Sorry I left you all hanging! Here's chapter 16 :)
6 days, 4 hours, and 23 minutes later…
It took two days for the injection to come in and three days in recovery after I had an allergic reaction to the injection. But after everything, my baby was gone. And I hadn't talked to Eric in a week. I lay in the hospital bed patiently waiting for someone to tell me I could go home. Alex stayed with me most of the time, but they were falling behind on recording and wasting studio time. I felt bad Alex and I never got to finish our song, but I didn't know I was pregnant. No one knew, and no one knew especially it was going to be so tragic.
Flipping through the channels I heard the door crack and I craned my neck and watched as Alex stepped in the room. He carried a bag with Panera written on the side and gripped an icy lemonade in his right hand.
"Thank you!" I gushed, "I've been so sick of this hospital food."
"No problem." Alex handed me the bag and I ripped it open. I lay the ham sandwich out on my lap and pried open the bag of chips. I shoveled a few in my mouth and licked the salt off my fingers. I hadn't had Panera in so long; it was almost like having it for the first time again.
"So how's everything?" Alex asked, "you feeling better?"
"Yeah," I shook my head as I bit into the juicy red apple, "I'm feeling a lot better, like ready to record better."
"Britta, you are not recording after this. You need to go home and heal," Alex rubbed his forehead, "this-this is a big thing, it's gonna mess with you emotionally and physically. You just, you gotta take it easy alright."
"Thank you for being worried about me, Alex, but I'm fine," I assured him, "really, I'm okay. I'm not achy anymore, or itchy. I'm ready to get back in the studio."
Alex sighed and crossed his left leg over his right. "You being okay is a hundred times more important than this dumb record, you're not recording. You're going home and resting."
"Fine Alex," I grumbled, "you're lucky you brought me Panera…or else I'd be kicking your ass right now."
"Oh don't worry, you're still going to be kicking my ass," Alex replied.
"What, Alex…what did you do?" I dropped the sandwich in my lap.
"Someone's here to see you," Alex looked the door as it creaked open.
Sam's POV-
Jen gripped the wheel tightly as we changed into the fast lane on the freeway. We were headed to La to see Britta after we found out she was in the hospital. Jen and I talked about the Leanne thing and decided that we couldn't tell her over the phone; we had to tell her in person, so we'd be there for support too. But the closer we got to LA, the more nervous I became.
"Jen, maybe we shouldn't do this." I bit my lip and slipped my shoes on and off.
"Oh Sam, we talked about this, everything's gonna be fine." Jen took the next exit and merged onto the LA freeway. The infamous traffic was living up to its reputation.
"But, she's going to be so crushed. This is Eric were talking about, the love of her life. She's gonna be heartbroken."
"Yeah she is, and it sucks, but we can't not tell her," Jen justified.
"Well we can't not not tell her," I suggested, "we can let Eric tell her."
"Sam, you did not fly all the way to Arizona, and I drive all the way to LA for us to not tell her," Jen argued.
"Ugh," I groaned, "this is all my fault."
"How on earth is this your fault?" Jen exclaimed, "Eric's the one who cheated on her. You didn't tell him to sleep with Leanne."
"But I did tell him about that dumb pact at her bachelorette party," I admitted. "that's why Eric thought Britta was cheating on him with Alex."
"Wait what?" Jen eased on the breaks and the traffic began to slow again, "you told him about that stupid pact thing?"
"Yeah, I shouldn't have. That's why he doesn't trust her around Alex; I told Eric that Alex was Britta's guy" I replied.
"Sam, how fucking drunk were you at that party?" Jen yelled.
"What the hell, we all were drunk, well except Britta…why?"
"Oh my god Sam," Jen slammed her palm into her forehead, "I can't believe you told Eric Britta's guy was Alex."
"Britta's guy was Alex..." I replied, confused.
"No Sam," Jen sighed, "Lacey's guy was Alex Gaskarth. Britta agreed with her and said he was sexy. She said she used to have a crush on him…but he wasn't her guy."
"Oh god," I slumped my head back into the headrest. What had I done?
"So now you've got Eric thinking Britta's cheating with the wrong guy!" Jen retorted.
"This is all my fault." I glanced out the window and sun shot rays onto the hoods of cars. The light reflected into my eyes and I had to shade my forehead. I couldn't believe Alex wasn't Britta's guy. I could've sworn that's what she said. But Lacey had said Alex, which was right. I must've thought it was Britta because she had agreed with her.
"But Jen wait," I burst out.
"What?" Jen asked as she dangerously changed lanes.
"If Alex wasn't Britta's guy…who was?"
Britta's POV-
The door pushed open and a familiar face popped in.
"Kennedy!" I exclaimed, "how did you know…"
"I called him," Alex admitted. He hopped out of the seat next to my bed and waved Kennedy over.
Kennedy sat down next to me and handed me a small teddy bear holding a card. Alex retired to the loveseat on the other side of the room and I awkwardly took a bite of my sandwich.
"I'm really sorry this happened." Kennedy sighed and sat back in the chair. "You must've been so scared."
"More like numb," I replied, before swallowing a big chunk of bread. "I just, I can't feel anything anymore."
"What did they do to you?" Kennedy leaned forward and grabbed my hand. We both looked down at our intertwining fingers and didn't say a word. The warmth of his freshly out of the California sun hands generated onto mine and the room felt as if it had raised 30 degrees in temperature.
"So uh, have you talked to Eric?" Kennedy asked, still holding onto my hand.
"I've tried to call him a few times, but he still hasn't picked up," I replied, "I don't even know if he knows about the pregnancy."
Kennedy cleared his throat as Alex's phone began to ring. The awkwardness in the room was beginning to fade, but I was still slightly uncomfortable, and angry that Alex had called Kennedy without telling me. I understood that Alex wanted me to be happy and blah blah blah, but I would have much rather be talking with my husband about what happened, instead of my two time ex who was still in love with me. The thought of Kennedy and I together popped into my head and the first thing thought of was the dreams I was having.
"Kennedy, want to hear something funny?" I asked him.
"Sure," he replied.
I explained to him about the dreams, everything from "waking up" in Gloria's office to sleeping with him in Paris. Kennedy laughed as I told him the funny parts, and bit his lip as I explained to him the serious ones.
"So what do you think the dreams were trying to tell you?" he asked once I was done explaining.
I didn't want to tell him what I really thought; that the dreams were telling me that I didn't really love him still. But I didn't want to flat out lie either.
"I guess they were saying that you and I will always mean something to me, but I need to realize that it's over…it has to be."
"It doesn't have to be," Kennedy smirked. I wrinkled my brow and shot him a look. "Yes darling, it d…"
"Hey party people!" Lacey burst in the door and tossed a can of Coors Lite into Alex's lap. "You don't know how hard it is to smuggle alcohol into a hospital until you…"
She spotted Kennedy and gasped. The awkwardness that had faded away returned in an instant and Kennedy and I immediately dropped hands.
"Oh hey Kennedy," Lacey flatly emitted into the dead air. The vision of them together from my dream crawled into my mind and I grabbed my scalp like I was suffering from a migraine.
"Uh, hey Lace…" Kennedy leaned away from the bed and tightly placed his hands in his lap. His body language was screaming "HELP ME" and I couldn't stop rubbing my forehead. Lacey padded over to the bed and handed me a can of Sprite. "I thought you'd be thirsty," she recited, "I didn't know Kennedy was bringing you Panera."
"Kennedy didn't bring it," I corrected her, "Alex did, Kennedy just came to visit."
Lacey glanced over at Kennedy and he squirmed a little in his chair. I was literally in the middle of them with no escape. My IV hooked me to this hospital like an anchor to the bottom of the sea. There was nowhere to run and nowhere to hide, I was trapped in the center of awkwardville and I had lost my map.
"Well that was very nice of him," Lacey's monotone voice buzzed in my ears and her eyes shot lasers into Kennedy's forehead.
"Well Britta," Kennedy swallowed hard and patted my knee, "I'm gonna go. It was nice seeing you, call me if you need anything. I'm gonna be in the LA area for a little bit. Probably visiting Garrett and Rach…"
"She gets it!" Lacey interrupted him with a bark, "you'll be around if she needs you."
Without saying a word, Kennedy shook his head and exited the room. I watched as the door shut and grabbed for the teddy bear he had brought me.
"What's the card say?" Lacey asked, inertly mocking his sincere gift.
I peeled open the card and read the haunting words over and over again. They started to look as if they were another language by the 14th time. In his masculine, yet neat, handwriting Kennedy had written in blue ink "I love you, Kid."
***
Lacey went down to the food court to get herself some food, leaving Alex and I alone in the room. He flipped through the channels until we agreed on a One Tree Hill rerun playing on soap net. Just as the screen faded into a commercial I heard my phone ring and reached for it. Eric was calling…finally. I pressed talk and nervously placed the phone up to my ear.
"Hello," I answered.
"Hey Britta." He sounded sad. He didn't call me Wifey, or baby, or anything. Just Britta. Something was weird.
"Lovey, is something wrong?" I asked.
"There's uh, something I have to talk to you about…" he began.
"Actually there's something I have to talk to you about," I replied, "it's kinda…big."
"Okay," he sighed, "tell me…"
I sucked in a deep breath and attempted to begin to tell him the story. Soon Sam and Jen burst in the door and I nearly dropped the phone.
"Sam? Jen? What are you guys doing he…"
"We have to tell you something…" Jen sadly exclaimed.
"Hold on," I held up my hand. I pointed towards the phone and mouthed "It's Eric."
"Is everything okay?" Eric asked into the phone.
"Actually no," I replied, "I'm in the hospital."
"What?!" Eric exclaimed, "what happened?"
"Lovey, I was pregnant."
"Pregnant?" he gasped, sounding as if he were about to faint. "What do you mean 'was'?"
I began to explain to him the sad news as I watched Sam and Jen trip over themselves grabbing pieces of paper and snatching a hospital marker off the whiteboard.
"Oh my God," Eric breathed, "so you're okay?"
"I'm okay, but they had to inject me with this chemical and I ended up being allergic to it. I've been here the past week."
Sam waved her arms in the air and held up a blank piece of paper. "What?" I whisper yelled.
She flipped the paper around and I read the bold blue letters. "HE CHEATED ON YOU!"
Jen stepped up next to her and held up her paper, shifting my eyes and read the words. "WITH LEANNE."
Wrath and depression surged through my body as I heard Eric gush into the phone; "I can't believe this, I'm coming out there to see you as soon as I can book a flight."
"Don't." I coldly replied and hung up the phone.
Thanks for reading!! :)