The Regret Series Complete Collection Box Set: Lost to You, Take This Regret, and if Forever Comes (20 page)

“Goodbye, Christian.” For the second time that day, he had to work to make sense of what Elizabeth had said.

Pushing past him, she reached out to turn the doorknob.

“Elizabeth.” She paused when he called her name. From behind, Christian observed the rise and fall of her uneven breaths, shocked at the heartless words he spat at her back. “Come back when you’ve changed your mind.”

She shook her head as she swung the door open and slammed it shut behind her.

Christian stared at the closed door, torn between running after her and waiting for her return. But if he went after her now, he knew that meant one of them would concede, and it wasn’t going to be him.

~

Two hours later, Christian sat at his desk studying for his politics midterm, all the while listening intently for the sound of footsteps outside his door he felt certain he would hear. He trained his attention on the heavy textbook in front of him, trying to ignore the growing anxiety he felt each time he picked up his cell phone to check if he’d missed any messages.

None came.

It was well after midnight when he crawled into bed, convinced she just needed some time to realize he was right. He
had to be right. He wouldn’t allow himself to think otherwise, so every time that wave of guilt came, he pushed it aside.

He envisioned her awake, just as he was, tossing uncomfortably in her small bed that rested in the far corner of her studio apartment and slowly coming to terms with what she needed to do.

But when he dragged his unrested body from his bed the next morning, his phone was still devoid of messages.

He had been cruel—he knew it. He could only hope he hadn’t pushed her too far, but that she would somehow understand he was just trying to protect their future.

Christian ate a bowl of cold cereal and then forced himself into the steam of his shower, desperate to find anything to chase away his fatigue. He found his head in a cloud, both from lack of sleep and from the scenarios running through his mind, ones including a life without Elizabeth.

What if she never came back?

Could he really give her up?

As he rubbed the soapy washcloth over his body, he tried to picture an existence without her. A life void of the perfect pitch of her voice, the way it rang out when she laughed. A life in which he didn’t touch the softness of her skin or have the right to pull her body against his. A life without a child crying out from the next room as he tried unsuccessfully to study for the bar.

Groaning, he shook his head and forced it all away, telling himself it would not come to that.

He was certain when he saw her in class today, she would take her normal seat beside him in the lecture hall, lean in, and whisper in his ear that he was right.

But when her seat remained vacant, his unease grew, gnawing at his stomach. The moment the professor dismissed
class, Christian raced from the room and to the café where Elizabeth and he studied every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday. He frantically scanned the room, finding several mildly familiar faces but not the one he wanted to see.

By the time he reached her apartment complex, he was panting, both from exertion from the mile he had run and the constriction fear had placed on his heart. He pounded on the door, giving her no time to answer before he yelled, “Elizabeth!” There was no sound from the other side, no rustling of curtains or faint shuffling of feet. Even then, he wasn’t satisfied. Fumbling with his keys, he found his spare and pushed it into the lock.

The door opened to the quietness, the small studio comfortably cluttered as always. The only thing that seemed amiss was the blankets from her normally neat bed were strewn on the floor. Christian crossed the space to the only separate room. The door to the bathroom rested ajar, that room as empty as the first.

Christian pressed his back against the wall and took a deep breath. He wasn’t prepared for this. He’d never thought it would go this far.

Reluctantly, he forced himself out of the apartment, shutting and locking the door behind him before he left, hating the voice inside his head that kept telling him this was for the best.

~

Reeling from the betrayal, Elizabeth ran down the three flights of stairs and away from the man she had thought would always stand by her side. She felt as if she’d been mortally wounded by his words. Christian knew that wasn’t an option for her. How could he even have suggested it?

In the harshness of his words, she’d searched the depths of his blue eyes for the man she thought she knew but must have never really known. The man she thought she knew would never
have been so cruel. She knew as she told him goodbye that her voice had shaken with heartbreak, but her choice was unwavering. There was nothing more important than the child growing inside her. When he’d called out to her just before she’d left, she’d prayed he had changed his mind. Above all, she loved him and didn’t want to live without him, but second to that, she was scared. She didn’t want to raise a child by herself, but she realized she would have to do just that when she heard no softness in his voice, but more words to inflict pain.

Tears fell endlessly as she walked the half mile from Christian’s apartment to her own. Her stomach was in knots and protesting each step she took.

She refused to look behind her as she pressed forward, her feet heavy with heartbreak, the weight causing her to stumble.

Halfway home the pain in her stomach intensified, and she vomited into some shrubs planted under the window of a storefront. This only caused her to cry harder and the cramps to worsen, which resulted in three more episodes before she made it to the single flight of stairs leading to her apartment door. She clung to the railing, holding herself up as she vomited once more over the side.

By then she was weeping, unable to control the shaking that had taken over her body. She made it to the landing of her apartment and, with trembling hands, let herself into the only place she came close to being able to afford.

She felt cold, her body convulsing as she pulled her clothes from her body and stepped into a shower that should have been hot enough to scald. Even then, she found no warmth, and she curled in upon herself on the tiled shower floor, hoping for comfort. She only quivered and shook more. She felt as if she was frozen from the inside out and nothing could thaw the chill
that had settled deep in her bones. She wrapped herself in a towel and sank to her bathroom floor, heaving again into the toilet.

Elizabeth was scared.

She’d never felt so terrible before. She ached. The worst part was she couldn’t discern the source of the pain—whether it was from something truly wrong with her or from the trauma of having her life shattered around her.

Most of all she worried about her baby. She didn’t know many things about pregnancy, but nothing about this felt normal to her. So when her stomach recoiled again and nothing came up, she was sure she needed help.

She pulled herself up to stand, steadied herself with a hand against the wall when she swayed with dizziness, and prayed she could make it to her phone.

She wanted Christian so badly, and her first instinct was to dial his number, but she forced herself to dial seven different digits than the ones she so desperately wanted.

Christian was no longer hers, no longer one she could rely on, and there was only one other person in this city that she trusted.

His voice was scratchy and hoarse with sleep when he answered, “Hello?” More time had passed than Elizabeth had realized. It was nearing midnight.

“Matthew . . .” she rasped, his name barely audible. The desperation in her voice pulled him from his haze, and he shot straight up in bed.

“Elizabeth?” Matthew became frantic. “What’s wrong? Are you okay?”

At least three seconds passed before she wheezed out a shaky, “No.”

Matthew pulled on pants and stuffed his arms into the first button up he could find while keeping the phone pressed between his ear and shoulder. He tried unsuccessfully to sound calm. “Elizabeth, sweetheart, tell me what’s wrong.” He was already out the door and starting his car before she could answer that she was sick.

Matthew was at her apartment and up the short flight of stairs before five minutes had passed, where he found his friend curled up on her bed, shivering under a pile of blankets.

“Elizabeth?” He rushed to her side, pulling the covers back to expose just her head, her blond hair darkened to a near brown from the profuse sweat pouring down her forehead.

He reached out to push her hair away so he could see her face, shocked by the paleness of her skin and the swollen redness of her eyes.

Matthew wanted to ask her a million questions, but she was passing in and out of consciousness, and it was clear she needed more help than he could give. He pushed her covers to the floor except for the one he wrapped her in before bringing her into his arms. Her small body was heavier than he anticipated, completely limp, and he struggled to maneuver her down the stairway and to his car.

He contemplated dialing 911, but the hospital was so close, he was certain he would get her to the emergency room before an ambulance could arrive.

Within minutes, Matthew was pulling around the circular drive under the bright red glow of the sign that read, “Emergency Room.”

He entered through the automatic doors, yelling for help. With a flurry of activity, several orderlies pulled Elizabeth from his arms and placed her on a gurney.

The nurse led Matthew to a small curtained area where Elizabeth lay unconscious. He felt overwhelmed as the nurse hammered him with questions he could not answer.

“Date of birth?”

“Is she on any medications?”

“Does she have any allergies?”

“When did the symptoms start?”

Shaking his head that had begun to pound from the immense amount of stress, he stated he didn’t know.

He slumped into a hard, plastic chair pushed against the far corner of the wall and watched as they began to poke and prod at his friend. He felt helpless, having no idea what he was supposed to do.

Should he call someone?

Christian?

Elizabeth’s mother?

No. She had called him, and that in itself gave him a clue. She needed him, and so he chose to be there for her, even if it meant waiting around and having no idea what was going on.

As he sat silently in the corner and watched the nurses and a doctor work over Elizabeth, he thought about how she’d come into his life. He’d met her the year before at the small diner where they worked on the weekends. They were much alike in many ways. They both lived in a city neither could afford, attending a college they’d dreamed of most of their young lives, living off scholarships, grants, and mounting student loans they’d both be paying for well into their thirties. The tips they made on a Saturday shift barely covered food and necessities for the week. But neither of them looked at those things as negatives in their lives. Instead, they embraced the opportunity and ran with it, and they’d become fast friends.

Matthew obviously knew how beautiful Elizabeth was. He wasn’t blind, but he’d never viewed her that way and didn’t harbor unrequited feelings. He loved her as a friend. Truly.

That didn’t mean he liked her boyfriend. To Matthew, Christian was a spoiled rich kid who was doing nothing more than slumming while he played at college. He was certain Christian would break Elizabeth’s heart.

Matthew winced for Elizabeth when they inserted a long, thick needle into her forearm before attaching an IV bag to the line.

For what seemed an eternity, Matthew sat and watched Elizabeth sleep while the color slowly came back to her face as the bag dripped its contents into her veins. Really, little more than an hour had passed when the very young doctor who had examined her returned, chart in hand.

He extended his free hand across the small space to Matthew. “Dr. Lopez.”

Matthew nodded and shook his hand. “Matthew Stevens.”

“All of her test results are back . . . severely dehydrated . . . anemic . . . pregnancy . . . too much stress . . .” Matthew tried to focus on what the doctor was saying, but really heard nothing more than pregnancy.

Matthew felt lightheaded with the implications this would have for his friend. Slowly everything fell into place, the late night phone call to him when it should have been to someone else, the swollen eyes—the doctor’s words about too much stress triggering shock.

Matthew curled his fists, sickened that someone could treat his friend so poorly—anyone that poorly. Matthew’s first instinct was to go straight to Christian Davison’s apartment and tear him apart. Instead, he moved to sit on the edge of
Elizabeth’s bed and ran his hand through his friend’s matted hair, silently promising her he would always take care of her.

~

May 2005

Christian stood in front of the full-length mirror, studying himself in the long, black gown, seeing nothing more than a pathetic excuse for a man staring back at him.

He should have felt
proud
. Receiving his bachelors at Columbia with top honors should be a
proud
day. His mother and father had just left his apartment to await him in the car but not before his father had proclaimed how
proud
his only son had made him this day.