"EEEEEEE! Ohmygod!" Imogen squealed as she pulled Harper and Tom into a bone-crushing hug.
Harper had sent a text in their group chat, telling Imogen, Danni, and Parker to meet them at Hank's. It was time to break the news to her friends, too.
Danni wore a face that said 'I told you so,' but she was ecstatic for them at the same time, and she and Parker joined in on the group hug as well.
Then came the onslaught of questions from an excited Imogen. "Ohmygod, Harper, congrats! When are you due? You guys know if it's a boy or girl yet? Can we go shopping this weekend? Eek! I'm so happy for you guys!"
"I think you just broke Imogen," Danni joked, grinning.
"First off, they said sometime around March 14th," Harper replied, giggling at her friend's enthusiasm. "And second, I think it's still too early to tell. But Tom and I decided to keep it a surprise."
Harper then slid a picture over to Imogen. "But look, we got our first sonogram today."
Imogen grinned as she held the picture up to the light, Danni and Parker huddling closer to get look at it as well. "Awww, look at that tiny little bean!" she exclaimed.
"Wait, Tom, weren't you going back to Hartfeld next month?" Parker inquired. "I know you guys have done the whole long distance thing before, but now that...you know..."
"Yeah, change of plans," Tom said. "We're staying in Pine Springs for the time being. Harper and I already talked about it."
Parker nodded. "Glad you guys got it all figured out."
"Hah! Doesn't feel like it," Tom chuckled, rubbing the back of his neck nervously. "I'm honestly terrified."
Harper nodded in agreement.
"Ah, it's your first kid, of course you're gonna be scared," Parker smiled, clapping Tom on the shoulder. "But seriously, I'm happy for you guys. You're gonna be great parents, I know it."
The five of them spent the rest of the day hanging out along Lakeview Boulevard, talking, laughing, and swapping stories about their latest adventures.
The months passed by rapidly for the anxious couple. Harper and Tom were able to find a two-bedroom apartment in downtown Pine Springs with the help of Imogen and Arthur. Elliot, of course, would come to visit them and vice versa. When Harper wasn't out doing odd jobs around Pine Springs, or going with Tom on a call, she would be lounging around at home, which of course she got bored with. Luckily, her friends would come over to keep her company, and sometimes the girls would take her out on shopping sprees, along with the occasional drive to Westchester with Tom to visit his parents and friends. Tom and Harper texted each other throughout the day, and he was met with her embrace every day when he got home from work. They often spent the evenings in each other's arms. As Harper was getting bigger, she liked to lounge around the house wearing Tom's shirts and hoodies, which he found adorable.
They debated on the gender - Tom, surprisingly, thought it was a girl, while Harper was set on it being a boy. As time progressed, Tom doted on his girlfriend ridiculously, which she insisted she didn't need, but he still did so - he would make her favorite meals, get her ridiculous cravings, deal with her mood swings (in which she would go from yelling at him furiously to crying and kissing him in a matter of seconds) and every single second he was around her, it seemed, he told her he loved her.
Harper felt odd having something growing inside her. She would touch her growing stomach and just stare at it at times, wondering about the little life inside her, that she was admittedly excited to meet someday soon. She would inspect herself in secret, and sometimes Tom would catch her and at times he would keep quiet and watch her admiringly, while other times he would question her on her actions. Harper would try to scramble away and make up an excuse, but Tom would simply shake his head and pull her into his arms, kissing her and telling her he was excited, too.
The pregnancy progressed gradually, normally. However, panic struck one night, paralyzing the couple. Harper slept beside Tom, his arms wrapped around her rounded stomach possessively. Elliot was spending the night in the other room. It happened in a flash - Harper didn't even know what was happening.
She turned in his arms, snuggling closer, but tangling her legs in his. She was awoken with a start, however, when she felt the sheets below her become wet. Sitting up quickly, she pulled away the blankets, and much to her horror, a pool of blood sat below her.
Tom groggily sat up alongside her, confused by her sudden stirring, and when he saw what her eyes were so focused upon, instant panic set in his brain. As Harper sat there, he jumped up and out of the bed, trying to shake her out of her horrified stupor.
"Harper." She didn't say anything, tears forming in her eyes. "Harper." Nothing. "Harper!"
"T-Tom," she cried, pointing at the growing mass of red liquid and feeling warm tears fall down her cheeks.
"Harper, we need to get you to the hospital. Now!" Tom told her quickly, panic reaching his heart and making it pound wildly. Elliot stood in the doorway, having been awoken by the commotion.
"What's going on, guys?" It only took two seconds for Elliot's eyes to adjust to the mess before him, and they widened. "Oh my god!" Elliot ran to the bathroom, retrieving some much-needed towels. He rushed to Harper's side and he and Tom placed them around a panicking Harper.
As they cleaned her up, Tom slowly got her out of the bed, and when she clenched over in pain and tears poured from her eyes, he immediately pulled her into his arms. Turning to Elliot, a mess of words escaped from his mouth. "I-I'm going to take her to the hospital. Are you...coming with us, or...or..." The fright in Tom's voice was very prevalent, and Elliot nodded at him hastily.
"Just go, Tom! I'll call Grandpa, just go!"
Tom grabbed one of his hoodies, which he covered Harper in, who wouldn't say a word beyond the frantic muttering escaping her lips.
As he ran for the front door, narrowly escaping tripping several times, he swore his apartment doubled in size because he never remembered the trip being so long. The look of pure agony on Harper's face pushed him forward, and he ran for the car desperately.
"Harper," he whispered to her as he gently laid her across the back seat. "You're gonna be okay. He's gonna be okay, too." She simply clutched his jacket around her closer, crying harder at the sound of his voice.
Tom got in the car and floored it to the hospital, adrenaline pumping through his veins. When they finally arrived, he rushed into the emergency room, Harper in his arms, scaring the nurse at the front desk. The young woman was all but prepared for the sight that entered at three in the morning.
She didn't even have time to ask as Tom jumbled out his words. "S-she...I don't what's going on with her...but she's bleeding everywhere. Please, help h-her." The mousy woman simply nodded at Tom, trying not to stare at the mess of blood that had pooled on the backside of his jacket. She was young - she hadn't been in the business long enough to have seen this kind of thing up close, but she'd read about it. She just hoped she was prepared to deal with a real life case of it.
She hastily directed him into a room, and instructed him to place the silently bawling Harper onto the bed. She went to exit the room, but before she could, a slew of older, more experienced nurses came from somewhere and entered the room.
They began to whisper frantically amongst themselves, Tom staring between them and Harper wildly, clutching her hand as though it would stop the steady flow of blood beneath her.
Quickly, an older woman stepped forward, and without a second to waste, asked him what had happened. Poor Tom explained the suddenness of the event and just how much blood there was and how scared both of them were. The nurses - not including the younger one - quickly got to work on Harper, who was losing mass amounts of blood as they spoke.
The older woman from before propped Harper up on some pillows and removed Tom's now blood-stained, ruined jacket. He felt sick at the sight of it, but quickly turned his attention to Harper, who still had tears running down her face, but whose eyes were lidded with the exhaustion and blood loss that was looming over her.
"Harper," he clutched her hand, squeezing it to keep her conscious. Harper's eyes slowly traveled over to meet his, tears spilling from them, uncontrolled. Her expression radiated pure fright, and he felt helpless. Tom then filled with unmitigated panic - nothing could quell his fear until he knew for sure that Harper and their baby were okay. He needed to know and he needed to know as soon as humanly possible. When he saw Harper begin to drift off some more, he instantly jolted her back with a strong tug of their interconnected hands.
"Harper, d-don't-" he was trying to keep his emotions under control - he really was - for the sake of the woman in front of him, but he felt himself spiraling out of control, as well. Feeling angry, indignant, but desperate and worried, tears beginning to well in his eyes, he squeezed them shut, but instead of preventing them, they simply cascaded down his face that much faster.
"Harper," he repeated her name for the third time, looking at her paling complexion. Upon watching her eyelids flutter shut and then open again a few moments later, he felt himself flush internally with emotion and whispered over and over again, "I love you, I love you, I love you."
He heard the nurses working behind him and heard one of them yell something frantically to another, but could not make it out, or maybe he didn't want to. Instead, he focused solely on Harper and keeping her comfortable. Wrapping his arm around her frame, he quickly composed himself to the best of his ability and brought one hand to her chin, turning her face away from the disaster unfolding in front of her.
"Harper," he said to get her attention. "You're doing great - this will all be over soon, I promise. You'll be okay, and he'll be okay, too. Just hang in there."
When she didn't reply, he realized just how desperately he wanted to hear her voice, but her weakened state wouldn't allow it. And it struck him hard then, the inevitability of what could be happening right then - he might lose both the woman he loved so desperately and the child that he never got to meet but loved as well.
His heart beat so rambunctiously in his chest, so filled with panicked adrenaline, it almost pained him. He could hear the blood rushing in his ears and his heartbeat, but nothing the nurses screamed or the clanging of tools and other clutter around him. He was in hysteria. He couldn't lose them.
No.
He heard something then, the most satisfying thing he had heard in years. Her voice - softened - in his ears. Turning to her, he seemed to hear through the loud din around him, and only heard her. "Harper?"
"Tom," she whispered, her tone hushed, breaking his heart just a bit more. "I love you." If it had not been for the way she said it, Tom would have been overjoyed by this bit of progress she was making. But her voice said it as though it was the last thing she would ever say, as if it were her final goodbye to her lover and the world she lived in.
"No," he told her forcefully. "Don't say it like that, you stupid girl! You're not going anywhere!"
Harper didn't have the strength to shake her head at him, so she simply sighed, before settling her eyes closed and through the frightful calls and clatters around her, found peace in a restless blackness, the last thing she heard being Tom's frantic voice ringing in her ears.