AN: Hey there! I got this new idea for a new fic, and here I am starting it. I thought I'd share it with you all right away. I hope that you like it, and please leave a review with your thoughts or ideas that you have, if you like! Enjoy!
It was just an ordinary weekday in late May of my last year at the high school I go to when things started to fall apart for Addison and I. I was in English class and it was nearing afternoon, lunch time, when I'd get to eat greasy fish and chips with John and everybody at our lunch table. I was writing an essay for this scene of a play by Shakespeare that we just finished reading a couple of minutes ago. I love literature and reading and even though this old style of writing and words they use can be hard to decipher and understand, I'm enjoying the play so far. That was until my day went downhill, and for the rest of my years this play became one I disliked and whenever it was mentioned or I thought about it, I relived the memory of that day and what happened.
I tap my pencil against my desk as I look around the classroom trying to think of how to end this essay I'm almost finished with, and my mind wanders off to what has been on my mind a lot lately, and by lately I mean the past almost four months. The challenge of money and a place to live is what has been bothering me the most, and how Addie and I are going to ever afford and be able to get by once next November comes along. John made a good point the other day saying that I'll have to possibly get another job besides being in the band so I can support Addie, myself, and our baby that is on the way. A family I'm going to have. It's almost exciting, but also downright scary at the same time. I feel a tap on my shoulder and I turn to see my male English teacher who's balding standing there.
"I was told that you're needed in the office, son, and that you should also bring your books along." he informs me in his whispering voice that is nothing but a whisper because teachers can never whisper, I reckon.
I nod my head with a confused look and he walks back off to his desk. I shut my notebook and grab my book bag from the back of my chair to deposit my pencil and notebook in it before zipping it up and tossing it over my shoulder. I leave the room of silently working students who half of them are passing notes and the other writing the essay or just nonsense. I make two turns before walking up to the offices door and entering to see my girlfriend's tall mum with her red hair done up in a bun whil standing in her sharp accountants outfit of a skirt and sweater with an open coat. She looks to me the second I enter and lifts her feet to walk over to me.
"Paul." she states with a sad look and my eyebrows fall as I notice her puffy, red eyes.
"Are you being here the reason I was called down here?" I question while I adjust my heavy backpack and she nods her head slowly.
"Paul, it's about Addison," she takes a pause from informing me of the news I was fearing the second she said who it was about. "She's miscarried the baby." she finishes and I exhale a heavy sigh and I rub my chin while trying to find my words.
"Where is she?" I ask, frantically with my now trembling voice and she begins to walk to the door with her chunky heels clicking on the tiled floor.
"She's at the hospital. She wanted you to finish the school day, but she really wants you there." she comments and she leads me out of the offices door while shock works on taking over my body and thoughts, I assume she probably already did the job of signing me out and all of that while waiting for me.
Addison's mum Judy who i've come to know over the past year of me dating her daughter drove to the nearby hospital that I was born at almost eighteen years ago and we get on the elevator to lead us up to whatever floor Addison is on. I still am having troubles processing this while my feet work on their own somehow. I look around at the nurses with those hats on their heads and the doctors in pristine white lab coats who hold clipboards as they scribble onto them and I just walk ahead behind Judy while my mind is swirling with a pool of thoughts as it still processes this new, certainly unexpected information I'm having a hard time believing.
"Paul." I hear a soft voice that I've heard utter my name plenty of times before mumbles and I focus my eyes on my dish-water blonde girlfriend who lays in one of those stiff hospital beds.
"Addie." I return and I walk over to drag a chair over to sit by her in the bed and I take her warm hand in mine.
"Paul, I'm so sorry." she apologizes with the help of her brown eyes that I've found beautiful from that first moment I met her a year and a half ago in Chemistry class.
"Love, don't apologize, you don't need to," I take a short pause and I hear the click of the room door and I turn to see that her mother had left the room to us."Wh-what happened?" I ask nervously while I watch sad tears come into her eyes the color of chocolate.
"We just had gotten done in gym class and so I went into the locker room to change, and I noticed that these bad cramps i'd been having all morning hadn't gone away and that I was bleeding really badly," she stops because now the tears are flowing and I give her hand a comforting squeeze. "I told the teacher and then my mum was called and she brought me here, and the doctor tried to find the baby's heartbeat but couldn't." she finishes with her explanation and I sigh as I watch her crying, I hate to see her cry about anything and especially what has happened to us now.
"It's okay, Addie. It's not your fault, darling." I attempt to soothe her while she cries and I let go of her hand and stand up to give her a hug that we both definitely need.
I stroke her shoulder length hair that is stick straight and that is now tied up into a ponytail while her pale arms are wrapped around my neck and I sit down on the bed after a few minutes. She rests her head on my chest while her arms are linked around my middle and I rest my head on top of hers while I can't help but to think. We had breakfast together at my house with my dad and my younger brother this morning before we headed off to school, pancakes and sausages that my dad was nice enough to make. We told him about the baby right away after she had told me that she was pregnant, which has a little over three months ago. She was beginning to look forward to being pregnant and us having a baby after the worst of the morning sickness had passed and she wasn't tired so much of the time like she had been up until a week ago now that her energy is coming back to her. Her appetite was getting better too now that she wasn't so afraid to eat and her stomach wasn't so sensitive anymore. I was along with her on becoming happy about us having a baby together even though we both have been really troubled about it. She had told her mum soon after she had told me and although her mother wasn't all that happy or pleased about it at first, she got over those initial disappointed and angry feelings and then she came to accept it. Her mum had even bought us a few boy outfits and girl outfits and a yellow baby rattle the shape of a duck the other day from this clothing store that she wrapped up and gave to us, we thought it so nice of her to do that.
I kiss Addison's dish-water blonde colored hair after she had stopped crying and had finally fallen asleep after she cried so hard which was tough to see her go through. I wipe my wet eyes and comb my hair back with my fingers and I close the door quietly behind me. I travel to the waiting room a dozen feet or so away from her private room here in the maternity ward. I find a pot of coffee that had just finished brewing and I take a styrofoam cup from its stack to pour some in. I find the packets of creamer and sugar that I open and empty into the steaming hot liquid and I stir it until the white powders blend in to it to make the liquid a light brown.
"Paul, there you are." a bold male voice comments and I cock my head to see my best mate standing a few feet away from me in the doorway of the little room in his black drainpipes and leather jacket.
"John, what are you doing here?" I question as I stuff my hands in pockets.
"I heard about Addison, her mum called me thinking you'd need a pal right now." he answers and I sigh and glance to my feet before looking back up at him.
"I'm fine, just go back to art school. It's a better time there than it is here right now." I tell him as I reach for my hot cup of coffee.
"Nah, you're wrong about that. The nude male drawing was yesterday, mate, and still I'd want to be here rather than having to draw some blokes prick." he remarks playfully and I grin briefly at his comment before it fades and he treads on over for a cup too and we take a seat by each other but none of us says anything while we wait for our coffee to cool off enough to drink.
"You didn't uh tell anybody, did you?" I query after having gotten the thought.
"No, but people are gonna notice when us three aren't there at lunch with a few servings of fish and chips for everybody to eat ." he responds and I nod my head, there's only two more people who sit with us; George and Addison's best friend Katie who we all call Kat.
"How is she then? Maybe I could go say hi to her quick."
"She's asleep right now." I remark simply while I stare into my coffee that I hold with two hands whose forearms rest on my thighs as I sit leaning forward, I still can't wrap this around my head.
"How are you hanging up over on the other end there?" he inquires while I'm lost in my thoughts about so many things and about all of things that are different now.
"You don't wanna talk about it, okay I get that." he states after I had ignored his question and I lift my head to see him tapping his foot as his hair is in a perfect quiff with only a few strands of hair sticking out here and there.
"It's not that. I just don't know what to say about it," I stop for a second to let out a sad sigh. "I was thinking about cuddling with a little baby who looks like Addie and I both who has little fingers and one of those cute baby smiles this morning right before my English teacher sent me to the office. We were starting to get happy about it, and thinking about what names we would like for a boy and for a girl. Now suddenly Addison and I aren't going to be parents anymore, and she's no longer pregnant. I was getting excited about the thought of being a dad, and now my chance to be one is gone." I finish while the feelings are swirling around inside of me.
"She hit three months and three weeks today, John. She was so close to making it to the second trimester." I add on to this rough and also new subject at hand we speak of.
"Did the doctor say why it had happened?" he asks of out I assume curiosity and I shake my head.
"I haven't spoken to her doctor yet, I haven't seen him at all either." I answer and he nods and then drinks from his coffee.
"Paul, maybe it was for the better. I mean, you two are still in school and you were so worried about getting a flat and being able to afford raising a baby." he comments and I look at him in almost disbelief.
"Are you trying to be an asshole, John?" I retort boldly.
"No, I didn't mean it that way. They, well people just say how those kind of things are for the best sometimes." he corrects himself and me too, I don't respond to what he had to say.
I shake my head with an unsure, blank look while my eyes as well as thoughts are lost in this shitty coffee I hold in my hands. I can't choose if this is a good thing happening to Addie and I like John thinks, or if its not because of the ways you can look at it. I was starting to look forward to becoming a dad in almost five, short months. That's what keeps running through my mind.
That was the only the start of my relationship with Addison Mitchell falling apart, and how things undoubtedly changed for us, my future, hers and ours for one day. It changed a lot, that's for sure.