Shae had spent the last twenty minutes alternating between pacing in his living room and shoving his head past the screen of the opened window to chain-smoke his goddamn lungs out. Yes, the stress was very nearly eating him alive.
Kami might be pregnant. Pregnant. And chances were good that it was his child she was carrying. Shae didn't know how to process that particular idea; there was no joy or elation at the thought of impending parenthood, only abject fear and a thick sense of dread that seemed to coat his entire throat and make swallowing far more of a challenge than it ought to be. He'd finished off the last two bottles of beer in his fridge, although he would gladly have welcomed another six-pack. Or possibly some vodka. Or bleach, even.
After slumping into his armchair in defeat, he'd finally noticed the unassuming black sketchbook that had been laid out on his coffee table for the past two months. Ren had unintentionally left the leather-bound book behind during the gumbo fiasco back in November, and every so often, Shae would flip through the glut of illustrations to the one sketch near the back- the one with long hair and dark eyes that bore an eerie resemblance to....well, to him.
Alright. His mind had just been made up for him.
Three minutes later he was standing in front of apartment #404, sketchbook tucked securely under one arm as he wrapped with his knuckles on the door. He wasn't sure just what that drawing meant, but he'd damn well find out.