One month later...
I get up from my office desk after a long day at work, I wrap up all the paperwork and prepare myself to go home. After I found out about my pregnancy I moved back into my parent's home. Although the news wasn't the most pleasant they were very happy to have their first grandbaby. My dad did insist on telling Nathan but I was adamant not to. I started working on my non-profit as soon as the doctors confirmed I have a healthy pregnancy and my beany is completely safe, resting in me. I rented an office in Zack's building giving me his support whenever required. I received initial funding and hired a couple of people as employees. All in all majorly girl-bossing or should I say mommy-bossing.
I wash my face to get rid of all the fatigue. I look at myself in the long mirror in the washroom and notice a very tiny bump. I run my hand lovingly on my stomach thinking about my beautiful baby whom I cannot wait to welcome. Nathan has taken a lot from me these past months, but he has also given me this ray of sunshine. I sigh at the thought of my baby not having their dad around. This is so scary that I often cry myself to sleep. I am working 24/7 to forget about him but I can't. I can't stop loving him.
"April, where are you?" My thoughts are interrupted by Zack's voice.
"Yes, coming!" I hollar. I quickly wipe my face and join Zack outside. "Hey, you wanna see something?" I ask him as we reach the lobby, walking towards our car.
"Yes, yes." He says in excitement. I pull out the latest sonogram of my beany and hand it to him. "Oh my God. So precious!" He squeals. "I can't believe he's growing inside you." I giggle at his reaction. This is exactly what I wanted to hear. This excitement. I wonder if Nathan would be this excited to see our baby's sonogram. "When did you visit the doctor?"
"Yesterday evening. Listen, do you wanna get something to eat. I'm really craving chinese."
"Sure, there's a nice chinese truck a block from here. It's really famous. Can you walk?"
"Yes. Let's go." We walk to the food truck and find a place to seat.
"So, how's it going? Is he hard on you?" Zack asks refering to beany.
"No, not much. But I absolutely hate morning sickness."
"It's okay but you are glowing darling. Anybody can tell you are pregnant." I blush at his comment. I do feel that I am glowing, my skin is so bright and young. "Uhh, did you see him?" Zack asks and I know he's referring to Nathan.
"Uh, no. I just..." I start to say something but my eyes well-up thinking about him. I often wonder how would he react to this situation. I remember seeing him with children and he has always been wonderful. Kids love him. I love him, "I'm sorry, it's just hormones." I say, wiping my tears.
"April..." Zack takes my hands in his as he starts, "I think you should talk to him. Maybe tell him about your baby. Once you know how he feels maybe you can decide how you feel about the baby."
"What do you mean? I know how I feel about the baby. Are you saying I should abort?" I ask him furiously. Zack pulls his hands away and refusing to look at me.
"Look it's a very personal decision. But yes, I think you are too young to do this alone. Of course you have all of us but it's still not easy to raise a child alone."
I was stunned by his words. He was right. I couldn't find a way to rebut it. "Whatever the case, I don't want to talk to him." I say and get up from my seat top fast and suddenly lose my balance. I for a moment I see darkness and my eyes open to me in masculine arms and green eyes staring at me with concern. I blink away the darkness of head rush and gasp when I find Nathan holding me. For a moment I feel like I'm dreaming. How can he be here?
"Are you okay?" I hear Zack rushing to my side. Nathan straightens me but keeps his hands on my waist ensuring I don't lose my balance.
"Hey hey, I got her." Zack elbows Nathan causing him to remove his hands from my waist. Zack is now standing right beside me and we are facing Nathan who looks completely different. I has lost a lot of weight and his eyes are baggy, almost hollow. Oh my God, what happened? Is he sick? I see Jason standing a few feet behind Nathan worriedly looking at the both of us.
"Are...are you okay?" I hear his voice after months. We stand in silence for a few minutes as I am not able to comprehend the situation. How is he here? I'm so confused. All I can do is nod ensuring everyone I'm fine.
"Ma'am, your order." The deafening silence between us is interrupted by the food truck placing our order on the table. Zack and I are still standing there, both unsure as to what to do.
I see Nathan take a deep breath and look down, "April can we..." I hear him say in a low voice, he looks at me with pleading eyes and all I want to do is run to him and hug him, "I know you must be busy but can we please talk?" I'm not able to say a word. The food I ordered was now making me nauseous.
"I think you should leave her alone!" Zack says firmly. I mentally thank him for supporting me.
"Can I get some water?" I say in an unrecognisable voice.
"Of course." Zack rushes to truck to buy a water bottle. I sit down again as my nausea increases. Nathan rushes to my side when he senses I'm not doing okay.
"Hey, what happened?" He whispers, "If you want me to leave I'll leave. I just..." He trails off as I look at him getting lost in my eyes.
"We came here to grab a bite. Nathan had a meeting nearby and had not eaten anything all day." Jason informed me.
"You haven't?" I ask him and he looks away. Zack hands me the water. Nathan twists the bottle open and hands it to me. "Thanks." I say to Zack as I start feeling better. Without saying anything further, Nathan gets up and start to leave. As he walks away his head is down in disappointment.
"Nathan." I call after him. His name feels strange on my lips. I walk towards him and he turns to face me again. "Do you wanna go for dinner?" I ask him mustering all the courage.
"Yes, of course!" He beams, his eyes light up for the first time.
I look back at Zack who gives me a reassuring nod. "Maybe somewhere more private?" I ask Nathan.
"Okay. Sure. I'm not familiar with the neighborhood much. Do you know any place?"
"Yeah I do." I gulp and gesture him towards the block on my right. I have seen a Mexican place nearby, if I'm not wrong it should be walking distance from here. Nathan says his goodbye to Jason who makes him promise to eat something and call him after returning home. I too say goodbye to Zack and apologise for cutting short our dinner. He wishes me good luck for my conversation.
When Nathan and I start walking towards the restaurant, there is dead silence in the ally. None of us say a word. I keep my hand on my stomach protectively to assure beany everything is okay. I don't want to startle my baby because of his father's actions.
"Are you okay?" Nathan asks me again, eyeing the hand on my stomach.
"Uh, yes. I'm okay." I keep on debating with myself whether to tell him about beany or not. Would he care? Was this a good idea? I look at the lights coming from the restaurant and point it to Nathan. We reach and Nathan calls for a table for two. The manager leads us to a corner table away from the hussle of the rest of the place.
"You look very nice." Nathan begins once we are seated, "Honestly, you are glowing." A blush creeps on my cheeks from the compliment. A thought runs through my mind - would he be able to figure out on his own?
"Thank you. We should order, I'm hungry." I tell him honestly. The energy bar I had an hour ago is not doing it anymore. I need food. Nathan nods and calls the waiter.
"I'll have a taco platter and a burrito bowl with chicken. Oh also, the chicken enchiladas look nice but I want them to be spicy." I give him my order. Nathan looks at me in bewilderment then shakes his head.
"If you want them to be spicy, I can bring the spicy sauce on the side." The waiter replies.
"That would be great. Thank you."
The waiter turns to Nathan who orders a salad. I am a little surprised by his diet. I raise an eyebrow at him, "I'm not hungry." He explains which doesn't offer any explanation because he had not eaten all day. Suddenly I realise that I am spiraling back to the old April who thought about Nathan all day. I should not care whether he eats properly or not. This is the man who cheated on me. Who broke my trust. I look into his eyes and instantly feel a sharp pain in my chest. His eyes are so honest and pure.
The food arrives quicker than expected, before we even get a chance to move ahead from small talk. I dig in without waiting for him and moan as I bite into the tacos. Nathan chuckles at my reaction and looks down to hide it. He plays around with his salad, occasionally taking a bite or two.
"Are you on some sort of diet?" I ask him rather curtly, "Does having a supermodel girlfriend result in salads for life?"
He looks at me with wide eyes. There is several moments of silence before he says, "It's not what you think. Do you really believe I would do that?" His voice is full of pain. He looks at me with tired expressions as if exhausted of explaining himself again and again.
"Yes." I say. I'm not going to buy this bullshit anymore. "If you think this act of yours is going to work on me again you are hugely mistaken. I'm not the same April anymore." I narrow my eyes at him.
"April please give me a chance to explain. I don't why Alyssa would say-"
"I don't want to hear her name ever again. You can play the victim all you want Nathan Walsh but we both know you are never the victim. You always leverage other people for your own gain, just like your father!" I hiss. Nathan looks at me with utter shock.
"How can you say that about my family? They have been nothing but welcoming to you." He accuses me but not once raising his voice.
"Do you not really know? Or are you just that delusional?"
"What are you talking about?"
"Your father threatened me that if I don't marry you he will destroy my family!" I say and the knife in Nathan's hand dropped to the ground. He stared at me for a long time with his mouth agape. Did he really not know? I suddenly feel a flutter in my stomach and my hand immediately goes to beany. Nathan notices the same.
"April, does your stomach hurt?" He asks, "Do you want me to call for a doctor?"
"No! I'm fine."
"So this is what you were hiding from me all this time?" He reverts to the previous conversation, "You married me to save your family." He says in a low voice, "I'm so sorry, I really didn't know. Please believe me. Please believe that I didn't cheat on you."
"I will never believe a word that comes out of your mouth Walsh! You don't deserve my trust. You never did." Another flutter. Argh! It's as if beany is punishing me for talking his father like this. I rub my lower abdomen to calm beany. My eyebrows furrow at the flutter and it catches Nathan's attention.
"April, if you are not well please tell me. We don't have to do this at the cost of your health." He looks at me with requesting eyes.
"I'm well. It's alright in early stages of..." I stop myself short when I realise I was about to reveal my pregnancy to him.
"Early stages of??" Nathan's face fills with dread. He looks like he's about to cry, "Early stages of?" He repeats as he gets up from his seat and kneels down in front of me. His eyes went blank and he turned even more pale, if that was possible. "April, are you..." He stops himself, unable to complete the sentence in fear. I close my eyes and realise he must have figured out by now.
"Are you dying?" He asks in a breaking voice and I jolt my head up. What? He thinks I have a terminal disease? I realise that sentence "early stages of..." May have many endings.
"No Nathan." I look at him almost sympathetically seeing his reaction, "Get up, please. I'm not dying." I role my eyes as I think why would he assume the worst possible scenario.
"Then?" A teary eyed Nathan lands back in his seat. "What has happened?"
"I'm pregnant." I reveal and color rushes back to his face, "It's yours."
"What?" He says in joy, "You're... we're... we're pregnant?!" Relief and joy is all over his face. For the first time that night I see the old Nathan again, handsome as ever. "I can't believe it. How did this happen? We're pregnant!" He squeals in excitement. I keep studying his reaction which completely opposite of what I imagined in my head. He's so happy. "Oh my god! When did this happen?" He gives me the biggest smile I have ever seen on his handsome face. His reaction makes me gush with happiness internally. He wants to raise our child.
But how? I get lost in thoughts when I realise I would never want that life with Nathan again. I will never go back to that house. I will never be the same April again. And I will go to any length to protect my child from Alyssa and Robin and whoever dares him or her any harm. Suddenly, Nathan finding out isn't the best thing for my child. If Alyssa wants to be a step mother for my child, that is not happening in a million years.
"Nathan, I'm not keeping the child." I say to him firmly and the smile on his face disappears.
"April, please believe me I didn't cheat on you. Those were all lies. Please come home, let us be a family."
"There is no family and there is no us!" I say furiously, "You and I are over. Now you can figure out how you wanna play it in the world, I don't care. But I'm not going to be a puppet anymore." With that I leave the table and walk out. Tears spring in my eyes as soon as I step out of the restaurant. This was much more difficult than I imagined. I find a quite ally and cry my eyes out. Sitting on the road, I try to calm my emotions which were all over the place. Come on April! Pull yourself together. I try to collect myself but the images of the past months with Nathan keep running in my mind. From Paris to New York to LA, he has broken me every single time and yet I fell for him.
Before I could spiral back in this, I wipe my tears and get up. I place my hand on beany reassuring him everything would be okay and that I will always love him. I check my phone and it is almost midnight. I let out an exhale and try to find a taxi. Suddenly I hear a black van screeching it's breaks right behind me. Before I can comprehend what has happened, my face is covered with a dark cloth and I feel sharp pain on my neck which makes me lose all consciousness.