Pretending to be Pregnant

Seven

I sat there in a shocked silence before being willed to speak by the frustrating voice of Diana.

"Esme? You obviously know what I'm talking about." Diana powerfully thundered down the vulnerable phone.

"Actually, Diana, this just isn't a good time." I told her truthfully.

"Esme, don't think you can avoid me. You can put that phone down and we can save this conversation for later or we can get it over and done with." I breathed down the speaker, panting slightly. Then came a sentence that I didn't expect, at all. "I can't believe you broke the pact."

For a moment I just sat there and watched the scenery as we drove. The pact? What was she on about? Then it dawned on me. The pact. Gradually, the day we made the pact, came back to me.

We happened to have been around thirteen years old and I remembered exiting the school, my arms linked with my four best friends. We were all in a straight line and were heading for our favourite hang out spot, under the tree. As the summer sunshine beat down on our already tanned skin, we laughed and giggled with glee. The last day of school was over and done with and now we were free to relax. A long summer of swimming, beach trips and shopping awaited us. We all sat down in a small, selected circle and kicked off our shoes before stretching out our legs. Diana had been there, along with my three other friends, Mia, Ruth, Gwen and Emma. Each and everyone of us were excited about the prospect of a summer together. Then Gwen, with her flowing, soon to be sexy, red hair made a suggestion.

"I know we're going to be friends forever." She told everyone sitting around her, only to be greeted by consistent nods. "So, I was thinking, we need to do something that'll make this friendship so strong it can never be broken." Everyone nodded once more, exclaiming how it was an excellent idea. "I think we should agree, that we'll all go through the experience of having children together. I mean, otherwise the friendship is bound to break apart." This time, Gwen was not greeted by simultaneous nods, instead everybody around her gave her a look of absolute confusion.

"Where has this come from?" Emma asked her. Gwen shrugged her shoulders before embarking on the art of explanation.

"My mum, well she's pregnant." Gwen paused whilst everyone else offered their congratulations. "I don't know if it's good or bad, but I mean, she's says that her friends barely talk to her anymore, simply because, well apparently all she talks about is babies and pregnancy. Apparently they don't have anything in common anymore so they've kind of stopped being friends." Everyone looked shocked. "I just, I don't want that to happen to us." Gwen told us. "I want us to go through that experience together, that way when we're pregnant, we can compare notes. When we give birth, we can compare notes. When our children are growing up, we can compare. And when they become moody, hormonal, teenagers, we can compare. It'll make our friendship so strong and I think we'll become closer because of it." We looked at Gwen for a moment, before Mia said it made complete sense. Being thirteen, everybody agreed. None of us raised any objections and none of us hinted that this might cause a few problems. I mean, not a single person questioned how we were all supposed to get pregnant at the same time, or what happened if one of us was ready to have a child and one of us wasn't?

Anyway, that very same afternoon, we all signed a contract. A contract which may or may not have been legally binding. Who knows? After all, we were all only thirteen.

Slowly I came back to reality and hid my face in my hands. The phone was still pressed to my ear and I could still hear Diana droning on about the pact. The pregnancy pact. I had to say something.

"Diana, I've just found out I'm pregnant aged sixteen and you're telling me that I need to be worried about some silly agreement that we all came to when we were barely teenagers? Please, just shut up." The frantic friend at the other end of the phone instantly came to an abrupt silence as she stopped talking.