a/n: for chi, in a teapot. right, anyway, this is for her because happy belated birthday. like, really belated. lol sorry.
disclaimer: j.k. rowling ©
So first he hears the scream and then the bone-rattling sobs that seem to break her entire body, and when he wakes up there is too much red.
They begin one steamy summer night when they have sex while he is still seeing Rose, and she is still hung up on Teddy. And then a month later there is a blue plus sign on a plastic stick and boom – she's pregnant.
He wants to yell, yell so loud I CAN'T DO THIS, but he just stays quiet and silent and just drops his head to his hands and God –
God. She just says it and then slides down against the door in a semi-dramatic sort of way and then she cries and says things like DON'T TOUCH ME NO DON'T and PLEASE NO PLEASE. She prays even though she is not religious and he doesn't even bother.
They go to Rose, together. Terror. Fear. They are afraid, perhaps not of Rose's wrath but of the guilt they can't possibly bear.
Lily just hands her the pregnancy test and Rose looks at the both of them and she leaves, easily, just strides away and Scorpius looks at her leaving and his gaze lingers on her back for a little bit too long.
They are okay. He stays because it is his responsibility, because he loves Lily, he does; otherwise why would he have sex with her? Why would he risk it?
HE LOVES HER.
HE LOVES HER.
Most mornings she wakes up and runs to the loo, retching in the toilet. Scorpius holds her hair back and looks at her, watches her as strands of too-straight hair slides between his fingers. He helps wipe her mouth when she's done and after they lay side-by-side on the bed, neither one reaching across the empty space between them to even touch hands or skin or anything.
There are months that pass by and he smiles once or twice when she cracks a joke, but all he can think of is the swell of her belly and the angular face that was meant to be more rounded, and the straight red hair that he wishes was a tangled mess.
HE LOVES HER.
"Scorp?" Lily calls – it's something like month five or six or – he doesn't know, really, the months are all blurring together and.
"Lil?" he replies from the other room; he goes to the bedroom to see her with her hand cradling her stomach and the biggest grin he's seen on her in ages. "What is it?"
"It's kicking. The baby's kicking," she says this in this way that sounds like she can't believe it herself; for a moment he stands there and then he comes to his senses. And he's running to her, his hand pressed lightly to her abdomen and he feels the smallest of kicks, right there above her belly button.
It's possibly the most meaningful thing he's ever done in his entire life but GOD HE CAN'T FEEL ANYTHING, NOT A THING –
HE LOVES HER.
In the morning he wakes up with his hand curled in hers, red staining the sheets –
She screams and cries and screams and he brings her to St. Mungo's –
They tell them the baby is dead; it can't be saved. She cries and he sort-of cries and he tells her they'll survive this, they will, and that HE LOVES HER but he doesn't, and then they go home and he washes the sheets and he regrets, he regrets, he regrets.
(She leaves him, tears on the pillow and a note on the bedside table; he doesn't care.)
a/n: um. please don't favorite without reviewing!