Infatuation

Chapter 70

I got pregnant very early in our marriage. In fact, I found out I was pregnant on our fifth month anniversary of being married. I was scared to tell anyone. Mostly Dallas. I was young. I had just turned 18 and it seemed like the word was ending. I was scared I was going to turn into James. I didn't want to be that way to my child and it scared me fiercly. One night, Sodapop confronted me about it.
  
"Are you okay? You've been acting a little strange." He said.
 
"I'm okay, Soda." I told him with a smile. He looked at me weirdly. One of his eyebrows were raised, and he stared at me for an explanation. "Soda..."

I started to sob. All the fear I had felt in the past couple of days came out in the loud sobs that wrecked my body. Sodapop didn't hesitate to comfort me. He rubbed my back with one hand and played with my hair. I immediately felt a little better.
 
"What is it?" He asked.
 
"Soda ... I'm pregnant." I blurted out.

Sodapop slightly pulled away from me. His eyes grew bigger as he digested what I said. Suddenly, he jumped up.

"Are you serious?!" He asked with the biggest smile. "Monroe-" he cut off what he was going to say with a kiss.

He pulled away after a couple of seconds and knelt on the ground in front of me. He placed his ear against my stomach. My stomach was growing bigger and bigger. The doctor thought I was somewhere around 3 months.

Soda looked up at me. He had tears in his eyes and the biggest grin I have ever seen him wear.

"I'm going to be a dad." He said as he stood up.

He wrapped his arms around me tightly.

"Dally is going to have a heart attack." I mumbled against his shoulder.

"Aren't you happy?"

"Of course I am! I'm just scared. What if I turn out like my father? What if I hurt him?" I placed my hands on my belly.

"You are nothing like James. You will not hurt him. Dally will be understanding. Besides, he can't do anything about it." He placed a kiss on my forehead. "It's a boy?"

"What is?"

"The baby. Is it a boy?" He asked.

"I'm not sure. I think it's a boy. We won't know until he's here."

Sodapop pulled away again. "I can't believe I'm going to be a dad!"

I wiped one of his tears away. He smiled at the touch of my hand.

We decided to hide the pregnancy from the gang. I wasn't ready to tell everyone, and frankly, Dally seemed to be a little on edge.

But eventually you can't hide a pregnancy.

At seven months I was huge. And I mean HUGE. I looked like I was carrying twins. It was getting harder and harder to hide the pregnancy. Johnny and Ponyboy eventually asked, but I assumed everyone already knew. I was the only one who thought I was doing a good job at hiding my belly.

We were sitting at the dinner table, eating chocolate cake, and I had a strange craving to put a pickle on top of it. Ponyboy gave me a weird look and elbowed Johnny. Johnny turned to me and had the same expression on his face.

"What?" I asked.

"Mon, are you..." Ponyboy asked.

The jig was up. I looked over at Soda and he had a big grin on his face. He looked over at me and stopped smiling.

"Oh, go get the other boys." I said to him.

He jumped up and ran into the livingroom, shouting out that we had an announcement.

Slowly, everybody came into the dining room. Some of their eyed traveled to my belly. It was clear that they ready knew.

Sodapop came over and pulled me too him. He looked at me questioningly. I nodded my head. 

I looked around the room. Dally was in the corner, surprisingly, with a smile. He nodded his head to me. I smiled back.

"We're pregnant!" He called out.

We got some congratulations, but I could hear Two-Bit and Steve fighting in the background.

"You owe me 30 dollars!" Steve yelled.

"I do not. The bet was only for if they got pregnant on their honeymoon." Two-Bit replied.

Steve looked at me. "Did you?"

Sodapop chuckled next to me. "Sorry, Buddy. She's only 7 months."

"You have got to be kidding me." Steve groaned.

Two-Bit held out his hand expectingly.

"I don't have the money right now, stupid." Steve said.

Two-Bit rolled his eyes.

Dally walked over to us and pulled me to a chair. I sat down in it.

"You don't seem angry." I said.

"I knew you were pregnant. You weren't fooling anyone. Not with that." He gestured to my belly and I giggled. "I'm happy for you. I really am."

Dally moved out of Buck's and found a place for him and Vivian. They were still going strong. A month later, Dally announced that Vivian was going to have a baby with a big smile. It shocked me a little bit. I had no idea Dally wanted to have a baby so much.

Two months later, I was putting my plate in the sink when my water broke. I screamed for Sodapop and he ran in. He looked so scared when he noticed what happened. He ran over and helped me sit down, before he went crazy trying to get everything ready for the hospital.

"Soda, I'll just have Nancy come and get everything ready later. We need to go now." I told him.

Instead of letting me walk to the car, Soda carried me. He struggled a little bit. I wasn't exactly the lightest thing to carry at the time, but he was persistent.

He freaked out even more as the contractions got painful.

"What do you want me to do? Oh my God it's happening. Monroe, it's happening." He said.

I think its safe to say that he was more scared than I was. I did my best to stay calm, and it paid off. I focused on my breathing as Sodapop debated whether or not to park in the emergency section of the hospital.

"Soda, hun, I'm fine. Relax a little." I said as he struggled to park the car.

"I am relaxed." He said.

I rolled my eyes at him. He was finally able to park the truck, and he rushed over to help me out. I was nine months pregnant, and it was difficult for me to get out. The truck was pretty high off the ground. It didn't help that I couldn't see my feet.

We made it into the women's ward, and a nurse came over to help me. She took us to a bedroom, and helped me get into the bed.

Sodapop wouldn't stop pacing. The whole time I was waiting for the time to push, he was pacing. He came over every once in a while and kissed my forehead or my cheek, but after that he went right back to pacing.

Eventually, as things got more intense, he came over and held my hand. The contractions were painful and he whispered in my ear how beautiful I was (even though I was not pretty while delivering a baby), and how good of a mom I was going to be.

As soon as the babies head crowned, he passed out cold, which caused me to literally laugh the baby out. I had been high on drugs at the time.

17 hours after my water broke, we had a small baby boy. Sodapop woke up on the last stretch of the delivery, and started to cry happily.

When the doctor put the baby in my arms I knew I wouldn't be able to hurt him. All of my fears disapeared as I looked into his beautiful blue eyes. He looked almost exactly like Sodapop and he was perfect.