[UNEDITED][JASON]

        “You’re what?” I asked in complete shock.

        I needed to take a moment to gather my thoughts and consider what Erin had just said. She told me that she was taking birth control and, every single night but last night, I made sure I used a condom just to be sure.

        I mean, I wanted kids but this was far too soon into our relationship. We had been together for two weeks, well, technically we’ve been together for nine months but in a proper relationship for two weeks.

        “I know you’re lying,” Oliver finally found the words to actually speak.

        “And how can you be so sure?” Erin challenged. I would have said something but he knew her better than I did, they had been in relationship with each other for two and a half years before I walked into the picture.

        I felt terrible knowing that I had slept with two of his girlfriends. Ria had insisted that she was single though and there was no one else in her life but, finding out that she lied to me, that hurt even if she was dead. I hated Oliver, knowing that he was the one who had killed both Ria and my unborn baby, but then I couldn’t help but feel sorry for him at the same time.

        The girl he loved fucked him over and she used me to be able to do it. Other than murdering an innocent child and his ex-girlfriend, Oliver wasn’t actually the bad guy in all of this.

        “Firstly, you don’t want kids, you always told me that. And, secondly, you took every precaution necessary to ensure you never became pregnant. The only thing you didn’t do was have a hysterectomy, but that was only because I talked you out of that,” Oliver laughed. All I could do was look at the two people in front of me, fighting like they were a married couple and it made me insanely jealous.

        “They failed,” Erin shrugged.

        “What? Every single aspect of your birth control happened to fail at exactly the same time?” Oliver laughed manically. He did have a point though, even if I didn’t like the man, he knew what he was talking about.

        “Apparently,” Erin replied simply.

        “Prove it,” Oliver countered, but Erin remained speechless because he knew as well as I did that she couldn’t prove it. She had lied to make a point and it was plain childish. “Exactly. That’s what I thought.”

        An uncomfortable silence then fell over the room and I couldn’t stand to be there anymore. It was all too much for one person this early in the morning and I needed some space to think about what had happened – Oliver’s admission, Erin’s lies, my actions.

        “I’m going to get dressed,” I muttered and as I went to walk out of the room Erin’s hand caught hold of my wrist and held me back. “What?”

        “I’m sorry,” she said.

        “Yeah.”

        “No, really, I am sorry Jason. I just wanted to see what he would do,” Erin sighed, but that didn’t make the lie any better.

        I wasn’t ready for kids but if she had actually have been pregnant, then I would have still been here for her. I would have raised our child and I never would have questioned it because I love her, but she lied and that hurt so much.

        “I would never do anything to you Erin. I especially wouldn’t dream of hurting you if you were pregnant,” Oliver pointed out.

        “You must forgive if I find that hard to believe,” Erin muttered sarcastically.

        “What I did to Ria, I have to live with that for the rest of my life. I have to live with the fact I killed the girl I loved and an unborn child, but I was young and drunk at the time. I know it’s not an excuse but don’t you think I’ve been punished enough?” Oliver asked and knowing he was carrying around the guilt of what he did wasn’t a proper punishment but I didn’t want to go back to the past.

        That was a seriously low point in my life. At sixteen, I was dealing with the death of my girlfriend and my child, but I was dealing with it alone because I never told anyone and they never found the killer either. Chloe tried to be there for me but, at nine years old, she didn’t understand why I locked myself in my room and refused to speak to anyone.

        When she heard me crying, she would always knock on the door and I would always let her in, but she would never speak. She would just cuddle herself up to me on my bed and fall asleep with her arms wrapped around me as I hugged her back. Back then, that was closest to happiness I had ever reached.

        “I’m sorry that I took your girlfriend from you back then and I’m sorry that it’s happened again—“

        “Don’t say that,” Erin hissed and I saw the sudden flash of hurt in her face as she thought I meant she was a mistake.

        “I’m sorry that it’s happened again, but it doesn’t change how I felt about Ria or how I feel about Erin. I understand that I have hurt you in ways I could never imagine, but you hurt me too and I can never forgive you for what you did Oliver. I think you need to leave,” I muttered as I looked at him with a straight face.

        I wasn’t going to let Erin out of my life just because he turned up again, declaring that he still loved her and that leaving her for her brother was a terrible mistake. I loved her and I wanted to spend my life with her, even if she did lie about being pregnant to wind her ex up.

        “You’re too damn nice for your own good,” Erin muttered, unimpressed with me apologising.

        “I want you gone by the time I come back down here,” I sighed, pulling away from Erin and heading back up to the bedroom.

        When I got in there, I sat on the edge of the bed and wondered how different my life could be right now.

        If I had never caught Charlotte with Matthew, then perhaps I would be married and settled down. I wouldn’t have loved her, but I would have had some proper stability in my life for the first time since I turned fifteen and I would have a life I could work with. Charlotte could be pregnant, expecting our child and we could have our own kind of happiness.

        Instead, I got Erin and everything which came with her. I got the psycho ex-boyfriend who, despite not actually wanting to be with her, didn’t want anyone to be with her either. I got the dark past which she didn’t want to tell me about but she wanted me to know she had regardless. I got the lies which always hurt more when they come out after the event.

        But I also got the most wonderful woman I could wish for. I could someone who could make me smile, someone who could make me laugh, someone who knew all of my faults and still wanted to be with me, someone who would do anything to see me happy, someone who my sister immediately connected with, someone who loved Amanda, someone who was generally all round amazing person and had made me realise what it really was to love someone.

        I was pulling my t-shirt over my head when the bedroom door opened and Erin walked in, sitting on the bed beside me.

        “I love you so much it scares me Jason. I didn’t mean to lie, especially not about something like that, but it just feels like this is all moving very quickly at the moment,” she sighed as she put her head on my shoulder and her hand on my leg, which I hadn’t had the chance to cover with a pair of trousers.

        “Amanda is coming over this afternoon,” I replied because I didn’t want to talk about anything which had happened that morning. I just wanted to pretend that it didn’t happen, at least until I was ready to discuss everything. “And she’s going to be—“

        “Please don’t ignore me Jase,” she muttered.

        “—staying with us for the entire week,” I finished my sentence and then stood up from the bed, walking over to my drawer to grab a pair of jeans out of it.

        I looked at Erin to see that she was doing her best not to burst into tears. I knew I was being a total twat and I had ruined everything which happened last night, but this is what happened when I was lied to and then discovered the truth.

        I didn’t want to speak to anyone. I didn’t want to talk about what happened. I especially didn’t want people to tell me that they were there for me. I just wanted to be left alone until I was ready to talk about it, which would eventually happen, but it would be on my terms and no one else’s.

        “Maybe this is something we both need,” Erin finally spoke, her eyes not quite meeting mine as she looked over to me.

        “Yeah. Maybe,” I muttered and then walked out of the room.

        “Jase, please, at least tell me you love me. I’m beginning to think you never have,” she shouted after me, causing me to stop half way down the stairs, while she just stood there and looked at me like she had just found out the Tooth Fairy wasn’t a real thing.

        “Have I given you reason to think that?” I asked.

        “Just say it. Just tell me that you love me,” she begged. It was obvious that she needed this, she needed to be reassured that I wasn’t about to run away from her and leave her alone, just like Oliver had done.

        “Of course I love you Erin. Don’t ever doubt my love for you because that doubt will be seriously misplaced. I love you with everything I have,” I managed to smile at her and it seemed to be enough for her since she walked away.

        I walked downstairs and into the living room, surprised to see that Oliver was still in there. When he saw me, he began to rub the back of his neck nervously, like he wanted to say something but he wasn’t sure how to say it.

        I would have spoken first, but I was rather enjoying his serious discomfort. He had gone from arrogant and cocky so silent and nervous in the space of ten minutes, something which I found highly amusing and it was extremely difficult not to laugh at that very moment.

        When he didn’t say anything, I headed towards the kitchen so that I could cook the breakfast I planned on cooking the moment I woke up this morning. It wasn’t going to be same, but I was still going to do it since Erin was usually the one who cooked for me.

        “Jason,” Oliver’s voice was just about audible. “I know you can never forgive me and I know you can never understand either, but please know that I am sorry for what I did that night. It was wrong and, regardless of how angry I was with her, I should never have killed her and then I shouldn’t have run either.”

        “Then why did you?” I asked without turning round. I didn’t want to look at him right now. In fact, I never wanted to look him again because, if I did, then I may end up hitting his pretty little face and be unable to stop before it got too much.

        “I was drunk. When I saw her sitting at the edge of the road, I wanted to make her pay and I wanted to make you suffer. I was a teenager with a drinking problem who had just had his heartbroken by the only girl who had ever understood him and actually stuck by him,” he explained.

        It was painful to listen to but, after fourteen years of wondering what the hell happened, it’s good to finally have some closure on the events of that night. I didn’t even know she was pregnant until I heard the paramedics tell her parents that she was two months gone. I hugged them and they hugged me back, right before they kicked me out and told me they never wanted to see me again.

        “My sister, she had a miscarriage and I told her that losing the baby hurt me like it hurt her, but she never understood why. She told me I could never understand how it felt to lose a baby because I had never been a parent. She told me if I had the chance to be a father and then we lost the baby, then I would understand, but until then I would never have the faintest idea of just how painful it actually was,” I found myself saying. I don’t even know why I was telling him this, I hated the man, but seemed relevant to the situation for some reason.

        “I’m sorry Jason. I really am,” Oliver whispered.

        “I could never tell my parents about the baby and my sister was only nine at the time, so she would never understand. All she could do was hug me and fall asleep in my arms every single night and, when the tears became too much, I would eventually fall asleep.”

        “You deserve to be happy Jason and me, well I deserve nothing, not after the things I have done. You and Erin are good together, don’t throw it away because of me,” Oliver said and, without even turning around, I knew that he was leaving and the sound of the front door slamming was the confirmation I was waiting for.

        When I heard that noise, I couldn’t hold it in anymore. I felt my legs give up on me and I feel to the floor in tears.