The Choices We Make

Chapter 1

Yanna

The team was just coming out of a meeting room when Yanna badged in that morning. She wasn’t sure if it was good that they caught her dropping by the office when she was supposed to be resting. Or waiting for the baby’s arrival. Afterall, she had filed for early maternity leave.

“What are you doing here?” her manager, Olive, greeted her, along with the rest of the team. “You should be at home!” she admonished Yanna but gently rubbed her round belly. “Kiddo, I hope you’re not as stubborn as your mommy.”

“How far along are you?” Parker, her back-up for the project, asked. 

“Thirty-seven weeks,” she grinned, rubbing her belly, feeling a slight stir inside as if the baby was thrilled that they would be meeting soon.

“You don’t look like you’re going to burst any moment now,” he commented. “Is it a girl?”

“A boy actually.” Yanna had forgone the theatrics of a gender reveal party. She believed it only entailed unnecessary expenses that could be used to buy other stuff for the baby instead.

“Baby daddy must be thrilled,” Parker grinned before heading to his work station. He had been aloof with her since she turned down his invitation to go out with him. She was in her first trimester then. Parker knew and didn’t care, it seemed. 

Unfortunately, Yanna wasn’t ready to jump into the dating scene. Or to have new digital footprints in social media when she had deactivated hers after asking DJ for space following their argument. She hadn’t known she was already pregnant then. And she didn’t have the guts to tell him. 

Even until now.

Her best friend, Rhea, had called her out numerous times for keeping the pregnancy from DJ. It’s not that she didn’t want him to know about the baby. She did. But only until she’s got everything under control. Only until she could show him that raising a child in the metro without relatives close by was possible. That raising a child and keeping her job was possible. 

Otherwise, DJ would have pushed for what he thought was easier and more convenient if they were going to build their own family: relocate to Tarlac where his relatives lived who could help in anything and everything.

Of course, Yanna knew he had a point. Afterall, how could a person like her who had lived on her own in the Metro since high school, take care of a baby? 

But she had dreams of her own which she had already built in Manila with blood, sweat, grit and hard work. Dreams already within her reach at thirty-one. She simply couldn't bear to uproot herself and see all those to go down the drain and restart in a different place. So when they couldn’t see eye to eye on the matter, she had wanted the space so she could weigh everything down, see things through his perspective. Without him giving her the puppy eye every damn time they were together, knowing it was her weakness.

Rhea had told her it was pride talking and Yanna agreed on some level. But unsure of how to tell him, she had not reached out to DJ in the past eight months. 

Nor did he.

Perhaps he got tired of waiting and gave her total freedom instead.

Which was a punch in her gut, if it were true. 

But whatever happens to their relationship, Yanna was thankful that she had a piece of DJ with her. Literally.

The fact that her baby was cooperative made it all bearable. Her pregnancy had been nothing but easy—no morning sickness, no weird cravings, no water retention in her face or feet. The backaches and shortness of breath and frequent trips to the bathroom had been normal apparently, as what the members of the mommy group she joined had said.