And so it continued until the third month. Cameron did what he did best. There was nothing different about their relationship, except she was pregnant. He kept her secret, as promised. And for that, she silently thanked him. Hiding it got a little difficult, especially in some of her tighter t-shirts.
She caught several of Cameron's friends scrutinizing her when they thought she wasn't paying them any attention. It wasn't blatantly obvious, but if she stood at the right angle and in the right light, they could guess. No one asked her directly though. But she was sure that they talked. It was like she'd gone to bed with a flat stomach one night and awoken with a tiny mound in its place. Thankfully, because it was November, she could lie around in sweatshirts and hoodies without attracting too much attention.
With her sketchbook, she sat in the lounge, bare feet propped up on one of the faded ottomans. The frats had finally been granted heat a few weeks back, making her stay more desirable. She no longer had to sleep in winter gear in order to be comfortable. How Cameron was comfortable on the floor she didn't know. But he didn't complain. The nights when he was alone, he bundled up and snored quietly amongst his accumulated junk.
"Oh, look."
Kith didn't have to look up to know who was now in the room. The malice in the voice wasn't understated, as it usually was when other people were around. She looked up, realizing that Heather had brought two of her friends.
For some strange reason, they were all wearing the same knit sweater in different colors: magenta, gray, and periwinkle. Heather took it upon herself to wear the boldest colors, skinny jeans, and boots. They were a little shy of looking like triplets. Heather's brown hair was pulled back in a ponytail, letting part of her curly bangs flop lightly against her face. One of her friends had blonde hair in a pixie cut and green eyes that looked exactly like emeralds. She had the largest pair of boobs of the three, which made her gray sweater the tightest. Her nose was a little large for her face, but she didn't seem to mind. The nose piercing made it look like she wanted people to stare at it.
The third one, the one manning Heather's left, was a wavy-haired brunette who looked as if she'd just stepped off a Calvin Klein billboard. Even without huge boobs and a nose piercing, she was still stunning. With her prettiness came a bitchy attitude. Kith could tell just by running her eyes and up down the thin length of her. Donning the periwinkle sweater, flare jeans, and plain sneakers, she stared back at Kith with a small smirk toying with her pink, plumped up lips.
"Kith, right?" Heather asked while sitting down uninvited on the couch. The other two grabbed chairs and pulled them up, aggressively staring her down for no reason. "You're not even old enough to be here. Why don't you go home?"
Ignoring them, Kith flipped to a clean page, not ready for anyone to see her drawings. She figured that if she ignored Heather long enough, she'd get bored and move on to something else. The attention spans of bullies were fairly short. Reacting only fueled their fire. She was minding her own business anyways. She'd kept to herself since moving in. If Heather had actually given her a chance, or acted her age, she might've discovered that Kith wasn't worth her effort.
Kith wasn't doing anything with Cameron because Cameron wasn't her type. Quite honestly, in her opinion, Cameron was a failure. He was the type who drank his way through college until he failed so badly there was no recovery; the only option was dropping out. He couldn't even take care of himself, let alone anyone else.
"Your parents must not love you," Heather said rudely, resting her arm on the back of the couch. "Parents that actually care about their daughter wouldn't let her live in a frat house."
"I wouldn't want my daughter if she was a whore, either," the blonde one commented.
"True," Heather mused, pretending to think over the matter. Kith ground her teeth but remained focused on the dimmed screen. "You are a little slut." Leaning over, she shoved Kith's sketchbook out of her hands and onto the nearby seat cushion. Remaining calm, Kith scratched behind her ear and blinked slowly. She made a point of not making direct eye contact with any of them. "You're living with my boyfriend, bitch."
"He doesn't even like you," the brunette commented, agreeing with her friends. Kith locked eyes with her, but said nothing. She couldn't tell if Heather's friends were speaking from their hearts, or acting as Heather's personal dummies. Heather was probably the ventriloquist in the situation. She seemed like that kind of girl, the type that thrived off drama.
From hanging around, Kith knew that Heather was in Pi Delta Delta. Kith thought sorority girls were supposed to lead interesting lives. That's what it had always looked like on TV. Heather seemed to have nothing better to do than generate conflict with a high schooler. Here she was, going out of her way to insult Kith and assert that Cameron was her boyfriend, when clearly, Kith didn't care either way.
"And is it true you're pregnant?" Heather asked.
Turning sharply from the friend to Heather, she glared, giving Heather the answer she needed. If she hadn't hated her before, she definitely did now. Heather's nostrils flared and her green eyes darkened and narrowed. "Do you not know how condoms work? You're seventeen years old and you're pregnant. Congratulations."
"Is it Cameron's?" the blond one inquired.
"Yeah," Heather backed her friend up and stared Kith down. Her palms started sweating and her blood ran cold. "Is that why you live in his room?"
"No," Kith spoke for the first time during the confrontation. Her voice was barely above a whisper.
"I have a hard time trusting sluts," Heather answered brusquely.
"You trust your friends," Kith replied, a clear mistake on her part.
"What'd you say?" Heather shoved her violently. Kith kept her mouth shut and hardened herself against the next blow. "You think you're the shit just 'cause you're on a college campus now?"
"You're nothing, girl."
"Yeah," Heather agreed. "You. Are. Nothing. And your life's basically done because you're knocked up by some guy you were dumb enough not to make wrap it up."
She shoved her again, and this time her entire body went numb. Instead of reacting, Kith just sat there and took it. There was no point in fighting back. Eventually they would give up; they would leave her alone. All she had to do was sit still. No one would hear her anyway.
"What are you doing?" Cameron burst in and marched over. Heather dropped her hands and her bitchiness, and immediately thrust up her mask of innocence.
"What?"
"She doesn't like when people touch her!" Cameron all but shouted, breaking the ranks of the semi-circle they'd formed. "Heather, what the fuck. What are you doing?"
"We were just talking," she lied.
"She's seventeen!" Cameron fired back. "I already told you we're not doing anything."
Retrieving her sketchbook, Kith brought it up to her chest, and strode quickly from the room, not bothering to stay for whatever else Cameron had to say to his 'girlfriend'. Retreating into their room, she sank onto the bed, grabbed her charcoal, and resumed her activities. Hours later, the doorknob turned, revealing Cameron's face. Hands in his pockets, he sat down on the floor, resting his back against some of his desk drawers.
"Thanksgiving Break is coming up," he said. Kith contemplated why he made no mention of what had happened downstairs. "And the school makes everyone leave, so..."
"You're going home?" she asked ridiculously. Of course he was going home. He lived an hour away. There was no reason for him not to go home. But if he went back to their hometown, where was she supposed to stay?
She didn't have money for a hotel, and her parents had made it clear that they never wanted to see her again. Could she stay at his house? No. No, no, no. She didn't want to go there. That was the last place on Earth she wanted to be. If the choice between Cameron's house and hell presented itself, she would choose hell. She couldn't make him spend the break in a hotel though. He'd already done enough for her. So it was either the streets or... his house.
"Yeah," he nodded. "Which means... I mean, you don't have to. But I don't know where else you would stay."
"Isn't your mom going to ask questions?" Kith inquired. Cameron's mom had always been nice to her, but she hadn't seen her in three months. There was no telling how the reunion would be, or what she would say.
Kith silently thanked whatever celestial entity that she wasn't heavily pregnant. The weather allowed her to shield her stomach from prying eyes, which meant Cameron's mom and... just thinking the name made air catch in her throat.
Austin.
Austin wouldn't ask questions because he wouldn't know. She hadn't spoken to him in three months either, a feat she would've once considered impossible. They'd been best friends since fourth grade. Now she avoided him in the halls, the cafeteria, the parking lots, everywhere. If they happened to make eye contact, she quickly looked away, and dashed to another part of the school.
Away, far, far away.
"I'll just tell her that you're living with me," he shrugged casually, like it was an easy answer. Everything was easy for him. He didn't have any problems because he didn't do anything.
"You don't have to tell her why your parents kicked you out. I'd actually be upset if you did, since you haven't told me." Cameron didn't need to know why she was kicked out. He'd graciously accepted her refusal to talk and let her move in with him anyway, completely violating school rules in the process. "And it's only a week."
I still don't want to be there, she thought to herself. Part of the college and high school break would actually coincide, which meant that instead of going to school for a few days, she'd sit around his house.
Austin would be there, too.
An awkward, uncomfortable situation for them all. She would just have to find things to do, things outside the house. Things like what, though? Cameron might actually be there. He definitely couldn't live his raucous, bachelor lifestyle under his mom's roof. Thanksgiving Break was a guaranteed week of his sobriety. That should be interesting, she pondered. The longest Cameron Blake had gone without beer was a day. He would be there, so she wouldn't be completely alone.
"Unless..." he paused.
"I can't," she answered, reading his mind. Her parents didn't want her. She could already envisage how their meeting would go. It would only result in insults and a door slamming, if they even opened it at all. When she first told them, they attacked her so viciously with their words and their eyes, she wondered if they were actually her parents, the people who'd promised to love her no matter what. And that was before she got pregnant.
"It's only a week," he said reassuringly, smiling a bit at the end. "And Mom likes you. You don't have anything to worry about."
"Yeah."
"And you can see Austin!" he said excitedly. "I'm sure you miss that kid."
"Mm," Kith answered ambiguously.
"Cool," Cameron hopped up brightly.
What do we expect?