Dots

Responsibility

Jake Jacobs took a quick look around the empty parking lot, before pulling out his box of cigarettes and popping one in between his lips.
He was working the night shift at the Value Mart and the lack of customers at this late hour meant that every once in a while, he could sneak out and light one up.
Unfortunately, today it was quite windy and Jake had forgotten his lighter at his apartment (and by apartment, he meant his mom's apartment where he bunked in a makeshift room on the couch since he barely slept there anyway). So he'd been reduced to stealing a box of matches from aisle 6 that his boss, Mr Freeman, would not notice were gone.
Mr Freeman was an incredibly assertive man, with a law book stuck so far up his ass that it somehow got itself into every open space in his brain (which was quite abundant); at least that's what Jake thought.

Back to his problem at hand though: no matter how hard he tried to shield the flame, the wind kept blowing it out, rendering the cigarette completely useless as it hung from his lips, taunting him. Later, Jake would've reckoned that that should've been his first sign from the universe.
"Jacobs!" came the angry snap of Mr Freeman just before Jake could try lighting his cigarette one last time. Jake, reacted quickly, pulling the cigarette out of his mouth and tossing it away. Unfortunately Jake wasn't the sharpest tool in the shed (still a huge tool though anyway) and realised a little too late that Mr Freeman had been watching him the whole time and knew what he was doing.
"Yeah boss?" Jake asked trying to come across as innocent but the shit-eating smirk, that he seemed to have constantly plastered on his face in the presence of his boss, was on full display, ruining the intended effect.
Mr Freeman gave Jake a disgusted look that made the permanent sneer on his face look even more loathsome than it usually did (and that's saying a lot).
"Get your junkie ass back to your till before I fire you!" he snapped.
Jake gave Mr Freeman a mock salute and made his way back into the convenience store but not before hearing Mr Freeman shout after him:
"You're on thin ice with me boy! If I see one more slip up, I'll fire you and believe me when I say I'll be watching out for it!"
And Jake actually felt Mr Freeman's burning gaze on him, even after he rolled his eyes and went back to his till.

He didn't know why Mr Freeman was throwing around the "firing" threat so much. It's not like it was a very good job: the pay was shit and so where the hours. The only reason why Jake hadn't quit yet is because he needed money to fund his alcohol and smoking addictions and no other place would hire him, considering that he hadn't finished school, much less studied further or gotten a degree. Speaking of alcohol though, Jake grinned in victory when he spotted his flask still under the till. Earlier, he had filled it with some hardcore vodka and tequila to take off the edge. He glanced around, noticing Mr Freeman still staring at him and the odd customer going through the aisles. He wouldn't get to sip it now but he slipped the flask into his jacket pocket for later. As he did, he felt his phone start ringing and immediately pulled it out to check the caller ID.
He smirked.
It was David, his wingman and ultimate party bro, probably calling to invite him to some "off the chain" party he was at. He went to answer the call but as he slid his finger across the screen, the phone somehow slipped out of his hand and fell to the floor with a crack.
This should've been his second universal sign.
Jake cursed and picked up his phone, noticing it had turned off, then restarted and that there was now a huge crack across the screen. He'd have to save up for months on his salary to afford to fix it.

A throat clearing caught his attention and he looked up from his phone noticing he now had a customer.
It wasn't just any customer though, it was Jenny Freeman.
His dark mood instantly lightened upon seeing her; not because he loved her, rather that she was a huge score in his book. A full out ten, with the curves of a model and the face of an angel (a killer combination in any guy's book).
Jake knew he was attractive (being as cocky as he was) but Jenny was in a league of her own and he'd managed to bang her quite a few times over the last few weeks. It was a great feat, only made more of an achievement noting that not only was she the hottest thing since summer, but his boss's only daughter.
He was too busy ogling at her amazing body to notice that her angel eyes were a little red and that she didn't return his full blown smile with a flirty one of her own like she usually did.
That should've been the third and final sign before the inevitable knockout.
"Hey babe, what can I ring you up for?" Jake asked as he gave her a flirtatious wink.
She didn't reply and instead just put one box down on the belt. He seemed confused at her lack of response and it was only when he looked down at the box that he realized why.
He froze.
1
2
3
We have a knockout ladies and gentlemen!

Jake could no longer feel Mr Freeman's eyes on him but there was a ghost of it that was only amplified by the stare of his daughter who was gauging his reaction.
He gulped and blinked harshly a couple of times to make sure he was seeing right, because sat there in front of him was his biggest fear;
a box of pregnancy tests.

Now let's get this straight, Jake was, by all means, an utterly immature, immoral, brain-dead idiot but even he was smart enough to figure out what that seemingly harmless box meant.
The cigarettes and flask of booze in his pocket suddenly felt a whole lot heavier and briefly, he registered that his phone was now on and David was probably still calling him.
Suddenly, like a slap to his face, he realised whether he liked it or not, his life as he knew it- the parties, the smoking, the drinking, the multiple girls and one night stands- was over.
Yet he still prayed that:
This didn't make him a father at 18, to a girl only two years younger than him,
That he wasn't anything like his sleazy, deadbeat father who'd been caught in a similar situation with his mother and him
and he prayed, more than anything, that maybe he had just misinterpreted everything.

Unfortunately, life doesn't work that way and prayers don't save you from reality.
Jake Jacobs realised this as Jenny Freeman uttered, in a broken voice, the very two words he'd been dreading;
"I'm pregnant."