Ariana's POV
"I put it in the bathroom, behind your cleaning supplies" Amy whispers and I nod my head.
"Thanks, your a life saver" I smile as Amy and I avoid saying exactly what we're talking about in case Harry overhears us. I asked Amy to get me a pregnancy test when she came over today. Harry thinks she's here to help pack up my stuff, and she'll definitely help but, I really only asked her to help so she could bring me one.
I've been so stressed lately, it's all I can think about. I hate Ricky, I don't like the thought of him being near me so the idea of him literally being inside of me makes me so angry and gross. I've actually been coming around to the idea of having kids in the future but this isn't what I want. Not right now, not with him, this fucking sucks! And I can't even tell Harry about it, I need him right now but it's impossible.
"I'm gonna go find the tape" I announce as I stop boxing up my stuff and head into my bedroom. I need to know if I'm pregnant and I need to know now but I can't let Harry know what I'm doing so I have to make an excuse for leaving. I quickly head into my bathroom and grab the pregnancy test, it takes two minutes to work. Hopefully, it's not too long and Harry won't get suspicious. Besides, I know where the tape is and won't have to waste time searching for that after all of this.
These two minutes feel like hours, every second that goes by my anxiety rises slightly longer. But I'll have my answer soon enough, at least that's what I thought. As I wait I hear Harry begin to yell and rush back into the living room to see what's going on.
Fuck, things just got so much worse.
...
Harry's POV
"I think we're gonna need a bigger box" I say and I hear Ari's best friend Amy Schumer laugh and Ari groans. It's currently Wednesday afternoon and the three of us are packing up some stuff in Ari's apartment for when she moves. We're going to London tomorrow night but Ari wants to start 'house hunting' online and moving out almost immediately after she comes back which is fine, I've done it before as well. So we're packing up so she can quickly get out of this place when she needs to. At the moment we're trying to put her DVD collection in a box but she's got so many of them, it's definitely gonna take up a lot of space, not that I care, I find it cute that she has such a huge collection and they bring her a lot of joy.
"Yea we're gonna need a lot of boxes" Ari smiles as she tries to defend her collection and just act like it's a completely normal thing. "Now let's get over it and pack, carefully!" she jokes as she grabs some of her DVD's from a shelf and begins packing them in a box. We've mainly been packing up little things in her house like the picture frames and personal mementos that she wants to keep since she plans to simply donate her couches and tables and whatever else and buy new ones. "I'm gonna go find the tape" I hear Ari say as we continue to pack up her collection.
"Okay babe" Amy shouts as Ari walks into her bedroom. "I'm really happy you too are back together" Amy says as she looks up at me, this is the first time we've been left alone together today and it means a lot that someone so important to Ari likes me as well. "She really needs someone like you around" she says and I nod my head since I completely agree.
"Thanks, I'm happy to be with her too. Especially after all she's been through, she told me everything by the way" I admit, since it feels like Amy's been beating around the bush lately because she doesn't know how much I know. I don't blame her, since Ari hasn't really told anyone else, she didn't want to tell me anything at first either so I'm sure Amy's unsure of exactly what she's told me.
"Oh really? Okay good that makes me so happy, Ari shouldn't keep that stuff bottled up it's not healthy and I was really worried about that. God I can't believe someone would do something so sick and disgusting" she exclaims and I nod my head. "I mean what kinda guy hits a woman?" she shakes her head and I feel my whole body freeze up, what the Hell is she talking about?!
"HE HIT HER??" I exclaim, still in pure shock. I watch as Amy's mouth drops open and now I realize it's true, and she thought I knew that. It all makes sense now too, why Ari didn't wanna talk about anything, why she flinched when I touched her! I am such an idiot! I wait for Amy to say something as a huge amount of anger begins to boil inside me but all she does is look past me eyes wide open. I turn my head as well to see what she's looking at and realize that Ari has walked back out of her bedroom and is now standing, completely frozen as well.
Before I can even fully process what's going on, I feel myself rush towards the door, I can't wait for Ari to come up with some sort of explanation, some sort of lie to cover this up, I just need to do something.
"Harry! Stop where are you going?" I hear Ari yell as she grabs my arm and tries to stop me. I want to just continue trying to storm out the door but something also makes me wants to stop and say something to her.
"I don't want to hear it Ariana! I don't wanna hear another lie or excuse, why didn't you tell me about this?" I yell and almost instantly regret it but I'm so angry, I can't help but yell. Besides, maybe all this pent up anger is good, I usually try and not yell at Ari even when I'm feeling frustrated and maybe she'll get the message this time that she really shouldn't keep things from me. I don't want to hurt or disrespect her but right now I can't think of anything else to do but yell so I just have to get out of here, I have to find Ricky, I have to fix this.
"Harry, stop please don't leave me, I'm sorry, please let me explain" she pleads as tears form in her eyes and now I'm more heartbroken and angry as ever.
"Ari I'm not gonna leave you are you crazy" I exclaim, I can't believe she thought that I was gonna break up with her over this. I actually wanna be there for her more than ever.
"Then where are you going? Just stay here, we can figure it out together" she begs as her grasp on my arm tightens but she's still not strong enough to hold on to me and I easily pull away.
"I'm gonna go fucking find Ricky!" I exclaim, as I head for the door again saying it out loud makes me realize exactly what I'm doing and it feels good. All I want to do is beat the living shit out of him.
"No! Harry stop just let it go, please just let it go!" She begs as she tries to grab my arm once again.
"Ari I'm not gonna let him get away with this, someone has to fucking teach him a lesson!" I yell back, my heart starts racing and I feel the adrenaline pumping through my veins. I don't know where the hell that douchebag is but he better hope I can't find him. I race to the door and just as I open it the door shuts right before me and I see Ari lean her whole entire body against the door. "Ari get out of the way!" I frown as the tears roll down her face. Why the hell is she crying? Why doesn't she want me to do this?
"No, Harry! Fuck that guy who cares?! Don't stoop to that level don't bring that guy back into my life! Please, please, don't bring him back into my life! If you want to help, help me! I need help!" She pleads and don't think I've ever felt so hurt before in my life. I feel tears begin to form in my eyes, she's been through much, she's kept so much to herself, she needs me to be here right now, not running around out in the streets full of rage.
"I-I'm so sorry Ariana, I'm here for you. I promise" I say as I pull her in to give her a hug, I feel her cry into my chest and I rub her back to try and cool her down. I have a lot of questions and I don't know how I'll approach it but I know right now isn't the right time. "It's okay Ari, it's over now. It's all over" I say trying to calm her. I'm gonna make sure she never has to talk to Ricky ever again and I hope she never has to try and keep anything from me ever again. After only a moment I feel Ari pull away from me as she wipes the tears from her face. "Are you good?" I ask and she nods her head.
"Yeah sorry" she says with a faint smile.
"I-I'm so sorry you guys, I didn't- I thought you knew" I hear someone say and I turn slightly to see Amy standing in front of us still looking completely shocked. Things have been so intense, I'm still breathing heavily because of how fast my heart's been beating, I totally forgot Amy was here.
"It's fine" Ari says with a little laugh. "It's okay, don't worry about it" she smiles, I can't tell if she's being honest but I know she would never be upset at Amy for something she meant as harmless.
"Seriously, I'm so sorry" she says as Ari walks over to her and gives her a hug.
"Seriously, it's okay. I'm not mad" Ari says as she gives her a long, big hug. "It's okay, you didn't do anything wrong, you didn't know" she admits. It's crazy to think that if Ari ever managed to get to Amy before I did, to tell her that I didn't know, I may never have ever found out. I may have gone my whole life without knowing.
"Thanks, that means a lot" Amy says as she pulls away. "I uhm, I think I should leave you two alone for a bit. I'll come back tomorrow morning to help pack anything that's left and to say goodbye" she says and Ari nods her head as they say bye to one another. "I'm sorry to just blurt all the out on you with no warning Harry, I didn't mean to. Take care of her okay" she says sternly as she walks over to me and I nod my head. I give her a small hug before opening the door for her as we say goodbye.
The apartment gets quiet for a moment, and I'm spending so much energy trying to think of what to say that I can't even turn back around. I hear Ari let out a short sigh and I know she's just as unprepared for this as I am.
"I'm not gonna apologize for keeping this from you" I hear Ari say to finally break the silence and it's enough for me to whip back around as fast as I can.
"I thought we said no more secrets" I rebuttal. I don't want to argue with Ari but I also don't see how keeping this from me wasn't a big deal.
"I know. And I mean that, I haven't kept anything else from you. But I didn't want to talk about that, I didn't know how to, I don't think it's wrong for me to keep something like that to myself, it's my business" she says. I don't like that she kept this from me but I can't really blame her, I have no idea what it's like to go through that and I guess I had no right to know if she didn't want me to.
"Why did you keep this from me?" I ask, I have a lot of questions and I'm trying to censor them away from anything too serious or personal.
"I don't want you to treat me differently. How do we come back from this?" she asks and I see her eyes swell up with tears again. It's clear that this has been stressful on her, I can only imagine how scared she was for me to find out and now it's happened. I'm thankful that I know but I also wish I didn't in the sense that I wouldn't have to see her in a different light. She's right, I don't know how we can come back from this, there's no way I won't treat her differently after all of this but I don't think it's a bad thing.
"I-I don't know Ari. I don't think I can just treat you like I did before" I admit and I can see her get even more visibly upset, I can't even think about how hurt she is on the inside.
"What- what do we do?" she asks as she folds her arms, her voice cracks as she talks and the tears stream down her face as she makes no effort to wipe them. "Should we just give up?" she asks, I see her try and smile as if this is all okay, like it's over and done with before just completely breaking down into tears.
"No! Ari, what?! I'm not gonna leave you, I'm not gonna give up!" I exclaim as I walk over to her. "Who cares if I know? I would be lying if I said it didn't change the way I see things but I acknowledge that you didn't want me to know and I'll try to treat you the best way that I can. I don't think we should give up, I want to be there for you, always, I don't see this as your fault or anything but it's still serious! I can't imagine anyone ever laying their hands on you, I hate the idea and I just want you to be treated right" I admit as I pull her into me but she pushes me away.
"I don't want you to treat me differently! I want to move on, I don't want to think about it, I don't want you to think about it! I can't stand the idea that at any moment you can be looking at me just trying to imagine what happened! I want us to be like the way we use to be, I don't want you to love me like you're protecting me or something. I just- I-I don-" she rambles before I cut her off by cupping her face in my hands and giving her a kiss. It takes a moment before she kisses back but when she does it's the best feeling in the world. It feels like she's finally decided not to give up on us and I will not let her regret this.
I slide my hands down to her hips and lift her up and twirl her around like I use to do months ago. I'm trying my best to remind her of how it use to was, she and I have grown, we've changed but the way I feel about her, the way I love her has only gotten stronger. I press her against the wall but I almost pull away since I remember what she's been through and I don't know if this level of force or something may remind her of what happened since I don't know exactly what he did to her but, I decide against it since I don't want to treat her differently and if she isn't comfortable she can tell me. Our makeout session starts to get more and more intense but I know it won't lead anywhere, I don't want to do anything else, this isn't the right time. At the same time I don't want to pull away from her, I don't want to let go, I just want to kiss her forever. After what feels like hours we both pull away almost at the exact same time and for a second I've forgotten about everything we were just talking about before. Everything feels okay for a second, like our love can fix anything, it can take away any sort of pain and stress and just shows that we'll get through this too.
"I'm not gonna treat you differently Ariana. We've both changed, we've both grown, but that only makes me love you more, that only makes me want to love you harder" I admit as Ari just closes her eyes. I can tell she's thinking hard about all this and I don't know why, "what's wrong with me wanting to take care of you Ari?" I ask since I genuinely can't figure out her train of thought.
"I-I don't think there's anything wrong with that. I just, I think the reason I don't want you to treat me differently is because I don't want to put that kind of burden on you. It's not your job to make me feel better, and that's a big task. I can take care of it, I promise, I just want you to be there for me" she admits and I can tell she's just wrapping her head around it herself. Everything makes a lot more sense now, at least it does to me, I hope it does to her as well.
"Ari, it's not a burden on me, trust me. And if I do get stressed out now I know that all that pressure is gonna be entirely from my own head and not from you. But trying to look out for you, trying to protect you, I've been doing that since we started dating" I admit and she nods her head.
"You're right, I'm sorry Harry. I don't want to push you away and I don't know why I'm still trying to do that. Please, please don't let me push you away. Everything's out in the open now anyways. It's like we have a fresh start" she admits with a smile as tears still form in her eyes. I don't know why she's so emotional right now, I've never seen her cry so much but I just want it to stop, I want her to be happy. I want her to have a fresh start.
"Alright Ariana. We're officially starting over" I admit as I wrap my arms around her and give her the biggest kiss I can possibly manage.