Pursuit of Happiness | Taz Skylar [1]

059. fuck the plan

The front door was unlocked when Zoe stepped up to the house that Bree shared with Jay, so Zoe pushed the door open and stepped inside, looking around for Bree. She was nowhere to be found, but Tina came trotting towards Zoe from the hallway, pushing her nose into Zoe's outstretched hand.

"Hey, girl," Zoe greeted the labrador, rubbing her hand over the dog's head to ruffle her ears. Tina accepted the pats happily, wagging her tail so hard that it shook the entire back half of her body. Zoe smiled down at the dog, asking, "Where's Bree, Tina?"

It was Bree herself who answered, croaking out a reply that was only just loud enough to carry through the house to Zoe's ears. "I'm in the bathroom."

Tina followed Zoe as she walked down the hallway, finding the only door that wasn't totally shut and nudging it open further. Bree and Jay's bathroom was twice the size of Zoe's, big enough that Zoe could stretch her legs out and lay down in it. The bath wasn't filled with water when Zoe stepped into the bathroom, but Bree was sitting in it, her arms looped around her knees to hold them against her chest. Her cheeks were red as if she'd been crying and as Zoe drew closer, she could see more tears glistening in her eyes.

"Hey," Zoe said gently, kneeling next to the bath. The tiled floor was hard and cold underneath Zoe's knees, but she didn't care, her attention too focused on Bree.

"Hi," Bree said back, her voice small and feeble. The tone was so unlike Bree that Zoe's heart twisted in her chest. Bree wasn't like her. Bree wasn't prone to tears the moment that something went wrong. She was carefree, so much so that Zoe felt pangs of jealousy when she witnessed the thoughtless, carefree way that her friend moved through the world.

Bree only cried when something was very, very wrong.

Zoe reached her hand into the bathtub, searching for Bree's hand. Bree let her take it, sliding her fingers into the gaps between Zoe's to grip her hand tightly. Her grip was a little uncomfortable, but Zoe let her do it, searching Bree's face as if she could get the answers that she needed. When she came up with nothing, Zoe whispered, "What's going on, Bree?"

Bree swallowed, moving her leg to kick her bare foot at something sitting in front of her in the floor of the tub. Something thin and made of plastic went skittering across the tub, stopping at the opposite end from where Bree sat. Zoe peered into the tub to see what it was, her eyes going wide when she realized that it was a positive pregnancy test.

"Are you sure?" Zoe asked, looking back at Bree.

Bree's bottom lip was trembling as she nodded. Zoe could hear the tears in Bree's voice as she answered, "I took three, just to be safe."

Zoe nodded, brushing her thumb across the skin that separated Bree's thumb from her forefinger. It was a gesture that Taz sometimes used on Zoe to help her calm down and Zoe hoped that it would work for Bree as well. It seemed to, the steady rhythm of Zoe's thumb rubbing back and forth giving Bree something to align her breathing to, helping her to push the tears back.

"I don't know what to do," Bree admitted.

"What do you want to do?" Zoe asked.

"I – I don't – I don't know. This wasn't the plan. The plan was to get married, for me to get at least one more album out before we even started thinking about having any kids. This isn't – "

"Fuck the plan," Zoe interjected, recognizing the early signs that Bree's thoughts were beginning to spiral. Fixing her eyes on Bree's face, Zoe continued, "It's out the window now, anyway. What do you want to do?"

Bree looked more lost than Zoe had ever seen her. It made Zoe think of all the times that Bree had been there every time that Zoe's grief had made her falter, steadying her and holding her up until she was ready to walk on her own again. It felt strange for that dynamic to be flipped, for it to now be Bree who needed to be held up, to be steadied.

When Bree found her voice again, the panic in her tone had fallen away, leaving only a newfound conviction in its wake. "I want this baby. I know it's insane, because the timing's all wrong and it screws with our plans for everything, but I want it."

Zoe smiled at Bree, reaching over to brush Bree's hair out of her eyes. "So have the baby. You can make new plans."

Bree's smile was more tentative than Zoe's, but it was a smile nonetheless. Now that she had worked her way past her panic and uncertainty, Zoe could see Bree's mind working behind her eyes, making a mental checklist of everything that would need to be done.

"I should get a blood test done," Bree mumbled, releasing Zoe's hand so that she could rest her back against the far edge of the bathtub, looping her arms around her knees.

"You took three pregnancy tests," Zoe pointed out, laughing a little. "Do you really think all three of them gave you false positives?"

"I just want to be sure, before I tell Jay," Bree replied, playing with her engagement ring as she talked, spinning it around her finger absently. "Could you . . . can you come with me?"

Zoe froze. "Wouldn't you need to go to the hospital for that?"

Bree nodded, tugging her bottom lip between her teeth to bite down on it gently. "Yeah, probably. I'm sorry. I know it's asking a lot."

Zoe considered it. She really did. She wanted to be there for Bree, just as Bree had been there for her so many times before, but when Zoe attempted to picture going with Bree to the hospital might go, all she could think back to was when she'd fallen off her skateboard. She'd been concussed and out of it, all of her coherence taken up by making sure that she didn't end up in the hospital.

Fear like that didn't just go away on its own.

"I can't," Zoe said, an apology in her eyes. "I just . . . I can't."

Disappointment flashed across Bree's face as she tilted her head back, breathing out a soft sigh. Guilt pricked at Zoe's chest, reminding her that no matter how much time she put between herself and the accident, there were some things that had just buried themselves deep into her psyche and there was nothing that she could do about it.

"I'm sorry," Zoe apologized, biting down on the instinct to change her mind, to tell Bree that she would go with her, just so she wouldn't disappoint her.

"Don't be sorry," Bree said, shaking her head. "I know hospitals are hard for you. I shouldn't have even asked."

"I wish I could," Zoe confessed. "I just – I've been doing really well lately. I think this year was the first time that I didn't really feel the need to get drunk on Ivy's birthday just to get through it. I don't want to fuck it up by pushing myself too hard."

Bree shifted, curling her legs underneath her and shifting forward again so that she could cross her arms on top of the edge of the bathtub. Resting her chin on top of her arms, Bree said, "You don't have to explain yourself. I get it."

"I just feel like I'm letting you down," Zoe mumbled, looking down at her hands.

"You're not," Bree said. "I want you to look after yourself. I don't want you to push yourself to do more than you can handle just for me."

Guilt still prickled uncomfortably in Zoe's chest, but she swallowed the feeling back down as best as she could. The guilt was a byproduct of that unbroken bond, that unshakeable loyalty that she felt for Bree, born of years of friendship that had seen them go through hell and back together. The guilt didn't care for what was best for Zoe, only what was more likely to keep Bree at her side.

Giving in to the guilt wouldn't help her, but standing against it would.