ANONYMOUS

"Jal's fucked up worse than any of us but it doesn't all have to turn to shit."

Chris's happiness immediately melted away. He didn't know what Michelle was talking about, but there was no reaction so he was obviously the only one who didn't. He couldn't focus on all the crap Michelle and Cassie were still spouting at each-other, and even though Chris could feel his skin going cold, his insides were burning up, squeaming in nervousness and fear. It felt like his throat had been cut off and his mouth was so dry he thought he'd never be able to speak up. But then Chris remembered Jal and he needed to get the words out. He couldn't risk being left out when it came to Jal.

"Guys, how's Jal fucked up?"

No-one answered him. Chris knew it must be something important because they were all avoiding his eye-contact. But then the door opened, and Chris knew it had to be Jal because she was the only one apart from Cassie who had a key. And he knew what the sound of her heels was like on the floor and how she seemed to walk to some sort of beat, like there was always music playing in her head. Chris imagined he'd probably spent too much time in bed trying to justify discharging himself from hospital and making Jal having to change his balls' bandages; she was the only thing he had to think about. But now it was as if his brain was going into overload. He looked at Jal, and she looked happy and beautiful - though to be fair, anyone could be beautiful if they sat in hospital with you for two weeks solid and looked after your cock - but now it seemed like she had something to hide. She hadn't been quite the same with him for a long time now, and Chris had assumed that it was just down to exam stress and then him being ill, but now he recalled all the times when she'd decided not to shag him just as they'd got into bed, or arrived late at his flat even though she'd finished school hours ago. Was she fucking someone else? It would be pay-back, for when he fucked her over with Angie. In fact, Chris thought it sounded pretty conceivable.

"Hi! Sorry, the train was late, and..."

He stared right at her, watching how her face fell, and how her eyes seemed so devastated when she looked at him. Sometimes he felt like he'd managed to fuck up her life ten times worse than he fucked up his own, because at the end of the day, if Chris died, he thought only Jal would miss him, but if Jal died, he knew the whole world would miss her.

"What have you done?"

Jal dropped her bags, and she instantly looked at Michelle and Cassie. It was obvious to Chris that all her feisty Jal-ness had just sort of evaporated and she stumbled over to Chris and sunk down on the floor in front of him. She looked like a baby again, like when he'd found her in the bathroom crying, or when they had been at that club and she'd drank all that shit coffee. He glanced up for one minute, and he saw that everyone else had slunk out of the room silently, either embarrassed or ashamed, Chris supposed. There were noises coming from Cassie's room, and Chris had no doubt to what she and Sid were doing, but for the first time in his life, he was able to filter out the sounds. It was like he'd managed to learn Jal's trick of playing your own music in your head so loud you couldn't hear anything else. Except for this time, Chris knew that the white, silent track wasn't just in his head, but it was taking up Jal's head too.

Chris couldn't take his eyes off Jal. She looked almost green, not with sickness, but with fear. He wanted to know why she was scared of him. Maybe it was all Chris's fault, and he'd turned her into this tired, worried person by being so difficult and not staying in hospital like she wanted him to, and by still smoking his spliffs even though she begged him not to. She even left the room when he lit up, and although Chris always knew that Jal wasn't exactly the most liberal when it came to his drugs and pills, he knew that she'd never reacted this badly. Now Chris was certain that she'd been having an affair, purely because he'd screwed her up so much, there wouldn't be anything else left for her to do.

"Have you been fucking Kenneth?"

Chris watched Jal, in a heap on the floor, slowly rise her head, that green fear even stronger in her eyes now.

"Fuck off. I can't believe you'd even think I'd do that."

Her voice had gone quiet and it was croaky, as if it was taking all her energy to stop tears falling down her face. He thought this was the worse he'd ever seen her. It was better when she had withdrawn from him, and it seemed to hurt her every time she had to change his bandages or prop him up in bed or feed him chocolate milk through a straw. Now Chris realised she was dependent on him, and he didn't know what would happen if he let her down again.

Suddenly, Jal's whole body went white and tiny goosebumps rose all over her skin. She stiffened, still gazing up at him with that devastatingly-Bambi-alike look, like a child, and it looked like all the fire alarms had gone off in her head. Her body heaved, and Jal hauled herself up from the floor, and half crawled, half ran in to the bathroom. She hadn't closed the door, and Chris just stared at her. He watched her throwing up, her head hanging over the toilet weakly. He didn't understand what was going on. His brain wouldn't fucking work. He couldn't think anything. He just watched, the white music still clouding up his brain. He kept watching as she flushed the toilet, crawled over to the sink and had to pull herself up by holding the basin. He stared at how she cried, splashing her face with water to clean herself up, even though her tears just kept streaming from her eyes. He watched them drop into the sink, falling past the thin gold heart necklace which he'd paid Michelle to buy for her when he was in hospital. He imagined how they were swallowed up in the water puddle in the sink, waves rippling around them as they joined the rest of the clear liquid. Chris thought of how fucked up water really was. It was the stuff that kept you alive, but at the same time it also stuck around when you were at your worst, and it tortured Chris to see all the water that was cascading, literally, out of Jal.

He couldn't keep watching her like this. It was the first time that he'd ever felt like he'd seen something he shouldn't have around Jal, apart from the time in Year 10 when he'd hid in the girl's locker room and saw her changing her top after Cassie had chucked her lunch all over her school blouse in a bid to prove that she wasn't hungry and she really didn't have a problem. It was also the first time that Chris felt really uncomfortable. He distracted himself by walking over to the sofa and slowly sitting down on it, focussing all his attention on lowering himself completely by arm-power. He didn't bend his knees, but tried to hold them out in front of him as if he was an Olympic gymnast, his hands grappling onto one of the arms and the back of the sofa.

"What the fuck are you doing?"

He didn't notice that Jal had been watching him from the bathroom door. He let go, collapsing into the cushions and watched as she followed him. But Jal didn't seem like she had any arm-power. She just sank down next to him, folding her legs under her.

"You can't do that right now, Chris," Jal whispered so quietly, Chris was only just able to hear her, "you're going to make yourself ill again. I can't cope with you getting ill again. You need to stick around, okay? I need you."

Chris laced his arm around her, pulling her stiff body into a hug. She was shivering, even though she still had her yellow cardigan on.

"What's going on, Jal? What have you fucked up?"

Jal blinked tears again. She looked down, avoiding his eye contact.

"I'm pregnant."

Chris felt dumb. He couldn't move. Everything was flashing through his mind. How many times had she tried to tell him and he'd made it a hundred times more difficult? Maybe she'd told him before and he was too pilled up to remember. He hated himself for being so difficult. Why did he always have to make life so hard?

He squeezed her hand and turned round pulling Jal so she was right in front of him. He knew it was easier when they didn't look at each-other, but Chris thought they needed to. They sat for ages, just looking at each-other. Chris wanted to look at her stomach. He didn't know what he was looking for exactly, but for some reason he had this ridiculous urge just to touch her, to feel the blood under skin like he had before so many times, but tonight it would be different. It would be his blood there too. Chris thought how weird it was to be having someone else's blood in you. He knew he did, he'd had transfusions, but this was really fucked up. His blood was inside Jal. It was fascinating how G-d made shit to be so disgusting and amazing at the same time. Chris felt like he was in a shop selling the best quality pills in the world and they were all free.

Chris wanted to give her his present. He had been saving it for Christmas. He'd written the letter a few days ago, writing for the first time since the operation. Of course, he had to borrow Jal's pen, but luckily he'd managed to convince her to go back to school for one day while he wrote it in bed. There had been one last day after the exams when Year 13 had a massive final party, spraying silly string all over the college and laughing at Year 12 who had to hang around for another year. He'd heard that it had been awkward though. Jal told him that no-one spoke to her normally, even the teachers, because they'd known what happened to him. He suspected they knew about her pregnancy as well, if she'd been to see the school nurse or talked to Claire, her clarinet teacher. Chris wouldn't have been surprised if the whole school knew. But at the time, Chris hadn't, and he'd written all that crap about having kids. The locket was in his room, inside his spliff box. He didn't know anywhere else to put it where Jal would never look. Chris had picked it himself. He cut out the photo himself and ripped the sheet music out of her book. Even though he'd given her necklaces before, like the one she was wearing now, but this one was extra special. He'd spent more money on it than he had before. He'd saved his pill money for two months to buy it. Real, solid gold. He wanted to give it to Jal now, but he didn't want to get up and leave her. Chris decided to give it to her tomorrow, when she was feeling better and they could sort out this tiny little anonymous issue completely.

He kissed her softly, not wanting to shock Jal. He could see her skin up close as he drew back slowly: she was all red and puffy around the eyes and cheeks from crying; it looked almost like she'd been bruised.

"Don't hurt, Jal."

She looked at her stomach, and Chris gulped as he followed her gaze. Everything meant something completely different now.

"What am I going to do?"

"We'll work it out, I promise."

He watched a small smile play on her lips for a split second. Chris knew it was because he hadn't left her alone. He hadn't believed that it was only her problem. In fact, it was probably more problematic that Chris didn't even think it was a problem.

"It isn't that easy, is it? I want to go to university. How can I play the clarinet with a baby?"

"We'll follow you round. You can be playing in fucking Africa or something and we'll watch. And it'll be fine, honest. We'll be like those fucking Austrians of that Julie Walters' film."

"I think you mean Julie Andrews. Julie Walters' Ron's mum off Harry Potter."

"That'll do. We'll be like the Weasleys."

"They've got seven kids."

"In time, Jal, in time."

"You don't understand, Chris. I think I want...I think I want to..."

Jal looked down again.

Neither of them could quite say it.

"I'm sorry."

"Nah, babe, it's, it's...fine. It's your fucking body isn't, after all? And all that shit."

The 'shit' bounced off the walls. He hadn't meant it to, but Chris realised he'd said perhaps a little too aggressively.

"Anyways, you wouldn't want to mess up your tits, would you? They're fucking fantastic. Perfect, in fact."

He thought he'd seen a smile, but right now, Chris couldn't be sure of anything. He imagined how massive her tits would get if she changed her mind. They were already bigger. Chris hadn't thought about pregnant people's tits much before, but it seemed entirely normal to want to fuck Jal now, even though it would have seemed majorly disgusting if it was any other girl up the duff. It wasn't an option anyway. There was a hole in his balls, and well, Jal was, most definitely, pregnant.

"How long have we got?"

"Two weeks. It's over four months."

"The baby's four months old?"

"Seventeen weeks, Chris."

Chris let his mind wander. He was still holding Jal, but it was Jal and this seventeen-week old blob as well. He wondered what it would like to be a dad. He wouldn't drop it, like he'd dropped Sammy. But Chris knew that it wasn't going to get much older, probably.

"How do they....do it?"

"Chris..."

"Please, Jal. What are they gonna do to you?"

"They...they have to stretch...and then they take it away with these...forceps."

"Forceps?"

"They're like tongs, I think."

"Oh," Chris held Jal tighter, not wanting let her go, "won't that hurt?"

"Chris..."

"I don't want you getting hurt, alright?"

"They give you anaesthetic."

"See! That's a fucking operation! That's no different to what I had."

Jal stayed silent. Chris couldn't see her face - he'd tucked her head under his chin - but he could tell she was wiping her eyes. He didn't want to make her cry.

"Can I come with you?"

"When they..."

"I'll have to make sure they don't fuck you over, won't I? You'll need protecting."

Jal kissed Chris's hand, curling into him more.

"Thank you."

"I won't fuck it up again, Jal. And I will be a good dad, one day. I'm not going to fuck it up like my mum and dad did. We won't fuck it up like our parents did."

"One day, Chris."

"You promise? One day?"

"Yes, Chris. When we can afford it, when we've got jobs and my dad isn't breathing down my neck."

"Is he?"

"Are you surprised?"

"No."

He hugged her even tighter. Chris knew it would make her sad but he couldn't resist, just in case he never got a chance to do it again: he slipped his hand under her top and rested it on her stomach. He stroked it with his thumb, feeling how it was more rounded and protruded than normal, and how sometimes it seemed to change shape very, very slightly under his hand, as if whatever was in there was moving. Suddenly he felt a tiny nudge in his palm. Jal shifted on top of him, as if she was trying to stop it from happening.

"No, don't. Stay still."

Jal almost whimpered, as if she was scared of something, scared of getting attached to this nameless thing, and of Chris getting attached too. But she stayed still for him, and they lay on the sofa together spooning, and Chris laid his hand flat on her stomach.

There were only tiny movements, barely noticeable, but Chris could feel them faintly. Jal could feel them more strongly, but she'd spent the past fortnight trying not to, and had learnt not to respond physically, even if it made her feel like crying inside. She'd spent hours on the internet, reading stupid baby websites, wondering what exactly was going on, but she still refused to acknowledge that it was really inside of her. She knew the facts, she knew that she'd been feeling it move a week or so earlier than it would have been expected to, but Jal thought that it was only because it wouldn't leave her alone. It had to keep reminding her that it was there, still anonymous and unknown, but there. All eight inches and six ounces of it, with its eyelashes, eyebrows and miniscule lungs.

They stayed on the sofa for hours, half falling asleep, half wide awake thinking. Jal checked her watch when she woke up properly. It was already four o' clock. She tried to move, but his hand was still firmly clamped over her stomach. He hadn't slept. He'd been up all night, feeling the baby, loving it, and she'd just let him. It made everything harder.

She liked Chris's reaction, not hating her, not running away like the old Chris would have done, but it made her feel bad. She wanted him to want her, and this baby, but she wanted her to want it to, and she didn't know whether just wanting it was enough. Jal had always been sensible, and she knew it was distinctly un-sensible to force a kid into the world with two skint parents, one of which could die at any second and the other which wouldn't be able to cope if he did. She remembered the words of the nurse at the hospital.

It's hereditary. The brother died of it.

"Chris?"

"Yes?"

Jal could feel his whisper in her ear and his foot as it threaded through hers, forcing her closer to him. Jal knew he wasn't only forcing her towards him though, but also the baby. It made her feel even worse.

"What happens if..."

"What?"

"If it happens again? The haemorrhage..."

"It won't. I'll give up the spliff for you. I promise. No more pills. I'll have my last one with Cass tonight, and then it'll be clean. I won't do it to you again."

Jal breathed in, closing her eyes. They were words she'd wanted to hear for so long, but he'd misunderstood.

"I meant...what happens if it happens later too?"

Jal braved herself to put her hand over his. It was the first time she'd properly embraced it, in some way, without thinking multiple swear words and crying and being nervous that everything was going to get completely fucked up. It was nice having someone there to help her.

"I don't know."

"Don't...don't touch anymore Chris, please."

Chris moved his hand, now resting it on top of her shirt and slightly lower, tilting her hips backwards over his. He didn't want to let go, he could have stayed there forever, but Jal seemed so vulnerable and fragile that he couldn't risk upsetting her again. Christ, he was fucking fragile right now too, having been reminded of the doubt that even if they did ever have kids, this plague wouldn't kill them off as well. He couldn't comprehend losing someone else, even if they were anonymous or non-existent, like he'd lost Peter.

"I love you Jalapeno."

"I love you more."

Chris laughed softly, both of them barely whispering while the light of the early morning crept in through the windows.

"S' not fucking possible."

"Well, I'm loving for two, aren't I?"

Chris could feel her pulse speeding up as he leant his head on her shoulder, and he suspected that it was the first time she had referred to the baby as something that was part of her, let alone him.

He kissed her neck and her shoulder, wrapping his leg over hers.

"It's time for me to change your bandages, probably."

"Oh. Thanks."

They got up from the sofa and Chris re-arranged himself. Jal got the medical kit out of her bag; she'd decided she should have one as well in case Chris forgot where he put his. Jal worked quickly, pulling the old padding off gently - she'd done it so many times, she'd learned how to do it."

"Fancy giving me the old, er - blowy, Jal?"

Jal giggled, hitting him on the arm softly.

"There's a hole in your bollocks, mate. I dunno what I'd end up with in my mouth."

"Fair play." Chris shrugged.

He watched her sort him out. He liked her being his nurse. He wanted to be her nurse too, in how many fucking weeks it would take. But Chris knew it wasn't going to happen.

"I need to go home now, Chris."

Jal looked at him from her kneeling position on the floor, throwing the medical kit in her bag. She was wiping her hands with a baby wipe, scrounging her skin of the essence of Chris.

"Do you have to?"

"Yes. I've got a clarinet lesson in an hour."

Chris was beginning to hate the fucking clarinet. If it wasn't for the stupid thing, Jal might not have any doubts about keeping his kid.

"Can't you stay for longer?"

"I've been here all night."

"Please. I love you."

"I love you too, don't forget. I'll come back tomorrow. I've got to see my dad; he'll be worked up about my audition. It was my last chance. If I don't get in to the Royal College..."

You'll keep my kid, won't you? I'll settle for the last resort.

"How did it go?"

"Good, Chris."

Fuck.

"I would be a good dad, you know. I'd take him to the park and do football and shit like that. I won't fuck it up."

"I know, Chris. But I might."

"You wouldn't fuck up anything, Jal. You can do anything. It'll be like a perfect family, and..."

He stopped when he saw her crying again. He couldn't avoid it now they were both sat up opposite each-other. He couldn't continue pretending not to notice.

"I've never had good parents. My own mum left me, and she only came back to tell me to get rid of it," Chris's heart jumped as he saw her rest her hand on her stomach, as if she didn't want to let go, "How do I know I won't be like that? We'll have kids one day, Chris. But right now, I need my music. I'd go crazy without it."

Chris stood up as she did, and kissed her. He held on for longer, not wanting to let Jal go, and what was inside her. She dropped her phone onto the table inbetween his door and the kitchen, forgetting to keep her hand wrapped tightly around it. He wrapped one arm around her waist, pulling her closer, and slipped the other between them; his hand was pressed up against her swollen abdomen. He held her until he felt another nudge. Chris treated it as if it was a goodbye, or at least a farewell. Shalom, even.

"I'll see you later."

"I'll see you later, Chris."

She kissed him once more, and left with her bag and clarinet, shutting the door behind her. Chris was in the room alone. He hated it.

Chris wandered into his room and sat down in his boxers, pulling off his pyjama top. He picked up his pills. Not the blue ones. Not the round ones. Not even the ones with smiley faces on. The ones he was meant to take.

He felt crushed. It hurt more than all of his head-aches, hangovers and comedowns. And this time, it really mattered. For the first time, Chris hurt completely on behalf of someone else.