Forever (h.s.)

Chapter 39

Chapter 39: In The End

Over the next couple months, free from the flurry and travel of tours, I was half sick and half busy and half focusing on finally looking for universities near London, near Harry.

It turned out to be a lot harder than I thought. I spent a lot of time sitting in my window seat, talking on the phone with my mum.

"Well...sweetie, what do you want to major in?" she asked me, literally every single time. Because I never decided.

"Anything but maths," I say again and again, but today I'd been thinking long and hard and maybe I had an idea. "I want to major in English," I told her finally. "And study psychology. Do theater."

"Why psychology?" mum asked, interested.

"I want to study dreams," I told her shyly. I'd been thinking about it since I was sixteen, but now that uni was starting up, my vision was becoming a reality.

All of a sudden, the virus was rearing its ugly head again and I felt my stomach turn. "Hang on a second mum," I said quickly, dropping the phone and racing to the bathroom, just in time to throw up in the toilet. Taking deep breaths, swishing a bit of mouthwash, I returned to the phone.

"Sorry mum," I said. "Sick."

She paused. "You know, you've had that sick for a while now..." I heard her sigh. "Honey, do you think maybe you should take a pregnancy test? Just to rule that out."

I sat, stunned. The thought hadn't even crossed my mind. But that Caribbean night on the beach made it very very real. But it was my mother. I couldn't say one word about it.

Instead of answering her, I cleared my throat and pushed the shaking worry to the back of my mind. She waited patiently for me to speak.

"I like Imperial College London," I said quickly, scrolling through the website on my laptop. "It's close by, great English program. Really highly ranked by the worldwide thingy."

"I think that'd be great," mum said softly. I gave her a thousand pleading thank yous for not expecting more of me. We continued our conversation like nothing had happened.

That night, Harry came home from a friends and greeted me with a kiss.

"How's my favorite?" he asked cheerfully, poking his head into the fridge in search of something.

"I'm okay," I told him softly, picking at my fingernails. He closed the fridge immediately, rested his elbows on the counter, and stared me down, concerned.

"Still stressed about school?" he asked gently, reaching over to tuck a piece of hair behind my ear.

"I guess so," I replied, sighing deeply. "Not the money, but the school, the major...maybe I just waited too long to apply. Maybe I shouldn't go. I probably won't last long anyways."

Harry quickly moved to my side of the counter and held me tightly to him.

"You're one of the smartest people I know," he said, looking into my eyes. "It's never too late to go to uni. I know it's stressful." He kissed my forehead. "I do. But you'll get through it, I'll be here every step of the way."

A tear crept into the corner of my eye without me noticing. I wiped it away and finally wrapped my arms around Harry's neck. "Thank you," I whispered.

But if only he knew what was really stressing me. What was really sitting on my shoulders like a weight I couldn't bear, and that he could never bear for me.

"Now. I know what'll cheer you up," Harry said, pulling me off the stool and spinning me in a circle.

"What?" I asked, forcing a small smile.