Nobody's Business (BOOK ONE)

Chapter 41

As the weeks go by and the days gets colder, everyone finds their selves ditching their shorts and flip flops for jeans and boots. The leaves have turned bright shades of yellow and orange and are slowly falling off the tree branches. And everday Aubrey's stomach seems to be stretching out her shirts more and more. Being four and a half months pregnant makes her feel like a cow. Thankfully the morning sickness has stopped and shes able to hold down more food. Her eating habits are all over the place and she craves food she thought she would never eat in her life.

 "Hey, a package came for you today." Her aunt tells her when she comes in from school. She thanks her aunt and heads to her room, throwing her book bag down on the floor she plops down on the bed. Aubrey reads the address it was sent from and noticed Keenan's name on the sticker. She opens the package and reaches inside, pulling out a bright yellow baby book with sticky notes poking out of the pages. She fights the urge to say aww as she flips through the pages, stopping to skim the pages that Keenan marked as important. She hasnt heard anything about him since he had been arrested, so to have him send a baby book to her makes her feel happy to know she's on his mind.

Other than Carson and her aunt, Aubrey doesn't have many people to talk to since she's still ignoring her sister and no longer taking her moms calls. She often finds herself rubbing her stomach, thinking about what life will be like when the baby is born. She'll no longer be lonely because she'll have a little piece of her self to cuddle close and keep her company. Aubrey hopes that Keenan will consider building a relationship with her for the sake of the baby once he's released from prison. She needs someone here to hold her up, someone who will give her love as a partner and not just a friend or relative.

 After changing into more comfortable clothes, sweatpants a t-shirt that she has to stretch across her stomach now, she climbs into bed with the baby book, too tired to start on her homework. She opens to the first page that's talking about her first trimester, she decides to skip all of that since she's already in her second. As she reads, she absentmindedly rubs her stomach up and down. The hard bump of her belly button ring is no longer there since she took it out last week. Even though they say it's ok to keep the ring in, Aubrey doesn't want to risk hurting the baby.

 "What's that?" Aubrey looks up to find her aunt standing in the doorway. Their relationship is slowing getting better and each day the tension between them decreases. Her aunt has actually be a great help to Aubrey. She tells her what to expect and calms her down when her pregnancy symptoms scare her. She acts more motherly than her own mother ever did.

 "A baby book from Keenan," Aubrey says. "He marked all the important pages for me...for us." She corrects gazing at the book lovingly. Her aunt walks further into the room and sits down on the edge of the book. Aubrey hands her the book and watches as she looks it over.

 "That's nice of him. You should send him a letter or something, maybe even a picture so he can see how big you've gotten." Her aunt tells her, handing the book bag. Aubrey considers this, she never thought about writing him. He does deserve to see a picture of her stomach though, just to be reassured that the baby is growing alright.

 "I have a doctors appointment next week, I'll send him a picture of the ultra sound." She says.

 Her aunt nods, "Good, I'm sure he'll be happy to see his baby." She looks around the walls for a moment, a comfortable silence settles in the air before she speaks again. "If you want...I'll take you to go visit him."

 Aubrey doesn't even have to think about it much before she shakes her head no. What would she say to him? Hey sorry that you got thrown in jail for attemtping to rape Sevyn, I miss you and I'm sorry this happened all because of me. Oh by the way the baby is pretty healthy, see you when you get out of jail. She knows theres going to be alot of awkward silence if they meet face to face. Keenan must know that too because he hasn't picked up the phone to call her. "I don't think that's a good idea. Keenan and I are still awkward around each other. He still loves Sevyn and I don't want to make things any worse between us. We agreed to be friends, I'm going to just leave it at that for a while."