Harry–
After I woke up at Evangeline’s home the other day, I realized that I have missed Veronica’s party by hanging out with Evangeline. It surprised me to no end that I forgot about such matter by only hanging out with her. It was absurd, hard to be believed. But, I suppose I forget the world around me when I am with her, causing me to forget a very important event to attend.
So I e-mailed Veronica later on, sparing her any affecting excuse for my strange absence. Of course, I did not tell her that I forgot going to the party because I was with my girlfriend back then; I told her that I had some kind-of an emergency that surprisingly came up. I was relieved that I had to lie through e-mails than speak on the phone or lie face to face as I was a terrible liar. It’s been eight days since sleeping over at Evangeline’s and since we all woke up to her manic episode.
That episode was quite strange, seeing as she was awoken by a nightmare before going through the concussion. I took it shockingly to be quite honest, and I bet her parents were baffled too. On the morning the next day, her parents did not even question my stay at their daughter’s room or look at me quizzically like I thought they would. I guess they were too consumed with their daughter’s conditions to even bother me.
In the last week or so, I have seen Evangeline twice due to her state and my busy work. We met up at the park late at night once when it was vacant and clear of any trace of a human being but us and the second time, we met up at the parking lot where we first met. We remained in the parking lot, sitting for hours on the pavement and talking about senseless matters. We did not enter the tiny bar that night as it seemed to be crowded and her conditions prevented her form being with anyone but me. It always amazed me how I was the only person she willed to spend her time with in spite of her social anxiety.
Niall suddenly emerged from inside into the living room, shirtless and stretching his bare arms. I scrunched up my nose in disgust. “Go and put on a shirt or whatever, you’re ruining my eyesight.” He snorted loudly before making his way back inside, coming back with one of my missing shirts on. Well, I guess it wasn’t really missing after all.
“When are you ever going to stop snatching my shirts without permission?” I asked in annoyance, looking from behind my glasses at his blank facial expression.
“When you accept seeing me half naked in the apartment, which is partially mine by the way.” Shaking my head, I averted my eye gaze back to the newspaper I was reading, knowing there was no use in lecturing him about anything. “What are you reading, anyways?”
I heard as he threw himself forcefully on the worn-out couch before replying, not sparing him a single look. “A newspaper, obviously.”
“No shit, Sherlock. Why you so grumpy this morning?” I shrugged nonchalantly, attempting to wave him off, wishing he’d find something else to do rather than interrogate me. Apparently, he had other plans in spending his morning that day. “No seriously, you look… I don’t know, but you don’t usually look like this while reading anything; especially a newspaper.” He pressed, and I huffed before folding the papers and setting them down on my lap, looking at him intently.
“I guess I am bored, that’s all.” Out of the blue, he perked for an unknown reason which I did not want to know nevertheless. He kept beaming at me for quite some time, which was discomforting to bear with. Finally, I decided on speaking. “What, Niall?”
“If you’re so bored, as you say…”
“I said that I am bored and not I am so bored. Big difference,” I cut him off, receiving a poker-face from him. I nodded for him to continue with whatever he was saying.
“Whatever,” he drawled, “if you are bored, why you don’t come out with me and the boys? We’re going out clubbing at nine, I suppose, what do you think?” I shook my head, immediately refusing the suggestion I was given. He scoffed, “why not, Harry? Tell me what you gonna do alone in this place?”
“I’ll call Evangeline or whatever, I think. Yeah, I’ll call her.” I suddenly got up, satisfied with the idea my mind came up. See, that’s part of the effect she has on me; my mind always work out solutions and suggestions involving her, which was quite indescribable.
“Yeah, go and call your girlfriend. Seriously, dude, you’re so clingy it disgraces me.” He yelled for me to hear as I strode to my room in order to retrieve my phone. I shook my head and pursed my lips in disapproval of what he had said, but I did not retort back anything.
After hearing the beeps on the phone for some portion of a minute, waiting for her to pick up, she finally did. I was expecting her sweet voice, calming my nerves and sending goose bumps all over my skin in excitement. In contrary, I heard her speak lowly as if afraid anyone would hear her talking on the phone with me. Her voice was husky, signaling she was crying for hours or so. I wanted to get in the car and drive all the way to her, but she refused, taking me aback.
“Why don’t you want me with you, Eve?” Sighing deeply form the other line, my insides crushed painfully at the rejection.
“I don’t think it’s a good idea to see you right now, Harry… this is the best for the both of us.”
“This is not the best for any of us, Evangeline; stop convincing yourself of that. You know you need me with you, you’re just too blinded to admit it.” I angrily replied to her, feeling all of my blood inside my veins boiling with uncontrollable rage.
“I don’t think I am blind at all, Harry. I just – I just don’t want to see you right now, sorry.” Breathing heavily for a moment or two, I placed my hand on the right side of my hip in determination to know what was going on, staring at the interiors of my dull room. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw the bed we once slept together in. I wondered if she’d ever sleep in it again.
I gave in at the end, huffing. “Just – just know that I am here, okay?”
She sighed again form the other line, “bye, Harry.” Then the line went dead afterwards, and with every beep sounding in my ears, my heart crushed even more painfully.
So I decided to go out with Niall, even if it meant that I was getting to interact with his douches of friends. I hated them with a passion, for sensible and logical reasons of course. They were snotty, little perverts who got drunk more than they blinked their eyes. Niall had some of their unbearable characteristics, such as partying and stuff, but he also had some beneficial ones within his character, making him easy to cope with. They, on the other hand, were so goddamn annoying and unbearable to interact with. But I needed to go out and get my mind off of everything going on in my life… off of the fact of getting rejected by my beloved girlfriend whom my life meant nothing without.
***
“Aye Zachary, you see that bartender over there; she’s smoking hot man. I bet she gonna be so good in bed, right?”
Zachary fanned himself, “I bet she’s gonna be so tight, damn.”
“Fuck, I’m hard.” Bruce spoke and I felt nauseous. I looked at Niall, who was shaking his head in disbelief as he eyed his shot, running his index over the rim of the cup. Scrunching my nose up, I arose from my seat quickly, looking at them all in disgust.
“Where’re you goin’ Harry?” Jason asked with fake interest. I looked away from his perverted face which reminded me of how a testis looked like.
“I’m going to the bathroom because I need to throw up.” I retorted harshly before making my way past their chairs and striding to where the loo was in a hurry.
Once inside the bathroom, I opened the sink’s facet and started cupping amounts of water in my hands and splashing my face with them, trying to refresh myself and get rid of the beads of sweat which formed on my face. Closing my eyes, I silently wished to vanish into thin air at that moment, wished I’d reopen my lids and find myself in my apartment, lying on my bed with her by my side. Sighing, I opened my eyes to find myself staring at my own reflection in the fogged and smudged mirror, depression coursing throughout my body. I inhaled then exhaled deeply before snatching a tissue and wiping the water drops on my face away.
The door opened, and in came some weird man who was obviously drunk to a max. Looking down below me to the muddy floor, I silently walked out of the loo, feeling as if exploding was a better idea than going back to the perverts I used to sit with. I was mid-way toward our table when my phone buzzed inside of my jean pocket, making me stop willingly to pick it up. When I looked at the blaring screen, I furrowed my eyebrows together when I found out that it was an unknown number. I answered nevertheless, but nonchalantly.
“Harry Styles,” I informed the caller blandly, my eyes lazily roaming around the tiny but crowded place. The music blasted louder than ever when the person on the other line decided to speak, causing me to cuss before saying loudly “What did you say, sorry?”
“Harry,” a familiar voice yelled, “I’m Lilly Wesley, son, where are you!?”
“I’m in a club, m – ma’am.” I stuttered out, receiving a huff from her. “What’s going on, Lilly?” She once told me to call her by her first name, so I guess it came out involuntarily right now.
“I’ll text you an address and you must arrive at it immediately, alright?” Running my fingers through my hair in frustration, confusion ran all over my body.
“What – why…”
“No time for questions, son; come right now.” Then she hung up, making me shake with fear of anything bad happening to the girl I loved the most.
So I ran over to Niall, snatched the car keys from him rashly then jogged to where our car was parked. I waited inside for the message to be sent, and when it was, I read the address once before starting the engine and the GPS program on my phone in order to find the location better. I was surprised when my destination was a hospital. My heart clenched at the sight of patients carried on trolley-beds in front of me, as families wailed somewhere not afar and as I heard a cardiac monitor beep continuously, signaling the patient’s final breath was spared. I could not help but wonder if I would ever be in the position of the family with Lilly, Adam, Jenna and Janice sobbing all around me.
When I was standing in front of the receptionist’s counter, I cleared my throat to gain her attention. She looked up at me with a bored expression drawn all over her face, anger rising up inside of me at the idea of families losing beloved members of theirs and she was blandly trimming her fingernails.
“How may I help you?” She spoke in monotone, sounding like a living robot speaking.
My fists clenched to balls. I did not know what to say; shall I say ‘Lilly Wesley’ or her daughter’s name? The latter option seemed to fit. “Wesley… Evangeline Wesley.”
Heavily sighing, she tore her gaze off of the white board behind me, replacing it back on the envelopes on the counter before her. I impatiently waited as she searched through the piles of papers for the name. I kind-of hoped she would not find any check-in with that name, wished that Evangeline wasn’t the victim in all this current situation. But I was proven wrong when she spoke up again.
“The Obstetrics and Gynecology department; second deck, to the right side of the elevator. Erm, ward A45.” I stared blankly at her, feeling stupider than ever.
“Uh – what’s that again?” She looked at me in disbelief of my ignorance before rolling her eyes and shaking her head disappointedly.
“That’s the section for pregnant women and childbirth. You get it now?”
The whole world around me started to spin around, violently shaking me to every corner. I was baffled; no, no; I was beyond the limit of bafflement. Shock ate me away, numbing my emotions and feelings for quite some time. I did not know where I was anymore, or who I was. All I knew was that Evangeline was in the section of pregnancy, meaning that she was… no of course it cannot be possible, but could it? I mean, we had an unprotected sexual intercourse back then but we were too foolish to think it might end up with anything serious. Look where that had gotten us! I wasn’t against the idea of being a father; I was just passing through the stage of shock and bewilderment. Nevertheless, I should not start assuming things out of the blue before making sure at first.
“Mr, are you okay?” The voice of the receptionist snapped me from my daze, and when I looked up, I nodded my head in total ignorance of everything going on around me. I wasn’t feeling my legs anymore, and when I started walking slowly toward the silver gated elevator, I felt like I was floating on clouds in the air.
When I entered, my phone started buzzing in my pocket once again, but I was too shocked to move a bone, too astonished to think properly for a fraction of a second. The whole situation flabbergasted me and it was like being hit by a truck moving over speed limit; it seems to be going in slow motion at first, but then it crashes on you so fast you lose balance. I was losing my mental balance, not really paying attention to anything around me. I almost missed my floor but I got out before the elevator closed back with a second.
I took the right side of the elevator as I was previously instructed, watching the sign dangling from the high ceiling with widened eyes. Written on it with big, bold, black letters was ‘OBSTETRICS & GYNECOLOGY’ for every passer-by to see clearly just like a full moon in a calm night-sky without stars shining around.
When I asked for directories to ward A45, I was instructed by a male-nurse to my destination. I walked through a tiny corridor with white painted walls surrounding and only frames of pregnant women and mothers carrying babies for decoration hung on the walls. Doctors in white and patients in blue passed by; pregnant women with their spouses or partners walked past me; teenage girls in their seventeenth also pushed their ways, rather morosely, past my stunned body. The letters in bold written on every door I passed by wasn’t really capturing my attention until the one I was looking for showed up, making me halt suddenly with force to stop my automaton body. I looked at the white door with dread, fearing what was inside.
I knocked twice before pushing the door handle down and opening the door, a creak audible when I pushed it open. Even the sound of creaking was unbearable to me at that time, causing me to furrow my eyebrows in annoyance. When I looked up to the interior of the ward, my breath got hitched in my throat at the horrendous sight. There was Evangeline, lying motionlessly on the bed with a cardiac monitor beeping beside her on a medical trolley. There was a pair of nubbins attached to her nostrils in order to give them the amount of oxygen needed. She was paler than ice, but her lips were rosy and not chapped much to my surprise. Lilly and Adam were standing on the right side of the bed, looking at me with sympathy, which made me curious.
I walked with my numb legs to the left side of her, involuntarily holding her hand in mine in an instant. I did not think further about my actions before bending down and kissing her cold forehead softly, desperately wanting to see her dark eyes stare at mine right now or her lips smiling sweetly at me when I pull back. Contrarily, they did not, and she did not even flinch a bit which was quite predictable. Shakily sighing, I stood up straight once again, my hand still in hers, and then looked at her worried parents.
“What’s wrong? Why is she in here?” I calmly demanded; my voice so low in fright and astonishment.
Adam sighed, tightening his grip around his wife’s shoulder. “There’s a reason why we’re in this department, you know.” Pang! There goes my heart and sanity.
“Care to enlighten me further more?” I shakily asked, still wanting any kind-of explanation, even if I already knew the answers which were to be said.
Lilly spoke up this time, “Evangeline suddenly fainted today morning, which surprised us as she has never fainted before, you see.” She started explaining, and I tried to listen intently to every word she said over the loud beeps of the monitor close to my ears. “So, we figured it was yet another strange symptom and when we transferred her here to the emergency department they… they told us she was… pregnant. Evangeline is pregnant, Harry.” Although her mother’s voice gave away her shock to the whole situation, a grin was intact upon her face along with her father’s too. Did I ever mention how she had her father’s grin and her mother’s hair?
Breathing heavily, I let what they’d said sink in for a moment or two. Evangeline is pregnant; I tried repeating in my mind, pregnant with my own baby… my son or daughter. It was impossible to be believed, but how not to when all the dots join and make perfect sense right now? How deny the truth when I was standing in it, surrounded by all the evidences; the department we were currently in, her parents’ testimony, everything proved the fact that she was indeed pregnant. At that moment, I knew how I was feeling; I was feeling beyond ecstatic. So I grinned widely, letting out a breath I seemed to be holding since the moment I laid a foot inside this ward.
“I’m going to be a father,” I spoke happily in disbelief, not actually absorbing everything as a whole quite yet. “I – I – I’m going to be a goddamn father, can you believe it!?”
They both laughed softly at my over-excited behavior, and when I looked back at Evangeline who was lying motionless on the bed, I sensed my love for her growing a thousand times more, pushing all the sensible limits upward, making my heart beat louder and clearer behind my ribs.
We were told later that day that Evangeline was so weak due to her illness and the episodes she went through that her immunity system dropped terribly, which caused her to be in that weak state of hers. She had fainted due to her tiredness, but luckily, the baby was not affected the slightest bit, which relieved me. Her parents left to get her everything she’d need by ten in the evening, and I stayed in the dark ward afterwards, sleeping on my right side on the uncomfortable couch to watch her while she was deep in her comma. She looked beautiful when she was asleep, her mind clearly free of its demons and her soul rid of its devils.
I was still not completely used to the fact that I was going to be a father nine months from now; it was shocking of course and the way I was told baffled me even more. But, I suppose knowing you were going to be a parent has a great effect on anyone, even if he was a heartless person, and it surely had its own magical effect on me. And the assurance that Evangeline and I were to be the parents sent chills running up and down my spine in over-excitement. A grin was plastered on my face, and sleep seemed to be a resentful option at that moment as I wanted to remain imagining life with a son or daughter and Evangeline and I playing with them; a life so beautifully easy and carefree.
***
“I see you’re so exhilarated about the whole situation, son,” Adam, or Mr. Wesley, started thoughtfully, staring at me intently the way he always does when he is about to ask some question. “You don’t look like you’re troubled with the news like most unmarried couples do when they find out the woman is pregnant. May I ask you the reason why?”
I smiled immediately, not needing a second to know the answer. “Because I love your daughter, sir; I love seeing her smile and laugh, I love hearing her talk and I absolutely and passionately love every little thing about her even the things she doesn’t see in herself. I love her to no measurable limits, Mr. Wesley, and I would gladly spend the rest of my life with her. And getting to have a smaller part of her to live with the both of us is such a beautiful thing that I cannot describe to you how much I love even if I took a whole lifetime trying to do so. We’re not living in some dramatic movie sir, nor are we in a tragic novel; we are surely in the midst of reality and reality is the fact that any normal man would love to be a father, no matter what.”
He smiled kindly at me before reaching with his right hand and patting me on the shoulder, making me relax slightly. Smiling back, I noticed how much happiness his eyes consumed and when they started tearing up, I felt myself close to the verge of crying too.
“Excuse me,” he whispered; his voice breaking due to the fact that he was almost sobbing. His moving body started reaching the door, which he opened and soon got out afterwards, gently shutting it behind him. I turned my head to my lover’s direction that was lying on the bed, her chest heaving as a result of her breaths.
I started moving gradually closer until I took a seat on the wooden chair beside her bed, the only sound filling my ears was the loud beeping of the cardiac’s monitor, which was similarly the only thing breaking the thick silence of the ward. I locked her hand in mine, squeezing the cold figurine in a mean of comfort… mostly to myself. I blinked, and noticed a couple tears falling from my eyes and streaming down my face rashly. Humorlessly laughing, I shook my head in disbelief at how I was crying because of something so happy and exciting about to occur; the birth of my baby.
The unexpected dose was a huge pressure on me, but I loved the pressuring feeling it gave me, reminding me of how much I loved Evangeline every second of the day. The feeling I was experiencing was quite… indescribable. It was satisfying but worrying; relieving but stressing; gleefully but also a bit shocking. I had the right to feel all these emotions at the same time for it’s not an easy event to cope to quickly. But, I know I would cope eventually; I want to, at least.
“I love you… so much, Eve.” I whispered over to her, whishing she could hear me, hoping she was able to respond back with the three simple words I loved to hear in her voice. “We’re going to have a perfect family; we’re going to have our own house, our own backyard, and our own garden which you would teach your child how to plant or something. Our home won’t be big, but it’d be ideal. We’ll have… three bedrooms and a living one, an office for me to write peacefully in, and a huge kitchen as I despise fast food. We’ll be happy and there shall be no more fears or worries or troubles standing in our way of eternal happiness. You’d be very ecstatic and full of life, Eve; you’d be normal.”
I sighed contently, thinking about the life I just created inside my mind. I would do anything, give up everything and have any precious object taken from me in order to be able to live that kind of life with Evangeline and our baby. I’ve always wanted a love-life and now that I have got one, I cannot help but want a stable and caring family. I lifted her hand which was in mine up until it reached my lips’ level, and I leaned forward slightly, placing my lips on it and leaving a wet kiss on the smooth but cold skin. When I pulled back, I gently started stroking her black and frizzy hair which was sprawled on the pillow underneath her.
“I promise everything is going to be alright, baby.”
Short chapter ik but at least an update huh? So sorry for not being able to update frequently but the bitch (a.k.a. school) is kicking my ass so hard idefk… hopefully I would be able to update immortals in during this weekend or so but no promises. Remember that u r all beautiful and I love each and every 1 of u babes xo