Savages

19: Pregnancy Fears

"I can't... I just can't get my head straight." Brock lifted his hands to his head, and then dropped them again, his voice high and panicked.

He turned around, to face Judit, and his eyes looked wild. "I just can't... I can't come to terms with it. I can't. I'm so scared. I keep having these dreams."

He dropped onto the bench, his head in his hands. "I dreamt last night that it came out and it was just this... starfish. Like a soft starfish. No bones or anything. It was monstrous. I swear..." his voice cracked. "I can't shake it. It's all over me. Just the feeling of this starfish. I feel like I'm going mad. I'm... I'm falling apart, Judit. I can't do it."

"You can. You can and you are," Judit said in her best supportive Perfect Girl voice. "You're doing so well. Just a day at a time. And I'm here for you. I'm always here."

He looked up, fixed his lost eyes on her, and she nodded understandingly. He had that look again, like what she said was Gospel, like she was the answer to everything.

"It's all okay," she repeated for like the thousandth time. "I'm here."

"I just want to run away," Brock said. "I just keep getting this urge. Get in the boat and run away. And then I think, well, of course I want to do that. I'm him, aren't I? That's just what he did. Things got heavy, and he ran."

"You're not him," Judit said.

She wondered momentarily what Brock's dad was like. Was he good looking, too? Must be, to sleep with all those women like Merle said. She imagined someone from the past, looking exactly like Brock, wearing old fashioned sunglasses and a leather jacket, singing on the stage in The Silver Pit. Loads of girls in old-fashioned clothes watching and swooning. It was kinda hot.

"I just want to be free," he said. "I want to have no responsibilities, no duties, no-one to look after. I just want to be me. Find out what me is. Have fun. Make spontaneous choices. I want it so bad. And it makes me want to get up and run away. And... and what if I run away?"

Would Brock run away? she thought. That's harsh. That would be so bad. Then she thought, Maybe we could run away together. For a split second it seemed like the best plan she'd ever come up with.

"You won't run away," she said eventually. "You're nothing like him."

She pictured retro-Brock as his club-singer dad again. Imagined herself watching him from some bar in a sleek vintage dress, them fumbling in some old-fashioned car.

"But I am." Brock looked up from his hands, his expression pained. "I mean... look what I did to you."

Judit's heart hit fast against her chest. No skitting way. Is he doing this? In all the times she'd come to him like this, since they found out about the baby—which wasn't often, you were literally never alone out here, and no one knew what time it was ever so it wasn't like you could make plans to meet up, it was a licit nightmare—it had all been totally, exaggeratedly just friends innocent. This was the only time he'd referenced anything from the summer.

"That was nothing," Judit said, guarded. "It was less than nothing. It doesn't matter. It doesn't count. It was nothing."

"It's not just that," he dropped his eyes. "I keep... I keep thinking. You've got to—you've got to stop coming round, Judit. I can't... I can't do this. I'm sorry."

Judit's stomach fell to her knees. Oh no. I literally cannot bear not getting to see him.

"I don't know what you mean," she said, her voice pathetic. "I thought I was being a good friend to you. I thought it was useful you getting to talk. I don't... I just want to be there for you."

"You are." He didn't look up, shaking his head from side to side in his hands. "You're... I can't tell you. I can't express... I feel like you're the only person I've ever met who's never wanted anything from me. I... I literally—I can't—I swear to God I've never been known before you. I mean, God, I tell you everything, and you're so..."

"I just enjoy your company," Judit said quietly. She felt kinda guilty about the never wanted anything from me bit. She wanted everything from him. He didn't need to know that, though.

"You're so calm," he finished. "Just...like it's all okay. Stuff I've never dared tell anyone my whole life, and you make me feel like it's okay."

"You tell me stuff you don't tell Lintie?" Judit said, and immediately regretted it. It was patently obvious she was checking off a vindictive triumph against his girlfriend. She'd have added it to the guilt list if that hadn't gone so far out of the window it was at the bottom of the ocean rotting somewhere.

Luckily, he was so caught up in his inner turmoil he didn't seem to notice her pettiness.

"Not even Lintie," he said. "I'm always trying so hard to be what she wants me to be. She loves someone, but it's not me. It's a... phantom. And I like how she loves him, I do, but he's not me. He's someone I'm desperately trying to be, for her sake, all the time."

He wiped his eyes with the heels of his hands. "It's fine. It doesn't matter. I just have to try and be there for her. I can't believe I'm even going on at you like this again. I'm so sorry. I should be ashamed of myself."

"You've got nothing to apologise for," Judit said quietly, and he looked up, and that whole cold blackhouse was hit with a tuning fork. The hum was deafening, the resonance of his deep sadness, his deep longing and her deep desire vibrating between them.

"You've got to go," Brock said, and his voice was almost a croak. "I can't take this any more. I'm so sorry. You've got to go."

He dropped his head again, and Judit stood for a moment, unsure whether to throw herself at him or leave.

She left.

***

Judit lay on her bed, curled in the foetal position. Her head had been ringing like the inside of a bell for what felt like hours after seeing Brock today. Thank God Sannah is out. I need some space.

She'd repeated everything he'd said to her, again and again in her head. She felt so powerful when she was with him. So in control. It was intoxicating.

She turned onto her back, and was momentarily surprised by the weight of her stomach, the shifted axis of her centre of gravity.

Okay, something's definitely not right.

No, no. It's fine. You're being crazy again.

No you're not. You know it's not right.

But that's literally impossible. Literally.

Is it though?

Yes. Yes it is. It's impossible.

Judit rubbed her belly. It felt huge, and intermittently bubbly inside, like she was a shaken-up bottle of water and bath foam. What had she been eating? She thought of the rations. Barely anything.

She'd nearly said something to Sannah about it today, but then she'd been such a crank bitch when she got back, that she didn't.

She was glad, now. There was nothing Sannah could do about her health problems, and telling her before she went away might just worry her, which wouldn't help at all. No, she'd keep it to herself.

Judit shifted again onto her side, touching her stomach again.

There's nothing wrong. That would be impossible.

Wouldn't it?