CHAPTER 187

CHAPTER 187
LILY POV

I stared at Samantha as if she were a ghost.

She stood in the middle of my room while I was still wrapped in a towel, my wet body dripping water onto the wooden floor. My heart was beating so hard I could feel every pulse in my throat, my ears, and my temples. Samantha held the small white box with the second pill between her fingers, as if it were evidence of a crime.

I wanted to lie.  
I wanted to say it was for a friend.  
I wanted to make up any story, run away, disappear.  
But my body couldn’t take it anymore. My mind had reached its limit. I simply… broke.

The tears came first, hot and silent. Then the sobs. A deep, guttural cry that I didn’t even know I still had inside me. My knees buckled. I held onto the edge of the bed, but I couldn’t stay on my feet.

Samantha froze for half a second. Her eyes widened, and her serious expression dissolved into something that looked like pain. She dropped the box onto the nightstand and reached me in two quick steps.

“Lily…” she murmured, her voice cracking.

She hugged me. Tight. Her arms wrapped around me as if she wanted to protect me from the entire world. I collapsed against her, burying my face in her shoulder, crying like a child. The familiar scent of lavender and the warmth of her body made me cry even harder. I was sobbing so much I could barely breathe.

Samantha guided me to the bed, sitting down with me, never letting go of the hug for even a second. She stroked my wet hair slowly, as if I were still a little girl.

“Shhh… it’s okay,” she whispered. “It’s okay, my love.”

“It’s not…” I managed to say between sobs. “Nothing is okay, Samantha.”

I cried for everything. For the fear. For the loneliness. For Samuel’s betrayal. For discovering that she had been watching us. For the pregnancy. For the choice I couldn’t make. I cried until my throat hurt and my eyes burned.

Samantha kept holding me, rocking me gently, as if I were a baby. Her fingers slid through my golden hair, trying to calm the tremors shaking my body.

After a long time, when my sobs had eased a little, she held my face with both hands, forcing me to look at her. Her eyes were watery.

“Lily… did you take the pill?”

I shook my head, still crying.

“No… neither of them. Not yet.”

Samantha let out a slow breath, relieved but still cautious.

“Do you want to take it?”

I stayed silent for a long moment. The tears kept falling.

“I don’t know…” my voice came out hoarse and broken. “I know it would be the right thing. A pregnancy right now isn’t in my plans. I’m sixteen. How am I supposed to take care of a baby? How am I going to study? How am I going to have a future? And what’s my dad going to do when he finds out? He said he’d kick me out if I got pregnant. You heard him last night.”

Samantha listened to everything in silence, without interrupting. Her thumbs wiped away my tears.

“Shhh…” she soothed, stroking my face. “I want to know what you want to do, Lily. Not what your father wants. Not what I want. What you want.”

I cried even harder.

“I don’t know… I don’t know…”

Samantha held my hands firmly, making me look at her.

“I understand exactly what you’re feeling.”

I shook my head.

“You don’t understand…”

Samantha turned away for a moment, looking at the wall, as if she were ashamed and vulnerable in a way I had never seen before. Her voice came out low, almost a whisper:

“I’ve been through this choice once, Lily. I was young. I had dreams, plans, a bright future ahead. I found out I was pregnant and… as much as I loved the baby’s father, the idea of becoming a mother so early terrified me. Being a mother is much harder than people say. It’s losing yourself. It’s stopping being who you were to become someone you never imagined. It’s putting another person’s life above your own, forever. It’s a love so big it hurts… but it’s also giving up everything. And no one talks about the hard part. No one talks about the fear.”

She took a deep breath, still staring at the wall.

“I weighed everything. I considered having an abortion. But in the end… I couldn’t. And today I don’t regret it. Despite all the mistakes, despite all the pain that came after. Being a mother was the hardest and most beautiful thing I’ve ever done in my life.”

We stayed silent for a long time, both of us looking at the wall, each lost in our own ghosts.

I finally managed to speak, my voice still choked:

“It wasn’t that hard for you. You were already married when you got pregnant with Samuel. You had stability. It’s not the same.”

Samantha turned back to me, her eyes shining with unshed tears.

“You’re right. It’s not the same. But I know what that fear feels like. And I want you to know that, no matter what choice you make, I’ll be by your side. If you decide to have this baby… I’ll help you. If you decide not to… I’ll support you too. But the choice has to be yours, Lily. Only yours.”

I threw myself into her arms again, crying.

“I don’t want to give up the baby…” I admitted between sobs. “I’m scared… but I don’t want to give him up.”

Samantha hugged me tighter, kissing the top of my head.

“Then don’t. It’s going to be hard. Really hard. But I don’t regret becoming a mother. That love… it’s something you can’t explain. It’s something you can’t let go of once you feel it.”

We stayed like that for a long time. Me crying. Her holding me. Stroking my hair.

After a while, Samantha pulled back a little and held my face again.

“Lily… I need to know one thing.”

I blinked, still with tears in my eyes.

“What?”

Samantha looked at me deeply, her voice soft but firm:

“Who is the father of the baby?”

The silence that followed was deafening.

I opened my mouth, but the words wouldn’t come out. The secret I had kept for weeks, the secret I had tried to bury along with the pain, was now on the tip of my tongue.

And Samantha waited patiently, holding my hands.

I knew that once I said it, nothing would ever be the same again.

I closed my eyes. A thick tear rolled down my face. When I opened them again, my voice came out so low it barely sounded like mine:

“It’s Samuel.”

The silence that came after was devastating.

Samantha went completely still. Her eyes widened for a fraction of a second, then filled with something I couldn’t name — shock, pain, guilt, sadness, all mixed together. Her lips trembled. She slowly let go of my hands, as if she needed space to process what I had just said.

“Samuel…” she repeated, her voice almost inaudible.

I nodded, tears falling nonstop.

“It’s his. The night before he left… we… I thought he loved me. I gave myself to him. And now… now I’m pregnant with his baby. Just like Ashley.”

Samantha brought her hand to her mouth, her eyes watery. She got up from the bed and took a few steps around the room, as if she needed to move to keep from falling apart. I stayed seated, wrapped in the towel, trembling, waiting for the worst. Waiting for her to yell, to judge me, to say I was a disappointment, that I had destroyed the family.

But she didn’t do any of that.

She stopped near the window, her back to me, and stayed silent for a long time. When she finally turned around, her face was wet with tears.

“My God, Lily…” she whispered, her voice choked. “My son… and you…”

I started crying harder.

“I know… I know it’s wrong. I know he’s your son. I know I’m… like a daughter to you. I tried to stop. I tried to forget. But I fell in love with him. And now… now there’s a baby. And I don’t know what to do.”

Samantha came back to the bed and pulled me into a tight hug. I clung to her as if she were the only solid thing in the world. I cried on her shoulder, sobbing, releasing all the pain I had held inside for weeks.

“I’m so scared…” I confessed through tears. “Scared of what Dad will do. Scared of Samuel finding out. Scared of Ashley finding out. Scared of everything.”

Samantha stroked my back, her chin resting on top of my head.

“Shhh… breathe, my love. Breathe.”

We stayed like that for several minutes. Me crying. Her holding me. When my sobs eased, she pulled back slightly and held my face again, looking into my eyes.

“I knew,” she confessed, her voice hoarse. “I knew you two were involved. I hired a detective. I saw the photos. I read the reports. I knew everything… but I didn’t want to believe it. I thought if I ignored it, if I sent Samuel to Juilliard, to Paris, everything would sort itself out. I was wrong. I was so wrong about both of you. And I hate myself for not stepping in sooner. For letting things get this far.”

I shook my head, fresh tears falling.

“I thought you were going to hate me… that you’d kick me out.”

Samantha shook her head vehemently.

“Never. You’re my daughter, Lily. In my heart, at least. Blood doesn’t matter. And this baby… this baby is also my grandchild.” Her voice broke. “My God… I’m going to be a grandmother twice.”

We both cried together. A different kind of crying now — softer, shared. Samantha hugged me again, rocking me gently.

“We’ll figure this out,” she whispered. “Together. If you want to have this baby, I’ll support you. We’ll tell your father the right way. We’ll face this as a family.”

I pulled back a little, looking at her with swollen eyes.

“And if I don’t want to?”

Samantha stroked my face.

“Then I’ll support you too. But you need to be sure. Because once the choice is made, there’s no going back.”

I nodded, resting my head on her shoulder again.

I was still terrified. I still didn’t know which path to choose. I was still carrying the weight of two lives — mine and the baby’s — on my shoulders.

But I wasn’t carrying it all alone anymore.