Here have some heart break.
"She's pregnant."
There's a finality in the statement. A period on the end of their short sentence. The final word of their novella.
Jessica's pregnant.
Wyatt's wife is pregnant.
Wyatt's wife.
She hadn't been fooling herself about their situation. He isn't hers to have, was never hers to keep.
But this… it's a different kind of ending.
There's the moment you come to the end of a book, but you leave it open, living in the story and soaking it all in, knowing there's no going back, but knowing you don't quite want to let the fantasy go…
Then there's the moment you close the book.
Those words that Wyatt spat at Agent Christopher, they slammed the book shut before the moment was over, throwing their story into the furnace of shattered possibilities.
It hadn't even occurred to her until now how many times she'd thought of it. Thought of that part of a life with him.
They had been fleeting thoughts, seen in the inbetweens of moments too trivial to be considered significant to anyone else, but not to her.
Thoughts of home cooked dinners crafter by his skillful hands while a brown-hair, blue-eyed little girl tugged on his leg until he scooped her up into his arms so they could work together. She sees it when she watched him make meals for everyone in the bunker.
Thoughts of the two of them tag-teaming on homework assistance for a hard-working, yet slightly rebellious teenager She sees it when Wyatt poured over history book after history book with her in her quest to crack Keynes' manifesto, pulling all nighters, drinking insane amounts of coffee, just to make sure she wasn't alone.
Thoughts of silly, cliche family game nights that they might have to force the kids into once they get older, but it always end up bringing them so much laughter. She sees it when she tries to teach him to play checkers.
They're ridiculous and far-fetched dreams even when they did have possibilities. The battle with Rittenhouse seemed endless. Who knew if there would even be time for children once the war was over? Who knew if they would even live to see the end of it?
Now they're dreams he's going to live out with someone else.
His wife.
The mother of his child.
He'll cook for them with skills she and Wyatt learned together, side by side, trying to adapt to life in a Stone Age missile bunker.
He'll help with homework because of knowledge she taught him, deep into the night where their eyes only stayed open from copious caffeine intake and the presence of each other.
He'll teach them how to play silly games he learned in the brief time he was hers, before a text message, before Flynn, when there was nothing and no one to let them question who they belonged to.
He'll be the husband and father they deserve because she helped him, because she changed him, because she saved him.
She still believes in fate, but as nothing more than a cold, conniving bitch.
"You throw her out; I go, too."
That's just it, isn't it?
His loyalty has always been torn. She and Rufus saw it first hand. At the Hindenburg, in Vegas, when he stole the Lifeboat, hell, even in Arkansas with Bonnie and Clyde, there was no denying the torch he still carried for her.
Here he picks a side.
Here he picks Jessica.
No matter what comes from this. No matter if he physically stays of leaves, here he leaves them behind, leaves her behind.
But, no, that can't be it.
This isn't Wyatt. This isn't how their book is supposed to end.
So she'll jump back in the fire to retrieve their story, risk the burns and the scars and the hurt because maybe it got closed mid-chapter, maybe that wasn't the end.
Maybe she didn't hear it right.
Maybe they don't know for sure.
Maybe it's not everything she fears.
Maybe she's…
Maybe they…
Maybe…
"She's what?"
Thank you for reading my half hour brain child. You'll be repaid for this pain with fluff and smut in the next chapter of Against All Odds.