The Archer | T.D. ✔

Chapter Thirty-Three

Rory exited the bathroom, dragging her feet as she walked. Hearing the door, the three people waiting on the couch looked over with expectant expressions. To them, Rory's face was unreadable except for the fact that she was in shock. Stephanie got up and ran over to her, bracing Rory with her arms. 

"Rory, what happened? What did they say?"

Rory gripped Steph's hand tightly, still shaking from her panic, and turned to look at her friend. "They're all negative."

"How are you feeling? Why don't you come and sit?" Steph kept a tight hold on her friend and led her to the couch so she could sit with Cass and Babs. Rory looked around, her senses were heightened from the shock she was feeling and her breathing started picking up again. 

"Rory, don't get yourself worked up again." Cass dug into the bag and pulled out two items, a bar of chocolate and a bottle of what seemed to be cheap whiskey from a run-down liquor store. Without a second thought, Rory reached for the whiskey and took a large drink of it, completely passing up the chocolate bar.

After a swig, Rory took a deep breath and sighed before taking more. It may have been a cheap bottle, but it was still strong and could feel her body had stopped shaking. Looking at the others, she could see they were waiting for her to say something. "I don't know if I should be happy or upset," she admitted.

"Should I be happy that I'm not pregnant, and don't have to worry about everything that comes with that, or upset because I'm not pregnant and deep down I secretly hoped that I was because it was something I wanted." Rory didn't get to finish her sentence before she broke down in sobs. 

Stephanie and Cassandra pulled her into a hug, as Barbara rubbed her back softly. Rory sobbed incoherently as they tried to comfort her, a pregnancy scare was not to be taken lightly. She didn't want to admit it to herself until the tests were negative, but Rory secretly wanted to be a mother. It was a dream of hers to have a littler her or Tim running around, but she was scared that she would mess it up.

Rory knew that she wasn't ready to be a mother. She barely had time with her own mother to learn from her what to do, not that Dinah wasn't a great mother figure to her but it was different. She cried for almost twenty minutes before she was able to calm herself down and think about what she needed to do. 

"Rory, are you going to tell Tim?" Cass asked.

Rory's head shot up and she looked at her. "No, Tim can never know! I can't tell him that I thought I was pregnant with his child and went through all of this without him."

"He needs to know, it involves him too. It's not fair to him for you to keep it a secret." Barbara said. Both times when it happened with Dick, she told him before and he was there with her waiting for the results. But Rory was different, she handled things differently than any of them did and wanted to do things herself.

"I can't Babs, I don't want to do this to him. It would change things between us and I don't want things to change," she explained, taking another swig of the cheap whiskey. 

Stephanie sighed and took the bottle from Rory, drinking some herself. "It's late, we should probably get back Cass. I think Rory is going to stay here for the night, right?" she looked over at Rory who nodded.

"As long as Babs doesn't mind."

"Of course I don't, stay as long as you need. I know my dad won't mind, he would enjoy having someone else who is able to cook around." she smiled, Rory giving her a grateful look.

"Should we tell Bruce?" Steph asked, standing up and grabbing a bar of chocolate.

Rory shook her head, "I'll tell him when I go back, or at least Alfred so an adult knows why I disappeared."