After Forever & Ever

Chapter 52

Tessa-Present

I think this is life's way of telling me it's time to slow down. Hardin gets me settled in my apartment and drives back to his place to get some of his things.

I'm scared.

What if something happens to our baby...to me.

I lay down for a nap or try to and I feel like I can't sleep. After tossing and turning for an hour Hardin returns and lays next to me.

I move in close to him so that I can lay on his chest and he can have his arms around me.

I feel like we both don't know what to say.

"It's going to be okay." He finally says.

"I don't want to think about it." I tell him.

"Okay why don't you just get some sleep." He tells me.

And I finally feel like I can now that I am in his arms.

I am woken up to him practically jumping out of his skin having a nightmare.

"Hardin! Hardin it's okay." I tell him.

He sits up and snaps out of it right away. "I'm sorry. I didn't mean to startle you." He tells me.

"It's okay how long have your nightmares been back?" I question.

"Tessa don't worry about me." He tells me.

And I am worried I know he doesn't think they are a big deal but they are and I don't want him to think he can't come to me just because of what we found out.

"I just want you to know you can talk to me with however you are feeling about everything." I tell him.

"I'm just worried about you that's all." He says as he leans over and kisses me on the forehead.

"We will be okay just need some extra rest, relaxation and cuddles and I'll be cured." I tell him giggling trying to make light of it.

He pulls me closer. "I can definitely provide you with all the cuddles and I think even some extra kisses might do the trick." He says as he proceeds to kiss me.

"You better stop because I don't know if we can stop ourselves once we start." I tell him.

"Well we kind of have to but I still can't help but kiss my beautiful girlfriend...the mother of my daughter." He whispers to me as he is kissing me.

And I don't know what it is but just hearing those words makes my heart so happy. I went from thinking maybe we really weren't going to make it. To back on cloud 9 even with the horrible news I feel safe in his arms and that everything is going to be okay.

And it is.

Things are actually perfect for the next month. Hardin and I have grown so close....Closer than I ever thought possible. He basically lives here without it actually being official.

I have been working from home, he also works Nonstop during the day on his music and self producing everything he is blowing up on Spotify and is getting a ton of attention from labels and is getting millions of streams on his songs. He decided to either wait for the right offer or continue to put out his own music which I am fine with because it keeps him close to me.

He even started writing again and playing guitar. He's so talented and everything he puts out is so good I am in constant amazement at everything he shows me and the fact that he shows me and has allowed me to be involved is another huge thing for us.

Everything is everything I could hope for, I even feel great. I have been seeing my doctor weekly and things are looking good all things considered just still wanting me to take it easy....and the only thing is....
I want to say the nightmares stopped but they didn't....

In fact that's the one thing that's gotten worse. He wakes up sweating and in a panic every night sometimes multiple times a night.

Tonight in particular was by far the worse. I felt like I couldn't snap him out of it. He was shaking his body felt cold even though he was sweating. I didn't know what to do just when I was about to grab a glass of water to splash in his face he woke up.

He takes a deep breath sits up, grabs his hair and pull his knees up and drops his head into his hands that are rested on his knees.

I go to grab his hand and he pulls it away.

"I'm sorry, I'm sorry." He quickly says as he grabs my hand and kisses the top of it.

"It's fine....you need to go see someone." I tell him.

"And tell them what... I'm a grown man with nightmares." He replies.

"I don't know Hardin...you can't keep going on like this, you are barely sleeping anymore and this is not an every once in a while thing anymore..." I tell him.

"Tessa I'm fine. I'll be fine." He insists and gets out of bed.

What is he doing? I quickly think to myself.

I get up and he is at his computer.

"Are you just not going to sleep the rest of the night?" I ask.

"I'm just going to do some work, go back to sleep I'll be back in bed in a little bit." He tells me.

"Now I'm the one worried about you." I tell him.

"Tessa stop. Please I'm fine. It's just stress we're getting closer to the baby coming and I just want everything to go okay...that's all I promise." He insists.

"Can you please just come back to bed?" I practically beg.

"Yea...yea. I'll be there in a minute." He says as he closes his laptop.

He comes back to bed and he makes it through the rest of the night with no nightmares.

I wake up earlier than him and I let him sleep. I have pushed off the baby shower as much as I can and today is the day.

My mom finally agreed to Hardin being a part of it which I don't know if it will be a good thing or a total disaster but I guess we will find out...