Tiny Grief.
She hated this. Waking up in tears; her slender body covered in sweat from the flashbacks of that night, screaming out and waking half the street in the process. Crying at the tiniest of things - finding his coffee mug at the back of the cupboard in the staff room, seeing a poster that had been in his classroom, passing a stranger in the street wearing his aftershave.
Sometimes she'd walk through the playground and have to cover her face from the pupils so as they wouldn't see her crying as she remembered watching him fall. Holding his hand. Crying as she went with him in the ambulance. Breaking down when she last saw him. The thing was; Tom Clarkson hadn't just been a friend to Nicki. He'd been so, so much more - the sun coming up in the morning and setting in the evening. The sound of the birds in the morning, before anyone else was awake. The feel of air on her skin when she ran through the countryside surrounding Greenock. He was the world to her.
She'd been into his house one night, while Josh was in Manchester and Chlo and Mika were still in London. She'd sat on his tiled kitchen floor where they used to sit together, sharing a bottle of beer; she leant against his body as they sat in silence, her tracing patterns on the fabric of his shirt, him stroking her chocolate brown hair. She'd sat on the sofa where they lay and watched long, dreadful films on rainy evenings, drinking endless cups of tea and ordering a takeaway. Finally, she'd crawled up the stairs and sobbed inconsolably as she lay in his bed; her face buried in the pillow that still smelt of him. She fell asleep there, and woke with dried tracks of salty tears on her face. The house was so cold without him. She was cold without him. The world was cold without him.
"We all miss him." - that was what she'd told Kacey. Some missed him more than others; Nicki especially. Had he known that she'd loved him? Their relationship had been more physical than emotional in the last few weeks, but when she'd held his hand on the way to the hospital, she'd told him that she did. He'd muttered something she couldn't make out, but she heard him say her name one last time. Less than an hour later, he was gone from her.
The funeral had been Earth's hell - everyone assumed that they'd just been friends, when she knew full well that he'd been the last man she'd ever fall so deeply, all-consumingly in love with. Since the staff had found out about Nicki and Lorraine, they'd all assumed that she wasn't interested in men, whilst Tom had known that she wasn't gay; just scared of men, having been hurt so much in the past. Tom had known how to handle her when she woke up from nightmares screaming. Tom had known the precise way she liked her morning cup of tea. Tom had known about the scars, both physical and mental, that plagued her, and made her feel alright about herself once more. Nobody else could hope to even come close to that. She'd lost soldiers and colleagues when she was in the Army; seen men and women have their limbs blown off, but what she'd felt then was nothing to how she felt at the loss of the man she was convinced was her soulmate. Perhaps Josh had understood - she wondered if he knew about his father and her, by the way he acted. Tom had probably told him at some point during their long phone conversations, or perhaps he'd just guessed. Either way, he seemed to know something nobody else did.
She often cried at night when she was alone. She had some t-shirts of Tom's which she held like a comfort blanket; breathing in the scent of him as she lay there alone, tears streaming down her pale skin. She was sick - she knew that. Physically, mentally... she wasn't herself without him. She was falling apart, but nobody could see it. She wondered about ending it all sometimes, just to be with him.
And then came the proof of their relationship. She'd been throwing up for a week or so, and it finally occurred to her, in the middle of a lesson, precisely why. It wasn't just a bug, or stress, or whatever else she could possibly pretend to blame it on. She took the test, waiting for the longest three minutes of her life until the inevitable result was ready.
Pregnant.
She didn't tell anyone - she couldn't. It'd spread round Waterloo Road like proverbial wildfire that Miss Boston was having a baby. She couldn't cope with the rumour and whispers; "I thought she was a lesbian", "Do you think it was a one-nighter?", "I wonder if it's one of the teachers... Lansley?". No; she wasn't letting that happen. She wouldn't have anyone spreading rumours that she'd had a one night stand with someone and ended up pregnant. She'd been in love.
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