Gathering Clouds by V. C. Andrews Read Free Book Online Page B

together. He didn’t attend any of the basketball games to sit with me and watch Lynette play nor did he come to any dances at my school. We didn’t even walk my campus together. Most of the time, he had to work, but when he didn’t, I would take him for rides out of our area so we could go to restaurants and other places where no one who knew me would see us.
    Occasionally, when he was off work, we spent weekends together at a motel near Richmond. Each time my parents thought I had gone to Lynette’s parents’ home. It was easy to deceive because I kept telling myself the deception was only temporary. Someday, I would find the way to reveal Larry to my parents and we would be accepted. When I mentioned it to him, he simply smiled or he would say, “It’s not important right now. We have time.”
    Time was exactly what we didn’t have, but for months we ignored any obstacles, any thoughts of unhappiness or disappointment. We simply refused to consider it. Fall passed quickly into winter, and winter, because I was doing things with Larry every chance I had, was never too cold or too dreary. I went home for the holiday breaks, of course.
    I did feel deceitful then because Mother thought my happiness was all attributable to the choice of college. My grades weren’t too bad, thanks to Lynette’s tutoring. I managed to call Larry every chance I had. He had gone with Marcus to spend Christmas with Marcus’s family, but returned to the college to work at the library on inventory right after Christmas. I surprised him by driving back there to spend New Year’s Eve with him. I managed it by convincing my parents I was going to a hotel with one of my high school girlfriends. I gave her the money to go there with her boyfriend so she would cover for me just in case. Victoria almost discovered the truth because she knew by girlfriend’s younger sister, but fortunately for me, Victoria didn’t ask the right questions. She simply didn’t care.
    I wished I had a camera in my hands when Larry opened his door and saw me standing there December 31. The picture would never leave my memory, however. His shock and surprise were only second to his happiness. We went to a Chinese restaurant and brought back food and spent New Year’s Eve watching the ball fall in Times Square on his small black-and-white television set. Lying there in his arms on his pull-out bed in his two by four studio apartment, I couldn’t help but laugh. The last five years I had spent New Year’s Eve in the ballrooms, dressed in gowns and escorted by boys in tuxedos. We had danced to elegant twenty-piece orchestras, had eaten caviar and lobster on fine china.
    We made love that night dreaming of a future together. We would live in England and we wouldn’t worry about anyone’s accepting us. We talked for hours and hours and didn’t fall asleep until almost morning. Late the next afternoon, I drove home and no one was the worse for it. Daddy asked about my New Year’s and I told him it was just okay. He felt sorry for me, but I told him parties weren’t as important to me. The truth was nothing I had thought important held the same value. I saw a look of concern in his face and I quickly returned to my old self just to make him comfortable. Mother, however, looked more suspicious.
    I, myself, had no idea how deep and significant were the changes inside me. I knew it four weeks after I had missed my period, but I was too afraid to say anything to Larry. I had missed periods in the past. Mother once took me to the doctor to check on all that, but there was nothing seriously wrong, nothing terribly unusual.
    This time, however, there were changes in my body. Twice, I had woken with morning sickness. Still, I continued to ignore it, to refuse to face it. I was never very good at dealing with serious trouble. All my life I was pampered and taken care of like a little princess despite Mother’s attempts to make me more self-sufficient and responsible. Daddy