Positive? (Ter)

[Kateri Rivera]

Kateri was furious. This wouldn’t have been a surprise to anyone who knew the redhead. She was often furious. She’d inherited her Irish mother’s temper, so things did tend to get to her and it didn’t take much. But this time was different. Now she wasn’t just furious, but she was also angry, terrified, and stunned, and all of this combined to make her even madder. It was a good thing it was the weekend, because had she been in class she would’ve given every single one of her students detention on the spot. She was that angry. And all that was because of two freaking lines on a white stick.

She was going to kill someone. But instead, she decided not to and called up Ter instead. It was early for the weekend, and she was probably waking him up, but she could care less.

When he picked up—or even if it was the voicemail—she started in, quick and with her Irish accent thicker than it ever was. She was also yelling. A lot.

“You bastard. Ter, you absolute bastard. Why couldn’t you just leave me on that bloody curb?”

[Terrowin Guthrie]

Ter had woken up early that morning to do some Nanquan practice. Now that he had a student that also knew the less-common martial art, he was determined to increase his skill in the subject. He had been studying Youtube videos all morning, quickly going through the movements and getting his movements nice and fluid, and, of course, fast.

He was surprised when the phone rang. He was panting heavily as he checked the clock - still quite early, and, shrugging, picked up. "Hello?" he greeted, wiping sweat from his brow.

His ears were immediately assaulted by the familiar sound of Kateri, and she sounded pissed. Well, it was pretty obvious by the word choices she was using.

"Whoa whoa whoa," he interrupted, frowning into the device. "Wot the 'ell did Oi do?" This had been the last thing he was expecting on a peaceful weekend morning. He was absolutely stumped at what she could be calling to early and so angrily about. "Wot do ye mean? That night Oi took ye back tae my place?" That had been a fun night. But why was she so ticked about it?

[Kateri Rivera]

“Yes, you bloody moronic fool, that night.” Kateri reserved most of her insults for (other) bad drivers, annoying personnel at the military pension office, and her mother in law. However, sometimes it seemed as if she’d made a collection of them just to make people angry. She could be pretty inventive sometimes. “And if you’re out of breath because of another woman, so help me Lord I’ll make sure you don’t even think about another woman ever again.”

And that threat she reserved for cheating boyfriends. Or for men during her time of the month.

“As for what you did,” she added in a far more, almost frighteningly reasonable tone, “well, does that night ring any bells? Because I can tell you exactly what you did. You got me pregnant, you bastard, and now YOU get to explain to my dear Irish and Catholic mother how that happened!”

[Terrowin Guthrie]

Terrowin knew Kat had a temper, but God, he hardly ever saw her like this. Or heard her, rather. When she confirmed the night, he was tempted to ask if the sex had really been that bad or something, but he felt like that might be inappropriate at the time. "Oi'm surprised ye remember most of that night," he replied meekly. She had, after all, been very intoxicated. "Hell no, Oi was just workin' out," he told her honestly, hoping she would believe him. "Oi promise." She wasn't generally upset about his sleeping around with other women. He didn't do it a lot, but it wasn't unheard of for him to go to the bar just looking for a good time. So what was the problem?

"Er, well, ye were drunk, an' Oi took ye home." Obviously. Why was she asking? As she kept talking, though, Ter felt his breath stop, and his heart seemed to freeze, too. Blood drained from his face. He couldn't speak for several long moments, he was too stunned for words. This wasn't possible. This had never happened before. She must be mistaken.

Finally,"WOT!?" he cried, running a hand through his hair roughly and pacing around the room. "How do ye know? Th... There must be some sort of mistake." He refused to believe this. The grip of his hand around the phone nearly threatened to crack it, he was so taunt with shock and anxiety. "Dammit, Kat, if this is a joke..."

[Kateri Rivera]

In truth, Kateri didn’t remember anything from that night. She hadn’t thought it was particularly important before. Waking up naked next to Terrowin wasn’t a new occasion by any means, and it didn’t worry her that morning. And it hadn’t worried her until she was late—then the whole event took on a whole new sense of urgency than it had before. “I don’t remember any of the night,” she informed him. “But it doesn’t take a genius to guess what happened because it always happens when I get drunk with you.” It was like a bad habit she couldn’t quit. But it eased her temper a little. Good. At least he wouldn’t get this call—actually, screw it. She wished he had a girl there so he could get the news with her there, because THAT was what he deserved, the bastard.

In a way, the two were pretty similar. Kateri was now pacing the room too, agitated and in a panic and still furious beyond belief.

“WHY WOULD I JOKE ABOUT THIS?” She yelled into the phone. “I bought a damn test! It says positive! Even Chris didn’t manage to get me pregnant and we were married!. And now I’m calling you because you HAVE to be the father!”

[Terrowin Guthrie]

"Oh," Ter replied simply as Kat retorted that she didn't remember what happened. He did suppose it had been a dumb question; it happened often enough between them that it didn't really come as a surprise to them anymore. It was why he had been so surprised when she had seemed upset about this night more than any other. He was almost never shocked into silence - he had a quick, sharp tongue - but her anger at him made him speechless.

"Oi'm sorry!" he yelled back as she did, pulling the phone away from his ear so she wouldn't rupture his ear drum or anything. It was just his automatic response to assume something like this would be a joke. Since he had never been in this sort of situation before. "Okay, okay, um," he tried to wrack his normally quick-thinking brain for an answer, some solution to this unexpected turn of events, but nothing came to mind. When she brought up Chris, he almost made a huge mistake about muttering something about the speed of his sperm, but bit his tongue at the last moment; even he knew that would be inappropriate. "D... Do you... I don't know..." He wanted to ask if she was going to keep the child, but he was still trying to grasp the fact that she was actually pregnant. "Oi.... Oi'll do what Oi can," he replied weakly, sinking to the floor of his dojo. "But God, Kat, this.... Oi mean, what about our jobs?" They both worked at Hammel, so he wondered what would happen once people began to find out. Could they get fired over this?

[Kateri Rivera]

Yes, they’d been doing this far too often. She knew that it wasn’t good for either of them, but she wished she could find some kind of way to, to…well, stop doing it. It was a nasty habit that neither of them could kick. Or at least…she couldn’t. Maybe Ter could and he’d just never said? That was a very strange and slightly upsetting thought.

Still, she’d rather hoped that she could bust an eardrum. If he experienced something it would make her feel a hell of a lot better. Especially as in eight months something that he made would be causing her a lot of pain. But of course, she didn’t take into consideration that it took two people. Why would she? She was angry and she definitely didn’t think clearly when she was angry.

Kateri hadn’t even thought about whether to keep the child or not. She was in her thirties, had a stable job, and the father was around. Why wouldn’t she keep the child? It wouldn’t have made sense. But as she didn’t know Ter was thinking about that, she wasn’t going to just go out and tell him. But she could reassure him on this point.

“We’re not gonna lose our jobs, “ she said, exasperation clear even though there was also a hint of…worry there as well. Worry which she was only partially suppressing. “We’re not the first to get ourselves into this situation, so relax. They don’t fire people for indiscretion anymore. Now if you’ve got some girlfriend on the side, you’re going to have some explaining to do, you ass.”

And we were back to that.

[Terrowin Guthrie]

Nope. Ter was as addicted to their little get-togethers as Kat was. It really was a wonder they didn't consider themselves together, considering how much it happened. Ter hooked up with other people on occasion, of course, but not nearly as much as he did with Kat.

He still was having a hard time wrapping his head around the idea that she was going to give birth to something he had helped create. It just.... He couldn't fathom having a little Ter in the world. God help them all.

Well... Okay, maybe he should have known there was no reason to give the baby away. Hell, the more he thought about it, the more he realized that, if this was really happening, he wanted the child to be around. He was the freaking father, after all. Damn. Still, it was just hard for him to grasp. He was going to be a dad.

"Right, okay," he let out a sighed, running his hand through his hair and thumping his head against the wall. "Oi can't damn well relax, Kat. This is... God. We never planned this." Duh. He snorted at her last comment. "Hell, Oi haven't had a girlfriend since we split," he told her honestly. Which made him want to bring up something that had been on his mind for a while, and especially now that all of this was happening. "Oi.... Oi've wanted tae ask ye out again fer a while now, but Oi wasn't sure how tae do it." He swallowed hard. "Tae ask fer another chance. An' now that this has happened..." He trailed off. What was he supposed to do?

[Kateri Rivera]

“Yes, because we’d both somehow magically plan me getting pregnant from a drunken one-night hookup.” Okay, so it was more like a perpetual string of “one night” hookups, but that particular statement had been too good for her to let go of. Plan for this. Right. Like you planned to get pregnant from your ex. She just kept cycling back to what her parents were thinking. God, at least she’d already been married so they wouldn’t have to have that discussion…

…not like her parents had been married when her mother had gotten pregnant with her. Still.

She sat down on the edge of her bed and stared down at the little test, breathing out slowly from her mouth and doing her best to relax. She doubted she’d be able to, but she wanted to try just because it…well, it felt better. She wasn’t sure she could deal with a kid. She still had a roommate. She had a stable job, sure, but that wasn’t saying much. What about her car? It wasn’t kid proof. She was starting to panic now and bit down on her lip to try to stifle it. No, everything was going to be fine. Just fine. She’d do her best to make it sure that she sounded that way. But she hadn’t been expecting Ter’s statement. She nearly dropped the phone and stared at it for a minute.

“Are you asking me out because I am pregnant?” she said after a moment. Her voice came out flatter than she’d expected it to be. “Is that what you think?” She tried to ignore the other statement—the one where he said he wanted to ask her out for a while, and he hadn’t had anyone since they’d split. Actually, this whole conversation was making her anxious and disarmed and—and—

“Ter, I am going now,” she said. “I think I am going to pass out.”