Chanelle Hayes - Baring My Heart

by Hayes, Chanelle

  Head Over Heels

  Your 18th birthday is meant to be one of the most memorable occasions of your life, isn’t it? Well, in typical Chanelle style, mine didn’t quite go according to plan!

  Mum and I had organised a huge party for loads of family and friends for the Saturday my big day fell on and she had even made me the same birthday cake Victoria Beckham once had, which was in the shape of a Muller Lite yoghurt pot with fruit on the side. On the Friday night, I’d been planning a quiet evening at home to prepare my liver but Rachel suggested we went for a quick drink in the pub after our shift at River Island finished. It really was only meant to be a swift one – we were still in our highly attractive uniforms, after all! We used to pop into this pub regularly after work and would always order a glass of Liebfraumilch. We thought we were so sophisticated – ha!

  Even though I can’t stand the stuff now, we bought a whole bottle that evening and sat there getting really hammered. Later, we ended up going to the roughest club possible, in Dewsbury, called Frontier, and we just had the best night ever, dancing, drinking and laughing. It was one of those unplanned occasions that just turns out all the better because it’s so spontaneous. But then, on my actual birthday the next day, we woke up at separate ends of my little single bed, with a greasy half-eaten cheeseburger lying next to my face on the pillow and Rachel cuddling the remnants of a kebab! We felt so unbelievably rough at my party. Everyone had made such a massive effort and there we were drinking lemonade. Oh dear.

  Over the next few months, I got my head down at college and started a new part-time job in a bar called Tryst, in Wakefield. And one Saturday night, I experienced one of those real thunderbolt moments as I clapped eyes on the most gorgeous guy I’d seen in ages.

  His name was Ian and he was tall, dark and unbelievably fit. But, boy, did he know it! He was one of those guys who worked the room with his eyes, knowing he could have any girl he liked. His brazen confidence (and buff body!) reeled me in straight away.

  ‘All right, gorgeous?’ he said, winking at me as I served him a drink. Bingo! ‘Has anyone ever told you that you look like Victoria Beckham? Except you’re more foxy!’ Double, triple bingo!

  Funnily enough, I was wearing a pair of VB jeans, which I quickly pointed out.

  ‘Very nice,’ he said and nodded, checking out my bum.

  By some small stroke of luck, Ian was mates with Rachel’s boyfriend, which provided the perfect excuse for us to be introduced.

  ‘Lovely to meet you,’ he said with a grin and I felt my face flush like some kid in the playground.

  ‘You too,’ I said, smiling back and praying that my hair hadn’t gone disgustingly flat in the heat of the bar.

  ‘What time does your shift finish?’ he asked. ‘Fancy joining us for a drink later?’

  ‘Mmm, fast worker!’ I thought. But he definitely liked me. Result!

  ‘Oh, I’m working until closing time,’ I said, silently cursing. ‘And I’d better get back to it or I’ll get the sack.’

  ‘Well, can I take your number?’ he asked. ‘Let’s hook up another time.’

  I always try to act coyly when I first meet a guy I like but who was I kidding here? He was seriously hot and this was butterflies-in-the-stomach territory. I gave him my number and spent the rest of the night trying not to look at him every five seconds. Whenever I did catch his eye though, I felt a bit giddy.

  ‘When am I taking you for dinner then?’ he texted late that night.

  Screw my rule about not wanting to seem too keen.

  ‘How about tomorrow?’ I replied.

  He took me for a pizza and it felt like we’d known each other years. He was so charming and we didn’t stop laughing the entire time.

  ‘I think this could be the start of something good,’ he told me when he dropped me home. And before I had the chance to reply, he gave me a slow, lingering kiss, which quite literally left me breathless.

  I floated off to sleep that night and, when I switched my phone on the next morning, a text beeped in. It said, ‘Thanks for the best night. You’re not only beautiful but loads of fun too. Can’t wait to see you again.’

  From that moment on, we were inseparable and, though Rachel was quick to warn me that he was a bit of a player, I laughed it off.

  ‘Ian’s never been with a girl for more than a couple of weeks,’ she said. ‘So, please, be careful.’

  ‘Yeah, yeah,’ I assured her. ‘Thanks for your concern but he honestly doesn’t seem that type at all.’

  Aged 23 to my 18, he was more mature than most guys I’d met and he didn’t mind when I announced that I was going to call him by his middle name, Spencer, instead of Ian – just because I liked it.

  One weekend soon after, I was meant to be going away with Mum, Dad and David to Center Parcs but I spotted an opportunity that was too tempting to pass up.

  ‘I’m really sorry,’ I told them. ‘But I can’t get the time off from the call centre this weekend after all. And I’m so tired, I think I’m just going to crash here instead.’

  They didn’t suspect a thing and merely said, ‘Behave yourself,’ as they left on Friday.

  ‘Of course,’ I said and laughed, as I secretly plotted my first evening at home with Spencer.

  At the last minute, Becca, a really close friend I’d met while working at Cedar Court, begged me to have a quick drink with her because she was going off to South Africa the next day.

  ‘OK,’ I said. ‘But I can’t stay long. Spencer’s coming over tonight and I am beyond excited!’

  When he arrived, I was putting on some make-up and he gave me a puzzled look.

  ‘Are we going out?’ he said. ‘I thought we were staying in?’

  ‘You’re staying here. I’m nipping out for a farewell drink with Becca but I’ll be back in an hour. Is that OK?’

  ‘Sure,’ he said. ‘I’ll just watch TV, cook dinner and make myself at home.’

  In the end, I stumbled in at 2am, blind drunk, which was really lame of me. Instead of the night of passion I’d envisaged, I conked out on the living-room floor, slurring, ‘I want to watch Ice Age,’ over and again. What an idiot!

  I felt dreadful the next morning but Spencer was lovely about it, despite the ruined meal. With a sore head, I headed to work while Spencer stayed at home. And when I got back that evening, I was stunned to find that he’d cleaned the whole place from top to bottom and made me dinner again.

  ‘Are you for real?’ I asked him. ‘What’s the catch?’

  ‘Er, there isn’t one,’ he said with a shrug. ‘I just want to do everything I can to make you happy.’

  Well, he was doing exactly that and I’m pleased to report that, on that particular evening, there was no drunken falling asleep, if you catch my drift!

  This honeymoon period seemed to go on for ages and we never argued. I couldn’t see why I had been warned about his reputation because he spent every single night with me, or down at the bar while I was working. For one of the few times in my life, I felt truly content with Spencer and, what’s more, Mum and Dad thought he was great too.

  ‘I’ve never seen you smile or laugh as much as you do now,’ Mum said one day. ‘I think you might end up marrying Spencer.’

  ‘Do you reckon?’ I said and laughed. I’d never given marriage any thought at all but she wasn’t the only person to say this.

  A little while later, Spencer sat me down and said, ‘Chanelle, I’ve something to tell you.’

  ‘What is it? Don’t tell me: I’m dumped.’

  ‘No! Shut up. Look, this is hard for me. I’ve never said it to any girl before. But I want you to know that, well, I love you. I want to spend my life with you. That’s all.’

  My jaw must have dropped to the ground and I had no idea what to say.

  ‘Oh, Spencer, that’s really lovely but you don’t have to say it if you don’t mean it,’ I said, taking his hand.

  ‘I do mean it. I wouldn’t say it otherwise.’

  He lo
oked visibly hurt and I could tell he was waiting for me to tell him the same but I wasn’t ready to do that just yet. I thought I did love him but, after my awful experience with Scott, I had to wait a bit longer to be absolutely sure I wouldn’t get hurt again.

  Early the next morning, he texted me: ‘Why didn’t you say you loved me back? I’m confused.’ It’d obviously really got to him. So I called Becca and filled her in.

  ‘Are you mad?’ she said. ‘What’s holding you back? He makes you laugh, you fancy him and he’s fun. He’s caring and thoughtful and your family adore him. Do you need your head testing, girl?’

  She was right, of course. I had nothing to be worried about.

  A few days later, I cooked him a candlelit meal and, before we sat down, put my arms around him. ‘I know I might not express it very well but this is just to tell you that I do love you.’

  He hugged me and said, ‘That means the world to me, Chanelle. I’ll never forget it.’

  It felt good for me to let go of the barriers I’d put up too.

  After that, Spencer and I got into the habit of giving each other silly little presents. For instance, he was obsessed with brushing his teeth all the time so, every time I was in a bar or club, I’d buy him one of those little balls from the vending machine in the toilets, which contain a tiny toothbrush! It always amused him. He’d make me CDs of ‘our songs’ and he was forever bringing me Mars bars, which were my absolute favourite.

  I know it probably all sounds a bit too perfect and I suppose we were one of those sickening loved-up couples that you’d roll your eyes at for canoodling on the bus. So that’s precisely why I was so staggered when it all went so horribly and painfully wrong.

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  The Hardest Decision

  The nightmare began when I got really sick all of a sudden. I kept throwing up for days and felt too terrible to even get out of bed. Spencer, who was working as a legal secretary, ducked out in his lunch hour every day to come and check on me, making sure I was eating when I could manage to. In fact, the only things I could stomach were, bizarrely, hot dogs and Cadbury’s Mini-Rolls, so he was forever bringing me fresh supplies.

  It seemed like I had a bad case of gastric flu but, when I was still being sick after a couple of weeks, I dragged myself to my GP, a nice lady who I got on well with.

  She seemed baffled. ‘Well, it can’t be a bug, as they clear up after a few days,’ she said. ‘I think we need to do some blood tests.’

  ‘OK,’ I said forlornly. ‘I just want to get well. I’m missing a lot of college work and I feel like death all the time.’

  After she took a sample of blood, she added, ‘I’m going to do a quick pregnancy test for you as well, so we can rule that out.’

  I actually laughed out loud. ‘What? You don’t need to do that, I’m on the pill – there’s absolutely no way I could be pregnant.’

  ‘Well, we need to make sure. You never know.’

  You’ve probably guessed what happened next. She went over to the other side of the room and dipped the little stick into my urine, looked at it and then did a double-take. She got another stick and dipped it in again and then repeated it a third time.

  ‘What? What is it? I asked. ‘Don’t tell me – it can’t be…’

  She turned around to face me and very simply said, ‘Chanelle, you are pregnant.’

  I swear I almost passed out. ‘But that’s impossible,’ I protested. ‘There’s just no way. What about my pill? I don’t believe it.’

  ‘Look, the evidence is right here,’ she said softly. ‘I’m not making this up. You are expecting a baby and have been for about six weeks now.’

  It only occurred to me then that I hadn’t had a period the previous month. But as they’ve always been a bit erratic because I have polycystic ovaries, I didn’t pay it any attention at all.

  Although, at the time, I thought I was fairly scrupulous about taking my pill, I did occasionally forget to take it for a day. But I just assumed that one skipped day here or there wouldn’t make any difference. I’m not proud of that now.

  ‘I can’t tell my boyfriend,’ I said to her. ‘He’ll freak out. Will you call him for me?’

  Fortunately, I’d been going to my doctor since I was a little girl and we’d always got on well, so she called Spencer at work for me.

  ‘Chanelle has asked me to pass on a message to you. She feels unable to talk to you herself at the moment but it’s pretty serious.’ There was a pause. ‘No, she’s fine. But we’ve just done some tests here and she is pregnant.’ Another long pause. ‘Spencer? Are you all right? What do you want me to tell her?’

  Eventually, she hung up and said, ‘He wants you to go and meet him after work.’

  I drifted out of the surgery in a kind of trance, feeling utterly numb. It wasn’t that I was appalled by the news, I just felt unable to process what it meant for us both and our future.

  I got to his office dead on 5.30pm and immediately things seemed different between us. He didn’t kiss me and there was a coolness there. We went for a coffee and it was unbelievably awkward. We barely spoke and Spencer kept looking at me blankly, his normally sparkling eyes full of anxiety.

  ‘I don’t know what to say,’ was all he could offer.

  I was dying to hear the words, ‘Don’t worry, honey, we’ll get through this together,’ but, from the very beginning, it felt like it was my problem alone.

  I could have handled it better if he’d said, ‘Look, I’m just not ready to be a dad. What do you think our options are?’

  That would have made sense but the fact that he wouldn’t say anything or discuss his feelings at all made it doubly hard for me.

  With my head all over the place, I realised the only person I’d be able to talk to about this predicament was my sister Maria, who had given birth to her son Luke when she was 18, the same age as me. That same evening, Spencer and I got the train up to her place. During the journey, we sat in total silence. It was as if a screen had suddenly come down and he was a completely different person. He sat staring out of the window and wouldn’t touch me, or even look at me.

  Within seconds of arriving on Maria’s doorstep, I blurted tearfully, ‘I’m pregnant! What are we going to do?’

  ‘Oh God,’ she said before ushering us both inside. ‘How? I thought you were… OK, just calm down. Don’t get upset.’

  Maria was great in a crisis and, as Spencer sat silently in the corner, she said, ‘You obviously have some tough choices to make. What are you thinking?’

  Glancing across at Spencer, whose eyes were fixed on his feet, I wiped my eyes and sighed. ‘We, well… I haven’t got a clue. I’ve got no idea. At the moment, I just can’t get my head around the fact there’s a little baby inside me.’

  ‘It is a lot to take in,’ she said and nodded. ‘I remember, when I first found out I was pregnant, it took me days to accept it. Weeks even.’

  She paused, then said, ‘I’m not sure if I should tell you this because I don’t want to push you either way but I would never, ever change anything about my decision to have Luke, you know.’

  ‘Yeah,’ I said slowly. ‘I understand where you’re coming from. I know how much you adore him.’

  ‘I know I was very young but he helped make me who I am today. My life changed for the better when I had Luke, really it did.’ She hesitated. ‘But at the same time, if I could go back and have him a little later in life, I probably would. Being a young mum is bloody tough. I’m not going to lie.’ Her eyes darted towards Spencer, who was still hunched in the chair. ‘Particularly if you were ever to end up a single mum.’

  There was so much to think about. Later on, after Spencer and I had got the train back to Wakefield, I started walking briskly towards the bus station for home, figuring he would follow me. Instead, he announced curtly, ‘I’m not coming with you. I’m going home.’

  That was virtually the first thing he’d said all evening and it got my back up.

 
‘Fine! Be like that,’ I snapped, walking away. And that was how we left things.

  At home, I went straight to bed, not saying anything to my parents. How the hell could I?

  I called Spencer the next morning but he didn’t pick up his mobile all day. He wouldn’t take my calls at work either. I kept texting too, saying, ‘Please call me. Why are you avoiding me?’

  Assuming he just needed some space, I called again the next day but still couldn’t get hold of him. This was absolutely unbelievable. I felt so alone and was still feeling sick too, so I climbed back into bed and stayed there. After a couple of days, Mum came into my bedroom and said, ‘Are you going to get up today, love? Why don’t you have a nice bath and I’ll make you some breakfast? That’ll make you feel better.’

  ‘No, I’m ill. Leave me alone,’ I said flatly.

  On the fourth day, she came in again and said, ‘What’s wrong with you? I thought the doctor didn’t find anything the matter, so pull yourself together. You’ll feel better if you get up.’

  I ignored her and turned over in my bed to face the wall so she couldn’t see my eyes brimming with tears.

  Clearly, she just thought I’d had a huge bust-up with Spencer because he wasn’t coming over any more, so I can see why she wasn’t more sympathetic.

  College had been phoning home too, asking where I was, and nothing got my dad angrier than the thought of me bunking off again. He barged in and shouted, ‘Get up! Stop being so lazy. There’s nothing wrong with you!’

  Again, I said nothing and curled myself up into a little ball, pulling the duvet right over me. I was drained and had nothing to fight him with. There was a pain gnawing away at my insides that wouldn’t go away.

  With Mum now very concerned that I’d spent nearly a week in bed and was barely eating, she asked Becca – who was now back from South Africa – to come round and try talking to me. When she arrived, she sprinted upstairs and sat on my bed.

  ‘Right then, you. What’s up?’ she asked.

  I sat up and burst into tears. ‘Becca, I’m pregnant. I don’t know what to do!’