"We were inseparable," she said the words as if they were more than a fact as if the words were etched in stone. "Of course I had a crush on him when I was younger. Bekah and I were best friends growing up. It was easy to have a crush on him when he was two years older. I never expected him to ever see me as anything more than his little sister's friend," she told her as if she had transported through time. "We started dating my sophomore year of high school. He was a senior. He didn't care about the ridicule or slander that came our way when we together. I was a year ahead of everyone in my grade so I'd be graduating only a year behind him. He always told me the age difference didn't matter. That we'd be together in the end.
"He settled on Tech to stay in the city…to be close to me. His parents wanted him to go to a private schooclass="underline" Princeton, Stanford, or Duke, but he swore he wouldn't leave me." Her hand dropped from her chin and she stared down into her coffee. "He was only there for a year before he transferred to Duke when I started my first year. His parents were proud of course. They were already…planning our marriage since I had always been the perfect influence on their rebellious son."
Lexi shook her head unable to believe this tall tale. This was about as far from Ramsey's story as Parker could possibly get. He had claimed never to have a girlfriend. He had never been in love. Her insides were icing over. No. He had never had any of these things before her. Now she was finding out that not only had he had a girlfriend, but his parents had been planning for them to get married likely since childhood.
"But it all went wrong," Parker gasped grasping her cup firmly with both hands as she tried to hold back the tears that were clouding her eyes.
"What happened?" Lexi asked surprised she even had a voice. She felt like she was living someone else's life right now. She couldn't believe that these things had actually happened. She had gone through too much time in one day. She was having delusions. Her fears were catching up with her. She had gotten stuck in a soap opera where everyone lied, everyone hid information, everyone was deceitful.
"Oh God, it all happened so quick. I'd been feeling sick for about a week. It was during finals," she told the story as if she had gone back in time and was still there. It was clear that she was trapped in her memories. "I'd asked for an extension because of the sickness. I just couldn't stop throwing up.
"I was finally able to hold down a meal and I raced over to Ramsey's. I hadn't seen him since falling ill because we didn't live together. Our parents would never have allowed it of course," she said swiping the tears from her blood shot eyes. "He was drunk…terribly drunk. I'd never seen him so drunk. His roommates were there with four or five mostly naked girls. I looked like hell and worse I felt like it, and there he was having a raving good time with some girls that would have sucked his dick at a snap of his fingers." The vulgarity surprised Lexi almost as much as the situation and her mouth fell open. She covered her hand with her mouth as she imagined the scene before her.
How could he have done it?
"I lost it. I just snapped. I screamed at him, yelled at him, called him every dirty thing that I could think of. It made me sick to my stomach and I had to rush to the bathroom. He was just as vulgar. I remember him telling me that all I cared about were my studies, that I'd changed, that he couldn't even see the old me anymore. He said more things that I hate to even imagine, but he was so drunk, he couldn't stop himself.
"I remember telling him he was a spoiled rich brat who would only ever amount to as much as daddy's money allowed. Then I left, and as he slammed the door behind me he told me never to come back," she said a tear falling slowly down her right cheek.
Lexi gulped hard her coffee long forgotten. "Is that how it ended?" she couldn't help asking.
"I wish," she said meeting Lexi's chocolate brown eyes. Lexi couldn't imagine it getting any worse. "If only I'd known then what I know now," she said forlornly. "I was pregnant."
Lexi gasped her chest beating frantically as the pieces fell together. Of course she had been sick, throwing up, her emotions rampant. It all made sense. He hadn't known. How could he have known? "Did you tell him?"
"It is my greatest regret that I did not," she stated sadly licking her dry lips. "I was angry. I couldn't forgive the things he had said to me. I was only nineteen after all…still too young…for everything."
Lexi stilled as the realization hit her. Ramsey could have a child with the woman sitting in front of her. "He has a baby?" she asked.
Tears really did spill forth from her eyes at that statement. "No," she breathed. "I finished my exams, transferred back home to Emory. By then I knew for certain and even if I tried to hide it, the baby was alive inside of me and growing every day. The last thing I wanted was for him to know. I hid it from everyone. I only left the house to go to classes and even then I restored to wearing sweats everywhere. I didn't even risk seeing a doctor I was so ashamed. My parents were terrified and wanted me to see a shrink. They thought I was depressed," she said with a sharp laugh. Lexi didn't think anyone could blame her for being depressed under the circumstances.
"But one day Bekah showed up at my apartment." Lexi cringed away at the name. "I didn't want to let her in, but she insisted and pushed past me. Well of course she could tell that something was different…that I was bigger. I'll spare you the details of the following days with her holed up in my apartment with me. Suffice it to say that I ended up miscarrying."
"Oh no," Lexi breathed the sorrow of the story beginning to overwhelm her.
"Bekah convinced me to tell him. When I finally went there, it was another bad night. It was storming the entire drive up to Durham. He was alone, but drunk again. I don't know why I expected any less. I hadn't seen or heard from him since I'd left his place that night I'd walked out on him. When I got up the courage to tell him, he called me a liar. He'd gotten it into his head that everything was my fault that night…" she paused unable to go on as she clutched her chest.
"Well when Bekah finally got to him, she made him feel like a worthless piece of shit. He called and visited and tried to repair everything we had had, but I couldn't do it. There was too much hurt and though he didn't give up for quite some time, I could never really get over what had happened to me. It's the reason I had pushed through to medicine," she sadly slumping back in her chair as if to show that was the end of her tale.
Lexi couldn't believe it. How could this be the same Ramsey that she knew now? How could any of this be true with what she knew about the man she had fallen in love with? It didn't add up. It just didn't make sense. He wasn't this person. He was so much more than that.
Why would he lie? It was such an elaborate story though. She had to admit it did all fit together, but still it didn't make sense. He had no reason to tell Lexi that he'd never dated, loved, or that Parker was nothing more than someone he had fucked and left…just like all the other girls.
She stood up abruptly the weight of the story heavy on her shoulders. "Don't come near me, my parents, or Ramsey," she said pointing her finger at Parker menacingly. She couldn't believe it. The story was too much.
"Lexi," Parker pleaded looking up at her through pained eyes.
She had gone through too much in one day. Her brain couldn't process any of it. She couldn't think of what all of this would mean if it were true. She couldn't think of shattering the one perfect picture she had of an individual. And so she stumbled away from the coffee shop and back up to her father's bedside to wait out the agony of the day.