The room’s silent, empty. I gaze up at the pictures on the wall. Brilliant sunsets, embracing arms, cheerful smiles and longing glances reflect back at me. I cast my eyes downward because they send darts through my heart. I contemplate setting the photographs in my hand down but decide not too because they remind me to be strong.

My visions slightly blurred as my eyes well up but I will them back. I have to be strong.

I hear the front door open and you call out your usual greeting as you close the door. I take a deep breath and continue staring straight ahead. You call out again when you don't hear me answer and pop your head into the living room. You start to make a joke but you pause and step into the room. Your voice changes, its questioning tone is colder then the snow outside the window. You start over towards me and reach out.

"Don't touch me." My words are emphatic and icy. You stop short and I know without looking that you realize I know the truth. I don't wait for your lines because my hearts starting to fail me.

"I called the college. They'll have a room ready for me at the end of the week and until then I'll be here. Alone. At the end of this term I'm going back home. Alone. Between now and then I don't want to speak to you, I don't want to be near you and I don't want to be civil with you. We... this... is over. Because apparently I'm not the one you want anymore."

"You don't..."

"Don't tell me I do understand!" I explode and make the mistake of looking at your face. I can see your grief and it strikes a cord in my heart. My anger is fueled by the tears that fall in defiance of my wishes. "Don't..." I pause for a bit to try and regain some steadiness in my voice. I toss the photographs in my hand at you. "You said forever. You said we'd be together forever. And I believed you. I believed you. Stupid me. I gave you everything I have and it’s not good enough. I'm not good enough." I stand up and walk over to the window to look out at the storm. My arms wrap around my chest protectively and I unconsciously lay a hand across my stomach.

You murmur some things but I tune them out so I can maintain my stance, so I don't break down. Somewhere in the words I hear "I love you" and I laugh sarcastically.

"If that was true then how could you do this to us? How could you abandon us?"

"Us? You mean you're..."

"Yes God damn you, you bastard. I'm pregnant with your child. That’s what my doctor’s appointment was for today. I was so happy, so excited that I could give you such a wonderful gift. And then..." The words got stuck in my throat and I struggled to compose myself. "You don't have to worry though. This child will be loved with every fiber of my being and I will raise it the very best way possible. And when it asks where its father is I'll have enough heart not to tell it that daddy didn't love mommy anymore. And that'll be it."

"But that’s my child too and..."

"You have no right to be near a child promising something you can't even give to anyone else around you. I will not let you hurt my child like my father hurt me. You blew it. Not me." I turn away from you again to look out the window. "I want you to go now." You make some more protests and you plead. "Just go. If you love me at all. Just. Go."

I stand at the window until I hear the door close. I watch you walk to your car and I turn away from the window because it hurts to see you leave.

This time the room is no longer silent. It echoes my sorrow as I collapse onto the couch, broken and alone.