The Girl of Diamonds and Rust (The Half Shell Series Book 3) Read online

  “Is that why you broke up with me?” he asks.

  His eyes burn into me and reluctantly I admit, “Yes.”

  “Fuck, Chrissie.”

  His legs come up in front of him, knees bent, and he plants his elbows on them, his face resting in his hands, his fingers tightly clenched in his hair.

  “What else don’t I know? You might as well tell me everything, Chrissie.”

  I’m so ashamed.

  “You know everything, Neil. I’ve told you everything.”

  He takes a slow, deep inhale of breath and then looks up. “Do you want me to stay longer? Go with you? Be with you during the appointment?”

  I can’t believe Neil just offered to do that for me. “I was just going to go alone.”

  “No, Chrissie. And I won’t let you. Fuck, I’m staying in Berkeley as long as you need me. I’ll go with you.”

  “I can’t let you do that.”

  “You don’t have a choice. I’m staying. I’m doing it. You’re not going alone,” he announces stubbornly.

  I drop my gaze to my clasped fingers resting in my lap. “Thanks.” I’m barely able to choke out that word before I turn into him and start to cry. “I’m sorry. I’m sorry about everything. I don’t know why you would offer to go with me or why you always are so nice to me.”

  His arm encircles me. “I love you. I’m pretty fucking pissed right now, but I love you.”

  Shame burns my digestive track. “You should hate me.”

  “Nope. Not doing it.” His hand moves gently on my back and once I’ve calmed he turns to look at me. “You need to call him.”

  All my muscles tense. “No. I’m not calling Alan. Leave it alone, Neil. I’ve made my decision.”

  Neil springs to his feet and exits the bathroom. A few minutes later he returns. Damn, he’s carrying the cordless phone.

  He holds it out to me. “Call him now, Chrissie. I’ll stay here with you while you do it, but it’s not right to make this decision without talking to him. I would fucking hate it if you did that to me.”

  “I’m not calling,” I repeat more forcefully and Neil continues to stands frozen holding out the phone. “Damn it. I’ve already called him. I’ve left a hundred messages. Alan won’t call me back. He ended it. I can’t tell him because he won’t talk to me.”

  We stare at each other and I can tell that Neil’s deeply engrossed in thought in the guy ready to manage and fix shit way. He sinks back down on the floor in front of me and something in how he looks at me makes my heart accelerate nervously.

  “Does he know about us, Chrissie? That you were living with me while seeing him? Is that why he ended it?”

  Damn. “Yes.”

  Neil turns on the phone. “Give me his number.”

  Fuck no! “What?”

  “I’m calling him.”

  My eyes go wide. “Like hell you are. He won’t talk to you. Why would he talk to you when he won’t talk to me?”

  Neil looks both amused and grim. “Oh, he’ll talk to me, Chrissie. He won’t be able to stop himself. It’s a guy thing. I’m not going to explain it. He’ll take the call even if it’s just to tell me to fuck off.”

  Neil waits expectantly. I can tell he’s not going to back down on this. “Fine.” Reluctantly I rattle off Alan’s number and Neil dials the phone. He stands up and moves away from me.

  Seconds tick by in agonizing slowness as no less than a dozen pictures of how dreadful this might go flash in my head. Then he clicks off the phone and tosses it on the counter. Frowning, I watch as Neil moves across the room and crouches down in front of me.

  He brushes my cheek with his thumb. “He’s disconnected the line. Is that the only number you have for him?”

  My heart drops to my knees. It’s the only means I’ve ever had to reach Alan, through the private answering service, and he has disconnected it. I struggle not to fall apart.

  I nod.

  “I’m sorry, Chrissie. What a prick.” The tic in his cheek starts to work. “Fuck it, Chrissie. You don’t need Alan Manzone. I’ll stay here and be with you.”

  CHAPTER THREE

  I sit on my bed and stare at the door. Even knowing Neil is waiting for me in the living room doesn’t make this any less frightening or awful.

  I stare at the phone sitting on my nightstand. I could call Linda Rowan. She’d know how to reach Alan. Or I could just call Brian Craig, Alan’s manager. I’ve known Brian my entire life. Crap, I could even call Jack. Jack knows how to reach everyone. I could probably still call Alan before I do this…

  No, Chrissie, no. Neil is wrong. It doesn’t matter. Alan is just going to tell you to have the abortion, anyway.

  I stare down at the stupid, fuzzy socks I’m wearing. I remember something about Rene saying her feet got cold during the procedure—so like Rene to complain about her feet and talk about absolutely nothing useful to help me mentally prepare for what getting an abortion will be like. I could definitely use some insight since she’s the only girl I’ve ever known who has admitted to having an abortion—but gosh the socks look stupid peeking from between my tennis shoes and my sweatpants.

  A knock on the door makes me jump and Neil lumbers in.

  “You ready to go?” he asks quietly.

  The tone of Neil’s voice makes my heart ache. Somehow I’ve dragged him into my abyss and between us there is a sense of shared misery. But it’s not. It’s not Neil’s baby, this isn’t Neil’s problem, and this isn’t Neil’s misery. It’s mine.

  I nod, but my legs refuse my command and I continue to sit there, staring blankly at the phone.

  Neil sinks down on the bed beside me. “Are you sure you want to do this?”

  Oh crap, I don’t want to rehash my decision again. For some reason, Neil doesn’t want me to do this. He hasn’t said it, but I can tell. He keeps asking me if I’m sure, as if any woman is really one-hundred percent sure about something like this.

  My body tenses as he runs a hand through his tousled hair. It looks like he’s been running his fingers through his hair all day trying to work through something he’s been thinking about.

  “I don’t get you, Chrissie. You don’t want to do this. I can tell. You don’t have to if you don’t want to. There are other choices.”

  Oh, why did he have to say it? I fight back another wave of tears.

  “It’s the right decision. I have to do it, Neil.”

  His mouth tightens and he shakes his head. “No, you don’t.” He sighs heavily. “Christ, we can get married. We can raise the baby if you want to. You can tell everyone it’s mine. No one ever has to know it isn’t ours.”

  My already roiling emotions start to twirl faster.

  “God, Neil, I don’t need to get married so I don’t have to do this. I have plenty of money. Jack wouldn’t think anything of me having a baby and not being married. That’s not why I’m doing this.”

  His jaw stiffens. “Then can you explain to me why you are doing something you obviously don’t want to?”

  I stare down at my stupid, fuzzy socks. Trying to explain all this to Neil would be the worst kind of betrayal to Alan, and yet I don’t think I can make Neil understand without telling him one of Alan’s secrets. And he did just offered to marry me—he’s such a good guy—Neil deserves the truth.

  “Only a handful of people know this, Neil, but Alan had a little girl named Molly.”

  Neil’s face shoots up, his eyes filled with confusion and surprise. “Molly?” He pauses, as if trying to make sense of something, and then his expression changes into disbelief. “You mean the song Molly is about his daughter not Ecstasy? It’s not a song about drugs?”

  “Death takes us all. I want it. I want you,” I quote sadly. “That’s not about addiction, Neil. It’s about how Alan didn’t want to live after his daughter died.”

  “Fuck.” He stares at me. “What happened to her?”

  No matter how I try to keep it away, that day in the barn when Alan told me about Molly ris
es vividly in my head. The way Alan looked. The expression in his eyes. I’m positive he wasn’t even aware of what he let surface on his face that day as he calmly told me about Molly’s death. But I can’t forget it. It’s haunted my every minute since I realized I was pregnant.

  “She got sick and she died,” I say simply. “It was a fucked-up situation. I can’t have the baby and lie to him. That would be unfair to him. Especially with what I know about Alan’s history. And it would be unfair to you and to the child if I lied and said you were the father. I can’t do that. Not to you and not to him.”

  Neil makes an obstinate shake of his head, and I can see that he thinks I’m wrong to care about Alan’s feelings in all this.

  “But what do you want to do, Chrissie? You’ve given me a hundred reasons why this is what you should do, but you haven’t said a word about what you want.”

  “I don’t know what I want.”

  “Then you shouldn’t do this,” Neil advises firmly.

  I roll forward onto my feet and stand. “I don’t want to talk about it anymore.”

  I head toward the door, stop and look back at Neil. Reluctantly, he stands and follows me out of the condo.

  We are both quiet as we drive to the clinic. My insides are tight, knotted bands that feel like lead somehow jumping anxiously within me. Worse than anything I’ve ever felt.

  I stare out the window, fighting not to look at Neil. Jeez, I can’t believe he offered to marry me. Why would he do that? My exhaustion-dulled wits can’t find the energy to try to figure that one out.

  Neil finds a parking spot across the street from the building and I wait in my seat as he pulls the key from the ignition, climbs from the driver’s side, and trots around the Volvo to get my door.

  He takes my hand and I stare down at his fingers laced through mine as we slowly work our way through traffic to the other side of the street.

  I don’t know what I would do if Neil wasn’t with me. It’s so much harder than I imagined it would be. I don’t know how Rene went through this twice, alone. She didn’t tell me about either until after the procedure was done, and it hurt, really hurt, at the time that she didn’t. I sort of get it now. I haven’t told her about me.

  Sadness moves across my jittery limbs. God, I don’t think I could get through this if Neil wasn’t willing to be here with me. I peek at him from the corner of my eye and my fingers tighten around his. I need Neil right now more than I have ever needed anyone. More than I’ve ever needed Alan. Or Jack. Or Rene.

  As if he senses me watching him, Neil looks down at me. “It will be OK, Chrissie. I’ll stay with you through it all. It’s going to be OK.”

  I’m not sure which one of us he’s trying to convince. Neil sounds worried and kind of despondent.

  As we pass by the high stucco wall into the clinic parking lot, I wonder if that’s how we look to people today: worried and despondent. Like a couple going through shit. Only this isn’t our shit. It’s mine and Alan’s. Even if Alan doesn’t know it and Neil has only stepped in as some kind of nice guy surrogate.

  He drops my hand and pulls back the glass door into the waiting room. I step in, pausing to let my eyes adjust to the change of light, and my gaze does a quick scan of the room. Jeez, it’s crowded, nearly every vinyl-covered metal chair is occupied, and there are a half a dozen girls working beyond the bulletproof safety glass. Bulletproof glass? God, what am I doing here?

  Neil’s hand moves to my back, guiding me forward toward the counter. “You need to check in there,” he says quietly.

  I nod, wondering why Neil seems to know more about what I’m supposed to do than I do. Maybe he’s been through this before. There is a lot about Neil’s history with his fucked-up ex-girlfriend that I still don’t know, but I’ve pretty much assumed that the parts he hasn’t shared with me were really intense and grim.

  I take from the check-in nurse the clipboard shoved at me beneath the safety glass separating us.

  “Fill that out. Answer all the questions, front and back, and bring it back when you’re done.”

  Her tone of voice is abrupt, matter-of-fact and efficient in this moment that is anything but matter-of-fact to me.

  “There are two chairs over there,” Neil says, and I follow him to the far side of the room and sink down beside him.

  I stare down at the form, willing myself not to look back up at the other people here. Christ, it’s bad enough knowing why I’m here. I sure as hell don’t like knowing why they’re here. Of course, everyone is not here for an…

  I tap my pen against the clipboard. Jesus Christ, what kind of questions are these? They make me feel like a slut just reading them…do you have safe sex?…what kind of birth control are you on?…how many sexual partners have you had?…how often do you have sex?…have you ever had an STD?

  Why do they want to know all this? I don’t even want to know this about myself. Cringing, I drag my eyes back up to the first line, not finding that one any easier to answer than the rest of the questions. Name?

  I freeze, unable to write. Damn, I hadn’t thought about that, putting my name on this form. A permanent record of the biggest Chrissie low point in my life. The pen hovers above the sheet and it feels like this becomes real, a forever part of me, the minute I put my name there.

  Neil stares down at the clipboard, frowns, and leans into me. “What’s wrong?”

  I move my face close to his ear and whisper, “I don’t want to tell them my name.”

  Neil exhales a breath, ragged and impatient. “Chrissie, medical records are private. No one can access them. It’s no big deal. No one will ever find out about this unless you tell them. Fill out the form.”

  My lids go wide. “How do you know people can’t find out about this? How do you know that?”

  “I just do.” He looks aggravated, and he runs a hand through his hair again. He waits for me to fill out the form, and when I don’t, he exclaims, “Fine. Write ‘Chrissie Stanton.’ That way it won’t matter if anyone ever sees it.”

  There’s a touch of bite in his voice and it leaves me feeling like I’ve just had the wind knocked out of me and really shitty about having Neil holding my hand through this.

  “I can’t do that.”

  “Yes you can. I told you to. It doesn’t matter. It’s no big deal. Do it.”

  “It wouldn’t be right.”

  Neil looks away, his jaw clenching slightly. “None of this is right, Chrissie. Just do it.”

  I flush. I’m not sure what just made him angry, but my emotions are too much of a jumbled mess for me to ask and I don’t think I want to know.

  I stare down and start to write. I can feel Neil watching me and I wonder if he’s reading my answers… sexual partners: two…have there really only been two? And why does that feel like a lie when it’s the truth? Oh crap, it is a lie. I forgot my one-night stand the August before I started seeing Neil. Does it matter that I lied?

  The knots in my stomach grow tauter and I start to heavily check off boxes: no, no, no, no, no. I check no even on the questions I don’t understand because there are a couple I don’t understand. How lame is that? Twenty-two years old and not even able to understand all the questions on a women’s health medical questionnaire. Where do people learn this stuff?

  After I’ve been still for a while, Neil holds out his hand. “You done?”

  I nod, and he takes the clipboard from me. I watch him amble to the counter and shove it under the partition.

  He sits back down beside me, his body close but not touching, and I don’t like the feel of his stoic remoteness. My leg starts to jiggle in that way it does when I’m trying to keep myself from freaking out. The wait is unbearable. I just want this over with…

  “Miss Stanton?”

  I look up to see a nurse standing in an open doorway, staring down at a clipboard. Neil goes to his feet.

  He holds out his hand to me. “Chrissie. Come on.”

  My legs are weak and shaky, but somehow
they manage to hold my weight. As I cross the room, Neil moves with me. I hadn’t realized he was planning to go in with me. I thought he’d just wait in the lobby.

  I stop at the door. “Neil, you don’t have to do this.”

  His lips tighten and he nods, but he doesn’t release my hand. He continues with me into the examination room.

  Neil drops down in a chair on the far side of the room as the nurse makes a sharp tug to spread new sterile paper on the exam bed. She shoves a cup at me, orders me to pee in it, then to undress and put on a gown.

  The door closes and I stare at Neil. I’m uncomfortable about having him here, even though he’s seen me naked hundreds of times. Why is it different here? I organize the gown on the table so I can pull it on fast, and do a quick check at Neil—his eyes are unwaveringly staring out the window. I jerk off my sweatshirt, pull the gown in place, and then remove my other garments.

  I hurry into the adjoining bathroom, pee in the darn cup, pass it through the tiny door in the wall to be tested by the technician, and rush back into the exam room to sit on the edge of the bed. I settle with a stirrup on either side of me, my heels banging into the metal over and over again. Feet hitting metal is the only sound in the room. Boom. Boom. Boom.

  A fast knock on the door and the doctor walks in.

  She gives me a brief smile. “Miss Stanton, I’m Doctor Leary. You are pregnant. Your last period was December 28th. Is that correct?” She looks at me. I nod and her eyes drop back to my chart. “I noticed you are requesting abortion services. I’ll have to perform an exam today and then we can discuss your options.”

  She smiles in Neil’s direction as if noticing him for the first time. “I see you brought your partner. It is always best to make these decision as a couple.”

  Neil’s gaze shifts and he says nothing, but the tic starts twitching in his cheek again.

  She pats my thigh. “Put your feet up in the stirrups and scooch down, dear.”

  Dr. Leary has an infinitely soothing manner, but I feel like I’m going to jump out of my skin anyway. I cover my face with my forearms since this is so embarrassing.

  I cringe, wait and tightly close my eyes. God, I hate this…I feel her rummaging around down there… cold metal… pushes on my abdomen…fuck, a finger there…and a click of metal as something slips out of me. By the time she’s done, every muscle in my body hurts from tension.