Dusk – Chapter Four

When I woke up, I felt warm. For a minute I thought it was a normal day, me home in by bed.

Well… until I felt the arms around me and the memory of last night slammed into my brain.

“Morning,” whispered San huskily, kissing my neck.

“No… shouldn’t… San…” I protested weakly, distracted by his lips moving against my throat. The foolish part of me that had been in control last night ached to turn around and um… “go again”…

But Logical Me was in charge now. She told the other part to shut up.

Steeling my resolve, I pulled away from him, off the bed and furiously started pulling my clothes on.

“Why the long face?” San asked, raising one eyebrow playfully. That little expression does things to a girl, you know.

“Because,” I replied, avoiding his eyes, “this was a mistake, okay? And besides, I have to go. Right now.”

“That’s fine… I guess I’ll see you at the usual spot after work then? There’s always time to make another mistake…” he said suggestively as he pulled his jeans on.

“No!” I gasped, trying to keep my eyes away from his bare chest long enough to say what I had to say. “San, this can’t go on. There are some… people out there who’ll go to any measures to find me. The longer I stay around you, the more chance there is that they’ll use you to get to me. I’m so, so sorry San. This has to be goodbye.”

With that, I turned to go.

“Wait! Dusk, please!” he shouted pleadingly.

But I just left. Just like that. Even the cries of that foolish little part of me weren’t enough to make me realise how much he meant to me.

———

The days that came after were dull. I got up, went to work, came home from work, went to bed and then did it all over again. There was none of the fun, excitement and mystery of the days with-

No. I was not allowed to think about him. It’s better this way – he’d be safe now. Only a memory of days gone by, something that would fade over time.

But… if it meant so little, why did my heart hurt so much?

And still  I went on trying to forget, trying to move on. I told myself he meant nothing – and a part of me believed it.

That was, until the day I started feeling sick.

At first it didn’t seem odd. Just a stomach bug, or something.

Then, as time wore on and I didn’t get better, I began to wonder. Trembling inside, I went to the pharmacy to get what I needed.

The first time I didn’t believe it. Or the second. Or even the third. It took five of those little plus signs to bring it home to me.

Pregnant.

What do you do when your whole world collapses in on itself? The shaky life I’d constructed broke apart as I contemplated telling him.

Didn’t he have a right to know? Or was it kinder not to tell him? All through the day and after work my head was spinning. I went into the music room to sing it out. I may have been a crappy singer, but I’d always loved music. It was like poetry with a beat.

“We’ll do it all

Everything

On our own.

We don’t need

Anything

Or anyone.

If I lay here

If I just lay here

Would you lie with me

And just forget the world?”

 

Why I picked that song I still don’t know… but whatever reasons I had, for once music was just confusing me.

By the time I left the school the sun was going down. I’d decided I wouldn’t tell San. It would put him in more danger than he was already in by just being around me…

“Dusk! Hey, Dusk!”

Speak of the devil. I broke into a run as I heard his voice, cutting into a fenced area behind the hospital in a bid to shake him off.

No such luck. He followed me until I stopped, out of breath.

“Dusk, can we just talk? Whatever’s wrong, you can tell me.”

Oh, he didn’t even know the half of it…

“San, no. There are things I haven’t told you. Things I can’t tell you. I just… I can’t deal with this.”

“What can’t you tell me? Because there isn’t a lot I won’t believe.”

Snap decision. Time for the moment of truth.

“San… I’m pregnant.”

He did an excellent impression of someone who’d been turned to stone.

“Um… San? Still here?” I asked, waving my hand in front of his face. “Earth to San!”

And that was when I heard it. Too close, too echoing to not be real.

“Duskie… we fouuund yoooou!!”

The stuff of nightmares. My nightmares.

Them.