Bad Things

10. You Might Be Worth It

  All this feels strange and untrue
And I won't waste a minute without you
My bones ache, my skin feels cold
And I'm getting so tired and so old

The anger swells in my guts
And I won't feel these slices and cuts
I want so much to open your eyes
'Cause I need you to look into mine

Tell me that you'll open your eyes  

- Snow Patrol.

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Shawn had never been to the free clinic before. Of course he'd known about it—people at college talked about the massive bags of condoms they gave out if you even suggested you might, possibly, in the near future, be considering having sex—but he'd never even thought to go. This place was for girls who wanted to get on the pill without their parents knowing, or guys who were too scared to buy their condoms at the store—like Alex. Shawn wasn't a sissy and he didn't want the cheap shit they gave away at the clinic anyway; he wanted the good stuff. He wanted the ones with less chance of breaking, so he never had to step one damn foot in this place.

So much for that now.

He sat in one of the most uncomfortable plastic chairs on the face of the earth, with his face buried behind a magazine about parenting or motherhood or some other shit he, as a teenage boy, had no desire to look at but pretended to in order to cover his face. God, was he ever thankful he'd at least worn the baseball cap. What kind of shit would he get if anyone saw him there? He'd never live it down.

Besides him and two other women seated several rows in front of him, the room was empty. At least they didn't look young enough to be girls from his college; that he could be thankful of. But that didn't meant they wouldn't know who he was if they got a good look. His face had been on the front of local sports more times than he could count, and he was often recognized in public. Usually he loved the notoriety, but not today. Not in this place.

Near the front of the room was a long, narrow "office area" cordoned off by a half-wall and Plexiglas. When he and Camila had come inside, they'd had to speak to the gray-haired woman, with glasses as thick as a bottle, through a slot made in the bottom of the glass. It took them three tries before she'd understood what they needed. At the very ends of that wall were some of those stupid looking magazine/brochure holders that were filled with pamphlets on birth control, pregnancy, STDs, teenage parenting, adoption, etcetra, etcetra. Shawn avoided those, like touching them would give him leprosy.

The nurse had come out and whisked Camila through a door off to the side before they'd even had a chance to think about sitting down. Shawn had just stood there for several seconds, staring at the door after it closed and wondering what the hell he was supposed to do now. So, he'd avoided the eyes of the two women, and took a seat near the back of the room.

Shawn shifted uncomfortably in his seat and peered over the top of the magazine at the clock placed just above where the Plexiglas ended. According to it, Camila had been gone for a little over twenty minutes. His leg started to bounce and he wiped his damp palms against the leg of his shorts. What was taking so long? If there was something wrong, she'd come tell him, right? Shawn shook his head in an effort to stop himself from thinking that way and tried to concentrate on what he was reading, until he realized it was an article on the way intrauterine devices were inserted. He threw the magazine down in disgust and lowered his face to his hands. Shawn couldn't believe he was there. Not just there at the clinic but there in his life. He was always so careful, with everything: college, football, friends, dating, sex, everything. And the one time he wasn't. The one time—