Note From The Author-- This is yet another WARNING that this chapter is really intense. It goes into some pretty heavy stuff and there's suggestion of controversial material in here. If you don't feel like that's something you want to get involved with or that you're not comfortable with, it may be best that you just wait for the final chapter of the story out soon and forget this one ever existed. For those who stick around April appears in this chapter. Just as a reminder she's Hawkes and his wife Carrie's daughter and she and Pat have been friends since they were very little. Here we go.
When her phone rang out shrilly Sophia rolled over and glared at the clock. Logically she knew she really shouldn't be all that upset about being woken up at the crack of noon, but it was her day off damn it. Not only was it her day off, it was the first day off she'd managed in the past three months of squeezing in extra shifts between classes so she could afford a new car. She had fully intended to sleep as long as she possibly could; she had even convinced Finn to get ready in the dark so he didn't wake her up.
So though she felt a bit like a lazy brat, she couldn't keep from snapping at whoever was on the other end. "What?"
"God Sophie, what's your damage?" Patrick questioned.
"My damage is you calling me on my day off, you pest. What do you want?" There was a tense pause in the wake of her question, and Sophia sat bolt upright in bed, her pulse suddenly racing. "What's wrong did something happen to mom or dad?"
He sighed. "No, mom and dad are both fine, I'm sorry I scared you."
The elder Flack breathed a sigh of relief. "It's okay, but what's going on?" she questioned.
"I was wondering if I could come over and talk to you."
Sophie looked over at the clock again. "Shouldn't you be at school?"
"If I wanted a lecture I would have called mom or Aunt Lindsay," he responded flatly.
Something was really wrong here, and before she responded she was already out of bed and tugging on her jeans and a sweatshirt. "Pat what's wrong?"
"April thinks she might be pregnant."
She froze where she was standing. "Jesus," she whispered, sitting down hard on the edge of the bed. "Jesus Pat, do Sheldon and Carrie know?"
He swallowed hard. "Not yet. She wants to be absolutely sure either way before she says anything."
"What..."
"Soph this is too hard to explain over the phone. Can I please just come over there?"
She was so shaken that she nodded before she remembered he couldn't see her. "Yeah," she told him. "Come over, I'll be waiting."
She waited, and she paced while she did. It only took Patrick half an hour to get there but it seemed like a millennium before she opened the door to him. For a moment she just looked him over, and it struck her that her baby brother had gotten so handsome, and that he looked so lost. Without saying a word she let him in, then she handed him a cup of black coffee when he sat down heavily on her couch.
"What happened Pat?" she questioned.
Her mother's green eyes stared back at her when he looked up. "If I have to explain that to you I think you and Finn have been doing something wrong."
For a moment her big sister, 'come here so I can smack you' instincts flared up. Then she remembered why he was there. "You know what I mean. Patrick how could you two have been so careless?"
"The baby, if there is a baby, isn't mine," he said quietly.
And there was the pain; it was written all over his face and she sat down next to him, touching his arm gently. "Oh Patrick. How far along?"
He shook his head. "If it turns out she is then she's three months in; it happened a couple weeks before we got together."
"Maybe you should start at the beginning," she urged as gently as she could.
His voice was carefully neutral as he began to take her through it. "We heard about the party that Maria's roommate threw while you two were in Florida," he told her.
"Damn it Patrick you know better than to go to one of her parties. They always get out of hand."
"Yeah, got that, thanks," he said bitterly. "Anyway we went to the party. Like I said it was before we finally got together, when we were both still trying to decide what to do about everything. She was pissed at me and she peeled off and headed straight for the drinks. That friend of yours from school Eli grabbed me and he was listening to me vent. I completely lost track of April."
He paused and Sophie could tell he was getting to the difficult part. "Take a break if you need to Pat."
He shook his head. "She got buzzed. I could tell that she was sober by the time I found her. I hadn't seen her in close to two hours when I got a text message from her telling me where she was. When I found her she was wrapped up in a blanket on the floor in Maria's room. She'd been with some jackass that we went to school with who had graduated a couple years back the whole time."
"Oh God, he didn't?"
"No he didn't rape her, thank God for small blessings," he told her. "Evidently he was interested in her when he went to school with us. One thing led to another that night and they slept together; it was totally consensual. In the moment she was all for it but when it was over she freaked out. She threw him out of the room and wouldn't let anyone come in until I got there. I wanted to kill the bastard but she told me that he hadn't forced her and I didn't know what to do."
Sophia felt a tear trace its way down her cheek. "At least she wasn't raped Patrick."
His eyes met hers and she saw tears of his own shining there. "No, she wasn't raped, but she lost her virginity to a guy she barely knew on Maria's floor with fifty people in the next room and a chair under the doorknob so nobody could get in."
"Oh my God," she whispered.
Patrick shook his head, and for the first time he let the tears fall. "I told her it didn't matter; that I couldn't care less how it had happened and that she hadn't done anything wrong. But Soph she was so ashamed of herself it broke my heart. She said she couldn't believe how stupid she'd been and that she'd do anything to go back and change it; she said she wished it had been me," he said, heartbreak in his voice.
Her heart broke for both him and for April. "What did you do?"
"She completely lost it. I just held her until she stopped crying and when she did I got her into a pair of Maria's sweats and had Eli block for me while I got her the hell out of there. Sheldon and Carrie were out of town so I told mom and dad that I was staying at a friend's house and I took her home. She didn't sleep all night, she just wept and all I could do was hold onto her and make sure that she choked something down in the morning."
"The poor thing," Sophia murmured.
He nodded. "It was hard the next couple days; we weren't sure how to deal with each other. Then about a week later we finally sat down and talked about it. A week after that we finally got together. Everything has been going so well but lately she's been a little off balance. I asked her why yesterday and she told me that she might be pregnant. I didn't know what to do."
"Why me?" she asked.
"Who else? You're my big sister and even though we fight you were the first person I thought of. I wasn't sure what to do but I knew I couldn't talk to mom or dad, and Uncle Danny and Aunt Lindsay were out of the question; they wouldn't be able to keep it from Sheldon and Carrie, and I understand why. I just needed to talk, and there wasn't a better choice than you."
Sophia had always known that her baby brother was pretty amazing; still her mind was screaming that he was exactly that, her baby brother. He was only seventeen years old, but already he was so strong. She knew that if she had to deal with something like this at his age she would have run straight to her parents. She just wouldn't have been able to handle it, and it amazed her that he was. "What can I do; or what can we do I guess would be the better question."
"April's at the doctor's office right now. She didn't want to do a home test; she wanted to know for sure. She asked Maria to go with her and me to come and talk to you. She knew she had to tell Maria what happened and she wanted the support, but she wanted you to get the full story too. She wants your help, yours and Maria's."
"What does she want to do?" she asked.
Patrick shook his head. "She doesn't know yet. Like I said she wants to be absolutely sure one way or the other before she does anything else or makes any decisions."
"And what happens with you two?"
His eyes met hers again, and this time what she saw was resolve. "Whatever she decides, I'm there. I'm in love with her Soph, I think I probably have been since I was six years old. So if it means holding her hand in a clinic or holding her hand during labor I'm going to be there."
She couldn't help the tears that fell from her eyes as she listened to him. She leaned in to kiss his forehead. "I am so very proud to be your sister," she told him quietly.
"Thank you," he responded shakily. "April was too freaked to drive, so Maria took her. They won't have the tests for a few days, she couldn't swing anything but a small women's clinic, but they're coming here after her appointment."
"Okay." Sophie took her little brothers hand and held it tight. "So we wait."
"We wait," he sighed.
When April had arrived with Maria an hour later they had both been ca complete wreck. April looked as if she hadn't slept in a week and Sophie could tell that her best friend was dealing with the weight of guilt that it had happened right in her home. For a few moments the three women simply embraced and cried together. Then April took refuge in Patrick's arms and they all talked for hours.
Patrick and April left just before Finn was due home and Sophia couldn't help but send out a little prayer for them. April had decided that she couldn't wait until she got the results to tell her parents, so they were headed over to the Hawkes. Maria hung around for a bit and try as she might Sophie couldn't convince her friend that she wasn't at fault for what had happened; if there was anyone to be angry at it was Maria's idiot roommate who had let two seventeen year olds into a party like that; even then there was no blame to be placed. Still, Maria left to scream at her just for good measure.
As she waited for Finn to get home Sophie thought back on everything that had happened that day. She knew that because of her parents' close friendships that it would only be a matter of time before Stella and Don and Danny and Lindsay were brought into the situation with all the rest of them, so she did her contemplative thinking while she could.
April was clearly scared out of her mind, but Patrick's presence seemed to soothe her. The pair of them had been a unit practically since birth, so it shouldn't have surprised her that they were wholly in this together, no matter what. Still, she couldn't help but marvel at their strength, even as she wanted to rage at the universe for what they were going through. She couldn't fully comprehend how April was feeling as she'd never experienced what the younger girl was going through; yet only feeling a fraction of the pain was almost unbearable, and she could imagine how it must be for April and her brother.
The door opened and shut and Finn walked in to find her sitting on the couch, her face streaked with tears. His amber eyes immediately lit with worry and she invited him to sit. Then while he listened attentively she described the hell the two teenagers were going through. He let her get through it before he pulled her into him; and when she wrapped her arms around him she wept for her little brother and the sweet little girl who would forever regret the one mistake she had made that had the potential to change her life forever.
Sophia and Maria both just about went crazy waiting to hear what had happened. Sophie had talked to both her mother and father in the days since everything had blown up. Both Stella and Flack told her that though they were disappointed, Hawkes and Carrie were mostly worried over what it was all doing to April. She was so miserable and so humiliated at telling her parents what had happened that they were terrified for her. Their entire interwoven group of friends and family had closed ranks and lent every ounce of support that they could.
It had been four days when Sophia's phone rang at work and April's number flashed on her caller ID. "Hey," she answered.
"Hey Sophie. I'm not pregnant," she said quietly. "Evidently it's stress or something; I'm honestly not sure. I sort of blanked out after not pregnant."
The relief was palpable, and she closed her eyes and took a deep breath as relief coursed through her. "You're okay?"
April let out a shaky breath. "I'm okay. Thank you Sophie."
"For what?"
"For listening, for not judging me."
Sophie made a sound of protest. "Oh sweetie I would never judge you. Everyone makes mistakes."
"Not quite as big as the one I made, but I'm glad that you feel that way. I'm lucky I didn't lose Patrick in the process."
"Honey Patrick's so in love with you that he'd crawl naked across the Sahara if you asked him to," she told her.
A hint of happiness crept into her voice then. "He does love me, and I love him, even though Daddy thinks we're too young to know. I'm so lucky to have him; I just should have realized that three months ago."
"It never helps to think about what might have been April. You two have gotten through this, and you'll get through everything else. And as for you father, it's going to take some time for Sheldon to come to grips with the fact that you're growing up."
"I know," she told her. "I've got to call Maria."
She nodded. "Do that."
"Thanks again Sophie."
"No worries."
She hung the phone up and only moments later her text messaging alert went off. It didn't surprise her that it was from Patrick. 'April stayed home today so she could take the call. Just called me and she's not pregnant.'
'I talked to her,' she texted back. Then it occurred to her, she didn't say it nearly enough. 'Love you baby brother.'
