Chapter 18 #2
As if he’s done letting me worry over him.
I lower my hand and fist my tingling fingers. “A little.”
His features tighten up. “Were you able to eat something?”
“Salad.”
He tells me what he thinks of it by exhaling sharply.
My morning sickness has gotten worse over the past few days and Reed hates it that I have to endure it during classes. My brothers hate it too and together, for an insane second, they thought that I should stop going to school altogether until it passes.
I put my foot down though. I put my foot down on some of their other plans too, but that’s neither here nor there.
Anyway I told them that if they wanted me to not quit school and get a job then I’m doing this the right way. Meaning I’m going to classes and I’m doing my homework and keeping my grades up.
They had to relent.
But I think it was mostly because Conrad is now the soccer coach and he knew he was going to be here to keep an eye on me after Reed dropped me off.
“Someone say something to you?” he asks then and I fidget with my skirt slightly.
Yes.
“No,” I lie to him.
He frowns. “You sure?”
Well, no.
Someone did say something to me. A group of someones. Girls from junior year I think. They didn’t so much say something to me as at me.
It was during lunch.
I was getting my salad and they pointed at my tray and giggled and they may have mimed throwing up. Or something like that.
To be fair, I had thrown up only an hour before. I had to rush out of class in order to do that and the news spread like wildfire. As I knew it would, about me getting sick, about me being the only girl living off campus.
About me being pregnant.
They all know now and they are all very scandalized. Again, as I knew they would be.
I knew that me being pregnant at eighteen would be a much bigger scandal than what happened with Salem. And it is. At least, I’m happy that some of the heat has been taken away from her. Because for a while there, they were all watching her.
They still do but now they watch me as well.
Our group has become the most rebellious of all.
We’re the St. Mary’s rebels.
In fact, my guidance counselor, who I always thought was my friend of sorts, requested that they switch me to a different counselor now that I’m pregnant.
I’m not going to lie. That did hurt, but it’s okay.
It’s not anything that I didn’t expect.
So I’ll live. But from the looks of it, he won’t.
“Yes, I’m sure,” I tell him. “Can —”
He looks over my shoulders. “Then what the fuck are they looking at?”
I know what he’s talking about.
Like me and my girls, there were others watching him as well. They’re still watching him and now me.
On his first day here, the whole school watched him pick me up after school. They stood outside the cinder block buildings, gathered in the courtyard and watched me walk up to him. Over the past week, a lot of people have lost interest but a lot of them haven’t.
So they watch him.
They watch me walk up to him and they watch as he takes me away in his Mustang.
By now they know who he is.
There are several rumors about him and me, and of course one of them is that we’re together. That he’s my boyfriend and I’m having his baby.
I am having his baby but he’s not my boyfriend.
He never wanted to be and he never will be.
“You,” I reply.
“What?”
“Girls always look at you, remember?”
“I don’t like it.”
Surprised, I laugh. “Are you serious? You loved it. And you always watched them back. And –”
“I didn’t.”
“What?”
“Watch them.”
“I…”
I forget what I was going to say because with the way he’s watching me, it looks like… he’s trying to say that he didn’t watch them.
He watched me instead and that’s absurd, isn’t it?
He moves his eyes away and goes back to glaring at the girls over my shoulder. “If they want to watch, I’m –"
“Just ignore them. I do.”
“You shouldn’t have to,” he growls.
“I swear it’s okay.”
He narrows his eyes for a second before taking a step toward the gate but I stop him.
Physically.
Well, maybe that gives the wrong impression. I can’t physically stop him from anything. He’s bigger than me, a lot bigger and stronger.
He’s like a towering mountain, a building, and I’m like a bag of feathers to him.
I can’t stop him, but I do.
I put a hand on his hard stomach and he comes to a halt, going all rigid.
He glances down at it, at my small, pale hand on his white shirt, before looking up at me. “Let me go.”
I have to take a moment before answering him. “No.”
He flexes his fingers on my backpack that he’s holding. “Take your hand off, Fae.”
And I swear to God, my heart spins so fast in my chest that I think it will break out. It will burst out of its cage made of bones like I burst out of mine, the cage of cinderblocks and black gates.
The one he sprung me out of.
The guy who’s so much stronger than me but somehow is letting me control him like this.
Letting me make him do things.
Like he could. Make me do things I mean. Back then.
Back when I was in love with him.
Swallowing, I say, “No. You’re not going in there.”
His jaw clenches. “I am.”
“No, you’re not. We’re leaving.”
“Fae.”
My own stomach clenches as I press a hand on his. “No. You’re not going to fight with anyone, Reed. I won’t let you. I told you that it’s okay. They’ll lose interest after a while. If they want to look at something, let them. I don’t care. But you’re not going in there and doing your thing.”
“What’s my thing?”
“Blackmailing people.”
“This is going to be much easier than blackmail.”
“Oh, that makes me feel so much better.”
“That’s the idea.”
I sigh. “No. You’re not going. Besides, aren’t we late for our appointment?”
He stares at me, all belligerent and angry, and I stare back.
I’m not belligerent though, no.
I’m breathless.
My lips are parted and my heart is racing.
Because I don’t know what to do anymore.
I thought I knew.
I thought that all I had to do was remember my mistakes from two years ago so I won’t repeat them. I thought that if I remembered every little thing he did to me and that if I carried every little piece of my heart that he broke, I’d be safe.
I’d be safe from him.
But I don’t think I’m safe anymore.
He backs off then. He obeys me and his muscles go lax under my fingers, like I’ve managed to tame this beast with just my touch.
“This isn’t over.” With that, he throws a last glance over my shoulders and commands, “Let’s go.”
The room’s stark white and smells of bleach.
Which is to be expected, because it’s an examination room.
We’re at a private clinic.
For my first doctor’s appointment.
Because in addition to taking a pregnancy test, there’s another thing a girl does when she finds out she’s pregnant. And like everything else so far, Reed has taken care of that too.
Even though the clinic is out of town — not in Bardstown but in the neighboring town of Wuthering Garden — Reed has assured my brothers and me that she’s a good doctor and comes highly recommended.
As soon as we came in, a nurse in pink scrubs gave us a bunch of forms to fill out.
Which again Reed took care of.
He asked me questions when he didn’t know the answers but mostly it was all him.
Then that same nurse ushered us into an examination room.
She told us that a technician would be with us in a few minutes and that in the meantime I should change into a white gown.
She also gave me a cup to pee in along with a thick Sharpie so I could write my initials on it, for the pregnancy test.
When I told her that I’d already done it, she smiled and told me that it was just standard procedure.
And now we’re here.
I’ve peed in a cup and written down my name on it. I’ve changed into the yellow-ish gown and the technician has just entered the room.
Her name is Christina and she’s all energetic and happy as she tells me that today she’ll be doing my first ultrasound.
She’ll also do an internal pelvic exam, which is basically to quickly check my uterus, cervix and vagina and make sure that everything is okay.
Not to mention, she’ll do a pap smear, check my weight and blood pressure and things.
So basically an overall exam to make sure that me and the baby are healthy.
“All of these procedures are very basic and standard,” she says, snapping on her gloves. “There might be some slight discomfort during the pelvic exam but it’s nothing to worry about. If it becomes too uncomfortable, let me know, okay?”
Swallowing, I jerk out a nod. “Okay.”
Once she’s taken my weight and other vitals, she tells me to lie down on my back, with my butt slightly hanging off the edge of the table. She also tells me to put my legs into these archaic-looking metal contraptions called stirrups and relax.
Because this will be quick.
Nothing about it feels quick though.
Especially when she pulls up a stool where my legs are spread and I’m completely exposed under my gown.
I hadn’t realized that I’d grabbed onto the edge of the exam table and all my breaths were tangled up somewhere down my throat and my lungs.
Until him.
Until he appears at my side.
So far he was standing on the opposite side of the room, leaning against the wall by the door. He kept his eyes on me during the weight check and everything.
As if keeping guard over me. As if Christina meant me some harm.
I don’t know when he moved though.
But he’s here now, at my side, and his long, graceful fingers wrap around my wrist, making me let go of the table. Making me grab onto him instead. And my fingers, they like that so much, so very, very much, that they latch on.
My fingers latch onto his and my breaths come easier.
The surging nausea in my stomach calms down too because he did what he said he’d do. He stocked up on his fabric softener and she likes that, the tiny bundle of cells in my stomach.
And the discomfort.
That vanishes as well because I’m looking at him. Into his eyes.
His molten gray, intense eyes.