by C. L. Donley
“Why don’t you believe it? You know me,” he assured her.
“I do believe you. That’s the problem. Are you going to stop being a nazi for me?”
“I’m not a—”
“You know what I mean, Adam,” she rolled her eyes.
“I really don’t, Jo. I don’t know how to be anything but what I am.”
“You’re a white supremacist. Having a black baby.”
Adam was quiet for a moment, his blue eyes shifting.
“…He’ll be mostly white,” he shrugged.
Jo broke down then, sobbing like a child being told she couldn’t have the toy she wanted.
Her life. Her fucking life. It was an irreparable mess.
“Jo, tell me what you want me to say and I’ll say it,” Adam tried to be soothing.
“Ma’am we really need to start the procedure since we’ve already administered the anesthesia,” the doctor interjected, awkwardly ignoring the ordeal.
“If you say one more word to her, I’m going to rip out your tongue with my bare hands,” threatened Adam calmly.
“Sir, I’ve already contacted the police,” a woman behind them said. “If you’re going to administer threats we’re going to have to press charges.”
“Do I look like a man who’s not ready to go to jail?” Adam asked in a raised voice. His response made Jo wail even louder.
Gingerly Adam went over to the exam table and attempted to simply extract Jo himself. It only took him a second to peel back the tape on her hand, remove the IV and then replace it. She couldn’t even imagine what experience he must’ve had to make him so adept at that.
“Come on, Jojo, let’s get outta here.”
She hooked her arms around his neck still sobbing as he carried her out of the room, out of the front doors and into his truck.
She sat slumped in the front seat as he went around to the driver side and got in. She was only distantly aware of her surroundings as she heard the ignition start. He chugged along the street and maybe it was the drugs, but she felt as though she were floating, as if none of this was real.
She was ready to face the cold life sentence of abortion. She was prepared. She made the choice. So what if she never enjoyed a single thing in life again? It was better than having another baby. Alone. By a nazi.
They rode along in silence, the cacophonous engine in Adam’s big truck propelling them down the street with the power of a small airplane. He looked over at her catatonic state periodically, shaking his head a bit in sadness, in disappointment. His head was swimming.
“Well. That explains 4th of July,” he broke the silence. “You, actin’ weird as hell. Cryin’ in the bathroom. Stuffin’ yourself with meat all night,” he said the last part with emphasis.
“I’m going to kill myself,” she announced.
“No, you’re not. Do not say that fuckin’ shit.”
“I am.”
He glanced over at her as he drove. She tried the passenger door handle, which was thankfully locked.
“I’m starting to feel pretty fuckin’ insulted, JoAnn.”
She kept trying the door as if she didn’t understand why it wouldn’t open. She must know it’s locked. She must be bluffing.
Much to his horror, she unlocked it a few moments later. He re-locked it seconds before she could try the handle again, swerving a little as he tried to drive while on suicide watch.
“JoJo, you’re not gonna die at this speed. You’re just gonna be maimed and paralyzed or worse.”
“At least I won’t have to do this. At least I’ll have had some say in what happens to me,” Jo hiccuped.
“You had a say in it already. It’s called ‘we fucked and a baby happened.’”
“I just wanted to come. And I got a life sentence,” she sobbed.
“I didn’t really get a chance to say so back there, but I’m actually happy about this.”
“Sure, why not? Be happy. Your life doesn’t have to change, at all.”
“Jo, enough!” Adam said. “This is a good fucking thing. You’ve been brainwashed, like all the rest.”
“You think I like my life?” blurted Jo. “You think I like working two jobs, and being attached to stupid fucktards for life, just because we have a baby? You think I want to spend all my time worrying about the kind of man Judah’s going to turn out to be because of me? Examining my every move? And then losing focus for one weekend, only to royally fail him? I want to die, Adam. I want this to be over.”
“I can’t talk to you when you’re like this.”
She started weeping again. Loudly.
“How many times do I have to fuckin’ tell you, that I’m gonna help you!” he yelled, his eyes on the road.
“FUCK your help, Adam!! The fact that you keep saying it only proves how you don’t know what the hell you’re talking about!”
His words seem to have an especially undesired effect, because she just started begging God to kill her. Adam slammed the brakes and unbuckled his seatbelt like he needed to get out, but he just turned to face her, the truck still running.
“Jo, I want this. I want to do this with you. But I can’t fuckin’ stand this shit. You have got to trust me. I can’t sit here and listen to you cry and wail and fuckin’ insult me. I’m sitting right here. If I didn’t care I would’ve let you…”
Adam stopped as if suddenly remembering something. He sat quiet for a long time. Finally, he shook his head, intermittently laughing.
He put his seatbelt back on but didn’t move, while cars honked their horns and swerved around them. Finally, he put the truck back in drive and they continued to chug along the quiet road back to her house.
He looked like he was emotional, which he didn’t mind showing since Jo wasn’t paying attention anyway. She continued to look catatonically out of her passenger side window.
“You know, the first time you were flirting with me— and I mean really flirting with me— that night at my house, I thought, ‘okay, maybe she’s not all that, maybe just your smarter than average hood rat. And then the more we hung out, the more confused I was. I thought, ‘well, she’s just a single mom and she wants the ‘d,’ and how else is she gonna get it if she keeps attracting faggots?’”
He stopped for a second, gliding his thumb across his bottom lip, as though the truth was pouring over him like a glaze, searing and burning him. He laughed.
“I can’t believe I’m just now realizing this. You basically told me as much out of your mouth. More than once. I was just blind I guess… seein’ what I wanted to. You can’t be happy about this, because you don’t give a shit about me. You’re not afraid of me. Maybe you were. Yeah, you listened to me. You got to know me. Like some goddamn hillbilly charity.”
Jo looked catatonically out the window while he spoke.
“But you don’t care about me or what I do. You didn’t try to change me, because what’s there to change? You never argued with me, because what’s the point? I’m just some dumb racist. But hey, maybe you could get some dick outta the deal. Tell your friends how you once fucked a big ass dude, with a big ass swastika. And it was pretty good. Got him to eat your little black pussy out…”
He gave her a long glance as he drove, but Jo still didn’t move or say anything.
“You won’t even argue with me now, because I’m 100% right. Or maybe I’m just not worth answering,” he sniffed. “Damn, you know I was starting to think we had something, Jo. For a second there. Boy am I a fuckin’ retard,” he marveled, his eyes misty and red. “You’re a goddamn hypocrite.”
They got in front of her house and he shut off the engine, the truck engulfed in quiet.
“Where’s Judah?”
“At my mom’s.” Jo spoke up.
“Does she know? About anything?”
“No.”
“Jesus, JoAnn.”
“It was all going away today like it didn’t happen. Why tell her about something that never happened? Why tell you?”
�
��Damn, Jo, you’re an idiot sometimes.”
“You wanna stay?”
“No, Jo. I do not want to ‘stay.’”
“Oh, are your feelings hurt, Adam!” she snapped. “I was supposed to come back here and rest. And not worry about this! You want to come and swoop in with some sanctimonious bullshit and then leave? Fuck you! I can’t be alone right now. You didn’t think this shit through.”
Adam sighed.
“I’ll stay, but Jo… do not go back to that awful place. Promise me.”
“And what if I do?”
“I can’t watch you 24 hours a day, and I can’t stop you. But I’ll never forgive you for it, Jo. If you really want to be done with me, then fuck all this cryin’, do that. And you’ll never see me again.”
Jo put her hand on the truck’s handle, about to pop it open.
“Wait a minute, Jo.”
Jo stopped but didn’t look over.
“If no one knows about it, who took you to the clinic?”
“Adam—”
“Just tell me who it was,” he demanded.
“No.”
“I already know.”
“You don’t,” Jo insisted.
“It was that… poor excuse for a gash, Judah’s dad. He’s the only one who would.”
“Wrong again.”
“Yeah, right.”
“I called him, that’s true. But he couldn’t do it. Couldn’t be bothered to help me do this one fuckin’ thing,” Jo spat. “Just when I think he can’t surprise me.”
Adam felt something bad in the pit of his gut. But he didn’t put it together in his mind.
“Jo… who dropped you off?” he asked again.
Jo turned and looked him directly in the eye.
“Your brother.”
“My brother, who?”
“Gus,” Jo answered.
“Gus?”
“Yes, motherfucker, your not-racist-at-all-brother, Gus! Is supposed to pick me up!” she yelled.
“Take that shit back right now, Jo!”
“Damn, you really are delusional,” Jo said, quickly grabbing her purse to retrieve her phone. She scrolled through her texts to find their correspondence and hurled the phone at him.
“How’d you get his number?”
“Kenny,” she openly confessed. He was silent as he scrolled through the messages.
GUS
June 28th, 5:28pm: Hey, this is Jo. I’m late. Pretty sure I’m pregnant. Need to get rid of it. Can you help?
June 28th, 10:12pm: Yep. What’s the plan?
June 29th, 8:59am: Family planning downtown. I can get down there, but I need someone to pick me up.
June 29th, 11:13am: I got Fridays off. Adam might need a story.
June 29th, 7:07pm: I’ll figure something out.
July 5th, 1:19am: Any update?
July 6th, 1:28pm: Okay. This Friday at 4. Should take an hour, they say.
July 6th, 11:59pm: I’ll find a reason to be in town. Just let me know if it changes.
Unread: Today, 3:48pm: Here.
Unread: Today, 4:13pm: Let me know when you’re ready.
Jo was stoic as he read. She popped the door open and Adam instantly reached over her and closed it. He turned the engine back over and they were off again. Erratically he peeled away from the curb of her house and headed back downtown where they just were.
“What are you doing?” Jo was suddenly alert.
“Did you really come by the other day?”
“Come by where?”
“Umbridge. Did you come by Umbridge?” he interrogated her, his eyes on the road.
“Wha— I… no.”
“That dumb motherfucker,” Adam marvelled with a laugh, thinking back to that stupid-ass excuse of an alibi. He didn’t even really need it. He could’ve just kept his fuckin’ mouth shut. But, that’s what happens when you conspire with a fuckin’ idiot.
“Why would Gus be helping you keep secrets from me?”
“Uh, you mean why would Gus help me get rid of your black baby?” Jo said with sarcastic wonder. “Gee, I can think of a few reasons.”
“What did he say to you?”
Jo’s heart beat erratically. Was he talking about… the night of the incident?
“When?”
“When??” he repeated, indignant.
Adam wove his truck in and out of rush hour traffic.
“Adam, you’re going to kill us!”
“Thought you didn’t wanna live? You make a habit of talkin’ to Gus?”
“No!” Jo cried, the horn of the car they almost hit blaring behind them.
“So, that night at my house, the night of the Caitlyn Compromise.”
Jo felt nauseous, but she refused to feel guilty. It’s not like she lied.
“Lemme guess, he told you some bullshit? Or did you even ask?”
“What exactly did he say?”
“You wouldn’t believe me, if I told you.”
“What?? Jo, what in the hell are you talkin’ about?”
“You’ve made it clear that anyone who’s white and male is who you trust.”
The horrible feeling he had on the way to Jo’s house was back, and now he knew why.
It wasn’t about Jo, it was about his brother. Betraying him.
Damn. This one he couldn’t deny. This one he knew was real.
“…Jo, tell me what he said.”
“No.”
In 20 minutes they were back in front of the Family Planning building. Adam parked right in front.
“Text him and tell him you’re done.”
“Adam—”
“Text him and tell him you’re done.”
The phone felt surreal in Jo’s hands as she quickly texted a confirmation back to Gus. Her eyes blurred with tears.
This was bad. Whatever was about to happen. She threw the phone carelessly and it bounced around the passenger side floorboard. She reclined her chair a bit, facing away from him.
They sat in his truck in silence until she heard another loud diesel engine approach the parking lot. Jo’s heart practically siezed. She didn’t move an inch.
Gus recognized Adam’s truck and pulled up right beside him. He saw Jo reclining next to him on the passenger side. Gus assumed Jo must’ve ratted him out. He rolled his window down.
“Hey.”
“Hey.”
“Meet me at the Umbridge house,” was all Adam said.
Gus knew what it meant. It meant that he knew. And that he wanted to scrap. Someplace they were less likely to get arrested. And he was mad enough that it couldn’t wait the 45-minute drive to get to his own house.
The very thought of it gave Gus all the incentive he needed. This black bitch, he thought.
“Alright,” Gus cordially agreed. Then he pulled off.
Adam got to the Umbridge house first. When he pulled up, a few of the workers were still there, and Corey, who looked completely oblivious and a little worried.
Adam parked in the pre-existing muddy grooves in the ground on the side of the house that would eventually be an actual driveway. Corey slowly walked up to the truck, barely making Jo out who was slumped over on the passenger side.
“Hey, Adam. Jo. Everything alright? You said I could handle it.”
“Stay in the car, Jo. You hear me?”
Jo burst into tears of anxiety before she finally nodded. Corey kept his eyes on Adam, who must’ve had a murderous look on his face, because Corey instantly had an expression of ashen sobriety, and was gingerly begging Adam to tell him what was going on in hopes of diffusing whatever it was.
Minutes later, Gus was pulling up to the property as though in a hurry. Everyone looked on in frozen confusion, as no one expected Gus to be there on his day off, let alone exiting his truck like a bat out of hell and heading straight for Adam in the middle of the front yard.
Everyone could see that Gus had no intentions of holding back as he charged his brother like a bus. Adam stood his ground, ready to m
ake his move. If Corey hadn’t vaulted himself in between the two of them, instinctively, who knows who would’ve landed who in the hospital. Gus knocked Corey out of the way onto the hard trench near the front yard.
Adam landed a punch across Gus’s face that sounded horrible and looked even worse as the blood instantly started to gush from his nose.
Gus was furious, but not as much as Adam. Gus used it to his advantage, easily landing a blow and wrestling Adam to the ground. They rolled in an intimate bundle of scowls and knuckles, face blood appearing from nowhere and pooling in places it shouldn’t. No one wanted to watch, and no one wanted to look away.
Somehow, Gus managed to get to his knees and Adam with him, his large forearm subduing Adam in a chokehold.
“Gus, please let him go! Adam!!” Jo screamed.
Gus leaned in lowly to Adam’s right ear.
“Wanna pass out while your nigger bitch begs me for mercy?”
It seemed as though that was exactly what was about to happen until Gus cried out in pain and released Adam, who’d jammed a small pocket knife he carried on his keys into Gus’s leg. Adam got to his feet while Gus remained on the ground. The men relaxed, the intangible resolution to the fight having passed among them. Their hard breath decorated the silence.
“That’s my kid, you miserable piece a’ shit,” Adam wheezed, breathless over his brother’s exhausted body.
“It’s a fuckin’ mongrel,” breathed Gus.
“Just because you can’t be happy.”
“I already told dad, so don’t even think of ever goin’ back home.”
“Dad can go straight to hell where he belongs,” Adam panted.
“All those women, throwing themselves at you, you had to find the one black chick in Canton and put a baby in her. On purpose.”
“What did you say to her, you miserable, jealous faggot?”
“You’re a traitor.”
“What did you say to her!!” Adam roared, his fist around Gus’s shirt collar and his other fist reared back ready to hit. Gus didn’t even flinch. Didn’t raise his voice.
“I told her the truth.”
Adam was frozen, until suddenly he let him go. It was quiet aside from Corey’s childlike sobs. Adam started back for the truck.
“You’re dead to me,” he heaved through great big gusts of air.
“When your nigger bullshit goes sideways, I can’t wait for you to come cryin’ back to us,” Gus projected. The onlooking crew was frozen. “We won’t do shit!” he shouted.