To Catch A Wife. Lee Mckenzie

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      “Why should I be grateful, Fred? I wasn’t expecting to see him, and I sure wasn’t prepared to tell him about the baby.”

      “And you were going to be prepared...when exactly?”

      He had a point.

      “Still, you could have given me a heads-up.”

      “Right. And given you a chance to cook up an excuse to avoid seeing him.”

      Fred knew her too well.

      “So? How’d he take it?”

      “Better than I expected.” Jack had been kind of amazing, actually, but he might not be so accepting once the shock wore off and he had time to think things through. “He even said...” No. She wasn’t ready to say that out loud, either.

      “He said...?”

      Emily watched Tadpole break through one end of the peanut shell and stuff the first nut into her cheek pouch. Life for a hamster was so easy. Eat. Run on your wheel. Sleep. Get up and do it all over again. Boring, but easy.

      “Come on, Em. You’re killing me here.”

      She sighed, knowing Fred wouldn’t let this go. “He said we should get married right away.”

      A moment of stunned silence was followed by stammering. “He... Seriously?”

      “Hey! Why so surprised? I’m a total catch.”

      Fred laughed. “Of course you are.”

      “I am!”

      “I’m agreeing with you.”

      “No, you’re not. You’re being patronizing.”

      “Sorry, Em. I figured he’d be more freaked out, that’s all. Do the typical guy thing and carry on about how you were trying to trap him.”

      She had half expected that reaction, too. Now she didn’t know what to think. Since taking the test that morning, she had roller-coastered through every emotion imaginable. This minute, she was a wreck.

      With the phone still to her ear, she stepped into the kitchen and filled the electric kettle for tea. “Under that cool-as-a-cucumber exterior, I’m sure he is freaking out, but he didn’t go ballistic.” Which was what she had expected.

      “Good. When’s the big day, then?”

      She switched on the kettle. “There isn’t going to be a big day. I said no.”

      Another moment of silence. “You said no? Em, are you sure? You’ve had a crush on this guy since we were kids.”

      Being best friends with Fred for most of her life meant he knew pretty much everything there was to know about her. Sometimes that was a good thing. Other times, like now, it was definitely annoying.

      She eyed a package of coffee longingly before shifting her attention to an assortment of teas. Mint, which Annie had once recommended for an upset stomach and was mildly palatable with a spoonful of sugar. Echinacea, for the time she’d come down with a cold last winter. However, all it did was make her tongue tingle. Red rooibos, which was supposed to be good for everything and tasted worse than all the rest put together. Mint it was, she thought, dropping a bag into her favorite coffee mug and returning to the living room to wait for the water to boil.

      “I had a crush on Jack when I was fourteen, not since I was fourteen. Either way, that’s no reason to rush into anything.”

      Fred made a big production of clearing his throat.

      “Don’t you dare say it.” She could read him like a book. “I did not rush into this thing with Jack. It just happened, and now I’m being rushed into motherhood, and I’m not ready for it, so I’m not rushing into marriage.”

      Tadpole cracked the remaining shell, crammed in the second nut, one cheek pouch bulging, and sniffed around the cage for more. The little critter’s face, now comically distorted, made her smile.

      “Your two-wrongs-don’t-make-a-right analogy is all well and good,” Fred said. “But what about your family, Jack’s family? Everyone will have something to say about this.”

      Everyone in town would have plenty to say about plain-Jane Emily Finnegan having Jack Evans’s baby. Maybe she should move to Chicago. “Trying to avoid gossip is not a good reason to rush into marriage.”

      “Fair enough. I hope you’ve talked to your sisters. I still can’t believe you told them I was the father.”

      “Not yet. I need to do that in person.”

      “You can’t call them?”

      “No way. They’ll want to know who the real father is, and I’m not explaining that over the phone.” With her free hand, she pulled her laptop out of her bag and set it on her desk beneath the window overlooking Main Street.

      “You can’t run out there this afternoon?”

      “No time. I have to get ready for my—” Hmm. She hadn’t meant to let that slip.

      “Ready for your...?”

      Fred would find out sooner or later. Probably sooner, since it seemed the barbershop was the hub of Riverton’s rumor mill. “Jack and I are going out for dinner.”

      Fred let out a long whistle. “A date. Interesting.”

      “It’s not a date. We have things to talk about, stuff to figure out.” Fred did not need to know about the getting-to-know-each-other portion of the evening.

      “And you plan to do that at the Riverton Bar & Grill? Gee, that won’t attract any attention at all.”

      “That’s not where we’re going.” And if Jack suggested that’s what they do, she would veto it.

      The whistle of the kettle drew her back to the kitchen. “I have to go,” she said, filling her mug and inhaling the fragrant minty steam rising from it. “I’ll call you tomorrow.”

      “Right after you’ve straightened out this mess with your sisters.”

      “I’ll call you. Goodbye, Fred.” She disconnected before he thought of another reason to prolong the conversation. She should work on an article for the paper and update her blog. Most important, she needed to figure out what to wear tonight. She hadn’t wanted to admit to Fred that it was a date, but it was. Jack had said so.

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