Rachel half-heartedly listened to her ex-boyfriend, Nick Savage, as he droned on about details of the payments of the flat she was soon to be getting. When he finally finished she began to tell him the news that Rachel really wished she didn't have to, "there is something else that you may or may not want to know?" The half-question slipped from her mouth as she waited for his reply.

"What?" Nick bowed his head in annoyance; he was fed up with her games. The sooner Rachel Bailey was out of his life the better.

"I'm pregnant." Rachel spoke the words very matter-of-factly trying hard to hide the emotion that had swelled up inside her, as she wished that it had all happened just a few weeks ago when she was together with Nick, trying to plan the rest of her life with him. She thought they were going to get engaged, certainly not break up.

"I don't believe you."

Rachel thoughts were suddenly reigned in as she heard Nick accusing her. She carefully controlled her emotions. She would rather be dead than him realise how much she was hurting. "Nine weeks." Rachel sighed, proving to him the reality of the situation.

"Well you can't be pregnant you're on the pill," Nick challenged Rachel, waiting for her response. Instead, she slapped the picture from her recent ultrasound down onto the table. Nick picked the picture up, and just stared at it, awkwardly moving it around in his fingers, touching it delicately. The photo brought back memories of his two sons, the happiness they had brought him. This quickly made him realise of the destruction this news could bring to his family. "Is it mine?" He suddenly and desperately questioned Rachel.

"It's you that puts is about pal, not me." Rachel spat, finally realising her anger. 'Who the fuck does he think he is?' Rachel questioned herself.

"What do you want? What do you want me to do?" Nick stuttered, unsure what to say in the situation. "Do you want me to pay for a clinic?"

"We're assuming it's a termination?" Rachel spoke back, playing the game as she took a drink of the soda water that she desperately wished was laced with vodka.

"Well you can't want a baby!" Spat back, praying this was true.

"Why not, hm? Am I not the type?" Rachel still carefully controlled her emotions because she really wanted Nick to be shitting himself. She could feel the satisfaction sweep through her as she realised she was winning.

"You're ambitious, you…you've got a career!" Nick attempted to reason with Rachel, trying so hard to make her see what she would lose.

"Yeah, and I thought I was in a steady relationship with a responsible adult until a few weeks ago!" Rachel finally let out some of the hurt she felt, hoping Nick would see the mess he had caused.

"You planned it?" Nick questioned with vengeance.

Rachel began to lose her temper, cursing at Nick's arrogances, "as it happens, I didn't." She finally spat out. "I've not got much choice, have I?" Rachel gave in. "It's not going to be you haemorrhaging down the toilet, torturing yourself over what a murdering bastard you are, is it? No, that'll be me." Nick began to look uneasy again. Rachel almost felt bad for her comments; they had hurt her to as she listened to her fate being drawn from her own mouth. "Sorry. Was that a bit graphic for you? Anyway, thanks for that, Nick, along with all the other pleasant memories." Rachel took back the small sonogram photo, momentarily staring at it, longing for it. She placed in her bag, which she scooped up as she left Nick who was stunned by the conversation which could potentially changes his life so much.

~()~

Rachel tried desperately to Janet as she filled her in on the details relating to their latest case. She had picked up that the body was found on Saddleworth Moor on Friday night and that it was a woman, but that was all she could grasp. Rachel felt the nausea sweep through her body.

"Are you listening?" Janet interrupted Rachel's thoughts. Rachel managed to delicately nod her head, fearing that if she did anything else in would further induce the sickness.

"Are you alright?" Janet questioned becoming concerned about her friend.

"Just pull in," Rachel murmured, indicating to Janet. She leapt from the car with all the grace of a hippopotamus. She hurried towards the grass verge and felt the vomit be expelled from her body. She hung her head, trying to regain her breath. Rachel could her Janet's footsteps becoming louder as her best friend approach. She braced herself for the enquiry that was to come. Rachel turned to Janet and waited.

Janet simply muttered the words "late night?" forming a question that would eventually lead to a telling off as Janet loved Rachel dearly but severely disapproved of her gallivanting through the night, drinking away only to feel like shit the next morning.

Rachel tried once again to catch her breath and finally responded with "pregnant." She could see the shock filtering into Janet's face. "I'm, er," Rachel faltered trying, unsuccessfully to find the words she wanted. "I'm having an abortion on Wednesday," Rachel finally finished.

"Does, does Gill know?"

Rachel let out a sigh. "No. I'm going to get grounded." Rachel half joked, half worried. "I've booked the day of but not said why." Rachel removed the sonogram photo which had been nesting in her pocket and handed it to Janet who stared at it closely then looked up in confusion.

After a few, long, minutes had passed Janet handed back the picture to Rachel and they both returned to the car.

The remainder of the journey didn't take long, but it was infused with a painful silence. Rachel spent most of the time staring out the window, wondering what to do. She knew having an abortion was the most practical solution but it felt so wrong.

The silence continued until they reached the victim's, who Rachel now knew to be Susan Metcalf, front door. Then, all of a sudden Janet broke the silence, "why go for a scan if you're having an abortion?" Janet had finally asked the question that had been pestering her mind.

"I don't know" Rachel responded after a long pause. Rachel grasped for and gave one closest to what she believed to be the truth, "I wanted to know what it looked like."

~()~

"Hello?" Rachel answered the phone, her voice hoarse from crying.

"You rang?" Janet quickly questioned Rachel.

Instantly recognising her best friend's voice she began the conversation. "What are you doing for you anniversary? Can I come?"

"Is that what you rang about?" Janet felt confused. When she had received the text from Rachel, telling Janet to call her she felt it was a lot more than that. Anyway, it was a given that Rachel would be invited.

"You know giving birth?" Rachel finally proceeded.

"Yeah?" Janet answered, encouraging Rachel.

"What's it like?" Rachel could feel the tears beginning to well up. As she let Janet continue the conversation.

!Well…it's painful and you can't ever imagine how you are going to come out the other side without being ripped to thunder," Janet faultered, " but you do and its brilliant and beautiful even when you have your legs up in stirrups having ten thousand up ya…But that's the easy bit; it's the next five, ten, fifteen years that do your nut in." Janet tried hopelessly to joke, to try to make her friend feel better. "Rachel?"

"I can't do this." Rachel let out her cries, her desperation and tried to take comfort from Janet.

"What can't you do?"

"The baby, ya know, its flesh and blood and a brain and, and it's mine." Rachel couldn't understand how she could love such a tiny thing, that she'd never met. It was just a foetus.

"Do you want me to come over?" Janet suggested.

Rachel almost begged Janet. Janet was lovely, and promised to be over within the hour. Rachel lay on the sofa, feeling trapped by her own desperation.

~()~

"I'd rather be here. This why I don't want any fuss made over this bloody anniversary." Janet answered Rachel's question. She couldn't even begin to explain the mess of her home life.

"What? What is?" Rachel questioned, thinking she had missed something Janet had said.

"Ade!" Janet exclaimed,

"Ahh, did ya know he was a Geography teacher before you married him?" Rachel jokes, trying to add some lightness to the heavy atmosphere.

"I'd rather ignore it completely than have to go through the pain of watching him having to make an effort. I get home and instantly I'm on nursing duty: Lady Gaga is farting around upstairs with period pains and he's just sat in front of the telly." Janet let out the annoyance of her everyday life.

"You wouldn't be without you, though, would ya? Even when they are driving you up the wall." Rachel had seen Janet's love for her kids, Elise and Tasie, even Rachel really liked the.

"Rach, I can't tell you what to do. Whichever way you choses you'll still torture yourself after that it was wrong. You've been dumped on from a great height by a man who needs his head examined. Nobody envies you, the position you're in, and nobody will judge you for it, after." Jane t offered her sympathy and advice to Rachel.

Feeling helpless Rachel finally asked Janet, hoping for inspiration of what to do. "What would you do, if you were me?"

"I'd get rid of it."