Destined to Lose: The 5th book

Chapter 25: B.A.B

It has been 2 weeks since Daryl broke up with me. My nerves about the pregnancy are starting to cripple me and I know I need to tell someone. I decide to head to the infirmary to talk to Siddiq. When I get inside, I wait for him to finish putting a bandaid on one of the kids in town before walking over. When the kid leaves, he smiles to me and asks, "what can I do for you?"

"Uhm, so I haven't told anyone else and I'm sort of starting to freak out over it but.." I hesitate to say it out loud.

Luckily and to my surprise, he says, "you're pregnant?"

"What? How'd you— how do you know that?" I ask.

He smiles and walks over to the bathroom cabinet and explains, "I have inventory of everything in here. I have a lot of time these days. When I took the inventory last week and saw two were was missing, I put it together. You didn't take any gauze, you took 2 tests."

My lips push together in understanding, and I ask him, "did you tell anyone?"

He shakes his head, "no one to tell. I didn't know what the outcome was. Even if I did, it's not my business."

"Well thanks, but uhh.. I'm not even really sure what's next. Like, is it possible to even have a baby. I mean ya, Lori did it. That was horrible, and I know Maggie is pregnant. But me? I don't want kids."

Siddiq just listens to me talk out loud. He waits till I stop and says kindly, "I mean, there are still options. Do you know how far along you are?"

"Probably 8-10 weeks. We uhh, the night before Negan was captured was the uhh, was the last time .. that's when it happened." I decide to just say that and leave it, figuring he knows exactly what I'm getting at.

"Alright. Well, you're almost into your 2nd trimester then, that's at 13 weeks." He goes to say, "doesn't mean there's still not options." He moves to go over to a shelf of books and finds one. It's a book about birth, abortion and adoption." He hands it over to me and says, "do you wanna take a look at this, come back and talk again?"

"I guess, ya." I take the book from his hands and shove it into my bag. I head off to the jail cell to take over for my shift.

Hours into the shift, I'm sitting on the stool reading a different book and Negan is on the ground doing push-ups. A few minutes in and he stops and mumbles, "no shit. Are you pregnant?"

He laughs but I shut the book I'm reading in a huff and grab the bag off the floor, "what? No." I stumble to grab the book from the bag. I lie, "it's just a book to read in case I gotta help deliver a baby or something one day."

Negan sits on the floor, arms behind him with his palms on the floor, his legs stretched out, "you're too flustered right now for that to be true. You're pregnant."

I sigh, knowing there's no point in trying to lie to him. I lowly return, "ya. Ya, I am."

"Well damn, why'd you go and do something so stupid?" He inquires.

I shrug one shoulder, "wasn't planned. We just kind of.. we let the moment take advantage of us. Never in a million years would I have thought I'd get pregnant."

He laughs, "why, did you forget you still have eggs or something?"

I give him an annoyed glare but answer, "we were always careful. But it was so long since we were intimate, we just let it happen. We didn't think. And now I'm pregnant."

"What are you gonna do?" He asks, "Is that why Daryl left?"

I shake my head, "he doesn't know. And I don't know how to tell him. Neither of us wanted—" I pause and correct myself, "wants, a kid. And now that we're not together, I just don't know."

"Sounds like you know exactly what you want." He replies.

I shrug one shoulder and reply, "If you'd ask me before I was pregnant what I would do if I got pregnant. Yea, I'd say I wouldn't keep it. But now I am pregnant, and I know there's a heartbeat in there. So it's not so easy anymore for me." There's a tear rolling down my face, and I quickly wipe it away and sniffle to try and stop anymore from falling, "and now that Daryl and I aren't together, it feels like it's all my fault."

In good old Negan fashion, he makes a joke, "you could always say it's mine. That we had some unapproved conjugal visitation while you were on duty." I chuckle and roll my eyes as he winks.

I joke back to him, "you're locked in a cell 24 hours a day, I should've figured that's what you're thinking about down here."

He chortles back with me and agrees, "they can not take away my imagination. And I have a damn good imagination." He laughs a little, making me laugh ever so lightly. It falls silent though, and Negan says soon after, "whatever you decide. Won't change what a bad ass bitch I think you are."

"Thanks, I guess that's something." I smile to him. He nods back to me, and I pick the book Siddiq gave me out of my bag and start reading it while Negan goes back to doing his push-ups.