Chapter 4 – A Totally Confusing Week
Trixie Tanner staggered from her bed in the predawn. The dim light that filtered through her curtains doing little to highlight anything of import, at least, not her motor bike helmet anyway, which she promptly tripped on in her haste to enter her ensuite.
She stumbled clumsily over to her toilet and fell to her knees with a groan.
Never. Drinking. Again. Even her thoughts were a painful whine. Fuck Kelly, Fuck Fi, Fuck Sharon and Fuck Layla. No More Bloody Drinking!
She was not entirely sure how she got home the night before, she didn't care. Could have been carried, slung over the shoulder of a huge tattooed, hairy biker for all she knew. Her stomach heaved as expected and everything she had ever eaten in her entire life exited her body in a rush. She lay her forehead against the cold toilet seat, not caring to think that her bum was probably there not too long ago. She was seriously questioning her life choices at this point.
She shouldn't have gone out last night anyway. She hadn't been feeling very flash for the last couple of days. There was an annoying stomach flu going around and she was sure that she had it. But she had bravely pushed the nausea aside and gallantly allowed her friends to drag her to a karaoke bar, of all places and while it was admittedly really fun, she was now going to pay for it… she was paying for it with an extreme hangover combined with annoying and lingering tummy bug.
She raised her head weakly from the toilet as she registered that her cell phone was ringing. She crawled with zero enthusiasm back into her bedroom and arrived at her bed side table, just as the call went to voicemail. She sighed when she saw who the missed call was from and picked up her phone, waiting for the inevitable. Her mum would call right back instead of leaving a message. She always did.
After a second, the phone began to vibrate again and the dulcet tones of Nirvana's 'Smells like teen spirit' rang out from her handset. She swiped to answer, leaning her back up against the side of her bed.
"Hey mum." She summoned her most cheery morning voice, she did not need a lecture on the binge drinking culture among young women these days… blah, blah, blah.
"Morning, Beatrix." Her mother chirped down the line. Thank god it was still morning. Trixie thought. "Just ringing to remind you to make sure you come over and water my plants while I'm gone… I'm trusting to not come home to a house full of sad, dried up corpses."
"Yes Mum, I didn't forget" She lied. "When do you fly out?"
"I'm on the red eye first thing in the morning… I will water them before I go, but you'll need to come here every two days for the next two weeks." Her mum instructed her. "Oh and can you take the milk out of the fridge at take it home, I don't want spoiled milk either. Ok darling, I'll leave you to your hangover now. I'll bring you home something nice… Bye-ee"
Her mum disconnected the call and Trixie glared at her phone. Fuck her mum too.
The stomach flu was not going away and at the prompting of Layla, who was a hypochondriac, she made an appointment at the GP. Trixie hated doctors. They asked questions and they prodded at you.
She scanned her tee shirt collection and decided today was a day to go old school and pulled her Pink Floyd 'wish you were here' shirt over her head and tucked it into the top of her tight leather pants, which seemed much tighter than usual. Trixie definitely needed to stop drinking or at least change to low carb. She shrugged into her jacket and wandered out to her bike, wedged her head into her helmet and set off to her appointment.
She arrived five minutes early for her appointment and ended up sitting in the clinics waiting room for a solid twenty minutes after that before her name was finally called.
"Beatrix Tanner, Dr Coulter will see you now." The indifferent receptionist intoned.
Trixie stomped into the examination room and perched sullenly on the edge of the paper swathed gurney, it was quite difficult to look sullen whilst perching, but Trixie managed it somehow. She answered all of the doctors questions and allowed him to prod at her. He took some of her blood and asked her to pee in a cup, neither of which were very appetising and then he sat her down next to his desk and tapped away at his computer.
"Beatrix." Dr Coulter began, adjusting the glasses on his nose and finally looking at her.
"Trixie." Trixie corrected him.
"Trixie. You are pregnant." He said offhandedly.
"No." Trixie replied calmly.
The doctor raised his eyebrows and regarded her sternly in silence.
"You're mistaken." Trixie stated confidently. "Unless, this is the immaculate conception…"
"I put you at about twelve weeks."
"Yeah and that is where the problem is." Trixie replied. "I haven't had sex in at least six months… easily. See, my fucktard ex didn't put his dick anywhere near me while he was spading the girl at the grocery store." She explained with exaggerated patience.
"I don't know what to tell you." Dr Coulter shook his head, "I can run another test and check your bloods, but I am 99.9% certain you are carrying a human being inside of you right now. We would normally do your first ultrasound around now so, I'll book you in for this time next week?"
Trixie was shaking her head slowly in denial… because there was no way in hell she was pregnant. No way in FUCKING HELL. She sat in that chair for god knows how long staring dumbly at the patch of empty air about an inch in front of her nose before the doctor realised that she had not heard a thing he had said about supplements and other kind of important things about impending motherhood.
In fact, Trixie zoned out for the rest of the entire day. She found herself curled up in her giant seagrass egg chair on her balcony when she finally rejoined the world, not sure how she had gotten home from the clinic, but guessing she had made it home on her own, her bike helmet still squished onto her head and jacket still zipped up. She had a prescription scrunched in her fist and an appointment card for an ultrasound in the other, she had been clutching them to her chest.
The sound of shouting is what bought her out of her daze, Sharon and Layla thumping up the stairs to her flat and calling out to her urgently. She didn't trust her voice to reply so she waited for them to find her. They eventually spilled breathlessly out onto the balcony and stood before her, eyeing her with concern.
Trixie, tilted her head to look up at them from out of her helmet.
"I'm pregnant." She said absently, still in disbelief.
"You said that on the phone, love," Layla said crouching down. "Who? When?"
"I called you?" Trixie asked, distractedly and Layla and Sharon both nodded.
"Fi and Kelz are on their way." Sharon said, easing the prescription out of her fist and wrangling for the appointment card as well.
Trixie shrugged. "It can't have been fucktard, unless he fucked me in my sleep… and there's been no one else… I'm so confused." She all but wailed.
"Hey Trix, it's OK we're here for you, babe, you know that." Layla soothed. "You need to think about what you want."
What did she want? She wanted her mum… who was off grid, at a retreat on a tropical island, with no cell reception or Wifi, playing bridge and napping in a hammock. When she looked back up again, Kelly and Fi were there too.
"Should I keep it?" She asked meekly, "I don't even know who the father is?'
"You can't make that decision right now, Trix." Kelly said softly. "You should go to your ultrasound and talk to someone who knows what they're on about, before you make a massive decision like that."
The rest of the girls murmured in agreement.
The Goblin King lounged back against his throne and ignored the chaos of his throne room. He held one long fingered and leather clad hand over his eyes and tried to block out the din of dozens of Goblins running amok; fighting, drinking, gambling, playing pranks and laughing raucously. He wondered if sometimes they forgot he was even there.
Business was slow these days, the belief in magic in the above was dwindling and no one even though the wish their children away to him and his subject. Parents and care givers were more like to tell their kids to fuck off than wish the goblins would take them away, that or something much worse, much more sinister. The Above was not what it once was.
He sighed and thought back to the last time he had been summoned for any reason… and a grin split his perfect face, lighting up his translucent skin and filling him with warmth. A tipsy mortal with a fighting spirit, foul mouth and luscious body. He wondered briefly what she was up too.
He almost regretted taking her memory of their tryst, he was sure she would have called on him again and that kind of distraction was exactly what he needed to relieve him of his more regular bouts of boredom.
He had been disciplining the gate guard for sleeping on the job again when he had heard the wish. He'd had to replay it in his head to make sure he had heard it correctly. He had walked away from his cowering guard mid tirade to replay the wish again just to be sure. No, he was not mistaken, a woman had wished for him to pleasure her… How odd.
But it was the best offer he'd had in a long time, he'd summoned a crystal and had taken a quick look at the lady in question and found her to be very easy on the eyes so why the hell not.
It had been a very satisfying diversion and he had been pleasantly surprised by a few things about the pretty lady, She had been aggressive but compliant. She obviously took pride in her appearance, right down to the streamlined appearance of her womanhood.
He had not seen a hairless quim before…. it was refreshing, he thought with a smirk.
He did regret taking her memory then, as his tight pants suddenly became even tighter… and he could not go to the Above unless he was summoned or unless he was in his other form and he doubted that she would care for a dalliance with a barn owl.
Before he had a chance to think about it, he had conjured a crystal and had bought forth an image of the object of his musings. He had not seen her since the day after their liaison, she had been barely dressed and was handing out intoxicating beverages to hordes of horny young men. That had only been a handful of short weeks ago
But now something was wrong. He could not hear what was happening but she was encased in her transport attire, gloomily surrounded by her female friends, and they seemed to be trying to provide her with comfort as she huddled in a overlarge chair.
How odd.
AN: I can see you reading this. Cummon... Review, you know you want to.