Pregnant Pause [H.S]

Chapter 33

Is 

It wasn't an easy week following the lunch at my childhood home. I spent the entirety of Sunday going back and forth between channel-surfing and web browsing, not paying attention to what I was doing half the time but not knowing what else to do with myself. Eventually, I suggested to Niall that we catch a movie. It might have been because he felt bad for me – one of my cheeks was yellowish from my father's hand and he knew I'd had a rough day – but from the way his jaw dropped and a slow smile spread broad across his face, it was as if he was witnessing the birth of Jesus. Movie watching was his specialty.

The next few days, I went to work, feeling dreary and oddly out of place. It was like I expected to be cornered and asked who I thought I was and what I was doing. Callum and Vic noticed the discoloration of my cheek – Callum with a suspicious, raised brow; Vic with concern and skepticism – but I figured that as long as I had something to talk about around them, they wouldn't have the opportunity to ask.

Mostly, I felt lost. Aimless. Uncomfortable in my own skin. Refusing to model myself after my father left me without substance – substance that I could identify, anyway. I didn't know who I was or who I was supposed to be.

But there were times I felt happy. There were times I felt at peace. Times that I felt I could just... be, without worrying if I was doing it right or not.

Mostly, those times were well past midnight, when I laid in my bed and talked myself to sleep with Fitz talking back at me through my laptop.

The fact that it was she who lent me normalcy and self-assurance never once escaped my attention.

*

Late in the week, following work and a long run, I hopped out of the shower and left the bathroom in boxer-briefs. I'd planned to grab a pair of joggers from my bedroom before finding something to eat in the kitchen, but I saw Niall on his laptop at the kitchen counter. Over his shoulder, Fitz was on the screen, chattering away about the trip to Nicaragua for which she'd been approved at the end of November. Intrigued, I wandered over – Niall saw me approaching in the screen and looked over his shoulder.

"What?" he asked, obnoxiously chewing on a piece of gum with his mouth open.

"Who're you talking to?" I nodded at the laptop.

"Hello, Harry," Fitz said casually.

"Hello," I answered over Niall's shoulder, giving her a polite wave. "How are you?"

"I'm fine. How are you?"

"Pretty good. America treating you nicely?"

"Mm hmm. It's all right."

"Everything going well for you?"

"Yep. Going to Nicaragua, actually," she answered as if I didn't already know.

I raised my brows in mock surprise. "Are you? Wow. I'd be interested to hear more about that."

"Niall can tell you all about it later," she said, sucking her top lip between her teeth to contain her smile.

"I will definitely follow up with him," I assured her.

I glanced at Niall, who stared back at me with a bored expression. "Really?" he asked, not at all convinced by our pleasantries. "We're all going to pretend that you two haven't spoken for months?"

"Dunno what you're saying," I said with a shake of my head. "Niall, what are you on about?" Fitz asked. He rolled his eyes. "You don't think I knew the exact day you started talking to each other again?" He pointed accusingly at me. "You, with your happy fingers texting away—" he looked at Fitz "—and you, who suddenly didn't need to tell me every mundane detail of your life because you had somebody more important to talk to?"