*Hannah’s POV*

I drew in a deep breath as my eyes shot open. I didn’t remember falling asleep. Feeling Harry’s arms tighten around me, I silently traced the tips of the wings of his sparrows poking out of the top of his v neck. It had been three days since my night terror and Haley was leaving in four. She wouldn’t really be straight up with us about where she was going, but Zayn was following her – he didn’t seem very happy about it though. She just said that it was something that she needed to do, and we kind of accepted that.

Today, Harry took me to the mall. I was becoming a lot more comfortable with him as the days went on. I started to find more things to differentiate Harry from anyone who had ever hurt me. I had just gotten my allowance today – marking the second Friday of the month – so I had a little bit of money to spend, seeing that my mum had put extra money in my account because of the holiday.

“Did you buy enough?” Harry teased as he helped me carry everything into my apartment.

“Shut up, you paid for most of it.” He had insisted that I should spend my money on getting my mother something and not having to worry about it later. Even though I hate for him to pay for my things, I did see his point.

As Harry threw the rest of my bags of clothes into my room, I stood at the counter, adjusting everything that I had bought for my mother inside. Her birthday was a few days ago, on the fourth, and I needed to get her something anyways. Her and my relationship hadn’t been the same since my dad passed away, but this month – between her birthday and Valentine’s Day – always seemed to draw us a little closer. My dad always was the one to hold us together… now I sort of felt like a burden. In the box, I put a bottle of my mum’s favorite perfume, an assortment of Bath & Body scents and a deck of Tom & Jerry cards – that was my favorite cartoon as a child… that’s what I was watching when it happened. With everything inside of the box, I also wrote her a note:

Hey Mum,
I know it’s been a while and I know that I should come and visit, but I’ve been really busy lately. A lot’s been going on, but I don’t have to talk about that right now. I hope that Marc Jacobs is still your favorite, because it’s the best that I could find, and you know that I always get you Bath & Body anyways J
It’s a late present… I know. But that’s because it’s for your birthday and for Valentine’s Day. I put the cards in there and I hope you still remember why. I don’t know why Mum, but this year I really miss him. It feels like forever since the towers fell, but I guess that doesn’t really make the hurt go away. I remember the fight that you guys had before he left, and how you were mad that he just got home and now he was leaving again, but none of that matters now. I just wanted to remind you that, if nothing else, Dad wouldn’t have wanted for us to be doing anything different when it happened. These are the cards that I was playing with in the living room while you were making breakfast. Tom and Jerry was on the telly and you were making eggs and bacon for Harry and me. Harry’s still here. He’s taken really good care of me Mum. He’s ‘in it for the long haul’ I guess you could say. I just wanted you to know that he was there then and he’s here now – just like Dad would be if he could be.
While Dad was miles away, he still loved you, and he still would if he were here.
I love you Mum,
xoxo Hannah <3

Not realizing that I was crying, I sniffled and went to wipe the tears away. I felt Harry’s strong arms wrap around my waist and I didn’t give it a second thought, leaning into the comfort that his warmth brought. He sort of sniffled too. I knew that he had just as much of an attachment to my father as I did. We still played cards just because we knew that it would make him happy if he were here. It had been years since my dad went on the business trip. He was in the World Trade Center when the towers in America came crumbling down. After that, my mum never forgave herself – she didn’t want for him to go in the first place. He had just come home and told us that work was sending him away again. She was furious, but told him to do whatever he had to. After it all happened, she blamed herself because she thought that she could have fought harder for him to stay home. I think that that’s why she still sent me allowance – she felt bad for giving my father to terrorists, but how was she supposed to know? I didn’t blame her, but she did.

Out of nowhere, my stomach began feeling a bit nauseous. Figuring that it was just because I was thinking about him, I brushed it off. I turned in Harry’s arms and gave him a sweet kiss. He hugged me tightly before he went over and began looking through the wine rack.

“Isn’t it a little late for that?”

“It’s almost twelve, and isn’t about time that we got back to this?” He looked at me a raised his eyebrows.

“Feeling a bit cliché aren’t we? Come on Babe, reliving old traditions?” I tilted my head to the side. It was cute at first, but I was still a bit nervous about drinking. I shivered slightly, remembering how he frightened me before. Harry just shrugged his shoulders and turned back to looking at the wine assortment in front of him – I think he had secretly been adding to my collection. Suddenly, the nausea returned, but this time it was stronger, overpowering even. Turning for the bathroom, I just made it over the toilet when most of what I had eaten for dinner was heaved up. What the hell? I stood and wiped off my mouth, swishing around some mouthwash to get rid of the taste.

“You alright Love?” Harry called from the kitchen.

“Yeah,” I smiled at my nickname, grateful that it was mine and not someone else’s now.

Walking out of the bathroom, I stopped at the calendar on the wall and marked off the tenth with a big, red X. The fourteenth had a red heart around it – that was the day of the masquerade ball. There was something missing though. I didn’t see the little pink circle that marked my calendar. I flipped back to the month before and realized that I hadn’t put the pink circle there either. Flipping back once more, I found a circle. It was around the day about a week before Harry and I first woke up, naked and in the same bed. I quickly brushed the thought from my mind – not wanting to think that I lost my virginity that way. Last month was just a complete mess; maybe I forgot. But thinking back, I realized that I hadn’t… it just hadn’t come that month, or the month before.

At first my eyebrows furrowed in confusion, but not for long. There was really no other explanation. I solemn look washed over my face as I put the correct month back to face and put the marker back. Turning to Harry in the kitchen, I saw that he was pouring two large glasses of wine. He glanced at me and took a double take at my expression.

“Babe, what’s wrong?” He tried to hand me a glass but I dismissed it.

“I can’t drink that.” A hurt look almost came over his expression but it seemed as if he were trying to dismiss it.

“I know that you think old traditions are cliché but still…”

“No Harry, you don’t understand…” he searched my features, seeming confused, “I haven’t had my period for two months… I can’t drink that.”

Before I knew what was happening, my knees were giving out and I was headed for the floor. Harry caught me before I could get too far and began to carry me bridal style towards my room. I clung to his neck and sobbed into his chest. How could this be happening? I’d heard about rape babies before, but there was no way that I was about to have one. How could I carry something inside of me that I despised?

We were on my bed now and I was still wrapped tightly inside of Harry’s arms. All that I wanted to do was for him to hold me tighter. Squeeze it. Squeeze it until it couldn’t breathe anymore. Squeeze the life out of it – out of me… No! What was I saying?! I knew what I believed in and THAT was certainly not it. THAT was murder, but what else was I supposed to do? I sucked in the breath that I hadn’t realized I was depriving myself from. Tuning back into everything, I heard Harry’s voice whispering softly in my ear.

“Hannah. Hannah? Listen to me. Everything’s going to be okay, Babe. It won’t be that bad. Are you listening? I’m here. I’m right here and everything is going to be fine.” I sniffled, gaining my strength to say just what I needed to, nothing more.

“Of course it’ll be fine. Tomorrow, I’m calling the doctor, and right after the ball, I’m getting this thing the HELL out of me,” I snarled. Beliefs or not, I just couldn’t. You couldn’t ask someone to carry the baby of a man who did such terrible things to her in order to put it there. I ripped out of Harry’s arms and turned onto my side, throwing the covers over me, only for them to be ripped off of me again.

“The hell you are.” His voice was level, but so strong. Spinning over to get my blanket, I met his eyes with a furious expression. Who was he to tell me what I was going to do?

“What?” It came out short and my face exposed the thin ice that he was walking on, but he exposed my own thin ice as well.

“You and I both know that you don’t believe in that.” His voice was a little bit louder now. My barriers began breaking. He was right, but there was no other way. “Hannah, if you don’t want it,” a look came over his face that appeared to be him wondering why I wouldn’t want it, “then there’s always… adoption.”

“How can I carry it for nine months and then give it up, Harry?!” I yelled at him. I felt bad, but I just couldn’t do it. Just a few months ago, I thought that I was invincible, indestructible, but so many things had happened to prove me wrong, and I had no leverage left. There was no battle to fight, no war to win. I had lost, and that was just it, so to hell and back with my beliefs. “It’s just easiest to get rid of it now.” I quieted my tone. It faded to almost nothing with my last words. Through teary eyes, I looked up to see tears in Harry’s eyes too. “Why do you want me to keep it?”

This tipped him over the edge. The tears began to spill down his cheeks and reached out to try to wipe them away, but he grabbed my wrists before I could. I looked back, my expression quizzical. “Hannah… what if it’s mine?” My eyes widened and I took a deep breath. He was totally right. My last one was right before Harry and I had had sex – I now know – and Marcus had attacked me less than a month after that. My eyes searched the room as if the answers would be written somewhere on the walls. With a shaking hand, Harry’s fingers drew under my chin, pulling my face to his. He kissed my forehead before pulling me into his chest tightly. “Love, I can’t let you k-kill it. I love you more than… than anything, but if that’s mine… I-I can’t let you.”

“You have to let me make my own decisions Harry.” It was a bet, and I was never any good at gambling. The chances were fifty/fifty and the stakes were either killing Harry’s baby or living with Marcus’ and neither let me win. Like Harry and I always said. The house always does win. In this case, Marcus seemed to be the house, and I wanted to stop gambling. That night, we both fell asleep, but I didn’t fall asleep to the sound of Harry’s humming and the steady beat of his heart. Tonight, nothing was normal. Nothing felt right. I was either lying with the father of my unborn child, or the man that wanted me to keep a terrible memory from a terrible past.

*Harry’s POV*

She wasn’t thinking. That’s what I had to tell myself. She couldn’t have been. Would she really think of giving up our baby - or worse yet - killing it? I couldn’t let her. She told me that I had to let her make her own decisions. What was that supposed to mean? Did it mean that she was going to get an abortion anyways? I couldn’t let that happen. I kept picturing this green eyed, mop top having the life sucked out of it. I tried to keep my breathing even, but I couldn’t help it. My whole being shook as I lied there, trying to think of what to do next. Then, another thought crept into my mind. These must have been the thoughts invading Hannah’s mind. She probably had pictured my baby dead at her hands, but the other thing to think about was almost as bad – Marcus’ baby alive. We both knew that we could act like it was mine all that we wanted, but if that baby was born with brown eyes – which no one from either side of our family had – then she wouldn’t have the heart to put it up for adoption after keeping it safe for nine months. It was a risk, and we had already taken so many.

To: Louis
We have a huge prob
~ Harry ~

From: Louis
What’s up?
~ Louis ~

To: Louis
Hannah’s period hasn’t hit in 2 months
~ Harry ~

From: Louis
So she’s…
~ Louis ~

To: Louis
Ya… we think so… she wants to get rid of it. Can’t let her tho
~ Harry ~

From: Louis
Y
~ Louis ~

To: Louis
U kno y Lou
~ Harry ~

From: Louis
Wanna keep it between us?
~ Louis ~

To: Louis
Actually, can u tell Z? he spent lots of time with her. Deserves 2 kno
~ Harry ~

From: Louis
Will do
~ Louis ~

*Zayn’s POV*

From: Louis
Hey
~ Louis ~

To: Louis
Sup
~ Zayn ~

From: Louis
Its bout Hannah
~ Louis ~

To: Louis
Something happen?
~ Zayn ~

From: Louis
She and haz think she’s pregnant…
~ Louis ~

My eyes went wide, even in the darkness of the room. I looked at the clock in the corner of my mobile screen and saw that it was about an hour and a half into the morning. My cell dropped to the bed and I stood up, walking around with my hands on my head, elbows in the air.

“Babe, what’s wrong,” asked a sleepy Haley from the bed behind me. The naked woman lying there was about the furthest thing from my mind right now.

“Gah! I can’t believe this!” How could this happen… not to Hannah. She’d been through enough already. She didn’t need this. I knew that she didn’t believe in abortion, but what other option did she have here. There was no way that she was going to want it, and she’d be too afraid of getting attached to it to make the adoption decision this early.

To: Louis
Abortion?
~ Zayn ~

From: Louis
No numbskull. Haz won’t let her. Could b his remember?
~ Louis ~

Fuck.

“Zayn, tell me what’s going on.” I sat on the end of the bed with my hands raking through my hair. I should have thought of it – the day after pill or something. I should have taken her to the hospital and then none of this would be happening. As Haley whispered more things to soothe me, I allowed myself to calm down enough to explain.

“So she really wants to get rid of it?” Haley played with her fingers in her lap, finding them to be the most interesting things in the world at the moment.

“There’s no way that Harry’s going to let her do that. Not if there’s even a hundredth of a percent chance that it could be his baby.” I put one of my hands in hers and she wrapped her other hand around the one that was with hers as well.

“You know he’s doing the right thing, right?”

“God I hope so.” She brought my hand up to her lips and took time kissing across each knuckle before she dragged me back up the bed and snuggle deep into my chest.

Notes

OH SNAP!!!!!! What just happened?!? What's Hannah going to do? D': poor everybody :/
Okay you guys, I'm going to Macanaw City, Michigan for about three days and I'm pretty sure that I won't have internet access. I'll try to at least write while I'm there (I use Microsoft word to edit before I post) but I can't garuntee anything because it's supposed to be so called 'family time' pffftt. I'll post as soon as I can but I need some of my awesome subscribers to put in their votes pppplllllleeeeaaaaaaaaaasssseeeeeee? :( pretty please? go do it now... I really want a high rating... but if it sucks then don't rate it... just tell me... and inbox me how I can fix it and I will
Feel free to post any predictions to what's coming next :) I love hearing from you guys. I had one commenter tell me that this story was like air and that it was getting hard for her to breath - very poetic by the way - and I just wanna know... did it get any easier with the breath taker?! maybe it knocked the wind out of a few lol ... how many people actually read my rambling author's notes? Thank you to those that do! It's my mini venting sesion :)
Comment, rate and subscribe! Love you all!
xoxo Hannah <3