Miles To Go

Chapter Seven

Two months. Two long, painful months since that day she last saw Regina. The guilt was still eating at her every single second of every single day. After the first week, Regina changed her number, after the first month, Emma couldn't even get into the front door of her building before the two security guards were escorting her away. It had been three weeks since she ran into Neal, her suspicions of being drugged brought to light as Neal told her he'd suffered the same fate as her that night. They weren't the only ones. Neal had told her that he found out three others had their drinks spiked that night without them realizing it, yet none of them knew or ever would know who did that to them. Even learning that, it didn't make anything better. Nothing would ever make anything better.

And it had been two months since she'd had her period and she was terrified, sitting on the edge of the tub with the white stick in her hand, waiting for the lines to appear on the pregnancy test she'd asked Ruby to buy her two days ago.

Two days was how long it took her to muster up the courage to take the test, but after some quick research, she already knew. She was pregnant. Now it was just down to the test that she was so afraid to take.

"Hey, how much longer?" Ruby asked as she stood by the sink and checked her watch. "The box said ten minutes, right?"

"Yeah."

"It's been almost ten minutes."

"Has it? Because it feels like it's been an hour already!" Emma snapped and she closed her eyes, the lump that had been in her throat growing as she waited for either the line to appear or the plus sign. Shaking the stick in her hand, she rose to her feet and swallowed hard as she stared at Ruby. "What if—"

"Then we'll deal with it, okay?"

"Ruby, I'm so scared."

Ruby nodded as she wrapped her arms tightly around Emma and held her tight. "I know, Em, I know. Me too, but I'm always gonna be here for you."

"Granny is going to kill me if I'm pregnant."

"She'll be wicked pissed for a little while, but you're family, Em, and family don't turn their backs just because of something like this. We'll talk to her, explain what happened and if you don't want to keep the baby or if you do, we're going to be there for you. Every step of the way, okay?"

"I'm too scared to look."

"We'll look together," Ruby said with a nod as they stepped out of their tight embrace. Rub gently grabbed on to Emma's right hand, the hand that held the test and they both looked down together. "Oh, Emma..."

Emma dropped the test into the sink, her heart fluttering and racing so wildly out of control she thought she was going to faint or have a heart attack or both. Ruby said nothing as she grabbed on to Emma and they both sank down to the cold, tiled floor. Emma started crying into Ruby's shoulder, so much fear filling her as the positive sign shone behind even her tightly clenched eyelids.

"What am I going to do?" Emma whispered weakly.

"What do you want to do, Em?"

Emma swallowed hard as she lifted her head from Ruby's shoulder. It wasn't even an answer she and to think twice of, despite everything else screaming at her to get rid of the baby before it was too late, before it ruined her life and she ruined his. Or hers. She frowned as Ruby grabbed a kleenex and dabbed at her rosy red and damp cheeks.

"I'm going to keep it."

"Yeah?" Ruby smiled, her own eyes filling with tears. "Are you sure?"

"Yeah."