KURT STOPPED MOVING immediately. His limbs grew still, even his hand freezing in midair and staying there as Lindy rushed to get her words out. She was crying so hard that he almost had not understood what she had said at first. But after the second time that she cried out her proclamation — 'I'm pregnant' — Kurt was finally made aware of his second child.
"What?" he demanded. It came out as tight whisper of disbelief, full of incredulity. His eyes finally locked with Lindy's. He had been hesitant to look into her warm brown irises, knowing that they alone might have swayed him out of his determination to die.
"I'm pregnant," Lindy repeated, these two words cracking as she placed a hand on her stomach. Her shoulders were rocking with even more sobs.
Kurt's hardened gaze fell to where Lindy's hand touched. He parted his lips like he was about to say something, but no sound came out. His surroundings were beginning to melt into the background, making him woozy.
"I'm three months along," Lindy said, tripping over her explanation. "I was going to tell you sooner but I got scared. But I had to do it now. I couldn't let you do this without knowing."
Kurt still did not speak, choosing instead to stare at Lindy's stomach as if expecting the baby inside of it to come out at that precise moment. Lindy cried harder, fearing the worst. She watched him lift both hands to his face again, this time shielding his eyes from her. But she saw his expression before they were covered.
His face was crumpling, another round of tears getting ready to pour from his eyes. His body began to quaver and he lowered his head, pulling his knees to his chest as he bowed forward. And then Kurt started to cry hysterically, rocking on the ground back and forth. It was hell as Lindy listened to his whimpers. Their sound overpowered her own.
"Kurt, I'm so sorry," she said. Her heart was officially dead. Even feeling its beat was unreal, a facade that could not be true. Kurt's reaction was enough to kill any last trace of joy that she had ever harbored for their future together.
"M-my f-fault," Kurt stuttered through a choking sob. He made a fist with his hand and slammed it down on the ground, nearly knocking his can of root beer on its side.
"DAMN IT!" he shouted. He wrung handfuls of his blonde hair between his fingers, his head still hanging dejectedly as he hid the flow of anguish across his features.
"I'm sorry. I'm so sorry. I wouldn't have said anything if I'd known how much this would hurt you."
"Hurt me?" Kurt demanded, looking at Lindy with bewilderment. "It only hurts me because I've brought another kid into the world who has a shit excuse for a father to look up to. Now it's not only you I've disappointed, but our kid. The kid we made together. It's got me for a father."
"But that's what makes this special!" Lindy cried, the veins in her neck tensing as she skated closer to delirium. "You're the father of our child! That's the greatest gift you could ever give me or our baby, Kurt."
"You don't get it," Kurt said, gulping back the shiver in his voice. "I won't be anything but a burden to any baby of ours. I've cursed you. I've cursed our child."
Lindy's patience had finally worn thin enough. Her desperation was already strained and on the verge of snapping and driving her straight off of a cliff of insanity. Of all the times in her life that she thought would be most monumental, she would have never guessed that talking Kurt out of suicide would be one of them. But yet it was. It always would be. She was at a crossroads, and only she could take control and choose the direction of where the situation could go.
Lindy had always known it. She had thought it just before entering the greenhouse — she would be the one to pick Kurt up off the floor, no matter if he were dead or alive.
