A Little Bump in the Road:
'This isn't happening. This is not happening. I'm having a nightmare. Wake up, Sophie! Wake up!' I thought to myself as I paced the length of my bedroom at home with a horrified expression and I ran a hand through my brunette hair, tugging sharply to test if I was dreaming or not. A soft whimper escaped my lips as I blinked away the tears that sprung to my eyes and I threw myself down face first on my bed as I buried my face in the pillow under my head.
I faintly heard the sound of the front door opening downstairs but I didn't bother lifting my head because I knew that Scott was out with Stiles and Mom was taking an extra shift at the hospital so that only left the person I was waiting for.
The familiar scent of Chanel perfume flooded throughout the house, accompanied with the 'tap tap tap' of high heels climbing the stairs assured me that I was correct in my assumption.
"Hey, I'm here! I'm here!" Lydia exclaimed in greeting as she ran into my bedroom without knocking and a muffled groan was the only response I gave her as she dropped down next to me on the edge of the bed. I could tell that she had rushed over to my house after my panicked phone call by the slightly out of breath tone in her voice and I was eternally grateful that she was my best friend.
"How are you feeling?" she asked me sympathetically as she placed a hand on my shoulder and I grumbled into the pillow indistinctly as she rubbed circles on my back. For the first time that day I was feeling slightly less miserable and her mere presence was the reason.
Whenever I needed someone, Lydia was there for me and that was the thing about having a best friend, they support you even when they don't support the situation. Lydia was the person that made my problems her problems just so I didn't have to go through them alone.
Lydia was the only person I could trust not to judge me because of my current situation.
The strawberry blonde brushed my hair over my shoulder so that she could see my profile and I turned my head slightly towards her with a pathetic expression plastered on my face as she smiled reassuringly, "I have the thing you asked for."
I immediately sat up as I swung my legs over to the edge of the bed, looking at her with a distressed expression and she smiled empathetically as she silently held out her hand with a plastic bag dangling from her fingers. I stared at the bag like it was going to attack me at any given moment and there was a foreboding tone to the conversation, a dark mood that had settled over us the moment she'd entered the bedroom.
"You don't have to, but it will eat away at you if you don't. You have to know, sweetie." Lydia reminded me softly as she shook the bag slightly, the plastic crinkling and I reluctantly accepted the offending bag with tips of my fingers, not wanting to touch it any more than I had to.
"Are you sure you don't want me call your mom? Or, I don't know, Derek?" she asked pointedly with one of her perfectly plucked eyebrows arched and I immediately shook my head furiously with wide eyes at the mention of my boyfriend as I took the nearly empty water bottle from my bedside table.
"God, no! I can't tell Derek about this. And neither can you. At least not yet." I mumbled the last sentence to myself as I uncapped the water bottle without looking in her direction and I started gulping down the rest of the water as I wandered around my bedroom so that I didn't have to stand in one spot for too long.
"He'd want to be here for you, Sophie."
"That's the problem."
"What do you mean?" she asked in confusion as she tilted her head to the side with a frown and I shook my head silently as I twisted the empty water bottle in my hands nervously.
"Derek's the old-school, gentleman-y type of guy. He opens car doors and pulls out my chair for me and carries my things for me." I explained absently as I nibbled on my lower lip anxiously and she nodded her head sagely as she hummed as though as understood my point of view perfectly without any further explanation. "I can't tell him. Not yet. He might do something insane. Like ask me to marry him, or something."
"Got it. But for the record, when you do get married, my maid-of-honour dress – "
"Will be dusty rose. I know." I interrupted the beginning of her rant knowingly with a wistful smile because we'd had the conversation many times over the years and she winked at me as she leaned back on her elbows with a smirk on her lips.
I glanced towards the ensuite bathroom in trepidation as I nibbled my lower lip and shifted from one leg to the other repeatedly as I wrung my hands in front of me. A heavy feeling of dread settled in my stomach as I pursed my lips together in a tight line and the plastic bag hanging from my wrist bumped against thigh almost provokingly.
"Why are you bouncing?" Lydia asked me in amusement as she quirked an eyebrow at me and I ran my fingers through my hair as I continued to rock back and forth nervously.
"I need to pee."
"Then go."
"I can't."
Understanding shone in her green eyes as she sat up on the edge of the bed, leaning forward to catch my eye with an earnestly open expression and she offered me a small smile, "Honey, you need to do this. I'll be right here."
"What if, and I'm not saying it will be, but what if – "I started to ask fearfully in a shaky voice as tears sprung to my eyes and she immediately jumped up from the bed with a determined expression marring her pretty face. She gripped my upper arms tightly as her manicured nails dug into my arm, pinching me hard enough to hurt but not break the skin and she looked directly into my eyes with a ferocity I'd only seen a handful of times.
"Then, I will be right here. Okay? You and me, always, okay?" she insisted sharply as she shook me slightly to get her point across and I nodded rapidly in understanding as she wrapped her arms around me. I squeezed my eyes closed to stop the tears from escaping as I clung to my best friend for all I was worth and I buried my face in the crook of her neck as I inhaled her comforting scent, a mixture of Chanel perfume, coconut shampoo and honey milk body wash.
The strawberry blonde's heartbeat was holding steady, a rhythmic thump thump thump that I focused my hearing on in an effort to calm down and I knew that everything she said was the truth.
"I really need to pee." I mumbled into her hair reluctantly as I tried to ignore the pressure building in my bladder and she laughed out loud at my misery as she pulled out of the embrace. The bright grin that stretched across her lips made me feeling a tonne lighter and I scrunched my nose up at her as I wandered into the bathroom, closing the door behind me.
"You want me to read the instructions?!" Lydia called through the door in a slightly excited tone of voice but I could tell she was trying to suppress her enthusiasm for my sake.
"I have to an IQ higher than 180, I'm sure I can figure this out!"
"No need to be snarky!"
I rolled my eyes at her as I sat down on the toilet and pulled the box I'd sent Lydia to buy at the pharmacy out of the plastic bag at my feet. The words First Response Early Result Pregnancy Test stared back at me defiantly and I swallowed nervously as I followed the instructions written on the back of the box. A minute later I was standing up with the pregnancy test in my hand but I couldn't bring myself to look at it and I flushed the toilet before making my way over to wash my hands in the sink.
When I exited the bathroom, the first thing I saw was Lydia sitting on the end of my bed chewing on her manicured nails, a nervous habit she'd conditioned herself to quit in middle school. Her head snapped around when I entered the room with a tentative smile and she nearly pounced on the test in my hand as she carefully took it from me. "How long do we need to wait?"
"Three minutes." I answered her easily as I sat down on the end of the bed, grateful for her use of the word 'we' and she started pacing the length of the room as her light green eyes analytically flittered around the bedroom. I narrowed my eyes at her suspiciously as she stopped suddenly in the middle of the room and I let out a groan because I knew exactly where her traitorous mind had gone. "You're already measuring for a bassinet, aren't you?"
"It'd look good in that corner. And I'm thinking an apricot colour scheme. It's neutral but not overdone like green or yellow. Of course I'm open to suggestions if you're – "
"Lydia!"
"What?"
When I didn't immediately answer her, she turned around in confusion with an expectant quirk of her eyebrow and her face automatically fell with she saw the tears streaming down my cheeks. She rushed to my side, wrapping an arm around my shoulders as she drew me into a hug and I cried into the crook of her neck as she whispered soothing words incoherently. "I'm sorry. I wasn't thinking. I'm sorry. Everything's going to be okay."
"No. No, I'm sorry. I am okay, I swear." I told her honestly as I sat up straight and brushed away the stray tears from my cheek with the back of my hand as I sniffled slightly but at Lydia's doubtful look, I sighed heavily in defeat, "I will be okay. I'm just – I'm feeling a lot of things at the moment and I'm not sure how to process everything."
"Maybe talking out loud will help you sort through everything? It's what you do when you're solving an extremely complex maths equation." She suggested in a placating tone of voice as she gently ran her fingers through my brunette hair and I normally would've been annoyed but Lydia had a way of being the exception to every rule.
"Okay. Um, it's just – you know I've been planning my future since I was five years old. Graduate high school early, or graduate valedictorian. Those were my only two choices. And then a top tier college. Ivy League, if I could get the academic scholarships necessary. Studying veterinary science. And my personal life? I was going to have as much wild sex as possible so that one day I can become an inappropriate old lady who blurts out things like 'when I was your age I got a concussion from being bent over a desk' and my family would be like 'grandma, you're making thanksgiving dinner really uncomfortable'. But now, everything has changed. I'm staying for senior year. I have an incredibly awesome, incredibly serious boyfriend who I love beyond belief. I'm studying to become a psychologist. I'm working part-time at the veterinary clinic and part-time at Eichen House. I'm in charge of training Liam. I'm in charge of educating Jordan. I'm applying to Stanford because that's what's expected of me from Scott and Stiles. Meanwhile, I'm being recruited by like every other college in America. I hardly have time to think about anything, and now I'm adding a baby to the mix?! I mean, I love Derek and I absolutely see us having kids, but that's in the future, not the now. I'm not ready for that. I'm barely ready for just Derek. You know how skittish I am about commitment. Would I still be able to go to college? Would I just get a scholarship? Because I need one. Or I'm either going to have to get money out of my savings, the money I'm getting by Eichen House, or I'm going to have to inherit that money from Peter, and I don't want to touch that. It's blood money, there's literally blood on it. I still might have to use my own money to pay Scott's way through UC Davis. And then on the other hand, a baby that's part me and part Derek? How can I not want that? He'd be an amazing father, and we'd be so happy together. A family. The baby would be so loved, and not just by us, but by everyone in our lives. My mom would be a grandmother, Scott and Stiles would be uncles, you'd be an aunt. And I know you'd all help me and be supportive. I would be able to raise a baby. I can do this."
"Sophie…" Lydia trailed off sadly at the end of my speech as I breathed heavily from the long winded rant and I turned my head to look at her as she stared down at the pregnancy test in her hand. A frown pulled at the corners of her lips as she handed me the stick with a shaking hand and I accepted it without glancing away from her face as I studied her expression intently.
I took a deep breath settle my nerves as I turned my attention to the stick in my hand and my mouth went dry as tears sprung to my eyes when read the results. "Oh."
"I'm sorry." She whispered compassionately in a thick voice as she threaded her fingers through mine and I tried my best to give her a reassuring smile but it felt completely wrong as I nodded jerkily.
"It's okay. Can't miss something you never had, right?" I said automatically because I knew that it was what expected of me but there was a dull ache in my chest that hadn't been there before and I rubbed my sternum with the heel of my hand as though I could erase the discomfort.
Lydia laid her head on my shoulder without another word as she squeezed my hand supportively and I stared at the negative pregnancy test in my hand as tears started to silently running down my cheeks.