✕ ╱ 𝙒𝙃𝙀𝙉 𝙏𝙄𝙈𝙀 𝙁𝙍𝙀𝙀𝙕𝙀𝙎 before your eyes, you start to reconsider all of your life choices. you wonder what led you to the place you are at the moment, and where different choices would take you. you imagine yourself in the shoes of a different version of yourself; and you’re never sure if you’d like it, but then, this is one truth you’d never see truly happening.
when she shows him the test, he finds himself yet in another one of those episodes, where he is mere spectator of the reality that unfolds in front of him and shatters beneath his feet – the shards, the unhinged edges of the truth grazing against his skin and making realize that this time there were no where to run – which made him realize an even harder truth –
he was alone, he would ever be alone.
❝ what’s this. ❞ it was a rhetorical question – like a child who’s testing the waters with those who they love, he asks, not expecting an answer, asking just because he wants to stretch that moment of desperation that makes him freeze in place; makes him undone. ❝ it can’t be… ❞
romeo didn’t doubt her truthfulness and integrity – of everything in his life, tamsin was still the most wholesome part; even though within her lies the power to destroy him, as she has done before. he doesn’t doubt her, not for one second, and the truth weighs his shoulders, makes his head hang in desperation as he holds the test with the same shaky hands as her own.
he didn’t want this, but that onlooker part of himself whispers in his hear – the outcome of being with her, with them is something you truly ever wanted.
his mouth is dry, his fingers tangled on his hair as he looks up at her, realizing her had sat at some points, in need of some ground to place himself. maybe, the voice whispers, it’s something you’d like to try.
❝ tamsin, i’m going to be a dad? ❞
THERE IS NO WAY to describe what she’s feeling other than fear. she fears what she is about to say, fears his reaction, fears his rejection. she fears she has to go through this alone, for even if it is her responsibility she’s not sure she has the shoulders to carry this burden. most of all she fears that she will irreversibly lose him — she thinks this is possibly the worst thing she will possibly have to go through.
she watches him as if she’s watching from behind a glass, but she feels like there’s oceans between them. there is nothing she wants more than to reach out to him, to reassure him that no matter the outcome they will be fine, but tamsin is honest, and she is not that brave.
but she is strong. this girl, built of blood and bone and tragedy and scars that will never heal, has an iron mind and steel walls guarding her soul. this girl, small in size and gentle in tone, has a will that moves mountains. romeo sways, he sits, and tamsin stands still not because she can, but because she must. this boy, she likes to believe, has cracked his own heart open for her to reach into, and she doesn’t know how to handle something so strong yet so fragile. still, she’s fighting — not because she can, but because she must.
« i think so. » the words sound distant, untrue, as if they haven’t just been uttered by her. she should not have to say this, but she knows a house is built on steady ground and this is her rebuilding now. trust, honesty, but first it will hurt.
« romeo, there was .. before that weekend before vegas .. » she clenches her fists, prays to a god she doesn’t believe in, « i was with someone one night, about a week before. it didn’t mean anything, but it still happened. » she steps closer to him, tentatively, and there is hesitation in every breath she draws. this was before them, before there had even been a them, a time she knew rome had spent with others than her as well, but this was bigger than just the two of us. he needed to know though. he deserved to know.
« it didn’t mean anything, » she repeats quieter now. « but i’m not sure yet .. if you’re the father. »
