Chapter 148

I woke up this morning, I could barely breathe

Bleary-eyed and exhausted, Robin rolled from her bed and shuffled to the door as the knocking grew more persistent. Too tired to even check who was on the other side, she simply pulled the door open. Her mouth dropped open as she saw Alexis standing on the other side holding a tray of hot drinks.

"I don't know how bad the morning sickness is" she said, nodding at the tray, "so I picked up chamomile tea, mint tea, decaf coffee and decaf chai. I figured something in there might appeal to you."

Stepping aside to let her friend pass, she shook her head. "You've seen Patrick, I take it?" she asked quietly as she closed the door.

Setting the tray down on the table Alexis turned to face her and nodded. "I was at Eric's when he showed up. How are you?" she asked kindly.

Shrugging, Robin folded her arms across her chest. "I'm okay" she answered weakly.

Alexis said nothing, simply arching her eyebrow as a challenge.

"Not buying that?"

She shook her head. "Not so much, no."

Robin sighed. "I'm a wreck," she admitted tearfully.

Alexis held her arms open to her and Robin walked into them. Closing her arms around her, Alexis hugged her tightly. Feeling the comfort from her friend, Robin dissolved into tears yet again. Taking her by the hand, Alexis led her to the couch and passed her a kleenex. Robin smiled sheepishly, taking the kleenex and wiped her eyes. After Patrick had left she had picked up the phone several times to call Mac and then Brenda but could not quite bring herself to complete the call. She wasn't even sure what she would say - that she was pregnant and just asked her boyfriend to move out? It had been easier to pull the covers around her and just stay in bed.

"Can I tell you a few things about pregnancy that don't ever seem to make it into the 'puppies and rainbows' scenarios that you always read about?" Robin nodded. "Okay, first - the hormones will kick your ass. There's no way around it and it's not a punchline. Tears, fatigue, being snappish, it's all part of the gift of pregnancy. And the second thing is that your body has ceased to be your own. Every decision you make, conciously or subconciously, now until you give birth is going to be dictated by the little one you're carrying."

"Terrific" she sniffed.

"I've really sold you on the benefits, haven't I?" she teased. "I'm telling you this because Robin, you are going to need to be exceptionally kind to yourself in the coming months as you try to adjust what's going on with you physically."

Nodding gratefully, she reached for one of the drinks in the tray. Peeling back the lid, she blew on the hot drink sending the steam billowing upwards. "How...how was Patrick?" she asked tentatively.

"He's confused and he's worried about you."

"He shouldn't be confused," she remarked, absently playing with the corner of the lid, "he should be furious with me."

Alexis cocked her head to the side and looked at her friend. There was a distinct mixture of pain and fear etched on her face and it was clear that Robin didn't necessarily understand where the feelings were coming from.

"Would it be easier for you if he was furious?"

Her head snapped up. "I don't understand what you mean."

Alexis inhaled quietly, aware she was going to be treading on dangerous ground. "Robin, is it possible that you don't accept that you should get everything you want?" Seeing the protest forming on her lips, Alexis held up her hands. "Hear me out. You've been close to having what you've wanted before - being deeply loved, a family to call your own - only to have it snatched away. You yourself told me that you moved across the world to get away from the pain of it. So is it possible that here on the precipice of having it again, you think it's easier to blow it up rather than wait for it to come crashing to an end?"

"I don't know" she whispered.

"Robin, I'm a Cassadine, self-sabotage is in my DNA and it takes every ounce of rational thought and strength not to give in to it when good things start to happen."

She pulled on her bottom lip as she considered what her friend was telling her. Every new experience was formed by past experiences and it was possible she was trying to ward off what she, on some level, believed to be the eventual end of things by ending it herself. She wasn't sure how to trust that things wouldn't come crashing to an end - she had not had a lot of experience with happy endings.

"Patrick doesn't want to be a father," she said when she finally spoke.

"Really?" Alexis challenged gently. "Because when I saw him he certainly sounded like a man who wants to be a father to his child."

She shook her head, frustrated that no one could see what she did. "He's only saying that because it's the right thing to do. I don't want to be his obligation."

Leaning back against the couch, she gave her a curious look. Alexis had some experience with living life as a duck - calm and cool on the surface but paddling like hell under the water - and she recognized a lot of herself in the young doctor. When so much time was spent on keeping an unruffled exterior, it could be incredibly destabilizing when all your insecurities and doubts came bubbling to the surface at once.

"His obligation? Robin he is madly, deeply, crazy in love with you - there's no hint of obligation there."

"You don't understand!" she snapped, slamming her hand down on the couch cushion.

Unfazed, Alexis shrugged. "So explain it to me."

With an exaggerated sigh, trying to keep her temper under control, Robin tucked her legs up underneath her. "I've trapped him - don't you see? He's trapped because of me."

"Sweetheart, I think if you ask him he will tell you he isn't."

"He's going to be tied to me for life - for however long my life is. We're going to have a baby and I'm not going to live long enough to see our child into adulthood - so he is going to have to do it." Tears pooled in her eyes but as she sucked in a breath she willed them not to fall. "He is going to have to explain to our child why I died, why I selfishly brought a child into this world knowing that my time is going to be short. I've trapped him into a lifetime committment when I don't have a lifetime to give. He will come to hate me for it and on top of it all, he'll have to take care of a child - our child."

Alexis let out a long, slow breath. "Robin, did you poke a hole in the condom?"

Her brown eyes widened in shock at the suggestion. "NO! God no, I would never do that to him - I would never expose him like that."

Reaching for her hand, she gave it a squeeze. "Then you haven't trapped him."

Robin's throat was thick as she took one serrated breath after another. "Alexis, I am going to die - slowly, painfully and way before I'm ready to. And if I let him stay, he will be by my side through it all-"

"Because that's what happens when two people love each other," she interjected.

She shook her head. "But now he's going to have to stay - with this baby. Even if he wants to leave he won't be able to because someone will have to take care of our child when I can't. And he is too good of a man to walk away from his responsibilities. So you see, I've trapped him - I didn't mean to but that's what's happened." The tears that she had been holding off, broke through and tumbled down her cheeks.

Alexis tugged the young doctor into her arms and hugged her tightly. "So finding out you're pregnant has brought your mortality into sharp focus?" she asked gently. Robin nodded. "Would you believe me if I told you it happened to every woman when she finds out she's pregnant?"

Carefully pulling out of the embrace, Robin dabbed at her eyes. "But not every woman has HIV."

"True. But discovering you're pregnant means that it is no longer about you and that means you start considering things that you may or may not have spent a lot of time thinking about."

"I'm trying to protect him" she said hoarsely.

"Do you think his pain of losing you when the end comes will be lessened because you've pushed him away? Do you think somehow he'll miss you less?"

"I don't know"

"Sure you do" Alexis encouraged. "Did your feelings for him diminish at all when he ran to New York? Did you stop worrying about him?"

Robin smiled tiredly. "You're very tricky, you know."

Alexis grinned in response. "Lawyer."

Exhaling, she ran her hands over her face. "I don't know what to do" she whispered.

"Would you like my advice?"

Robin smirked. "Pretty please?"

"I think this is a conversation you need to have with Patrick. He needs to know your concerns and your fears - and you need to know his. Look, maybe the space isn't a bad thing right now while you sort this out - it will help both of you clarify your feelings - not for each other, but for everything else that comes with it. And then I think you need to talk to someone, be it your support group or a professional. Your child is a miracle in so many ways - just like you," she added.

"Alexis, I'm scared."

"I know you are" she smiled sympathetically. "I'd be more worried about you if you weren't. You're going to come through this," she assured her, "with Patrick."

"Promise?"

"I promise."

Robin ran her hand over her stomach and sighed. She had always imagined that acheiving her dreams would make her feel invincible, as though she could walk on water. It never occured to her that it would give voice to her nightmares. And until she could silence them, until she could think about the future without seeing the end of everything she needed to tread cautiously; with herself and with Patrick.