The Rise of Rachel Stark Read online

  So in the end she said OK. Like she always did.

  But she did not trust them.

  Because she knew. Women die.

  Rachel had read about back alleys and wire hangers. You won't die? The statistics say yes, they do. Too many die. When abortion is banned, women die, she read. It made sense.

  She had nightmares. She was lying in a bed, and what she saw, in more places than she ever could have imagined, was blood. There was blood on the walls. There was blood on the floor and on the ceiling. There was blood on her hands and arms, and on her Mom and Dad's hands and arms.

  But there was no blood on the doctor. Her white smock was spotless. She just stood there looking at Rachel. She was holding a bicycle spoke. Then an umbrella spoke. Then a wire hanger.

  So women die, she said, and they had no answer for that.

  Rachel told her Mom and Dad: To get to the uterus, where the fetus is, the wire hanger, or the bicycle spoke, or the umbrella spoke, has to pass through a tiny opening in the cervix. A back-alley abortionist is going into that area blind, and if she doesn't find that opening, she could easily puncture the uterus and maybe sever one of the arteries there, arteries that pump a lot of blood.

  They told her to stop talking like that.

  Women die. They bleed to death.

  And even if the abortionist does find that small opening in the cervix, she has to know how to exert the right amount of force to get the wire hanger into the uterus. Too much force also could puncture the uterus and cause serious, even fatal, bleeding.

  They told her to stop talking like that.

  Rachel told her parents: Even if the wire hanger manages to get safely into the uterus, she would be at high risk of dying from an infection in a matter of days. Wire hangers are not sterile. They are not even clean.

  They told her to stop talking like that.

  So she did. Like always.

  She wrote a song instead. Wrote it in her head, like she did with many of the songs she wrote. When she was done, she sang it to herself in a soft, whispery voice as she played her guitar. It was a sweet song, she thought. Not at all like life.

  Chapter Three

  The Best Laid Plans …

  The Galaxie, flexing its young muscles, sprinted up Cemetery Road like a frightened fawn.

  "Look," Sheldon said. "We have to make a plan. What we're going to do once we get there. We're going to be there pretty soon."

  "Yeah," Bull said. "Any ideas, Jimmy?"

  "Well," Jimmy said. "First, we're going to have to park some distance away from their trailer, so they won't see or hear our car coming up the driveway."

  "Right," Bull said.

  "So then we walk to the trailer. If there's a strange vehicle there – I think that old black Ford pickup and that 1952 Plymouth are the only vehicles the Stark family has, right?"

  "Yep, right," Tabby said.

  "OK, if there's a strange vehicle there I'll take down the license number, year, make and model, color, etcetera," Sheldon said.

  "OK, great," Jimmy said. "Then Bull, you bang on the door as loud as you can and yell 'police!' "

  "OK," Bull said. "And if they don't answer right away, we'll break the door down."

  Silence.

  "This is so scary, guys," Tabby said. "So scary."

  "Yes, it is scary, I'll admit," Sheldon said. "But remember, we have somebody inside, Rodney, who is on our side. He knows we're coming. At least I'm pretty sure he knows. And if he's in the kids' bedroom, which I absolutely think he would be, you know, keeping the little kids quiet and out of the way, if they aren't already asleep. Anyway, he's a lot closer to the front door than the people in the parents' bedroom at the other end of the trailer. He's going to open that front door for us immediately. Does that sound right, Tabby?"

  "Yes, but then what?" Tabby asked.

  "Then Rodney tells us what's going on," Sheldon said, "and … and then we go from there."

  He paused.

  "We don't know exactly what we're going to run into, it's true. I wish we did, but we don't. That's a fact. I mean, we could run into an entirely different set of conditions. You know, like maybe people aren't going to be where we think they're going to be. Or maybe they told Rodney to take the little kids and go somewhere. We just don't know. We're just going to have to think on our feet, and we're going to have to think fast."

  "But our objective is simple," Jimmy said, "and it is clear. If there is anything going on in the parents' bedroom, or wherever Rachel is, we are going to go in there and put a halt to it. Any. Way. We. Can. If that means physical violence, then so be it. We have three big guys, maybe four if we count Rodney. At most, there will be two guys in that bedroom, Benjamin Stark, who might or might not stand in our way, and one other guy, the guy doing the abortion, again who might or might not give us trouble. But I'm confident the four of us can handle it. Five of us, Tabby. You'll be taking care of Rachel."

  Silence.

  "Tell me again," Tabby said, "why we decided to yell 'police' instead of actually calling the police. It's their job. They know how to do these things."

  "Two reasons," Sheldon said. "First, the Chante town cop, poor old Harley Jones, doesn't have jurisdiction up here. We're in Neehawk County now. Harley wouldn't be of any help anyway. He's totally useless.

  "Second, the county sheriff's office is in Neehawk, half an hour away. Probably 45 minutes to an hour away on a Christmas Eve when it's snowing like this. We don't have that much time."

  "Yes, but do we have the right to do this?" Tabby asked. "Isn't this a private matter? Who do we think we are? We're four teenagers, and we are planning to break into someone's home and … and what … take over? Do we have the right to do this?"

  "No!" Jimmy shouted from the back seat. He leaned forward and pounded his right fist into the palm of his left hand as he spoke.

  "We don't have the right! We have the duty! For the love of God, we have the duty! Rachel is our friend. We are probably the only friends she has in the world! She has nobody but us … nobody but us. We're all she has. We're the only ones she has told about getting raped, and she is being forced to have an abortion she does not want! And we cannot let her die. We cannot. We have to do everything we can – "

  A large whitetail buck deer suddenly darted onto the road and into the path of the Galaxie. Sheldon hit the brakes just as the 3,400-pound car slammed into the deer, which weighed 250 pounds at most.

  For a moment, the four did not know what had happened. The loud crunch of metal colliding with living flesh surprised them, but they did not know where the sound came from or what it was.

  Then time slowed down.

  They watched as the deer rolled up and over the hood. They shielded their faces as the animal slid up, but did not break, the windshield. They heard the buck skid across the top of the car before it fell spinning to the road. They hung on as the car slid sideways and smacked into deep snow in the opposite side ditch and wound up facing downhill. Then the motor stopped running.

  For a few moments, silence.

  "Is everybody OK?" Sheldon asked. "Tabby, are you OK?"

  "Yes, I think so," she said. "Yes."

  "We're OK back here," Bull said. "Right, Jimmy?"

  "Yeah, OK."

  Sheldon took a deep breath and exhaled loudly.

  "Oh, god," he said. "That was close." He and Tabby hugged.

  "Let's get out and see what's what," Bull said.

  The snow on the passenger side of the car came up to the bottom of the window, so Tabby and Jimmy had to crawl over to the driver's side to get out. Even then, the snow was nearly knee high.

  Bull and Jimmy dragged the dead deer off to the side of the road, leaving a trail of blood.

  Sheldon looked at the back of the car, buried in snow.

  "That's why the engine stopped," he said. "The exhaust pipe is plugged up." It was too dark to tell the extent of damage to the front of the car, but Sheldon felt the broken glass of the passenger side headlight. />
  "Where are we, exactly?" Bull asked.

  "My guess is about a mile, maybe less, from the cemetery," Sheldon said. "That means we're about two miles from the Stark place."

  "Well, we're never going to get this car out of the ditch. Not tonight anyway," Bull said.

  "And we're wasting time talking about it," Jimmy said.

  "What are you suggesting?" Sheldon asked.

  "C'mon, two miles," Jimmy said. "We can walk this, run this. But we have to hurry. Let's go!"

  "Tabby? Bull?" Sheldon said.

  "Sure, why not?" Tabby said.

  "Let's do it!" Bull said.

  Sheldon looked at his Christmas present, trapped and sitting cockeyed in deep snow in a ditch, brand new only a few minutes ago, but as useless to the four of them now as an old, dead clunker. He threw up his hands.

  "What's Dad going to say?" he said to no one.

  Tabby gave him another hug.

  "I'm sorry, Sheldon," she said.

  The four were dressed for the winter, but as they started walking up the road they knew they had two, maybe three things, working against them: The uphill climb; the headwinds that blew snow into their faces; and the odds.

  Chapter Four

  Celeste

  A dark blue 1960 Chevrolet Bel Air crept down the unplowed driveway leading to the single-wide trailer where Benjamin and Holly Stark and their five children lived. The driver, a 46-year-old woman, was having trouble following the tire tracks that were rapidly being obscured by a heavy snowfall. She cursed in the darkness, but finally arrived at the trailer.

  She got out of the car, a medium-sized black leather case in hand, and walked toward the trailer door, which was illuminated by a bare light bulb protected from the elements by an overhead tin cover Benjamin had fashioned.

  Before she could knock, the door opened, and Benjamin said, "Celeste?"

  "Benjamin?" she said.

  "Yes, come in," Benjamin said.

  He held the door open for her as she entered. They did not shake hands.

  ●●●

  Did headlights from a car coming down their driveway suddenly flash across the bedroom ceiling? Rachel caught her breath.

  Did she hear a car door slam?

  Did she hear Dad talking to someone at the other end of the trailer?

  She wasn't in East Tennessee anymore. She was back in the real world, where her hands trembled, and her body shook.

  ●●●

  "Here, follow me," Benjamin said. He walked through the kitchen and into the living room. He pointed to the closed bedroom door.

  "She's in there," he said.

  "I'll talk to her later," Celeste said. "Where's your wife?"

  "In the bedroom with her," Benjamin said.

  "Call her out here," Celeste said. "We need to talk."

  Benjamin walked over to the bedroom door, opened it and mumbled something. Holly came out.

  "This is Celeste," Benjamin said. "This is my wife, Holly."

  Holly, thin, pale and red-eyed, as if she had not slept for days, nodded.

  "You said you had other kids. Where are they?" Celeste asked.

  "In the other bedroom, far end of the trailer," Benjamin said, pointing.

  "Are they locked in?" Celeste asked.

  "Can't lock that door," Benjamin said. "They're with my son, Rodney. He's 16, and he has orders to keep the kids in the room. You can trust him. He's a good kid."

  "Let's hope," Celeste said. Benjamin and Holly sat down on the couch, Celeste on a wooden chair facing them.

  ●●●

  Rachel could hear the sounds of conversation in the living room, just on the other side of the bedroom door. She had an insane notion to step out into the room and tell them to stop talking like that.

  But she lay quietly in the bed that she was conceived in all those years ago in that wonderful, happy place called East Tennessee.

  But now she was frozen with something that went far beyond fear.

  She could scarcely breathe. How strange it is, she said to herself, to think that I am alive, that I am here, by mere chance. That I might die in the exact spot that my life began.

  ●●●

  "First order of business," Celeste said. "I need my money up front. One hundred dollars. Cash only, as you know."

  Benjamin cleared his throat. "How do I know you won't take it and run?" he said.

  "You don't," she said. "But the only way you are going to get this business taken care of is to give me the money now. Your choice."

  Benjamin took a deep breath and sniffed. He reached in his shirt pocket and pulled out a wad of bills.

  "I had to borrow this," he said. Celeste shrugged. He handed her the money. She counted five $20 bills and stuck them in her black case.

  "OK. Now. This might sound like a strange question, coming from me," Celeste said, "but why are you doing this?"

  "This?" Benjamin said.

  "Why do you want your daughter to have an abortion?" she said.

  Benjamin stared at her for a moment.

  "I think that's for us to know and for you to wonder about," he said.

  "Fair enough," she said. "Now you do know that abortion is illegal in Nebraska, right? That you're breaking the law?"

  "So are you."

  "Touché. How old is your daughter?"

  "Eighteen."

  "What's her name?"

  "Rachel."

  "Does Rachel go to school?"

  "She's a senior in high school."

  "And she's on Christmas vacation right now, right?"

  "Right."

  "Do you know who the father is?"

  "She won't tell us."

  "Was she raped?"

  "So she says."

  "Who raped her?"

  "She won't say."

  "Why not?"

  "You'll have to ask her that."

  "Maybe I will. Yes. How far along is she?"

  Benjamin turned to his wife.

  "Six weeks. About six weeks," Holly said. Her voice, like her body, was thin and pale.

  "OK. Now," Celeste said, placing her hands on her knees. "Do you have any questions for me?"

  "Yeah," Benjamin said, "why are you asking us all these questions?"

  Celeste shrugged.

  "Some of it I need to know, to do my job. The rest, well, I'm a student of the human condition," she said. "I'm always curious to know why people do what they do. It's kind of a hobby of mine. I find it very interesting."

  "What's your last name?" Benjamin asked.

  "You'll never know. You don't even know what my first name is."

  "Your name's not Celeste?"

  "Of course not."

  "And so you're not going to tell me where you live, are you?"

  "Of course not."

  "Have you done this before?" Holly asked, her voice quavering.

  "Oh, yes, dozens of times."

  "And have you, I mean, did the women, the girls … did any … die?"

  "Holly, no," Celeste said. "No, I have never lost a client. It's true. I know what I'm doing. I have studied my craft. I have been doing this for 14 years now. I am very experienced and skillful. I am very careful. You don't have anything to worry about, I assure you."

  "What will you do to her?" Holly asked.

  "Well, I'm going to go over the procedure in great detail with Rachel," Celeste said. "In fact, I'm going to talk her through it. Let's wait till then so I don't have to go over it twice."

  "I want … I want to know now," Holly said.

  Benjamin put his hand on his wife's shoulder.

  "It's OK, Holly, we can – "

  "I want to know now!" Holly screamed. "That's my daughter in that room!"

  "OK, OK." Celeste raised her hands. "Calm down." She could hear Rachel's younger siblings crying for their Mom in the other bedroom.

  Benjamin got up and went into the kitchen.

  "Rodney, keep the kids quiet," he said through the closed door. "Kids, it's OK. M
om is OK. You have to be quiet now." He listened for a second, then went back into the living room and sat down.

  "Sorry," he said.

  "Let's start over," Celeste said. "Holly, I will give you the short version of what the procedure involves. But first you have to understand this: Screaming does nothing but get people, especially kids, very upset. And you probably have gotten Rachel very upset as well. That makes it much harder, maybe even impossible, for me to do the job you've hired me to do. This is your first and last warning. If there is another outburst like the one we just had, I will take the money you have already given me, and I will leave. And you will get nothing for your money. Understood?"

  Holly nodded.

  "Good," Celeste said. "Now. This is a very simple procedure. In a nutshell, I am going to insert a very thin device into Rachel's vagina, and very gently advance it until it reaches the uterus. I then will insert the device into the uterus and, to use a layman's term, break her water. It is possible at that point that Rachel will abort immediately, and the tissue, that is, the fetus, will be discharged. Usually, however, it is two or three days before she loses the fetus. And that's all there is to it. Very simple."

  Silence.

  "What is the device?" Holly asked.

  Celeste took a deep breath.

  "Well, it's not a coat hanger," Celeste said, "if that's what you're afraid of. That is barbaric, and I have never used one. I have found through years of practice that the best and safest thing to use is a common, everyday knitting needle. And I always sterilize it just before the procedure begins.

  "Now, unless you have any other questions, why don't you introduce me to Rachel?"

  Benjamin nodded. He got up and helped Holly to her feet. They walked slowly to the bedroom door and opened it. Benjamin poked his head into the room.

  "Honey," he said, "the doctor is here."

  Benjamin turned on the overhead light. Celeste walked through the door and set her bag on the floor by the side of the bed.

  "Good evening, Rachel," she said. "How are we doing tonight?"

  Rachel couldn't bring herself to say a word. She was visibly shaking.

  Celeste sat down on the edge of the bed. "My name is Celeste," she said. "I'm going to take a few minutes and tell you exactly what is going to happen here tonight. OK?" She put her hand on Rachel's arm.