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Author's Chapter Notes:
I actually cringed when I re-read the previous chapter 2 to begin 3..and decided it needed to be re-written before I could do anything more. So here is the new, and in my opinion MUCH improved chapter 2. Feedback is appreciated! Thanks!!!!

Chapter Two

 

    Making her way down the stairs slowly, it was all Jadyn could do to keep her eyes open. With the exception of all of about an hour and a half that she’d actually gotten of straight sleep, the rest of the night had been spent with little fifteen minute naps where she couldn’t remember if she’d actually fallen asleep, or if her numbed mind had just blocked out her conscious existence. The remaining time, she’d been awake and painfully aware of her discovery the night before, and wracking her brain of what she was going to do.

 

    Her eyes were now dry, the tears that she’d been crying what seemed to be all night now invisible. If she could cry more, Jadyn knew that she would be. The thing was, she couldn’t, convinced that she’d drained herself of all of the tears she was allotted for the month.

 

    “Well, good-morning, sleepyhead.”

 

    Jadyn looked up, shaking her head from her daze, realizing she had subconsciously ended up in the kitchen. There she stood on the marbled tile floor of the entrance, with both her father and her older sister, Tiffany, staring at her with goofy, chipper smiles on their faces. Disgusted, Jadyn walked towards the table, plopping down tiredly into a vacant chair. She buried her face within her arms, annoyed with her family’s happiness. Had it really only been yesterday that she too had been a care-free fourteen year old, laughing and having fun? It seemed light-years away.

 

    “Somebody woke up on the wrong side of the bed.” Her dad, Nick, joked, flipping pancake’s on the sizzling griddle. A soft hiss filled the kitchen as the battery goop turned into a bready substance. The smell made Jadyn’s mouth water, yet somehow, she just didn’t feel like eating, even with her stomach grumbling violently.

 

    “I didn’t sleep very well,” Jadyn mumbled, rubbing her temples, wondering if she should confess to her dad what was going on.  Then, this whole nightmare could be taken care of. Sure, her parents would be livid with anger, but at least they could help her, right?

 

    “I thought so. You’re usually up by now. I thought I was going to have to come up and drag you out of bed for school.”

 

    Jadyn’s stomach churned at the thought of school. How was she going to concentrate when something much more important than anything she would learn in the classroom was taking place. Somehow the fact that she had another life growing inside of her outweighed Shakespeare and mathematical equations, which she was convinced would get her nowhere in life. When her dad placed a place of the pancakes, complete with a side of bacon, in front of her, Jadyn pushed the plate away, “I’m not hungry.” She lied.

 

    “It’s your favorite though,” Nick sounded hurt.

 

    “Where’s mom?” Jadyn asked quickly, changing the subject.

 

    “Oh…she had to go into the studio early.” Nick recalled, already forgetting the neglected breakfast plate, “One of her clients wasn’t happy with the way their wedding photo’s turned out, so she is re-editing them,” Nick laughed and shook his head, “I don’t know how she deals with Bride-zilla’s all day long.”

 

    “Me either.” Jadyn mumbled softly.

 

    “Are you okay?” Nick finally asked, concerned, as he sat down with his own plate, biting off a piece of bacon, “You’re acting weird.”

 

    Jadyn gulped. This was her chance to confess. To let go of the stress bottled up inside of her. Looking from her dad, to Tiffany, who was now putting her dirty dish in the dishwasher, Jadyn took a deep breath.

 

    “Can I talk to you…” she looked up to her seventeen year old sister, then back to her dad, “Alone?”

 

    Nick looked back to Tiffany, who had been leaning against the counter, ready for a good listen in. Rolling her eye’s at the cue, she stood upright and began walking away, “I get the hint.” She stated, “But the brat better hurry up or I’m leaving without her.”

 

    Nick shot her a warning look before turning back to Jadyn, “What did you want to talk to me about?”

 

    Her palms sweaty, Jadyn gulped. Rubbing them on her pants, she refused to look up at her dad. Her throat clogged with tears all over again, which she forced down again. Could she really carry through with this?

 

    “Jadyn?”

 

    Finally, she looked up and took a deep breath before speaking, “Well, see…um…” she stammered, watching her father look at her expectantly. She knew that she could tell him anything. Much more than what she could tell her mom. Her dad and her had a freakishly close father-daughter relationship. But that was before she became pregnant. What now? “I’m having trouble with my algebra…could you help me with it?” she lied again, chickening out of telling him the truth.

 

    “Of course,” he looked confused, “Are you sure that’s all?” Jadyn nodded, “Alright,” he scratched his blonde head and laughed, “You had me worried there for a second.”

 

    Jadyn offered a tight smile, and stood, “I gotta go…Tiff is waiting for me.” She leaned over and hugged her dad, “Love you.”

 

    “Love you too, Jade.” Nick gave her a kiss on the cheek, ‘Have a good day.”

 

    Jadyn just nodded and turned around before her dad could read the lies within her troubled eyes. She’d wanted to tell him. Really, she had. She wanted to tell her dad alone too, when that time came, because she knew if her mom was present, and she told her parents together, the result of their reaction would be a hurricane instead of simply a storm.

 

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    As the final morning bell rang at promptly seven-thirty, warning students that they had better be in their classrooms, Jadyn found herself slipping into the women’s restroom. She hadn’t the intention of skipping, but now that she was hidden away from everybody, she didn’t exactly intend on going to her first period class either.

 

    Setting her backpack against the wall, Jadyn turned the water on, leaning over the sink to splash her face. She looked up, and was startled at the reflection that stared back at her. With her complexion a few shades more pale than usual, and the dark circles under her eye’s, Jadyn was ashamed to even be seen in public looking the way she did. Then there was the lack of makeup, and for the first time, she realized that she’d forgotten to put any on at all, along with brushing her hair.

 

    “Whatever,” she said aloud, not really caring what anybody thought of her at the moment.

 

    Her mind drifted off to the conversation her and her sister had had on the twenty minute drive through town to the school. Tiffany was a senior, this fact making their three and a half years apart seem all the wider.

 

    “So, what did you need to talk to dad about?”

 

    “If I wanted you to know, I wouldn’t have asked you to leave the room.”

 

   “ Right,” Tiffany had rolled her green eyes, “And since when don’t you eat chocolate chip pancakes and bacon? Dad’s right…they’re your favorite.”

 

    “I just wasn’t hungry.” Jadyn pulled her backpack tight against her as if it would somehow protect her from the questioning and the accusatory gaze her sister was throwing in her direction.

 

    “Dad went through a lot of trouble to make that for you before he had to leave for work. You really are an ungrateful brat.”

 

    “Since when is not being hungry a crime?” Jadyn spat angrily.

 

    “It’s not.” Tiffany replied simply.

 

    “Alright…then lay off it.”

 

    Tiffany grunted, turning the volume of the radio up a few levels, the sound of some rock band blocking out any tension that had built up in the small, black Hyundai Elantra. The eight minute silence was short-lived though, when Tiffany turned the volume back down. She sighed deeply, as if contemplating on whether or not to speak. Biting her lip, Tiffany turned towards Jadyn for a moment.

 

    “You’re not like, going anorexic or anything, are you?”

 

    “What?” Jadyn turned towards her sister, “What gave you that idea?”

 

    “The not eating,” Tiffany replied logically, “I mean, it’s not like you’re fat or anything. You know if you need to talk, I’m here.”

 

    “I’m not going anorexic.” Jadyn whispered, visibly upset. Her voice trembled with emotion.

 

    “Alright, I’m just saying…”

 

    By that point, they were already pulling into Tiffany’s reserved student parking spot. Without waiting for the car to be completely shut off, Jadyn was already out the door and making her way towards the back entrance of the high school.

 

    “Meet me at the car when you’re done.” Tiffany called after Jadyn as a reminder as she locked up the car.

 

    Jadyn just continued walking, giving no sign that she’d heard Tiffany, her only thought being getting away.

 

    Which led her to that moment of hiding away in the girl’s restroom to compose herself before facing a world of cruel high schooler’s just waiting to trample a freshman in distress.

 

    Another bell sounded, letting Jadyn know that the fifty minutes of first period had whizzed by without her realizing it during her deep thoughts. She officially had five minutes to get her act together and get into second period, knowing she couldn’t skip another class. At least not two in a row.

 

    “Okay…time to get your act together, Jade.” She coached herself, still staring at her reflection. Taking a paper towel, Jadyn dapped at her eyes, it still obvious that she’d been crying, but the evidence at least somewhat fading away.

   

    Digging deep into the safety of her backpack, Jadyn retrieved the plastic bag that contained the pregnancy test. Opening it up, she pulled out the stick, praying that it had all been a mistake and that she’d misread it. The two pink lines she had seen the night before had long since faded away from the stick, however the image of them were permanently etched into her memory as she shoved all of it into the garbage can and hurried out of the restroom and into the world that awaited her.