Intersex

Chapter 21.

"What..?" Trina chuckled, obviously thinking that I was joking.

"You're really having a baby?!" Molly, Trina's youngest squealed.

"Y-Yeah..." I said letting a relived laugh slip.

It took me and my parents nearly an hour to thoroughly explain what intersexual meant and how it worked, how rare my body was, unique even according to the doctors I'd met. While that explanation went on, Molly, stood by my side curiously poking and stroking my stomach. She was only five so it was expected that she'd be curious. That didn't mean that it wasn't a bit annoying though. Cute, but annoying.

"That's... quite something..." my youngest cousin, Trina said, baffled. "I didn't think you were gay..."

"Wait... Wait!" One of my younger nephews exclaimed. He was one of Patrick's kids. I looked at him, confused. "You're a guy... you don't have a v****a like ladies so... where did the other guy put his penis..?"

My face burned like the f*****g sun and turned bright red as a rose. I didn't want to have to explain to how gay s*x worked to my cousins' young kids and it didn't seem like anyone else in the room wanted to either. I swallowed. My younger nephews and nieces looked around the table, confused.

"Mommy, what is he talking about..?" Molly mumbled and walked over to her mom.

Lenny slammed his head onto the table, startling my sixteen-year-old nephew, Denver, Patrick's son. He was the oldest of their cousin group and also the one who didn't seem to like people too much. Had Lenny slammed his head in embarrassment or annoyance? I couldn't tell. But the sudden actions caused silence to fall over the dining room.

"Who wants dessert..?" My mom awkwardly chuckled.

⚥ ⚥ ⚥

The weather was only getting colder which meant that my jacket was getting more and more unbearable to wear outside. I really had to get a winter coat. December was a few days away and I still hadn't gotten a new one. I tore the zipper and ripped the left sleeve of my old coat. It was beyond repair. It was the day after Thanksgiving, I was bloated, sleepy and a bit nauseous from stuffing my face once more at the breakfast table.

Things hadn't been the same after I revealed my pregnancy to the rest of my family. They'd been quiet and every time I looked away I felt eyes glued to my body, watching my every move. All the younger kids, who usually played rough had all been extremely gentle and careful. Patrick's eldest, Denver, avoided everyone in the family, just like he always did, but I couldn't help but feel as if he was avoiding me most of all. Trina and Grace had tried to give me both pregnancy and parenting advice but that had ended with them arguing over breastmilk. Taking other people's advice was tiresome, to say the least, I preferred just letting everything unfold however it wanted to in its own time.

It was strange to be so close in age to my eldest nephews now that they knew about the pregnancy, Lenny was only four years younger than me and Denver was only three years younger. The two of them had been acting awkwardly after dinner. I couldn't blame them. What I had told them had been huge and confusing.

I pushed the door to Daisy's diner open and took in the sweet scent of whatever food was cooking. I had a headache.

It was easy to spot Hannah in our usual boot down by the jukebox. She was sitting with her back to the entrance which meant that she hadn't seen me yet.

"Sup loser..." I chuckled and lightly smacked the back of her head as I walked past her.

"Mickey you hoe! I missed you!" She squealed and shot out of her seat to hug me, hitting her knee on the table in the process.

I wrapped my arms around her waist and her arms found their way around my neck. We stood like that for a solid minute, just hugging tightly. My growing stomach was pressing against it but she didn't seem to think much of it, nor question it. Who wouldn't be a bit bloated the day after thanksgiving?

"I missed you too..." I murmured against her shoulder. "Like... a lot..."

"I'm here..." She hummed. "We're back..."

We slowly pulled apart and I looked up into her eyes. Her voice had gotten brighter since I last saw her and her eyelashes were longer. She looked gorgeous, just as she always had. "You look really pretty..." I said and smiled at her.

"And you're like... glowing..." she said and raised a brow at me. I mimicked her expression and she suddenly cupped my face, pulling me toward her. "Are you wearing makeup..?"

I pushed her hands back and furrowed my brows. "No. No, I'm not."

"You look all rosy and like... full?" She looked down at my stomach and I anxiously tried to cover it with the jacket that I could barely zip up anymore. She let out a chuckle and poked my bump, flinching slightly when she noticed how hard it was. "How much turkey did you eat?" She wheezed.

"Mostly mashed potatoes and gravy actually..." I chuckled nervously. She immediately noticed the change of tone and furrowed her brows.

"You okay?"

"Yeah, everything's fine I'm just kinda nauseous from literally eating a third of my weight in these past twenty-four hours..." I pulled and twisted a wisp of hair around my finger that had fallen down over my forehead. "I'm gonna go get a milkshake, you want anything?"

"Nah, I still have most of my cherry coke and waffles..."

With a nod and a quick turn, I waved to the young waitress who was smiling brightly behind the cash register. She had light blue beautiful eyes that could rival Jayden's. She was quick to make the milkshake and quick to hand it to me with a mountain of whipped cream and sparkles. I smiled at the sweet drink and thanked the cute barista. Only two dollars for a milkshake stuffed to the brim with deliciousness.

When I sat turned back to Hannah with the large milkshake she chuckled. "You look like a spoiled kid..."

"I am a spoiled kid..." I snickered.

I only got to take one spoonful of the whipped cream and sparkles before I was hurried into one of Hannah's long stories. She could drag on for thirty minutes about the most minor things such as someone not thanking her after she held the door, bumping into her or even finding a pebble in her shoe. This time it seemed that she to have a story of, in Hannah's own words, "the best one-night stand ever that became super awkward".

I listened for about ten minutes as she explained how she met the guy and how good-looking he was until she went into detail about the s*x for another twenty minutes. Then, at what I bought would be the end of the story, She instead started talking about her marketing management professor for some reason.

"And in the morning I wake up to a stern knock on the door and guess who walks in. MR JENSEN! And I'm sitting there naked on the bed and we just look at each other like we were making a silent contract to never tell a soul about what happened. In all this freaky mess Mike suddenly throws his arms around me and grabs my boobs out of nowhere which made me moan and that's when I realise that I'm literally naked in front of my college professor in his son's apartment while his son is holding my t**s to cover my nipples."

I blinked a few times, somewhat lost in the story that I could so vividly see in my head. This was just one of those things that happened to Hannah. "And then what?" I found myself asking as I wanted more detail. A moment ago I'd been bored by her story but now it was suddenly getting good.

"So Mr Jenkins turns red like a f*****g tomato while Mike stares at his dad in horror, hands still firmly gripping my boobs," she interrupted her story and gestured to me while nodding in agreement with herself. "And you know how sensitive I am, so at that point, I'm a whimpering mess, too f*****g out of it to really do anything like some sort of bad porno. Then suddenly Mike starts yelling at Mr Jenkins to cover his eyes and while Mike was yelling he just started unconsciously squeezing my boobs even harder." She took a deep breath, slurped her neglected coke and stuffed half a waffle in her mouth before continuing. "But Mr Jenkins didn't turn away or cover his eyes!" She said and slammed her hands onto the table, mouth still full of food. I flinched and moved my empty milkshake class away from her so she wouldn't knock it over if she decided to throw her arms around. "I swear to god he got a hard-on right there!"

"Really?" I chuckled, not quite believing her.

"He ended up shuffling out of Mike's apartment and I ended up with another few hickeys, bruises and bite marks..." she carefully tugged her shirt down to her collarbone to expose a row of hickeys that led down under her shirt. "We're still seeing each other!"

"That's... great?"

"Yeah, he's awesome! He even apologised for his dad. Here, look!" She pulled her phone out and started scrolling through texts before she found what she was looking for and pushed her phone to my side of the table.

I picked the phone up and read the text. 'Sry bout the old man... hes a creep. hope u dont h8 me now... can I make it up to u wit dinner at 7.30 2nite??' I rolled my eyes. He texted like a middle schooler with a flip phone. "He seems... interesting..." I said and gave Hannah her phone back while she took another bite of her last waffle.

"He's kinda dumb and reckless but he's so good in bed... plus, it's not like we're married! I can do whatever I want!"

I chuckled. She hadn't changed at all. She was still optimistic and shameless. My Hannah.

"Well enough about me!" She said and placed her chin in her palms. "You said you had something to say when I called!"

I awkwardly chuckled, coughed a bit and scratched the back of my head to stall for time. I really didn't feel like saying it again. Saying it felt wrong since it didn't feel quite real. I'd seen the ultrasound pictures, I constantly talked to my stomach like a maniac and I was definitely affected by the mood swings and cravings. I was always one to shift quickly between moods though, always acting tough and aggressive for no reason other than I was easily annoyed.

"So..." I murmured. "I... uh..." I grabbed my wallet and shot off toward the cute waitress again. "I'm getting a refill!" I said. Better to wait for the milkshake at the counter than face Hannah.

When I returned from my quick milkshake run I froze as Hannah stared at me wide-eyed. She was staring right at my stomach. Right where I was most self-conscious and the moment.

"That's not a 'food belly', is it..? You're..." She stuttered. "Micah... are you..? wait..."

I sighed and put the milkshake down on the table. She'd noticed it when I walked in, but it was only now that she put two and two together.

"Yeah..." I sighed, though it came out more like a whimper. "I f****d up..." I chuckled in a depressed tone and put a hand over my stomach.

"Oh my god, Micah..." She whispered. "You're nineteen! You can't have a baby... You haven't even finished college and now you're..." She stopped herself just in time for tears to well up in my eyes.

I wrapped my arms around my waist in an attempt to cover my bump as a sudden wave of doubt washed over me like a tsunami. I tumbled and swirled in its grip. She was right, I couldn't have a baby. What was I thinking? I barely made enough money for myself. How was I supposed to support another human being? Nausea. Had I gotten too ahead of myself? How had I even excepted the whole thing so quickly? Jayden and I hadn't talked this through thoroughly enough, not at all. A living human being. Someone who would depend fully on me for everything from safety to nutrients. I never even wanted kids in the first place. Damn it I kind of hated kids. My cousins' young kids were a nightmare whenever I saw them and I could barely manage a few hours with them. How would I manage one of my own twenty-four hours a day? Was it too late to back out? Too late to... Smith. Damn it I'd already gotten overly attached to my wiggling shrimp. A tear trailed down my cheek.

"Who the f**k was it?" She growled as she pulled me into a tight hug. "Tell me their name and I'll teach them a lesson..."

Blinking away tears, I took a large sip of the milkshake on the table and let the sweet, cold flavour dance on my tongue. "It's fine... I'm to blame too... He was drunk, I was not. I let him blindfold me and I seriously messed up..."

"What're you gonna do?"

That question again. The question I'd been asked myself just a moment ago. With a light push to get Hannah to pull out of the hug and a gentle tug of her hand, I placed her palm on my stomach along with my own. At first, she flinched but half a second later she was staring in amazement before placing her other hand on my stomach as well.

"I have lots of people who are willing to help me. No, who are going to help me. People who are already excited for this baby's arrival. I'm... I'm going to be fine. There's nothing to worry about..." I murmured. Although I was trying to reassure Hannah of my well-being, it sounded more like I was trying to reassure myself. Like I was trying to convince myself that I was really okay.

"How can you be so certain..?" She whimpered, hands still cuddling my growing belly. "You'll be tied to the father for the rest of your life..."

"He's not a bad guy. He's actually really sweet, kind, gentle and protective... He'll be a good dad..."

"That's not what was talking about..." Hannah said quietly. "Mickey... You'll be tied to him forever. All your life, he'll be there. Your longest relationship lasted what? Two weeks and you hated everything about it..."

"We're not in a relationship," I said. Although he wanted that. Both him and Kennedy. They'd only get bored of me though. They'd be disappointed and things would be so f*****g awkward. Neither of them knew how annoying I actually was. Being in a relationship with me would be the end of not only our friendship, but also their respect for me. "I don't do relationships..."