Heartbeat (10 page)

The doctor came in finally, and he smiled as he glanced at her chart and recognized her. She was a nice girl, and he had always liked her.

“What can I do for you today, Mrs. Townsend?” He was a pleasant old-fashioned man, about the age of her own father.

“I …” She couldn't bring herself to say the words, and her eyes looked huge in her pale face as he watched her. “I came here …for an abortion.” The words drifted away, spoken so softly, he could barely hear them.

“I see.” He sat down on a small revolving stool, and glanced at her chart. She was married, thirty-one, in good health, none of it added up. Maybe the baby wasn't her husband's. “Any special reason?”

She nodded painfully. Everything about her told him that she didn't want to be there. The way she was curled up on the table, as though to protect herself from him, the way she shrank backward every time he went near her, the way she spoke, barely able to say the words. He had seen a lot of women in distress, women who would have done anything to get rid of babies they didn't want, but this girl was not one of them. He was willing to bet she didn't really want an abortion.

“My husband doesn't feel this is the right time for us to have children.”

The doctor nodded again, as though he understood perfectly. “Is there any reason why he feels that way now, Adrian? Is he out of work? Is there a health problem?” He was looking for why this girl was there, and without a good reason he was not going to do the abortion. Legal or not, he still had a moral responsibility to his patients. But she was shaking her head to all of his questions.

“No, he just …he just doesn't feel this is the right time for children.”

“Does he want children at all?” She hesitated, and then shook her head as her eyes brimmed with tears.

“No.” It was the merest whisper. “I don't really think so. He was one of five children, and he had a very unhappy childhood. It's hard for him to understand that things could ever be different.”

“I should think they could be. You have a fine job, and I suppose he must be fairly stable. Do you think he might change his mind in time?” She shook her head sadly as the tears rolled down her cheeks, and the doctor was quick to tell her something that he suspected might make her a little less nervous. “I'm not going to perform an abortion today, Adrian.” He had switched to her first name as soon as he understood the gravity of the problem. This was no time for formality, she needed a friend, and he wanted to help her. “First, I want to make sure that you really are pregnant, and there isn't a mistake. Have you had a pregnancy test?” He assumed that she had or she wouldn't be there.

“Yes. I did it at home. Twice. And I'm two weeks late.”

“That would make you four weeks pregnant the way we calculate it. And I'm sure you are, but we'll just check to see in a moment. And after that, I'd like you to go home and think about this, just to be sure. If you still feel you want to terminate the pregnancy after that, you can come back tomorrow. Does that sound reasonable to you?” She nodded, feeling both hysterical and numb. She felt as though the emotional trauma she was going through was going to kill her. But the doctor was gentle and kind, he confirmed what she already knew, told her to go home and think and try to talk it over again with her husband. He felt that since she felt so strongly about not wanting to abort, surely her husband would come around if she explained it to him. What he did not take into account was the fact that Steven was rabid on the subject. And when he called her that night, he sounded clearly annoyed that she hadn't already had the abortion.

“Why the hell didn't he do it today, for chrissake? What's the point of waiting?”

“He wants us to think about it before we do anything drastic. And maybe that's not such a bad idea.” The realization of what she was going to do left her with a crushing feeling of depression. “When are you coming back?” she asked anxiously, but he seemed not to hear the panic in her voice as she asked him.

“Not till Friday. And Mike and I are playing tennis on Saturday morning. Maybe you and Nancy can join us afterward for a set of doubles.” She couldn't believe what he was saying to her, either he was completely insensitive, or just plain stupid.

“I'm not sure I'll be playing tennis by then.” The sarcasm in her voice was both obvious and brutal.

“Oh, that's right … I forgot.” In ten seconds? How could he forget so soon? How could he let her do it in the first place?

“I think you should be thinking this over again too. Steven, it's not just my baby, it's yours too.” But she could feel the walls go up even as she said the words.

“I told you how I feel about it, Adrian. I don't want to discuss it anymore. Just take care of it, dammit. I don't understand why you have to wait until tomorrow.” She didn't answer him, crushed by the brutality of what he was saying. It was as though the baby was threatening him, and she had betrayed him by letting it happen, and now she had to fix it at all cost, no matter what it did to her to do that. “I'll call you tomorrow night.” Adrian caught her breath as the tears stung her eyes.

“Why? Just to make sure I did it?” Her heart felt as though it were breaking as she said good-bye to him, thinking that in a few hours it would be too late to save their baby. And she lay in bed awake all night, crying and thinking of this child she would never know. The child she was sacrificing for her husband. She was still awake when the sun came up the next day, and she felt as though she were waiting for an execution. She had taken the week off from work, and all she had to do now was get back to the doctor's office and force herself to have the abortion.

As she dressed, she kept telling herself that at the last minute Steven would call and tell her not to do it. But he didn't. The house was still silent as she left and drove away in sandals, a denim skirt, and an old work shirt. And she arrived at the doctor's at nine o'clock, as she'd been told to, if she decided to go through with the abortion. She hadn't eaten or had anything to drink since the night before in case they had to administer an anesthetic. She was trembling and pale as she drove the MG along Wilshire Boulevard, and she arrived at the doctor's office five minutes early. She told the nurse that she was there, and sat down in the waiting room with her eyes closed, and a feeling in her heart that she knew she would never forget for the rest of her life, and for the first time in her life, she knew that she hated Steven. She had a frantic urge to call him, to find him wherever he was, and tell him he had to change his mind, but she knew that it was pointless.

The nurse stood
in
the doorway and called her name, and smiled at her as she led her down the hallway. She put her in a slightly larger room, and this time she told her to take all her clothes off, put on the blue gown, and lie on the table. There was an ominous-looking machine standing by, and Adrian knew that it was the vacuum. She felt her throat go dry, and her lips seemed to stick together like dampened tissue paper. All she wanted was to get it over with and go home and try to forget about it, and she knew that for the rest of her life she would never again let herself get pregnant. And yet, part of her still wanted to keep this baby. It was insane, she was using all her inner strength just to get rid of it, and part of her still wanted to hold on to it no matter what happened or what Steven said, or how neurotic he was about his childhood.

“Adrian?” The doctor popped his head around the door, and looked at her with a gentle smile. “Are you all right?” She nodded, but no words came to mind as she stared at him in ill-concealed terror. He walked into the room, closed the door and spoke to her firmly. “Are you sure you want to do this?” She nodded again as tears sprang to her eyes, and then shook her head honestly. She was so confused and so terrified and so unhappy, and she didn't want to be here at all. She wanted to be at home with Steven, waiting for their baby. “You don't have to do this. You shouldn't do it if you don't want to. Your husband will adjust. A lot of husbands make a fuss like this at first, and they're the ones who are the most excited when the baby comes. I want you to really think about this before you do it.”

“I can't,” she croaked. “I just can't.” She was sobbing openly as she sat on the table. “I can't do it.”

“Neither can I.” He smiled. “Go home, and tell your husband to buy himself a cigar and save it till, oh …” He checked her chart again. “…I'd say the beginning of January, and then we'll give him a nice fat baby. How does that sound to you, Adrian?”

“It sounds lovely.” She smiled through her tears and the kindly old doctor put an arm around her shoulders.“Go home, Adrian. Have a good rest, and a good cry. It'll be all right. It's going to be just fine. And so will your husband.” He patted her shoulder then, and left the room so she could get dressed and go home, with her baby. She smiled to herself as she dressed, and she cried, and she felt as though something wonderful had happened. She had been spared, and she wasn't even sure why, except that her doctor had been smart enough to know that she just couldn't do it.

She started to drive home, and she decided suddenly to go to the office instead. She felt better than she had in days, and she wanted to go to work and lose herself in the piles of papers on her desk. She drove to the studio with the wind blowing in her hair, and she took a deep breath and smiled to herself. Life was suddenly so sweet, and she was going to have a baby.

She walked into her office with a spring in her step but feeling as though she had run a ten-mile race. It had not exactly been an easy morning, or an easy few days, and she still had to deal with Steven when he got back from Chicago. But at least now she knew what she was doing. She felt more relaxed than she had in days and the crushing feeling of depression seemed to have lifted.

“Hi, Adrian.” Zelda stuck her head in the door halfway through the morning. “Everything okay?”

“Fine. Why?” Adrian was looking distracted with a pencil stuck behind each ear, and it was unusual for her to come to work in old clothes and no makeup.

“Well, to be honest, you don't look so hot. You look as though you've been through the wringer,” and she had. “Are you feeling okay?” Zelda was more observant than Adrian had realized. She was right. Things had been pretty awful.

“I had the flu.” She smiled, grateful that Zelda had noticed. “But I'm okay now.”

“I thought you were taking the week off.” She was looking at her intensely, as though deciding whether or not to believe her when she said she was all right. But she seemed happy as she sat industriously amid the debris in her office.

“I decided I missed all this too much.”

“You're nuts.” Zelda smiled at her.

“Probably. Want to go out later for a sandwich?”

“Sure. I'd love to.”

“Come by whenever you're ready.”

“I'll do that.” She disappeared again then, and Adrian went back to work, feeling better than she had in days. The idea of a baby still scared her a little bit, but it was something she thought she could get used to. It was better than the alternative. She knew she couldn't have lived with that, and she still resented Steven for trying to force her to do it. She wondered how they would ever recover from the emotional bruises they had inflicted on each other in the past few days, or if they would ever forget it. She went back to work then, and tried not to think about him. She would have to think of what she was going to say to him later.

A
ND IN A STUDIO JUST DOWN THE HALL
, B
ILL
T
HIG
-pen was sitting on a stool, talking to the director and groaning.

“How the hell do I know where she is? She checked out of her hotel room a week ago. I don't know who she's with. I don't know where she's gone. She's a grown woman and it's none of my business …until she starts screwing up my show. Now it's my business, but I still don't know where the hell she's gone to.” Sylvia Stewart had not come back from Las Vegas the previous Sunday night. She had checked out of her room there on Monday morning, exactly nine days before, the hotel said, but she still hadn't come back to work, and feeling awkward about it, Bill had gone to her apartment to check, and she hadn't been back there either.

They had written alternate scripts for the past week, but it was getting pretty desperate without her.

And in a few more days they would have to replace her. And Bill had just said as much to the director. By not calling in to at least explain to them what was going on, she was in clear violation of her contract.

“If she doesn't turn up before tomorrow's show, you've got to get me someone else,” Bill was saying to the director and one of the assistant producers. They had already called one of the agencies earlier that day, but it wasn't going to be easy to replace her without upsetting their viewers.

“Did everyone get the new material today?” the director asked, frowning at what Bill had just handed him. It was a whole new script, and it was obvious that Bill had the writers working night and day in Sylvia's absence. It was a heroic piece of work, and it kept the story afloat while she was gone. There were so many dramas occurring on the show at the same time that so far it seemed plausible that Vaughn Williams had not been seen for nine days, but barely. She was still in jail, being held for the murder of the man her brother-in-law had killed nine days before, on a Friday.