Silk

by Heidi McLaughlin

  The emergency room was filled with people. After filling out the paperwork that asked for more information than I could possibly provide, I took a seat in a hard plastic chair in the corner. A woman two seats down from me was vomiting into a trash can that she’d apparently brought from home. Another woman across the aisle was holding a bloody rag to her son’s head. A dirty, scruffy man, who I would have thought was homeless if he hadn’t been chasing a toddler, had the freakiest eyes I’d ever seen. They were dark, almost like he’d been punched in both eyes though it appeared to be a more permanent problem. As I looked around, I wondered if it was a full moon tonight. Isn’t that what they say? That ERs are crazier than usual on a full moon?

  The nurse who had taken Lizzie’s registration called me over. “Mr. Hill, can I ask what your relationship is to the patient? Are you the responsible party?” she asked suspiciously.

  Suddenly, I realized what it looked like. I’d brought in a 14-year-old pregnant girl who was bleeding profusely. The nurse wasn’t asking if I was the one who would be paying the bill. Her pointed glare told me that she wanted to know if I was the one responsible for putting Lizzie in this position in the first place.

  “No, ma’am,” I said with conviction. “I am just a friend. Actually, Lizzie is a friend of my girlfriend. She’s meeting us here.” I stumbled on the word ‘girlfriend,’ causing my denial to sound a little less genuine than I would’ve liked.

  “Okay, sir. Have a seat. A caseworker will probably come talk to you in a bit,” she said in a tone that told me that she didn’t totally believe me.

  I smiled at her as I turned away, but I was groaning on the inside. I wasn’t excited about seeing her again, but Allie really couldn’t get here fast enough.

  After about 20 minutes, the door to the drive slid open, and Allie rushed in. She looked disheveled, but even more gorgeous than earlier in the night. I didn’t want her to have an effect on me, but it was involuntary. She left me breathless.

  “Where is she?” she asked as she ran toward me.

  My emotions betrayed rational thought. It had been 20 days since I’d felt her against me, and all I wanted to do was wrap my arms around her. However, the image of Jay flashed through my mind and set something on fire in me. It almost killed the urge I had to touch her.

  “They took her back right away ... about 20 minutes ago,” I said. “I filled out some forms, but you might take a look. I didn’t know how to answer most of the questions.”

  “Okay, thanks, Adam,” she said, with relief. “I’ll go see what they need.”

  I watched her walk across the waiting room and mentally undressed her. I told myself that it was the dress. How could I not think that way when she was dressed like that? She spoke with the nurse who had given me the scolding a few minutes ago and then headed back in my direction. As she approached, I mentally redressed her again. Since she made no move to sit down, I stood, too.

  “They’re going to let me go back and sit with her,” she said. “Thank you so much, Adam, for doing this. Do I need to get your car detailed?”

  The professional tone in her voice got under my skin. “I’m not worried about my car, Allie,” I said. I didn’t mask the fact that I was offended by her question. “I’m worried about Lizzie. And, though you are clearly no longer my business, I’m worried about you.”

  “I know you are,” she said, her voice softening. “Tonight ... with Jay ... it’s not what you think. I made a mistake, Adam. A terrible mistake.”

  And that was all it took. I wanted to kick myself, but I was all in again. I didn’t have any fight left in me. I placed my hands on her shoulders and gazed into her steely blue eyes. “Then what was it?” I asked.

  “We need to talk. I want to. But I need to go back and check on her first. I don’t know how long this will take. You don’t need to wait around. I promise I’ll call you.”

  I wasn’t so sure that she could be trusted to fulfill that promise. I tucked a piece of stray hair behind her ear and then lifted her chin so that she couldn’t dodge my intense gaze. “I’m not going anywhere. I’ll be right out here if you need anything.”

  I slid an arm around her waist before she could protest and pulled her in close. I kissed her lightly to test the waters.

  “Not now, Adam,” she said softly.

  “Not now implies that there will be a later?” I asked.

  She cocked an eyebrow and licked her lips before giving me a devious smile. “I’m saying, ‘not now.’ We’ll talk later.”

  She nodded and turned to go. I couldn’t stop the shit eating grin from spreading across my face if I tried. What a pansy ass. Four words had reduced me to a pile of rubble at her feet.

  “Oh, hey,” she said, whirling back around. “Did you see her mom when you picked her up.”

  “No. She wasn’t there.”

  “Okay, if I can’t come out, I’ll text you.” And then she was gone.

  I spent the next two hours surfing the Internet on my phone. When I reached the end, I opened up Angry Birds and tried to demolish some pigs. I made it to level 14 before I got the notification I’d been waiting for.

  ALLIE: You can come back now if you want. We are in room 10. Lizzie wants to see you. I promise it’s safe.

  I didn’t waste any time texting her back. I assumed from the smiley face tacked on the end that things were going to be okay. I walked over to nurse Nazi and told her that I’d been summoned by the girls. She barely looked up from her paperwork and waved me on through. It appeared that Allie had cleared the air with her and I was no longer the lead suspect.

  As I approached room 14, I could hear Lizzie’s sweet voice through the cracked door. I started to knock to let them know I was there, but the conversation on the other side of the door stopped me. I shouldn’t be eavesdropping. It was wrong. But I couldn’t seem to make my feet move forward or backward.

  “Yeah, I was scared,” Lizzie said. “But, honestly, I was relieved. I don’t want this baby, Alexis. I hate it.”

  “That’s understandable, sweetheart. You’re just a kid. Why would you want this baby. You’re too young to know how to deal with this. But you have options, and you’re not alone.”

  “I just wanted it to go away. I’ve seen it on TV. I know what a miscarriage is. I just wanted it to go away. I was so relieved. I haven’t even told my mom.”

  I heard a familiar sigh. My Allie, she was a sigher. “It’s okay. We’ll figure it out, and we can tell her together.”

  “I’ve already figured it out. I want you to take it.”

  “What? Take what?” Allie asked. Her voice was shrill and panicky.

  “The baby,” Lizzie said simply, like she hadn’t just given away her firstborn child.

  I felt like the air had been sucked out of the large hallway. Time stood still. I didn’t know how long it was before Allie answered, but it felt like years. Eons.

  “I can’t take your baby, Lizzie. That’s not how it works.”

  “But it can work that way. I Googled it. And I called Planned Parenthood and talked to my case worker. I can give you the baby. A judge has to sign off on it, but it’s just paperwork. You’re a lawyer. Don’t you know judges?”

  Allie laughed. I wished that I could see her face. The laugh wasn’t brittle or hollow. There was energy behind it. There was hope ... and genuine amusement. Without even seeing the joy on her face, I knew. Lizzie was making her dreams come true ... and crushing mine. This wasn’t what I wanted. I’d made that clear. I’d spent what should have been my childhood taking care of other people, and I wasn’t interested in doing it again.

  My previous life flashed before my eyes. I remembered the days that I’d spent sitting with my unresponsive mother, hoping that she would wake up before my dad got home. I remembered all of the nights I’d made dinner so that he never figured out what a complete basket case she was. Every now and then she was cognitive enough to figure out who was taking care of her and she would tell me what a good son I was. Then s
he would tell me that I was going to make a great husband some day. I’d vowed then that I would never be a husband.

  I remembered all of the afternoons I’d sat with her in the bathroom while she puked. I didn’t ever want to get puked on again. I knew for a fact that all babies were good for was eating, pooping, and puking. Unfortunately, I had firsthand knowledge. It was the reason that I’d never ... not once in my whole adult life before the last time with Allie ... had sex without a condom.

  Joy had been my sole responsibility until she’d been big enough for my mom to take an interest in her. I was 14 ... Lizzie’s age ... when I’d come home after school every day to find Joy stuck in a pack ‘n play in the living room, her diaper full of shit and screaming her head off because she was hungry. I changed her diaper and made her a bottle because she was my little sister and I loved her, but I’d vowed then that I would never be a dad.

  The voices behind the door ripped me out of the past.

  “Come on, Alexis,” Lizzie prodded. “You’re more of a mother to me than my own mom. I can’t think of anyone else who I’d want to raise my baby. You’ll be a great mom, and Adam will help you. He’ll make a great dad.”

  I turned and walked back the way I had come. I pushed the red button that promised my release from the hospital that suddenly felt like a prison. I walked past nurse Nazi without giving her a second glance. I was completely numb by the time I got to my car and slid behind the wheel. I cranked the engine and listened to it idle. For a second, I heard a heartbeat in the rhythm of the engine. Then I realized that it was my own.

  CHAPTER 29

  Alexis

  I nodded reassuringly at Lizzie and then looked at my phone when it lit up to alert me to the incoming text.

  ADAM: I’M SORRY BUT I HAD TO RUN. BURKE IS STUCK AND NEEDS A RIDE. LET ME KNOW IF YOU NEED A LIFT HOME, AND I’LL COME BACK.

  My heart fell into my stomach. Just when I thought I had everything figured out, he was gone.

  I didn’t respond. I’d told him that we needed to talk. Even though I was ready and I was more than a little worried that he was still furious with me, it would have to wait until tomorrow. I pushed away my disappointment and focused on Lizzie. Tonight wasn’t about me and how I’d messed everything up. Tonight was about Lizzie and how she could make everything right.

  Adam

  Twenty-four hours later, and I was back at The Shelter. At some point, I would have to get my drinking under control. I knew that the solution to my problems couldn’t be found at the bottom of the bottle, but it was my genetic predisposition to look there first. The boys had a gig later, but they hadn’t shown up yet. So I grabbed a stool at the bar instead of our usual table. I wasn’t there to meet them anyway.

  I was drinking alone again, but I didn’t need to call attention to it. I looked down at the beer in front of me and considered it a true testament to the progress I was making. After all, it wasn’t whiskey

  True to her word, Allie had called twice today. We swapped a couple of voicemails throughout the morning, but I’d intentionally put her off. My head was in a strange place, and I had to get my shit together before I was ready to actually talk to her. That’s exactly what I was trying to do when her familiar perfume swirled around my head. The scent reminded me of what I’d once had and what I could probably have again if I was willing to compromise.

  How things had suddenly flipped around so that everything rested on my shoulders was beyond me. Even though that sentiment hadn’t been spoken, we both felt it.

  She slid onto the open stool next to me. “Thanks,” she said, nodding toward the drink that was already waiting for her.

  “How’s Lizzie?” I asked.

  “She’s good. She’s home now. It looked bad for a while, but the doctor said everything should be okay. There’s no reason that she shouldn’t have a normal pregnancy from here on.”

  I was glad. I really was. I’d seen all the blood, and it had scared me. I didn’t know what the right outcome was for Lizzie, but I was pretty sure that the episode in my car wasn’t it.

  “She really wanted to see you, you know,” Allie added. “She wanted to thank you.”

  “Yeah, I’m sorry,” I said. “Burke called me to come get him. I thought I could go and come back, but it took longer than I expected. Tell her that I’m sorry, okay.”

  “She knows. She got your flowers this afternoon. You’ve always been good with deliveries, you know.”

  She traced her finger around the tattoo on my wrist. The heat traveled all the way up my arm. I wondered if her touch would always have this effect on me. I hoped so.

  “I’m ready to talk, Adam.”

  “I’ve been waiting,” I said. It didn’t sound as welcoming as I’d hoped. I knew that my body language wasn’t encouraging her to open up either, but she did anyway.

  “About last night,” she started, “that guy wasn’t a real date. He’s just a friend of Ethan’s. We went to law school together. It was nothing.”

  “I know,” I said without looking at her. “I talked to Ethan today. He told me.”

  “So you believe me?” she asked.

  “I believe you. I also believe that you wanted to run me off for good.”

  “Did it work?” she asked. Her voice was barely louder than a whisper.

  “I’m here, aren’t I? When did you decide?”

  “Decide what?” she asked.

  “That you can’t live without me. I assume that’s why we’re here.” I threw a sly smile at her so that she knew I wasn’t trying to be a prick.

  “That’s why I’m here. I hope that’s why you’re here.”

  I gave her my most charming smile. “Well, then it’s settled. We can’t live without each other.” I lifted my hand in the air. “Check, please,” I said to the nonexistent bartender. I didn’t know where he’d run off to, but Allie and I were now totally alone.

  “Before we go, Adam, I need to talk about that day,” she said.

  I looked at her questioningly. There were so many days that we should probably talk about.

  “I know you have your own version of what happened, but I need to tell you mine. You can’t possibly forgive me if you don’t know what you are forgiving me for.”

  I took a long drink and leveled my gaze on her. “Wouldn’t you rather do this in private?” I asked.

  “No. I’m not going home with you unless I’m going to stay.”

  My heart skipped a beat. Even though I still wasn’t sure how this was going to all work out, I knew now that I wanted it to.

  Her breath hitched a little, and then she began speaking. Her voice was soft; yet, it was strong at the same time. “I’d been at a cheer camp all morning, and I was on my way home to change my clothes. It was St. Patrick’s Day weekend, and most of my friends were already on Greenville for the parade.”

  “Thomas, my boyfriend of three years, had broken up with me two weeks before. Prom was coming up in a few weeks, and we’d already been nominated for king and queen. It was stupid, but I’d been really upset because we wouldn’t be going together. He’d already asked Whitney Barnaby. It wasn’t like I couldn’t get a date or anything ... but the fact that we weren’t together any more had me totally jacked up. I wasn’t myself.”

  I remembered high school Allie and I wasn’t sure that that was a bad thing. I didn’t say that though.

  “Before I could get home, the weather started turning bad. The sky got really dark, and it started sprinkling. I had a convertible, and the top was down. I told myself to stop and put the top up. I wonder now if I had, if everything would have turned out differently. Maybe I wouldn’t have been in such a hurry.”

  “But I decided not to stop. Not even for stop signs. I was oblivious to everything except getting home so I could change. I just wanted to meet my friends.”

  “You see, I’d talked to my best friend just before I’d gotten in the car. She was already on Greenville. All week, she’d been telling me that Saturday was my chance
to find someone new ... someone older ... someone who would make Thomas jealous. The plan was that I would either take the new guy to the prom or Thomas would be so overwrought with jealousy that he’d drop Whitney Barnaby like a bad habit, and then we’d go together as originally planned.”

  “Anyway, I guess she and a few of our other friends were at the Goose, trying out their new fake IDs. They’d met a group of guys at the bar, and she’d called to tell me that I had to get up there because she had the perfect guy for me ... someone who’d gone to school with us a few years before. They were tired of the Goose though, and they were moving on. I was supposed to wait for her call so that I’d know where to meet them.”

  All of a sudden, I felt like she was talking through a tin can. Her words had become long and drawn out and echoed around my head. I could feel my body temperature rise as I remembered that day, too.

  She looked at me hard, and I wondered what she saw. I hoped that she didn’t see anything ... that I was sufficiently masking my thoughts.

  “I’m sorry,” she said. “None of this is important. I know you don’t care about any of this.”

  She couldn’t have been more wrong. I did care. I spoke for the first time since she’d started her story. “What did you say the name of your friend was?” I asked.

  “I don’t think I did. Her name was ... is ... Brittany.”

  “You know, it’s funny,” she said. “I hadn’t seen her in years and then out of nowhere I ran into her a few months ago at Starbucks in the bottom of my building. We used to be inseparable. I mean, we were friends practically from birth. We used to finish each other’s sentences. But, when I saw her back in June, I couldn’t even talk to her. Isn’t it ironic how someone so important in your life at one moment can mean so little at another? People change, I guess.”