Gwen's smile faltered, but only for a second. Then she nodded. "Things worked out for the best. I really believe that."
Nina frowned and pulled one of her knees against her chest, her socked foot resting flat on the flowered bedspread. She cocked her head to one side. "That means you're not pregnant, right?"
Gwen licked her lips. "No." She swallowed hard at Audrey's gasp. "I… I am pregnant."
"Jesus," Katy muttered while Jacie sat in shocked silence, her tongue refusing to work at all.
"Are…?" Nina didn't really know what to say and a quick glance at her friends revealed that they were all in the same shocked boat. "Are you okay?"
Gwen's chin trembled, and for the first time all day her brave veneer began to crack. Then her expression turned bitter and she snorted. "Mentally or physically?" She raised her eyebrows as she waited for an answer.
"Gwen." Jacie pulled her into a hug and pressed her lips to Gwen's ear. "I'm so sorry." She wished again and again that Gwen had left that godforsaken party with her and Nina that night. Or that she had stuck with Gwen or done anything different that would have triggered a change in the course of events that had shattered her friend.
Gwen wiped angrily at her eyes, not wanting to cry anymore. She'd done little else for weeks, but now… now things were finally getting better. Gently, she disentangled herself from Jacie, feeling several warm pats of encouragement as her other friends moved in to support her. "I'm okay." With effort, she was able to smile again. "I'm going to have a baby and marry someone I love." Cautiously, she searched their faces. "It doesn't get much better than that, right?"
Katy looked away, unwilling to answer that question honestly. Jacie and Audrey suddenly found something very interesting about Gwen's bedspread.
"If you say so, Gwen," Nina said weakly, still not believing what she was hearing.
"Malcolm's a helluva guy," Jacie suddenly inserted, doing her best to be positive in the light of news she couldn't help but view as horrible. "Being willing to bring this baby into his family. I can see why you love him so much."
Most of the color drained from Gwen's face.
Audrey blinked slowly as realization dawned, the weight of it leaving her knees rubbery and her chest heavy. "Oh, my God, Gwen." She turned to look into watery eyes. "You didn't tell him what happened."
Katy sprung off the bed. "Holy shit!" she whispered into her hands. "What have you done!" She shook her head, refusing to look at Gwen when she said, "You suck."
Nina pinned Gwen with an intense stare. "No way, Gwen." She shook her head gravely. This was going too far. "Tell us that Malcolm doesn't think he's the father."
"He loves me!" Gwen defended hotly, refusing to answer Nina's question, and grabbing her pillow and clutching it to her chest.
"No. No. No. This is impossible," Jacie said, her forehead deeply creased, her hands gesturing wildly. "You haven't even slept with Malcolm. You've told us a million times that you were waiting until you married the perfect guy. He can't think the baby is his." She stopped when Gwen's cheeks turned bright red and she buried her face in the pillow.
A light bulb went on in Audrey's head. Gwen was smart and desperate, a very dangerous combination. "You slept with him after you missed your period so he'd think the baby was his." It wasn't a question.
Gwen nodded miserably, still refusing to look up from her pillow. She couldn't bear the thought of what her friends had to think of her now, but worse than that was the possibility of losing Malcolm. Her stomach twisted. "I had no choice," she said harshly, tears dampening the pillow. "None of you understand." Her fingers clutched convulsively at the soft cotton. "He took me to meet his mother last week."
Nina nodded. They all knew that. "You said it went okay."
"Yeah, it was okay. Except that she barely spoke to me!" Gwen wailed, her face crumpling. "She asked me what my parents did for a living and all about my family."
"So?" Jacie asked, more sharply than she intended. "You don't have anything to hide, Gwen."
The redhead's face snapped up. "So?" Her cheeks turned beet red. "The Langtrees are one of the richest and most respected families in Missouri."
Jacie rolled her eyes, having heard that statement from Gwen a dozen times in the past couple of months. "That doesn't make them better than any of us."
"They care
,
" Gwen continued, "that my mother is a housewife who didn't graduate from high school and that Daddy sells insurance for a living! They care that I am from Hazelwood and sound like a Missouri hick!" She snarled, "No matter how I tried, I could see the disapproval in her eyes. She thinks I'm nothing but white trash!" She blinked away more tears. "And compared to the Langtrees, I am."
"Bullshit," Jacie said flatly, losing patience quickly with Gwen's class conscious attitude that had been there since they were little girls. "That's your mother and her delusions of grandeur talking." She pointed at Gwen and then the other girls. "You and all the rest of us come from regular working class families. You are hardly white trash."
"Grow up, Jacie. Do you actually think his family would let him marry me, no matter how much we loved each other, if they knew I was carrying a rapist's child!" Gwen screamed, on the verge of becoming hysterical. "Do you?"
Jacie gritted her teeth. As sickening as it was, she couldn't deny that Gwen was probably right about that. "I–"
"Jacie," Nina placed a calming hand on Jacie's shoulder as Katy made her way back to the bed. "This isn't helping." Her eyes begged her to bring things down a notch, and she smiled softly when Jacie nodded.
Audrey and Katy exchanged helpless glances.
"You don't have to do this," Jacie said to Gwen, intentionally gentling her voice. Then she said what the other girls were feeling, but too chicken to express. "Tricking Malcolm isn't right."
Gwen pulled her hand away as though it had been burned. "What are you talking about?" Her eyes were wide with disbelief. "You still don't understand? This is the best day of my life! Malcolm loves me. This baby could have just as easily have been his. It was only horrible, horrible luck that that bastard did this to me first!"
Nina ran a hand through her hair, shaking her head. "But the baby is not his. You know that for a fact."
Gwen's eyes widened. "Don't say that again."
"Gwen," Jacie repeated, "we'll help you with the baby. You don't have to trick anyone." She glanced around at her friends, who all nodded eagerly. "We discussed it today while you were at the clinic. We'll all help and take turns watching it and help with money, too."
"We can do it," Nina swore to her. "Between us all, including Katy who thinks babies are nothing but poop machines but who offered to help anyway," this drew a weak smile from Katy, "we can make it work. You don't have to get married or even move back home."
Gwen looked at Nina as though she'd never seen her before. "But I want to marry Malcolm."
Audrey valiantly picked up the ball. "I know you do, honey. But not this way."
"Won't it be hard finishing school if you're married?" Katy tried. "You could just be engaged through college and we could–"
Gwen shook her head. "We're having the wedding during winter break." Unconsciously her hand drifted to her stomach. "Before I'll be showing much. And… Malcolm says his mother will likely insist that I drop out of school even before the baby." She drew in a ragged breath and gazed at the window, not seeing the twinkling stars looking back at her. "At least that's what happened when his cousin got into a similar mess last winter."
"Who gives a shit what his mommy says!" Jacie exploded, seeing Gwen's entire future being shaped by other people. People who didn't care about her. "You want a degree. You can still have that."
Gwen's pale gaze sharpened. "I want Malcolm more," she said firmly, her face hard.
"And this baby," Nina prompted gently, knowing full well that she was treading on intensely sensitive and personal ground, even between the closest of friends. "Do you want it, Gwen? There's nothing that says you have to raise it or even have it." Her expression softened, and she felt tears well up in her eyes. A lump formed in her throat, but she spoke anyway. "Under the circumstances, no one could blame you if–"
"I could never do that, Nina," Gwen admitted quietly. "I've been thinking about it for days…" She lifted one hand and let it drop lifelessly. "I just can't."
Nina nodded, quite sure that it was something she could do under the right circumstances, but understanding that this was a personal decision that only Gwen could make for herself.
Katy sighed. "Gwen, maybe you could tell Malcolm the truth but then keep it from his family?"
Audrey, Nina, and Jacie all nodded at once, latching on to Katy's idea with gusto.
Gwen sniffed. "It's too late." She pulled her pillow closer, protecting herself from the world. "I wasn't going to, but it just came out." Her eyes fluttered shut. "I've already lied to him. There's no going back now. He might believe what his mother probably already thinks. That I'm just a gold-digger."
"It's not too late yet," Jacie insisted. "It's like I said before; he's a good guy, Gwen. He won't blame you or the baby for what happened. It wasn't your fault," she emphasized again and received a trembling smile for her words. "He's been worried sick over you these past weeks. He does love you."
Gwen had explained away her injuries by saying she'd been in a car accident. Malcolm had sent flowers, cards, and called twice a day during the days immediately following the rape when Gwen was still in pieces and refusing to see anyone or even leave her room. "Trust him," Jacie urged, shifting closer to Nina, wanting to feel her presence.
"I do trust him." Gwen squared her shoulders. "But right now I have to trust myself more. Please," her last word broke. "Please understand, Jacie. This doesn't have to be a bad thing. Malcolm and I love each other and want to be together. Things are just happening sooner than they would have anyway."
Of all the girls, it was Jacie's understanding Gwen wanted most. In the nights since the party Jacie had tirelessly calmed her when terrifying dreams ripped her cruelly from an already fitful sleep. And though there'd always been a tiny antagonistic edge to their relationship, Jacie's comforting arms would wrap around her each night, making her feel safe and warm until she could find sleep again.
Jacie's lips thinned and once again she felt the loving pressure of Nina's hand, reassuring her. "I do understand, Gwen," she finally said. "I think you're wrong and I wish you'd reconsider leaving school and…" Everything was just happening so fast. She swallowed and forced herself forward half-heartedly, knowing her friend needed from her more than logic or reason. She allowed her dark, confident stare to meet Gwen's. "But… I do understand."
Gwen let out a sob. "Thank you." She turned her eyes to the other girls, not surprised to see wet cheeks. "You too?" she asked fearfully. "Please?"
Nina tugged a throw blanket up from the foot of the bed and wrapped it around Gwen's shoulders. Then she surprised her by kissing her on the cheek.
Gwen felt warm breath against her skin.
"We love you forever, Gwen," Nina murmured against the salty, moist cheek. "You know that."
"Forever," Katy and Audrey agreed solemnly.
"I'll never tell another soul about this, and most importantly Malcolm can never know," Gwen reminded them all, hating herself for the lie but not seeing any other way out for herself, Malcolm, and the baby.
This is our chance to be happy. We have to take it.
"Never," the girls agreed, grasping hands in a gesture that, for them, was as old as time.
* * *
Present Day
Rural St. Louis.
Gwen pulled herself from the past and read over the latest blackmail email that she'd received weeks before. She'd brought it to Charlotte's Web to confront her blackmailer with it. The words sickened her. "Never" had turned out to be 21 years.
Tucker isn't Malcolm's son. You lied.
You know it, and so do I. And if you don't pay…
so will your family and friends.
Gwen carefully stowed the note back in the file in her suitcase. Then she lifted her chin and left her room in search of the other women… and some answers.
Time was running out.
Present Day
Rural Missouri
A
RM IN ARM, Jacie and Nina walked along the twisting path that followed the river. The breeze was cool, and Jacie shivered a little as she stuck her hand into her coat pocket. They'd been talking and walking for so long that their noses were red, and the sun, still behind a heavy veil of clouds, was just beginning to sink over the horizon.
Starting to talk, really talk, had been both harder and easier than they'd both imagined. So much had happened over the years that it was hard to know where to begin. But they'd managed. The conversation was forced at times, and then, suddenly, in the form of a laugh or a smile or warm sentiment, some of that old familiarity would peek through, and things would feel easy between them in a way that they never experienced with any other person.
The discussion made Jacie frustrated and angry and Nina a little sad, serving to highlight everything they'd so foolishly let slip through their fingers.
Nina turned and looked at Jacie as they walked. "You know," she squeezed the arm wrapped around hers, "when I think of you, you always have that beautiful long hair."
Jacie shrugged, the ends of her hair brushing the bottom of her coat collar. "I haven't worn it long since… Well, I cut it right after I left Missouri." She sighed and gazed at the river. "I needed a change."
Nina absorbed that silently and then released a long breath. "I guess I have this picture of you in my mind where you're permanently 18."
The corner of Jacie's lips tugged downward. "Are you disappointed in the way I look now?" She blinked. She'd felt as though she was in the best shape of her life. But that didn't mean Nina would see it that way. "I know it's been a long time. But–"