Chapter Seventeen: Rescue Me

Three weeks later the cast came off and Ava refused to leave the bedroom, what's more she refused to let anyone in the room, even Josh. It didn't stop Nathen standing outside and trying to plead with her maternal side for her to eat for the baby. She didn't care about the baby, she didn't want it and nothing they said or did was going to change that. She had to get out of there, but it was harder then she imagined. Her cards had all been cancelled and the movie she had been shooting was going on without her. Once Gloria had the audacity to push a mother and baby magazine under the door, Ava burnt it and listened happily as the smoke alarms all over the house went off and every banged on the bedroom door to see if she was ok. She let them worry. She was going to make them pay for doing this to her. Ava felt like she had some sort of infection, like the baby was a virus and there should be some pill to take it away. What's more is that Ava was no fool, and as soon as she had the chance she paid one of the maids to send a message to John just so he would know. So she could tell him what they had done to her and that somehow she would get back to him. The same day she sent the message was the same day Josh walked in and sat on the bed, smiling at her like he hadn't done anything wrong.

"Ava, I love you but this behaviour isn't good for our baby. It has to stop."

He spoke to her as though she was a child and Ava rolled her eyes.

"You don't love me, it's your baby and I'll do what I want. I swear to god Josh I'll starve myself to death if it means getting away from you!"

Josh rubbed his hairline, as he was prone to do when he felt insecure. "If things get so bad I'll have a doctor commit you to a hospital."

He spoke like he had learnt the line off by heart, which of course he had. It was the ace up Gloria and Nathen's sleeve, the one sure thing they still had to control Ava with right? Wrong. She smiled, for the first time in weeks she smiled and it didn't matter if it was fake, then she leaned close to her husband.

"You wouldn't commit me, can you imagine the terrible repercussions. No one would view us the same again and I'm pretty sure studio producers don't want to hire a man with a crazy wife. You would lose everything and besides, you need to be sick before they put you away."

"You are sick."

"No Josh, you are."

Score one for our girl.

The message came in the form of a phone call when John was in his hotel room. Ava, as always, had been in and out of his dreams like a butterfly, fluttering by whenever she pleased and it was driving him crazy. What was worse was not seeing her anywhere. There where no more pictures in magazines, she hadn't been on TV and he knew that couldn't be a good thing. The phone call was of no surprise. The woman on the other end had a foreign accent he couldn't quiet place or really understand, the conversation between them was difficult and at first all he could understand was that something had happened, but he'd already guessed that. Then came the real hit, the big exclusive millions would of died for and John didn't want to hear, the woman told him Ava was pregnant and he immediately hung up. His insides felt like rock and he knew he had no right to react this way. After all he told her to go back to her husband and that's what she'd done. She'd gone back to her husband and jumped straight into bed with him to make a baby, which just proved everything she had told John when she last seen him had been a lie hadn't it? That night John went out to a bar with some friends and picked up a waitress, how was he to know that poor Ava was waiting for a reply, a reply that would state without a doubt that he was coming to rescue her from her own personal hell, a hell that was getting worse every day.

Especially the next day, as Ava slept late, tired from staying awake until 5 am, Gloria and Nathen where issuing a statement to the press. A fabulous work of fiction telling the whole world how the Carson's where overjoyed at the news they where having their first baby. Yes, Josh would be giving interviews later that week but no his wife wouldn't be joining them as she was still very ill. They had got what they wanted, they had just thrown away the key that would unlock Ava's chains and to the casual observer it may look like it would stay this way. In every life a little rain may fall and god knows Ava's had enough of that, but you have to remember that after the rain, the sun usually follows.