Who's Your Daddy?

The horror. Her pregnancy was a horror and apparently she was thrusting it upon the Averys just by being in the same space as them. Even before today, Dora wasn’t sure how to feel about the whole ordeal. Did she want to be a mum? She’d never given any thought to it. No one ever expected Dora to get married, who would want to marry her? And babies came after marriage. She’d never thought she’d be doing it in any other order. She never thought she’d be doing it, full stop. No matter what she thought about her pregnancy before today, it was clear what everyone else would think. She’d not told anyone other than Fin because what was the point of telling people? What if she didn’t keep it? What if she did but she ended up like Lucius’ wife and losing it? Why she’d said anything at all in front of the Averys was beyond Dora, she was just so nervous around Fin’s dad that it just sort of popped out of her. Complete and utter word vomit. At least it wasn’t real vomit. Not yet, anyway.

Dora felt her lower lip quiver and she bit it hard to keep from letting her emotions out. Green eyes locked firmly on Fin’s father, watching as his face reddened with anger and contorted into a nasty expression as he turned on Fin and began accusing him of… An ache in her chest was the only warning sign before suddenly Dora burst into tears and Fin and Aurelius argued over whether her unborn child was Fin’s or not. Because that was of course the worst possible thing that could happen to Fin; for him to be saddled with Dora for the next 18 years. The implications Aurelius made were bad enough, but the disgust in Fin’s voice – or what she interpreted as disgust – as he explained that they’d never even shagged. Dora couldn’t be there a moment longer.

The legs of the chair scraped loudly against the floor as she pushed herself away from the table, nearly knocking straight in to Fin’s mum who was sitting there eating as if nothing even remotely interesting was happening around her, and ran off toward the stairs, tucking herself away in the guestroom she had once called her own. The door slammed loudly behind her, no doubt sounding down into the dining room though whether the men had stopped yelling at each other long enough for it to be heard was unknown. She flung herself onto the bed, tears pouring into the bedding as painted nails gripped the blankets tightly. Her chest was sore and she struggled to catch her breath, her sobs turning to ragged breaths as she curled her legs up underneath her body, face buried into the mattress. Dora squeezed her eyes shut so tightly she saw stars but still it didn’t help to calm her. She could hear the muffled sounds of commotion from the floor below. She couldn’t make out the words or who was speaking but she really didn’t need to hear it all properly for her mind to run wild with what was quite possibly a very accurate transcript of the conversation.