Unexpected

Chapter 23

Trying to find a job and being pregnant wasn't an easy task at all. No one hires you. After a couple of months, I ran out of money. The money I had made while touring with Metallica had finished, and my parents were the ones supporting me. Even if I was so ashamed of it, I took their help. I needed it.

I told my parents the whole truth. I explained who the father was, and why he wasn't present. I even explaining why he wasn't present at all. At first, they raged but then they understood my reasons and my mother even got sympathetic with James's situation. Though she didn't agree with the fact that he had chosen to stay away from the baby's life. We took it that way because since the visit to my apartment, he never showed up again. He never called to see how things were doing. For what I knew, he didn't even know I was having a baby girl that I decided to call Willow.

So as I said, my parents began to support me when my money went short. My mother started visiting me in LA quiet often as the pregnancy evolved so she would give me some support. Lars and Connie were also very supportive. Lars was the one coming and going quite often too. Trying to see how I was doing and I wondered if James ever asked about us but I never ventured to ask him. I didn't want to talk about him.

"I think you should take the offer, Cleo." Lars told me in one of his visits. "You need the money. Your daughter will be here in a few months and hospitals cost money. You don't have a job here and I am telling you that a friend of mine is willing to let you work for him. It's a nice place. He's a well-known lawyer in San Francisco and he'll pay you well."

"It's in San Francisco!" I retorted.

"And? Do you have anything here?" Connie argued.

My mother looked at me agreeing with them, I could read the look in her eyes, but my problem was not with the city at all.

"It's not that..." I breathed.

"You're afraid to see him?" Lars asked me.

"It's quite possible and I don't want to see him. I don't want him to think that I moved up there to pressure him or anything." I explained.

"It's a job, Cleo." My mother insisted.

"And where am I going to live? Guys..." I tried to call for their reason.

"That's not a problem..." Lars added. "I have an apartment there that I don't use at all. You can stay there. I don't even want the rent." I curled an eyebrow suspiciously.

"So, you came here to offer me a job and a house?" I asked him.

"The job it's not my offer. I talked to him..." He said. "Well, I asked if he could help me and explained your situation. Not everything... but anyway... he said he could use a secretary since the one he had left. The house, well... it's my treat, but I think you could use the help."

"Take the offer, Cleo." Connie told me. "You don't have anything here right now and there, you have us, a job waiting for you and a house. Your daughter needs stability, and a baby costs money..."

"I know all that. I just don't think it's a good idea to go there." I whispered.

"Look... I think that sooner or later you two have to talk. Come on... it's not like nothing is happening. On the opposite, something big is happening. You're having a child together, that's something big. He can't ignore all the time that he has one with you and you can't pretend he doesn't exist the whole time. Despite that, and since none of you are talking to each other, I think this is a great opportunity." Lars said.

I knew they were right. They were right in every word but going to San Francisco and take the chance to run up into James scared me. I was still hurt. More than that, I was still in love with him. That was even scarier.