by Holly Hart
Katie studies my face seriously for a few seconds, and the longer she stays silent, the longer I think that she is about to kick me out of her room. I begin to think that I've seriously screwed up. And honestly – I wouldn't blame her. What I'm asking is unforgivably rude, after all.
"No," she finally says.
No!
"Really?" I ask, elated, my face suddenly filling with a broad smile. "That's incredible!"
Katie raises an eyebrow and stares at me, a haughty look on her face. "Are you saying you think I'm the kind of girl who sleeps around?"
Oh shit, I've really gone and put my foot in it this time… Still – that's the best news I've ever heard!
"No, no," I say, raising my hand and babbling in my attempts to mollify my beautiful lover, "that's not what I think at all. It's just…"
"It's just…" she repeats, mimicking me and arching her eyebrow ever higher. "You better get explaining yourself soon, Mike, or we're going to have a problem…"
She hasn't got up and bolted yet, but I feel at this rate it's only a matter of time. Still, my hand's still resting between her chest and her tummy, and I decide to use it to test my suspicion, dragging downwards and feeling the gentle rise in her tummy. It's almost imperceptible, and I think that the only reason I've even noticed it is due to my training with Delta Force. They've always trained us to pay attention to the smallest of details, and this is definitely one of those.
"Have you noticed any… changes recently?" I ask.
"Changes?" Katie asks, now just looking confused. "Stop talking in riddles, Mike – just be straight with me."
"Okay, I will," I say, pausing. I feel a massive surge of pride swelling up inside me, something I never guessed I'd feel in a moment like this, and for a second, a little frog in my throat stops me from telling her the good news.
"Katie… I think you're pregnant."
Chapter Eleven - Katie
"Pregnant?" I say, my hand racing to my stomach. "You can't be serious? What makes you think that? Why?"
The questions rush of my mouth faster than my brain can come up with new ones, and before long I realize that I'm babbling.
"Feel your breasts," Mike says, gently squeezing my left. "They're definitely heavier than they were last time I bedded you, and you've got a glow about you – have done for at least two weeks now. I don't know how I didn't notice it until just now. I think I was blinded by my attraction for you. But I'm sure, Katie – I'm sure you're pregnant."
What the hell do you know about pregnancy? I want to scream, but resist, trying to figure things out in my own brain before I descend into a gibbering wreck.
"It’s just the pizza," I say plaintively. "I've been eating too much – that's all."
"You could never eat too much pizza to make me not attracted to you," Mike grins, "and besides – does pizza give you a radiant glow? I thought it just gave people acne. Hell, you're the nurse – if pizza makes people look this good, then let's go back to the states and start selling it as a health supplement!"
I open my mouth to spit back a sharp, biting retort, but close it after a few seconds as the logic of Mike's words begins to hit home, leaving me looking like a goldfish for a short period of time.
I have been hungrier than normal. And the nausea – I'm such an idiot, it can't be morning sickness, can it? What the hell kind of nurse misses their own pregnancy?
I focus my eyes on my naked body, desperate to get to the bottom of things one way or another. I bring my hands up to my breasts, cupping each one gently. He's right, I think, they are bigger than normal. I did notice that… But how could I have been so stupid as to think that it was just eating too much pizza? How did I not think more about the fact that I’ve been feeling horrible in the mornings? How could I have just thought I was overworked and overstressed…
"Katie – you okay?" Mike asks, concern in his voice. It sounds so sweet, so genuine that my heart can't help but melt, no matter the emotional turmoil coursing through me as I try and come to terms with the storm he's just unleashed.
"Okay?" I croak. "You're asking me if I'm okay after telling me that I'm pregnant!"
"It's a good thing, isn't it?" he asks, looking slightly uncertain. "I thought you'd be happy?"
"Happy?" I half say, half laugh back in surprise. "I haven't planned a baby – hell, I don't even really know I'm pregnant or not. What makes you think that I want to bring up a child right now? Hell, I'm living in a war zone!"
"Yeah…" Mike drawls, his momentary lapse into indecision almost immediately disappearing, subsumed by his overpowering, alluring self-confidence, "but it's my baby, and you wouldn't be doing it alone…"
The meaning behind his words doesn't hit home until a couple of seconds later. "You'd… You'd raise a child with me?" I ask, stunned by the suggestion. Hell, everything that's happened since Mike first mentioned he thought I was pregnant has left me reeling, and this is no different.
"You think I'd let you do it alone?" he asks, looking almost insulted at the suggestion. "You're the mother of my child, Katie – tell me you aren't – and it's my job to protect you, my job to keep you safe, my job to love you."
My stomach does a backflip at the word, but I keep my face level, not wanting to crumble once. A child is a big commitment. No – it's a fucking huge commitment, and it's easy for Mike to say that he is interested now, but what about when it's more real…
"Mike," I say, stumbling over my words because they're difficult to say, "why would you want to be with me?"
He suddenly fills the room with a peal of laughter and slaps me gently on the shoulder as though I've told the funniest joke he's ever heard.
"You're kidding me, right?"
"Um, no…" I say, still bemused by the turn this conversation’s taken.
"Katie – do you think you have to prove yourself to me or something?" he asks, a barely disguised look of mirth on his face.
"Kinda…" I say, trailing off as I realize how much merriment this is causing him.
"You're mad! Katie, you saved my life. You nursed me back to health. You rescued my dog, you've been the best sex of my life, and now you're bearing my child – I couldn't be happier if I tried. Hell, if this is you not proving yourself, then I'd love to see what you could do if you tried!"
When he puts it like that, I can kind of see what he's getting at.
"Mike," I say, "think about it – what kind of life do you think you're going to be able to give this kid if you're always jumping from deployment to deployment? Do you think I could stay with you when I don't know from week to week whether you will even be alive? What kind of life is that for our child?"
Our child…
Mike goes silent for a second. "I'll leave," he says simply.
"Leave, what, you mean – leave?" I say.
"I mean it – I'll leave the army for you, Katie. I've done my time, hell – apparently I'm a goddamn American hero these days. If I ask my colonel to speed the papers through, he'll do it in a flash."
I can tell, just by looking at him, that he is serious. I have no doubt that if he was on a mission, he'd be harder to read than a professional poker player, but he doesn't hide anything from me – he's just an open book. And I can tell he's serious, truly serious, about settling down and raising a child with me.
"If you want to keep it, that is…" he finishes uncertainly.
I fix him with an immediate, serious, motherly stare, suddenly feeling maternal instincts that I'd never known existed. "Oh, if you think that I'm doing anything other than raising this child –"
I stop as soon as I notice that his face is filling with a smile. "Thank God!"
"So you're serious about raising a child with me?" I ask, knowing the answer, but wanting to hear it regardless. "You'll leave the army, come settle down with me – white picket fence, all of that. You won't be bored?"
He grabs my hand with his left and squeezes it tightly, as though he's marking his territory. With his right, he sneaks it down m
y body and brushes my wet slit.
"Trust me, Katie – when you're around," he grins, "I'm never bored."
Chapter Twelve - Katie
Fireworks?
I groan quietly as my body stirs from its slumber. Judging from a quick glance around the room with eyes that are still heavily lidded with sleep, it's still dark out. Except that the fireworks are, intermittently, giving off flashes of a brilliant golden light.
But fireworks?
Out here in the desert, fireworks aren't exactly the kind of thing I've come to expect people to be loosing into the sky. After all, on a heavily armed military base, people are far more likely to mistake them for bombs.
Bombs.
I slap my forehead. How can I be such an idiot sometimes? Of course the fizzing thumps and crackling pops that I can hear all around me aren't fireworks, they're explosives. And if someone's setting off explosives in what's supposed to be the most secure part of the country for hundreds of miles around me, then I'm as sure as I've ever been that this isn't a place I want to be hanging around. Especially not now that I know I’ve got another life inside of me. Mike’s child…
I need to get to the shelter, but first I know I've got to get Sophie. Suddenly, all around I hear the wailing moans of sirens beginning to cry melancholically into the moonlit sky. The noise confirms what I already suspect – I really do need to get to safety.
I roll out of bed, landing with an unpleasant thump on my side, and gasp in pain as the impact forces all the air out of my lungs. I'm not thinking straight, but at least my instincts are on point – the floor seems like the safest place to be right now. My hand jumps to my belly immediately, with a belated reaction that I need to be more careful now I’m expecting. Still, if I don’t make it through the night, our child won’t have a chance anyway.
The cool desert air seeping through the cracks in my poorly constructed plywood bedroom is caressing my exposed legs – all I'm wearing is an oversized T-shirt and an old pair of panties, and I'm acutely aware of how ridiculous I must look, even if there's no one around to see me. I reach around in the semi-darkness, knowing I shrugged off the pants from my scrubs when I collapsed into bed earlier, and when my hand finally brushes up against a soft puddle of cloth, I gratefully pull them on.
Sophie.
That's the only thought in my mind – I trust that Mike can handle himself. She's a heavy sleeper, so I know that there's absolutely no chance the noise from the ‘fireworks’ will have woken her up, especially not after the long and stressful day we've just had, and I know it's up to me to get her.
I keep my head down, slithering on my belly along the rough wooden floor, suddenly wishing that I'd taken the time to put a rug down, instead of leaving it exposed like this. It would probably have done my psyche a world of good over the past few months if I'd been able to come back to a nice, homely looking bedroom after work instead of this spartan, sparsely decorated dormitory.
But I didn't do that, so no use regretting it now.
I reach up for the door handle, straining all the sinews in my body so that I don't have to lift my body up off the floor to do so. I manage it, but my shoulder's burning by the time the door clicks open. I don't know if I'm imagining things, but it feels like the sounds of battle are getting closer. All of a sudden, I can hear the ‘pop, pop, pop’ sound of individual gunshots in the background – not as loud as I'd have imagined they'd be, but still, it was obvious that they were heading in my direction.
I prise the door open and have to squirm backwards to allow it to swing inwards. Fuck! I don't have time to be messing around with stuff like this.
BANG!
I turn in horror, only to be greeted by the sudden and unexpected sight of moonlight streaming through what had previously been the solid plywood outer wall of my bare bedroom. In its place is a wall speckled by the evidence of gunfire – three fist sized, irregularly shaped holes in the wooden surface.
I can hear shouts in the distance, but whether it's in English or – terrifyingly, not – I can't tell. I press myself even closer to the floor, more conscious than ever now that the walls around me won't provide much protection against hard, fast metal bullets. And it seems obvious that more of those will be on their way sooner rather than later. I start crawling.
Sophie's room is only six yards or so down the dimly lit corridor, but moving at the glacial paced amounted by my newly adopted need to walk, it takes ages. I raise my hand, forming it into a fist, ready to bang it against her door, and just as it's careering towards the flimsy wood, I splay my fingers and halt its forward movement.
"Sophie!" I hiss, keeping my voice as low as I can manage, but also loud enough so that it has a chance of waking her up.
Nothing.
"Sophie!" I try again, placing my ear against the wall and desperately listening for any sound that might indicate movement inside. Still nothing. I'm going to have to go in. I cross my fingers and offer up a silent prayer, hoping beyond all hope that she hasn't locked her door. If she has, I'm not sure what I can do – the shouts around the cabins are definitely getting closer, and I don't know if I'm brave enough to start banging against her door, just in case I draw the wrong attention.
Just like I did to get out of my room, I stretch my arm upwards, my tired shoulder screaming its displeasure as I reach for Sophie's doorknob. My hand closes against the cold metal and I close my eyes, quietly praying once again, and then I twist the metal in a swift, unyielding movement.
Click.
My arm sags back down to the floor in relief, and I rest my forehead on the ground for second, allowing myself to recover and build up a little bit of mental fortitude.
Whatever happens in the next few minutes, I've got a feeling I'm going to need it. My breath reflects off the floor, blowing little swirls of dust and hair around like a miniature storm, and my momentary revulsion at the filthy condition of our barracks is enough to jolt me back into action.
Don't stop moving, don't stop moving – it's all I can think, like a mantra drumming into my head – don't stop moving, don't stop moving – because a feeling sweeps through me that if I do, I die – don't stop moving, don't stop moving – the thought is so intense, so immediate that it stuns me, but I follow the advice – don't stop moving – my lips moving soundlessly in time with my new motto, I start crawling as fast as I can, head down into Sophie's bedroom – don't stop moving – I glance up for a brief second, just to orient myself before another rattle of gunfire outside convinces me to hurl it back to the floor – don't stop moving – I can see her out of the corner of my eye, she's completely out of it, and for a second I'm jealous, because I'm terrified, but I keep crawling – don't stop moving – and I find myself by her bedside, my hand groping at her covers until the fingers come across the silky, smooth tendrils of my friend's hair, and I know I don't have time to be polite – so I yank them, hard.
"Aargh!" she yells, sitting bolt upright. "What the hell was that?"
"Sophie!" I hiss urgently from the floor. "Get your head down, come on, quickly!"
She looks at me, eyes stupid with sleep – heavy lidded and puffy. "What are you doing down there, Katie? It's the middle of the night…"
"Get on the floor!" I half scream, grabbing her shoulder and bodily pulling her down. As she falls, I see her eyes narrow with suspicion, and then fear. She clings onto me, and I'm grateful for the reassuring feeling of her warm skin against mine.
"What the hell's going on?" she asks, whispering this time, apparently realizing the seriousness of our situation. I just can't believe she didn't wake up earlier – it sounds like a war zone out there.
Another two bullet holes appear in the flimsy plywood walls of our barracks, their arrival signaled by a loud cracking, splintering sound and sawdust spraying across the room, filling it with a light dust that tickles the back of my throat. I resist the urge to cough.
"I think we're under attack!" I reply, painfully aware that I'm stating the obvious. "Do you think we sh
ould try and make it to the shelter?" I asked, holding on to my friend for dear life. Thankfully, Sophie doesn't seem to have a problem with it, because she's holding just as hard back to me.
"You mean go outside?" she asks haltingly. "Are you sure that's a good idea?"
"Well… no," I agree somewhat lamely. "I mean – it's what they told us to do in the event of an emergency, isn't it?"
"I guess so…" Sophie agrees, "but I don't think we'll make it to the shelter. It's a least a hundred yards away, isn't it?"