CHATROOM LOVE
Chapter Forty-Two

January 7, 2002
Edmonton, AB, Canada

Huddling deeper into their coats against the January cold, Rose and Dawn hurried into the school, grateful for the warmth once they were inside.

Dawn slouched a bit, sucking in her stomach as she pulled off her coat. Rose noticed.

"You’re not showing yet," she whispered.

"I know…but what if someone guesses?"

"How would they guess? There’s nothing to see."

"I still don’t want anybody knowing."

"Are you and Tommy any closer to deciding what to do?" Rose asked, taking off her own coat as she reached her locker.

Dawn looked down, shaking her head. "Not really. I used to think it would be an easy decision to make…whether to have a baby or not…but it isn’t."

"And if you decide to have it, then you have to decide whether to keep it or give it up for adoption." Rose turned to open the locker.

"Yeah. I have three choices…and I can’t make up my mind about any of them." Dawn stopped as an envelope fell out of Rose’s locker. "What’s that?"

Rose bent down to pick it up. "I don’t know." Glancing around, she opened the envelope, her face paling as she read the card.

Happy New Year, Darling

I trust you had a good trip. Did your mother know where you were? I wish I had been there myself. You look so beautiful in the winter. Did you have a good time with Jack? I know he was with you. I watched all of you get into your friend Tommy’s car and leave.

I would have shown you a better time, of course. Jack is only a boy…a beautiful girl like you needs a real man.

Be careful what you do, Rose. I’m watching you.

Not surprisingly, the card was unsigned, and nothing was written on the envelope, either. Dawn snatched the card as it fell from Rose’s fingers and scanned it.

Rose looked at her best friend, her face beginning to turn red. "He won’t stop. He won’t stop! I hoped that if I was gone for a while he’d give up, but he’s worse than ever! When I checked my e-mail last night, there were twelve messages from twelve different addresses…one for every day since I last checked. He knows when we left, when we came back…he even knows that we went to the Medicentre."

Dawn’s eyes widened. "Oh, my God! What if he tells my parents?"

Rose rolled her eyes. "That’s the least of your worries. He wants to know what kind of birth control I’m using. He didn’t say a thing about you."

Dawn sighed with relief. "That’s good, because I don’t want my parents to know I’m pregnant."

Rose glared at her. "Dawn! This isn’t about you! He’s stalking me!"

Dawn looked embarrassed. "I’m sorry. I’m just so worried about being pregnant and everything, I didn’t think about—"

"Some friend you are!" Rose slammed her locker door and stomped off into the milling crowd of students.

"Rose, wait!" Dawn chased after her. "I said I was sorry!"

Dawn caught up to Rose when she stopped beside Jack, who was digging through his messy locker. "Rose, come on!"

Jack turned to look at them. Rose was glaring at Dawn, who was looking back at her pleadingly. "What’s going on?" he asked, looking from one to the other in confusion.

Rose snatched the card from Dawn’s fingers. "I got another note from Cal, but all Dawn can think about is that someone might tell her parents that she’s pregnant, which they’ll probably find out anyway!"

Jack didn’t quite understand. "You got another e-mail?"

"No, I got a card that someone left in my locker." She held it out to him.

Jack took it and read it over, his brow furrowing. "But does this have to do with Dawn?"

"I told her about the e-mail where Cal said he saw us at the Medicentre. Now she thinks he’s going to tell her parents!"

Dawn gave Rose an indignant look. "I do not! You said that he only asked about you!"

"Yes…after you thought he was going to tell your parents!"

"Hey, that’s enough." Jack stepped between the two girls, who were glowering at each other.

Dawn looked at him suddenly, her eyes narrowing. "How did you know about the e-mails?"

Rose rolled her eyes at her again. "He’s not the one stalking me, if that’s what you think. We were chatting last night and I told him."

"Why didn’t you tell me?"

"Because you weren’t on-line last night. I tried to call you, but I got a busy signal."

"Oh…yeah. I was talking to Tommy."

"Well, that’s why I didn’t tell you last night!"

Jack looked at them uneasily. "Okay, you’ve both got problems. Fighting won’t help anything—"

"Her problem won’t hurt her!" Rose snapped.

"How do you know? My mom didn’t have anymore kids after me because something went wrong when I was born! How do you know the same thing won’t happen to me?"

"Your problem isn’t stalking you!"

"Yours isn’t growing in you!"

"You should have told Tommy no!"

"And you shouldn’t have gone out with Cal in the first place! He’s too old for you anyway."

Jack looked nervously from one to the other. "Um…okay…you’ve established that neither of you can tell the future, and that neither of you are very smart…" He stopped, realizing what he’d just said. "Uh…I mean…"

"Shut up!" Dawn and Rose responded in unison, turning to glower at him instead of at each other.

Jack backed away, looking around to see if any of their other friends were nearby…anyone who might diffuse the tension.

He was relieved to see Helga and Fabrizio walking in their direction, but the two were so wrapped up in each other that they didn’t notice Rose and Dawn’s angry faces or Jack’s desperate look.

"Fabri! Helga!" he called. After a moment, they looked up and saw him.

"Jack!" Fabrizio greeted him happily, steering Helga in their friends’ direction. He stopped when he finally noticed the expressions on the faces of his friends. "What’s wrong?"

"Uh…Dawn and Rose are fighting…"

"And you’re stupid," Dawn added, glaring at Jack.

"He is not!" Rose defended him.

"Why is Jack stupid?" Helga wanted to know.

"He said Dawn and I aren’t very smart." Rose narrowed her eyes at Jack.

"Hey! I thought you said I wasn’t stupid!" Jack protested.

"I changed my mind."

Helga looked at them in confusion. "Rose and Dawn are fighting because Jack said something stupid?"

"No." Rose leaned back against the bank of lockers. "Cal sent me a bunch of e-mails and put a card in my locker, and all Dawn can think about is—" She stopped, looking at Dawn. "Did you tell her about…?"

Dawn shook her head. "No." She looked at Fabrizio. "Did you tell her?"

"Tell her what?"

"Tell her about…" Dawn gestured to her stomach.

Fabrizio shook his head. "No."

Dawn took a deep breath, turning to Helga. "You can keep a secret, right?"

"Of course. I haven’t told anyone about Rose’s ex-boyfriend stalking her, you know."

"Well, this is something else that needs to be a secret. I don’t want my parents to know…I don’t want the whole school to know, either."

"What is it?"

Dawn took a deep breath, wishing that Tommy was there to support her, but he was home with a bad cold. "I’m pregnant." She put a hand on her middle.

"You are?" Helga looked at her in surprise. "What are you going to do?"

Dawn sighed. "I don’t know. That’s why I don’t want anyone to know—at least, not yet."

"Is it Tommy’s?"

Dawn sighed in aggravation. "Why do people ask me that? Of course it is. Who else’s could it be?"

Fabrizio interrupted. "Rosa got another note?"

Jack handed the card to him. "Yeah. She got a bunch of e-mails, too."

Fabrizio and Helga looked at the card, mouths dropping open.

"What a jerk!" Helga exclaimed. "Rose, you should show this to the police."

Rose sighed. "I tried that before. They didn’t do anything."

"Still…"

Fabrizio frowned. "But you have a…what do you call it…something to stop him from bothering you?"

"A restraining order? Yes, but it’s only as good as the paper it’s printed on. It’s no different now than it was when I first told you guys about this a few months ago. The police don’t believe Cal could be behind this."

"Did you save the e-mails?" Dawn asked, forgetting for the moment that she and Rose were mad at each other.

"Yes…and I forwarded them to Jack, too."

"Do you still have the old e-mails?"

Rose nodded. "I saved them in case the police actually decided to do something."

"Forward all those to me, too," Jack told her.

"And me," Dawn added. "That way, if he messes with your e-mail and erases them, we still have proof." She paused, thinking. "Send them to Tommy, too."

"And me," Helga interjected.

"Si…me, too," Fabrizio said. "We all want to help you."

Rose looked down. "Thanks, you guys. He’s really scaring me. And no one but you guys and Mom seems to believe me when I say it’s Cal."

"It has to be," Dawn told her. "Who else would know some of those things?"

"He doesn’t know everything, though," Jack said. "He didn’t know where we all went on vacation."

"Or why you were really at the Medicentre," Dawn added.

"I wish he’d been right about that," Jack mumbled, then turned red when Fabrizio smirked at him.

Rose turned red, too, but didn’t say anything. She just took the card back from Fabrizio and tucked it into her purse so she could show it to her mother later.

"Rose," Dawn began, "I’m sorry I kept talking about myself. I know this is scary for you."

Rose shook her head. "I shouldn’t have yelled at you. You’re not the one who’s being stalked."

"Yes, but…he’s watching all of us, you know. He seems to know whenever you’re with any of us."

"Maybe you should stay away from me," Rose joked weakly.

"No way. We’re here for you…right, guys?" Dawn looked at Jack, Fabrizio, and Helga.

"That’s right," Jack told her. "Cal’s not going to hurt you…not if I have anything to say about it."

"We’re with you, too, Rosa," Fabrizio assured her. Helga nodded in agreement.

"And you know Tommy can’t stand Cal," Dawn added. "He hasn’t liked him since Cal hit you for talking to him."

"Your old novio hit you for talking to Tommy?" Fabrizio asked incredulously. "But Tommy already has a girlfriend."

"That didn’t matter to Cal," Rose told him. "He didn’t want me talking to any guys except him."

"He did worse than that, too," Dawn said. "Rose finally broke up with him and got the restraining order after he tried to rape her."

Rose flinched. "I don’t want to talk about that."

Fabrizio looked as embarrassed by the idea as Rose was, but Helga walked up to Rose and gave her a hug.

"Rose, that’s horrible! He should have been put in jail for that."

"He didn’t actually get a chance to do anything," Rose mumbled. "We were at my house when it happened, and luckily, Mom got home before he could do anything. She’d liked Cal before, but when she caught him trying to rape me, and then I finally told her about his hitting me, she told him to get out and never come near me again. Then she helped me get the restraining order."

"Which he keeps violating by sending you all these notes and e-mails." Dawn looked at Rose. "Maybe one of us should send him a letter or an e-mail to let him know we know it’s him."

"He already knows. The police have talked to him…but he always has an alibi…"

"An alibi can be made up," Jack told her. "Trudy’s told me a few stories…"

"I know it’s him. What I need is proof!" Rose exclaimed. "But he’s not stupid enough to sign his name to anything, and the police haven’t found any fingerprints except ours and Mom’s on the notes. And of course the police can’t get into his computers or his phone records without reasonable suspicion."

"Why don’t they listen to you?" Fabrizio wanted to know.

Rose threw her hands up in frustration. "I don’t know! Maybe he’s paying someone off or something! They sure seemed suspicious enough of me when one of them said I was sending the notes and e-mails and making the phone calls to get attention! And they always believe him when he says it was just a coincidence that he happened to be in the same place as me."

"We believe you, Rose," Jack said, putting an arm around her as the bell rang, signalling that it was time to go to class.

"Yeah," Dawn added. "Whatever happens, we’re here for you." She shifted her coat to her other arm. "By the way, are we still up for tennis this afternoon?"

Rose looked at her, trying to push her fear of Cal and his continued stalking out of her mind. "Sure. Sorry I was so mad at you."

Dawn sighed. "That’s okay. You’re scared. If someone was stalking me…like if Tommy and I broke up and he decided to send me a bunch of stupid notes…I’d be mad, too."

Rose smiled weakly. "I can’t imagine Tommy stalking anything but a football or a pizza."

"Well…you know what I mean."

"Yeah…thanks for sticking with me."

"You’re welcome."

Chapter Forty-Three
Stories