Chapter 4

Oak Grove was a small, fairly religious community. Nearly everyone, including the Ferguson and Wyatt families went to Sunday School and church at one of the four churches. Sundays were time for families to gather over diner and spend time together. Taylor and Xander had no opportunity to get together. They settled for texting back and forth during the day.

Granger High looked completely different on Monday when the ninth graders met up with the remainder of the students. The school seemed spacious on Friday. Now it was crowded with kids, all older and larger than them. To call it slightly intimidating was an understatement.

Xander met Taylor outside her homeroom before first period. They walked to math class together, holding hands. A few of their friends congratulated the couple on getting together. One obnoxious guy, almost 6’-0” tall, catcalled to Taylor.

“Hey Babe, you need to find yourself a real man instead of that freshmen runt.”

“That’s your best pickup line?” Taylor retorted, facing the boy. “Has that line ever worked?”

Some of the other students in the hallway overheard the exchange and laughed at the boy. “You must spend a lot of time with your hand since you don’t seem to know how to pick up girls.” Taylor added as she and Xander walked away. The brought more laughter from the crowd at the obnoxious kid.

“You handled that great,” Xander commented.

“He was an asshole,” Taylor said. “Mom taught me how to deal with assholes.”

The couple went into the Algebra II class and took their assigned seats, side by side. Mrs. Serrano began the day with a review of the algebra they had learned last year.

As the teens listened to the lecture, the small cluster of cells in Taylor’s body were in her uterus. They divided again. The cluster had grown to sixty or seventy cells tightly packed in the hard outer shell of the ovum. The latest division increased the pressure to the point where the outer shell ruptured. The mass of cells oozed out of the shell and floated free in Taylor uterus. Her and Xander fates would be determined in the next twelve to twenty-four hours. Would the cells embed in her uterus and make her pregnant? Or would they get flushed away, the detritus of a failed attempt at procreation?

Unaware of what was going on in Taylor’s body, the two kids went about their school day. They rejoined for science class third period and for lunch. Taylor and Xander sat with their normal crowd of friends who they played Capture the Flag with during the summer.

Taylor pulled Xander aside about twelve minutes before the lunch period would end. “Did you replace that lube from Saturday night?” Taylor asked. “I am horny and haven’t felt you stuffing me since Saturday. One time in three days isn’t enough.”

“Umm ... I didn’t have a chance to replace it yesterday,” Xander said. His cock started to swell at any hint that it might get stuffed in a girl’s pussy. “You know, this week is one of the week’s when Westin and Emily said it is safe to screw without protection.”

“Safer without protection, not safe,” Taylor countered. “We reduced the risk from last Monday to 10%. Emily thinks chances are around 12% from Saturday night. We do this again without protection, say add in another 10% chance. Add in us getting horny a couple more times this week and now chances of me being safe are down to 50%. Flip a coin. Do I get pregnant or not this month? No thank you. You need to wrap up before you stick that wonderful dick of yours in me again.”

“Yeah, you’re right,” Xander agreed. “I promise, I will go over to the pharmacy as soon as school is over and replace the oil based crap with the water based lube Westin recommended.”

“Do that,” Taylor said. “I don’t want to go from fourteen times in last week to none this week.”

“I don’t want to go there either,” Xander agreed. They dumped their trays and went back to rejoin their friends. The pair hooked up again in seventh period English. Xander walked Taylor to her bus at dismissal. She reminded him of his promise to run to the pharmacy.

You would imagine the teachers would add homework slowly at the start of school. Oh no. They piled it on the kids immediately. Xander figured he had at least two or three hours of work Monday night. He was supposed to start his homework when he got home from school. He had no chance to go to the pharmacy.

It was 8:30 when Xander finally completed his homework. His parents said it was too late for him to go out to meet friends. He had to be satisfied trading texts with Taylor.

-----oooOooo-----

Tuesday morning Tyler Fitzwallace, the kid who sat to his right in homeroom leaned across the aisle and commented. “I heard you knocked up your girlfriend, Xander. How’s that feel?”

“What?” Xander squawked. “Where did you hear that? It’s not true.”

“I heard it around,” Tyler said. “Did you really nail that Wyatt chick?” Xander blushed but didn’t answer. “Really? You nailed her? Way to go dude. I’m glad to hear you didn’t preg her.”

“Don’t spread this around, Tyler,” Xander begged. “It’s private.

“Sure, man,” Tyler agreed.

Xander got two more comments about pregging Taylor before homeroom was dismissed. He denied everything, though no one believed him.

Xander found Taylor outside her homeroom, nearly in tears. “Did you hear the terrible rumor going around?”

“I did,” Xander said as he embraced his lover. He gave her a kiss on the cheek.

“What do we do?” Taylor asked as they started towards their classroom.

“Deny it all,” Xander said. “We don’t know that you are pregnant. Denying it is the truth.”

“But I might be,” Taylor replied.

“That is private and none of their business,” Xander said.

“But they know we are having sex,” Taylor said.

“We are a couple and we are in high school,” Xander said. Lot’s of high school couples screw. We aren’t unusual. The majority of high school students have sex before they leave high school.”

“This is only our second day in high school,” Taylor said.

“So we got an early start,” Xander said. He waved his hands towards the crowd of students in front of them. “Half the kids you see have sex. We are part of that group now instead of the half that hasn’t screwed yet. It isn’t a big deal.”

“I guess you are right,” Taylor allowed. They slipped into their seats at math class. Kim-Ly Nguyen stopped by Taylor and whispered to her, “I am sorry to hear your boyfriend got you pregnant. Is there anything I can do to help?”

“I am not pregnant,” Taylor answered out loud. Kim-Ly blushed and scurried to her desk. The loud comment drew looks from half a dozen classmates. Taylor realized she would need to apologize to Kim-Ly. It actually was very nice of her to come by and offer support if the rumor had been true.

Teasing followed both teens throughout the day. Most of the teasing Xander received as in the vein of ‘Way to go bagging that chick. Too bad about knocking her up.’ The verbal abuse Taylor received was more vicious. The girls’ comments said essentially, ‘You dumb slut for allowing that boy in your pants. You deserve to get knocked up for being so stupid.’

Taylor talked with Morgan after second period. Morgan denied telling anyone about Taylor having sex with Xander. Xander found Billy Smith before third period.

“Did you spill the beans about what you saw last week?” Xander demanded of his friend.

“Hell no!” Bill insisted. “I took an oath I wouldn’t. You can trust me.”

“How do people know?” Xander asked.

“Drew McKeown was with me when we spotted you two,” Billy said.

“He’s in eighth grade,” Xander said. “How would he spread the word around high school?” Billy had no answer.