January, 1986

Henry McCord shifted uneasily as he watched his competition from across the hotel's grand ballroom. He needed to get his head on straight. This wasn't the time to be lamenting the fact that Olivia, his girlfriend of two years, had broken up with him. He was the Captain for his Central Catholic High School Speech and Debate team. This was the first year that his school had a real shot of doing well at the National Championship Tournament and he desperately wanted to bring home a trophy. He had handily won the first twelve rounds, now there was only one obstacle in his way. His eyes narrowed to slits as he watched her from across the room. Elizabeth Adams, from Houghton Hall Academy, was the one to beat.

Henry and Elizabeth were on rival teams, but somehow through the last four years, they had never managed to actually debate each other. He'd seen her in action though, and she was good.

Elizabeth surveyed her competition slyly, stealing quick glances. Henry didn't seem to be as confident as usual. She'd been watching him during her last three years at Houghton and although, they hadn't gone head to head, she admired him. Today though, he looked nervous, and when you're nervous, you make mistakes. Elizabeth Adams did not make mistakes. She was cool under pressure. Henry McCord was about to take a nosedive. He just didn't realize it yet.

A voice sliced through her thoughts. "Extemporaneous Debate Final Round. Contestants please sign in at the registration table before 1pm." The scratchy voice over the loudspeaker cut out. Elizabeth checked her watch. 12:50. She stood, smoothed the wrinkles from her red tartan plaid skirt and adjusted her red blazer. Rifling through her purse, she pulled out a lipstick. Using a mirror that had been left on the table, she quickly applied the bright red shade, making sure that it didn't smudge. Looking up,she caught her competition watching her. She winked at him before making her way to the registration table.

Henry, flushed red, embarrassed that he'd been caught watching her. Henry wouldn't yet admit it in the midst of his own personal love life turmoil, but Elizabeth Adams was formidable and he found that incredibly sexy. He quickly straightened his tie, slipped his blazer back on and made his own way to the table to register.

They received their debate topics at exactly 1pm. They had 20 minutes to prepare and report to the main stage at 1:25. Elizabeth and Henry opened their instructions at the same time.

Topic: The United States is safer now than ever before.

Elizabeth flipped the lower half of the page down.

Position: Opposed

She grinned. This was going to be a cake walk. She calmly walked back to the table where her teammates were gathered. Opening a file box that set in the middle of the the table, she removed a file folder. She sat down and got to work, furiously jotting notes on cards. Midway through, she glanced up and saw her opponent sitting in a chair alone. His eyes were closed and he generally looked pained. With her play at appearing rattled having no effect, she put her things away and watched him. She genuinely felt the need to go ask him if he was okay, but then thought that maybe this was his way of rattling her. Elizabeth wasn't sure, but his rugged good looks definitely caused her stomach to flutter.

At 1:20, they both stood and made their way to the main stage. Members of their teams sat in the reserved area, along with sponsors and a few parents. Henry wished for a moment that his parents had been able to come, but his father refused to take off work and his mom wouldn't travel without his father. Henry shrugged it off. There would probably be an all school assembly where they would present the trophy. His mom would be there. That might make him feel better, but he doubted it, especially when Olivia would be there too.

Elizabeth looked into the crowd and her friend, Joey, gave her a thumbs up. In moments like these, no matter how hard she tried, she longed for her parents. They'd been dead now three and a half years, so some things were tolerable, but every so often, especially on a special occasion, she would miss their presence. She was thankful for Joey, but even he kept his distance. He lived in constant fear that his father, the King of Bahrain, would somehow know that the two were friends and he'd get pulled from his expensive Western school. So, their relationship consisted entirely on midnight chats on the roof of the dorm. That was fine, but she longed for a real connection with someone. She shook her head, ridding herself of these thoughts. They were useless and had nothing to do with the task at hand. She quickly slid back into character.

Henry stepped toward Elizabeth and extended his hand. "Good luck Miss Adams." As their hands connected, Henry felt an undeniable warmth radiate up his arm.

Their eyes met and Elizabeth's stomach flipped, and not just from nerves. "Thank you, and good luck to you Mr. McCord." She shot him a confident, wide smile and crossed the stage to take her seat.

They began and Henry, as the affirmative position, stated his case first. Elizabeth was impressed. He was good, but she was still better. She took her one minute of cross examination before her two minute presentation of the opposition. She was confident, but Henry was excellent nullifying her two weakest points. Taking a minute to collect their thoughts, both offered rebuttals to the opposing argument and then made final speeches. The entire process took less than twenty minutes, but both Elizabeth and Henry were exhausted by the end.

Before they left the stage to await the results. Elizabeth reached out to Henry and placed her hand on his shoulder. "Nice job," she said.

"Thanks. You're an excellent debater."

In the end, Henry had beat her by one point and Elizabeth gracefully conceded. She was a little disappointed, but Henry had done an excellent job and he deserved to win. After they had both received their medals and trophies, Henry leaned close to her and whispered. "I know you could've beat me if your head was in the game."

She gave him a confused look. "I caught you thinking right before we started." Henry said. "If you had your head in the game, you'd have kicked my ass."

"Not necessarily. I saw you in the ballroom. You've got things that you're thinking about too."

"Maybe. I guess so." Henry looked off in the distance.

They ended up in the same elevator going back to their rooms. It was silent and Elizabeth was starting to grow uncomfortable, although she didn't know what to say. Henry, feeling the same way, broke the silence. "The team is going out to eat tonight, but I really just don't feel like doing the big group thing. I was just going to go downstairs and get a pizza or something. If you aren't doing anything, would you like to join me?"

If truth be told, Elizabeth knew that she would probably go sit with her team in someone's room for a while and she'd just glance at Joey now and then, wishing he could be a real friend to her. After an hour, she'd retreat to her own room and cry herself to sleep. She smiled at Henry. "Yeah, I think I'd like that."

Later that night, Elizabeth stepped out the elevator. She was feeling a little awkward, hoping that her jeans and t-shirt was appropriate attire for hanging out at a restaurant.

She spotted Henry. He had shed his blazer and tie and had his sleeves rolled up to the elbows. The top two buttons of his shirt were unbuttoned, He was leaning back in the chair with his fingers laced behind his head, woven through his sandy brown hair. Elizabeth swallowed the lump that had formed in the back of her throat. He was undeniably attractive. He spotted her immediately and jumped to his feet. "I thought maybe you'd changed your mind," he said.

"I wasn't sure what to wear, so my suitcase is upended." She gave him a self-deprecating smile.

"You look great," he said, and pulled out a chair for her. The room was dimly lit and she was thankful. She hoped he didn't see her blush. It probably was just a platitude. Henry seemed like a gentlemanly sort of guy.

They talked for a while about the tournament and other speech related things and it morphed into sports, her field hockey and his track and field. A large group came in and sat near them, so they scooted closer together to hear each other better. At some point, the pizza tray was emptied and the waiter had stopped filling their glasses.

When colleges came up, Henry shared that he had an ROTC scholarship to Pennsylvania State University and she told of her full ride to University of Virginia. They fell into silence thinking about all of the things that would change in just a few short months. Elizabeth couldn't help but to be melancholy thinking about all of the things she would be doing alone, her parents gone and her brother detached and doing his own thing. She felt his eyes on her.

Elizabeth was never one to back away when she felt uncomfortable in a situation. If that were the case, she would never have accomplished anything. At some point, she just accepted feeling uncomfortable. She turned to meet his stare. Elizabeth had expected him to shy away, but instead he held her gaze, his soft brown eyes boring into her iridescent blue ones "I think you are the smartest, most beautiful person I've ever met," he said.

She let out a small laugh. Henry normally wasn't this forward and perhaps it was because he was still heartbroken over Olivia or maybe it had nothing to do with her. Maybe it was because he knew that Elizabeth was something special, but he didn't think twice about saying those words to her. "It's obvious that you don't hear that enough, but that doesn't mean it isn't true."

"It's a shame we don't live closer or plan on going to the same school. I think we could be good friends," she said. The thought wasn't lost of either that maybe they would've been more than friends.

By midnight, they had been booted from the restaurant and stood in front of the elevators, ready to return to their rooms. On a whim, she invited him to her room.

As they rode the elevator up, a thought occurred to her and she turned to Henry suddenly. "Uh, the invitation doesn't mean that I want to-you know."

"Oh, no! That's not why I coming up. Just talking." He couldn't help but notice the slight change in her eyes at his words. "But, not that I wouldn't be interested under different circumstances. I mean, we barely know each other."

"Right. Of course." The elevator dinged and the door slid open. He followed her down the hall. She stopped about halfway down and inserted the key into the lock. She turned the handle and Henry slid his hand against the door, pushing it open ahead of her. She flipped the lights on and he sat down on one end of the the couch not covered by her clothes. She scrambled to toss her things in the direction of her suitcase before she camped out on the opposite end of the couch. They continued their conversation.

Henry wasn't sure when it was that he told Elizabeth that Olivia had broken up with him. Somehow it lead to a full blown verbal dump of how he thought he'd been in love and how she obviously didn't reciprocate those feelings. When he was finally finished, Henry looked at Elizabeth. "I'm sorry. That was a whole lot of crap to hear that you didn't really care about."

She shook her head. "Try not to take this the wrong way, but it's sort of good to know that I'm not the only one whose life isn't the best."

The look he gave her was nothing short of pleading, and before she knew what she was doing, her guard was down and she told him about her parents and her brother and even how Joey, who was the closest thing she had to a friend, wasn't really. By the time she was done, she realized that somehow they were now sitting much closer to each other than they had started out. Her rational mind knew that this probably wasn't the best idea, but then wasn't being a teen all about doing wild and crazy things and living life carefree? She had never been that girl, but in this moment, she wanted to try it out, even if just for one night.

She leaned into him, until they were only a couple inches apart. "We shouldn't do this," Henry said, his voice so low that it was barely a mumble. Thoughts tumbled around in his head. He knew he shouldn't just fall into the arms of the next girl that happened by. But, at the same time, Elizabeth was here and she had been nothing but wonderful and he was certainly attracted to her.

"Do you want me to not do what I'm about to do?" she asked. Henry placed his hand on her thigh and closed the gap. His lips pressed against hers and she her stomach was full of butterflies. Their lips parted at the same time and her tongue darted out to taste him. Henry met her and it took them a few minutes to find their rhythm with each other. But then she pulled back and stood, holding her hand out to him.

Henry took her hand and stood, placing his hands on her waist, and looked into her eyes. "Are you sure?"

"Yes. Very sure," Elizabeth untucked Henry's shirt and started unbuttoning it. Her hands traveled up his chest. "Very sure." Grabbing his collar, she pulled him toward the bed.

As the daylight started to creep in around the curtains, they untangled themselves from each other and he pushed her blonde locks away from her face. "It's a shame that we don't live closer to one another," he whispered, kissing her.

"Yes. If we were closer, we might make this last. I had a great time, Henry. Thank you." Elizabeth shifted in the bed, sitting up and watching him dress, committing to memory this moment.

Henry turned away and pulled his pants up, buttoning them. He turned back and faced her, and took her hand, pulling her naked form from under the sheets. Up on her knees, at the edge of the bed, he took her in his arms one last time. "No, thank you. You are wonderfully brilliant Elizabeth Adams. I hope someday we meet again."

Henry stepped away and blew her a kiss before leaving the room. As the latch clicked behind him, Elizabeth fell back on the bed both elated and devastated.

Two months later:

Henry sat tapping his pencil on the edge of his desk. He was anxious for this day to be over. He had track practice and had to work a couple hours before going home and tackling one of his last research papers before graduation. He let his mind wander to Elizabeth. He often wondered how she was, or what she was doing. He should've asked for her number or address or something. He was blaming that on the euphoria he'd had that morning, Henry thought about her all of the time. Somehow, Olivia never quite seemed to enter his thoughts anymore. It was always Elizabeth.

"Henry McCord, please come to the office, immediately," the intercom speaker sputtered, eliciting a lot of "oooos" and "uh-ohs" from his classmates. He grinned and quickly packed up his belongings and walked across the building and stepped into the office.

"Hey, Mrs. Pritchett. What did you need?" The secretary looked up.

"It seems that we've become your personal post office," she said, handing him a letter. "Give people your address so I don't have to play mailman."

"Yes ma'am. I'm sorry about that." He looked quizzically at the letter which was neatly addressed with small script to Henry McCord ℅ Central Catholic High School with the school's official mailing address. "Have a nice afternoon Mrs. Pritchett."

Henry stepped out into the hallway and slipped his finger under the flap, tearing it open. He pulled the letter out and opened it. He smiled, seeing Elizabeth's name and phone number, then his jaw dropped and he reread the letter twice before shoving it into his backpack, leaving the building, track practice long forgotten.

Dear Henry,

I really need to talk to you as soon as you read this.

I'm pregnant.

Elizabeth