Lee and I are alone, totally and completely alone, for the first time in weeks, if not months. Mom is going out of town for some meeting in Jacksonville and was leaving me home alone all weekend. Most kids would be having a huge party (I hate loud music and messes), inviting all of their friends (which is currently up to a whopping three people) and drinking and smoking pot all weekend (I hate the taste of alcohol and pot makes me break out in hives). So, Lee came over, throwing his bags onto my bed like he belonged her and had been here all the time, like he’d just come back from his own trip, and curling up on the couch with me, watching re-runs of Vh1 news and laughing at the utter stupidity of the newest whereverthehellthey’refrombecauseyouknowthey’renotallfromwheretheyclaim housewives. It was getting close to nine o’clock, and my head was lolling on the back of the couch against Lee’s arm. I grab his collar and pull him down on the couch on top of me, like he was just another afghan hanging on the back of the couch, and rolled onto my side. He kissed my neck, smiling at me and I pull him down further to kiss me on the mouth. He laughs, his hands roaming up my shirt, and I jump “Damn your hands are cold!” I whisper. He sits up, rubbing his hands together and then slides them back up. I smile, choking out a short barking laugh and nod “Much better.” His mouth finds mine again, and I run my hands up his back to the point where his shoulderblades meet, grabbing and holding on for dear life, feeling adrift on an ocean, the rocking of the waves rocking, rocking me to sleep.
The light is too bright. Why the hell is the light so bright? What time is it? It can’t be that late- I always wake up insanely early and roll over, even if I just turn back over and go back to sleep again. I roll over onto my side, seeing the problem-my curtains are open. Again, why the hell are my curtains open? I never keep my curtains open! Didn’t I pull them shut last night? That’s one of the things that I’m insanely OCD about that Mom teases me about all the time. Groaning, I roll back over and bury my face in my pillow. Wait, this is too soft to be my pillow. What the hell? I shoot up, looking next to me, and see two beautiful blue eyes staring back up at me- Lee’s awake. “Mornin’ baby.” He whispers, wrapping his arms around my back and squeezing lightly.
I clear my throat, feeling the scratchiness that I’ve become accustomed to in the morning move up and down with the tightening of my throat. “Hey.” I manage to choke out. “How did we get up here?”
“You fell asleep. We were on the couch and you went into this trance about half-way through and then fell asleep right after.” He laughs, “I thought that only guys were supposed to do that. But I carried you up the stairs and tucked you in. Did you sleep ok, baby?”
I nod, smiling, and getting up. “Yeah, do you want some breakfast?”
He smiles, closing his eyes and stretching, “You sure that you don’t want me to get it, baby?”
“No, honey, I got it. You just come downstairs in a bit and I’ll have it ready, ok?”
He nods and I get out from under the covers, walking out and softly shutting the door behind me, ducking into the bathroom faster than a fifteen year old buying condoms who just saw her pastor walk into the store, and, strangely, with just as much guilt weighing my shoulders down. I pee, feeling oddly sticky and wet between my legs; before I can stop it, the weight drops into my stomach, a twenty pound medicine ball that literally brings me to my knees before the toilet, retching and coughing into it. I get up, letting the lid fall, and stand in front of the mirror, my face white as a piece of notebook paper, my eyes so huge in their sockets that it looks like they could fall out at any moment. I push my hair behind my ears in some vague attempt to fix it, and open the door, poking my head into the bedroom. “Baby?” I ask, quietly, to Lee’s naked back, digging under the bed in the search for his boxers.
“Yeah, babygirl?”
“Um…we did use…something last night, didn’t we?” I ask, trying to keep my voice from shaking and digging my nails into my palm. The skin screams in protest, but I keep digging my nails in, willing myself not to freak out.
He turns around, smiling, the smile faltering for a second when he sees my face. “No, baby, we didn’t. But it’s fine, right? I mean, I pulled out, so you shouldn’t get pregnant.”
I nod, willing myself to smile back until I can turn around. “Ok.” I reply, trying to make my voice light, “its fine, hon. No big deal.” I turn around and walk slowly down the stairs, peeking into the living room where our clothes are scattered all over the floor. I unwind my underwear from the legs of my jeans, pulling them on, and grab Lee’s shirt, pulling it over my head, then walk into the kitchen, willing myself to keep the bile that was rising up in my throat from coming up all over the hall rug. In the kitchen, I shut the door, turn on the water of the sink, and throw up, watching the water wash it down the drain, downdowndown into the center of the earth.
Mom’s car crunches on the gravel of the driveway, but I stay on the couch, staring at the faces of Ren and Stimpy laughing on the TV in their wonderful cartoon world where no one had problems, there was no death (and if there was, then the character came back within the next ten minutes; I guess it was some kind of rule that no one dies in cartoons), no unplanned pregnancy, nothing that would upset or confuse the kids that were watching it on Saturday morning, stuffing their mouths with Sugar Coated Sugar Bombs and looking forward to nothing more than going to play at the park later that afternoon while Mommy was shopping for groceries. I can’t meet her at the door; I can’t tell her what happened, because I don’t even know what happened. If I met her at the door, she would know that something was up, and that it was big. I’ve always hated- in books, in movies, in anything-where the Tragic Heroine finds she’s pregnant with Someone Else’s Baby and she can’t possibly have it and then give it up for adoption, so, of course, she is left with the dreaded word: abortion. And, of course, because “God is punishing her for her crimes” (even though, no one will say exactly what those crimes are…we’re just supposed to accept that she is being punished for her crimes) she dies- or almost dies- after having the abortion, and spends the rest of her days regretting her decision, or living in unimaginable agony, or going to a Home for Ruined Women.
She walks in, dropping her bags on the floor, smiles at me in the reflection in the TV. “Hey, baby, did you have a good weekend?” she leans over, smelling like her lotionshampoothecoffeeshedrankonthewayandtheleftovermakeupfromdinnerlastnight, and I lean back into her chest, smiling.
“Yeah, Momma. What about you?” I ask, and she kicks off her shoes, sitting down cross-legged on the couch and pulling the afghan over her legs.
I’m laying in bed, not wanting to get up quite yet. I’m scared. No, scratch that, I’m terrified. This is not what I wanted, this is not what I needed, this is totally not what I expected. I’m scared to get up and dig in my purse, scared to do anything that might hurt or help. How do people procreate without worrying themselves to death? Staring at the ceiling, I talk myself into it, pushing Miranda into the back of my mind. She will not screw this up, she will not screw this up, she will not make me do anything that could hurt me now. I stand up, the steps to my purse sitting on the edge of my chair taking forever to get to, and slowly walk to it, digging in my purse and pulling out the crinkly plastic bag that I smuggled in pushed in the veryvery bottom of my purse under my extra tampons and my iPod. Walking into the bathroom, I pull out my cellphone and watch the clock, reading the directions in the prettypinkbox (which, if you think about it is a tad bit sexist.) and pulling the stick out to pee on.
One Mississippi, two Mississippi, three Mississippi, I’m counting slowly, trying to make myself breathe in and out. A blue wave slowly slides across the two windows, making my breath catch: that’s the control. The pink line slides into the second window, and slowly, so slowly, too slowly slides into the first window, and I start to breathe again. Until the second line slowly starts down, sliding across the first. A cross. The plus sign. Holy shit.
I sit down heavily on the floor, trying to keep breathing as I pick up the test and put the purple top back on it. Breathe in, I tell myself, putting the cap back on and tucking the box into the very bottom of the trashcan. I sit back against the cabinets, suddenly feeling lightheaded and nauseated. I wrap my arms around my stomach and sit there until the little part of my brain that actually makes sense most of the time pipes up, standing on top of my brain and waving her arms to get my attention. Hey! Idiot! Breathe out! You’re going to pass out if you keep doing that! I let out my breathe and the lightheaded feeling dissipates instantly, leaving me to gasp, laying on my side on the bathroom floor. I lay on my side, watching the air go out from under the bathroom door, the dust that has settled against the floor and baseboards being sucked out and then pushed back in. Minuteshoursdays later, I hear the front door open and slam closed: Momma is home. She pulls off her heels, dropping them on to the hardwood floor of the front hallway, and starts toward the bathroom in her stocking feet.
“Baby? Are you home, Lilli?” she calls, and I sit up, pushing the test into the wasteband of my sweats, pressed tight between the skin and the fabric, then taking a quick glance around the bathroom to make sure that nothing was out of place.
“Yeah, Momma. I’m in the bathroom. I’ll be out in a second, ok?” I call, getting up and flushing the toilet, then running the water in the sink to make her think that life was just going on like normal, hoping that she couldn’t see in my eyes that everythingwascrashingdownthewallswerecrashingdowntheworldwascrumblingdownaroundme, just trying to act like I normally would, but I can’t even manage to do that.
“Jesus, Lil, what are you going to do?” Jess’ eyes grow huge as I tell her what has happened, leaning over her coffee the next morning at McDonald’s. it’s still dark outside, and all of the elderly men and women are crowding around the counter, trying to get themselves heard and glaring at the two teenaged trouble makers that are sitting in the corner. Jess is home for the weekend, or at least that’s her story to Lee and her parents. In reality, I called her last night as soon as I knew Mom was asleep, huddling in my closet, pulling my sweatshirt around me, and told her, and she had gotten in her car and driven over to see me. My hair was pulled back in a sloppy ponytail, hers brushed down around her ears, an old baseball cap pulled over the bare spots so we didn’t freak the old people out too much. I kept staring at her coffee, feeling myself getting sleepy again, until she tried to pass it to me, but I push it back at her, feeling nausea creep up from my stomach everytime anything go too close to my nose. Plugging my nose, I took another bite of my sausage biscuit, trying to chew and swallow without gagging.
“I don’t know yet, Jess. I mean, I’m terrified. I’m terrified and moody and everything hurts!” I make a face. “And I don’t even know how or if I’m going to tell Lee. I mean, I’ve been putting it off until I know what I want to do.”
“Well, don’t you think that he’s going to notice when you gain twenty or thirty pounds and your boobs get huge?” she ask, taking a long slurp of her coffee.
“Well…I was hoping that it wouldn’t get to that.”
I had never seen anyone- except people on TV, of course- do a spit take, but Jess did. She held a napkin up to her mouth, wiping away the coffee that was dripping out of her mouth as I tried to mop up the table and dabbed at the spots on my jacket. “You mean….”
I shrug, “I don’t know yet. I’ve been researching all the options. You know, there are ways to do it naturally….”
“But those don’t work unless you’re less than three months. Do you know how far you are?”
I count backwards quickly “About two months…maybe close to three. I’m not sure exactly.”
“Then you need to not put all your faith in that, Lila. Believe me, there was this girl in my Psych class last semester that had an abortion- you know, the surgical one, not the pill because you wouldn’t be able to get the pill this far along- and she was completely mentally fucked up afterward. I mean, baby, you gotta admit you’re not the most stable person without that on your mind, too.”
Miranda pops into my mind and I shudder, “Yeah. I know. But, really, I don’t know if I trust myself with a baby. I mean, you’ve seen me do some pretty wicked things to my body, but now I’d have a baby to deal with, too.”
“Well, if you had Lee and your mom and me, I’m sure that you wouldn’t do the same things. You know that if Lee knew he got you knocked up he would be the happiest guy in the world and would kill you before he’d let you kill his baby.”
“wouldn’t that kind of defeat the purpose, though?” I ask, smirking.
She rolls her eyes, “You know what I mean, Lilla. C’mon now, you don’t have to be a smart-ass about it. But anyway, you don’t think that your Mom or Lee is gonna notice when you have to work to not gag when you’re eating?”
“Nope, I think they’re used to that.”
“Nope, I think they’re used to that.”
“Ok, well what about your boobs?” she motions to my ever-expanding chest, “There’s no way that you’re going to be able to strap those udders down much longer.”
I shift a little, “I can’t strap them down now! Do you know how much it hurts to even have a shirt on right now?!” I grimace, “I haven’t been able to wear a bra in at least two weeks.”
Jess laughs, “Well, that’s one way to get Lee’s attention. But, don’t you think that he’s going to notice if there’s something kicking in your stomach in a few months?”
I roll my eyes, “You know, I hate it when you make sense.”
She raises her coffee cup in a mock toast, “And that is why I’m here.”
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