David smiled slightly, "So, I guess we can be considered official now?" He struggled to keep the hope out of his voice and failed. "I can shout it at the top of my lungs? Finally!"
"Why can't we just keep things quiet like we had been doing?" she whispered, fearing once again becoming the center of the gossip mills. It had been months ago but it still felt recent.
“You want to keep us secret?” David asked, confusion coloring his tone.
Blinking, “What’s wrong with that?” In her mind keeping their relationship status quiet meant that nobody would be trying to break them up. It meant that nobody could try to ruin their relationship or spread rumors about them or any of those other things that she’d faced at the beginning of the school year.
"Why do you still want to keep us quiet?" David asked, slipping his hand up to cup her cheek as he started to lean closer. "You're not concerned about the gossip are you?"
She looked behind him and saw the small crowd that was gradually growing bigger. His intimate gesture told them everything that they needed to know and she clutched her notebook even closer to her chest. "I guess that isn't an option anymore. We have unexpected witnesses."
Her eyes wide, he gently brushed his lips over hers and pulled away before taking the notebook from her grip and setting it in the open locker behind them . After taking those few second, David started kissing her properly. This time she responded, one hand slid into his hair, fingers tangling in the soft mass, and the other rested on his chest, grasping at his shirt. For a moment she forgot that they were in the middle of the hallway surrounded by people.
A small cheer coming from the crowd nearly masked the gasp coming from Aimee as she managed to make her way to the front. Fake tears sprung into her eyes, but they were more out of habit than from wanting to put on a performance for this group of spectators. She hadn’t gotten what she wanted, even if she never had the chance to try to get it since David never went into the bookstore anymore. Those closest to her figured that they were tears of disappointment.
Breaking apart, "But you're planning on going to…"
"No, I'm not," David interrupted. "I don’t have to. I decided to try to go to the exact same state school that you are attending. The program is better so you better not start on that." He kissed her again. After having waited longer than he realized to hold her in his arms he had trouble letting her go. He hoped that the crowd would be able keep the teachers out for a little while longer.
Chapter Sixty
It took a few weeks before their schedules could mesh up and the young couple could attend the Bible Study class for young married couples. They knew that they would be the youngest couple there at the meeting. At a study session where Hannah would be the youngest Bible Study student. All of that unnerved Hannah a little.
She felt uncomfortable continuing to go the Teen Bible Study class with the chatter about dates and if so-an-so liked them as more than a friend, about homework and parent woes. They couldn’t possibly understand Brady’s ‘my father-in-law hates us’ concerns or how Hannah was concerned about money and her growing baby.
They never doubted that other teenagers had concerns about where their next meal was coming from, if their mother’s new boyfriend could be trusted, or if they had time to do homework after they had taken care of their younger siblings. She’d seen it with some of her classmates, but none of those classmates had time to come to the Wednesday night Bible Study. They were at home either cooking dinner or helping with homework.
Brady and Hannah had no idea what was about to happen as soon as they walked through those doors. If there would be more or less judgment that she occasionally felt from several other Teen Bible Study classmates.
Waving to Kelly as they watched her and Penny - the other girl had decided to join Kelly on occasion - disappear into the Teen room, Hannah quickly glanced to see if Aimee was present – the other girl hadn’t returned since vandalizing David’s car - before hurrying to catch back up with Brady. Instead of going into a room where they would know everybody they were about to enter a room where they knew nobody.
That was a tad scary.
“I can’t do this,” Hannah started to panic. “I can’t go into this room with people who are going to judge us for getting married so young and for such obvious reasons.” She rubbed her hand over her belly where she was just beginning to show. Soon she would have to worry about clothes not fitting.
Brady tugged her into his arms. This wasn’t the first time she had acted irrationally and by now he knew better than to comment that she was being worried over nothing. The first time he had told her that she was acting ‘crazy’ she had gotten mad so quickly that it shocked both of them. Hannah had then burst into tears.
“Baby, we’ll be fine. These are the young couples. None of them are above college age and several of them are freshmen and sophomores in college. They won’t think anything about us. I think one or two of them are even pregnant. We can swap horror stories.”
He took a step back when she started glaring at him. “Horror stories? What ‘horror stories’ are you talking about?”
Sighing to himself, “Like sitting in the waiting room worrying about what you were having to go through during that first doctor’s appointment. Or they can prepare us for the appointments to come. What it feels like when the baby first starts to move around.” He took care to move the topic away from the discussion of ‘pregnancy horror stories’ and into happier areas.
He imagined that the program of events in the Young Couples Bible Study happened similar to those in the Teen Bible Study with studying and then talking about everything while everybody ate the food that somebody from the church had provided. He just wondered how different the conversation topics would be.
Chapter Sixty-One
Aimee Kirkland was steaming. For once she had created a truthful rumor and nobody appeared to care that Hannah Stanfield-Johnson was actually pregnant! They’d asked her when she was due - “Late May or Early June” - and if she knew what she was having yet - “We decided we wanted to be surprised.” They were “oohing” and “aahing” over her rings and asking what married life was like.
She was pregnant for crying out loud! Nobody believed that “Birth control can fail” or “It was only one time” crap. Nobody Aimee knew was that gullible. Yeah, sure, she had tried to use that against David months ago, but nobody believed her because they knew that birth control was infallible.
To make it worse whenever she tried to discuss this with Kelly the other girl would shut her down. She’d say things like, “Hannah is my sister now.” Or, “I don’t want to talk about Hannah.” Then Kelly would walk away.
So she would find Will Cooper. Only he was still bitter about the whole, “You knew Hannah was in a serious relationship and was still willing to barter her for my cooperation.” He wouldn’t even look at her as he walked away.
That didn’t mean that Aimee didn’t hear him apologizing to Hannah for his part in Aimee’s schemes. He even handed over a wedding/peace offering/apology gift of a gift card to Wal-Mart. It was embarrassing hearing that he apologized for her. Her! Like she did something wrong! All she did was state the truth!
“Can you believe that?” Aimee asked Candy, turning to look at the girl after her rant. Candy was nowhere to be seen. “If you are going to blow me off at least have the courtesy of doing it to my face!” she shouted down the hallway.
From behind her Wesley Pitts started laughing. “That’s funny. The Queen of the Backstabbers,” he stated as if that was her title, “wants people to diss her to her face.”
Slamming her locker door shut, Aimee stared him down.
“You honestly think that glare is going to scare me?” Wesley laughed. “My father is retired military. You could learn a thing or two from him.” Then the infuriating guy walked away. Over his shoulder, “Learn some compassion and humility. You need it.”
It didn’t help that somebody started clapping.
Chapte
r Sixty-Two
Hannah sat there staring blankly at the book she was supposed to be reading. She was lucky. She knew she was lucky. Out of all of the possible books she could have been assigned Pride and Prejudice was it. She could have been assigned Great Expectations. Jane Eyre. The Picture of Dorian Gray. Not that there was anything wrong with the other novels, but she had already read Pride and Prejudice thanks to Aimee’s attempt at getting David Carver’s attention a few months before.
It was the class’ second novel – they had been assigned Frankenstein as a class – and this one was a solo read. She found being assigned an already read book made things easier on her homework load. She just wondered if the teacher knew about the fact that Delilah Davis had stated which movie was closest to the book in the middle of the hallway during a confrontation with Aimee.
The problem was that she couldn’t focus. The “dining room table” was littered with textbooks. Half-finished Trig problems were in front of her. An assignment that needed recipe research for Culinary Arts sat to her right. Her only relief was that Coach Barnes had her walking laps in aerobics instead of working out to the exercise video like the other girls. On occasion another girl could join her, but mostly she was alone. The yoga segment would be a welcome change.
It wasn’t that her doctor said that she couldn’t work out to the dance DVD’s the teacher was using. In fact he encouraged it, telling her to be careful right now. She was only four months along, but the coach didn’t want to run any risks despite the doctor’s note approving the activity.
But she only had three more weeks in the semester and the yoga unit was next. That still left her English IV book report and presentation. It left math problems that were getting increasingly difficult. A recipe project that included cooking one of the recipes as a final.
That barely changed the fact that she was having trouble focusing. Brady was at his night class. Kelly had come over to study and keep Hannah company, but her new sister-in-law left at 7:30. She’d enjoyed the meal Hannah had made, but Kelly couldn’t keep her company until Brady came back from class.
Looking down, she could see her stomach beginning to round. Soon she would be showing and all of Aimee’s nasty rumors from September would return.
She doubted Aimee had learned any lessons. Hannah knew that Aimee still asked Kelly how David and Delilah were doing; it barely mattered that Kelly was trying to avoid Aimee. She had a new loyalty now: her sister-in-law.
But Hannah knew that Aimee would never let getting knocked off her mean girl throne set her back, not that anybody cared.
“Hey, Peanut,” Hannah whispered. “I hope you never think that you weren’t worth this.”
The jingle of Brady’s keys in the lock told her it was after nine.
The nurse wrote down a few pieces of information for Hannah’s chart. Her blood pressure was slightly high, but everything else was at reasonable levels. She made a note to monitor the teenager’s stress – Senior Year could be stressful – and blood pressure levels before getting down to the reason both parents were in for this appointment instead of just Hannah.
“So…” she looked at Brady and Hannah, “are you wanting to know the sex of the baby?”
Hannah looked at Brady for a moment before looking back at the nurse. “No. If I found out what the baby is going to be then I’d want to decorate and do all those other nesting things. I really don’t want to decorate until we move into the apartment we are planning on living in during college. If we find out that we’re having a boy I’ll be tempted to put little baseballs on the walls with the bears that I’ve already bought. While I know they are vinyl and I can reuse them, they just don’t stick the same way after they’ve been used and we’re only supposed to be in the apartment for a few weeks after the baby is born.” She thought about the green and yellow pieces she was putting together in her Baby Wish List like the fitted sheet for the crib that had little bears with green and yellow bellies and ears. Or the yellow stuffed duckling she wanted when the baby was a little older.
“I understand that,” the nurse responded, nodding her head. “Plenty of parents want that moment of surprise.” Pouring the gel on Hannah’s stomach, she pointed out something that neither parent had thought about, “Just keep in mind that sometimes the baby does not want to cooperate with the parents’ wishes.”
“We understand,” Hannah responded while Brady nodded his head. “We still want to see the Peanut.”
Looking at the screen they saw a clear image of their growing baby, including the very part that they had hoped to avoid. Nothing needed to be pointed out and there was no confusion about the sex of their little Peanut.
Tugging at her pants, Hannah started panting as she tried to get them pulled up. “I can’t get my pants on! Not even with the rubber band trick!” she called out to Brady.
“You’ll just have to wear a skirt today,” Brady called back from the bathroom. “The hem is long enough it won’t matter.”
Peering around the door frame, “I wore one yesterday and Aimee ‘accidently’ spilt something on me at lunch.”
Brady growled. He was getting tired of hearing about the little things that Aimee had done that may or may not have been an accident. “I wish something could be proven against her.”
“She’s just mad that I’m still liked and nobody wants to be seen with her. I’ve taken to using Heather, Jennifer, or Delilah’s lockers instead of mine.” Hannah disappeared to scan the closet for another skirt. “I wish I could wear my stretchy pants. I guess I’m going to break down and ask for written permission from the principals.”
“Why are you using the other girls’ lockers?”
Hannah looked at him while sniffing a skirt she finally found in the dirty laundry hamper. “Somebody spilled perfume in front of my locker last week and the smell makes me nauseous.” Looking up, “It wasn’t Aimee; just some annoying freshman who was trying to act like her older sister.” Moving to pull the skirt on over her tights Hannah finished explaining, “Besides, their lockers are actually closer to my classes.” She didn’t want to mention that she was concerned that Aimee would attempt some of the tricks she’d done to some of Brady’s ex-girlfriends. Hannah knew that she was on Aimee’s short list if only because Aimee hadn’t reduced her to a public mass of sobbing tears yet.
Staring at the scented lotions and body sprays, she considered camouflaging the slight dirty laundry smell before deciding to toss a pair of stretchy black pants into her back pack. She’d ask if these pants would be okay for her to wear and if they were she would change at school.
“I guess that makes sense,” Brady slowly answered. He took so long to respond that Hannah had forgotten what they were talking about. “Your mom is planning on dropping off some money for clothes this afternoon.”
“Good. I need some more pants before I’m completely out of clothes that I can wear.”
Chapter Sixty-Three
“Look..,” Wesley started to say to his ex-girlfriend; they had been dating ever since their friends had all started to date. “It’s not like we haven’t gone to things together before.” He didn’t want to admit that he was having trouble keeping up with Jennifer on their daily Christmas Break run.
She wanted to keep in shape and be prepared for her last Track and Field season. Jennifer had State and scholarships on her mind.
So focused on trying to keep up, Wesley barely noticed as Jennifer rolled her eyes as she asked, “What’s your point?”
Will you go to David’s party with me?” he finally asked.
“No.”
“No?”
“No.”
Impatiently, Wesley asked, “Why not?”
“Because,” Jennifer answered him while channeling one of her older brothers.
“Why?” he repeated?
“I don’t have to answer that,” Jennifer retorted, picking up her pace intentionally.
For the hundredth time that night Jennifer sighed, “I can’t believe I agreed to
this.”
“I can,” Wesley answered, handing her an orange drink can. Deciding to make a joke, he jested, “You just want my body.”
“You aren’t that good.”
Grinning, “How would you know?” Wesley asked her.
“You’re right,” Jennifer reluctantly agreed. “I wouldn’t.”
Scanning the room, she observed for a few minutes. Delilah was scanning Mrs. Carver’s bookshelves. Kyle and Grace were sitting on a sofa; occasionally he would rub his scar on his knee. Kelly had been allowed to come and was talking to her date - from her Bible study class – and Penny. The look of annoyance and Kelly’s crossed arms caught Jennifer’s attention.
Almost everybody had paired off. David and Delilah. Kyle and Grace. It was sad. Certainly she’d go out with Wesley if the need called, but they’d agreed back near Christmas that they were better off as friends, occasionally friends who dated when they needed a plus one, and exercise partners. She would have been ill-prepared for the first week of Track practice without him.
He thought nothing of it when she let out a string of curse words that would make her military trained brother blush – even though she had learned most of those words from him.
Wesley thought nothing of their secret bets on how long each of their friends’ relationships were going to last.
One bet they constantly had to revise: Grace and Kyle. Jennifer expected Grace to get swamped with the ACT and the college application process and push Kyle away. Wesley expected Kyle to get bored and decide to stay on the baseball team. Both of them were wrong.
There were no bets placed against David and Delilah. At least they didn’t place any bets for during high school. They both predicted that half of the couple would decide that Delilah would need to date other people before settling into a long-term serious relationship. Jennifer gambled that it would be David making that motion. Wesley placed his money on Delilah ending it with David. They didn’t know if they would be able to discover the outcome of that relationship, but they made the bet anyway. Their lives were filled with little and big bets.
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