Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Kian and JC. JC and Kian. Best buddies it seemed since forever. That’s the way it always had been. Ever since they had met in 2011 and started their collab channel in 2015 after our2ndlife finished, they had been riding on a high that didn’t seem to end.

That was until today. Ever since the ‘Playing With A Taser’ video they did, JC had been feeling kinda off. The feeling had been following him around for a while, but he didn’t really pay attention to it. He usually felt bad on a normal day as, come on, have you seen his life?

He thought, at first, that it was just repercussions from the taser and drinking alcohol combined. He and Kian pretty much drank a fair bit every night, despite Kian not being of legal age to drink and they usually had friends over.  There were also some nights they couldn’t even remember because they had drunk so much that they would black out. Thankfully, they didn’t happen as much.

So, he laid off the alcohol for a while, thinking that the feeling would pass once his body healed, but it didn’t. In fact, it got worse. He started getting sick every so often, ending up in the toilet at random hours of the day and night vomiting, dizzy, pale and stomach cramping.

He hid them from Kian for about a month before he noticed one night as he suddenly went pale and muttered something about being back in minute and took off from their group of friends without warning and sprinted towards their shared bathroom. Kian, concerned, followed him quickly, finding him in the fetal position in front of the toilet before he was throwing up again.

Oh, Kian saw red. Rushing quickly to tie his hair back and help him, he berated the slightly older man for not telling him about this and extracted a promise from him between bouts of vomiting and sitting on the bathroom floor with JC’s head on Kian’s thigh to go see a doctor, despite JC’s reassurances (that Kian wasn’t believing for a second) that he was fine and it would pass.

It was another fortnight before he actually did as he asked, as they were on tour and the vomiting spouts were getting more frequent than just every so often. In fact, if he had to really had to go back and reanalyze that time, he was pretty much vomiting every day almost.

His chest had also started hurting bad, making it hard to sleep on his front and the pain also made him breathless sometimes. That backflip he did in his hotel room a few days ago for a Kian & JC Q and A didn’t help either. He spent a whole 2 hours afterwards vomiting and threw the film off. Kian thankfully, though not too happy, didn’t complain, more worried than anything. He seemed to keep his eye on him a lot more after that.

He absolutely hated the doctors, but he complied with everything that wanted. Urine, blood, whatever they needed, he just wanted to prove Kian wrong that he was only a little sick and that he would be fine soon enough. The younger man had taken to watching his best friend like a hawk at moments when he thought he wasn’t looking, giving JC uneasy vibes along with the fluttering of his heart that he’d had since he'd met him. Not that he knew about that though.

When he was called into the office from the waiting room, he thought it was simple. A stomach bug or a intolerance of alcohol (that would really suck, but he could live with it) or something just as mundane and silly so he could throw it in Kian’s face and say ‘I told you I was fine!”.

He didn’t expect pregnant though. Not pregnant, anything but pregnant. Oh god.

“...What?” JC questioned the woman in front of him, blinking disbelievingly. “Please tell me you’re joking.”

“I’m afraid I’m not Mr. Caylen.” The doctor, a woman named Clarissa spoke softly, looking at him unmoving. “We’ve done all the tests and they say you’re about 2 months pregnant. You’re very lucky. You hopefully didn’t do much harm as your history precedes you.”

JC swallowed hard. First he was freaking out about being pregnant (Oh god, it had to be Kian’s, it couldn’t be anyone else.), now his mind has switched over to whatever was growing in him right this second. “What do you mean? Is it okay?”

“Your tests came back clean thankfully, we couldn’t find anything too harmful and your liver test came back in the normal range, so that’s good for now. However I can’t be sure of other things I need to check unless I do a ultrasound.”

JC didn’t know if it was just him or if that room and table appeared out of nowhere, but two seconds later it seemed, he found himself lying on his back on the metal table provided next to the ultrasound machine, jacket on the chair beside him and blue plaid and white shirts rolled up to expose his stomach.

“Alright, now I’m going to warn you, this is going to be quite cold. Usually we warm it up first, but our warmer’s been broken for a while.” JC shivered as she squeezed the thick blue slime on his lower stomach under his belly button in a zigzag pattern before putting the curved wand to his skin, pushing down every so often as she moved it around.

“Ah, there we go.” He suddenly heard a thumping sound in the room and looked around panicky, turning his head to her so fast it almost came of his shoulders. “What the hell is that?”

“That is the heartbeat.”The doctor murmured, turning the screen towards him to show him.

JC pulled himself up slightly to look at it. The image in black and white was hazy at best and really hard to make out, but you could clearly see a space of black with a small white shape inside of it, 4 tiny black and white holes moving in sync. “Holy shit...”

Kian should be here, Kian should be seeing this. But the thought of even telling Kian (fuck, what would he say? They were not ready for something like this) made him want to be sick and upset. He swallowed it down, though he was sure as he was cleaning himself up that the doctor could see the terror in his eyes.

A bunch of prescriptions, an ultrasound photo and about 5 panic attacks later, JC was back in their hotel room, staring at the photo in question with tears trailing down his cheeks. How in the hell he was going to tell Kian about this. It was obvious they were not ready to be dads yet. Their house was trashy, they had loud parties every so often, they did stupid shit nearly every day for their YouTube channel, they put themselves in harm’s way because it was fun.

A baby...a baby changed everything.

Head in his hands, JC looked down at his stomach, wondering what he should do? There was most likely a Planned Parenthood clinic around here, it would be over and done within a few hours and he could continue as normal, but…

He looked back at the photo again, having moved it to his bedside table, feeling his heart break at the thought of aborting the little thing. It was so...small. With legs and a little beating heart and it needed him. He might not have been the best parent ever right now given the drugs and alcohol he had consumed over the past few months, but, surprisingly, he’d wanted to be a dad. He just...didn’t expect to have that choice now.

Suddenly hearing footsteps coming and talking coming from outside his and Kian’s door, he quickly jumped into action, sweeping the multivitamin bottle, ginger sweets (thank god for small things, like holy shit, they’d done wonders already) and photo into his suitcase, wiping his eyes dry as the door opened and Kian stepped though.

“Hey, did you just get back from the doctors?”

“Yeah, I told you it was nothing motherfucker, I just needed to lay off the alcohol.”

“Woah, dude, okay!” Kian held out his hands in a placating gesture, but JC could see the relief in his eyes. “Are you coming? Harrison, Corey, Dom and Vitaly wanna go do Strip Poker in Harrison’s hotel room.”

Oh fuck. “Yeah, I’m coming, but I ain’t playing.” JC shook his head.

“You’re such a pussy JC” Kian teased before moving out. “Now come on, they’re expecting us!”

“Alright, wait a second. I”m feeling lightheaded.” He shook his head and took the photo back out, tucking it into his wallet quickly. ‘I’ll tell him tomorrow. He needs to know.’

“Hello, Earth to JC Caylen!”

“I”m coming, so shut the fuck up!”

Chapter Text

But he didn’t tell Kian tomorrow. Or the day after that. Or the day after that. Why? JC was just too scared, he didn’t want to upset Kian, but at the same time, he didn’t really know how Kian would take it.

He was going to turn 21 in a few weeks, so he was way too young. Their house was not prepared for a baby, their own mothers would cuss at the state of it and on top of that, there weren’t even in a relationship. It was doomed from the start.

So, he kept it to himself. It was better that way. Then he would just...he didn’t know what to do after, but he hoped it would come to him sooner rather than later. Hopefully, he could hide it. He wore mostly to big clothes anyway, that was his style. He could get away with lounging in hoodies and pajamas and giant t-shirts all day, so Kian and their friends wouldn’t notice.

It was made easier by the fact his stomach only grew so much, it stuck out like a sore thumb, but only to him. Nobody else noticed it.

He didn’t know how, but he managed to roll with it, quietly going about his business and only changing slight things to accommodate so he wouldn’t be suspicious over time:

- He made sure it was safe to get a tattoo while pregnant before shooting ‘Truth or Dare…Loser Gets a Tattoo’ and losing, getting Kian’s first name initial on his arm. (May be he could do that for the baby? Somewhere Kian wouldn’t see it obviously. He also totally did not like /any/ of the eating challenge either or how good some of the bad foods tasted.)

- He managed to pull himself up at the right time to avoid Kian’s elbow and other body parts from their friends into his stomach in the ‘Say Anything Challenge’ video they did with the tour crew. (His friends looked at him weirdly, but didn’t question it.)

- He checked it was safe to smoke pot during pregnancy (he only did for like, 2 seconds) and sucked his gut in on the ‘Breaking Every YouTube Rule In 60 Seconds’ video he and Kian made to protest the new YouTube rules.

- He substituted all the alcohol he gave Kian on his 21st birthday for colored water in ’Drunk Pop Quiz’. (Kian noticed he wasn’t drunk and questioned him, but he deflected, saying that his vomiting had stopped and he didn’t want to chance it just yet. Thankfully, he bought it, happily celebrating at the fact JC wasn’t sick anymore.)

- Double checked it was okay to have a tattoo during pregnancy and got the word ‘Six’ tattooed on his arm in ‘2 TEAMS, 2 LOSERS, 2 TATTOOS’.

- Did the same substitution trick in ‘Truth or Drink’.(Kian caught him in the act this time and they got into an argument, Kian asking him loads of questions and JC scrambling to come up with answers. He finally ended it when he said he just hadn’t felt like drinking tonight, but didn’t want to disappoint the viewers. Kian rolled his eyes and gave him a side hug, throwing out a ‘Now, was that so hard?’ before letting them get back to the game.)

- And all around, tried to wear larger and more loose clothing. (Unfortunately, his stomach hadn’t stayed flat for long, the obvious curve now stretching from the top of his chest to his groin. He was now able to cradle it in his hands slightly. That scared the shit out of him.)

But now, the stakes were high. He was 5 months and 3 days pregnant when Kian, in his exuberance, came bounding over Corey, bringing with him a /lot/ of products from the 99 cent store they were in. Namely out of the few, pregnancy tests.

JC almost dropped the claw he had, hand protectively hovering over his stomach before he swiftly put it down (he had taken to doing that now, hopefully Kian didn’t notice) and tried to process this new development as he asked in a shaky voice. “The fuck are those?”

“Dude, I have the greatest idea for tomorrow.” Kian’s grin was a mile wide, eyes lit up. (JC wanted to smile back, but the cold stone sinking feeling he had outweighed the gesture.) “I found all this shit in the back of the store, we should totally do a video with these tomorrow. Get the fans excited and all.”

“Sure...why not?” He faked being on board, all the while having a mental breakdown inside. Holy shit, how was he going to rig this one? He couldn’t rig a pregnancy test, it would sell him out immediately, but he would have to try.

All he could think about for the rest of the day was those pregnancy tests. Even during the historic Chicago Cubs vs. Cleveland Indians baseball game (he held a pillow to his stomach during the game, gaining weird/suspicious looks from Kian when he tried to pull it away and JC fucking full out /snapped/ at him before turning his attention back), all that went around in his head was plans and theories on how he could possibly convince Kian not to do this.

His pleas fell on deaf ears and the next day when it turned midnight, saw him in a oversized white t-shirt, red bandanna, black pajama pants (Kian scrunched up his nose, but made no complaint), toeing his sneakers on the floor as Kian rigged up the camera gear.

After chugging a Red Bull (obviously, he wasn’t going to get the luxury of sleep tonight.), making Kian go deaf with an airhorn (karma, bitch), putting a tampon up his nose (funny, but annoying) and wearing fake eyelashes, the tense moment had come. The pregnancy tests.

He tried to play along as soon as they started opening them on camera, masking the fear inside him in favor of pretending to be grossed out when Kian peed in an empty cup they had just lying around.

His mood swings flared when Kian tipped urine down their sink (god, does he even comprehend just how disgusting that is!?), but he quickly backed them down in favor of letting it go (he could scrub it later when he wasn’t here.) and instead, commented on the color of Kian’s piss. “It looks like a fucking Corona.”

“I know.” Kian agreed, placating JC for a moment, but then getting on his nerves again when he tried to put piss on their floor. JC wouldn’t let him touch him after that.

Then, it came for his turn. Fuck. Shit. Jesus Christ. What was he going to do? He had to do something. He quickly picked up a half empty plastic cup, still filled with vodka (Kian’s of course) and held it under him while trying to find the tie under his stomach.

It took him longer than expected, but he finally managed to pee (Kian cheering at the fact he was peeing didn’t really help) and just said “This is fucking weird, I never want to get pregnant.” before letting the dropper go and leaking his now mixed urine onto the stick.

Unfortunately for him, the stick reacted immediately with his piss, starting to change already, the shock making him exclaim “Woah, woah, woah, woah, some shit’s happening.”, making Kian peer between the sticks confused.

It took a couple of minutes of banter for the sticks to reveal their results and obviously, Kian’s only had one line. JC’s however, had one very obviously bright pink line and another smaller and slightly fainter line under it that you could barely see towards the back.

JC quickly thrust his out when Kian sad only his had one line, agreeing with him before making the joke that he would have called his ‘Kian Jr’. If Kian knew how near JC had been to the mark, he probably wouldn’t have laughed and started asking him about piss.

They managed to keep going with the shoot soon after that, getting out the spray on hair dye, but Kian suddenly did this motion of shoving dicks into his mouth that JC stupidly decided to copy, leading to Kian pushing him and them falling over off their seats and crashing to the ground.

Kian laughed it off, but JC almost cried out at the pain it caused. He managed to keep it toned down so Kian wouldn’t notice, but the shock of the ground colliding with his ass sent a flash of pain through his stomach. It faded quickly, but was still sore though the rest of the video.

Soon enough, while still buzzing with energy and in a fair amount of pain, JC made a move to stumble up to bed after helping Kian clean up. He was just opening the door to his room when Kian clasped his shoulder softly. “Hey.”

He peered at his friend, frowning. “What, Kian?”

“Are you...okay?” He looked at him concerned. “I mean, dude, the last couple of weeks you’ve been really closed off lately. That and you haven’t been doing as much with me or Dom or Corey...anybody for that matter.” He sighed, biting his lip. JC swore he could see something in Kian’s eyes that he’d wanted to be there, but he tried not to comment on it. “I just wanted to make sure you’re okay, man.”

JC sighed and tried to put on a small smile for Kian. “I appreciate it man, but it’s all good.” It tried to make it sound convincing, tried tone giving it away. “I’m fine. Just tired, haven’t been sleeping well lately.” It wasn’t a huge lie, because of his chest and stomach, he couldn’t really sleep in one position like he used to.

“Why didn’t you tell me?” Kian questioned, making himself closer to hug JC. JC winced at the pain, but managed to do it though his teeth, making it sound more like a sigh than anything. “I wouldn’t have given you so much shit if you had told me you weren’t sleeping.”

“You know me, dude. I don’t tell people a lot of things.” he tried to make it come of as a joke, but it fell flat. “I just need some sleep and I’ll be fine. Better than fine.”

“You’d better be.” Kian pulled back to let him go, punching him in the shoulder. “If I catch you lying to me again about something stupid, I’m going to pull you over my knee and spank you.”

JC suddenly discovered pregnancy libido was no joke, because as soon as Kian said that, even though he’d only said it in passing, his penis sprang to life. He quickly clamped his legs together to avoid Kian seeing and blushed hard, stuttering. “We-Well, I’d better not then.”

“Exactly.” Kian yawned, arms stretching up and making his black sweatshirt rise slightly, exposing his abs. JC tried not to, but found himself fixated on them for the 5 seconds they were out on show before the moment was over and he walked into his room. “Night’ JC.”

“Night’ Kian.” He murmured softly, turning to go in his own room and strip off. He ended up going to bed in just his t-shirt, pants discarded as it was too hot in California that night to wear them. He wasn’t out for too long when a sudden wash of pain took over him.

Waking up in a sweat and feeling like he was going to vomit, JC cupped his stomach, crying out as white hot pain flared from inside. What the hell was going on?

Looking down, he saw blood. Red, dark blood was staining his bed sheets and his legs and thighs, even his the lower part of the curve where it had obviously imprinted into the blood, bright red on a clean white t-shirt a minute or so ago.

Panicking, he tried to get out of bed and doubled over as the pain became worse, crawling on his bedroom floor towards the door, hands covered and leaving red hand prints while his legs left a streaky trail of red on the ground towards the bathroom.

He felt lightheaded and started to vomit, barely making it to the toilet before it came out. He felt dizzy and concussed, the pain having started to become so bad, he was on the verge of blacking out.

It didn’t know if he had cried out loud enough for Kian to hear him or if Kian had been on his way back from getting a drink or about to go to the toilet, but he heard a shout and suddenly, Kian’s face swam into his vision, along with the feeling of arms pulling at him.

“JC! JC! Holy shit, what the fuck is going on!? Holy shit, you’re bleeding, you’re...holy fuck, I need to call 911!”

JC quickly grabbed onto his shirt to prevent him from leaving, grip weak as black started to edge out his vision.”I-I-I’m s-s-sor-rrr-y K. I’m s-so sor-ry…”

He heard Kian talking to him, asking him questions, but his head felt heavy and soon enough, it went black.

Chapter Text

The world all a haze when JC finally woke up. Sort of.

He couldn’t really see anything and could hear only certain things. Beeping, humming, snippets of muffled conversation, some shouting and arguing and some quiet and whispered, but he heard it. He couldn’t really make out the words though, mind slow to catch up.

As he drifted in and out, he went to roll over when a sharp stab from his stomach pulled him back. Then, he remembered. It shot back to him with so much force he almost vomited over the side of his bed, shaking. The pain. The blood. So much blood…

His hands flew under the several blankets he found himself wrapped up in, quickly feeling for his stomach and tears streamed down his face in relief as it’s roundness was still prominent.

Shakily, he raised two fingers to his lips and kissed them, whispering ‘Thankyou..’ to whoever was watching over them and pressing them against his stomach with a sniffle. The baby was okay. Or so he hoped. He didn’t know for sure, though his gut told him it was.

Blinking as he came to, he finally managed to look around and noticed that...he was definitely not in his bedroom. For a start, it was white, blindingly so and familiar smelling. It smelled...clean, with a metal tang to it. The window that greeted him looking out over the California landscape confused him, but the medical equipment made it obvious. A hospital. A fucking hospital. Great, seems Kian did make do on his 911 call. Shit.

Groaning with a grimace at the ache he felt in his groin, JC pulled the blankets off himself carefully, intent on getting up, but finding his legs were made of jelly on the first try, he sat back down with a wince. This was going to take some doing, wasn’t it?

Looking around, his eye found the IV line in his hand and traced the tubes from the bed back to the pole beside him. Ah. Readying himself again, he gripped onto the metal shaft of the pole, slowly pushing his feet on the ground to raise himself up…

“Don’t. You. Fucking. Dare.”

Kian. Fuck. He sounded angry, no, he sounded hurt. Both. He didn’t know, but he knew that tone of voice. Kian only used that tone of voice when he was extremely upset and angry with someone and it wasn’t that often that voice came out.

JC quickly lowered himself back down, hissing from the pain that shot though him because of it, looking towards the floor as squeaky fast footsteps came towards him and trainers appeared in his vision. Yep. Definitely Kian.

His heart, already panicked before about the baby, started hammering faster in his chest. He knew Kian well. Knew his actions. His moods. His voice tones. He lived with him for nearly 4 years for Christ's sake.

The only way Kian could be that angry, that upset, was if he knew. He /knew/ about the baby. God, when did he find out? When he checked him over? When he called the ambulance? At the hospital? He didn’t want to know the answer.

“Justin.” His real name was said angrily as two trembling hands clamped down on his thighs. “Justin Cloud Caylen, look at me.” He didn’t want to, as Kian’s voice was scaring him, but did as he asked, dry throat flexing as he swallowed hard before tilting his head up to look square in the face at Kian, eyes wet.

“How...How…you almost died. You lost so much blood! You should have fucking told me you hurt yourself!” Kian was shaking really bad and he was as pale as a ghost, eyes red having obviously been crying as much as JC had. “How long have....? You should have told me! You should have fucking told me you motherfucker! What were you thinking?!”

He must have been outside smoking something to calm down as he smelled like weed and it made JC feel sick, groaning and having to look away when he tried to open his mouth to talk.

Kian’s eyes went wide, reaching out to grab a vomit bag nearby before he realized what was wrong and scrambled to get the hoodie he had thrown on at the house to cover up his bloodstained shirt, off, chucking it to the other side of the room.

JC tried to swallow what little he did have left once the smell left, the sight of the blood unnerving, chest clogged as he tried to breathe in and out, but the panic seizing him made it hard.

He closed his eyes as more tears started streaming down his face, not wanting to look at Kian anymore, but suddenly felt hands. Warm, trembling hands reached up and wiped them away before a thin body slid next to him, holding him tightly.

He broke.

Full blown sobbing, he reached out and clutched fistfuls of Kian’s shirt, face buried in his shoulder as all he had kept inside of him, all the fear, came out. It took him a moment to realize, but Kian was doing pretty much the same to him, except into his hair. He could hear him murmuring something, but couldn’t make it out, too overwhelmed.

They stayed like that for almost an hour before JC made to gently pull away, swallowing as he attempted to talk again. “I...I’m s-s-sorry.” JC’s throat was very dry, but he managed. “I...I d-didn’t m-mean to...I d-didn't want to…”

“How long have you known?” Kian’s voice was quiet, angry, but soft and calm at the same time, thumb rubbing circles back and forth over JC’s knuckles. He hadn’t noticed till now, but they were holding hands. He didn’t think much of it thankfully. He couldn't right now. Kian wanted answers. “A w-while…”

“How long?”

“Bout’...t-t-three months. F-Found out w-while we w-were on tour.”

Kian took a deep breath in, having to look away before looking back at him, hurt clear in his eyes. “Why didn’t you /tell/ me?”

“I didn’t w-want to…we a-aren’t ready for this.” JC closed his eyes, shaking his head. “We aren’t r-ready for this k-kind of t-thing yet. W-W-We’re not together in that w-way, w-we barely k-know how to take c-care of ourselves and i-it was a accident.”

Kian stayed silent, long enough for JC to realize he could keep talking. “I...I was also afr-afraid. Of w-what you would s-say. I d-didn’t want you to h-hate me.” He hadn’t noticed, but his hand came to curl around his stomach as he was talking, protective.

The hand disappeared and JC shuddered from the pain at the loss of contact, but was quickly thrown off by the feeling of arms cautiously encircling him, kisses on his forehead, closed eyelids, nose and finally his lips, before a voice muttered. “You fucking idiot.”

JC’s eyes squeezed open and he found himself staring into Kian’s dark brown ones.

“You fucking idiot.” Kian repeated again, anger gone. “We aren’t ready, you’re right about that. Our house is trashed, our lives aren’t at the best time...you’re right about a lot of things. Except, you got one wrong. I certainly didn’t expect this, but JC, I could never hate you. Ever.”

“You should.” JC sniffled, shaking his head. “You should hate me. I kept this whole thing from you for 5 months. I should have told you and I didn’t. You should hate me for that.”

“I did, at first.” Kian’s face became serious. “I didn’t know what was going on with you, but when the doctor told me out there what happened...my heart was in my throat, man. I thought they were kidding, but when I realized they weren’t, I started crying. When you hit the floor after I pushed you, it was apparently so hard, you had a placental abruption...whatever than means. They said they’d come in later to explain it. I thought...I thought you’d had a miscarriage...”

JC bit his lip, nodding along with him. “You thought you were going to have to come in here and tell me I lost it and you know how much I like kids.”

”Exactly.” Kian’s bottom lip wobbled, having to start wiping at his eyes in case. “I thought you were going to be devastated. I was getting up to come in here when they told me it barely made it. Just. You lost so much blood, Justin. Too much. You were so pale. I seriously thought my best friend was going to die because of me and I-”

“Shut the fuck up.” JC snapped, Kian taken aback. “Don’t you dare say this was your fault.”

“But-” Kian protested.

“No. It wasn’t your fault. It was mine. I should have said something.” JC shook his head, pulling himself up to finally be level with Kian. “I’m not going to just sit there and let you take the blame for something that you had no idea about, just because I’m a pussy who doesn’t-OW!” JC suddenly hunched over, and on his stomach.

“What’s wrong?” Kian was quick to jump in front of him, panicked.

“Nothing.” JC said though clenched teeth. “Stretched out too far. Just hurts.”

“Shit, lie back down. You shouldn’t be sitting up.” Kian started to push him down gently back onto the bed, careful not to jostle him too much.

JC, though not liking the fact he was in the bed in the first place, didn’t fight him. It was surprised though when Kian went under the wires and crammed his long skinny frame beside him. “What do you think you’re doing?”

“I’m lying down with you so I can watch you.” Kian’s hand reached out, but then pulled back. “Can I...uh...can I touch it? Your...uh...stomach, I mean.”

“Dude, it’s your kid.” JC rolled his eyes at Kian’s awkwardness. “You do what you want. I don’t care.”

“I know, but I don’t want to hurt you...I’m new to this too, remember?” Kian sighed.

“I know.” JC sighed back. After a long moment of silence stretched between them, he reached out and took Kian’s hand, fingers accidently intertwining as he placed on the left side of his stomach. “It’s feet are down here, from what I know and it’s head…” He guided Kian’s hand up gently to avoid hurting himself more and making Kian feel worse in a sweeping motion across it to the top, near his chest. “...is here. Something like that.”

“Wow…” Kian whispered, fingers dragging gently across the area without leaving JC’s hand. “It’s so...small. It is supposed to be that small?”

“Yeah. It’s meant to be that way.” JC nodded, Kian’s head having ended up on his shoulder.

“It'll get bigger, won’t it?”

“Most likely, yeah.”

“Huh.” Kian nodded to himself, before licking his lips. “What are we going to do with it?”

“What?” JC looked down at him, confused. “What do you mean?”

Kian looked up at him, serious. “What are we going to do, when it’s born? It won’t stay in there forever.”

“I don’t know.” JC looked down. “I’m not sure.”

“I think you do now what you want to do, JC.” Kian propped himself beside him. “I want to hear it come from you.”

JC was silent, before he made a small sound, looking back up at Kian. “Is...is it bad, that I want to keep it?”

“...No.” Kian shook his head. “I knew you would think it was, but it’s not.”

“You’re taking this whole thing pretty well, K.”

“Most likely hasn’t sunk in yet.” Kian huffed. “It will later. Right now, I’m more worried about my best friend bleeding out than anything else.”

JC really wanted to talk to him about it properly, but he guess this was about as good as he would get right now. He just nodded and snuggled into Kian’s side, tired from crying and drinking in the safety he felt from it. He knew he wouldn’t get it again, so he tried to take in as much as he could.

As he was dozing off, he almost heard Kian say something along the lines of ‘I love you too much to lose you.’, but he was too tired to really make it out and fell asleep to Kian’s weight on his side, content with just enjoying what he had for now.

He knew their whole worlds would change soon enough.