Hello again! I really feel MIA at the minute and it well and truly sucks! I'm just a bit busy with life, but I am still determined to keep the updates going. It would help if I hadn't decided to get obsessed with another TV show too, haha. This chapter was originally going to be longer, but I cut the end off for the start of the next chapter, and you'll see why ;)
Also it's one of my amazing friend Rose's birthday today, so happy birthday sweetie :)
Self beta'd
Enjoy!
Ellie can only stare at Kate as though she's a figment of her own imagination. Well, there's no other way to explain that her and Rachel are in the same room together and things are not getting out of hand. She doesn't give Kate a chance to speak, instead scrambling to get upstairs and away from her, away from everything.
She still feels shaky and panicky, even once inside the comforts of her own room. It's there that she throws herself to her bed and cries harshly into the pillow, content to just cry away the day. But fate seems to have other plans, and moments later the door creaks opens. Ellie doesn't need to look up to know that it's Rachel there, and in spite of the past few weeks, of knowing how she's upset and hurt the woman, all she wants is to be held and told everything is going to be okay.
The bed sinks next to her, a hand delicately brushing along the small of her back. "Hey," the woman whispers. "Ellie," she reaches forward to gently squeeze her shoulder, "sweetheart…"
"Mom," she chokes out, in a voice that she swears isn't her own. Quick as a flash, she's sitting up and staring to the woman, not caring about her dishevelled appearance, or the way the tears refuse to stop. Her pillows gives her no comfort, instead she finds herself manoeuvring toward Rachel's open embrace, suddenly encased in soft, warm arms. "Mommy," Ellie hears herself say, eyes clinching tightly together. A part of her feels childish, for finding comfort in such a simple thing, but a larger part of her struggles to care, not as Rachel holds her so tightly to her chest.
"Shhh," Rachel brushes back the tendrils of hair that're stuck to her wet cheeks, soft eyes finding Ellie's. "Just let it all out."
That she does, crying until her throat is raw and sore, and her face a red, puffy mess of the original. She spies Kate jut lingering at the doorway, but that's honestly the last thing she cares about right now, especially when she almost…when…
Rachel soothes her hand up and down Ellie's back, moving to circular motions. The gentle touch calm her, Ellie managing to find a steady breathing to match that of her mom's. And slowly, finally, the tears begin to make way for words. "I'm so stupid," she confesses, head bowing.
"Hey, hey." Reaching forward, Rachel cups Ellie's chin with her fingers, lifting her gaze. "You are not stupid. Yes, you may have done some stupid things, but you are not stupid, Ellie."
"No – mom… you don't un-understand." Rachel's frown deepens with confusion, "I – I… we – " Her breath hitching halts any further explanation, and Rachel makes another soft cooing noise that makes Ellie sink further into her embrace.
While's Rachel's expression gradually becomes more concerned, she is only successful in working herself up all over again. "It's okay," Rachel says, an arm wrapped tightly around her shoulder, "whatever it is, it's okay."
She sniffles loudly, furiously wiping at her eyes as Rachel continues to stare at her. It isn't until the woman gently calls her name that she can find the courage to speak. "Me and Callum," she harshly whispers out, "we…I was gonna go over to his house today because we were supposed to have sex." She doesn't know what she expects – maybe for Rachel to freak out over the thought of it, or for the woman to instantly berate her. But… but she doesn't. Rachel looks to Ellie with tears swimming in her chocolate eyes, lips pursed tightly together to keep back her words.
But they still come. "Oh Ellie," she eventually starts, "you… why didn't you tell me? I'm – I'm supposed to…" She lifts a hand to her trembling lips, upset shining through, and in an instant Ellie is ridden with both their guilt on her shoulders.
She returns Rachel's vice like grip. "I should have told you… I wish that I had, mom. You always know the right thing to do – you would have told me what I refused to believe from my friends." Rachel peers up at her through her tears, eyes wide, "t-that I'm not ready." Ellie's own tears return, bubbling over the surface while she makes no effort to restrain them this time.
The relief in Rachel is evident, in the way she breathes out as though she'd been waiting on baited breath, or how she holds Ellie in a new way, her arms a protective fortress around the girl. She continues to shush her, to comb soft fingers through Ellie's tangled hair, before the question finally comes. "D-did you…?"
She shakes her head, swallowing thickly. "No, I-I told him no and he wouldn't stop. W-when I said it again and he didn't listen, I… I punched him – in his face." She sniffles loudly, "then we argued for a bit. And the next thing I know I was coming home and feeling… so – mom, I feel awful."
"Hey, this isn't your fault."
Ellie bows her head guiltily, lower lip wobbling. "Yes it is. Vanessa told me not to, but I had to be stupid and go along with it just to prove a point."
"Baby, it's okay." She squeezes her again, "you made a mistake. But that didn't stop you from making the right choice in the end." Though the words should make her feel better, they don't, and she further sinks into Rachel's embrace, content to stay there until her emotions calm from a whirlpool to calm waters. That doesn't look likely any time soon. Instead, she lets the cries choke and suffocate any more potential words, only to encourage Rachel's cooing and comforting.
"You did the right thing," she repeats, ever so softly. Ellie feels a content in her heart that she hasn't felt in a while, after having thought that her ability to do right has become severely deficient.
Lifting a hand, she wipes her nose with the back of her hand, sniffling loudly. The blur of tears over her eyes begins to retreat, too. Until she can see Rachel clearly and as her eyes are tugged to the door by the slightest of movements. Kate is still there, eyes fixated on the pair even as Rachel is completely focused with Ellie, and the girl still clinging to her mom as though her life depends on it.
She gulps thickly, the lump painfully inching back down, and dares to speak. "What is Kate doing here, mom?"
Both heads now turn to look at the woman, who is standing completely out of place. She tightly hugs herself, teeth tugging uncomfortably at her lower lip while those usually confident and unwavering eyes stare back at them in defeat. A deep down yearning shines through her gaze, before she drops her head, decidedly cutting off the pathway into her feelings. Ellie keeps her face stoic, her own lips from trembling and the tears from falling.
Kate dares to take a step into the room, risking another when neither Ellie nor Rachel make a protest. "Ellie… I –"
"She wanted to see you," Rachel cuts her off, eyes darkly moving over to Kate. "She wanted to talk to you."
It's clear as to the reason why that is, though Ellie still finds herself looking toward Kate with curiosity lingering in her eyes. She doesn't know why she expected it to be just like last time, with Kate leaving without anything other than a note. Only this time she doesn't want a note; she still hasn't worked the courage up to ask about the first one. Now, after everything that's happened, the last thing she wants is a note, because there's no way that one measly note can sum up the past few months. No way.
"I don't…" Ellie shakes her head, "I can't –"
"Ellie, please."
She tugs herself from Rachel's tight grip, eyes ablaze. "I can't do this anymore, Kate. The lying, the constant back and forth, you and my parents hating each other. I can't do it." She sucks in a deep breath, chest heaving, "I can't listen to you bitching about Rachel or people telling me how bad you are for me; I don't everyone looking at me like I'm a lost little girl who's in too deep…" She gives out a strangled sound, "because that exactly what I am. And I am so scared, all the time… a-about all the things that I don't know how to fix anymore."
"I never meant for any of this to happen," Kate insists, "I just wanted to know you."
"Oh please, you've made it your mission to disregard me every chance you got," Rachel interjects, eyes hard.
"I don't –"
"Don't even try to deny it," she manages to stand, one hand cradling her bump and the other pointing accusingly at Kate. "Don't you dare say that you didn't! Every opportunity to undermine me was so much fun for you, especially in front of Ellie."
She shakes her head, "it wasn't like that –"
"Stop with all the crap!" Ellie has to do a double take, not only at Rachel yelling, but her cursing, too. "Stop it," she insists, "you can pretend all you like that you just suddenly grew a conscience and decided to find Ellie again, that an abundance of motherly feelings overtook you, because it didn't. I know it didn't. For whatever reason you decided to come back, you only wanted Ellie to yourself, because that's all you can think about. Yourself. You don't care if you drag her down with you while you ruin everything along the way. As long as Ellie likes you, that's all that matters, right?"
"I was jealous, okay?! Is that what you want to hear, Rachel? I didn't intend to act like I did when I first met her, but then I saw the way you two were with each other, and it hurt… it hurt so much. All I wanted was to make the pain go away." Her words shake, body overwrought with her intense feelings.
Rachel's face hardens, "what did you expect? For the entire world to stop the second you left? News flash Kate, life still goes on when you're not there."
"I wasn't ready!" she fires back, "not to see Finn with another woman, to . . . to see Ellie with someone else, too." She bows her head, whispering out, "I wasn't ready."
"So what? You just thought that Finn and Ellie lived their life lamenting the loss of you and living in your shadow?"
She growls in response. "No, I – I wanted her to have her mom. I wanted . . . I . . . is that so bad? To want my daughter to have a mom?" Kate narrows her eyes at Rachel, daring her to speak, to challenge her words.
But it isn't Rachel that it earns a rise out of this time; it's Ellie. "I have a mom, Kate. I've had one since I was seven years old." Her gaze momentarily moves over to Rachel, before snapping back, and suddenly Ellie's on her feet. A thundering heartbeat sounds over everything, but she still begins to speak, unable to damn the flow now that it's started. "Rachel is my mom, she has . . . always been my mom. S-she held me when I was scared of a thunderstorm, she managed to make me smile when I thought I was going to die during my first period, and I . . . I know that no matter what, she will always be there for me." Her breath hitches, "even now, with how I've acted, how upset I've made everyone – she s-still can give me one hug and make me feel like things are going to get better." She has to tear her eyes away from Kate then, unable to even give a few seconds in her direction. Her voice is low and soft as she says, "Rachel is everything that a mom should be."
She doesn't plan on looking over at Rachel, but it somehow happens, her heart clenching tightly when she sees the tears swimming in her chocolate eyes, and the way her lips twitch with the most delicate of smiles. Ellie hopes that her expression conveys at least some of the regret that she feels over all of this, though that thought is torn in two as Kate returns from her silent strike.
"I – Ellie . . ." Suddenly she has two pairs of eyes on her, watching as the oh so put together Kate struggle to keep a hold of herself, eyes red rimmed and tears pushing their way through. Ellie briefly looks to Rachel, who has lost the hard touch to her expression reserved for Kate, and instead her face is awash with sympathy. "I need . . . a few minutes."
With that, she hurries from the doorway that she'd been stuck to for the past few minutes, leaving a shocked Rachel and Ellie behind. Only, it's seconds later that Ellie realizes she's the lone occupant of the room, Rachel apparently having been on Kate's tail surprisingly fast for someone so pregnant.
She hears the clatter of feet down the stairs, the front door opening. Ellie is quick to pursue the pair, unsure of exactly why Rachel is following Kate, but definitely determined to find the answer.
Hurrying down her, she suddenly halts when Kate calls her name in a terrified shriek. When she steps through the already open door, she feels her heart plummet at the sight of Rachel on the floor beneath a slippery looking piece of ice that Ellie had managed to avoid on her way in. "Mom!" she calls, instantly rushing to her side, though mindful of the ice. They really don't need someone else falling. "Mom, are you okay?"
"She was just walking a-and the next thing I know she'd fallen," Kate panics, helping Ellie pull her into a sitting position.
She breathes heavily, hands flat on her stomach. "I'm fine, just . . . just a little fall."
"How did you land?"
"On her back," Kate supplies, eyes concerned. "It sounded pretty bad. Her head hit the pavestone." Ellie's frown deepens, and she feels herself softly rubbing Rachel's back as the woman sits unusually quiet on the floor.
Kate seems to notice too, all evidence of her prior upset gone. "Come on, you should go to the hospital."
"But we – we didn't finish talking," Rachel says, "We need to get everything out befo –"
"Mom, you've got to get the baby checked out. Also your head, the last thing you want right now is a concussion – how do you feel?"
Pulling in a long breath, she hesitates, "I feel dizzy."
"O-okay," Ellie nods, "c'mon on, let's get you up. And we'll go to the hospital just to be sure and I'll call dad and tell him – everything will be okay." The two of them help Rachel stand up, which causes another bout of dizziness that has them sharing a concerned glance. They easily get her inside the car, Ellie sat tightly to her side as Kate drives.
Ellie laughs when she notices Rachel clutching onto the seat; sometimes Kate's driving can be a little scary to her too, especially now that it's an emergency. "You, ah, you get used to the driving," she points out, hoping to make light of the situation. But then she notices the strain of Rachel's expression, the way her eyes flutter open and closed. "Mom?"
"I don't know . . . w-what's wrong, but it h-hurts."
She turns into a frazzled mess, "what is? Where are you hurting, mom? How bad is it?"
The tension disappears then, a breath of relief escaping Rachel. But her eyes remain serious as she looks to Ellie once more, "I really need to go to the hospital." Her features are sewn with worry, forehead creasing tightly together.
"Going as fast as I can," Kate responds.
This continues for the next few minutes, with Rachel's pain ebbing back and forth, until suddenly she sits up straighter, eyes widening a little. When Ellie notices this she gives a questioning look, wishing she could climb inside Rachel's mind and see what she's thinking.
It doesn't take that, however, as Rachel is more than happy to share. "I think – I think I'm in labor," she confesses, a harsh whisper that's full of fear and worry and upset. Ellie gives a look that practically mirrors that.
"Y-you what?"
"I – the fall, it must've done something. And I," she pauses as her face tenses once more, eyes shut, "I think I'm having contractions."
Ellie can only hear the sound of her own heart palpitations, blood pounding in her ears. Faintly, as though listening to someone underwater, she hears herself say, "Oh crap."
I know, another cliffhanger *hears all your sighs*. I need help, seriously! Someone ought to take my laptop off me to stop this from happening.
Anyway, please review :)