---TRIGGER WARNING---

Evelyn's POV

"Oh honey, you're burning up..." My mother murmured, with an expression that aged her beautiful face. 

"Jax, thank you sweetie for taking care of her while we were out. Has she been like this all day??" My mother asked Jax. He raised his eyebrows as he answered, crossing his arms. 

"Unfortunately, yes. She threw up twice and she's been in and out of sleep with a headache for the most part. I gave her some medication for the nausea and the headaches, that helped a bit." He answered, smiling sorrily at my parents who now looked weary. 

"Alright, well I'll take it from here. Honey why don't you start up some chicken soup with vegetables for her just in case she's coming down with something." She says to my father, rubbing his arm gently. My dad kisses me on the forehead. 

"Feel better kiddo I'll bring it up when it's ready." He whispers in a comforting manner. He kisses my mom on the cheek lovingly squeezing her arm before heading downstairs. 

"Jax, thanks again. You've done so much for her." She smiles, tears welling up in her eyes.

"No need to thank me. She'll be okay." He says looking at me now, and I can tell he doesn't want to leave. I think my mom can tell as well because she ends up telling him to stay for dinner. She doesn't know what happened with Ashton, but I haven't decided if I should talk to her about that or not.  

My mother sits on the bed next to me and wipes her tears in such an elegant manner I wonder if I look as elegant as she does most of the time. Probably not.

"Maybe it's food poisoning?" I offer, having no idea what's wrong with me. I've had stomach cramps the whole damn day. 

"Maybe?" Jax says, sitting on the other side of my bed. 

The sun had now painted the sky pink and orange hues and the sunsets reflection on the water made me drift to a different place until my bladder pulled me back. 

*Are You feeling better? Please talk to me I'm begging you.* -Ashton. 

I stare at my phone screen and toss my phone to the side ignoring Ashton's message. 

"Ugh, I need to pee," I mutter, they both roll their eyes. But when I sit up, I frown, something's not right. My pajama shorts are drenched, and I feel something dripping down my inner thighs. Jax and my mom look at me with a perplexed expression, frowning at me. 

"Mom?" I say, dread filling my chest.

I put a hand to my inner thigh and bring it up to inspect what the wet substance is. My mom gasps and calls for Jax to grab me a change of clothes and get the car ready. 

"No, no, no, no... This can't be happening. I didn't know." I start crying, fumbling over my words, terribly broken. 

Jax's eyes go wide when he sees the blood, so much fucking blood. Blood is seeping through my white comforter; I pull the covers off and get up as I look down. There's blood everywhere, there's loss everywhere. I start sobbing, clutching my stomach. Jax runs over to me as I begin trembling, my legs betraying me. The only thing keeping me standing is Jax and that's because he's holding me up. 

"Amy she's-it's- It's a lot of blood Amy." He turns to my mother. 

"Jax wait for us downstairs please, take her change of clothes with you to the car. I need to take her to the hospital." She tells him, walking over to me.

It was too much blood for it to be my period, it wasn't even time for me to get my period yet. Not even close. I was pregnant and I had no idea, how could I be so stupid? How could I be so selfish? So reckless? A baby, I always thought I couldn't get pregnant for some reason and now this happens. My heart was running on fumes right now, I couldn't take much more. Why was I being tested like this by God?

I start crying on my mom's shoulder. "How could this happen?" I sob. She holds me tight, running her fingers through my hair. 

"Honey, this isn't your fault. Let me help you, I need to take you to the emergency room sweetie I'm so sorry." She shushes me, dragging my shell of a body to the bathroom. 

- - -

Jax helped me get to the backseat once I got out of the bathroom and my mom and dad had helped me downstairs. My poor father was so distraught. On our way to the hospital, Jax sat in the backseat with me, holding my hand the whole time as I wept. I looked out of the window, trying to hide my sadness. I had a little life inside of me, a baby, and I didn't even know. This is how I find out?? I say a small prayer silently, asking God why this happened. Why? 

When we get to the hospital I shudder, I hate hospitals always have, always will. I'm suddenly terrified and I can't put on this dauntless attitude, not right now. We make our way inside and Jax and my father take a seat in the waiting room.

- - -

I feel empty, I feel scared, I feel guilty. I thought that I had felt real pain, but nothing beats this. Heartbreak after heartbreak, I haven't stopped crying since I left my house, since the procedure was finished. They had said it was to "Get the remaining tissue out." Who the FUCK says that?! Professional or not it's cold and a woman having a miscarriage shouldn't have to hear those words at the hospital! They had warned me I would feel nauseous for the next couple of days and to take it easy, that I would bleed for 2-3 more days. 

Ashton's car is parked outside when we pull back up to my house, I didn't even know how I was going to tell him. As we enter the driveway, I see him sitting on our curb with his head in his hands. He had gotten up as soon as he saw the car pull in. 

"You told him?!" I ask Jax angrily. He shakes his head no. 

"Baby I told him; I thought you would want him here?" My mom says, looking back at me. I can't, I don't have the energy for this right now. It's like I'm falling apart, I can't stop crying. 

"Look if you need me at any point, I'm a phone call away," Jax tells me. I pull him into a hug and then he steps out, I don't miss him looking back at me one last time. 

"Evelyn how??" Ashton asks. "I'm sorry." He says, tears brimming his eyes. Seeing him cry after I just lost a piece of myself, a piece of him too. 

"Let me help you inside please." Ashton looks at me, his eyebrows almost touching, his dark under eyes give away that he hasn't slept much.

- - -

I'm lying down in bed again and Ashton is pacing around the room. I explained to him that the doctors must have estimated that I was about 5 weeks pregnant, I told them I had wine last night and they said it could have been anything and that it wasn't the wine that had caused me to miscarry. I looked at Ashton with a worn-out expression on my face. 

"I'm so sorry." He says pulling me into him. We hold each other like that for a moment, a heart-wrenching moment. 

"It's all my fault." He cries. 

"Ashton, why would you say that?" I gape at him. Ashton slouches and I realize he looks as wrecked as me. 

"If I wouldn't have upset you this week like this if I wouldn't have-" Ashton stutters and he does not stutter often. I look at him shaking my head, sympathizing. 

I touch his cheek with the back of my hand, quickly pulling my hand back as I remember the moans from the other girl he was touching. 

"Ashton don't, don't do that to yourself trust me. You'll drive yourself mad thinking like that, I've been doing it to myself for hours. The doctors said it could've been anything this early on. It hurts but ultimately it's not your fault." I say to him, a single tear running down his face. He buried his head into my arms, right next to my stomach. My fingers ran through his dark hair, playing with the longest strands. I sighed momentarily, forgetting why I was angry with him, forgetting why I had broken up with him until I remembered he used that same word in the phone call with Jax. Forgetting. 

We made such a good team, but I can't forgive him every time he deems it a good idea to push me away for his sake. My brother clears his throat, and we turn to look at him. 

"Dinners ready guys." He mutters, giving a hard look at Ashton but softening his gaze once it lands on me. 

"I'm not hungry, but you can go ahead and eat," I say to Ashton. 

"You need to eat something, it's chicken soup. It'll make you feel a little better." He says softly. 

"Yeah, I don't know about all that," I answer back. He said he'd bring me some anyway, to at least try so I reluctantly agreed. 

- - -

Loss and heartbreak seem to be a part of this world in constant motion. For a while, I stopped focusing on all the bad, because I realized it's all about perspective. Things happen, and sometimes we never find out the reason why. I have a lot of faith in God and I'm aware it's impossible to understand God's reasoning when we have human reasoning. Maybe one day I'll get it, maybe one day I'll understand the twists and turns of life and why things happen the way they do. Why I made certain decisions that I deemed regrettable at the time and how the good choices affect the path laid out before us. One day I'll understand it all, hopefully. 

- - -

---A couple of days later---

The girls had come to check up on me when I told them everything that happened, they didn't hold it against me that I waited a couple of days. They understood I needed time to process. I got hugs and cuddles from them all and words of wisdom from Sophie, it was greatly appreciated. Jax and Ashton came over on different occasions to make sure I was okay. Ashton and I hadn't gotten back together and considering the circumstances I was still hurt by it all. You don't just get over something like that. The miscarriage, the lies, it had truly been an awful week. We never ended up speaking about what he did or didn't do the night of that awful fucking phone call. 

Today was the first day back to class because I had finally stopped bleeding and I ignored the pitiful looks and the snarky comments, I just didn't care anymore. Once I got home, I ate, finished some assignments from my literature class, and decided I was going to take a walk on the beach. I put on a loose white long-sleeve that was too big for my body and decided on some dark grey yoga pants, it was still pretty chilly out. 

As soon as I made my way outside, I looked beyond me at the seascape, the water a deep aquamarine color, the dark clouds over the water held the promise of rain. I dug my toes deep into the sand watching them fall off my French pedicure. I crouch down and hold my hands up to my face, breaking the facade I had put on for the past couple of days so people would stop worrying. I felt so empty like something was missing. I wiped my tears with the edge of my sleeves and looked at the ocean, what used to be calm waters was now an ocean of stormy waves. Kind of like me. 

I cry silently for a few moments wondering what my life would look like a couple of years from now. Would I be studying abroad? Would I be a mom with my shit together? Would I be happy? Does anybody have their shit together? Would some of my friends betray me like Ashton did? 

I wondered if there was any possibility of Ashton and I getting back together, I yearned for it I truly did. But it was easier said than done. Everything with him had felt like an escape from the darkest conflicts of the past until it didn't. There was supposed to be a bonfire in a couple of days, but I probably wasn't going to go, I didn't really feel up to it. 

Jax's POV

Each day I thought about her more than the last. Each day I asked myself if she was doing better than the day before. I understood her in ways I barely understood myself. I think I understood her more than Ashton, but I wouldn't have said that out loud...not now anyway. 

I hear Cole and Damien get to the house, and my social battery running extremely low. 

"YOOOOOOO, Daddy's home," Cole yells through the house, barging into the living room. I give him a look that says, 'You're an idiot.' He sits on the couch next to me and Damien chuckles. 

"What are we doing tonight? You've been in a weird mood all week dude. I know you're like in love with Evelyn and everything, I mean look at her but you gotta snap out of it. That's bro-code, that is Ashton's woman you can't just do that." Cole says as Damien stays quiet. 

Well, Damien can't say shit about bro-code, not when he slept with Allison after Ashton did, even if she and Ash were never a sure thing. 

"She didn't even go to the bonfire yesterday, you were waiting for her to come out like a puppy and so was Ashton matter of fact, she doesn't care," Damien says now. 

But they have no idea what she's had to deal with or go through, she probably lacked the energy to put on a fake smile just so everyone else feels comfortable around her. 

"We are going to the strip club tonight. Yup, that is indeed what we are doing." Cole says, smacking his hands together in a hyped-up manner. I look at him with a repulsed expression on my face. 

"I'm not going to a fucking strip club tonight out of all places." I scoff. I don't need to be around women who are pretending to like their jobs for my sake, that would make me just flat-out depressed. 

"Is Ashton going?" I ask. They shake their heads in unison. 

"No, he's having dinner with his parents tonight, which is why we need you to come out with us and get out of your freaking head at least for one night." Damien retorts. 

"Fuck it, I'll go," I answer, I figure I might as well attempt to get out of my mess of a brain. They high-five each other like children and proceed to tell me to be ready by 9:30 pm and I nod my head. 

- - -

At the club, it reeked of cigarette smoke and cheap liquor. I sighed already regretting my decision to come out with them. There were some very impressive moves being done on poles by pretty women and I looked at them dully, expecting to feel something but feeling nothing. I passed one of the girls a 100-dollar bill, which was a terrible mistake because she followed me around for half of the night. Cole, Damien, and I take a seat in one of the sections of the club in front of a dancer and I order a drink. 

"Coming right up, handsome." The girl that was waiting for us purred, eyeing me like she wanted to jump my bones. 

"So much for being discreet, she wanted to eat you alive," Cole says laughing. I cock my head to the side when I look at him, clearly uninterested in his amusement.

"Can you at least pretend to be having fun? Sarah and Allison are going to look at you crazy when they see the bored expression on your face." Damien says, irritated with me.

"You fucking invited Sarah and Allison? What the fuck man you said it was just us!" I say angrily. 

"They wanted to come!" Damien defends. I sigh, over it.

An hour of drinks and bad decisions (bad decisions from Cole and Damien) pass by and I'm on my third cigarette, in a drunken haze I look at the dancers, they really are impressive in the way they turn and twist around the slim pole makes them look almost majestic or maybe I was just drunk. I babysit a glass of whiskey and my cigarette. It was incredibly hot in this club; some strands of hair were sticking to my forehead, so I pushed them back. 

A young girl probably in her early twenties wearing red lingerie had come up to me, I had seen her watching me from afar like an animal who stalks its prey. She smirks at me with her red-stained lips, running a hand over my knee and along my thigh.

"Want a dance? You're looking extremely lonely in this corner." She whispers inches away from my ear. I turn to look at her, disappointed it's not Evelyn with me. 

"You seem lovely really, but not tonight," I whisper back, handing her 110 dollars. She winks at me and goes back to the stage to continue her shift. That's wild, I've wasted two hundred dollars tonight and haven't even gotten a lap dance. That's the thing though, it doesn't seem appealing to me. I have no connections to these women, even when I slept with Sarah, I immediately regretted it. I felt nothing with her, and I won't feel anything with these women. Any man can get hard and have sex with whoever but for what? It's like robbing yourself of a pleasure and love-fueled experience.

"What's been up with you lately?" Allison asks I need to take a sip from my drink to have a conversation with this girl. I breathe in deeply and turn my head to look at Allison, she's wearing a black corset top with a black leather skirt and some high heels that look very uncomfortable. 

"He's in love," Cole mutters under his breath. 

"Yeah right, Jax doesn't fall in love." She says the last words mockingly, making quotation marks with her fingers. I ignore her and tell Cole and Damien that I'll be outside finishing my cigarette. I needed some fresh air; the entire club was full of smoke and bad intentions. 

I try not to stumble as I step outside into the starry night. I spot a few other guys from the college, and they recognize me. They turn around and make their way over to me to make pointless conversation is what I'm guessing they're about to do. 

"What's up, man?!" Jason says as we do that handshake most guys do. 

"Not much, everything good?" I ask him, feigning interest. 

"Ahhh man, everything's great. Yo did you tap that??" He asks smirking. 

Tap that? What the fuck is wrong with most men my age, I swear I don't have the best judgment sometimes, but I would never ask someone that, at least not in those words. 

"Tap who exactly?" I question. 

"Man come on, you know who. Evelyn, she's hot, my gosh the things I would do to that girl. Whether she let me or not-" 

Before he could finish that sentence, he already had a black eye forming, my fist hurt badly afterward but I'll survive. 

"You don't get to talk about her like that. You don't know that girl, nobody knows her actually. She's smarter than you'll ever be, a better person than your mom probably is and she has bigger balls than you because she's survived things that would make you probably off yourself. So next time you say her name, respect it and make sure you're not saying some dumb shit like that you fucking dickhead." I say as he pinches his bloody nose. 

That's my sign to leave the club and go home.