rode my bike from work to the pharmacy near the train station and nervously asked for a pregnancy test – feeling like a 12-year-old boy buying a razor he doesn’t yet need. It felt too grown up – and too jinxable.

And I said to myself, “Tomorrow morning.”

I woke up at 2 a.m., heart racing, palms sweaty. It was ridiculous. I couldn’t wait any longer, so I peed on that stick and squeezed my eyes shut. When I opened up one eye three minutes later:

In the months leading up to this moment, I had thought about what cool way I would tell Björn. I would buy a little pair of Chucks. Or stick the test in an envelope. Something creative and witty, like I always am in my head and hardly ever am in reality.

The way I hadn’t thought about doing it – not even waiting for him to be fully awake at 2:05 a.m. as I hissed, “Hey! Björn! I’m pregnant!!! – is the way it came to be. His response: Huh?

Then all I had to do was hope that my little embryo would make it through the next 35-odd weeks.