"I can't believe you kept this from her," Gabby said to Ethan, sitting back in her chair. "You're supposed to be her friend!"

"Me?" Ethan retorted. "You're the one that's been ditching her for your new boyfriend."

Gabby crossed her arms. "If you're referring to last week, I already felt bad enough about that. That's why I sent you in my place."

"Okay, well you're also forgetting that I'm not your backup friend!" Ethan said. "You can't just send me when you would rather be hanging out with some cashier you met while shopping for Amara's baby!"

"Oh, I'm sorry," Gabby shot. "I didn't realize that I wouldn't be allowed to have a life while we're waiting for the babies to be born! Ethan, we still have a few months! I'm just trying to get closer to Ken before I have to be with Amara all the time."

"That's the problem!" Ethan said. "You know what's going to happen? You're going to get closer to him, then once you're all caught up in your relationship, you'll back down when Amara needs you most."

"I will not!" Gabby stood up.

"Prove it!"

"You want me to break up with him? Fine!" Gabby pulled out her phone.

Ethan laughed. "You don't actually expect me to believe that you're going to do that, do you?"

Gabby held the phone up to her ear and bored her green eyes into Ethan. "Hi, Ken. Look, you know my pregnant friend who you met at the store? Yeah, until she has the babies--and probably for a little while afterwards--I can't see you anymore."

She paused; Ethan's eyes widened as she continued, "Yeah. I'm sorry. But, I hope you'll wait for me?" Another pause. "I understand. Yeah, I guess I'll see you around."

As she hung up, Ethan stared. Gabby shrugged. "I have priorities. I'll stick by Amara as long as she needs me."

"Fine," Ethan said, crossing his arms. "You've proved yourself. Just don't let Amara down."

As he walked back to his cubicle, Amara wandered back from the bathroom. "Gabby?"

"Yeah, Boo?" Gabby said, sitting down.

"Why did you just call me like you were breaking up with Ken?" Amara asked. "Did you mean to do that?"

Gabby smiled mischievously. "Yep."

Later that week, Amara was just getting to the office, when Gabby sat down really quickly. Amara studied her for a second, before asking her question.

"What'cha doing?"

"Um--" Gabby glanced over at Amara's section of the desk "--nothing."

Amara's eyes moved down to the light green piece of paper poking out from beneath Gabby's rear end.

"What's that?" She asked, pointing to the paper. She sat down at her desk, but kept her eyes on Gabby, whose face was starting to go as red as her hair.

"It's--um--an invitation to the wedding," Gabby finally admitted. She pulled out the envelope. "I thought you might have gotten one, but--I guess I'm not really surprised."

Amara took the envelope from Gabby and read the invitation inside. It was pretty, and obviously expensive.

"I get a plus-one" Gabby said. "You could come with me if you want."

Amara studied it for another moment, before responding, "No, it's fine. They obviously don't want me there. You can take Ken."

"No, if you're not going, I'm not going," Gabby said. "They've been screwing you over since you found out you were pregnant. And I'm done with it."

"Are you sure?" Amara asked. "This seems like it's going to be an evening of 'fine dining' and 'high class'."

"Yeah, but they've been acting like jerks to you for the last five months--or however long it's been since you told them," Gabby reasoned. "Besides, who cares about high dining or fine class?"

Just then, Ethan walked past the desk. He was also holding a green envelope. "Did you guys get one of these too?"

Amara looked down.

"Um--I did," Gabby said, hesitating. "But I'm not going. I don't want to support them after what they did to Amara."

Ethan watched Amara for a minute, then said, "You didn't get one--did you?"

"No, but it's fine," Amara said, shifting in her chair. "I wasn't going to go anyway. I don't want to watch the father of my children get married to some tramp, without even acknowledging his own family."

"Whoa," Ethan said. "I mean, you have a point, but still--"

"You could always go crash the wedding," Gabby suggested.

Ethan shot her a look, which Amara matched.

"I'm not going to crash the wedding," she stated. "I'm better than that. Plus, I don't want to have anything to do with them right now." She turned to the computer. "I'm just counting down the days until maternity leave."

That evening, Gabby, Ethan, and Amara were all hanging out at Amara's apartment. Ethan was cooking something in the kitchen, while Gabby and Amara were searching for houses to rent online.

"Ooh, this one's nice!" Gabby said. "Three bedrooms. That's one for Ethan, one for the babies, and you and I can share the other one."

"Don't you think Amara would want her own room?" Ethan called from the kitchen.

"I would, but this is the best one in my budget right now," Amara pointed out. "I would be more concerned about the fact that there is only one bathroom."

"Well, that's not too much of a problem," Gabby said. "By the time the babies are potty trained, you probably won't be needing us to live there anymore."

"I was more thinking about Ethan," Amara said. "He's the one that would have to share a bathroom with two woman. One of which is you."

Gabby rolled her eyes, but smiled as the doorbell rang.

"Ethan, can you get that?" Gabby called to the kitchen. "We're a little busy here."

"I'm kind of up to my elbows in uncooked meatloaf right now!" Ethan called. "Unless Amara wants raw meat and spices on her doorknob!"

"Nevermind!" Gabby yelled. Then she nudged Amara. "Get used to the volume increase."

With Amara giggling on the couch, Gabby got up and moved for the door. She had to step over a couple of boxes of baby things in order to get there. Yeah, they definitely needed to get a bigger place for Amara--especially if she was planning on having two kids.

Gabby opened the door, and gasped. "Ken! What are you doing here?"

"Well, I stopped by your place, but you weren't there," Ken said. "And you told me that if you weren't there, then you'd be at your friend's place."

Nice, Amara thought. But she smiled. Gabby really liked this guy, and she didn't want to wreck it.

"See, was that so hard?" Ethan yelled.

"What was that?" Ken asked. 

Gabby looked back, in a panic, as she knew what this was looked like to him. "Just a friend. He's making meatloaf."

"I thought this was your pregnant friend's apartment," Ken said. 

"It is!" Gabby said. "Amara, can you come out here?"

There was no answer. Ken gave Gabby a look. Just then, Ethan appeared.

"Oh, hi," Ethan said. "I'm Ethan. I'd shake your hand, but I was have meat all over the place."

"Uh, yeah," Ken said slowly. "I'm Ken."

"Oh," Ethan said, awkwardly. Then he turned to Gabby. "I thought you broke it off with him."

"Okay, thank you, Ethan!" Gabby shoved him back inside.

"What is going on?" Ken asked.

Gabby shifted, then looked inside, hoping to get a glance of Amara. 

"Okay, look," she finally said. "Ethan's just here to help me and Amara. I promised her that I would help her with the babies, since she's going to be a single mom."

"Okay, you told me that you were helping her," Ken said slowly, "and I understand if he's helping. But why does he think we broke up?"

Gabby froze. She was trying to figure out the best way to explain, but that she could get out was, "It's a long story."

"Right," Ken said. "I don't think I'm in the mood to hear it right now. I'll call you if I ever decide I want to hear it."

"No, wait!" Gabby said, as he started to walk away. "Ken!"

He didn't answer, and instead, just kept walking. Not wanting to push it any farther, Gabby just watched him leave. For the first time in her life, she felt like her heart was breaking. And there was nothing she could do about it.