AN: Thank you to those who have signed up for this little adventure. I hope you enjoy the next installment.

Chapter 3

Henry waited by the phone a week and a half later and when it rang at 8:15, he practically knocked his sister, Maureen, to the ground to get it. "Hello?" he said, slightly out of breath.

"Henry?" she asked, keeping her voice low as there were still other people on the opposite side of the lounge.

"Yeah. How are you doing?"

"I'm alright I guess. I'm not throwing up four times a day now, usually just once in the morning when I get up and maybe again before lunch. I guess that's an improvement."

"Yeah." Henry wasn't sure what to say. "I've been doing a lot of thinking about things and I want to help you, but I just can't get behind what you want to do."

"You can't even say it?" Her voice was full of contempt. "You-"

"That's not it at all. I need you to be aware of where I am right now, okay?" Henry whispered into the phone. His sister, Erin, looked up from her spot on the couch and he turned away from her.

"You want to destroy my future," Elizabeth said, forcing herself to keep her voice low.

"I don't. I just want to not destroy someone else's to save yours," Henry wasn't articulating himself well and he felt like she'd already made up her mind. "What if I helped you?"

"That will work well when you are states away," she muttered. "Sending a check every once in a while isn't going to be much in the way of help."

"No. Wait a sec." Henry eyed his sisters who were both intently watching him from across the room. He shot them an evil eye hoping that they would go away, but when they didn't, he pulled the excess phone cord from behind the couch and took the phone to the bathroom and locked the door behind him. "I already called the recruiting officer. I can transfer my ROTC scholarship to UVA, and there's room for me if I want to join there. The officer at UVA said so. I will physically be there to help you."

"And the social stigma of being an unwed mother? The guy gets the benefit of being a ladies' man, a player, and I am just a slut that was unlucky enough to get knocked up," Elizabeth spat. "I won't do that. My parents would be so disappointed." Even the thought of her parents in the middle of this was enough to make Elizabeth fall apart.

"But your parents would be fine with you killing a baby?" Henry asked and even as the words left his mouth he regretted them.

"Fuck you!" she scowled and hung up.

"Damnit," he muttered and set the receiver back into the cradle He sat on the edge of the tub and rubbed his eyes. "What am I going to do now?" It wasn't that he didn't understand her concerns. On an intellectual level, he totally got it, although he conceded that he probably really didn't fully understand since he wasn't facing it. However, he'd always been raised to believe that abortion was wrong, altogether, flat out, no two ways about it, and to condone aborting his own baby, he just couldn't. A sob forced its way out and he slapped his hand over his mouth to muffle the noise.

Someone knocked. "Yeah?" he answered, doing his best to use an even voice.

"Henry? Do you really think you need to be having a conversation with someone while you're in the bathroom?" his mother, Evelyn, asked.

"Sorry Mom. The girls kept trying to eavesdrop, so I was trying to get away from them," Henry replied.

"Come to the kitchen. We need to talk."

Henry heard her move away from the door. "Fuck," he muttered. He couldn't let her find out. Not now. Not yet. He quickly washed his face and replaced the phone back on its little table before going into the kitchen. Henry grabbed a glass from the the cabinet and filled it with water before sitting down.

"It's time you level with me," she said. Henry did his absolute best to give her a blank stare. "Don't do that. Something is going on. You haven't been right since Olivia broke up with you. Are you having trouble working through that?"

He answered before he thought it through. "No." Henry wanted to kick himself. Saying yes would've taken care of it, but he didn't really lie to his parents. Sometimes he withheld information that he didn't necessarily think they needed, but he didn't out and out lie to them. His mother was staring at him. He hated it when she did that. "It's kind of like this. I met a girl at the Debate Tournament. We kind of hit it off and I've just been thinking about her a lot. She just called me and wants to do something that I think is a terrible idea and I told her so and now she's mad. I'm just upset about it is all."

"Henry, how invested are you in this girl? I mean you don't know her well, do you?" Evelyn asked.

"Not very well," Henry admitted.

"Okay. Is the decision going to hurt her?" Evelyn asked.

"You're going full on Socratic method with me, Mom?" Henry joked, but Evelyn just looked at him. "It might, but I think she sees what she's doing as the best option she has, and although I offered other things, she doesn't see them as being helpful."

"It sounds like you need to let her do what she wants and just try to support her," his mother said. Henry nodded. That was easy for her to say when she didn't know it was her grandchild they were discussing.

"Okay. Oh hey, I forgot to tell you I called her the other day. She asked me to call her right away and no one was home to ask." He dug into his pocket and pulled out ten dollars. "If this isn't enough to cover the phone call, let me know. And, if it's alright, would it be okay if I called her back later this week and checked up on her?"

"You like her?" Evelyn raised her eyebrows at her son.

"Maybe I could've if things were different. I don't want her to do something hurtful though. It's kind of confusing." His mom eyed him to the point that he wondered if she'd figured it out.

She blinked and said, "You should probably go ahead upstairs and finish up any homework you have. You have a track meet tomorrow, right?"

Henry nodded. "Thanks Mom. Love you." He leaned over and gave her a hug.

"Love you too, Henry."

Elizabeth slammed the phone down and walked out the door. At that point, it didn't matter that it was ten minutes before lights out and she could get into trouble. She couldn't stop the tears. Her fists were clenched and she rounded the corner and the building and hid under the fire escape. Elizabeth buried her face in her knees and sobbed.

Ever since her parents died, all she wanted to do was to make them proud. Since their death, she worked harder in school than ever before, participated in groups and sports that she wasn't really interested in, and excelled in all of them, because she just wanted to be the best. She wanted to show her parents that they could be proud and all it took was one indiscretion, one poor choice, and she'd ruined it all. She should've known better, paid closer attention, not been so needy, something.

What pissed her off the most was that Henry was probably right. Her parents had never been religious, but they cared about people. They helped out at soup kitchens and always gave away her and Will's outgrown clothes to organizations that helped those less fortunate. Her mother loved babies and would always take notice if she saw a new mother on the street and tell her how beautiful her baby was. Her mother would've been an excellent grandmother. Thinking these thoughts only made her more upset.

She cursed Henry for bringing it up. It was easy for him to say such things. He had nothing on the line. No one would think poorly of him. It wouldn't be the same for her. She wouldn't be accepted to law school with a toddler running around after her, assuming she could actually go to college in the first place. If she kept this baby, she would end up in some dead end secretarial or food service type job and barely be able to stay afloat. She had worked too hard for that and her parents deserved better.

Elizabeth wiped her eyes on her sleeve and stood. She went up the fire escape to the second floor and snuck inside the building where she went straight to her room and crawled under the covers, not saying a word to Kendra, who looked on with concern.

It wasn't until Thursday evening when Henry finally gathered the nerve to call Elizabeth. As the girl who answered the phone went to get Elizabeth, Henry's nausea climbed. He was actually afraid of what she might say when, or maybe even if, she answered the phone. Several minutes had passed and Henry thought that he should hang up. He was just about to when she picked up. "Hello."

"Hi, Elizabeth," he said, almost timidly.

"Henry." Her tone was clipped.

"I called to apologize. I was way off base. What I said was uncalled for and I'm sorry."

"Alright." Henry waited, but that was all she said, so he continued on.

"My position remains the same, but I want to support you. If you think this is your only course of action, I will come down and be with you," he said.

"That's not necessary, Henry. I'll be fine."

"You don't need to do it by yourself. Not this. We aren't talking about you getting a filling. It's a surgical procedure. Someone should be with you." She was silent. Henry wasn't sure if she was still there. "Elizabeth?"

"Yes?"

"Are you okay?"

"No, not really." She paused. "You'd come all the way from Pittsburgh just so I wasn't alone?"

"Yes. Just let me know when and I'll be there and I'll stay until I know you're okay."

Elizabeth bit her quivering lip. "Okay. I'll let you know." She waited a few seconds. "Thank you."

"This isn't your fault. It's our fault, and I want to do be there for you. Please let me."

"I'll call you when I make the appointment. Bye, Henry."

"Bye."