I sat in the hotel’s Suburban car, still drunk and attempting to follow what was going on. Justin and Mike were having a heated argument and I was trying to stay low-key. Justin was in the foulest mood I’d ever seen and it was completely directed at me. I wasn’t used to it, I didn’t like it and therefore I was hoping he’d forget about me. So far staying quiet was working; poor Mike was getting reamed. Look, somebody had to bear the wrath, right? And I was already bearing plenty; it was time to spread the wealth around.

“Would you fucking go and get it?” Justin kept thrusting a handful of money at Mike who repeatedly pushed it back at him.

“Hell no, I’m not getting caught up in the middle of your shit. You two are in so much trouble,” Mike drew out the word trouble like they do on bad sitcoms.

Unfortunately that’s exactly what I felt like I was in, a really bad sitcom. They were acting like we were trying to rob a place or something

“Do you know how everybody’s gonna be? Do you realize what’s gonna happen when--”

“Do you know how to fucking go and get the test? Or I swear to God, Mike, I’ll fire you. I’ll fire you right now!”

I don’t know why he thought that would scare Mike. He threatened to fire him all the time and if he hadn’t gone be then I doubted that would make him. I was right.

“You can’t fire me, I don’t just work for you,” he chuckled which only made Justin angrier.

Great Mike, aggravate him even more. That’ll make things even better for all of us. However, he did have a point and in my drunken state I forgot about trying to stay invisible.

“That’s true,” I chimed in. “Doesn’t he work for the whole group and Johnny?”

Boy was I sorry I said anything. They both turned and glared at me, even Mike which was something new since I usually was the one glaring at him. Come to think of it, I don’t even know what he was glaring about but whatever. Usually I wouldn’t blink an eye at Justin glaring because he does it, like, a million times a day, but him glaring at me like that was new. I wanted to crawl under a rock or something, I swear, mostly because I knew he was right in being angry. I already said I was sorry, what else did he want me to do?

Take a test, obviously.

Which explains why we were sitting double-parked for almost fifteen minutes outside Duane Reade on freaking Broadway while they argued about who was going to buy it. Mike wouldn’t let Justin go in for fear of being him recognized, which none of us wanted, but he refused to go in and get it himself because it was embarrassing. Nobody cared that I might be embarrassed that we were all sharing my personal business, you know, since it was my condition and all, but I’d long ago given up on trying to keep private stuff from Mike. But I still didn’t want to take the test. They were being ridiculous though, screaming back and forth so much that I got fed up.

I snatched the money out of Justin’s hand and went to climb over him to get out. “For God’s sake, it’s just a fucking test! I’ll fucking go get it!”

He took the money back and growled, “Sit down. Just sit there and don’t say anything right now, okay? Get over being drunk.”

He scared me. Chastened, I sunk back against the leather and shut up again. Was it wrong to like this new, in control side of him? Was it wrong to want to jump him and--

Oh yeah. I forgot. That’s what got me sitting in front of Duane Reade with two idiots in the first place.

My life sucked.

Mike shook his head at me. “Why were you even drinking, Tara? What’s wrong with you? You know better than that,” he said sadly.

If one more person asked me ... I bit my tongue. I did roll my eyes, though.

“You would think that, wouldn’t you?” my soon-to-be ex-boyfriend interrupted. I didn’t recall Mike asking him anything, but I was sort of scared at how mean he was being that I didn’t comment. “You would think someone would have more respect for themselves and their child, not to mention their boyfriend, than to put themselves in danger. I know I thought someone--.”

“Oh shut up,” I wanted to be quiet but I was really getting sick of him. Self-righteous prick. “We don’t even know if there’s a child yet, would you get off my fucking back?”

I admitted I was sorry. There was nothing else to do except keep apologizing and I wasn’t in the mood. All I wanted to do was lay down and go to sleep if you want to know the truth. That dip I just had hit the spot and the drinks had me feeling pretty relaxed, despite my current circumstance.

“Don’t tell me to shut up,” he fired back. “That’s why we’re here right now, because I shut up and let you act like you don’t have any fucking home training. Mike, go get a fucking EPT!” He tossed a couple of twenties at him and I thought I glimpsed a fifty. How much did they think those things cost?

Again, Mike brushed the money off his lap onto the floor. Instinctively I leaned down and began picking up the bills scattered all over the floor. I wasn’t stealing. I was just being thrifty; Justin wasted too much money and would probably forget about it. Really, that’s all. I was saving it for him.

Asshole. I had home training, great home training. Just because he was mad didn’t mean he had to be so nasty. I stewed, thinking about how out of line his comment was. While I fumed I smoothed out the wrinkles in the money and counted my stash and they continued arguing.

“You can yell at me all you want, dawg. I ain’t getting a test and you don’t have to fire me either because my ass is about to quit. Buying that shit ain’t in my contract, dude, and neither is keeping secrets from Johnny,” Mike stuck to his guns.

Silently I raised my fist in solidarity with him. Go Mike.

“Fuck this,” Justin reached for the door handle, “I’ll take the fucking chance. You just sit here and fucking relax.” He was halfway out the door and I started to offer him some money but decided he didn’t deserve any of it since he was acting so cranky.

As I shoved it into my cleavage since Justin didn’t let me get my purse before he kidnapped me, Mike the Gutless Wonder gave in. I knew he would eventually, I just figured he’d hold out a little longer. “Wait, shit!”

Justin had one foot out the door. “Stop fucking around, Mike, I’m not sitting here forever,” he pulled the baseball cap he had been wearing down lower on his forehead. “You won’t do it and T can’t even fucking walk so I’m it.”

I could so walk.

“I’ll do it! Shit!” Mike pulled Justin back into the car and shut the door, cursing the whole time. “You always do this, you know that? I’m always stuck in the middle of some shit for you. All the fucking time,” he complained wearily. “What the fuck do I have to do? Where do you even get this shit from?”

He was in rare form. Mike hardly ever cursed in front of me and whenever he did he always excused himself right away, but he was beyond furious. At least it was at Justin instead of with me. Just in case I stayed silent and observed while Justin tried to instruct him on where to go.

Pure comedy. And I wanted to know what kind of shit Justin always got him involved in. Nobody ever mentioned that to me before...

“Here,” Justin handed him the few crumpled bills he still had left. I had most of it now; what had started out as a wad of cash in his hand was a nice little wad inside my bra. “Just go to the back and ask the person at the counter.”

Mike looked horrified. “I’m not asking anybody! Don’t you know where that stuff is?”

Frustrated, Justin ripped his hat off and rubbed his head. He does that when he’s really mad. “How the hell would I know, man? How the hell would I know where the pregnancy tests are in a fucking store?!”

As entertaining as all this was, I decided to risk Justin remembering he was mad at me. “Guys? Um … I know where they probably are ... I think.” They turned and looked at me. “I mean, I never bought one before or anything ... but usually all that stuff is in the same place at every store ... I can tell you where to go and you’ll probably find a bunch of them.”

“Okay. Where should I look?” Poor, poor Mike.

“You know where they keep all the ... you know ... feminine ...” I let my voice trail off as Mike began to frown and Justin tried not to laugh. We sat in silence for a minute before Mike opened the door in a huff and stomped off, slamming the door behind him. Momentarily all anger was forgotten as Justin and I howled with laughter at the look on his face.

“Did you see ... oh my God; he looks like he’s gonna fucking die!”

“I know ... I wish we could peek in and watch him, don’t you?” Without thinking, I leaned over onto him and laid my head on his shoulder, still laughing a little. Until he remembered. I could tell the second he did because his body language changed and he stiffened, but he didn’t move away from me. I took that as a small sign of encouragement. “Justin ...”

He sighed, staring straight ahead with all laughter gone. “Tara, I don’t want to be nasty to you. I love you,” he told me, still avoiding any eye contact. “But right now I’m so mad about what you did that ... I don’t know what to say without being nasty. I know you’re drunk ... and ... as far as I’m concerned there’s nothing you can say that will make that okay.”

Talk about feeling an inch big.

“Baby ... why would you do something like that in the first place? And you know I saw you were drunk when I came in and I still thought, maybe she forgot or whatever. I didn’t even get mad, I just asked you very nicely to please not drink. That’s all. I wasn’t gonna yell or anything, I just asked you to wait a few minutes and then I was gonna try to talk to you, make you understand that you shouldn’t drink until we know, which isn’t something I should need to explain to you because you already know that. Right? Am I off base here, or am I sounding rational? Tell me because for real, I’m so mad that I can’t tell if I’m being calm.”

My head was still on his shoulder and I took in a shaky breath, inhaling his cologne. “You’re making sense,” my voice was trembling. “You’re being rational, but Justin, I--”

“So what is it then? What’s so wrong, what’s making you act so crazy that you can’t just tell me? I know you’re not talking to anybody else so it’s not like you’re confiding in your friends. Are you?”

I didn’t answer. It seemed like the majority of my life was spent with people asking me to talk about what was on my mind. Nothing was on mind.

“Tara. Are you? Are you talking to anybody about what’s going on? Because you’re sure as hell not talking to me. You’re pretending like everything’s fine, like you can get drunk and party and what if--”

“What if what?” I snapped, taking my head off his shoulder and moving away. Not snapped as in talking, but like something in me broke. “You don’t feel like being nasty? Well, I do. I feel like being nasty and selfish and whatever else I fucking want, okay? I felt like having a fucking drink and I did. The world’s still turning, Justin. We’re all still alive, nobody died, and no crimes were committed. And what else? Let’s see, how about I don’t feel like talking to you or my friends about something that we’re not even sure is happening. I’m not pretending or hiding or any of the dramatic psychobabble you’re all trying to come up with, I just don’t have anything to say, so would you get off my fucking back?!”

He gazed at me. Not angry or cold like before, but genuinely confused. “Baby, what’s wrong with you?” he asked quietly like I was some kind of freak. Unfortunately for him, I have a real nasty side and he was about to see it in full effect. It doesn’t come out often but when it does, it’s pretty nasty, but you probably already know that from what I said to Sasha.

“Nothing!” I screeched, fighting not to burst into tears. He didn’t understand, no one seemed to and they were all making me feel like I was insane. “There’s nothing wrong with me except you guys won’t stop badgering me! I made one stupid mistake and now you’re dragging me around like I’m a piece of furniture telling me what to do? I said I was sorry! I’m sorry!”

And he kept staring while suddenly I teetered on the verge of hysteria, screaming in his face.

“And you want me to take the fucking test. You decide I’m taking a test. You decide its okay to tell Sasha, Chris, Dani, Mike, shit now the driver knows our fucking business!”

That poor driver probably wished he’d never gone to work that day. He was trying his best to be discreet and huddle down in the front but I never forgot he was there. I just figured it didn’t make a difference -- everyone else knew, right? And I couldn’t stop myself. The words were pouring out, I didn’t even know what I was saying and every harsh word made me cringe but it was like a demon had taken over. Justin only stared as I continued my tirade, eyes wide with confusion.

“So I’ll take your fucking test. You all think I’m pretending I don’t know what’s going on? I know better than any of you what the fuck is wrong and I knew everything would change! Everything was fine and now it’s all fucked up, and you and I aren’t going to be the same and I knew it would happen, I was trying to stop it. Do you understand me now? Do you see how fucked up everything is now? It’s only going to get worse after the test but I don’t even fucking care. I’ll take the test, you want to fucking hold the stick while I do it? You’ll probably lock me in the fucking bathroom--”

“I got-- Tara! Stop it!” Somehow Mike had returned from the drugstore with a white plastic bag that he tossed to Justin. He leaned back from the front of the car and sort of shook me, not hard but enough to jolt me out of my babbling. “What’re you doing, honey?” He stopped shaking me and gripped my shoulders, rubbing them briskly while looking right into my eyes. He’s so steady, always the same and it was just what I needed. “It’s okay, honey. Calm down. J, what’s going on?”

He shook his head, not knowing what was going on either. “She ... we started talking and she started yelling and I couldn’t get her to stop. All the shit she was saying ... I don’t know what she was talking about.”

“I’m right here,” I said faintly, gazing from Mike to Justin in a daze. “Don’t talk about me like I’m not here.”

I felt like I was dreaming again, only this was like a nightmare. When had my life turned into this mess? When had I turned into an uncontrollable mess, shrieking like a madwoman at my boyfriend who was only doing what was normal? All I had wanted that weekend was to be regular Tara but instead I seemed to be growing more unbalanced every day.

Thank God for Mike. He got me back to planet earth and after a nod from him, Justin snapped out of his fog. He immediately put his arm around me and pulled me over to him almost onto his lap, stroking my hair. “I know you’re here, baby. I’m sorry.”

I didn’t realize I was shaking until I was pressed against him, but I was. My entire body was trembling and I felt hot, sweaty and nauseous. Closing my eyes, I snuggled into him and prayed that I wouldn’t get throw up. Lately I was either on top of the world, happy and excited, or feeling sick and hysterical, trying not to vomit.

Justin was right. Something had to give.

I heard him and Mike talking in low voices but I didn’t bother trying to listen. For once I didn’t care what they were saying, I just wanted to go back to the hotel and get things over with.

I couldn’t put it off any longer. It was time. Way past time.

~*~

“I guess he wants us to be sure, huh?” I rifled through the stack of tests that Mike had gotten. There had to be one of every possible kind made on the bed. Justin sat next to me, his hand resting on the nape of my neck, lightly rubbing.

I dozed off on the way back to the hotel even though we weren’t far away. Once there, we went right upstairs without stopping even though I briefly wondered where JC and my evil ex-friend had disappeared to. But I had more important business to take care of and in order to do it I had to stay calm. Not freak out. Not get sick.

Doing any of those things wouldn’t change my situation, right?

Mike left us at the door although it was obvious that he was dying to know the results. I love Mike now, was beginning to like him a lot then, but I draw the line at some things. He’d find out soon enough. So Justin and I came inside and he led me right over to the bed where we lay down for a minute, side by side. That was a first, us lying side by side instead of holding each other. We held hands, but we didn’t hold each other.

I knew things would change.

“Are you okay?” he asked after about ten minutes of silence.

No lying, right? “No,” I answered. “I’m not okay. But you already know that.”

He mulled that over for awhile. “I know I yelled earlier, but I still don’t ... I don’t want to make you do something you don’t want to, baby. I just don’t know what else to do; you’re not making this easy for me. It’s like you’re calm one second and the next you’re going fucking crazy and I honestly think that if you just, if we know either way, then ... at least we can do something. Right now we’re in fucking limbo and I can’t stand it and I know you can’t either. You’re scaring me and I can’t ... I want you to be okay again.”

I’m a huge Bill Clinton fan for lots of reasons. I’ve probably read just about every book published on him out there, and there’s one thing that’s been in almost every one about him that I could completely identify with. He has a gift, they say, for compartmentalizing. Like when he was having trouble with the Lewinsky scandal, he was still able to put that aside and work on whatever else was going on. Whatever is bothering him, whatever is a problem, he’s able to put it out of his head and focus on something else when he needs to. I think I have that gift too, in fact I didn’t even know it was a gift until I read that about him, I just assumed everyone did it, but they don’t. Most people deal with their problems head on or in their own way; I compartmentalize so well that I can put things away in little boxes and leave them alone until they either resolve themselves or someone else takes care of it. Whatever gets the job done, as long as I don’t have to do it.

Justin compartmentalizes when he has to, like, for work. He can be furious or sick or sad and go on-stage and unless you really know him, you wouldn’t notice a thing. But he doesn’t avoid things like I do; he wants to talk and get the important shit dealt with and move on. Waiting was making him nuts and looking back, I’m amazed that he was so patient. He was scared, though. In this case, I think part of him didn’t want to know either, but it was only a small part. He wasn’t waiting anymore.

“Let’s do it, then,” I simply answered, and that was when we sat up and found the fifty tests Mike got.

“Any preference?” He picked up three or four and held them towards me. I didn’t know what the hell to pick so I went with the brand name. He opened it and we read over the directions -- I wanted to make sure I did it right the first time. When I was satisfied that I knew what to do, not that it took much thought, I got up and went to the bathroom without a word.

What was there to say?

A little privacy was too much to ask for though, because Justin was at the door the whole time, pacing back and forth. “When-- when you’re done, come back out okay? So we can look together. Okay, T?”

What, did he think I was going to sit in there alone? I was doing what I had to and getting the heck out of there. If he wanted to stand over and watch the stick turn or not turn blue that was totally his call.

“Okay,” I called back. It only took a few seconds really, then I sat the little stick thing on the counter, washed my hands, and opened the door. He practically fell in on me.

“You done?” He’d been glued to the door; he didn’t hear the toilet flush?

I nodded. “Yep. It’s on the counter.” We stood there staring at each other.

“How long again?” He looked pale and nervous while I felt strangely calm. I guess because I knew the results already. I just did.

“Three minutes,” I told him and he reached out to hold my hand again. “You want to just stand here?” I really shouldn’t have had any alcohol, because man, was I feeling it. I wanted to lie down and just let him tell me the results but he needed me. It wasn’t fair for him to find out alone. We had to do it together.

He leaned back against the doorway and pulling on my hand, drew me into his arms. I wrapped my arms around his waist and leaned my head on his shoulder, listening to his heart pounding while we waited.

“It’s gonna be okay,” I said out of nowhere. We switched roles so easily; one second he was comforting me, then it was the other way around.

He hugged my shoulders tighter, almost like he thought I might run away. “I know ... I know you think everything’s changing and maybe it is but I still love you, T. I don’t care what the test says or how crazy you act,” he said into my hair.

“I still love you, too,” I replied. My heart was jumping in my chest too. “That’s what I meant when I said it’s gonna be okay. Even if I act crazy occasionally, I’ll be okay. We just needed to know ... I shouldn’t have waited.”

He sighed. “It doesn’t matter, baby. I don’t care about that. I just want to know so we can move on, you know? Don’t you feel relieved at all, that we’re gonna know in a few seconds?”

In a way I guess it was nice to have that monkey off my back, but relief wasn’t exactly coursing through me. Neither was terror. I was still numb, I think, from the shock of it all. From time to time I’d come out of the numbness, like my screaming earlier at Justin and Sasha, but for the most part I was still doing my compartment thing.

“Mmm,” I gave my standard vague answer that didn’t mean anything at all. I can remember squeezing my eyes shut so tight, not wanting the moment to end. “Justin?”

“Yeah?

Something he said bothered me. “Move on to what? What do you want to move on to?”

“I don’t know exactly ... but I want us to stay together,” he said firmly, holding me even tighter. It hurt but I didn’t want him to stop. “Whatever happens, whatever we decide to do, I don’t want it to break us up. Promise me that we won’t break up over this, okay? I won’t leave you, Tara. So you gotta promise not to leave me, either.”

Never, not once since we decided not to see other people did we ever discuss breaking up. It’s like it was a foregone conclusion that we’d be together. It never entered my mind, leaving him, not seriously. He was this enormous part of my world and until he said that I didn’t think he’d ever thought about it, either. And his voice ... I’d never heard him sound so scared before. He was always so confident and sure that he knew what he was doing, what we were doing, how everything should be. But not then.

“T, you promise?”

And I knew that he knew. He was in the doorway and could see the test; it was way past three minutes, too. That’s why he was asking me not to leave and telling me he wouldn’t leave me. “Yes, I promise. I won’t leave you.”

“Okay.”

“It’s blue, isn’t it?”

“Yeah.”

Believe it or not, I didn’t get sick or anything. In fact I didn’t move at all, just stayed in his arms there in the doorway, still tipsy and wearing the slightly damp dress from where I’d spilled that drink earlier. Seems like we stayed there for hours because for all his talking, I don’t think he thought knowing was so great an idea after all.

Finally I spoke. “So now we know.”

“Yeah.” His head was still buried in my hair. “Now we know. But you already knew, didn’t you?”

He wasn’t so oblivious after all. “I didn’t take a test or anything, but yeah.” He didn’t comment. “You knew too, didn’t you?”

“Yeah ... I guess I sort of did,” he admitted. I moved out of his arms and reached into my bra, pulling out the wad of money I collected earlier. He’d been holding me so tightly that I felt it, I’d forgotten all about my silliness in the car.

“Here,” I held it out to him. It didn’t seem funny anymore.

He looked puzzled. “What’s this?” It was a couple hundred at least, a few fifties and lots of twenties. And he hadn’t even noticed I snagged it all.

“The money you threw all over the limo,” I answered and went to sit on the bed while he followed, sitting next to me.

“You picked it all up?” He flicked through it, smiling a little.

“You were wasting it! Of course I took it. Be glad it was me and not the driver.” I’m such a cheapskate.

He laid it on my lap. “Whatever’s mine is yours, too, Tara.”

Again with the Tara. I didn’t need his money. “I have my own money,” I pushed it back towards him but he wouldn’t take it.

“So now you have a little more,” he picked it up and pushed it back into my bra.

I didn’t understand him. “But I don’t need it,” I protested.

He sighed. “Then keep it because I want to give it to you. Not because you need it, just because I can give it to you, okay?”

Whatever. “I’d rather have presents than money,” I informed him. Hey, it’s true.

I could tell he was smiling. “I can probably do both if you want.”

“Okay.”

I don’t know if he knew what he was doing but I did. I just couldn’t believe he was reacting that way so soon. That money? It was Justin ‘providing’ for me, for me and the baby, already. Only a few minutes had passed and already he was trying to behave like he thought he should. He always liked to pay for dinner and stuff but he’d never tried to give me cash before. I’d held his wallet and credit cards, borrowed five or ten bucks here and there when I didn’t have my purse or something but I never took money from him and he knew it. I didn’t need it and I never wanted it; it was a matter of principle to me. He had so much of it -- money was such a big part of his celebrity -- that it seemed important that I not be associated with it. He knew how I felt but now ... things were different.

Changes. Already.

I didn’t like it but I didn’t want to argue, so I let it go. Plenty of time to argue later. Leaning onto his shoulder, I let out a deep sigh.

“What?”

What? Gee, nothing, Justin.

“I don’t know. It just seems like ... now we know. It’s all so anti-climactic. And we’re here in New York ... do we really want to deal with something this serious here, with everything going on tomorrow?” I know Sasha and I technically weren’t speaking but I also knew she expected my butt to be front and center for TRL the next day. And I still wanted to go whether I was pregnant or not.

His voice was low as he slipped an arm around me, rubbing my back. “Do you know what you want to do?”

I would’ve thought that it was obvious that I had absolutely no idea what the hell I wanted to do, as evidenced by my bizarre behavior. So I turned the question back around. “Do you?”

He moved his head and kissed me, a sweet kiss on the forehead. “I know I love you,” was all he said.

We’ve been over this a million times. Love wasn’t the problem, you know? We loved each other as much as humanly possible, I think. But how come he never understood what I did?

Love isn’t a miracle; love doesn’t solve all problems.

Bottom line?

Love isn’t always enough.

And promises aren’t always kept, either.

Love wasn’t the problem. The problem was everything else but love.

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