The Inconceivable Life of Quinn

by Marianna Baer

  Instead of ruining her fantasy, all he did was hug her closer and say, “I reserve the right to cut my hair, Q. Gotta look sharp for my lady.”

  Please be Jesse’s, please be Jesse’s, please be Jesse’s . . .

  Her phone rang at a little past three. She knew it was her mother without looking. Suddenly, she didn’t want to answer it. She reached up for her pendant, forgetting she hadn’t been able to find it today.

  Jesse squeezed her hand. She climbed off his lap and took her phone out of her bag.

  “Quinn, sweetie?” her mother said. “Get your stuff and meet me in front of school. I’ll be there in five minutes.”

  “Is it his?” Quinn asked.

  Katherine paused. “We’ll talk in person.” There was the slightest tremor in her voice. “Dr. Jacoby fit us in for a brief appointment. I don’t want to be late.”

  “Oh, god.” Quinn bent over. She didn’t need her mother to say anything else. After hanging up, she drew a deep breath and pressed her fingers against her eyes. But the hot tears pushed their way through, and soon her face was wet and Jesse’s arms were around her and her body was shaking with sobs, the first ones since this all began.

  She made her final decision that night: It didn’t matter that the baby wasn’t Jesse’s, she was still going to have it. Her parents accepted the announcement with white-lipped silence and, eventually, tightly worded promises that they’d support her.

  In the morning, she went down to get breakfast early, hoping to avoid seeing either of them. But her father was already sitting in the kitchen. A laptop was open on the table, in the midst of a mess of newspapers and a couple of tablets and his phone. He looked like he hadn’t slept.

  She walked carefully over the eggshells that were between them now and headed to the fridge.

  “He didn’t wait,” Gabe said. “My team and I are figuring out how to deal with it. I’m meeting people in a few minutes.”

  “Who didn’t wait for what?” Quinn asked.

  “That journalist. Blogger. Whatever. He didn’t wait for our press release like he said he would.”

  He handed her one of the tablets.

  The browser was open to a page on Gazer called “Gotham Glimpse,” which featured short, gossipy morsels. The lead Glimpse said:

  Which celeb Brooklyn Dem congressional nominee’s sixteen-year-old daughter is carrying a future voter? Sources say she’s going through with the pregnancy, so it won’t be a secret for long. Will the baby daddy stay a secret, though? Apparently it isn’t her longtime boyfriend. Oops!

  Quinn’s mouth went dry. “How do they know it’s not Jesse’s?” she said. “I thought we weren’t going to say anything about who the father is?”

  “Not sure. We weren’t going to. And, like I said, he didn’t even get the press release yet.”

  She swallowed. “Well, at least it’s anonymous,” she said, trying to keep her voice steady and unconcerned. “Right? I mean, who’s even going to care enough to figure it out? Who even reads that dumb site?”

  She put the tablet down and went about getting herself breakfast as if this weren’t anything important. She hadn’t really thought about how it would feel to see even this fleeting, anonymous mention of her most private life in a public forum. Her hands were tingling with panic and she had to purposefully slow her breaths. Of course, she’d known people were going to find out she was pregnant when her dad issued the press release. But somehow this . . . the gossipy tone of it, the speculation, the direct statement that it wasn’t Jesse’s . . . on a public forum! Had she made an enormous, life-ruining mistake, like her father said? Had she been a fool to think she was strong enough to deal with the consequences? Too late. Too late now.

  As she buttered her toast—which she most definitely was not hungry for—her phone pinged with a message. From Sadie. And almost immediately after, one from Isa. Already? Was that possible? The blurb hadn’t even said her name! Shit. Shit, shit, shit. She couldn’t bring herself to read the texts. Just pressed the button to turn the phone off.

  QUINN

  A hush blanketed the hallway as she walked to her locker. Eyes darted toward her. Toward her stomach. Even though there wasn’t much to see, she adjusted her shirt so it was hanging as loosely as possible. She should have worn something made of stiffer fabric, not this soft tee that clung. She hadn’t thought about it when she got dressed, had just wanted something comfortable and familiar. Every person who looked at her, she wondered—Does she know? Does he know? But they all knew. Of course they did. Once one person knew something like this . . . Something like this. Ha! She’d heard of one senior getting an abortion, but that was it. No one ever, ever had attended New Prospect while openly pregnant.

  She kept her head up and tried to walk like she didn’t care.

  As she stood at her locker, her hips felt strangely loose and her legs felt rubbery and weak. She stared at her combination lock, blanking on the numbers. Jesse appeared, nudged her out of the way, and opened it for her.

  “Are you okay?” he said quietly.

  “Depends what you mean by ‘okay.’” She reached up for her phantom pendant.

  “I’m so sorry,” he said. “About my mom.”

  “Your mom?”

  “Didn’t you get my texts?”

  She shook her head.

  “Oh,” he said, rubbing his nose. “The blogger guy called and talked to her and she freaked out and I had to tell her it wasn’t mine and . . . she called him back and told him. She didn’t want me mixed up in it. I’m really sorry.”

  “Don’t apologize,” Quinn said, realizing it didn’t even matter at this point. “It’s not like we were going to pretend it was yours. How did everyone here find out so quickly?”

  “I’m not sure everyone—”

  She cut him off with a Don’t bullshit me glare.

  “Michael P.’s dad reads that website. He told him. And . . .” He shrugged.

  Quinn imagined the storm of texts that must have raged around the neighborhood and felt all the eyes in the hallway drilling into her. She needed space. “I’ll be right back,” she said. She needed to pee, too. She walked as quickly as possible to the nearest bathroom.

  She shut herself in one of the stalls and sat on the toilet, her throat tight. You will not cry again, she told herself. You’re the one who decided to keep the baby. Now you have to deal with it. They don’t know the weirdness of what’s really going on. Being pregnant isn’t that big a deal. Only Jesse knows the impossible truth.

  The bathroom door opened, and through the crack of the stall door she could see two girls come in. They started to talk; it was Sadie and Isa. They weren’t using the other toilets, just the sinks. Probably they’d seen her come in and had followed her. And she should want to talk to them. They were her friends! She sat silently as Sadie tried to fix something about Isa’s bra strap. First bell rang. Quinn still had to get her stuff from her locker. She flushed and went out.

  “Quinn . . .” Sadie said.

  “Hey, guys,” Quinn said and began to wash her hands. She didn’t want to turn the faucet off. Wanted to fill up the sink and climb inside, swim down the pipes and follow them to the sea . . .

  When she was finished washing and drying, Sadie wrapped her in a quick, strong hug. “Are you okay?”

  Quinn managed a smile. “Totally humiliated and screwed for life, but fine.” She said it jokingly, hoping to lighten the moment.

  “We thought you were still a virgin,” Isa said. “I can’t believe you didn’t tell us. Even for you, that’s crazy.”

  “I’m sorry,” Quinn said. “I . . .” She shrugged.

  “And it’s not Jesse’s?” Isa pressed. “Is that true? You cheated on him?”

  Oh, god. Quinn struggled to remember her father’s advice about answering questions like this. Don’t lie, he had said. That could come back and bite us.

  Don’t lie. Don’t tell the truth. If you couldn’t lie and couldn’t tell the truth, what did that leave
?

  “No, it’s not Jesse’s. It’s . . . um, it’s complicated.”

  “What do you mean, complicated?” Isa said. “Do we know him?”

  “Uh, no.”

  “And you’re not getting an abortion? Why? And why didn’t you take Plan B? Didn’t you know you might need to?”

  “Don’t you have to meet with Ms. Hilton?” Sadie said to Isa pointedly. “First bell already rang.”

  “Oh,” Isa said, adjusting her books in her arms. “Yeah, I do.”

  “So . . .” Sadie raised her eyebrows.

  “So . . .” Isa said, “see you guys later.”

  “I should go, too,” Quinn said, but Sadie touched her wrist and said, “We still have a minute.”

  Watching Isa disappear into the hall, Quinn had a queasy sensation that reminded her of second grade, the year she’d had no friends. That sickly feeling of being different, wrong, weird.

  Sadie gave her an uneven smile. “We all know that Isa isn’t the most tactful,” she said. “And I guess if you wanted to talk, we wouldn’t have found out about it from some random website. But I just want you to know that . . . well, I want to be here for you in any way I can. I can’t imagine what you’re going through. I mean, it’s so hard to wrap my mind around.”

  “I wanted to tell you myself,” Quinn said. “Of course. But it all happened so quickly.”

  “I guess it explains why you haven’t RSVP’d for my party. Pretty good excuse.”

  Sadie’s birthday party. Her half-brother had had a bar mitzvah, so she’d wheedled an elaborate costume party at the Boathouse in Prospect Park for her sixteenth.

  “I’m sorry, Sade,” Quinn said. “I’ve been so distracted.”

  Sadie waved her off. “I was kidding. Obviously! Not to mention that it’s still weeks away. But . . . do you not trust me or something?” she asked, more serious now. “Because, you know, I won’t tell anyone else who the father is, if you don’t want me to. I know how private you are—I get that—but I assume you need to talk to someone. Stuff must be beyond weird with you and Jesse. Are you even still together?”

  “Uh huh,” Quinn said. “And I’ll talk to you at some point. I promise. I just need time. Okay?”

  “Oh. Well . . . okay.” Sadie turned toward the mirror and began running fingers through her long curls.

  “It’s not that I don’t trust you. Really. And don’t let this, like, freak you out,” Quinn said. “I’m still me. I’m just going to be pregnant for a few months and then be normal. You don’t have to worry about being wrangled to change diapers or watch me breastfeed at lunch.”

  “Can you imagine?” Sadie smiled into the mirror, but it looked forced.

  Final bell rang.

  “I’ll talk to you about it as soon as I can,” Quinn said, at a loss as to how to make the situation any less strange. “I promise.”

  JESSE KALBITZER

  Second period had ended, and right as Jesse was about to round the corner into the dead-end hallway with the best vending machine, he heard Sadie’s voice. Her tone made him back up a step, staying out of sight.

  “She didn’t tell me anything,” Sadie said. “I swear.”

  Jesse should have known they’d be here. Their group of friends shared an addiction to these specific gummy candies that were only sold in this machine. It was a gathering place between classes to stock up and share news.

  “Jesse neither,” Adrian said, just above a whisper. “All I know is he’s too fucking whipped. I mean, a guy’s gotta have some dignity.”

  Jesse swallowed. He shouldn’t be listening.

  “We don’t know the story,” Sadie said. “Maybe . . .”

  “Maybe what?” Isa said. “Obviously she hooked up with someone else. Someone she likes, since she’s having his baby.”

  “I knew still waters ran deep,” Caroline said. “But I can’t even believe this.”

  “You know . . .” It was Oliver talking this time. “Jesse could have seen this coming. Not the pregnancy, per se, but the fact that Quinn had something else going on.”

  “What are you talking about?” Sadie said.

  For a split second, Jesse had the same question. Then he realized and the back of his neck flared with heat.

  Fuck this.

  Before Oliver could answer, he stalked around the corner and straight to the vending machine, met by stunned silence. He didn’t look anyone in the face. As he put money in the machine, Sadie started to speak, but he cut her off.

  “You guys should be careful what you say here.” He punched D12. “Anyone could be listening.”

  The gummies clunked into the receptacle. Jesse took the packet and walked away, steaming. He’d had a whole morning of his older sister telling him he was too loyal and not to be a doormat. He didn’t need more of it.

  And he didn’t like the way other people’s (uninformed) opinions brought out the questions he was trying to avoid, the things that didn’t add up: Quinn’s obvious happiness over the summer, the fact she didn’t seem to have other PTSD symptoms . . . and, yeah, the condom Oliver had been about to mention. It wasn’t that he wanted her to have been raped—god, no! But if he found out that she was lying . . .

  When he started to think that way, it ignited his old insecurities. Years of thinking he was better off as the best friend, because Quinn could do much better than him. Not because she was so hot, which she was. But because while most of his friends were as interesting as, say, a Wes Anderson film, Quinn was an entire effing Fellini festival.

  No, Jesse couldn’t let himself dwell on questions and doubts. He was the one person she was counting on. Quinn kept some things to herself, sure. It was part of her appeal. But she wasn’t a liar.

  QUINN

  When they arrived at lunch early, Jesse suggested they take a two-person table in the corner of the lounge, instead of saving a bigger table for the group.

  “Won’t that make us more conspicuous?” Quinn said. “Breaking our routine?”

  “Eh.” He shrugged. “I have a quiz next period I should study for.”

  As the room filled up, the air thickened with curiosity, making it difficult to eat. Still, sitting there with Jesse was better than the rest of the morning had been. Quinn’s previous class block had been spent in a meeting with the Head of Upper School, the school counselor, and Mr. Dellatoro, supposedly discussing their desire to help her “negotiate the situation so it disrupts her New Prospect experience and her education as little as possible, and so she feels supported and secure.” That’s what came out of their mouths, at least. Their eyes asked all the same questions that Sadie and Isa had, their fascination just as undisguised. Her mind had gone back to second grade again, to sitting in the principal’s office after she’d try to run away during recess.

  As she opened a baggie of edamame, she saw Caroline scanning the room, then going over to join her art friends.

  “Do you think if Caroline knew the truth, she’d think I was like Mary?” Quinn asked in a low voice.

  “Huh?” Jesse said, flipping through his chemistry textbook.

  “The Virgin Mary. She goes to church, you know.”

  “Uh, yeah. She’s religious. Not stupid.”

  Would it be stupid if Caroline thought that? The way Quinn understood it, the whole point of religion was to see the world through the lens of your beliefs. If Quinn was religious, she was pretty sure that she’d at least wonder in the back of her mind if it were possible. And, honestly, she was kind of sorry she wasn’t. This all would have been a lot easier if she believed it was God’s plan. Out of curiosity, she’d read what she could find about the Virgin Mary; it turned out that an angel (named Gabriel, ironically) had told her that it was God’s baby at the beginning of the pregnancy. Mary was lucky she’d been clued in.

  Quinn became aware of someone near the table and looked up. Noë Becker and her boyfriend, a senior named Sebastian, were standing next to them.

  “Hey, Quinn,” Noë said, hooking her thum
bs in the pockets of her worn Levi’s. “Sebastian and I just wanted to say that we’re behind you one hundred percent.”

  “Uh, thanks?” Quinn said.

  “All you did was have sex. If you were a guy who got a girl pregnant, it wouldn’t be a big deal at all. It’s a total double standard. You shouldn’t be ashamed for one minute. I mean, we’ve had sex . . .” Noë gestured back and forth between herself and Sebastian. “And I’m not ashamed.”

  Quinn thought she heard Jesse choke on his milk. Sebastian appeared unfazed. Or maybe just stoned.

  “And since you guys are obviously still together . . .” Noë looked at Jesse now. “I’m assuming you’ve got some sort of open relationship. Also cool. Seb and I have an open relationship, too.”

  Sebastian’s face showed signs of life. “We do?” he said.

  Noë rolled her eyes. “Duh.” She extended her fist to Quinn. Quinn returned the bump, biting her lips.

  After Noë led Sebastian back to their table, Quinn met Jesse’s gaze. Without discussing it, they quickly packed up their trash and recycling and left the room, barely able to hold in their reactions until they made it outside into the small courtyard.

  “Oh my god,” Quinn said, when she could finally catch her breath after laughing so hard. “Am I Noë Becker’s new cause?”

  “I guess so,” Jesse said.

  “Unbelievable.” Quinn tucked some hair that had escaped her braid behind her ears. “Of course, she’d be disappointed to hear that I haven’t actually had sex.” Seeing the look Jesse gave her, she clarified, “In the usual way.” They sat for a minute, and the humor leaked out of Quinn like air from a balloon.

  “I’m sorry people think, you know . . .” she said. “That I hooked up with someone else.”

  He leaned down to tie his sneaker, shaggy hair hiding his face. “Whatever. I know you didn’t. That’s what matters.”