"You are going to tell him?" Hugh broke the silence and let go of my hair. I looked at him.

"Yes," I said firmly. Silence. He continued to rub my back. Drained of all my energy, I leant back into him.

"When?"

"Soon."

"I think he's planning on leaving tonight," Hugh told me. Was he? First I'd heard of it.

"Tonight it is then."

"Good," he nodded. I closed my eyes. "Once you've told Jack. What's going to happen to you?"

Too tired to cry, I shrugged. I opened my eyes in an effort to stop myself automatically picturing what was bound to happen. "It depends how he takes it," I said. My answer was truthful, but it also put off saying what I knew I had to. Hugh nodded.

"How do you think he'll take it?"

We both knew the answer. Sometimes truthful answers were the hardest to say, but they had to be said nonetheless. "Badly."

He nodded, confirming what I already knew. "And then what?" The weight of everything threatened to push me down and I thought it might physically stop my heart from beating. The thought alone was enough to make me feel like I was being torn apart and the pieces of me scattered to the wind. I closed my eyes and took a deep breath, simultaneously bracing myself for what I needed to say and putting off saying it. "When he takes it badly, what will you do?"

I noticed it was a case of 'when' not 'if'. I looked Hugh in the eye and said it. Doing so did several things at once. It hurt me, it made me stronger. It made it final, set in stone with no way back. In a strange way the certainty of it set me free. Above all, it made me certain I was doing the right thing.

"I'll leave him."

The hardest part of it all was that I had to act as if everything was normal.

I had to smile at Jack when I saw him even though all I wanted to do when his eyes met mine was break down and cry. But I couldn't. I had to laugh along with him and pretend to share in his good mood. He was happy because he was indeed planning on leaving that night. I had to talk to him without my voice cracking. I had to let him wrap his arms around me and hold onto him like everything was normal, like every touch didn't break my heart that little bit more. When he bent to kiss me, I couldn't do it. I could always find some kind of distraction, some excuse to turn away at the last second.

It was the longest day of my life. I both longed for and dreaded the end. I wanted it all to be over. I wanted to lift away the worry and the guilt and the dread that was weighing heavily on my mind. I wanted time to go back to normal- counting up the minuets of the day, rather than what it seemed to be doing now- counting down. Counting down to the moment where everything would change. Every tick of the clock, every beat of my heart seemed more ominous than the one before.

While it was happening, the day felt impossibly long, but once it was over and darkness started to fall I wondered where all the time had gone. The Pearl was ready to sail and I waited for Jack at the door of the house, leaning on the doorframe and chewing on my nail. I waited and the minuets turned into years and then I saw him coming up the path and I wished for one more moment. I went to meet him before he reached the door, leaving my mask behind I did not smile.

He smiled when he saw me coming towards him. "Hello, love, are you…?" He looked at me, changed his tone, and changed his question. "Are you alright?"

I shook my head. "We need to talk, Jack."

He nodded, but I saw him panic, silently running through a list of things he could have done wrong. He looked confused, "Of course, shall we-" He gestured to the door of the house, where I could hear Adam and Jenifer laughing. I shook my head.

"No, we should be away from the others." I walked past him and up the garden path, not looking to see if he was following. When we got out onto the wider path he fell into step with me. I said nothing.

"Where are we going?" he asked. I shrugged.

"Somewhere quiet."

"This whole island's 'somewhere quiet'," he smiled. I didn't laugh or smile back; instead I turned off a smaller dirt track and kept walking. I didn't know where I was going, but I thought that I might know when we got there. Sure enough, I stopped in a clearing, with no desire to go further. Here we were surrounded by wilderness that grew tall and thick. We were cut off from the houses of the island, from the Pearl, from the people, from the sea. For once it was just Jack and I. I stopped and stood still, my arms folded. I had folded them as I walked to stop Jack taking my hand. Suddenly, I didn't know what to say, where to start. I wished it was the morning again.

"Belle?" Jack said after a moment's silence. "Belle, please say something… you're scaring me."

I looked at him.

"Oh my God, what's happened? Why are you crying?" He took a step towards me; his arms already out to hold me. I stepped away. I shook my head.

"Don't," I said and he dropped his arms. I looked at him, willing myself to speak, but nothing came out.

"What is it?" he asked, looking helpless as I stood there and cried. "Have I done something to upset you, love?" I shook my head and opened my mouth to tell him, but he didn't notice. "Who was it, Belle? Who's done this? What's happened? I swear I'll-"

"Jack." I cut across him. He stopped pacing and looked at me.

"Yes, love?" he asked gently.

"I love you." I said, so that I could hear it one last time.

"I love you too." I memorised the words and the way he said them. Then I turned my back on him.

"For Christ's sake, Belle! Tell me what's going on!" he shouted. It echoed in the silence around us. I looked up from the ground, at the dense wilderness I wanted to disappear into.

"I'm pregnant."

I said it quietly, but I knew he had heard me. The silence that followed swallowed me up. And when I turned around… he was gone.

Aaaaand now you know! Honestly, the conclusions you lot were jumping to! Cheating on Jack? Whatever gave you that idea? :P... What do you mean me? Moi? I would never diliberately mislead my readers for my own amusement, you know me! :P

Love you!

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