Estella

Chapter 17

"Es," I hear as I walk into the house. "Where did you go?" Eli asks me. "I tried to find you after school." He says to me.

"Oh, I just got food with a friend." I tell Eli, truthfully.

"Parker?" He asks, his tone being way too overprotective.

"Yes, Parker, what does it matter?" I ask him.

"You know he likes you right?" Eli asks me.

"Obviously." I say, he straight has told me that multiple times.

"And I know you like him." Eli tells me. "And you aren't ready for a relationship, Es, this whole mess with Jacob just happened, you can't just move on a week later." My brother tells me.

"Eli, you aren't in charge of me, I am eighteen, and I am allowed to do what I want, and if I want to spend time with Parker, I am going to. I know you just want me to be safe, Eli, but I know that I can trust Parker, he actually cares" I tell my brother, truthfully.

"Does he know that you're pregnant, because knowing that might change his mind, he may not want to del with that." Eli tells me.

"You know what Eli, he actually does know, I told him, and it didn't change his mind not at all. He actually cares about me, so why won't you just let me be happy?" I ask my brother before storming up to my room.

When I get in my room, I slam the door shut before falling face first into my bed, starting to uncontrollably sob.

To an extent, Eli is right.

I know that I shouldn't be with Parker yet after everything that happened with Jacob.

But I never saw it as moving on from Jacob.

I never had feelings attached to that relationship, in fact, I hated him.

I saw that relationship ending as escaping, finally ending something I never agreed to start.

I know I should have trust issues now, but Parker is so different than Jacob, from the start, Jacob gave me every reason not to trust him, Parker has giving me none.

All I want is to be happy, and I think I deserve that.

I know starting a relationship this close to having a child is a bad idea, that I should have my child, get settled, and then give Parker a chance, but I cannot wait a year and a half.

I like Parker way too much, and I know that I can trust him.

When my crying finally calms down, I get out of my bed, knowing that all my overreactions are due to my pregnancy hormones. Or at least that's what I am going with.

After I get up all I can do is stare in the mirror.

Had it been that visible all day?

I have tried my best not to look at my stomach this whole time, not wanting to see how visible the pregnancy was, dressing to avoid it showing.

It isn't too clear, like you cannot tell I am pregnant by looking at me, but if you know I am, it is clearly visible. It is getting to the point where hiding it is going to be nearly impossible.

I don't want the world to see me and judge me for a choice that wasn't mine.

But I also don't want to pretend as though it isn't happening, because I cannot change the fact that this child is going to be born, and I am not going to alter my decision to keep it.

As I stare in the mirror more, I hear knocks on my door, assuming they belong to Eli, I open the door.

Rather than being greeted by Eli, as I expected, my dad enters my room.

"Everything okay, Es? I heard you and your brother fighting." He says, following me as I walk to my bed and sit down, he sits right beside me.

"Everything is fine, you know Eli, just being himself." I say to him.

"What happened, why are you two arguing?" He asks me.

I sigh.

Talking to my dad about my potential relationship is not something I want to do, talking about boyfriends with your dad is never a good time.

"He's just mad at me." I tell my dad, trying to subtly tell him that I don't want to talk about it by being as vague as I can be.

"Well, what is he mad about?" My dad asks me.

"Well I have this friend," I start, once again sighing before I get into it. "Parker. So, Parker and I hung out after school today. And Eli got mad about it when I got home." I tell my dad, leaving out about as many details as I can.

"Why? Does he not like Parker for some reason?" My dad asks me, clearly wanting the full story.

"I mean, well, he doesn't like the fact that Parker likes me, and I like Parker." I admit to my dad. "He thinksI should stay away from him, that I should give the should Jacob situation the time it needs to settle." I say to him, giving much more detail than I would ever want him to know.

My poor dad knows way too much about my relationship drama.

"Es, you probably should give it time-" My dad begins to say before I cut him off.

"I don't want to give it time, I have been stuck with someone I hate for years, and now that I actually have someone who cares about me, I actually have a chance to be happy here, and I want to take it." Admitting everything to my dad.

"I am not going to be mad at whatever you chose, it is up to you, you know what you are getting into, just be careful, and I want to meet this boy." My dad tells me, I can hear the ending being directing towards the fact that I never let them meet Jacob.

"You will, trust me, I don't want to hide this one from you." I tell him, letting him know that this relationship isn't going to be sketchy, I am actually going to be happy.

I am finally going to actually be happy with someone.

I am sobbing because I just finished a book. I started writing it way after this one and I have been so focused on it because I love it so much. Now I need to focus on this one so I can finish it and move on because I am so close to the end.

I just always struggle because I always lose interest in books when I have like 4 chapters left to write because that's when a new idea hits me and I cannot stop thinking about that one.

Now I need to promise myself that I cannot write anything else until this book is done. I'm not sure what my next project is going to be, I'm still deciding between a few, but I love starting new books.

I typed the rest of that a few weeks ago, so now about the current situations.

I live in a very diverse city, the black to white ratio is about 1:1, we had a protest on Saturday, I did not attend because people didn't all have masks on and were in no way 6 feet apart, so I decided to social distance instead.

Anyway, some kids from about 4 hours away, whom I believe were protesting the protest? I think they are on the white supremacy side, come to where the protest ended, and at 2 AM, they set fire to the children's playground and did about $500,000 worth of damage and it's just devastating because that park is a huge place for children to play and hang out(although parks are still closed here at the moment, NY is a bit behind on all the reopening because of how hard we got hit). It's just so sad, I have two friends who work for the parks and rec department, so I am getting updates, they were able to catch a few of the 3 or 4, I've heard different numbers. It's just so sad and devastating.

The book I just finished writing actually is all about racism, and I might post it early just because of the current situations in the world because it is complete already.

I was going to post it after this one, but I think it needs to be up now.

It's called A Long Road Ahead!