Cielo finds out on a Tuesday.
A completely ordinary Tuesday.
Which is exactly how life enjoys ruining people.
—
It starts with Jessa yelling from the kitchen again.
"If you're not pregnant, I'm going to stop buying you eggs because you clearly don't use them for survival purposes!"
—
Cielo, lying on the couch in a spiritually committed state of doing nothing, replies:
"I use eggs for emotional support."
—
Jessa appears instantly.
"That is not a food group."
—
Still, something feels off.
Not dramatic.
Not cinematic.
Just… persistent.
—
Nausea that arrives uninvited.Fatigue that feels personal.A body that suddenly has opinions about everything.
—
Cielo stares at the ceiling one afternoon.
"…Either I am dying," she mutters, "or my body has started updating software without permission again."
—
Jessa narrows her eyes.
"That is not a joke. That is a symptom."
—
So they go to the clinic.
Not with panic.
Not with certainty.
With that very Filipino energy of:
"Let's check it before it becomes a problem we have to emotionally process."
—
The nurse is kind.
Too kind.
The kind of kind that makes you suspicious.
—
"Let's just do a pregnancy test," she says casually.
—
Cielo blinks.
"…I beg your pardon?"
—
Jessa leans in immediately.
"Yes. Do that. Absolutely do that. Science her."
—
Ten minutes later.
Cielo sits on a plastic chair that suddenly feels like it has ancestral judgment.
Jessa is pacing.
The nurse is too calm.
—
And then—
—
"Positive."
—
The world does not explode.
It should.
But it doesn't.
It just… pauses.
—
Cielo stares.
"…Positive what?"
—
Jessa gasps so loudly someone in the next room says "shhh!"
—
The nurse smiles gently.
"You are approximately three months pregnant."
—
Cielo does not speak for five seconds.
Then:
"…I don't think that's mine."
—
Jessa turns.
"CIELO."
—
"I mean scientifically—"
—
"CIELO."
—
Her brain is doing something very technical.
Like rebooting.
Like crashing.
Like filing a complaint with reality itself.
—
Because there is only one explanation that doesn't make her entire life collapse into confusion.
—
Lee
—
And suddenly—
everything goes quiet inside her.
Not peaceful quiet.
The other kind.
The oh no, this is real kind.
—
Later, outside the clinic, Jessa is still spiraling.
"This is HUGE. This is LIFE-CHANGING. This is—do you even know what this means?!"
—
Cielo sits on the curb.
Very calmly.
"…It means I can no longer pretend my life is just emotional instability and instant coffee."
—
Jessa points at her.
"You are underreacting!"
—
Cielo nods.
"I am conserving energy for future breakdowns."
—
But inside—
inside is a different story.
—
Because the truth is not dramatic.
It is quiet.
Heavy.
Real.
—
Something inside her is growing.
Not metaphorically.
Not emotionally.
Physically.
—
And that changes everything.
—
That night, she doesn't sleep.
Not because she is scared.
Not because she is excited.
—
Because her hand keeps drifting to her stomach.
Like it's checking for confirmation.
Like it's asking a question she is not ready to answer out loud.
—
"I don't even know how this happened," she whispers to the ceiling.
Then immediately adds:
"…Actually, I do. I just don't want to think about it in detail."
—
And for the first time in a long time—
she doesn't dream of Lee.
—
Instead, she dreams of silence.
Of something small.
Of something waiting.
—
The next morning, she writes in her notebook:
"Observation: confirmed pregnancy (3 months).Emotional response: delayed processing."
She pauses.
Then adds:
"Additional note: life is now officially more complicated than any hacking system I have ever encountered."
—
Jessa reads it and sighs.
"So what now?"
—
Cielo shrugs lightly.
"I guess… I stop being just me."
—
Jessa softens.
"That sounds scary."
—
Cielo looks out the window.
"…It is."
A pause.
Then, quieter:
"…But it also explains why I couldn't let him go."
—
And somewhere far away—
or maybe not far at all—
a question begins to form inside her story.
Not answered yet.
Not spoken yet.
—
Just alive.
—
Because if this is real…
then everything else might be too.
—
And reality, for Cielo, has never been gentle when it finally arrives.
—
End of Chapter: Pregnancy in the Shadows