{UNEDITED}
For an hour, we sat in total silence. Matthew’s arms wrapped around me in a protective hug, every fibre of my body was telling me that I should have pulled away by now, but I didn’t want to leave the warmth and protection of his arms. They seemed to calm me down and helped release all the tension I was feeling without too much effort.
It seemed that, being in just his company now was enough to set my thoughts off with every kind of ‘what if’ humanly possible. It didn’t matter what he did, he was always on my mind and he was constantly clouding my judgement about even the simplest things. I didn’t want to like it but I couldn’t help it, it was the first form of proper stability I had for a very long time.
It was only when my phone started ringing that I pulled away from him, checking the caller ID before answering it. I wasn’t surprised to see that it was my father, probably wanting to know where the hell Matthew and I had got to because he was stood in the middle of some store waiting for the two of us to arrive.
I, personally, didn’t see the point in getting my wedding dress now. In three months I was going to be more than double the size now so, whatever my father picked out for me, wasn’t going to be any use when it came to the wedding. I wouldn’t be able to fit into it and I would be walking down the aisle in my jeans and a hoodie.
“You should see what he wants,” Matthew chuckled, his hands resting on my shoulders as he looked at the person who was calling.
“You know as well as I do what he wants. He wants to know where the hell we are,” I laughed, finally taking the time to look around the living room properly. I had been here a couple of times already, so the size didn’t bother me anymore, but I hadn’t looked at what there was in the house.
The two leather sofas sitting opposite each other with the glass coffee table in the middle. It gave the room a very homely feel and it was somewhere I could imagine living with Matthew and our daughter, somewhere we could make our own and no one would be able to stop us from being what we wanted to be. The TV was too big for my liking, but since my father paid for it, I wasn’t going to complain and throw it out.
The thing which caught my eye though were the pictures on each of the walls. They created an image which was non-existent when it came to my family. The images of me stood with my mother as a child were all a lie, the images of my father smiling were nothing more than a façade and the images of us as a family were a creation of someone else’s imagination.
The only picture I really wanted on the wall was that of Jason and me. I was three years old and he was ten, it was taken outside my Nan’s caravan the year we spent the summer with her. That was the last summer we spent with her because she died a couple of months later, some illness she didn’t tell any of us about because she didn’t want the worry. She just wanted Jason and I to enjoy our holiday with her.
“I don’t like the pictures. I think they need to go,” Matthew said from nowhere as he realised what it was that I was looking at. He didn’t look too impressed with the pictures of himself which had been put all over the place, he looked just as pissed off as I felt.
“We can deal with that when we move in properly. I don’t want my parents knowing I’ve been here already,” I replied. “I can show you the nursery while we’re here though. Jason has been working on that, but only because your father asked him to.”
“Sure. I can judge his taste,” Matthew laughed as the two of us pushed ourselves up from the sofa. I walked up the stairs, ignoring the look of awe on Matthew’s face as we passed several doors before getting to where we needed to be. I still think there are far too many rooms for the number of people who are going to be living here, but at least there is room for people to be able to spend the night rather than sending them home.
The house is probably as far away from the city as you can get without being in the middle of nowhere. It was far enough that I wouldn’t have to see my parents on a daily basis anymore, but close enough that I could still go home if I ever felt the need to do so. The moment I finally moved out though, I wasn’t planning on going back there any time soon.
The quicker I was out of that place, the better it was going to be for me. I would finally be able to stop worrying about whether my parents were going to wake me up with a pointless argument over something or whether I was going to be shouted at for something which wasn’t actually anything to do with me.
“I told Jason to go unisex until we knew what we were having. I have a feeling this room is going to be very pink though by the time he is done with it,” I laughed as I imagined Jason deciding which shade of pink he was going to use or which pink was going to look best for the carpet or which pink would make a perfect set of curtains.
I pushed the door open to reveal Jason’s work so far. The walls were magnolia and there was a yellow border going round the middle of the room, Jason had even put some Winnie the Pooh stickers on the walls as well put the cot up. The small elephant which I had bought a couple of weeks ago sitting in the corner beside where her head would be when she was asleep.
She hadn’t even been born and she already had her first toy. I saw it and when I saw it, I knew I had to have it because it was the cutest toy I had ever found. It was perfect for the baby because she was going to be cute when she was born.
“Your brother has done a good job. I especially love the mobile,” Matthew grinned. He walked over to the cot and fiddled with the mobile which hung over it.
There were two stars, a moon, two clouds and the sun with a nightlight in the middle of them all. There was a switch which, when it was actually put to the use it was meant for, the mobile played a calming song which was supposed to help the baby sleep. I didn’t know how true that was, but I guess we would find out in time.
“Just think, in three months we’ll be living here as husband and wife, then a month later Amanda is going ruin the peace.”
“It’s a weird thought. I mean, I had thought about marriage and kids, but I never thought either would happen until I was almost thirty. It’s all happening and I’ll have only been nineteen for five minutes,” Matthew said. He had put my thoughts of the last month into words and it was a relief to know he was feeling the same way, that he didn’t want any of this at his age because he had things planned out.
I had plans and I was still going to follow those plans. They were just going to be put on hold until Amanda was old enough for me to be able to do what I wanted to do. I wanted to help other people and I wanted to make sure they got everything I didn’t, hence the dream to be a teacher. I know people hate you when you are a teacher, but if I can help just one person, then I will always leave with a smile on my face.
“I planned for marriage, but never for having a baby,” I said, my hand resting on my stomach as I turned and walked over to the window. The view was of nothing but the countryside surrounding us, it was somewhat peaceful and I could get used to living in this sort of silence. “I always wanted a princess wedding. Just for once, I wanted to feel like I was the most important person in the world.”
“You’re the most important person in my world and you’ll be the most important person in our daughter’s life too.”
I knew that I shouldn’t have done because it would only encourage his comments, but I smiled when he said that and found myself hugging him as tightly as I had been before my father ruined the bliss we were sharing. I didn’t want to give him the wrong impression, especially when I didn’t know how I was feeling myself, but there was something about the new Matthew which I found impossible to push out of my mind.
He had been there for me. He didn’t freak when he saw the house my parents bought for us, although I was certain that he was pissed off when he realised they were only trying to buy back my love. He wasn’t forcing me into anything I didn’t want, he was simply being a friend in the way he knew best, even though he was slowly falling for me at the same time.
He was just different and I loved the person he was now. He had given up everything he was used to, just so he could be there for me and his daughter. He even told Lydia that he never wanted to see her again and told his friends that they either accept his decision, or they knew where the door was.
He had changed for the better and, despite not wanting to admit it to myself, I was beginning to fall for him. I could imagine him being an amazing father, he was already thinking of all the ways in which he could spoil her and treat her like a total princess, so I don’t really know what was stopping me from giving him the chance he had spent a month working to get.
We were, after all, going to be husband and wife soon enough. I was going to have to accept him being around, so it would be easier if I felt the same way about him as he did about me. I just couldn’t bring myself to say it aloud, at least not until I had spoken to Braydon properly and he had given me the chance to explain everything.
“You shouldn’t say things you don’t mean,” I replied.
“Good job I mean it then,” Matthew said and I could feel him looking at me as I tightened my grip around him, not willing to let him go too quickly. “Perhaps we should get going. Your father is already going to go mental for us being two hours late.”
“I don’t care. He’s an arrogant old fool who is used to getting his own way. It’s time he learnt what waiting was all about,” I muttered.
“Aw. I love you too darling,” I heard a voice chuckle. It was cold and clearly full of anger, but I didn’t want to look at where it had just come from. I knew it was my father and I knew he was going to have something to say about my opinion of him but, if he wanted more, then I had plenty more opinions to share with him. “You two do look the picture. Anyone would think you two were dating.”
“You and my mother are in the process of arranging my marriage to him. I’m sure dating isn’t going to affect that,” I said sarcastically.
“I am just a little surprised, that’s all. I never thought you would be stupid enough to actually fall for him,” my father retorted. I looked over to where he was now sat, on the chair in the corner of the room which Jason had bought for me last week after I mentioned just how much I liked it.
“I was stupid enough to get pregnant with his baby, so actually falling in love with him isn’t really that stupid,” as soon as the words came out of my mouth, I knew what I had said and it was too late to take it back. I am sure my father brings out the worst in me and that he deliberately waits for me to say something which he can use against me, it was something which I had grown tired of now. “I didn’t mean that I loved him, I just meant, it’s, oh, I don’t have to explain myself to you.”
“Last I heard, you were dating Braydon again. What happened to him?”
“He ran and hid, only to decide that he hated me again when I told him I was getting married. He seemed to think I had cheated on him again and wouldn’t even bother giving me a chance to explain.”
“Oh. Yes. That,” my father said, pausing for a moment as a satisfying grin appeared on his face, “I may have had something to do with that.”
I could feel my body tense as he had the nerve to grin about it, like he was proud that he had successfully ruined another part of my life. It didn’t matter what he did, as long as he had one up on me and he had the ability to ruin my life, he was happy.
Even when I was younger, he was always finding ways to make me miserable whenever my mother wasn’t around to stop him. He banned me from going round other people’s houses to play, he stopped people I knew coming in the house, he confined me to my bedroom until I had finished with my homework and he only allowed me to spend three hours a day with Jason.
Now he was just using my pregnancy to get what he wanted. He was using it to get Braydon out of the picture, he was using it to marry me off to the guy who got me pregnant and he was probably going to use it to turn the rest of our family against me. He had even managed to use it to convince my mother that this marriage was the right thing to do.
I had never hated anyone more than I hated my own father. He was supposed to love me and be there for me, instead he was finding all the ways in which he could push me away and keep me away.
“What did you do?” Matthew asked for me as his grip around me tightened a little.
“Why are you bothered? With Braydon out of the way there’s more chance of this marriage actually working out,” my father laughed.
“I don’t want this marriage, neither does Chloe nor do Jason and my parents. The only people who want this marriage to actually happen and work out are you and your wife,” Matthew snapped.
Any other time and I would have shouted at him for losing his temper but, given the situation, I would say that he is well within his rights to lose his temper. At least if it is him who is venting his anger at my father, I don’t have to and it means I won’t put my blood pressure through the roof again. My father needed to realise that he was in the wrong, with everything he was doing, he was in the wrong and he was a total fool for thinking it was right.
“You two should have thought about that before you had unprotected sex then, shouldn’t you?”
“Oh right. Because everyone who has unprotected sex and ends up pregnant turn to marriage. How silly of me not to have realised that was the answer,” I shouted. Sarcasm was the only way I could deal with my father right now, if I even tried another way, then it was going to end in mayhem and I was going to be the bad guy in the whole thing.
“At least if you are married, I know the baby is going to have a set of parents.”
“You are so selfish. You only think of yourself and have never really given a damn about me or how you make me feel in the process,” I snapped, holding back the tears which were building in the corners of my eyes. I didn’t want my father to see the way in which he affected me or how he played with my emotions, being pregnant didn’t help all that much either since I was already on an emotional rollercoaster for the next five months. “I am supposed to be your daughter but you have never given me any reason to make me think you actually love me. You only seem to be happy when you are making my life hell or when you are controlling what happens in my life.”
“I do it because I want the best for you. I know you will never be able to make the right decisions, that’s why I make them for you,” my father shrugged and that was all it took for me to disappear from Matthew’s arms and over to where my father was sitting.
I didn’t even time to think before my fist collided with his face, not just the once, but twice. I noticed the red mark which appeared immediately and the small trickle of blood which was coming from his mouth, but neither of those two made me feel the slightest bit guilty about what I had just done. If anything, it was a relief to know I had done that and that he didn’t even have the time to stop it from happening.
I had actually hit my own father and left the mark to prove it. I would love to see how he’s going to explain that one to people since I don’t think anyone will believe that it was his pregnant daughter.
“I hate you. I fucking hate,” I spat as the tears rolled down my cheeks. I was so far past the point of caring now that it didn’t even bother me that I was crying in front of my father, I didn’t have the time to be worried about crying in front of Matthew.
“This marriage is happening and, when it is done, you get to live happily ever after in this place,” my father said. His tone was harsh, like he didn’t want to allow us to live here after what had happened, but I also knew he wouldn’t dare take it back off us now. It would only make him look bad in front of the people he was trying to impress. “However, the moment you become a Jenkinson, I want nothing more to do with you. As far as I am concerned, I don’t have a daughter.”
“Good. But the last laugh will always be mine,” I managed to laugh.
“How so?”
“I get to tell people what an arse my father really is and I never have to worry about you coming after me,” I said and it was with that that I walked out of the room, heading straight out of the house and to Matthew’s car. The second I was in the passenger’s seat, out of the view of both Matthew and my father, I pulled my phone from my pocket and dialled Braydon’s number in the hope that he would actually answer it.
He may not have wanted to speak to me, but he didn’t know the full story and it was the time that he knew the truth. Not my father’s version of the truth, but the actual version of the truth. If he wanted nothing more to do with me after that, then that would be his decision, but at least he would know the truth and I would be able to live with that.
“Hello?”
Ranked: #867 ~ Teen Fiction