A/N: Warning for mentions of abortion and underage prostitution.


As Jody had fearfully guessed, the whole household was now aware of what'd taken place in the office the previous morning and, naturally, she and Tyler were the main suspects; Ella escaped scrutiny because she was relatively new so no one really knew anything about her, Charlie was simply too sensible and good to land herself in such a situation, and Candi-Rose was just too young (although, according to Ryan, no boy with half a brain would be interested in her). To make matters worse, Mike and May-Li weren't keen on allowing the (suspected four) girls to go on the theme park trip on the 14th - just three days away - because one of them might end up endangering her health by going on the rides if she was indeed pregnant. As a consequence, the other three girls were looking to Jody to fess up so they could all go to the theme park.

"Jody, please just admit it! We're friends, right? Do it for me?"

"Jody, we all know it was you. Just tell May-Li the truth and we can all move on!"

"Jody, I'm not saying it was you but if it was, maybe you could text May-Li like she suggested? No one would ever have to know..."

"For God's sake, I am not pregnant!" Jody roared, having had enough of the annoying pleas, especially from the real culprit herself. "Candi-Rose, I thought we were friends but we're not! Mates have each other's backs, they don't try to emotionally blackmail each other into making false confessions to cover their own backs! Ella Mansfield, you can just shut your fat gob! We both know it wasn't me who took that test! Charlie, I- I don't even know what to say to you except that it wasn't me! Do you really think I would do something like this right after my mum's death?!"

Charlie and Candi-Rose had the decency to look ashamed but Ella remained straight-faced, chewing on some gum which made her look like even more of a nasty piece of work.

"Your mum died last month," Ryan spoke up. "It's old news. Get over it."

"Your mum died?" Bird inquired, and Jody was surprised he could hear anything with those massive headphones on twenty-four seven. "I'm sorry."

"Why?" Jay questioned his brother, sounding disgusted. Typical, insensitive Jay.

Tired of the incessant accusations directed at her, Jody stormed out of the lounge and headed for the garden, hoping she could get some peace and quiet out there. If there was one good thing going on today, it was that Tyler was keeping his mother as far away from Ashdene Ridge as possible for her weekly visit; she could only imagine how messy it'd get if Sally 'found out' from one of the residents that she was going to become a grandmother by her son's care kid best friend. Jody walked into the garden, sitting down on the green garden bench and taking in a lungful of fresh air. She smiled, feeling relaxed.

It wasn't long until her newfound peace and quiet were disrupted, though.

"Wait, so Jody's having a baby?" she heard Archie ask. Apparently, he had only just become aware. She turned around, spotting the boy in question sitting in front of the flowerbed with Joseph, Taz and Floss. Great. Now her humiliation was complete.

"Will the baby live here?" Taz implored.

"No, I think you have to be five or older to live here," Floss answered. "It'll have to go into a babies' care home."

Floss' last few words hit Jody right where it hurt, raking up bad memories about the first time she was dumped at Elm Tree House. Even though she knew she wasn't really pregnant (and never would be, if she could help it), the thought of dumping her own child into care was unimaginable. She remembered how lonely and out of place she'd felt when she first arrived at Elm Tree House, how unwelcoming the other children had been, and how devastated she'd been when she realised her mother and brothers had taken the bloody dog with them instead of her when they absconded from their old house. She would never do that to her child. In fact, she'd just rather not have any children at all even if it meant she had to get an abortion. After all, it was better to not come into the world at all than to know that you were an accident.

"Hi."

Hastily composing herself, Jody turned her head to see Joseph sitting down on the other side of the bench. She briefly turned back to see that the others were still in front of the flowerbed before looking back at the resident science whiz.

"Hi," she responded flatly, wondering what preposterous questions the thirteen-year-old had lined up for her. "If you're going to ask questions about the baby, forget it, because there is no baby!"

"I wasn't going to," he informed with a smile. "I just wanted to say that I believe you when you say you didn't take the test."

She raised an eyebrow. That simply sounded too good to be true. "How come?" she asked cautiously.

"What the others are saying doesn't make sense," he started, shrugging his shoulders. "Just because you went to the bathroom first, doesn't mean it was you, and just because you and Tyler spend time together in each other's rooms, doesn't mean you did anything." She shifted uncomfortably at the thought of doing something. "My room is next to Tyler's anyway. Either me or Archie would've heard something because you two are in there a lot."

"Okaaaay, thanks Joseph," she replied, her face growing hot. She and Tyler really needed to spend more time outdoors or downstairs or just anywhere that wasn't a bedroom. "It's great that you believe me but no one else does. Can you imagine what would happen if Sally heard about this? Tyler can't keep her away from the others every time she visits."

"They'll all stop when they realise you're not having a baby."

Joseph was right, of course, but Jody's reputation would forever be marred by this incident. She could just about tolerate the others thinking (knowing?) she was sweet on Tyler but she couldn't handle them thinking that she was doing that with him under the same roof as them. It was disgusting.

"They'll still think that I took the test, though, won't they?!" she complained, burying her face in her hands. There was no fixing this mess.

.:. QK .:.

After an afternoon of listening to the others whisper about her and Tyler's 'little secret' right in front of her, Jody burst into the office, determined to make them stop.

"Easy, Jody!" Mike warned, looking up from his desk at said girl in shock as she all but ripped the door off its hinges.

"I can't take it anymore!" she cried, hurriedly pacing around the office. "They're all doing my head in! Charlie, Ella and Candi-Rose want me to say I took the test so we can go to the theme park and the others just won't shut up about me and Tyler!"

"Jody, calm down," he said soothingly, doing a hands down motion with his arms. His efforts were in vain, though, as she continued to rant about her housemates.

"What's going on?!" May-Li demanded in a hiss, popping her head around the connecting door between the quiet room and the office. "Archie's meeting potential foster parents in here!"

Jody didn't have anything against Archie but she really needed May-Li to sort her problem out first. "Get all four of us one of those stupid tests each so that no one has to miss out on the theme park!"

"Okay, May-Li, I'll go and supervise Archie," Mike offered, taking his glasses off and pushing himself (and his chair) away from the desk. "You update Jody on the theme park situation."

May-Li nodded, momentarily popping back into the quiet room and saying something before returning to the office and taking a seat in her desk chair. Mike literally ran into the quiet room and firmly closed the connecting door behind him as if being in the same room as Jody was a total nightmare. She sure hoped that wasn't the case; Mike was practically her dad.

"What theme park situation?" she asked quietly, trying to control her anger. Tyler had been looking forward to that trip for weeks. "Is it cancelled?"

"It's not cancelled," May-Li answered, clasping her hands together. "None of you have to miss out on anything; the one who took the test owned up and it turns out that she tested negative."

"What?!" Jody shouted as all of the taunts she'd been listening to since the evening before rushed through her mind. "When were you going to tell me this?!"

"She told me just before Archie's potential foster parents arrived," May-Li replied, holding her hands up. "I was going to tell you as soon as I got the chance."

Crossing her arms and leaning on the door leading out to the lobby, Jody huffed. "It was Ella, wasn't it?"

"You know I can't tell you that."

Jody clenched her fists at the typical, unfair and downright infuriating response. She (and Tyler) had been subjected to some of the worst gossip and humiliation she'd ever faced throughout her whole life and now she wasn't even allowed to clear her own name. How unjust was that?!

"So that's it?!" she spat. "Tyler and I don't even get an apology? You know, he texted me earlier to say that he was really struggling to keep Sally away from here. She just couldn't understand why he didn't want her to be around his friends."

"I'll ask the others to apologise to the both of you when Tyler gets back," May-Li responded, appearing to be apologetic. Jody understood the privacy policy and why May-Li had to adhere to it but that did nothing to make her feel less like she'd been let down. "Is that okay?"

"It's not okay," she muttered, shaking her head. "We both know that they're all still going to think that it was me."

"I'm sorry, Jody," May-Li apologised, smiling sadly. "My hands are tied."

Realising there was nothing left to be said, Jody turned around and left the office, spotting Ella disappearing through the front door on her way out. She narrowed her eyes - Ella seemed to go out an awful lot for someone who had no friends in Pottiswood. May-Li's hands were tied which was fair enough given she'd almost lost her job a couple of weeks ago but Jody's weren't; there were no legally binding rules stopping her from exposing Ella. If Mike and May-Li couldn't clear her name for her, she'd just have to do it herself.

.:. QK .:.

"Jody, just leave it," Tyler warned exasperatedly from the other end of the line as Jody boarded the local bus. "People are still going to think what they want about us, no matter what you tell them about Ella."

She groaned, walking all the way to the back of the bus and sitting in a window seat. She'd expected Tyler to be behind her one hundred per cent on her mission to expose Ella but to her surprise and dismay, he was wholly uninterested and had even been actively discouraging her since the very beginning. She didn't understand why. Did he want everyone to think they were doing the nasty every time they went off alone together?

"They'll believe us when they see the proof."

"But what proof? You're just going to get into heaps of trouble when Mike and May-Li find out you're stalking her!"

"Photographic evidence," she replied, gazing out of the window. "Since when do you care about getting into trouble?"

"Since I went up against Mike and May-Li and ended up getting all of our plans cancelled!"

"The April and May plans are back on! We'll get the cinema and the bowling back too!"

"Look, Jody, I'm not going to help you with this one but I won't tell anyone either."

"That's fine by me!" she exclaimed before hanging up, sinking in her seat when one of the elderly women sitting in front of her turned around to look at her.

On the day she'd decided to clear her name, Jody had enlisted Sasha to help her find out where Ella's regular haunts were. Within a few days, Sasha had reported back with her replacement's daily movements and was able to place her as being at a particular local park at the same time every day. Not only that, but Ella was always seen in the company of a random man who gave her money before sneaking off with her for a few minutes. Jody wasn't naive; only one type of woman took money from men on a regular basis in exchange for a few minutes of her time.

Soon enough, Jody reached her stop and got off the bus after a couple of very slow elderly people, spotting Ella sitting on a park bench in plain view of the bus stop. As the bus pulled away, she ducked and hid behind the walled section of the park's perimeter. She was wearing a rarely seen skirt - an appropriate disguise for someone like her - and a wig she'd nicked from Candi-Rose (it surprisingly wasn't pink) but being extra careful couldn't hurt. Inching towards the fenced section of the perimeter, she got her mobile camera out and positioned it between two of the fence's bars.

Ella was breaking the law. All it'd take was a couple of pictures and she'd be putty in Jody's hands; she'd admit to being the one who took that wretched test in exchange for the destruction of the evidence, and Jody would finally be able to breathe easy. Her housemates' teasing of her and Tyler had got so much worse since the pregnancy test scandal and she could only take so much more of it before she exploded in a fit of rage. Even boxing couldn't fix this one.

After a few minutes of waiting, a middle-aged man of medium build approached Ella and kissed her cheek. As he pulled something out of his jacket's inner pocket and handed it to Ella, Jody took picture after picture after picture. She smiled as the man put his arm around the seventeen-year-old and led her away. Her victory was imminent.

.:. QK .:.

It was nearly dark when Jody got back home so she snuck in through the back gate and sat down on the green garden bench. Taking her (Candi-Rose's) wig off and shoving it in her bag, she peered up to check if Ryan or Jay were watching her from their respective windows but relaxed when she saw that both boys had their curtains drawn.

"Jody!" she heard Mike call and she turned to see that he was popping his head around the patio door. "Come inside, it's getting dark!"

"Okay, Mike!" she responded loudly, standing up and hoping that her wearing a skirt didn't raise alarm bells in his mind. She scampered inside, receiving side-long glances from both Mike and May-Li who were in the dining room.

"Where've you been all day?" May-Li questioned as she sauntered towards the cooker. Dinner smelt delicious.

"I've been in the garden the last two hours," Jody lied automatically, surprised by how easily the falsehood had tumbled out of her mouth. "I went to the park before that."

Mike and May-Li exchanged a disbelieving glance right in front of Jody before the former told her to go upstairs and put her bag away. As Jody walked through the lobby, she was wonderstruck by how quiet it was. Where was everyone? Oh well, at least no one was around to see her in a skirt.

Quickly going to her room, Jody ditched the skirt and changed into normal clothes before running into Tyler's room and slamming the door shut behind her.

"Oh come on in, no need to knock(!)" he chimed sarcastically, standing next to his bed as he held a towel around his hair.

"Hi!" she replied unabashedly, giving him a once over. He was in a different outfit to the one he'd worn straight after getting back home from school. "Did you just have a shower? At this time of day?"

"Not by choice," he mumbled, his voice tinged with ire. "Taz and Finn chucked paint all over me."

She giggled uncharacteristically, still high from taking incriminating pictures of Ella. "Oh why wasn't I here to see that?! I can't believe I missed it!"

"Haha," he said dryly, though she could see the corners of his lips twitching. "Anyway, how did it go? Did Sasha give you the right name?"

"Are you sure you want to know?" she asked, walking over to where he was. "What if you get into heaps of trouble?"

"Can't get into any more trouble than I'm already in," he stated, putting his hair towel on the radiator. Jody bit her lip at the state of his hair; it looked horrendously frizzy but cute at the same time. Oh, God, her euphoria was turning her brain into mush. "After you went out, Mike gave me a good talking to for... never mind. Just tell me."

Jody took a deep breath, pulling her phone out and going to the gallery. She inched closer to Tyler, flicking through the pictures of Ella receiving money from her client and disappearing off with him. "Posh Miss Ella Mansfield is a prostitute."

"No way!" Tyler exclaimed, his eyes glued to the mobile phone screen. "Mike and May-Li would kick her out if they knew..."

"She obviously took the test because she thought she was pregnant by this old fart!" Wrinkling her nose in distaste, she scoffed at Ella's audacity. "I can't believe she tried to frame me when she was such a... such a huge slut all along! She needs to get real and own up!"

"Too right!" he agreed, looking past her shoulder at something. "It's time for dinner. We'd better get downstairs."

"Yeah," she concurred, putting her phone in her pocket and following him to the door. As they stepped outside, she noticed that Alex's, Finn's, and Archie and Joseph's rooms' doors were all open but they were nowhere to be seen. "Where is everyone?"

"No idea," he answered as they continued on their way to the dining room.

.:. QK .:.

Sitting down at the head of the table, Jody exchanged a confused look with Tyler, who was sitting on her right, at the lack of people in the dining room. Other than the two of them and their carers, only Charlie, Joseph and Chloe were present. Jody raised an eyebrow at Tyler as Ella joined the fray, sitting down at the other head.

A few minutes later, the missing residents turned up and quickly filled up the empty seats with Finn, Archie and Taz sitting at the breakfast bar. What with fifteen residents, they'd never been more stretched for space. As they dug into their food, Jody noticed a few of the residents talking to each other with their eyes, some of them sharing smiles while others made big eyes at one another. In particular, Candi-Rose and Bird were seemingly warning Floss, Jay and Ryan to keep their mouths shut.

All in all, in an unprecedented move, dinner was a quiet affair. That was until Taz opened her mouth.

"Ella, what's a prostitute?"


A/N: Trust me, this is all going somewhere even though it probably seems as random AF. Hope the warnings didn't put too many of you off.

I had trouble ending this chapter. Just felt like writing and writing.

Thanks to CharlieSMarts12 and yourfire for the reviews. To CharlieSMarts12 - I agree that they'd never put something like teen pregnancy on the show. It's far too mature. To yourfire - I didn't realise I was portraying Jody as a damsel in distress. That was the last sorta girl I wanted her to come across as. Could you maybe point out where I went wrong?