Ana
We have been sitting on the tile floor of the bathroom for over an hour now. I am still sitting on Christian lap, while he runs his hand soothingly through my hair.
My tears have gone, and all that remains left is that hopeless feeling in the pit of my stomach. It's not a sense that I have very often. Even though Christian and I are homeless, I still feel safe, cherished, and loved because I have him to guide me through our struggles. I trust him with my life. When he is with me, I do not feel hopeless. I do not feel alone or hollow, because I have the one person who cares about me the most in this dangerous world by my side.
Right now, Christian and I are free. We are living and surviving on our own, without anyone's help. We can go anywhere, do anything, and be anything we want. Up until this point, our life was simple. There are always going to be struggles. We are always going to have to find ways to survive. There are times where we are not going to have a roof over our heads, or food in our stomachs, or clothes that are warm and clean.
What we do have is each other. We love each other. The kind of love that many people in this world do not ever find in their lifetime. I am always grateful that I have found the person that I love so early on in my life. We grew up together. We have been through the same hardships. We have been through the same abuse, and the same violence that young children should never have to go through.
We have been through a lot together, and we have always come out stronger in the end. I know we can get through this. I know what can happen next. I know that we are in the high percentages of getting pregnant.
I close my eyes tightly at the thought of bringing a child into this world at this point in our lives. I know that a baby right now is impossible. We don't have a place to call home. We don't have jobs or money or for the basic necessities. We can't afford a baby, or give the child what it needs to survive.
Formula, clothes, diapers, wipes, blankets, car seat. All of those baby essentials are impossible for people like us. Christian and I don't even have extra clothes for the two of us, let alone a newborn baby.
A lone tear slips out of the corner of my eye at the thought of us having a baby.
"Stop Ana," he says firmly.
I sniffle as I lean my head back to look into his eyes. They are full of pain, much like my own.
"I'm sorry. I'm just scared Christian," I whisper.
"I'm scared too baby, but we don't know for sure if you are pregnant. Just because I came inside of you, doesn't mean you are going to get pregnant. I know it's extremely likely for it to happen, but I don't think we need to worry about it until we know for sure. Okay?" he pleads.
"Okay," I agree.
He gives me a sad smile and kisses me on the lips softly.
I suddenly jump when we hear banging on the front door.
"Let's go! Check out time was twenty minutes ago! Get out of my motel!" someone yells.
Christian sighs and places me on the floor and stands up.
"Get cleaned up baby. Let me tell him we will be out soon," he says.
I nod and get up and stretch. I sigh and go to the bathroom. I hear Christian raising his voice in the bedroom. He is arguing with the guy about paying extra for overtime we spent in the room. I put my head in my hands and groan. We'll have no more money.
I hear more arguing and then I hear Christian telling him to keep the change and slams the front door. I get up from the toilet and walk into the room. Christian is pacing up and down the room, without his shirt on.
He runs his hand through his long hair and stops when he sees me staring at him.
"The asshole wanted more money. That left us with only five dollars left," he hisses.
I nod weakly and look down at the ground at my bare feet. I am still naked.
I hear Christian sigh and he walks over to me. He lifts my chin with his finger. I stare at him with a defeated expression. He closes his eyes and kisses my forehead.
"Let's get out of here, and get to the shelter," he murmurs.
I walk to the bed and see that he has laid out my clothes. We get dressed, and when we are finished, he takes my hand and leads me out of the motel room.
We make it to the bus stop and sit down next to an old couple that is waiting for the bus. Christian puts his arm around my waist and I rest my head against his chest. I look over at the couple and she is staring at us. Pity written all over her face. I look away quickly. I hate when people look at us like that. I hate people feeling sorry for us.
The bus pulls up and we get up and find a seat in the back. I sit down next to Christian and stare out of the window as Christian rests his head back and closes his eyes. I lean my head on the cold glass of the window and stare at the city of Detroit as we ride the bus to the homeless shelter.
We get to our destination forty-five minutes later. Christian takes my hand and we walk off the bus. We see a long line in front of the shelter that we frequently visit.
The shelter is huge, with a long winding ramp in front of the brown brick building. There are many people in front of us waiting to get inside of the shelter. Most of the people who stay here at this shelter are regulars. There are many couples like Christian and I, some are all alone and some are single parents with children, and some are families. I snuggle up at Christian's side when I see a couple of kids who couldn't be more than two years old in front of us. The father is holding a little girl, who is wrapped up in a wool blanket. Her little head is resting on her father's shoulder. She has her eyes closed and is snoring softly. The other child is a younger boy, who is holding onto his mother's hand.
Christian moves me in front of his body. He wraps both of his arms around me and rests his chin on top of my head. I hold onto his arms and rest my head on his shoulder.
We stand there for a couple of minutes, while we move forward every few seconds due to them letting people into the building. The boy that was holding is mothers hand is now staring at me. He looks up at me and gives me a shy smile. I reciprocate and give him a little wave.
He giggles and hides behind his mother's legs. I giggle at him, while Christian chuckles behind me. He pokes his head out from behind her legs and we spend a few moments playing peek-a-boo with each other. The father turns towards us and smiles at me lovingly. I bit my lip and give him a shy smile back.
He mouths 'thank you' at me and turns back around. The mother provides us with a warm smile and picks up the boy and they turn towards the door. They are next in line.
The couple goes inside and it's our turn to speak to the manager of the shelter. She is an older African American women who has short dark hair and kind eyes.
She smiles at us warmly when she sees us approaching the door.
"Christian, Ana, how are you?" she says sweetly.
"Hi Mrs. Shana. We're doing okay," I give her a hug.
She hugs me back tightly. I always love her hugs. Shana is an amazing women. She works hard, and is always giving back to the community. She is like a second mother to the people around here. I always look forward to seeing her when we come into the shelter when we have nowhere to else to go.
"Come in and get some food. We were fortunate enough to get some new donations of clothing. You two look like you can use some."
"Thank you Mrs. Shana," I choke back a sob.
She gives me a motherly kiss on my forehead and gives Christian a kiss on the cheek. He still has his touch issues. Christian and I suffered the same abuse when we were little, but for some reason I overcame my fear of contact. Christian is still having difficulties with others touching him. I can touch him freely, because he knows I would never hurt him.
We walk into the building and the first thing you notice is all of the cots around the large room. They have colorful blankets and pillows that cover the beds. There are lines of bunk beds on the far wall. Those are for families with small children. There are also lines of bunk beds in a separate room, those are for families who have infants and toddlers. There are more private, so the children can sleep more soundly. It's also to help the other people who sleep on the cots, so they can have some peace and quiet when they go to bed at night, without hearing the constant cry of infants when they get up at night to feed.
In the far corner, there is a door that leads to a big kitchen area. There are many long tables, so all of the people can eat throughout the day. There are individuals who volunteer in the kitchen. They help fix and serve meals to all the families and individuals who spend time in the shelter.
"Let's go get some clothes baby," he whispers in my ear.
I nod and we walk around all of the empty cots.
We enter the room where they keep the donated clothes. It's a medium size room where multiple boxes are lined up on the far wall. The clothes are labeled, including the sizes that are written on top of the boxes. I walk over to the box that is labeled women's size 4 and look through the box. I find a pair of black worn out skinny jeans and a tan long-sleeved shirt with buttons at the neck. I like my converse, so I skip the shoes and head to the bathroom to change into the clothes.
I come out of the bathroom and see that Christian has also changed into some new clothes. He is wearing some black jeans and a plain white shirt. His long hair is slicked back, and out of his eyes. He found some new shoes, and is wearing black and white Adidas's high top sneakers.
He takes my hand and we head over to the cots. We set down our old clothes and leave them on our chosen cots for the night. We usually sleep on the back of the large room. Christian still has nightmares and even though it is typical to hear others dreams at night, Christian is still somewhat embarrassed when he wakes up screaming. Most of the people here are used to people's dreams so they don't say anything in the morning. Almost all of them know that Christian has nightmares that are nearly every night when we are here.
He takes my hand again as we follow the others to the kitchen to eat dinner. There is a long line, and we stand there waiting for our turn. There are numerous people here serving us, so it usually doesn't take long to get food. We get to the top of the line and get plates, knives and forks. We go down the line and hold out our plates so they can give us our portions of food. I smile at the older lady who gives me a large helping of mash potatoes.
"Thank you," I murmur.
"Your welcome sweetie," she smiles warmly at me.
She serves Christian with a wink and he rolls his eyes and smirks. We continue down the line, and when our plate is full, we go over to the tables and sit down.
"What do you want to drink baby?" he asks.
"Just water please," I say.
He nods and gets up. I pick up my fork and start to devour my food. Tonight there are mashed potatoes, corn or green beans. You get a choice of ham or turkey. I choose ham. Also, there are an assortment of dinner rolls and different deserts. I picked up a slice of cherry pie, and Christian wanted an apple pie.
"Hey," I hear a deep masculine voice coming from behind me.
I smile and turn my head to see the man who suddenly appears beside me.
"Hey you," I beam up at him.
He chuckles and sits down beside me with his plate of food.
I haven't seen him for a few weeks. I frown and see that he suddenly jumps and then tenses when we hear a loud bang coming from the kitchen.
I put my hand on his shoulder when I see him frantically search the kitchen, he is suddenly on high alert.
"Hey it's okay," I coo.
He turns his brown eyes towards me and give me a pained look.
I squeeze his hand and try to reassure him that it's okay.
"It's okay Jason."
AN: Thank you for all the reviews for the last chapter.
As I said in the beginning, this story is going to be hard to read. I know some of you are worried about the baby issue. I know no matter what I do, some readers are going to be upset of the direction of this story. I cant please everybody, so please bear with me and hopefully all of you will continue to read their journey. I will tell you that there will be many obstacles and struggles for our favorite couple in this story. It's not going to be a lighthearted story, and it will upset some of you. Just wanted to warn you all again beforehand, so I hope you stick with me.
Pinterest is updated. Ill have the next update here soon. Thanks for reading.