Page 38 of Forgiving Paris
Finally, when her tears had dried and she was no longer gasping above the sound of her sobs, Ashley pulled herself up off the bench. What she was about to do would help her baby. The child would be in heaven—much better than living with someone like her.
She took a cab to the clinic a block down the streetfrom the gallery. At the desk she signed in. “Name?” The desk clerk gave her a compassionate look.
“Ashley Baxter.” She felt dead inside. This was the only way… the only way out. The abortion was for her baby’s good, she was convinced. It wasn’t because of her job. She would find another place to work. No way she was stepping foot back in the Montmartre Gallery. Never again.
The woman handed her a clipboard with two pages of questions. “Have a seat, Ashley. We’ll be right with you.”
Another girl was already in the waiting room, and as Ashley sat down she practically gasped. It was the blonde who had been with Jean-Claude. Did that mean… was she…
Ashley couldn’t think about it. She sat down, her back to the girl, and filled out the paperwork. Name. Date of last period. And then a box to check, giving the clinic permission to put instruments inside her and scrape her uterus clean. The procedure was called a D & C, the document explained. Harmless, but with occasional rare side effects.
Yes.Ashley checked the box. Yes, she was willing to take the risk, willing for them to rip her baby apart and throw it in the trash can so she never had to think about Jean-Claude Pierre again.
She finished the paperwork and signed her name at the bottom. Then she returned the clipboard to the woman at the desk. But as she sat down something began to happen. She could hear a voice. A child’s voice.Mommy… don’t do this. You don’t want to hurt me.
Ashley shook her head and put her hands over her ears. What was this? Who was talking to her? But even with her hearing muffled, the voice spoke.Leave this place, Mommy. Run! Don’t do this.
Stop!Ashley ordered the voice. “Stop!” She spoke the word out loud, but it did nothing to silence the sound in her head, the childish words filling her heart.
I love you, Mommy… I already love you. Even if no one else does, I love you.
And Ashley could picture her baby. It would be a boy, she knew. With every cell in her body, she knew. As if God Himself were telling her it was so. He was alive and whole and his heart was beating inside her.
But not for long.
And suddenly… as if her own life depended on her next move, Ashley stood and ran for the door. Fast… like someone escaping a charging lion.
“Ashley Baxter?” the woman called after her.
“No!” Ashley was at the door now. She looked over her shoulder at the woman. “I won’t do it. I won’t!”
She raced out the door and down the street, away from the clinic. Away from the Montmartre Gallery. She didn’t stop until she was at a café, and she tore through the front door. Two minutes later she was eating a muffin and drinking a glass of milk. Not for herself.
For her baby.
With one hand on her still flat stomach and the other gripping her napkin, Ashley hung her head and closed her eyes.God, I’m a failure. If You’re there, if You’re real… Youknow that.She had nowhere to turn, no one she could tell. Ms. Martin would kick her out as soon as she learned the truth. And she would.
Jean-Claude had eyes everywhere. Ashley was beginning to understand that.
She remembered his comment about the dead bones. They were beautiful, he had said. She shuddered. Suddenly she felt sure about something. Jean-Claude might kill her for keeping her baby, and if he did, so be it. This child would not die at her hands.
Life would be nothing but hard roads and lonely valleys from this day forward. Her family would not want her back, and she didn’t want to return, anyway. She would find a way here in Paris, maybe in one of the residential arrondissements she had visited with Jean-Claude. But one thing was certain. She would not be alone. Not ever again. Because she would have her baby boy.
And no one would ever take him from her.
Not ever.
14
Cole Blake was walking back to the dorm from a meeting with the other resident assistants when he got the call from his grandpa Baxter. This was the summer before Cole’s junior year, and classes hadn’t started yet.
It would be months before he’d be home to see his family. He smiled and took the call. “Hey, there.”
“Cole, my boy!” His grandpa’s smile was practically visible over the phone line. “It’s good to hear your voice!”
“You, too.” Night had fallen, and fireflies danced on either side of the path. “Everything okay? With you and Grandma Elaine?” It wasn’t often that he got a call from his grandfather. Texts came every few days. But not phone calls.
And not this late in the evening.
