He wakes up with a dry throat, sore neck and disorientated mind and hating every second of being awake and being alive and wishing he can just stay in bed, miss school for the rest of the week– a month sounds good too.

He knows that won’t fly very well with his parents and they might start suspecting something– the last thing he needs is them watching him too closely– and he’s never one to miss a day of school. He’s rarely sick and when he is, he still makes an effort to attend school and often makes it through the day.

Jongin blindly searches for his phone and finds it warm and resting under his left thigh, not caring to find out how it managed to get there. He sees one missed call from Jongdae and a message from Chanyeol tell him good night and reminding him to get something to eat – Jongin doesn’t respond to Chanyeol’s message because he feels too guilty to even think of a valid reply.

He doesn’t call Jongdae back or text him because he’s afraid of what more he has to say about his situation. Jongdae knows now and there’s nothing comforting about that– a tiny part in his is glad, so goddamn glad that he’s not the only one who knows about this– but why did he stupidly tell him?

When he thinks about last night– the phone call and his confession– the more he doesn’t wish to get up. He fears his parents already know, that Jongdae called them up last night and told them– but if that was the case, he’s positive their parents would’ve barged into his room last night and demanded to know if whatever Jongdae told them was true.

He sets his phone on his pillow before swinging his legs off his bed and getting to his feet– this time he falls to the ground with a loud thud when his legs start shaking horribly and are unable to hold up his weight, his head swims and he whimpers, bites his bottom lip as he rubs the hip he ungracefully landed on.

Getting up from the floor is difficult– his brain is sort of scrambled from the fall and he feels ridiculously vulnerable for a second, but he manages and has to sit back down on his bed to gather himself. He puts his face in his hands and rubs them furiously over his face as if trying to shake off the weakness he feels throughout his body.

He collects whatever energy he has left; he stands up and drags himself out of his room and down the short hallway to the bathroom. He locks the door behind him and walks to the sink– a strong nausea crawls up and he feels bile in his throat, he turns the sink’s tap and opens the shower to create unnecessary noise before bending over the toilet bowl and he starts to dry heave.

Drying heaving goes on for an annoyingly long time and he feels tears of raw frustration well up in his eyes. Dry heaving and throwing up whatever he ate is a common occurrence in the mornings– it’s mostly kept under the wraps because his mother leaves for work at ungodly hours and his father sleeps like a stone through it all.

Morning sickness is disgusting, it’s also a reminder– like every morning, since the symptoms started; that it’s there to remind him and not let him forget that hey, your body is changing and it’s my job to make you even more aware of that little fact– he just wishes for it to stop.

He steps away from the toilet when he’s done throwing up nothing, but liquids he doesn’t even remember drinking. He flushes, slams the toilet’s lid harder than necessary before he turns around and he stands in the center of the bathroom doing nothing with his arms dropped to his sides. He stands there and lets the irrational anger flare through him and starts to hate himself just a little bit more.

He turns around, stares at the mirror against the door and swallows. He avoids looking at his face because he knows he looks like a mess; his face is probably swollen and red. He holds the hem of his shirt, his hand trembles as he lifts it upwards– he shuts his eyes at the sight of his skin and a shaky breath escapes him.

He opens his eyes, eyes landing on his midsection and lets out a breath he doesn’t know he was holding when he sees nothing’s out of place. He shuts his eyes again because he knows it’s only a matter of time before everything starts to change.

()()()()

He excuses himself out of history class around 12 p.m.– catching both the teacher and his classmates off guard because him leaving in the middle of class is unusual– and he doesn’t return to class. By 2 p.m. he finds himself inside the clinic’s waiting room. His uniform is neatly folded in his backpack– uniforms are how you get caught– his backpack feels heavy and so does the cap on his head as he sits in the waiting room in the same position as the last time he was here.

The nurse by the receptionist calls his name and he already knows where to go. He drags himself to Doctor Jung Woomi’s room, legs just as heavy as last time and knocks on her door. She welcomes him and he steps in, stands before front of her and bows his head after she asks him to sit down.

“Hello, Jongin,” She greets gently, “How are you feeling?” She asks with a small smile once he’s settled, he doesn’t smile back.

“Good.” Short and simple, that’s how he wants to keep this whole visit– he doesn’t want to be here longer than what is required, but he knows he’ll have to be here longer than he’s comfortable with. “Uh,” He stutters, “Results?”

“Positive.” She slides the paper to him; he takes them and skims through all the words for the word positive. He finds it and bites his lower lip when it trembles, heart sinking. He knew the results would be positive, but he kept the fool hope of it being negative. “You might be a little over seven or eight weeks pregnant, but you need an ultrasound just to be sure.”

He brings his hands to his lap. “What do I do?” He sounds unsure, a lot younger and helpless. He has never felt this helpless before and he hates the feeling because it makes him feel vulnerable and like he’s in control of nothing that’s happening. “What do I do?” He repeats, his words unsure and shakier than moments ago.

“Have you told anyone about this?” She questions and he knows she’s purposely avoiding his question.

“My brother,” He answers all the while still fiddling with his fingers and hoping she can pick an option for him without him having to ask her or beg her for it.

“What has he said about it?”

He looks up from his fingers to her, stares at the mole under left eye and shakes his head. “He wasn’t happy.”

“Understandable,” She breathes, “Have you thought more about what–”

“Abortion,” He interrupts hastily. Get rid of the problem before it grows– that’s the logic he decides to go with. No one will be happy about this anyway. And even if they are, he isn’t and he doesn’t think this is something he’ll embrace fully without hating himself. It’s also wishful thinking if he expects his parents to brush this off and give him hugs and congratulate him.

He isn’t the most popular at school and his classmates aren’t his biggest fans because most teachers favor him over them. The thought of him attending school pregnant or telling his teachers about it– if the school even allows him to continue attending, that is– makes his insides twist and turn and he wants to vomit.

“Are you sure?” She’s not looking over at him as she pushes her chair back, looks through her drawers before pulling out a file– he watches her read over them quickly before she hands a paper from the file to him.

“Just fill these in for me,” She slides a pen towards him, she looks uncertain now and stares at him with a hard look as if she’s debating if he’s suitable enough to make his own decisions.

He ignores her as he himself look at the abortion form and signs his name at the bottom without any more thought about what he’s signing up for– his hand is trembling madly and his name comes out looking like a sloppy mess.

He slides the papers and pen back to her and stays silent– the anguish eating at him has him failing to speak because he doesn’t know what he’s doing and he doesn't know if this is even the right thing to do. All he knows is that he doesn’t want to be here and he certainly does not want to be a parent months from now.

()()()()

His visit passes in a blur– he gets an ultrasound and finds out he’s just shy over seven weeks. He’s asked if he’d like to pick the ultrasound pictures and he shakes his head so hard, he’s surprised it doesn’t fall off.

The faint heartbeat he hears has him nearly pissing himself and he is more scared out of his wits and not understanding why the technician is happily explaining what is on the screen he can’t even look at it and she has already been informed he’s going to terminate it.

He walks out of the room is a daze and finds Doctor Jung’s office. Doctor Jung then refers him to the clinic’s counselor who bombards him with a lot of questions: is the decision yours? Are you sure you want this?  Is anyone going to pick you up afterwards? Have you talked to your parents? What about the father?

The counselor explains the pills– he fails to remember the long names and pronunciations– he’ll be taking and how long it’ll take for the first to work before he has to take the rest– he’s told the side effects he might experience and Jongin’s already too overwhelmed to listen to everything else or remember what he has been told.

He’s sent back to Doctor Jung and his head is spinning. He sits before her, rubbing his eyes before bringing his hand down to stare at the single pill and glass of water waiting for him.

“It won’t take effect until you take the rest,” She slides a small box, “But you have to take this one in front of me and the rest at home for the next two days.” She continues when he says nothing, “I hope the counselor informed you of what happens once you’ve taken the pills.” Jongin looks away after nodding, “Do you want me to go over everything with you once more?”

“She says I’ll bleed for a few days– I don’t know,” He says quietly looking up at her, “My parents will know,” He tells her and she nods.

“You had to choose between a medical abortion and surgical abortion,” She points out, “You chose medical abortion,” She reminds him and he looks away again. “I thought I insisted last time that you talk to your parents about this.” Medical abortion sounded less scary– going back and forth like this is terrifying him and because medical abortion will be even harder to hide from his parents– they live under the same roof and he just can’t stop helping around the house for a few days or the shop because he’s not feeling very well. His mother will get worried and will demand to know what’s up.

“But my mum will find out if I take these,” He presses, he suddenly sounds freaked and he wants to flee– why hadn’t he thought this through?

“Jongin, you don’t have to do this today.” Doctor Jung sighs, “You’re hesitant about this–”

“I don’t want this.” His voice trembling with barely repressed emotions, “I really don’t want a baby. I don’t want to do this–,” He stops short and he can’t see much past the tears b in his eyes– he’s annoyed and angry with himself, he’s never one to cry easily– at least not openly in front of a woman he knows nothing about.

“You don’t have to do anything you don’t want to,” She says it so easily and he wants to scream because there’s nothing about this that he wants. Nobody his age wants to be a parent– it’s unreasonable if seventeen year olds wish to be parents, but he can’t take any of this back, can’t rewind because this is something can’t be undone and that’s slowly killing him. “Adoption and parenting are the other options I told you about,”

But both of those mean he has to keep being pregnant for the remaining many months. Suddenly the emotions are twirling through him and become too much, he hasn’t felt this much emotion– the last he felt this miserable, lost and angry was a disagreement with his parents about him spending the weekends with Chanyeol– there’s so much confusion inside him and being in an unfamiliar place with a face he has only seen twice makes him push his chair backwards and lean forward.

He distantly hears Doctor Jung push her own chair back and her heels clicking hastily as she comes over to his side. Her warm hand on his shoulder gives him a lot of discomfort, but he lets her and doesn’t shake her hand off.

She’s soon whispering close to his eye for him to take deep breathes, count to ten and try to calm down, that stress isn’t good for him right now– and he knows why she’s encouraging him to keep himself together; it’s because he is pregnant and his body isn’t his alone– everything he does now is affecting the undesirable thing inside him.

He rubs his hand over his face, putting his face into his hands and leaning forward some more before shaking his head furiously. He wants to call out Chanyeol’s name– to see him, hear his voice and to be held by him and to hold him, but his mouth works faster than his brain, “I want my mum,” He cries into his hands that are wet with his shed tears, “I need my mum here– please call my mum.” Because his mother always knows what to do, the sight of his mother always makes him feel better– she won’t be happy about this, that much he knows, but she won’t turn him away.

He knows it’s a bad idea for her to find out like this, that he has skipped school to go to a clinic about an hour away without her being in the know– that after she put all her trust in him to allow him spend nights away from home after being reluctant for so long, he went– broke all her unspoken rules– and got himself pregnant.

()()()()

Not proofread orz next update on Friday or Saturday or next week (/•ิ_•ิ)/