Plus One

by Sarah L. Young

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  Emily

  As I brought the platter of cookies—no, they were churros—back into the kitchen, I actually did feel a sense of sadness. Lexi didn't need me anymore; she had people to go to for advice; she had people who would take care of her; she had, for all intents and purposes, a brand-new family. I felt completely useless, and that made me sad. Would she still want to get back together with me if she didn't need me anymore?

  I wiped away a tear that had formed in the corner of my eye as I walked back into the living room where Lexi was sitting on the couch smiling brightly and staring out the window hopefully. "We need to talk," I told her. Gee, that sounded ominous, even for me.

  "What's wrong?" she asked, motioning for me to come over and join her on the couch. I sat down and crossed my legs under me. I reached over to Lexi and wiped a lock of hair from her face. "We should be celebrating!" she said. She looked so happy, but I wanted to have a real conversation with her about this. About all of this.

  "Back in August when I broke up with you," I started. "Well, that was the worst decision probably that I've ever made in my life. You were wonderful and caring and loving and I got scared because of the transition going between high school and college. And I was worried that long distance wouldn't work, and that I wouldn't have time to get ready for college if we were still together. And maybe I even thought that it would be less painful to say goodbye to everyone when I leave for college next year if I didn't have to say goodbye to you too. I wasn't thinking, I was stressing myself out over nothing and so I panicked, and I've regretted it ever since.

  "I cried so much after I broke up with you, because I missed you and I couldn't believe that I had hurt you so much. And now, with everything that's going on with Jeff's family and with you being pregnant, it's really made me realize how much I care about you, how much I love you. How much I even love this baby, who I have nothing to do with! I'm crazy about you. I have been since the day I met you, and I will be until the day I die."

  She laughed and said, "This is starting to sound like a proposal." I smiled at her before continuing.

  "I want to get back together with you. I want to raise this baby with you. And one day, when we're finally old enough, I want to marry you and I want to adopt your child.

  "What do you think?" I asked her. She looked positively shocked, and I honestly couldn't blame her. But I had come so close to losing her, and I didn't want to risk doing that again. She was the love of my life, my soulmate, I was sure of it. She reached over and grabbed my hand.

  "I'm crazy," she told me, looking deeply into my eyes. "I'm nutsy and weird and I'm pregnant so now I'm going to be hormonal which is probably going to make me even crazier and nuttier and weirder. And I'm going to have to take care of a baby starting a few months from now! I love you so much, and I always have, and I know that I always will, but why on earth would you voluntarily choose to be a part of all of this craziness?" she asked me, motioning to herself, and then her belly, her baby. "You don't have to stay with me. There's no obligation here, to me or to my baby. You don't have to start your life already tied down. I don't want to feel like you have to do that, and I can't do that to you."

  "Baby," I said, placing my hands on her shoulders and kissing her deeply. "You aren't doing anything. I want this. I'm choosing this. This is what I want my life to be, it's my decision. I'm not being tied down, I'm staying with the girl that I love, the girl of my dreams, and I'm going to be helping to take care of our child. I don't care that I'm not related to this baby, I need you in my life. It doesn't work without you. You'll always be a part of my family, and so will this baby." I told her, placing a hand gingerly on her belly. "We can do this, together."

  "I'm so scared," she whispered, placing her hand on top of my hand which was still on top of her belly. "I love you, and I love this baby, but everyone keeps telling me that love isn't enough. I feel like this whole week I've been falling apart in slow motion. Even now, when things are finally starting to look up, I can't help but feel like nothing is going to work, and that scares me out of my mind. In seven months, I'm going to have a whole other little life to take care of, a little thing and it's all my fault that it even exists at all and what if I can't do it? What if I screw everything up and they hate me? Or what if we get back on our own after we stop living with Jeff's family and I can't make enough money and so they don't have enough to eat and they're always hungry? Or what if I'm not a good mom and they don't love me? What if it's all too hard? You can't give up on being a mom, once you're in, you're in for life. What if I mess everything up?"

  "Calm down," I commanded. "You need to relax or you're going to give yourself an anxiety attack. It's okay, it's all going to be okay. No, love isn't enough to raise a child, but that isn't all that you have. You have support and love from me and my mom, you have food and clothes and doctors and money and a place to live because of the Stanton family. You have all that you need to raise a baby, and the only other thing that you need to raise a baby right is love. You have to love your baby, and I know that you do because everyone has been telling you that you can't keep your baby, but you already love him or her and so you're protecting them and defending them and you're doing that all out of love! The only way to raise a baby right is to surround them with love and make sure they stay safe. You have the resources, thanks to the Stantons, to make sure that your baby stays safe and healthy. You need to love them to make sure that it all works out. You have more love to give than any other person that I know. You will love your baby enough to deal with all the hate and the negativity from the rest of the world. You don't need to worry."

  "You know what I realized?" she asked me. I shook my head. "I keep saying that you can't give up on being a mother, but my mom did. She got rid of me because she didn't want to handle being my mother anymore. She grew up in Mexico, made it to America, taught herself English and earned enough to raise a family, and yet the hardest thing she had to do was to be my mom. She never gave up when she was working toward anything else, but she gave up with me. She didn't want to be my mom anymore." With that realization Lexi suddenly seemed to implode. She crumbled from the middle down, doubling over and howling. "Oh my God," she screamed. "Dios míos, if my mom can't take care of a child after all that she's been through, after all that she's worked for, then what kind of hope do I have?" By now she was crying and gulping big mouthfuls of air as she hiccupped. I didn't know what to do, so I pulled her in closer and rubbed her back with the palm of my hand.

  "But that's not it," I told her. "That's not it at all. Being strong and going through hell and coming out the other side, that has absolutely nothing to do with being a good mom. She went through all those things and it made her hardened and cold and less loving and that's why she didn't have the courage to stick it out. That's why she wasn't brave enough to take care of you, because she didn't have enough love. But you do! You have all the love in the world to give to your child. And just because you've been through far more than your fair share of hard things doesn't mean that you'll end up like your mother. Because you are two completely different people.

  "You handle things totally differently. She let her problems get to her and make her mean but you haven't done that! Everything that you've been through, everything that the stupid, screwed up world made you go through, has made you an even better, an even more incredible person. You've faced things head on and instead of changing yourself to make it better, you try to change the world. And that is going to make you the best mom that ever was because you have so much love to give your child and that love is going to help your child be able to get through the works and beat the odds.

  "Your kid is going to be born to a teenaged mom, there's nothing that you can do to change that. That's your situation. But just because you're a teenager doesn't mean that you can't be an amazing mom. You will be, I know it. You care so much already. You found yourself a place to stay and people to take care of you so that you can take care of yo
urself and eventually so that you can take care of your baby. I know that it's going to be hard. It's going to be so, so hard. But having a support network, having a place to stay, having some money, and having all the love that you have is going to make everything that much easier. You can do this. We can do this, together. We're in this together. I'm here for you, my mom is here for you, Jeff is here for you and now so is his entire family.

  "Maybe you all by yourself can't do this, but you don't have to because you're not by yourself. Not by a long shot. So yes, you can worry that your baby will get sick or that you'll be sleep deprived or that the other kids at school will be shitty to you, but you can't worry that you won't be a good mom, because that would be impossible. You're going to be a great mom, and your child will love you no matter what. And so will I."

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  Lexi

  Even though I had only been staying with Emily and her mom for one night, leaving their house that evening around five-thirty still felt like the end of something. I felt ridiculous for even feeling that way, seeing as it wasn't really the end of anything. I would still see her every day at school, and now that we were back together again, we'd be spending a lot of time together even if I wasn't living with her. Although I knew it was silly, I couldn't help but shed a tear when Mr. Stanton came back that evening to take me to his house. Well, I guess it was my house, too. Home?

  "Are you ready?" he asked the two of us as I stood by the door. I nodded my head and gave Emily one last hug before heading off into his car. I barely had anything to take with me. I hadn't had any time when my mom had forced me out the door, so I didn't have much of anything to take with me to the new house. I had borrowed a few items of Emily's clothes, but we were different sizes for the time being, and I didn't know at all how the pregnancy would affect my figure. So, I had taken only loose t shirts, a sweatshirt, and a couple of pairs of her size medium black leggings. I considered myself to be so lucky to have found the Stanton family because I really didn't have anything at the moment.

  "Is this all that you have?" Mr. Stanton asked me as soon as we had gotten in the car and closed the doors. I couldn't tell if he was kidding or not. He knew that I had gotten thrown out, what did he think I had?

  "Well, yeah," I told him. He waited patiently for me to explain. "I mean, my mom threw me out the door. Like, physically. I didn't have any time or anything to get my things. I didn't even have time to grab a jacket, and it was really cold. But Emily gave me a couple of things of hers that she's going to let me borrow. At least as long as they still fit."

  "I knew that you had gotten thrown out," he said sadly, shaking his head. "But I assumed that it was more as a matter of speaking, like you were using the expression. Okay, well you obviously don't have enough in that little bag of yours to last you, so do you want to go get some new clothes now, or would you like to go later, either tonight or maybe tomorrow, once you've gotten settled and everything?"

  "If you don't mind," I told him. "I'd prefer to go to your house and get settled before I do anything else. It's been kind of a, well, I guess you could say that it's been a couple of unsettling days. I want to get to a place where I'll be for more than just the next few hours. I want a little bit of constancy. But whatever is better for you, honestly, would be totally fine with me." I summed my argument up, realizing toward the end that I should go with whatever he wanted to do. I was under his mercy, after all.

  "No, of course," he told me apologetically. "Whatever you'd prefer. I have plenty of time because Halloween is not traditionally a flower holiday, so I can pretty much take you whenever you'd like to go. Or I could have my wife take you. Or my daughter if she's free. Actually, that would probably be the best option. She's already been through pregnancy, so she knows how your body is going to change and what kind of new clothes that you'll need. And when it gets a little bit closer to the due date, she can take you shopping again to get all the things that you'll need for the baby. Well, all the things that we don't have left over from back when Clair had little Jacob. That's my grandson's name, by the way. Jacob. Anyway, we've kept most of the things that we could from back then. We kept clothes and blankets and the crib and highchair and all that stuff, but there are still lots of other things that your baby is going to need, like diapers and formula and toys, but don't worry about that yet. We'll cross that bridge when we get to it, and it shouldn't be too bad. Clair actually had a lot of fun with that, picking out the toys especially."

  I nodded along, only half-listening. I stared halfheartedly out of the window as we drove into the expensive part of town. I had always assumed that Jeff was well off, but we were entering the neighborhoods of miniature mansions, three car garages, and in ground swimming pools in their perfectly manicured backyards. There was a wreath on each door and a candle in each window. We were still in the same town that I had grown up and spent my entire life in, but this area was completely and utterly unfamiliar to me. I bet that this was the sort of neighborhood that was going to give out full sized candy bars in a couple of days for Halloween.

  "Welcome home," Mr. Stanton announced as he pulled into a driveway, snapping me out of my rambling thoughts. The house was a gigantic red brick ranch style mansion. There were black shutters in the window, but they were all open. As I climbed out of the car, my few measly belongings in tow, I followed Mr. Stanton to the garage door. After typing in a four-digit code, he began to usher me inside before stopping suddenly and calling me back outside.

  "Here, why don't I show you the code," he told me when I had joined him. "I haven't made up a key for you yet, but you can get into the house through the garage. The door to the house from the garage is hardly ever locked, and we'll all be extra sure to make sure that we don't lock it until we've gotten you a key. Anyway, the code is zero five two four. That was the day that my wife and I got married, May 24. So as long as you can remember that you should be able to get in."

  I nodded my head but honestly wasn't paying much attention. It was starting to get cold outside, and I wasn't wearing a jacket. He showed me back into the garage and then into the house. We went up a couple of steps and opened the door into the house. The door opened into a kitchen with a hardwood floor and counters with black granite tops. The microwave, sink, and four-burner oven were all a matching shade of chrome. I looked around as I stepped inside, and then I took a deep breath in. The kitchen smelled delicious, like tomatoes and chicken. I noticed that there were a couple dishes in the sink and hoped that they hadn't eaten dinner yet. In trying to figure out the couple of pieces of clothing that I was going to borrow from Emily, we had completely forgotten about eating lunch. I was starving by the time I walked into the Stanton's kitchen.

  Suddenly, I heard Jeff call out "she's here!" and suddenly there were people everywhere. Jeff popped out first. "Hey," he told me nonchalantly, waving awkwardly. Then his mom was in the room. She wrapped one of her arms around me protectively and maternally. I was grateful for the gesture but also a little bit overwhelmed by it all.

  "Hi there, sweetie," she cooed. "Welcome to our home. We're so glad that you're going to be staying with us!" I smiled appreciatively but couldn't find my words to say anything. Nothing that I could have said would have been enough. Just then a petite blond girl walked into the room holding a young child.

  "Hey," she said cheerfully. She extended her free hand out for me to shake. "My name is Clair, but someone probably told you that already." I shook her hand awkwardly as she introduced her baby, or rather her child, since her dad had told me that he was two. "This little nugget is Jacob, Jacob say hi!" He waved a little wave to me, crinkling his fingers and smiling. I couldn't help but laugh, he was so cute!

  "Hi, Jacob, nice to meet you!" I said, finding my voice again. I took hold of his little hand and smiled. He smiled back at me and my heart melted looking at his sweet face.

  "So, Lexi," Jeff's mom began. "Are you hungry for dinner? I made some pasta and chicken. Oh no, are you vegetarian? Or gluten free?
I forgot to get Chris to ask." She looked so anxious and guilty and I felt bad for my silence.

  "No, no," I told her. "I eat everything. I mean, not everything. I eat a normal amount. I mean that I eat anything. I don't have any allergies or anything like that. Don't worry. Chicken Parmesan is actually one of my favorite foods."

  "Oh, I'm so happy, dear!" she said. "I wasn't sure what I should make you for your first dinner with us. I wanted to make a good first impression and my cooking is probably my best feature." The whole family laughed. I felt like I was missing some sort of Stanton family inside joke, but it didn't matter much. "So, should we sit down to eat dinner right now or would you like us to show you to your room so that you could get yourself all settled in?"

  "That sounds nice," I told her despite my hunger. "I want to put my bag somewhere," I said, motioning to the green canvas grocery bag I held on my arm with all my belongings in the world in it.

  "All right dear, where are the rest of your things?" Mr. Stanton was trying to wave his hands in front of her, trying to cut her off. She didn't get the message, but I wasn't upset or anything. It was my reality now, and I had to learn to live with it.

  "No, this is actually all of my things," I told her. She pursed her face into a confused look at her husband before I explained. "When my mom found out that I was pregnant, she got really angry and sort of pushed me out the door and then locked it behind me. So, everything that I have in this bag, and everything that I'm wearing right now, is borrowed from my girlfriend until I can get some clothes of my own. So that's pretty much what's going on now." Mrs. Stanton put one of her hands on my shoulder and placed her other hand over her heart.

  "Bless you, dear," she said. "No child should ever be punished like that. Rest assured you'll be safe here. We would never do that to you, to any child really. What kind of example is she setting? Would she stand by if you acted that way to her grandchild? I certainly would hope not. But here I am getting all riled up and before supper even! Jeff, would you show Lexi to her room. And grab her bag from her, would you?"