Sorry this isn't my best work, got a lot on my mind tonight. Next chapter will be up asap. Please review x

x x x x

September 12 1973

She would be insulted if she wasn't so relieved that nobody had noticed that her clothes were getting bigger. Not that she needed to worry; her baby bump was remarkably small for seven months. She knew enough about pregnancy to know that it was too late to get rid of it now, but she had yet to figure out what she was going to do. She had been doing some background reading, courtesy of the library, and had been looking into the various options.

Adoption?

Surrogacy?

Leaving it outside a hospital?

She even considered taking it to the police station and claiming she found it, but after thinking about the logistics she decided that it was too risky. Someone might work it out.

Either way, one thing she was certain of. She could not tell her mother.

X x x

One thought that had been playing on her mind a lot recently was the little issue of childbirth. She didn't know what it was like, but she had it on good word that it was bad.

As the day loomed ever closer, horror stories filled her head. She started to wonder whether she had made a mistake by deciding to keep the baby. She had no idea what the birth was going to be like but she knew it was going to be messy and it would hurt like hell.

One day, sitting at the breakfast table while her mom flitted about the kitchen doing whatever she did on her day off, curiosity got the better of her.

"Mom," Catherine questioned, "what's it like, having a baby?" Lily whirled on her, one eyebrow raised. "It's for a biology assignment." The teenager covered quickly. Well, she wasn't really lying, was she?

"Oh." Lily nodded, placated. "Well, it hurts." She stated bluntly. Cath swallowed hard.

"How much?" She asked tentatively.

"A lot." Lily continued to add to Cath's fears. "But," she continued after a moment. "When it's all over and the baby's born, it's the best feeling in the world." She bent down and kissed Catherine's head softly before taking her cereal bowl to wash. Catherine thought about this for a moment.

"Do you regret it?" She asked at last.

"What?"

"Having kids." Lily didn't even hesitate to answer.

"Oh no. I love you and your sister more than the world." She insisted. "Even if you are turning me grey." She joked, ruffling her daughter's hair as she drifted past, disappearing into the lounge to continue her cleaning spree.

Subconsciously, Catherine rested a hand on her stomach.

X x x

She didn't know whether she'd pissed off some deity or the universe just had it in for her, but it was just her misfortune that her mother had started checking her timetable and the school had started phoning home if she didn't attend. To add salt to that wound, today she had gym class. And this time, she had run out of excuses.

Stood as far away from anyone else as she could get, she practically climbed into her locker to get changed. She changed into her shorts first, leaving her thick jumper on for as long as possible. When she finally had to remove it, she whipped it off and pulled her t-shirt on over her tank-top as hurriedly as humanly possible. Tucked in it highlighted her bump more so she left it loose, and hoped to God that she wasn't expected to be upside down at all today.

Mercifully, it was not gymnastics, so no hanging upside down for her today. The downside of that was, it was dodge ball. And dodge ball meant balls flying with great speed at her general stomach area.

For the first half hour she was doing great. Never had she dodged so many balls.

It was towards the end of the class that it all went pear-shaped. One of the lads, a big guy who was renowned for his athletic ability, apparently got fed up of a small cocky guy that had been dodging his aims all class and hurled it full force at the kid. Unfortunately for Cath, he wasn't only cocky he was quick too and ducked easily out of the way. The ball came hurtling towards her so fast she didn't know which way to duck. So she froze. It took her out from the right hand side, sending her sprawling to the ground with a grunt of pain.

The whistle blew and the class was dismissed, but Catherine couldn't move.

"Get up Flynn." Coach Jackson yelled, standing over her. Slowly she picked herself up, stumbling her way back to the changing rooms. "Get a shower and straight to next lesson girls!" He called through the door, making her wince at the voice.

Shower? Don't think so.

She sat on the bench, catching her breath back after it had been knocked out of her. Stiffly, she started to get dressed, opting to pull her sweater over her Phys Ed. T-shirt rather than take it off. She gathered her things and departed for her next class, English thankfully (no great physical exertion required) but for the remainder of the day, and the days to come, she had a horrible feeling that the blow had done some form of damage to the baby. Something just didn't feel right. She was convinced that she was going to lose it, with just a month to go.

However, as she was to find out in 4 short days time, the blow had done quite the opposite.