Another update so soon? Yes. My mind won't shut up about this story. Thank you, wishyouknew22, for your amazing reviews! Also, I'd love a Beta to make this story top-notch and somewhat quality, so if you're game, just PM me.
To be honest, it hasn't hit her yet that she's pregnant. She knows she is, knows it because her mother has been screaming at her about it for the past half-hour while her father joins in, but the reality hasn't sunk into her skin just yet. Needless to say, there are no more awkward silences because she can hear her parents heated arguing downstairs. About her, about Hayden, about how they think this house is the problem when she wants to shout at them that they're the problem; the house is just that—a house.
She isn't even going to touch the fact that the father is dead. Dead people don't make babies; the only time that shit happens is in Twilight. (Shameful to say, she's read the saga from start to finish.) She spends her time pacing her room, occasionally lifting up her shirt to see her still flat, but slightly bloated, stomach. Eight weeks. "If you're worried about your weight, I think you look perfect." She turns around, startled, to see Tate sitting on her bed. His eyes are brighter, less teary and morose than before. He seems…calm, happy, while she's still tired and now confused as all hell. "Seriously, Vi; you're delicious." He opens his arms and she's in his embrace soon after, returning his slow, passionate kisses as she straddles his lap. She can feel him twitch beneath the denim of his jeans, causing a soft gasp to escape her mouth. He notices, pulling away to flash a wolfish, shit-eating grin. "I can just eat. You. Up." He punctuates with kisses, trailing down her chin to her neck, nipping the pale skin of her bony shoulder.
It's not like she can get even more pregnant, right?
Still, any mood is killed as her parents verbal altercation grows more heated, causing Violet to give a petulant eye roll and moves to sit on the bed beside Tate, resting her head on his strong shoulder. His arm wraps around her waist and they tumble on the bed together, her waifish body curls against his side, and Violet realizes that she's now the vulnerable one. "Remember Halloween night, before those kids started all that shit?" Violet asks. Tate breaks out into a toothy grin, licking his lips with his pink tongue teasingly. "You were kinda straight to the point in seducing me, you know? I never had a girl just grab my crotch before." He gives her a playful wink and she returns it with a light slap on his chest. "Why?"
She pointedly avoids his eyes when she breathes out with a shaky, timid breath: "We didn't use protection." She can't see his reaction, but can feel his body stiffen. "Which is why I've been blowing chunks all the time; I'm pregnant, and my parents, if you can't hear them, are pretty pissed."
After a moment of silence, Violet gains the courage to stare into his eyes to notice he's crying. Her own vision becomes blurry but he simply hugs her tightly to him, pressing a kiss on the crown of your head. She's beyond relieved he doesn't dare ask who the child is like some would; she bites her tongue from asking if he knows he's dead, because she figures this wouldn't be the time or the place. She falls asleep in his arms and when she wakes up, he's there, fully clothed with his hand on her stomach. It's almost childlike how his fingers brush against her abdomen; like it hasn't hit him yet that she's pregnant, too. There's some strange, foreboding tension she can't put a finger on, but she ignores it when she sees a sheepish smile. He's been caught and he's acknowledging it. "Are we ready for this, Vi?"
Violet gives a shrug because, honestly? She has no fucking clue.
They spend the earlier part of the day in bed, before Tate leaves because he doesn't want to be caught. Violet doesn't blame him. A light rap on her door makes the teenager put down her US History notebook, eyeing the ajar door curiously as it pushes open. She prepares herself for her parents, or even the dog, but instead she's greeted by their neighbor who still looks like she could be in the sixties era with how she dresses. "My, my, I do hope I'm not disturbin' you too much, my dear," her Virginian drips off her well annunciated words like the true debutante she is. "I just heard you caught a little bitty bug and brought a peace offering."
"It isn't a cupcake with candy violets on it, is it?" Violet deadpans. "Also, I'm kind of knocked up, so it isn't really a bug. Right now it's an embryo."
Clearly she's annoying the woman, her boyfriend and baby-daddy's mother, but she still tries to radiate the façade of giving a damn so she waves Violet's rudeness aside to show her "peace offering": a carton of cigarettes that makes Violet itch to light. She knows she can't now, anyway, but the temptation is still there. "However, I assume in your position, it isn't right for me to aid in your vices. You're gonna be a momma now, anyway."
Violet is going to assume that Constance isn't omnipotent and that her mom spilled the beans. Figures. Still, she gives the tiniest smiles of gratitude at Constance's gift, even if she can't accept it. "It's Tate's." She says after a moment.
Constance gives a long, tired sigh and nods before sitting down on Violet's bed. (She brushes imaginary crumbs before doing so, as if not wanting Violet's taste to taint her old fashioned clothes.) "I figure that by now you've realized he's dead as Moses?" Violet nods. "Which makes me ask my next question: Are you sure that that baby is my boy's?" Violet nods again. "Then there's someone I need for you to meet. She's an expert in the paranormal. She can give us answers that the modern world cannot comprehend."
Violet can't help but to be curious, so she needs, accepting. Really: if someone can confirm that she isn't losing it, that there is a ghost baby inside her, then she figures there's nothing to lose. Constance cranes her neck and calls for that said person.
A woman with curly hair, a Gucci business suit with stylish heals walks in, holding her hand out to Violet. "Violet, this is Billie Dean: I found her on Craig's List. Regardless of what you may think, she's the real deal. She's a Medium."
"Like Jennifer Love Hewitt?"
Billie gives an almost offended look; "I have a better figure, thank you." She pulls the unshaken hand away, eyeing her room, before her eyes trail to her stomach. "Constance and I are good friends. She says you've got questions and I can have the answers—wait." Her brows crease in confusion, staring at Violet's stomach, causing the teenager to wrap protective arms around her person. "I keep seeing babies. Are you pregnant, Violet?"
Violet eyes Constance. "You didn't tell her?"
The old woman shakes her head.
Billie eases herself on Violet's bed and places a hand on the bare skin of her stomach. Before Violet can swat the offending hand away, Billie takes care of it, face blanching. "You can cut the dramatics, Billie, and tell me what you see?" Regardless of the pregnant girl in the room, Constance lights up a cigarette. "There are no cameras to be found in this house."
It seems as soon as Billie came, she leaves, not bothering to utter a single syllable as she rushes out of Violet's room. "Jesus H. Christ. That woman should be a Soap actress with how dramatic she is." Grumbles Constance in annoyance, inhaling and exhaling away from Violet, even if she's certain second-hand smoke is just as bad as smoking during pregnancy. "I'll go get her. You just sit tight and relax."