Breaking the news

Rey was sitting beside Ed on a chair staring at the wall opposite Ed, reading a book. It had been almost 2 weeks since the incident and there were still no signs of Ed waking up anytime soon.

Even then, Rey still didn't lose hope and continued to come to his dad's clinic everyday and spent the entirety of his day alongside Ed. It was only after his and Ed's parents begged him, did he agree to go back home and that too only for sleeping. Is left to him, he would have permanently stayed in Ed's room, not leaving even for a second.

Jenny also came sometimes to check up on him but because the distance between the two towns was not small, she could only stay for a day or two.

"Soph what do you think I should do when Ed wakes up? You know, as an apology." Rey has been struggling for the past couple of days about what would be a suitable apology to Ed.

[Well you could try to be less annoying and use that head of yours for a change. I think that will be the perfect gift for Ed.]

"Come on Soph, I am trying to be serious here." Rey did not like Sophie's joke regarding his minimal use of intelligence.

"Well I won't mind that but you can try to buy me lunch for once."

"Yes, a lunch would be..." Rey suddenly paused and slowly turned his head around when he realised that he was supposed to be alone with an supposedly unconscious Ed.

The first thing he noticed was that Ed was smiling with his eyes half open.

"ED!!" Rey was delighted on seeing his friend smiling and at once leapt from his chair and onto Ed.

"Agghhh... calm down Rey!" Ed tried to get Rey off of him as it was getting painful but Rey's grip was too strong for a weakened Ed to contest and after admitting defeat, he also hugged him back.

They kept hugging until the nurse who was taking care of Ed came for her daily round.

"Ahem... It is certainly nice to see that young master Ed has finally woken up but you should show some restraint little Rey."

"I know, I know!" Rey let go of Ed and sat back on the chair which was thrown in one corner of the room.

The nurse went away to bring Rey's father and soon he alongwith Ed's parents arrived and all of them were most delighted to see Ed talking again.

After Ed's parents surrounded him, Rey quietly slipped out of the room to give them some space and went back home as he also had to talk with his mother.

After Rey had completely recovered, his mother came to him to talk about something important but as he was preoccupied with Ed at that time, he asked her to wait till Ed woke up.

And now that Ed had woken up, it was time to hear what his mother wanted to talk about.

He rushed back to his house to find his mother casually humming a tune while washing the utensils.

"Mom!" he called out to her, grabbing her attention. She stopped her work and turned around to face him.

"Has Ed woken up?" she could more or less guess why Rey came back this early in the day, so she didn't trouble him with the useless talk.

"So, what did you want to talk about earlier?" they moved their conversation to the sofa and all the time we was getting anxious. He had prepared himself for something bad like his parents dying soon or them disowning him and whatnot. Ace because of that he had his expectations set for the worst case.

"Well you know, it just happened....." now that it was really time to talk about it, Amanda was also having a hard time explaining everything to Rey.

"Oh gosh! Now that I think about it, I don't know how to tell you any of this."

"Mother!" Rey moved in closer and held his mother's hands, "No matter what, I will always be there for you." He felt that it was something so bad that his mother couldn't even talk without getting embarrassed.

"Just know that even if you decide to leave dad, I will continue to love both of you." Rey's imagination was running wild and he tried to console his mother to the best of his abilities but it backfired.

Amanda freed her hands from Rey and looked at him with a weird expression, as if not believing what he was saying. She clearly looked pissed, which scared Rey.

"What nonsense are you spouting? Have you hurt your head? Why would I leave Nathan?"

"Is that not the case then? If you are not going to leave dad, then why are you hesitating so much?" Rey was getting relieved that his parents weren't getting divorced and he wouldn't have to choose one of them.

"Because it is embarrassing that's why." Amanda looked away, her face flushed red.

"Come on mom, it can't be that bad. Just tell me." Rey decided that at the pace they were going, it would take his mother a whole day to even make some progress, so he tried to give her a little push.

*Shake* *Shake*

But Amanda just shook her head in rejection to Rey's persuasion.

This continued for some time with Rey trying to persuade his mother and his mother rejecting him everytime.

"Dammit mom! You are acting like you are pregnant or something. It can't be more embarrassing than that, surely you guys are not that carel...."

Rey paused mid sentence when he saw his mother sheepishly nodding at his words with her face hidden behind her palm.

"What?" Rey was in disbelief, he thought that maybe he had seen wrong and his mother didn't just nod to his statement. But much to his dismay, his mother again nodded, leaving him dumbfounded.

"You... you..." Rey couldn't even speak as he just used his hands to imitate a baby bump and ask his mother again for confirmation.

His mother again nodded not this time more aggressively.

Rey finally accepted the situation and fell back into the couch, tired from all this revelation.

"Seriously?" even though he accepted it, he was still shocked by it nonetheless.

"So care to tell me when did this happen?" Rey resigned himself to the fact that nothing could be done now.

"The day you went to Birchwood." his mother was now more relaxed as she believed that her son had funny accepted it but she was still embarrassed to look him in the eye.

"*sigh* I need some time to digest all this. I'll be going back to my room, don't disturb me please."

Instead of walking to his room, Rey slowly assimilated with his shadow and traveled back to his room, leaving his mother shocked.

"I gotta tell the good news to Nathan and when did he get such a skill?" Amanda was happy as she went back to her work with a different kind of aura.

Meanwhile Rey was having a totally different reaction than he had just moments ago.

"Soph can you believe this? I am gonna be a big brother. A big brother, how cool is that? Like, I always wanted a younger sibling and now I'm gonna have one. It's the best feeling ever."

Rey was uber excited by her mother's pregnancy news and barely controlled his excitement. He acted all shocked Ave displeased before as he thought that the atmosphere was tense and he should refrain for the time being.

But unlike him, Sophie was not too thrilled about this whole incident as she felt insecure from an unborn person.

[If Rey gets a younger sibling *gasp*, he won't spend time with me anymore.

But it's not like I care about it or anything, just that it will be pretty annoying to have a child around. I'll have to do something about it for the sake of my time with Re....I mean for the sake of my peace *ahem* *ahem*.]