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Guilty
All week, a heavy fog settled over me. My legs felt like lead, my body unbearably dense, and even the smallest effort left me drained. Something was wrong—I could feel it, pulsing under my skin—but I could not name it. When my period didn’t come, panic gripped me like a vise. I bought a pregnancy test, heart hammering, hands trembling. The result appeared. Positive.
The world tilted. It couldn’t be true. Sunny and I hadn’t been careless, at least not entirely—but even a single misstep could bring a life into being. My first thought cut through me, precise and cold: I didn’t want this. Not here. Not now. Perhaps not ever with him. Yet, what was done was done.
Sunny’s reaction offered no solace. His eyes mirrored my shock, but his words gave nothing—no comfort, no plan, no hope. He admitted bluntly that he wasn’t ready, that he had neither money nor stability, that a child was impossible under our circumstances. And in that stark moment, I knew: whatever came next, the decision, the weight, the burden, would fall entirely on me.
My mind scattered, skittering from one fear to another. Each path seemed unbearable. If I stayed in Ireland, I had no options—the procedure was illegal here. I would have to leave, abandon everything I knew, and do it quickly. I didn’t even know how far along I was.
I wandered the streets, trying to summon courage, trying to steel myself for what I knew I had to do. I was about to end a life already begun, and each step felt like a betrayal of some sacred trust, a sacred possibility I could not honor. The guilt pressed down on me, iron and relentless, and I felt it in my bones. I wrote home. My mother and sister responded with horror, but their voices were steady, grounding me.
“Come back right away. We’ll figure something out. But don’t stay there,” my mother urged.
Their support offered a fragile comfort, yet it could not erase the shame that coiled in my chest. This was my fault. I had been reckless. Careless. I tried to imagine the child, and the ache in my chest tightened, a quiet, persistent pain. A boy? A girl? One afternoon, a tiny red shoe appeared on the street—a girl’s shoe, small and lonely. I froze. My chest tightened further, torn between sorrow and longing, imagining what might have been.
“So, you would have been my daughter,” I whispered to the empty air, and tears blurred my eyes, tracing paths down my cheeks I could not stop.
The day before I was to leave, I went to Carlow to book my flight. Every step carried the weight of inevitability—and a single, impossible desire: to see Jack, just once more. Not to linger. Not to hope. Only to see him.
And then it happened. As if the universe itself had bent to my longing, I looked up—and there he was, walking toward me, every step deliberate, every motion familiar and impossible at once. The street around us blurred; the crowd thinned into nothing. My heart lurched, disbelief and joy mingling, as if all the weeks of longing had been leading to this single, predestined instant.
I laughed aloud—at the audacity of the moment, at the strange coincidences that seemed to follow me like shadows, at the sheer power of a wish sent out to the universe, answered in the most impossible way. His shirt was smudged with dust and grime from the building site. He stumbled over his words when I told him I was leaving tomorrow.
“Wait here a second—I just need to run into the bank. Or no, better—go into that pub across the road. I’ll be right there,” he said, already darting away before I could answer.
I went into the bar of the pub we had agreed on and found a quiet corner to sit. I tried to calm my racing heart, but every second stretched impossibly long. Nervousness knotted my stomach, yet beneath it all, a spark of joy surged at the thought of seeing him again. The world outside seemed to fade, leaving only the anticipation of this impossible encounter.
A few minutes passed, each one heavier than the last, until finally, he appeared. Breathless, cheeks flushed, Jack slid onto the barstool beside me, and for a moment, nothing else existed but the pulse of our shared presence.
“What are the chances? I was just thinking how much I wished I’d see you—and there you are,” I laughed again, nerves and joy mingling.
“Really?” he said, shaking his head, a small smile tugging at his lips.
“Why are you leaving?” he asked, voice gentle, searching.
“I don’t want to… but I have to. I’m pregnant,” I whispered, shame burning through me.
Jack’s face changed instantly—serious, alert, his eyes sharpening.
“You’re sure?” he asked softly.
“I’m sure,” I said, voice trembling.
His words caught, unspoken panic hanging between us. “You’re not going to keep it?”
I dropped my gaze, tears rising. “No. Sunny… he wants me to go home. To end it. He says it’s best.”
Jack’s eyes darkened, and I heard the low mutter of frustration: “What an idiot.”
We talked, circling memories, lighter moments, laughter breaking through the heaviness. For a while, he carried me away from it all. With him, I felt strength returning, courage sparking, readying me for what must come. He understood, better than anyone else. He admitted he sometimes wondered what might have been if Alice hadn’t kept Julian. And then he said he was glad it never came to that, because now he had a son he cherished above all else.
That evening, we parted as friends.
But later, back at my apartment, grief returned in full force. I sat on my bed, suitcase half-packed, heart heavy with longing. This couldn’t be the end. I picked up my phone, fingers trembling, and sent him a message: that I still loved him.
The reply came almost instantly, a single line that carried everything:
I love you too.
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