"Her or me?" A tear rolled down Michelle's puffy cheek, "You have to make a decision."
For Michelle, life has always been about control-control in the studio, in her friendships, and even in the secrets she hides. But with an unexpected pregnancy...
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"Thanks for inviting me over." I say to Emily, "At least I didn't have to do it myself this time."
She rolls her eyes as she continues to show me to her bedroom. "Yeah. Having you stay the night does feel a little weird, but I could do with the company. I've not been sleeping, and the house just feels so empty right now."
As I walk through the house, I pass multiple rooms that I've never seen before. And as I walk down the hallway, I'm able to catch a glimpse of a bright-pink-coloured children's room. I immediately take notice of the crib and all of the stuffed animals. They truly are prepared.
"Jesus, this place is like an actual mansion!" I take in just how much space she has. "They don't make houses this big on my side of town."
"I paid for it myself." She says, looking quite proud of that.
"Oh..."
She leads me towards the end of the hallway. "Here. This is my room."
As soon as she opens the door, I take my time to scan each and every part of the room. The first thing that catches my eye is the giant king-size bed in the middle of the room. And despite Emily's love for the colour red, the room doesn't have even one tiny hint of that. Neutral colours seemed to have been a hit when designing the house.
"Wow..." I say, taking it all in, "I've never seen a room this big before; the space is lovely."
"I wanted to have the best if I was going to start a family."
"Well, she's definitely going to have the best." I tell her.
She smiles before saying "I didn't always have all of this. I had to work really hard to be able to afford to have this lifestyle. When I first left home, I sacrificed everything just so I could be with Michelle, and we had nothing at first."
"Jesus, my mom and dad don't even know that we live together!" She announces "I haven't actually seen them in a long time. I try to stay as far away from them as possible because they'll hate me if they find out that I did all of this for Michelle."
She continues "I took a huge risk just so that they wouldn't stop me from being with her..."
I can see that she's starting to get upset, so I gently wrap my arms around her body, pulling her into a warm hug.
"Hey... it's okay!" I try to calm her down. "You did the right thing."
"I hope so."
She then pulls away from the hug, pointing towards her bed. "Do you want to sit down?"
