Less Ordinary: Scientific Method Universe

By Kris Ripper

One moment, the future is wide open. In the next, everything goes dark.

When Beccs loses a pregnancy, everything freezes. The past is irrelevant. The future has vanished. All she can do is go numb, even if it means she can’t make any decisions about where to go from here, even if she can barely look at her best friend.

Adam has no idea what to do. Is he supposed to pretend he isn’t wrecked by the miscarriage? Because he is. Is he supposed to pretend Beccs’ silence isn’t destroying him? Because it definitely is.

Eleven years of friendship, intimacy, shared lives, but tragedy threatens to break both of their hearts. How can they find their way back to the life they thought they’d lead? And does it still exist?

• Language: English
• Publisher: Kris Ripper
• Release date: Apr 24, 2018
• ISBN: 9781386711247

Book preview

Chapter One

EVERYTHING WAS EXACTLY as usual. They brushed their teeth (Beccs first, smiling to herself listening to Adam and Will bicker in Will’s room). They got in their pajamas (Ads in his Batman PJs, wiggling his ass at her). She activated the white noise app on her phone and connected it to the speakers, turned just high enough to drown out the sound of her hand on his skin.

This moment. She could live her whole day for this moment. She worried a little about when the baby came—what if they were too tired to do this? Or what if (even worse), they forced themselves to do it even when they were too tired and it lost its magic?

Do you worry that parenting will screw up…this? She was already sitting on the edge of the bed, waiting for him to complete his double-sock routine. Adam had notoriously cold feet. Thankfully in only the literal sense. In everything else he was gung-ho, unhesitating.

He stepped over to stand between her knees, resting his hands on her shoulders. Eyes positively twinkling. Perk of living with my brother. We’ll just put Will on kid duty for like half an hour each night.

What if he’s not here? she asked, snaking her fingers beneath his shirt.

He shivered. Which was delightful. More of that real soon. But he didn’t seem the least worried. "We’ll make it work. Beccs, come on, it’s us. We can make anything work. We are legit."

We are definitely that.

He waggled his eyebrows. So? How do you want me?

Mmm. It had started out as something like a roleplay: spanking the naughty boy over her knee. And Ads was perfectly white and middle class and cis and heterosexual. He was the exact guy to spank if you had a kink for disrupting the status quo.

But sometime after it became a nightly ritual she realized they’d disrupted her disruption. They’d taken something that was about sex and power and trust, and made it something that was far more about…love. Appreciating one another. Making the mundane sacred.

True magic, if you believed in that sort of thing. And maybe it was pregnancy, but Beccs found herself believing in a whole lot of things over the last few weeks.

I think my hormones are making me a sap.

Nah, that’s Christmas commercials. Happens every year.

Christmas was three weeks ago.

And yet the commercials keep airing just to make you a sap.

She ran her hands up his back and he shivered again. I want you on your hands and knees. Naked, okay?

"It’s freezing, though!"

You can keep your socks on.

He grumbled, but it was no more than a token protest. Ads liked the extra edge of doing something purely at her request almost as much as she did.

Sure enough, when he was in position (doubled up socks, thick blue wool over black cotton, looking quite mitten-like in contrast to his pale skin), she ran a finger down his spine and he nearly arched into it.

You’re such a tease, babe.

I know.

Spanking, yes. She was already turned on, just knowing what was coming. You know, I think my body is generating somewhat extreme levels of sexual arousal right now. Like. She pressed against him, grinding a little, shuddering at the sensation. I could basically come just from rubbing up against you.

"Okay, well, yes, please, and also— He knelt up and craned so he could kiss her. You’re so fucking sexy. Can I go down on you after this? Is that gonna get creepy at some point? It’s definitely not creepy now."

It’s not creepy now is what matters. And yeah, if I don’t wear you out. She shoved him away. Go on. I’m horny.

This time he mercilessly wiggled his now-bare ass at her as if tempting her to lose control all over him.

Which…there was something to be said for going at him until he was all flushed and pink, then rubbing one out over his hot skin. But not tonight.

She started like she nearly always started, with her hand, warming him up, pausing once to make the white noise a little bit louder. In the right context both of them could get off on a tiny bit of exhibitionism (more than once they’d giggled over giving hotel room neighbors a little extra memory to take home from vacation), but that didn’t apply in the house.

Not at all hot.

There was something to the hormones, though. Beccs did a lot more draping-herself-over-him than she used to, nuzzling into his neck, his back, as if she were a cat, scent marking him with her cheeks. His pleasing little sounds of enjoyment only encouraged her to do it more.

She’d meant to be efficient, but found herself reaching instead for their favorite paddle, the one that made Adam feel strong and god-like. ("I don’t know what it is about that thing, but man, it makes me want to go out and conquer the freaking world," he’d said, after the third or fourth time they’d used it. She’d had to convince him to try the first time, but after that…)

Christ, if she wound herself up any more than this she was going to have to change her pants. Her skin tingled as she applied herself to the very satisfying job of making Adam’s skin uniformly red, and her pussy pulsed each time she reached around to play with his dick.

He moaned and she went still, carefully not moving. Beccs…please…

A few more with her hand, just to feel the vibration of their bodies coming together. Then she flopped down beside him and barely had a chance to thread fingers under her waistband before Ads was pulling off her PJs, kissing her skin everywhere he exposed, making such delicious animal noises into her that she couldn’t help drumming her heels on his back in silent entreaty.

He laughed. Oh god, let’s both come right the fuck now, okay?

Beccs had thought she’d been with enough people to understand how sex worked before she hooked up with Adam (the second time), but no lover she’d ever had, no matter how much they liked going down on her, had ever been so gloriously abandoned to it as Adam (the second time they got together, not so much the first). He pressed his lips against her and used his tongue, one arm hooked around her leg for stability while his other frantically jerked himself off.

Her resolve to make it last crumpled immediately into a shattering orgasm, practically before he’d even gotten started. She was shaking, vibrating, pleasure extending to a pinpoint of pure joy, then crashing back into intensity. Then she was trying to kiss him while he was coming—on her, on the sheets, wherever—pressing his face into her thigh and shaking himself.

Pregnancy orgasms are awesome, he murmured almost too low for her to hear.

God, for real.

It was almost impossible to clean up and right their clothes and actually get into bed, but somehow they coaxed their still-trembling muscles to exert just a little more effort.

That was amazing. He kissed her without finesse, eyelashes fluttering, then rested his hand over her belly. G’night, Tadpole.

She interlaced her fingers through his. Goodnight, Tadpole.

* * *

Shortly after one a.m. Beccs woke up and she knew.

I’m bleeding.

The words, said softly into a night full of ambient noises from the street outside, did not wake Adam. He didn’t so much as twitch.

She stared down at him, suddenly dizzy. This was it. She wasn’t a huge believer in intuition—or at least that it was magical and infallible—but that didn’t matter now.

She was losing the baby, in real time, as she lay in this bed and looked at Adam’s sleeping, relaxed, familiar face, and all she could think was: I’m sorry. I’m so sorry.

* * *

The hours that followed were eternal.

Adam had been terrified, but he’d tried not to let on. It could be spotting. It could be anything. Are you in pain? Then his lips had tightened. Sorry, stupid question, you’re breaking my hand.

She hadn’t even been aware she was holding it.

The household rallied. Will drove and distracted Adam. Adam made sure she had a coat. Ally did what no one else dared do: she cried, tears wet on her face as she stood in the driveway and watched them drive away.

The ER was too bright, far too loud. Adam, gripping her hand every bit as had as she was gripping his, did all the talking. He usually alternated between goofy and attentive, depending on the situation, but now he was serious, voice strained, explaining that Beccs was pregnant, and bleeding, and cramping, and something was very wrong.

They took her back when she doubled over in the waiting room. It felt like bad cramps. She tried to find a pattern, a rhythm. Was it steadily intensifying? It was definitely intense.

And no period she’d ever had looked like this.

Beccs knew. She knew, standing in the bathroom in the hospital, looking at the clumps in the toilet. She knew, even before they brought in the ultrasound machine, even before they told her.

Adam buried his head against her neck and wept. Beccs began the cold, hard process of shutting everything down.

Eleven weeks. And it was over.

* * *

The worst part was the silence.

The silence in the car on the way home after the D&C she’d insisted on. No, she didn’t want it to happen naturally. Nothing about this felt fucking natural.

She’d seen the baby’s heartbeat. And now it was dead. Or not dead. Vanished. As if it had never been. Flushed.

They’d given her Vicodin. They didn’t know that she was already numb.

No one knew what to say. Ally knew the minute they walked into the house, and gave them hugs, crying into their shoulders.

I’m sorry, I should be comforting you guys, oh my god, I’m so sorry.

Beccs didn’t want comfort. She left Ally in Adam’s arms and went upstairs.

Eleven weeks. They hadn’t decorated. They’d only told the family. Their real family, not their blood families. Still, Beccs stood in the middle of the spare room that would have been the nursery and masochistically imagined the baby who would not live there.

Will came to find her, later, to offer breakfast. I know it’s early. We just figured we can’t sleep, so we might as well eat. There’s toast. He glanced around the empty room. I googled. Most people go on to get pregnant again—

Leave me alone, Will. She turned away before she could see his face fall, but she didn’t have to see it. Will and Adam didn’t share all of their expressions, but she knew this one well: I was only trying to. I thought I could just. It might make you feel better if you.

He left her.

Beccs took another Vicodin and went to bed.

Chapter Two

SHE DIDN’T FEEL Adam get into bed. She got out while he was still asleep.

Sunday morning. Will was at work. Ally’s car was gone, so she might be out with Paul. Beccs couldn’t remember if Adam had a shift at the center.

How long had she been standing in the kitchen?

The worst thing was the silence in her own head. How had she given over so many of her thoughts to a child who barely existed? Now every thought had to be cut off, truncated, snuffed out. Filled with a vacuum. Could you fill something with a vacuum? The vacuum was easier than trying to stuff all those empty places inside her with new thoughts, replacement thoughts.

The vacuum allowed her to feel nothing at all. Feelings existed but she refused them entry.

Someone knocked on the door.

Beccs ignored it.

The knocking got louder, but she didn’t think it would wake Adam up, so she kept ignoring it.

Rebecca, open the fucking door before I pick the lock!

From anyone else that might be an idle threat. Beccs had no doubt Lucy could pick a lock.

She opened the door.

Lucy stood alone on the front stoop, all five foot three of her, low slung jeans emphasizing her lack of height, tight black shirt emphasizing her everything else. She stared at Beccs for a long moment before nudging her aside and walking into the house.

Coffee.

On some other day, in some other universe, Beccs might have said, Make yourself at home. She would have said it dryly, and trusted Lucy to know it was a tease.

Today she said nothing, following Lucy to the kitchen.

Your boy here?

Asleep.

Lucy nodded. Filter in the machine, coffee in the filter, water in the reservoir. She flicked the button and resumed staring at Beccs.

Neither of them spoke.

The coffee brewed. Beccs could smell it, but her brain didn’t inform her that it smelled good. Or bad. Her brain had no opinion on the smell of coffee.

Lucy poured into two mugs and set the milk on the counter between them. Drink.

She could drink all the coffee she wanted now. She’d been keeping it to one cup a day, but now that she was no longer pregnant she could drink a whole pot.

It didn’t taste any better than it smelled, but it was hot, and she was cold.

You still in pain?

They gave me Vicodin.

Good to know. I’ll hear about it if you refill that prescription, pet. Don’t even think about it.

I won’t need to. I had a D&C. It’s over.

Lucy nodded. My cousin Jazzy bled for five days when she had a miscarriage. I’d’ve picked a D&C, too.

I’ve had one before. It wasn’t a big deal. It had been painful in a wrenching, invasive, undeniable way, which she’d endured with relish. The pain was so much more real than the grief.

Yeah. That’s what everyone says about miscarriages. ‘No big deal.’

Beccs inhaled around the word as if she could wall it off, cover it in scar tissue, not feel it. Pregnancy loss. That’s what they called it.

Uh huh. Lucy eyed her. Don’t be the damn fool who thinks she doesn’t have to grieve.

I’m fine.

All right. Good. Then I expect you’ll jump right back on the horse and start trying again. You horny right now, Rebecca? You want to go up there and have sex with your man?

Beccs’s entire body locked down. Coffee sloshed over the edge of her cup and burned her. She put it down and shook out her hands, aware of Lucy watching dispassionately.

Do not lie to me. Lie to yourself all you want, but do not fucking lie to me.

She could feel emotion rising in her, a fever filling her empty uterus, her abdomen, her chest, clogging her throat—

Footsteps on the stairs. Adam.

Hi, Lucy.

Hey, boy. I’m so fucking sorry about your loss.

Yeah. His eyes were red and the attempted smile was strained. Yeah, me too.

Don’t look at me. Don’t see me. Beccs picked her coffee up again and hid behind it.

Listen, my chicks, if you ever need anything, you call me. Unless it’s money, in which case you should call Hugh.

We’ll keep it in mind. He stood beside her.

It took everything in Beccs’ power to stay still. She wanted to fight him, and she wanted to dive into his arms, and more than both of those things she wanted to get in her car and drive for days until no one had ever known her. Until no one ever could.

Adam shifted on his feet. How’re you feeling?

Fine. Better. Less like I’m dying. More like I’m already dead.

He didn’t say anything else.

Well, the boys and I are going to make some dinner and drop it by later. Lucy refilled her coffee cup and handed it to Adam. You could use this. Then she pulled his head all the way down so she could kiss his forehead.

Thanks, he mumbled, and Beccs didn’t have to look over to see his eyes were full of tears.

She didn’t want to look over.

Lucy squared off in front of her. I want to hear from you once a day. If I don’t, I’ll come looking for you.

Beccs didn’t reply. Lucy kissed her lightly on the lips and backed away.

You’ll see the boys later.

That was it. She let herself out, leaving the two of them standing in their kitchen.

I keep telling myself it’s not the end of the world. Adam’s voice was harsh and low. "But it is. It feels like it is. It feels like the end of something."

Beccs knew she should speak. Commiserate. Should tell him she felt the same, she understood. But that would just open the door to that awful wave of emotion she’d only barely choked off.

Instead she drank her coffee and tried to remember what she’d done on all the Sundays before this one. How did she fill all those hours?

A treacherous hand stole across her belly before she could stop it, before she could remember that there was nothing there any more, nothing to think about, nothing to dream about.

She walked away, up the stairs, into the bathroom, stripping off her clothes without turning on the light. It wasn’t dark enough, but it would do. She stepped into the shower and stayed there.

* * *

Work was a relief. The endless paperwork of grant funding, reporting, coordinating services with vendors, with clients. Just like any Monday morning. She got some stuff done, triaged her weekend emails, sorted her week into tasks and goals. The absorption was welcome.

She worked late. Mondays were always long.

On Tuesday she drafted the usual January email about changing fund numbers for all the funds that turned over at the calendar year instead of the fiscal year and sent it to her staff. She’d meant to do it last week, but it had slipped through the cracks, which only meant she’d need to correct everyone’s time sheets.

Last week, when she’d cavalierly