Helena was sick for the next four days and stayed home from work that Monday and Tuesday, feeling as if she was getting worse instead of better. The woman could barely keep water down and Leon was about to bring her to the hospital if she didn't get better soon since she was at a high risk of dehydration. Aliya was just as worried about Helena as Leon was, often hearing her vomiting in the middle of the night.
Since the bonfire, Aliya and Trevor had finally talked things through, well, Trevor talked and Aliya just listened since she had avoided him all day that Saturday and the two agreed to give dating a shot. Helena was obviously the keeper of that secret while Leon stayed oblivious. Helena arrived home from dropping Aliya off at soccer practice to see Claire and Sherry sitting on the front porch.
"What're you guys doing here?"
"I have the day off and Sherry is on her lunch break. We heard you weren't feeling great, so we decided to stop by to see how you were doing." Claire says as she and Sherry got up from where they had been sitting so that Helena could unlock the door.
"I've had better days," she says, unlocking the door and letting them in.
"How about I make all of us coffee? You look exhausted." Sherry says, going to where they kept their coffee maker by the stove only to discover no coffee pot in sight, "did you guys move your coffee pot?"
"No, Leon put it in the basement because the smell has been making me sick."
Sherry stopped and looked at her, alarm bells going off as she and Claire looked at each other.
"That man is so oblivious it's scary." Claire says, making Sherry snort at the comment.
"What are you guys talking about?"
"Helena, when was your last period?"
Helena thought for a moment. She had been so busy with work and being a guardian to Aliya that she hadn't even noticed that her period was almost a week late.
"Oh fuck,"
Claire got up from where she sat at the island, "alright I'm going to the store because we need to know. I'll be back."
Helena watched as Claire left and looked at Sherry.
"Don't you have to get back to work?"
"Oh, I'll be a few minutes late. I'll just say that I got my period suddenly. Leon and Jake won't ask questions."
"I wish I got mine," Helena mutters, making Sherry laugh, "what am I going to do Sherry?"
"Here's what you'll do: if it's negative, you don't even have to tell Leon that it was a thought in your mind. If it's positive, you can take your time to process it before telling him and figure out what you want to do. I do know though that once the initial shock wears off, he's going to be ecstatic."
"I know," she sighs, "I mean we want to have our own biological children, I just hoped that we'd be married for a couple of years before babies happened."
Sherry shrugged, "sometimes the universe has other plans."
Helena sighed and got up when Claire came back with a grocery store bag.
"Alright, let's get this over with." She says, taking the bag from Claire and going into the bathroom. Helena opened the test and made sure to read the instructions, making sure to set a timer on her phone for the five minutes that she had to wait.
The five minutes were torture for her as she waited for the results. She wasn't sure exactly how she'd feel if she was pregnant, it had always been hard for her to imagine herself as a mother. She never had a great home life growing up and the part that scared her the most was the possibility of ending up like her father. Helena looked at the test when the timer went off and the plus sign on the test told her that she was, in fact, pregnant. Helena quickly threw the test away and exited the bathroom.
"Well, I'm definitely pregnant," she says, going to sit down at the table and put her head in her hands.
"What're you thinking?" Sherry asks as she and Claire approached her.
"That Leon should be here finding this out with me but now two other people know and neither of them are Leon."
"Hey, this is safe with me and Sherry until you tell him."
Helena was about to speak again when there was frantic banging on the front door, and she opened the door to reveal Trevor. The boy's blond hair was drenched in sweat, sticking to his pale forehead. He had clearly run there.
"Trevor? What's going on? I was going to pick you and Aliya up in an hour."
The boy struggled to catch his breath as Helena stepped out of the way for him to enter the house. This was clearly urgent if it couldn't wait until Helena picked the two teens up from practice. Trevor finally caught his breath enough to speak and the words that came out of his mouth were those that none of the adult women wanted to hear.
"Aliya's gone."