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Coach Dombrowski had told Kelly that he had to do 20 pushups, something that would have been easy for him to do about six months ago when he was in peak athletic condition, before he could rejoin the baseball practice. The rest of the team had all run back onto the field, leaving him on the sidelines.
Unfortunately, Kelly was not currently in peak athletic condition. It felt like just the opposite, actually. He struggled immensely with each pushup. He got out of breath really easily since this whole thing started, and the extra weight now that he was into the third trimester didnt help at all. Kelly also kept forgetting what number he was at. He ended up at around seven pushups before noticing that the coach wasn't actually looking at him and decided to stop. He sat down cross legged, watching the others do what he wished he could.
Kelly sometimes wondered why he'd even decided to take on this pregnancy, or why he'd chosen to continue it after Lisa broke up with him. It wasn't really a question; the answer was simple. He'd grown attached. Attached to the pregnancy, to the idea of being a parent…The thought of being able to bring another life into the world. He'd had six and a half months to grow a bond, and he found himself smiling whenever he felt the baby move within his makeshift womb, thinking everything might be alright.
But then he looked realistically about how this pregnancy was panning out. Uncle Theus had, for some reason, told him to keep it a secret, and that was ruining his chance to do just about any extracurricular or even to hang out with family members other than Theus. He was about one incident away from getting kicked out of church altogether, after disturbing the peace again and again.
All he really wanted was for everyone to stop being mad at him; Coach was definitely mad, he couldn't bear to meet his eyes, and Lisa had fully broken up with him when she realized this wasn't going to be a walk in the park. Even if he had someone to talk to, they'd just talk about how women have been doing this for millennia, which, while true, did not make his situation any easier.
Kelly sat and picked at the grass of the high school field, trying to rip the blades in half without pulling it up, and tried to blink back the tears that were blurring his vision. He shouldn't have dated Lisa in the first place. Ditto had told him; she was the priest's precious little girl, of course she was going to be insufferable.
“Hey,” said a voice. He looked up. Ditto was standing next to him.
Kelly cleared his throat. “Um, hi. Shouldn't you be practicing for the big game?” He looked back down at his lap, or what was his lap six months ago and was now covered by his baby bump.
Ditto sat down on the grass next to him, crossing his legs as well. He took off his baseball cap. “To tell the truth, I'm actually not super into exercise,” He admitted, placing the hat on his knee. “I really only tried out because you were doing it. I didnt think I'd get in. And now that you're kind of benched, I don't really have a reason to be doing this anymore.” He glanced at Kelly, smiling kind of sheepishly.
The pregnant boy looked up and knitted his brows. “Ditto, we've been in baseball since sophomore year. Why did you stay in it so long if you hated it? If it were me, I would have left last year when it got tough, even if my best friend enjoyed it.”
“Well, what can I say?”His friend's eyes softened. “The guy I joined for is pretty great.”
Kelly sighed and looked back at the grass. “Yeah, I guess I royally fucked that up too, just like I did my future in baseball and my relationship, really my future altogether. Now I'm just kind of a shitty person.”
“Hey, woah. Kelly, you're not a shitty person. It takes two to make a child, and in our case, it took four or five if you count Adam,” said Ditto. Kelly looked up at him and saw a blush creep up his cheeks as he said the next part. “I'm so proud of you for taking this on for Lisa, even if she doesn't realize how big of an undertaking it is. She kind of sucks. I'm sorry she left you.”
Kelly managed a small smile at Ditto. “Thanks, man. That means a lot.” He closed his eyes and tried to shake away the overwhelming wave of emotion that was washing over him, but was unsuccessful.
Usually, he was pretty good at not crying, just pushing everything down so just didn't feel anything; now, it seemed impossible not to feel, not to break down. He found himself crying softly, all of the emotions from the past six and a half months erupting out at once.
Ditto's quickly moved to hug him, holding him close. “You're okay. I've got you.”
Kelly buried his face in Ditto's shoulder and just let himself cry for the first time in several months. His friend did his best to soothe him, rubbing his back gently. He tried not to think about the amount of people who could potentially be looking over and seeing him cry at the moment. That would be possibly the worst thing that could happen.
After a long moment, Kelly took a shaky breath and looked up at Ditto. “I'm sorry. I just… Life has kind of sucked lately.”
Ditto nodded, squeezing his hand. “You've kind of got the worst case scenario going on here.”
Kelly couldn't help but laugh at Ditto's bluntness. “I didn't think it would be this hard,” he said. “I mean, I was prepared for the pregnancy and what it would do to my body; I did my research. I just thought… I don't know, I guess I thought Lisa would try to stay with me, or be nice to me, at least?”
His friend sighed. “I don't know what her deal is. You're making, like, the ultimate sacrifice for her, and the second you have symptoms of pregnancy, very normal ones, she dips? Not gonna lie, I kind of hate her.”
“You were right, man, I shouldn't have dated her. Her dad is the priest and she turned out to lack basic human decency? How has she survived this long?”
Ditto snorted. “Apparently when you're popular, you can get away with anything.”
Kelly nodded gravely at that observatjon. It was something he'd seen for years in other kids, but he had been blindsided by his love for Lisa.
That was the last thing that was said for quite a while. They watched as the rest of the baseball team did their practice duties, Ditto's arm around Kelly's shoulders.
Eventually, as the practice was wrapping up, Ditto spoke again. “Hey, listen, would you want to go to prom with me?”
Kelly looked up at him and knitted his brows. “I mean, yeah. I thought we were going stag together?”
His friend nodded, not meeting his gaze. “Um, yes, but I was wondering if you would want to go in the way you would have with Lisa, you know, before?”
“Like a date, Ditto?” Kelly chuckled.
“Yes, that's a good way of putting it, I suppose,” he replied, looking up at the sky. “If you'd be willing to, I'd really enjoy it, I think.”
Kelly grinned and sat up further, taking Ditto's hand from his shoulder to hold it. “I would love to.” He used his other hand to cup his friend's face, making him look at him. “I think that would make me happier than Lisa ever did, honestly.”
Ditto's face lit up. “Really? I mean, of course, I never doubted that you would want to go with me, but I really doubted that you would want to go with me,” he rambled nervously.
Kelly squeesed Ditto's hand and opened his mouth to say something, but just then, the coach blew his whistle to signal that practice was over.
He looked over at Dombrowski as the stampede that was the baseball team ran by and quickly disentangled his hands from Ditto's. He was already the laughing stock of the school, he wasn't sure he could handle the freshmen calling him gay, too. Ditto looked like he wanted to protest the stopping of the hand holding, but ended up just gesturing with his head toward where the coach was walking toward them. Kelly's eyes widened and the two of them scrambled to get up and leave before Coach got over to where they were sitting so he could yell at him again. Ditto stood up and helped Kelly stand, and they hurried into the locker room to change back into their normal clothes. He pretended that he just didn't hear Dombrowski when he called his name.
After changing, they went to Ditto's house, something they did a lot. It used to be that Ditto would take Kelly to Theus's house, in the beginning of the pregnancy, to make sure everything was going right, but Kelly's uncle had decided that they didn't need to meet so frequently anymore.
The boys had gotten used to seeing each other after practice, though, so they usually hung out in Ditto's room and played video games. Sometimes they went to Kelly's house, but his kid brother was there and neither of them wanted to deal with him, so they tended to end up at Ditto's.
At this particular moment, Kelly was sitting cross legged in Ditto's room and leaning back against the bed. They had just finished a round of the race game Ditto had on one of his consoles. Kelly had won, as usual. Sometimes he thought his friend let him win; who was this bad at the easiest difficulty on Mario Kart? Then again, he'd seen the way he held the controller, acting like it might catch on fire at any moment, which wasnt ideal for a game where the remote acts like a steering wheel. Maybe car racing just really wasn't Ditto's thing.
Kelly had set down his remote and was looking up at the ceiling, thinking. Mostly, he was wondering how to bring up the whole prom thing again. He didn't know if Ditto was serious about it, and since his friend had been sort of awkwardly not saying anything about it, he was worried that he'd changed his mind.
Ditto had gone really quiet as well, which was sort of odd. He looked over, expecting to see him concentrating on picking his character and customizing the car he was going to use for the next round, but instead found that his friend was looking back at him. If that was what he'd been doing the entire last race instead of looking at the screen, no wonder he'd lost.
When he saw that Kelly had noticed him staring, Ditto quickly turned back to the screen. He was clearly trying to act normal, but the tips of his ears were turning red and he had a lot less to say than normal.
Kelly decided that if he didn't say something about the prom situation, it wouldn't be said at all. He awkwardly cleared his throat, making Ditto look at him again. “Uh, do you still wanna go to prom together?” He asked, not meeting Ditto's eyes. “I don't know what I'd wear, but I could figure something out.”
He looked slowly back up at his friend, who was grinning. “Yes, I do,” he said and pulled him into a slightly stiff hug.
Wrapping his arms around Ditto, Kelly said, “We're gonna have a great time. Screw what Lisa or anyone else thinks.”
Ditto nodded. “Don't pay her any attention. She's not worth it.” He thought for another moment before saying, “You know, I've seen a maternity clothes store, we might be able to find something for you to wear there, though if we do there's a strong possibility that if we do it'll be a dress…”
Kelly shrugged. “I already get stared at; might as well. I don't mind if you don't.”