accidental love • n.maloley「✓」| EDITING

nine

anderson

"jessica had another doctors appointment today," nate tells me.

"oh, yeah? what'd they say?"

"well, she's nine and a half weeks pregnant, the baby's the size of a grape and is finally starting to look more like a human. still have to wait until the end of next month to find out the gender though, which sucks," he chuckles.

"you really wanna know that gender, don't you," i murmur, holding the phone between my shoulder and ear as i scroll through different pages on my laptop, looking for different things i can do for carrington's birthday. she turns eighteen in a month and even though that's still quite a bit away, i like to have everything planned out ahead of time.

"i do," he says. "i really do. i want to start thinking of names, but i don't want to think of a good name then get my hopes up for that gender, so i'm trying to hold out for a few more weeks on the whole brainstorming for names ordeal." i smile at his words, pausing what i'm doing on the laptop. just a few weeks ago this boy didn't know if he wanted to keep the baby or not, and now here he is talking about genders and names.

"it all comes back to the gender, doesn't it?"

"yes. i wish the doctors had some kind of special tool or whatever where they could tell the gender from the beginning," he says, and i let out a small laugh. "jessica thinks it's a girl, though. i don't know why, she just swears it's gonna be a girl."

"what about jessica, though? like, how's she doing?" i ask.

"well, she's still not showing yet, but the doctor said she probably will be in a few more weeks. she's got mood swings from hell, and is still having morning sickness. but the doctor said all that's normal, and it should all die down in a couple more weeks, as well," he tells me. 

"yeah, it'll all get better during the second trimester, but then it'll get worse again towards the end."

"you say all that like you know from experience," he chuckles. "you got something you're hiding from me, anderson?"

"i do know all this from experience, but not from personal experience," i tell him. "my best friend was pregnant last year and went full term, all the way to her due date, but the baby died an hour or so after birth. they couldn't figure out why."

"oh. i'm sorry," he says.

"you've no reason to be sorry," i tell him before changing the subject. "when's jessica's due date?"

"april tenth."

"oh my god, my birthday's april third!" i tell him.

"oh yeah? how old will you be?"

"you never ask a woman how old she is, nate," i tell him, grinning in amusement. "but i'll be twenty-one."

"pfft, you're so young," he jokes.

"young? well, how old are you then?"

"i'll be twenty-two in january."

"you're literally one year older than me!" i exclaim.

"i know," nate chuckles, probably shrugging as well. "but anyways, back to the original topic."

"what about the original topic?"

"i don't know, i'm just kinda excited," he admits. "like, i know i said at the beginning that i didn't know if i'd keep the baby or not, but just over the past couple months i've gotten so excited. like, i'm gonna be a fucking dad."

"a lot of responsibility comes with being a dad, though," i tell him. "not that i'm trying to say you're not responsible enough, because honestly i don't know you enough to know whether or not you are, but i'm just saying. like, when the baby comes there can't be any cussing -"

"can't be any cussing, can't be any smoking around the baby, i know," nate cuts me off. "my mom gave me the longest lecture ever."

"good, she needs to give you tips," i say. "what do you smoke though? cigarettes?"

"nah, cigarettes are nasty. i smoke weed."

"well, i agree with you on the cigarettes are nasty part, but you definitely can't smoke weed around the baby once it comes."

"i know, and i'm trying to slow down on it now, so when the baby comes i'll be almost done with it," he says. "i'll never be able to give it up fully, but i'm definitely gonna slow down on it majorly for my baby."