baby | lrh

chapter 40

Penelope Rhodes

His face turned a new level of pale as those words came out of my mouth; so much for we're in this together forever.

"Can-Can we go back to the room and talk about this in private?" He choked out. I nodded silently.

We walked up the beach and through the back entrance of our hotel. The walk to our room was long and so quiet that I could hear my heartbeat in my ears. When we finally reached our room, the door shut with a loud slam, proving that the silence wasn't going to be broken anytime soon.

It felt like hours before he spoke, still white as a ghost. "How late?"

"3 weeks? I realized a little before Hayden gave birth. I thought it was just stress because it's happened before. It's not unusual to be late due to stress... but this felt different. With all the baby fever in the house... I picked up a test..." I whispered. I finally looked up to face him and what I saw felt like a knife through my heart.

"Take the test again." He demanded. His breathing was choppy and he seemed frazzled, like his brain was running a thousand miles a minute and he couldn't produce one coherent thought.

"Luke, I've already taken-"

"Take the damn test again, Penelope!" He snapped, throwing his hands down on the bed. "You don't know what one fake pregnancy announcement does to a person. Take the test again, please."

I jumped, startled at his outburst. I was afraid. I hate to say it but me being afraid of Luke was something that I've been in the past and something I wished to never be again.

"I... I need to get another one. I don't have one on me." I whispered, tears streaming down my face.

Without another word, he stormed out of our room, most likely to the convenience store down the road to buy some more tests; as if 7 weren't enough.

I picked up my phone, shaking in fear- what if he wasn't coming back? What if he was just leaving me again and never coming back this time? I know how he feels about commitment and even though I thought this was what we eventually wanted, maybe I was wrong.

"Penelope?" The voice on the other end calmed me.

"Calum," I cried, breaking down at the sound of his voice.

"P, what's wrong? Talk to me."

"I've made a terrible mistake"

"What happened? Where's Luke?"

"He left. I'm not sure if he's going to the store or just never coming back. One minute he's telling me he'll never leave again and all this together forever shit and then the next, I'm opening up my big mouth"

"What did you say?"

"Cal.. I'm almost 3 weeks late..."

"P..."

"I don't know what to do... Calum, what if he doesn't come back? I can't do this alone. I can't do this without him. I can't live if he leaves again- I won't survive."

"Take a deep breath... I'm sure he's running to the store to get another test. We'll figure this out. I promise. Everything is going to be okay... just breathe and try to think positive."

I wasn't sure if it was my nerves or the pregnancy but before I could open my mouth to respond to Calum I was running to the bathroom, emptying my guts with my head shoved in the toilet.

"Penelope?" I could barely hear Luke's voice over the sound of my current situation.

"Penelope are you okay?" Calum asked from the phone next to me.

"Cal.. he's back.. I gotta go." I hung up.

I continued to cough my guts out as I felt cool hands grab my hair out of my face and rub my back.

"Baby..." He trailed, soothing me.

"I'm sorry you had to see me like this..." I croaked, covering my mouth as I finished. I then went to wash my mouth and brush my teeth.

There was an awkward silence between us. He was holding a bag so I swiped it out of his hand and shooed him out of the bathroom.

I peed on the stick for the eighth time and walked out to find Luke with his hands in his hair, absolutely a nervous wreck. I sat down on the bed and curled myself into a ball, ashamed. How could I have let this happen? Were we not careful?

Time passed like hours.

"How long do these things take?" He nervously asked.

"3 minutes."

When the 3 very uncomfortably silent minutes were up, signaled by the timer on my phone, I looked down at the stick hesitantly. One line: not pregnant, two lines: pregnant.

"Does two lines mean what I think it means?" He asked quietly. I just nodded in response, tears streaming down my face.

"I'm sorry, Luke..." I told him. I felt like my world was crashing down- a baby is the last thing we need right now being thrown into the mix, especially due to the fact that our relationship is just now finally starting to feel back to normal. "What are we gonna do?" I whispered. The sound was barely audible. I looked up from the test to meet his gaze; his eyes were bleary and his nose was red.

"We're going to figure it out, Penelope..." He ran his fingers through his tousled curls.

"Do you even want this?! Luke, you're a rockstar and I'm still in college. You're afraid of commitment, I'm afraid of abandonment. How do you know we are going to make this work?"

"We have to make it work! If you're asking me if there is still a part of me that wants to run for the hills, I'd say absolutely. Hell yeah. I'm scared as fuck! But I'm just going to take a wild guess and say you are too. So there really is no other option."

"I don't know how Ash and Hayden did it... "

"We have to be ready, P. We can't just get rid of him or her. That's our kid in there." He placed his hands on my stomach and he smiled.

His happiness calmed my nerves as I tried to picture what we had planned: a little me or Luke running around the house, him teaching our baby how to play guitar and me teaching him or her the alphabet, us sending our child off to kindergarten and then watching them walk across the graduation stage years later most likely with younger siblings in the audience. All of the important milestones fled to my mind as I pictured our little mess of blonde hair and blue eyes.

"That's our baby," I cried out of happiness. His anger from before was gone now as he picked me up and swirled me around. 

a/n: 40 chapters?!?!?! i've literally released 40 chapters of Baby already? there's no way. gosh, i do love this story. cringy enough, this story is my baby and i'm so thankful for every single one of you that take the time to read it. i love yall <3 <3 <3