Pregnant Pause [H.S]

Chapter 1

I was back to pinching the bridge of my nose, exhaling in exasperation. "Yeah, I know."

"How would you know?" Fitz chimed from the receiver. "I haven't even told anyone yet; I was waiting until I told you."

Recalling that I had her on the line, I pressed the receiver to my ear. "What? Sorry, um... what?"

"What do you mean Fitz's tone was pressing, but Beckett made no move to leave, saying, "I came by to ask a favour, but clearly you're occupied."

"I'm not occupied," I said, gathering strewn papers in a pile as I held the receiver to my ear with my shrugged shoulder.

"What? Harry, what's going on?" Fitz asked.

"Sorry, I'm... there's someone here."

"Did you hear what I said?"

"Nnnn... no," I said hesitantly. Sending Beckett a glance, I asked, "Will it take long?"

"It took twenty seconds, but apparently that was too much time for you to spare," Fitz snapped.

"Not you," I said quietly into the phone., what? Weren't you listening?"

"Five minutes," Beckett replied.

"You begged me to tell you my important news and then you didn't even listen."

"Fitz, I can't talk right now."

"Fine. We're fighting."

I groaned. That was a game Fitz liked to play – the 'we're fighting' game. In truth, it wasn't so much a game as it was a warning, designed to prompt me to apologize and/or surrender.

In less stressful moments, I liked to play my own little games with her. In that moment, however, I needed to eliminate at least one ongoing conversation.

"Sorry," I said, far too hastily to be perceived as genuine. "I have to go. I'll pick you up on my way home."

"You can't."

Similarly, in some moments, a difficult Fitz made me smile... while in others, it was all I could do to clench my jaw and take a deep breath to keep myself calm.

"I said I was sorry," I repeated, my voice barely above a whisper. Cubes provided very little privacy as it was, but with Beckett looming over me and undoubtedly judging my every word, privacy was entirely foreign. "Your place, then. I'll come over straight from work."

"I won't be here," was her clipped reply. "The hen party is tonight."

"Shit," I breathed, squeezing my eyes shut. "I forgot."

"I reminded you this morning."

"I know. Sorry."

The buzzer to Fitz's flat sounded in the background while Beckett tapped his fingers on the cube division, one brow arched in skepticism.

"That'll be Macy. I have to go," she said.

"Tell her I say hi."

"If you were here, you could tell her yourself."

I let out a gritty sigh. "I'll ring you later."

"Yeah."

"Love you," I said, but she'd already hung up.

I fumbled with the receiver as I weakly placed it back in its dock, prolonging the eventual necessity of looking at Beckett's smug face.

And smug it was. Leaning casually against my cube wall with folded arms and a chin held high, he oozed pretention even behind the façade of amusement. The slicked back blond hair didn't do much for modesty.