Author's Note: Before everyone comes after me with pitchforks and torches with intent to mount my head on their wall, keep in two things in mind. 1) This story is fiction! 2) The protagonist is a teenager! I know no one who would've been happy about learning they're pregnant at 14 (or 15 or 16 or even 20!). Personally, I'm 23 and getting pregnant is still one of my worst nightmares. Yes, I know teenage pregnancy is seen as more of a positive thing today than it was back in 1990 or so, and I've even read anecdotes from people who wanted to get pregnant while in their teens. This story is not meant to be a moral lesson about teenage pregnancy. It's a fictional tale based on a video game series written for fun and nothing more.


The moment the tardy bell rang, the students cleared out. The girls emptied the halls of themselves, creating a nearly instant silence. Their classrooms locked, holding in any amount of chatter that could've escaped their walls. It was quiet.

Except for Azalea.

14 years old and so scared, she hadn't the courage to take a pregnancy test at home. Instead, using a week's worth of lunch money she'd saved, she purchased two from a pharmacy near her school and hid them in her bookbag, intending to take them when she could manage to slip away between classes. Anxiety filled her, but she got her chance right before her study period was to begin.

The tests she bought weren't the kind with plus and minus signs, or blue lines. No, the results would blatantly display "Pregnant" or "Not pregnant". Against every strain of hope she could have, her result for both tests were the first.

Azalea was so crying so hard, her tears were soiling her uniform's skirt, not that she cared. She quietly begged every entity she could to not let this be true. She could only imagine the rumors. How could a teenage girl who attended an all-girls school be pregnant? What would her friends think? Her teachers? Her parents? Azalea almost felt herself retch about the last thought.

But her most fearful thoughts were of herself. What would she do? What could she do? Her very first thought was an abortion, but the idea exited her mind as quickly as it entered. She couldn't have an abortion. Well, she couldn't have a professional abortion. She'd need one of her parents to consent. Even if she didn't, she had no clue how to go about making appointments for herself.

With one option no longer an option, her mind swung to adoption. But like abortion, she'd need one of her parents to consent, and she was certain they'd refuse. She knew they adored babies. She could, in secret, take the infant to a different hospital and abandon the child there, but her parents would never forgive her if she did.

Thus, Azalea had no options. She had to continue this pregnancy. She had to give birth. She had to keep that child. And the more that brutal reality set in, the harder she cried.

Three class periods passed before Azalea became calm, though not because she wanted to stop. Her throat ached and her voice was hoarse. She also heard knocking and a voice on the other side of the stall's door.

"Azalea, are you in there? Is that you?"

"Y-yes, S-selene," Azalea softly replied in pain.

"You know the teachers have security searching for you, right?"

Azalea didn't care. She had a very brief hope they'd arrest her and take her somewhere, so we wouldn't have to go home.

"Will you open the door?" Selene asked, clearly annoyed for a reason Azalea didn't know, but again, didn't care about.

"Will you bug off?!" Azalea finally shouted, though even her shout barely rose above a whisper's volume.

"Fine. The dust mites can infest you. I'll tell the guards you want to be alone." Selene walked off, and despite not seeing her, Azalea could hear that snooty walk. With Selene gone, Azalea's mind immediately shot back to her own predicament.

"My life is over."