Our First Date Since...... (Cho)

Cedric looked in the mirror that laughed at him. He didn't see what was so amusing. He thought that he looked nice. Well, as nice as he could, given the fact that they were still living in a room above the Leaky Cauldron. They would need to do something about that soon. Cho was starting to show, and he knew that she was feeling insecure. So this evening, he was going to take her on their first date. Well, of course it wasn't really their first, but it was the first since they had found out that they were going to be parents.

He looked down at his shirt. It was clean, not a spot on it. But he knew that this mirror had a habit of insulting him, so he just rolled his eyes and turned away, picking up his jacket to dust it off. He hung it on a hook and turned around the room, looking to see if there was anything that he'd forgotten. Not finding anything, he picked up the flowers he'd gotten for Cho. He sniffed them and smiled. They were so pretty, just like her.

He looked for a better place to put them, other than the bed. He might sit on them before she got back to the room. He decided to lay them on the mantle of the fireplace. He stoked the fire while he was there, trying to get the room warm. Cho was carrying his baby, and their health was the most important thing to him. That was why he was going to insist on this date. She needed to get out of this room once in a while, and not just to go back to Hogwarts. Not just to go down to eat in the Leaky Cauldron.

He turned around as the door to the room opened, smiling when he saw that it was his love.

"Cho, I am not going to take no for an answer, we are going out this evening."

Cedric

Cho was rather shocked when she saw that Cedric was all dressed up and eager to leave the Leaky Cauldron. She, personally, wanted to hide there until the end of time. Until she was through with her nine months and had her baby. She felt fat, and although when they were alone it was nice to marvel at her belly...when it came to going out in public it was just embarrassing. Their parents had practically disowned them so they were on their own, the only reason they were able to stay at the Leaky Cauldron was because Tom was extremely generous and Cedric helped him with odd jobs around the pub. But that didn't change the fact that she was still pregnant and wanted to leave.

"Ced...I don't think I should go outside," she said gently. "I look...bad."

She knew that that was probably a lame excuse, but Cho just did not feel like doing much of anything that did not involve sleeping or crying. She was just so distraught at their parents reaction to her being pregnant, and so aware of just how hard life would be once she went back to school. She was SHOWING and it was just something the world scoffed out. And the ironic thing was she was not even the first girl to get pregnant at a young age. There were many people who did it, but because she was not one of the people those had expected it to happen to, she was alienated for it.

"Maybe we should just stay here tonight," she whispered sadly. "We...we don't have to go out..."

Cedric shook his head. Cho didn't realize how beautiful she was to him. The fact that she now carried their baby made her even more wonderful. He wished that she could see her the way he did. Then she could see the things he did when his heart looked at hers.

"I said that I will not take no for an answer, Soon-to-be Mrs. Diggory. And that is still my response. We won't be going far, just to the ice cream parlor. You don't even have to eat if you don't want, but I hope you do, it's better for the little one."

He crossed to her and lay a hand on her stomach, hoping to feel the being that he'd helped create answer his touch. He smiled and kissed the baby's mother. Above all else, he loved her, and their child. He would go to the ends of the earth to protect and care for them. Which involved this evening.

"On second thought, I do want you to eat. You need food, and so does our little one. I'm not asking much, just a sandwich?"

He hoped that she would want more than that, though. Her morning sickness had been so hard on her. He wanted her to gain back all the nutrition she'd lost. She would need it, and more, given that she still had a while to go, and they needed to find a home, jobs, and still get through this school year.

Cho cringed at the thought of food. She did not understand it, most of the books said that she would be twice as hungry. But the morning sickness just made her want to boycott food for the rest of her life. She had cravings, but not for food... she craved certain drinks. There were days where she would go down to Tom in the Leaky Cauldron and just beg him for a carton of orange juice. Of course he gave it in good spirits, he liked the Diggory's and any friend of them was a friend of his. But she could go through a whole carton of orange juice and not be hungry at all. The same thing happened with milk, water, soda, butterbeer, she just had liquid cravings...which was probably why she peed so much.

But she knew that Cedric was worried, if she did not eat then the baby was losing nutrients. They had scheduled her first doctors appointment for the following day, so at that time she would find out what was wrong with her. She just hoped that it wasn't something too serious. Cho believed it to be her not being used to throwing up every morning. She was sure that as time continued she would get more used to it and be able to eat...but the problem was she had been pregnant for a couple of weeks now, and it just seemed to linger. She ate little portions, but Cedric said it wasn't enough for both her and the baby.

"Cedric," she sighed. "I really don't want to go out...you may think I am beautiful but other people just see a pregnant teen...they don't care if I am pretty or not."

And she did not think herself pretty, she thought herself fat.

Cedric reached up and stroked her cheek. He knew that her feelings about her appearance right now were hard for her to deal with. He constantly let her know that he thought she was beautiful. She always had been, and to him, she always would be. Now, or when she was ninety. He leaned forward and kissed her cheek.

"Cho, love. I think we both need some fresh air. It's not good for us to be cooped up in this room, and then cooped up in Hogwarts. You need some time outside. I'm sure that the baby would appreciate it as well?" He looked down as he lay his hand on her stomach again. He didn't want to push her if she didn't want to go, but he did want to have dinner with her somewhere else other than the Great Hall, where they were seperated by the Gryffindor table, or the dining area downstairs. Personally, he was getting sick of the food, and he thought that if she went to another location, possibly she would be able to eat something more than she had been. From what he saw, all she was doing was drinking various liquids. Granted, they were all good for her, but she needed to have solid food as well.

"Please, Love. For your health and the baby's. Please let's just get out of this room for the evening. I don't care what people think. All I care about is making sure that my family is healthy and taken care of."

Cho shook her head and went back to the bed. Laying down she turned on her side away from her beloved. She knew that he wanted to just do what was good for her and the baby, but he wasn't the one carrying a baby. He wasn't the one that had to walk around and be laughed at. She loved her unborn child already, but that still did not change the fact that she was embarrassed. Cho would never admit to regretting making love to Cedric, because she didn't...she regretted that they had not been more careful. Pulling the blankets up around her she sniffled.

"I just want to stay here," she whispered. "I don't feel so good anyway....you can go and get ice cream Cedric...you don't have to stay here with me."

She felt so guilty that rather than him being downstairs having fun, or with his family, he was with her. He was suffering with her, trying to make this all better and she was just sitting there pregnant and a burden. At night when she woke up sick because of the baby, he would wake up with her and hold her hair back while she threw up. If she threw up down her front he would clean her up and help her drink ginger-ale. He was too good to her and she did not deserve any of it.

"I don't want people staring at me," she said softly. "I would much rather just hide up here."

Cedric kicked off his shoes and moved to get into the bed with Cho. He scooted as close to her as he could, wrapping his top arm over under her arms and over their child. He knew that she didn't regret their baby, or sleeping with him. He didn't either. What he did regret was that it was because even though they had used protection each time, he'd apparently not been careful enough at least once, as they were now going to be parentsm and they were on their own.

Cedric just lay behind his fiancée, moving his hand lightly over her stomach, no longer caring if they went out or not. He wanted her to get more nutrition than her almost entirely liquid diet provided, but if that was all she could handle, he wasn't going to keep forcing her. But this life wasn't good enough for her, and he made a decision.

He was going to go to the Headmaster first chance he had when they returned to Hogwarts. They needed better living arrangements, and he needed to find a job that paid more than the Leaky Cauldron could. He wanted to be able to provide for his family, and he was going to do that, dammit! He did not want his baby to have to grow up in a room above a bar. And as the child's father, Cedric felt an instant surge of protection running through him. He was going to do what it took to protect his baby, and the love of his life.

"Cho, I'm sorry. If you don't want to go out, we don't have to. We can stay here if you want, all right?" He kissed her cheek gently.

Cho hugged her pillow and sniffled. She just felt so sad lately and she wasn't sure if this was normal or if she was just going through some form of depression. She had been reading books on teen pregnancy and they said that depression in teens was very common; but that didn't mean Cho wanted to have to put Cedric through that kind of worry. Closing her eyes she just tried to sleep...she never wanted to wake up again. All she wanted to do was drift away into oblivion where no one in the world could touch her.

"I just want to go to bed," she whimpered, tears slowly sliding down her face. "You can go out and eat without me."

Pulling the blankets up over her head Cho sniffled as her shoulders began to shake with sobs. She hated being so sad all the time, but she couldn't help it. She wanted to be happy and normal again...but she just didn't see the light in this situation. She was seventeen and pregnant; what future did she have other than being a mother for the rest of her life? How was she supposed to teach her child that sex before marriage was bad, when she could not even wait for graduation.

Sobbing softly into her hands she opened her eyes and faced the graying wall. This room didn't do much to help her mood either, if anything the dark decor just made her feel worse about herself.

Cedric sighed and moved over to the bed, lifting Cho off it and pulled a sweater of his out of the closet, pulling it over her head. It was bulky enough to hide her stomach, but light enough that she'd be able to move. He had had enough. She was not going to continue to do this to herself. She was pregnant, not a leper. She was an adult by magical standards, and he knew that even though she was feeling bad about the pregnancy happening the way it had, he was not going to let her hole up in this retched room and rot.

"We're going, end of discussion." He pulled on his jacket again and led her out of the room with a hand at the small of her back. If something didn't happen soon to bring her out of this depression that she was in, he was going to take her to St. Mungo's and have either Healer Spencer or Healer Bauer look at her. Maybe both! There was just something wrong here.

He led her to the ice cream parlor and sat her in a secluded table, not that it mattered much anyway. They were the only ones in the establishment, and they'd not seen more than one person on the way in, and that person had had their back to them. He sat down across from her and took her hand, more to comfort her than himself.

"Cho, no one is staring at you, you can have anything you want, even if it's just water. But you are not going to sit in the room and feel bad. It's not good for you or the baby and if you don't get out of there once in a while, I'm going to have to take you to a Healer."

He didn't want to tell her that he had been thinking about just that on the way to the parlor, or the new thoughts that were starting to make him wonder in his head.

Cho felt her chin quiver and gently she rested her head on the table and wrapped her arms around her belly. She didn't want to be out in the open where people could see her. And even if they weren't looking at her it still felt like they were. Cedric just didn't understand...no one really stared at him while she was pregnant. All eyes were generally on her. They felt she was horrible for having sex out of wedlock, and she was even worse because now she was an unwed mother. What if Cedric left her while she was pregnant? What if he didn't want to be with her anymore. She would rather die than have to raise a child all on her own. Her parents could not stand the sight of her and Cedric's father had left them out to dry. Now they were living in a drab room above a bar! How had their life fallen apart so quickly.

Crying softly into the table she sniffled and looked away from Cedric. She felt so sad and miserable that words would never be able to describe it. She felt ugly, fat, and gross. Why couldn't Cedric just see that? Maybe after she had the baby she should just throw herself off a cliff. Her fiance would be so much better off without her. At least then he would be able to date a girl that was actually pretty...a girl that was happy and not sad and morbid all the time. Cedric deserved a girl like that...he deserved someone perfect. He deserved to have a life.

"I want...want to go back..." she sniffled. "I just want to go...go to bed...."

Cho

Cedric was lost now. It was seeming to him that Cho didn't want him anymore. That broke his heart. She'd been like this more and more since learning that she was pregnant, and he wondered if she regretted sleeping with him in the first place. He didn't believe that they'd made a mistake, even though they hadn't actually planned for it to happen. But he would never regret being with the woman that he loved. Not for one second in his existance.

He bit his lip as he looked at her across from him. She was so sad, and it worried him. There had to be something he could do to make her feel at least a little better, but he didn't know what it could possibly be. This was scaring him beyond belief. She wouldn't go out, she cried all the time, and although he knew that it was hormones for some of it, it seemed to go deeper than that. He didn't want to have to take her to St. Mungo's to keep her from hurting herself and the baby, but he would if he had no other choice.

What he wanted to do was learn what was making her so depressed, why she didn't want to go out of the room for any reason unless she was in class at Hogwarts, and from what he'd heard from her fellow Ravenclaws, she didn't want to then, either. He was so worried about her that he could hardly concentrate on anything other that his Cho.

One idea came to him, but he didn't think that she would want to do it. She'd more than likely tell him no, not right now, but he didn't know what it could hurt for him to at least try.

"Cho, you don't have to do this if you don't want, but I was interested in your answer." He took a deep breath and let it out in a whoosh with his words. "What do you think of us getting married today?"

Cho sniffled and shook her head. It was just simply out of the question. She had no dress, she looked a mess, and she just didn't feel happy enough to say "I do". Why had Cedric even suggested that? Couldn't he just stop pushing her so much? She needed time to process everything! Of course she wanted to marry him, but that didn't mean she wanted to at that exact moment. She was feeling horribly depressed and getting married wasn't going to change that...maybe she needed help?

Sobbing into her hands she shook her head and looked down. She didn't want to make Cedric angry with her, or to make him leave, but she just couldn't help herself anymore. She didn't know what was wrong with her, all she knew was that she was not herself anymore and it scared her. She needed to go to a Healer and get fixed...because if she wasn't cured soon she would lose her mind.

"I can't..." she sobbed. "I can't do this Cedric...I need help...I need help..."

She wrapped her arms around herself and continued to cry, the tears rolling down her face onto the checkered table cloth in front of them. She felt so sad all the time and she just wanted it to end. She wanted the sadness to go away, but nothing seemed to make it. She would have a moment of happiness, but just like that it was gone!

Cedric looked at Cho across the table from him. She was right, and it was just what he'd been thinking. She needed help, and he was going to get it for her. He stood up and took her hand, leading her from the small shop and out to the London streets. He was taking her somewhere to get the help she wanted and needed.

Once they reached St. Mungo's, he sat her in a chair and went to speak to the Welcome Witch. She paged a Healer right away as the hospital was not busy that day and told Cedric that it would be just a few minutes. He nodded and returned to Cho's side. He took her hand and wiped the tears from her almond shaped eyes. He loved her beyond anything in his life, and he would do anything to protect her. He was going to be with her through this, and forever after if she would have him.

He held her hand while they waited for the healer to come for them. He wanted her to know that he was there for support, love and whatever else she needed from him. No matter what came, he was not going to leave her.

"Cho, it'll just be a few minutes, then someone is going to come get you. I'll go with you if you want?" He looked at her beautiful face and decided that he'd go as long as he was allowed. If she wasn't able to tell the Healer all that was wrong, he could do it for her.

He looked up as he heard their names being called and stood, gently tugging Cho to her feet and following behind the Healer to the exam room. When they got to the room, he became confused as to why there were two Healers.

"Um, I don't mean to sound like a dolt, but is there something going on that I don't know about?"