Six months later.
London in winter was nothing like Ravenwood.
The rain here felt softer somehow, mixing with fog that turned everything grey and dreamlike. I'd grown to love it.
My studio apartment in East London was tiny—one room with a kitchenette and a bathroom you couldn't turn around in. But it was mine and nobody could take it away.
Well, unless I missed rent. Which was always a possibility.
I checked my reflection in the cracked mirror by the door. Seven months pregnant now, my belly unmistakable under my waitress uniform. My dark hair was pulled back in a simple ponytail.
I looked tired. In fact I was tired.
The walk to the café took twenty minutes as the autumn cold bit through my thin jacket.
Just a few more months, I told myself. Then maternity leave. Then I figure out the rest. I had no idea what "the rest" looked like.
Bruno's Café sat wedged between a laundromat and a betting shop on a street that never quite woke up. The owner, Bruno himself, was a sixty-year-old Italian immigrant with no patience for excuses but a soft spot for hard workers.
The café door chimed as I came in. Bruno looked up, his thick eyebrows rising.
"Aria. You're early," he grunted, wiping his hands on his apron.
"Couldn't sleep," I said, grabbing my apron from the hook.
"The baby?" He nodded toward my belly.
I tied the apron above my bump. "Everything," I whispered softly.
He grunted again. "Go make coffee. The morning rush will start soon."
The morning rush at Bruno's meant maybe twelve customers over three hours. But they were regulars, and they tipped us well.
I've been working here for five months. Bruno paid me under the table—four pounds an hour, it was illegal but better than nothing. He let me take home leftover sandwiches at the end of shifts.
It wasn't much. But i was surviving
Mrs. C came in first, like always. She smiled warmly, her voice gentle. "How's the little one?"
"Active," I answered, pouring her tea. "Kept me up half the night kicking."
"That's good, shows it's a strong baby." She left a pound coin tip and nodded at me before settling down.
The morning moved on. Coffee, tea, toast. Smile, chat, clean.
My feet ached by ten AM.
At my break, I sat in the back room with a stolen sandwich and my battered laptop—a second-hand thing I'd bought for fifty pounds.
I opened my business strategy notes. This has become my routine: work. Study. Plan.
Every spare moment, I researched—corporate acquisition strategies, venture capital funding, tech startups. I read business journals, watched lectures online, absorbed everything I could.
I was building myself into something new. Something sharp and unbreakable.
The café door chimed again.
I looked up through the service window.
A woman walked in, she was in her late twenties, professional-looking even in casual jeans and a peacoat. Dark curly hair, warm brown eyes.
She looked familiar.
"Aria?" Her face brightened instantly. "Oh my god, it is you!"
My mind scrambled. Then it clicked.
"Olivia?" I stood, nearly knocking over my tea. "What are you—you're in London?"
She crossed the café in three strides and pulled me into a hug. "I'm doing a rotation at Royal London Hospital. Part of my medical degree." She pulled back, looking at my belly. "And you're—wow, you're really showing."
I laughed, a little breathless. "Seven months."
"Can you take a break? I want to catch up properly."
I glanced around the café. Empty except for Mrs. C who'd dozed off with her newspaper.
Bruno waved me off without missing a beat. "Go. I'll handle it."
Olivia and I sat at the corner table. She ordered coffee while I stuck with water—caffeine made the baby go crazy.
"So," Olivia stirred sugar into her cup. "Tell me everything. How did you end up in London?"
"It's a long story," I started hesitating.
"I've got time," she smiled, patient.
So I told her. Not everything—not the most painful parts. But enough.
The flight here. The struggle to find work while pregnant. Bruno's café, the tiny apartment.
Olivia listened, her expression darkening.
"That's…" She shook her head slowly. "Aria, that's insane"
"Pretty much," I admitted quietly.
"And Damien Blackwood? He's not supporting you at all?"
The name squeezed my chest painfully. "No. He made it very clear he wants nothing to do with me or the baby."
Olivia's jaw clenched. "What an asshole."
I laughed bitterly. "That's one word for him."
She reached across the table and squeezed my hand firmly. "I'm so sorry. Nobody should go through this alone."
"I'm not alone." I touched my belly protectively. "I've got this little one."
"You know what I mean." She leaned back. "Do you have any support here? Friends? Help with the baby?"
I shook my head. "Just me."
"Not anymore." Olivia's voice turned firm. "I'm here now. You've got me."
Something cracked inside me. "You don't have to" I began hesitantly.
"I want to." She pulled out her phone. "Here. Give me your number."
"I don't have a phone," I confessed.
She stared, surprised. "Seriously?"
I shrugged. "Couldn't afford one."
"Okay, that's changing." She stood. "Come on."
"What? I'm working" I say.
"Bruno!" Olivia called across the café. "I'm stealing your waitress for two hours!"
Bruno looked up from wiping the counter. "Are you paying?"
She pulled out a twenty-pound note. "Does this cover it?"
He waved us off with a grunt.
Two hours later, I had a cheap prepaid phone with Olivia's number programmed in.
"It's not fancy," she said as we walked back toward the café. "But at least now I can check on you. And you can call if you need anything."
"Olivia, I can't ask you to"
"You're not asking. I'm offering." She stopped and turned to face me. "Look, I know we barely know each other. But I'm not watching you struggle alone when I'm right here and can help."
My throat tightened. "Why?"
"Because I'm training to be a doctor. Helping people is literally what I'm supposed to do." She smiled warmly. "Plus, you seem like you could use a friend."
I did. God, I really did.
We exchanged information. She gave me her schedule, her hospital contact, even her flat address—shared with two other medical students in North London.
"Text me every day," she said firmly. "Even if it's just to say you're alive. I'll worry otherwise."