Sniffle. Well, here it is. The last chapter of LKG. It's heavy on the dialogue, I'm aware, but it was quite difficult to break it up. It's just like the last chapter of ATCR, it's most just that final scene that wraps everything up but leads into the next. You could end the series here, if you want, without many lingering questions. But at the same time, if you want to know what happens with Smitchie, and Naitlyn, and Janastasia, and Nicky, Kevin, Riley, and any thing else, you'll have to read. As promised -threatened- I'm taking a small break from this series, but I hope to have the next story up absolutely no later than Thanksgiving. Trust me, it probably won't take me 5 weeks to write a few chapters to get myself started before posting the new story, but- I promise to have it started by then. It's been a long, glorious ride so far. 71 Chapters of something that started as me being bored with a lack of good CR fics and randomly writing my own. I recall the original summary saying I have no idea where this is going… and look how far its come. Thank you all so much for the support. As of right now, I have 2940 reviews. More than likely by the time the reviews are done for this chapter, LKG will have broken 3000 reviews. I cannot express my sheer gratitude and how much I appreciate it. I apologize if I seem to have gotten cocky over the last few weeks. Anyway, on to the chapter. Sorry if it seems entirely too short. And yes, its mushy between Shane and Mitchie. Deal. Lol. XD
Chapter 40: The End
I think the three weeks I had to wait for Shane to come home were worse than the three months I'd had to wait before that. Our Valentine's Day was amazing, but coming home had been hard. I didn't want to leave him again. I just wanted to stay in his arms forever. Unfortunately, school was waiting.
But Shane would be home tomorrow and I was excited. Paranoia had taken over ever since Shane swore I was showing, too. I now had a slight bump -still nowhere near showing, but that small rise he saw had become more pronounced. I was now at 14 weeks and a tad round. I knew from reading online that I'd start showing soon. I'd gain more weight and in the next 6 weeks I'd be showing. Right now, I could still get away with being chubby.
I didn't really sleep that night due to my excitement. I was at the house talking to Kevin, about my inability to sleep to be exact.
He yawned sleepily as I continued talking. "I can't believe you and Savannah broke up!" I stressed for the third time.
He sighed. "Mitch, it happens. It was getting boring between us." He shrugged.
"But you were so perfect for one another." I pouted.
"We're still friends." He sighed, again. "We just aren't physically together anymore. The next step in our relationship was sex and she didn't want it…" He admitted.
"You didn't have to have sex, Kev. I would have hoped you knew that."
"You don't understand, Mitch. She didn't want to have sex… with me. That's why we aren't together." I looked at him confused.
"Wait, what? Explain that… more." I commanded.
He looked away from me. "I don't… tickle her fancy." He tried.
"Kevin… are you saying she's not… attracted to you?" I asked. He nodded. "Awwwww, Kev. You are attractive. What is wrong with her?"
"Apparently, jocks are more her type than theatre kids." He shrugged again. "Can we, just, drop it? Let's talk about the baby." He tried to change the subject.
"No. Kevin, how does someone date for over a year and then just decide they aren't attracted to you?" I demanded.
"I don't know, Mitchie." He yelled at me slightly. "I'm sorry. I, just, I don't get it. We were perfectly fine until Chas decided he wanted my girlfriend." Kevin's never gotten angry with me before. It was startling to see the least and I could see he didn't want to talk about it.
"I'm sorry. Let's talk about the baby." I said softly. "I told you Shane's suggestions for names, right?" One definite good thing about this baby was the easy subject change they made.
"Yeah. Justin Cole. I don't really like Justine Nicole though. I think you should name a son after Justin. If it's a girl, name it something else." Kevin offered his opinion.
"Well, what would you name your niece?" I inquired, not having any idea where to start with girls' names.
"Hmm… Maybe, Melody. Or Cecilia." He suggested.
"Really?" I asked. "Why?"
"Well, Melody… obvious. But Cecilia is the patron saint of music and musicians." He explained.
"Your brother would love that!" I exclaimed. Shane was oddly religious in his own way and Cecilia would be perfect. "Cecilia what though?"
"Cecilia… Aine… or Anne…" He decided. "Our grandmother's name was Aine."
"I like that." I agreed. "So, you are either Justin Cole or Cecilia Anne." I spoke to my stomach.
"Nice." Kevin laughed at me talking to my unborn child.
"Oh! Look." I lifted my shirt over my stomach and laughed at Kevin's comical expression. I was showing him my slightly stomach when I heard a cough from the door way.
"I thought you weren't replacing me with my brother?" Shane asked.
"Shane!" I shrieked, running over to him. After throwing my arms around him, I explained. "I was just showing him my stomach. Look." I lifted my shirt to show him the tiny bump.
His eyes glazed over slightly. "That's awesome, baby." He said softly. "Kev. How's it been?" He asked, pulling himself away from me to greet his brother.
"I have this crazy pregnant sister-in-law flashing me." He replied playfully hugging his brother.
"You know you liked it." I replied as Shane wrapped his arm around my shoulder.
He looked away. "Maybe." He said before laughing at the look on Shane's face. I leaned up and kissed Shane's cheek. "So, when are you going to tell everyone else?"
"Whenever Mitchie's ready." Shane shrugged.
"Soon as everyone's together." I shrugged as well. "Oh! We named the baby if they're a girl." I told Shane.
"Huh? We? They?" He asked, confused.
"Kev and me. He didn't like Justine Nicole…" Shane shrugged indifferently. "Anyway… Cecilia Aine."
"Where'd you get Anne from?" He asked looking at me with a small smile.
"Aine was your grandmother's name… wasn't it?" I asked.
"Wait, so you're using Aine not Anne?" He asked.
"See, I can barely tell the difference between the two. But yeah, Aine. It's Gaelic, right?" I guessed.
Shane nodded. "Yeah. My grandparents were Irish and Scottish." He explained. "Okay, now where did Cecilia come from, Kev? Did you just like it?"
"Patron saint of music and musicians…" Kevin said simply.
"I like it. Cecilia Aine Grey." Shane repeated smiling down at me. "Nice, Kev."
"Cecilia Aine and Justin Cole." I said looking down at my stomach.
"Wait, are there two babies? You keep saying they…" Shane finally asked.
"No. I just don't like calling the baby It. Have you ever read that book?" I asked the boys.
They looked at each other and shared confused looks. "We've seen the movie." Shane offered.
"You've never heard of the book A Child Called It?" I asked. They stared blankly back at me. "It's about the worst documented case of Child Abuse ever. It was just… disgusting to read about. I just… whenever I refer to a baby as it, I get freaked out thinking about that."
"Oh." Was all they could say in reply.
"Wait, delayed reaction. Why are you home early?" I demanded of Shane.
"I wanted to surprise you." He answered smiling. "Hey, Kev, do you think you could…" Shane trailed off.
"Go blast music and trying to block the mental images of you two having sex? No problem." Kevin shuddered a bit as he left the room, closing the door behind him.
"Did you say hi to Nicky yet?" I asked.
He shook his head no. "She's out with Chuck." Shane spat the poor guy's name out like it was something utterly foul.
"You don't even know him. He's not that bad. And you couldn't expect her to be with Riley forever, could you? Even Savannah and Kevin broke up." I argued.
He groaned. "I know. That means I have to remember another one's name."
"You know, Shane, you and the guys didn't find 'the one' until you were 18 and 19. They're teenagers. Let them be." I pointed out.
"So? You were 16." He argued back.
"And I was scared." I replied. "If it's meant to be it'll be. You can't stop it. If it's not, you can't force it." I smiled at him softly. "If it's meant to be between Riley and Nicky, it'll happen. Though, I'm not sure her recent lifestyle choices are going to be such a great thing for that possibility."
Shane looked at me oddly. "You made no sense on that last part."
I sighed. "Nicky's… well… she's decided to… um, I don't think I'm supposed to tell you…" I stumbled.
"That she's fucked Chuck?" He spat out again.
"Shane!" I smacked his chest and placed a hand on my stomach. "I get that you're angry but don't curse around the baby.
He calmed almost instantly and wrapped his hands around my hips. "I'm sorry. I already knew, though. She told Riley. I just, I don't get it… Isn't she the same girl that contemplated sleeping with Riley after a year and flipped when he told her he loved her? How does she randomly just hook up with Chuck like that? I don't get it!" He yelled slightly, though not at me.
"She told Riley?" I asked, slightly enraged. "What is wrong with her?" I, myself, yelled. I tried to leave our room to go yell at her, but Shane grabbed my arm lightly and pulled me back.
"A. She's not here. B. Getting worked up like this is not good for the baby." He told me softly, trying to calm me down.
"You're right. Hormones. Sorry." I sighed. It was still wrong.
"I already freaked out. I know. I just don't know my baby sister anymore, Mitch." He sighed, sitting down on the edge of the bed.
I sat next to him, rubbing his back as he dropped his head into his hands. "You okay, babe?" I asked.
He looked at me from the corner of his eye, head still in his hands. "I'm just scared." He admitted. "I don't want to ever drift from our kids like I have from Nicky."
"That won't happen." I assured him. I took his hands away from his face and placed one on my stomach. "We're going to raise them with an open mind. They're going to know they can come to us about everything and hopefully they won't drift from us. But if it does happen, so be it."
"You… are going to be an excellent mother." He kissed me.
I smiled and looked down. "Really? I don't think so. I'm so scared to be a mother."
"We're going to be fine as parents. I promise." He assured me, caressing my stomach with his hand that was resting on it.
"I'm so happy you're home." I smiled at him.
"Me, too." He sighed holding me tightly.
"What's wrong?" I asked, looking up at him.
"You know, we have a lot to figure out now that I'm home." He said, as I laid back on the bed. He followed, laying his head so it rested on my just below my stomach. I smiled and ran my fingers through his hair.
"Like what?" I asked. "I'm sorry, right now I can't think past how happy I am that your home now."
"Where are we going to live?" He asked. "Are you staying on campus while I stay here? Am I going back to New York? Are you going to stay here with me? Or… do you, do you want to get an apartment in Boston? Near campus?"
"I think our own apartment would be good." I decided.
"Okay, so, tomorrow, I'll start looking." He said, kissing my stomach. I giggled.
"Any other pressing matters?" I asked.
He shrugged. "Nothing important right now."
"Do the boys know what they're going to do?" I asked curiously.
"Well, Jason's going to get an apartment up here, too. I know Nate's going back to Pennsylvania soon. But I don't know where he's going to live permanently. He'll probably bounce back and forth between his house in Pennsylvania and either our apartment or Jason's."
"What about the New York apartment?" I asked.
"Well, we're going to move everything out sometime in the next couple weeks. I think Jason and Nate are going to move back in until we get everything out. If you weren't pregnant, I'd go with them. But I don't want to miss any more." Shane explained.
"Oh. Well, the baby won't start kicking for another two weeks and I have an appointment next week. You could go this week." I suggested.
He shook his head. "Nuh uh. Not missing anything else."
I smiled at him. "So, what do you want?" I asked randomly changing the subject.
"What do I want, what?" He asked.
"A boy or a girl?" I reiterated.
He shrugged. "I want a healthy baby." He replied while caressing my stomach. "Whether this little one is Justin Cole or Cecilia Aine, I'm good."
"I'm going to laugh hysterically if I'm pregnant at Jason and Stas' wedding." Shane looked at me oddly. "Stas is going to try to plan her wedding for this summer. She doesn't want to wait forever."
"Oh." Shane smiled. "Didn't Jayden jinx you guys into saying it'd be funny if you were pregnant at one of their weddings?"
"I forgot about that!" I laughed. "Well, I think Stas could handle it better than Caitlyn."
"I think he's going to propose soon." Shane said smiling lazily.
I looked at him slightly confused. "Who? Nate?"
He nodded. "Yeah. I think that conversation in our room about him wanting a family really hit home for her. Nate said she's been talking about little Baby Grey non-stop lately."
I smiled and rubbed my stomach. "Oh, that reminds me." I said. "We're gonna have to tell the press soon."
Shane laughed. "Oh yeah, I can see that press conference. Mitchie's pregnant. No, I hate using condoms. She had to be taken off of it due to irregularities. We're willing to take whatever God throws at us and he threw our little one at us. No, we don't know the sex, and we aren't going to find out-"
"We aren't?" I interrupted his hypothetical press conference.
He shrugged. "I don't know. I don't want to know. You can, find out, I mean, if you want. But I don't want to. And the press doesn't have to know if we do or we don't."
"Very true." I agreed. "Are we going to sell pictures of our baby?" I asked, suddenly worried.
"No." Shane stated firmly without thinking. "If they happen to get pictures when we're out with the baby, that's fine. But there won't be any 'exclusive rights to the baby's first pictures' or anything."
"You're amazing." I smiled down at him.
"I know." He thought for a moment. "Actually… What you say if we gave Cosmo the first picture of you and the baby?"
"Why not the three of us?" I asked. "And what do you give?"
"Because I'll be the one taking the pictures." He smiled. "And like, free of charge, said here. I refuse to make money off of our baby… but… I want to share them with the world. They're going to be just as beautiful as their mother."
"I love you." I spoke softly. He lifted himself up from my stomach and laid next me, kissing me softly.
"I love you, too."
I fell asleep in Shane's arm that night with the blissful knowledge that for now, there was no looming departure waiting on the horizon. He was amazing. Utterly, truly, perfectly amazing. I often found myself wondering when the blissful feelings I got from him would end. When the happy life we were building would crumple and we'd be just another Hollywood marriage. When our friends would stray from us. When life would pull us apart and we'd be miserable. When life as we knew it would just… end. But it doesn't. Life keeps going and it never ends.
Bree is very sad. She shall miss LKG. Just as she misses ATCR. But! she knows that... It Never Ends. :)