CHAPTER 1 Part 1 – Once Upon a Baby

Katie blew out another breath as she tried to squeeze into her jeans, but it was pointless. There was no way they were going on. Ripping them off her legs, Katie threw them onto the increasing pile of things that she could no longer wear.

Trying not let it get the best of her, she turned back to her closet.

“Kat get your butt down here! We are going to be late for school!” her older brother Liam bellowed from the kitchen.

“I’m not going!” Katie knew she sounded like a two-year-old. But how many seventeen-year-old girls out there were dealing with a pregnant belly?

Katie could hear Cole, Liam’s best friend’s rumbly voice. That was perfect. She only needed more witnesses to her humiliation.

“Katie-cat,” Cole’s voice was just outside of her door. “What is the problem? Are you feeling sick again?”

Most of Katie’s first trimester had been hellish. Whoever named it morning sickness, is a complete numbskull. It was an all day, every day, puke fest.

Katie had even lost five pounds on her small frame. The doctor had been concerned and even pulled Liam in to speak with him about it.

“I’m fine, Cole,” Katie yelled through the door.

“If you are fine, I’m coming in.”

As the knob started to turn Katie realized that she was standing there in her underwear. Screeching she grabbed a blanket from the bed to cover herself.

“What the hell, Cole? I’m not dressed!”

Cole caught sight of the tornado that had hit his friend Liam younger sister’s room. He wasn’t even sure he could see the floor. Raising his eyebrows, he glanced over to where Katie was standing with a blanket wrapped around her.

“Were we invited to a toga party I wasn’t aware of?”

Katie rolled her eyes, “I wasn’t dressed.”

Cole laughed. “I used to see you run naked across the yard on a daily basis.”

Cole lived next door to the McCannons and had been best friends with Liam for as long as Katie could remember.

When Liam and Katie’s parents were struck in a hit and run accident a year ago, Liam had been eighteen and was able to keep Katie, a minor, living with him in their parents’ home.

“I haven’t run naked in the yard for over ten years,” Katie frowned at Cole.

Laughing at her tone, Cole stretched his arms over his head, showing a slice of his washboard abs. Katie couldn’t help a wave of lust shooting through her. Stupid second trimester, it was causing havoc with her hormones. Here she was ready to jump Cole. Obviously, she was out of her mind.

“More is the pity,” Cole sighed. “Now, you have your brother’s panties in a twist. So, throw something on, and let’s go.”

Katie felt a pinching behind her eyes, those damn hormones! “Nothing fits, and I am not going to school in a blanket.”

It was bad enough that people thought she was a slut because she was seventeen and pregnant. Friends that she had known for years completely dropped her. It wasn’t a secret that Katie got a little wild after her parents passed. Everyone deals with grief in their own way.

“Cole?” Liam was in her bedroom doorway. “What the hell happened in here?”

“Fashion crisis,” Cole quipped.

Katie wanted to throw something at him, preferably a spiked heel. “Nothing fits, I’m not going to school today.”

Liam leafed through the discarded pile. “If you didn’t insist on wearing those damn skinny jeans.”

Katie’s lips trembled. “I’m fat now. I will just get uglier and uglier.”

“Aww hell,” Cole went over to Katie and awkwardly patted her head. “Can we skip today and get the girl some clothes?”

Liam apparently did not want to skip. But he knew what an emotional mess Katie could be. And this pregnancy thing threw in a wild card that he had no idea how to deal with.

“I have a test in trig, Kat,” Liam tried to reason, but as he saw the first tear splash against her cheek, he knew that he was cooked. Liam would do anything for Katie. They were all they had left for each other.

“I don’t have any tests today,” Cole offered. “We can drop you at school, and I will take Katie shopping.”

“You would do that?” Katie’s voice held just a hint of disbelief.

“Anything for you, Katie-cat,” Cole shrugged it off. “What do you say, Liam?”

Katie looked up at her older brother with longing in her eyes. For the first time that morning she looked hopeful.

Liam sighed, “Fine, but as soon as you are finished you need to get your ass to school.”

Katie made a face. “It’s my favorite place, why would I want to miss a moment?”

Cole grinned, “Sarcastic, much?”

Liam laughed at Katie’s sour expression. Both boys knew how challenging school had been on Katie since discovering she was pregnant.

Katie looked around, “But what am I going to wear to go shopping?”

Liam’s eyes lit. “I have just the thing.”