BABY | B. CHILWELL

• 27 •

Marion's waiting patiently for her gyneacologist to come and get her. This time Sophie couldn't tag along to support her.

She hears footsteps walking down the hallway and she looks up from the magazine she's reading. Her eyes widen when she sees Ben walking towards her.

"Ben what are you doing here?"

Ben smiles and takes a seat next to her. He lightly pecks her lips. "I saw Sophie and Kieran at Tesco's and I knew you'd be here on your own. So I decided to come instead," he tells. "Aren't you happy to see me?"

Mari forces a smile on her lips. "Of course I'm happy," she lies.

She's absolutely not happy about him joining her. There hasn't been a right moment yet to tell Ben that he's the real father and she doesn't want him to find out this way.

"Marion James? You can go in," the assistent says and Mari stands up with a nervous smile, Ben in tow.

She walks into the office and greets her gyneacologist, dr. Lily Avery.

"Hello Marion. I see you brought someone else," Lily says.

"This is Ben. He wanted to tag along," Mari answers while taking a look at Ben, who's looking around the office. Upon hearing his name he smiles at the doctor.

"Well hello Ben, please take a seat." Lily gestures at the chairs in front of her desk.
"So you 30 weeks far, right?"

Marion nods and Ben furrows his eyebrows. Mari hopes he isn't already doing the count in his head. He doesn't say anything, making her sigh in relief.

The gyneacologist explains all the things she will check at this stage of the pregnancy.
After the explaination Marion lays down on the table and they start the ultrasound.

During the ultrasound Ben keeps quiet. He's completely mesmerised by the rapid sounds of heartbeats echoing through the room and the image of the little baby on the screen.

It's after the ultrasound that it's clear to Mari that Ben did the maths and that he found out she's been lying to him all this time.

When Marion unlocks her car, Ben immediatly gets in, even though he came with his own car.

"When were you going to tell me it's mine Mari?" He looks at her with furious eyes.

She looks down at her hands. "I'm sorry Ben,  I didn't tell you because I didn't want you to feel obligated to stay with me and take care of a kid."

"Why didn't you tell me the moment I decided to stick around even though I thought it wasn't mine?"

"I was waiting for the right moment, " Mari whispers.

"The right moment?" Ben shouts. "For fucks sake Marion I stayed after you told me you were pregnant. I told you I'm in love with you! Weren't these the right moments?"

Marion keeps looking down at her hands. Tears threathening to spill from her eyes. She knew she shouldn't have kept this from him, but now it's too late.

"I missed every ultrasound, because you were waiting for the right moment! I should've been there every step of the way, but thanks to you I couldn't." Ben's raging right now.

"I'm sorry."

"You fucking should! You kept my daughter from me! I need some time alone right now. I need to think, because I want to raise my child but maybe not with someone who lied to my face for more than 6 months," Ben says, not realising he let the gender of the baby slip.

After this he gets out of the car and leaves a crying Marion behind.
He knows he shouldn't gone off at her like that, but she kept his baby from him. He missed almost eight months of seeing his little princess grow.