The last month seemed like it had flown by faster than normal. Each night saw me falling asleep in Jimin's arms after usually two rounds of passionate sex. Then, I woke each morning in the tight embrace of my boyfriend's arms. Our days were spent falling in love. Sometimes it was Jimin and I spending time together, and on others, we were surrounded by his family or some of the other Seed Bearers and their females.

Everyone was supportive of our relationship. At times, though, I found a few of the other assigned females looked at me with green jealousy. I especially felt that when we all caught up for the combined birthdays of Jungkook and Namjoon 11 days ago. As an ARMY, it felt surreal to celebrate a Bangtan birthday with the actual men. Only Jimin knew the truth of the reason why I went completely overboard with making such an elaborate birthday cake for the two men.

It had been about six weeks since the blonde Seed Bearer and I had started being intimate together. Along with my love for him, my guilt increased with each day that we spent together. At least once a day, Jimin asked if I thought his baby might be in my belly. Since I had not bled while we'd been sleeping in the same bed, his hope for a pregnancy had grown exponentially. It was strange for me to have a man this invested in whether I was pregnant or not. The two pregnancy scares I had with my ex-fiancé had Nate praying that it was a false alarm.

The breakfasts we had most mornings with the rest of Jimin's family were my most dreaded times. It was during these meals that the Parks discussed our possible pregnancy. I still was not used to my sex life being discussed and debated by members of a family, but I had learned from Ari and Soon-Bok that this was normal. From their reactions, it seemed that Jimin's family were more discrete than others. I'd accidentally spat my coffee on the other two assigned females when Ari said Yoongi's parents wanted to watch to make sure his technique was correct. She said it didn't come to that, thankfully, since she'd found out that she was already knocked up.

For the past three Sundays, Mrs Park had given me a pregnancy test. It was no surprise to me when it always came back with a 'negative' result. While I knew there was never going to be a different response, Jimin and the rest of his family were disappointed each time when they heard the result. I found myself being more affected by the look on my boyfriend's face than the unchanged paper; Jimin's lower lip jutted out and his eyes lost some of their sparkle.

So here we were, yet another Sunday. I held the pregnancy test in my hand as I strode towards the bathroom. The tests were similar to the ones we had in my universe where you had to pee on them. Although, what they were made of was different. Instead of the plastic stick test that was the standard back home, the one here looked like litmus paper. When the paper touched urine, it would turn blue if any HCG, the hormone made only during pregnancy, was present. If there was no HCG present, the paper would remain white. Mine were always white.

"You want me to hold your hand?" Jimin asked as he met me at our bathroom door. He'd held my hand the entire way upstairs, his thumb rubbing gentle circles into my skin.

"You want to watch me pee?" I teased, pinching his cheeks lightly when they turned pink as he shook his head. "I'm okay, Bubba. It's not the first time we've done this."

"For luck?" he murmured, patting his lips and requesting a kiss. Unable to decline him, I pecked his puffy lips and then moaned as he wound his hand into my hair to deepen it.

"You're silly, Jiminie."

"You love me anyway," he said with a wide grin that made his eyes turn into little crescents. "Go. The sooner you do the test, the sooner we know whether there's my baby in there or if I need to keep trying to put one in."

꧁♥💜♥꧂

"I don't understand, My Love. H-how can we have so much sex and the test still came back negative?"

My heart broke seeing Jimin in tears like this. As expected, the test had come back as 'negative'. But today was different from the other Sundays as Jimin had broken down and ran away from the dining room when I announced the result. I'd found him tucked into the corner of our walk-in robe, tears streaming down his handsome face.

"Is- Is it me? Has something happened to me since last year?" he uttered aloud. "I know I can't be sterile because my hair hasn't turned black."

I was shocked by this. Could a Seed Bearer go from being virile with colourful hair to having black hair overnight? Could Jimin be rendered unable to reproduce? Before I could ask, he continued on and began muttering about how it wasn't fair that both Seokjin and Yoongi had children coming. He complained that while the two Seed Bearers had a close relationship with their assigned females, they weren't in love like Jimin and I were.

"Why do you automatically assume it's you with the problem," I whispered. My eyes widened as I registered what I had said unintentionally. Judging by how Jimin stilled, he had heard it too.

"What do you mean by that?" While his voice was soft, there was a coldness to the tone in which the words came out. A lone tear streaked down my cheek as I watched the hope disappear from Jimin's eyes. "What aren't you telling me, Elenor?"

I hated hearing my name come from his lips like that. Jimin hadn't called me Elenor since the first day we met. When I'd asked him to call me by my nickname, he'd used 'Nell' instead. I opened my mouth to speak but nothing came out. I didn't want to say the words. I knew that revealing my secret would harm not only my relationship with the love of my life; it also might cost me my life.

"For fuck's sake, just tell me!" he shouted, scaring me with the venom that seeped from each word.

"I'll never be able to get pregnant. I can't have children." My voice was barely louder than a whisper; with the silence hanging around us, each one sounded like I had used a megaphone. Jimin recoiled as if I had slapped him. His hand moved to cover his mouth as a strangled wail forced its way from his throat.

"No. No! Tell me it's not true," he whimpered.

Both of our cheeks were covered by tears, although it felt like we were mourning different things. Jimin was upset from being lied to and deceived since the day I came into his life, whereas I was terrified that I'd be losing him today—and my life.

The sound of both of our hearts breaking was deafening, even drowning out the sounds of our sniffling. Neither of us said anything. I had no words. What could you say to comfort someone you loved with every cell in your body when you were a failure of a woman? There isn't a Hallmark card that says, 'I'm sorry I made you fall in love with me, only to die shortly after because I can't carry your baby'.

Finally, after what felt like an eternity of spiralling thoughts, Jimin turned to me. It took me a few seconds to realise that he was asking that I clarify what I had told him since he didn't understand.

"You know how you were asking about the scars on my stomach," I asked, not able to look him in the eye. Through my peripheral vision, I saw blonde hair moving as he nodded. "Well, when I got them, I lost the chance to ever conceive a baby."

I grabbed hold of my phone from its hiding place and turned it on so I could look through the gallery. There was one video that I knew would prove to him that I was telling the truth. It was the one my mother took of me waking up after the surgery. It was difficult hearing Past Nell wailing because I'd realised my dream of being pregnant wasn't ever going to happen. Seeing Jimin's reaction though... That was like seeing all hope dissolving from the world.

"I was telling the truth, Jimin. I did have benign tumours like I told you the other night. What I left out, though, was that they were g-growing i-in my u-uterus." I had to pause for a few moments to calm myself down. My tears were brewing again seeing Jimin's face contort into pain. "Between the unbearable pain I'd get each month and the potential spreading of the growths to other organs, I had to get a hysterectomy... I had to have my uterus removed."

"S-so there's no chance at all t-that you could get p-pregnant?" Jimin asked, sniffling after watching the video. I knew he couldn't understand the words being spoken by my mother and me, but the emotions could be easily comprehended in any language.

I shook my head and explained that although I still had my ovaries, I didn't get a period. I told him how I'd heard the old wives' tales that some women could still get pregnant after a hysterectomy. My gynaecologist had said that was extremely rare, though. 'You'd have more luck winning the lotto twice,' she had told me when I asked if it was possible.

"Jimin, wait!" I shouted as I watched my love walking away from me and towards the door.

'Fuck you, universes! What am I... your punching bag that you pull out whenever you're bored?'