by Lexie Ray
“Very good,” she said, smiling as she tipped me out. “Two of my regulars were in, and they adore me.”
“There is much to adore about you, baby,” I said, wiping down the surface of the bar.
“You never got to go upstairs with Jake,” Shimmy observed.
I shrugged. “He’s got my number, if he wants to call it.”
“Blue the man-eater,” she laughed. “Love ’em and leave ’em, right?”
“That’s the only way to go,” I agreed.
I tucked away my cut of tips before giving the rest to Mama. I’d recently started asking for more money than I needed every week, squirreling that away, too. I didn’t question my instincts when they told me to do something. I just did it.
And when they were screaming at me to forget about Jake, I did my best to comply. Maybe he’d call this week and maybe he wouldn’t.
“I’m sorry.”
I straightened to see Cream, who was holding the vacuum.
“Sorry about what?” I asked, cocking my head.
“What I had with Jake can’t be compared to what you have with Jake,” she said, staring at the floor. “It was wrong of me to compare the two, and wrong of me to put ideas in your head. You don’t need that.”
“Oh, baby, come here,” I said, sighing as I stepped out from behind the bar and gave Cream a hug. “You don’t have to be sorry about anything. There aren’t any hard feelings between us, are there?”
“Of course not,” she said, hugging me back. “It just wasn’t fair of me to say what I said last week.”
“It’s forgotten,” I said, waving my hands. “Don’t you worry about a thing.”
But then I really started worrying the next week. My period, which began unfailingly on Thursdays ever since I started taking birth control in Tennessee, didn’t show up that Thursday. I chewed my lip and waited it out. I’d been under more stress than usual, and maybe it’d affected my cycle.
But when Friday, and Saturday, and Sunday passed with not a single cramp or drop of blood, I began to get worried. I was never late like this.
Trying to swallow my terrible dread, I woke up early on Monday and went to the closest drug store to Mama’s nightclub. It was in a kind of shady neighborhood, but I felt like that just made it more special. I liked hole in the wall places. They had more character than the sterile, cookie cutter stores elsewhere.
I tried to keep a neutral face as I purchased a pregnancy test, but the cashier winced for me.
“Good luck, whichever way you want it to come out,” she said, patting my hand in a kindly manner.
I’d gotten up so early that everyone was still asleep by the time I got back. That suited me just fine. I crouched in the middle stall, the only one with a door, and dribbled piss on the applicator, as well as my fingers. I cursed softly and finished peeing, keeping the applicator beneath me to ensure I gave that fucker a soaking. The box had said that I needed to wait three minutes for results. Fine. I pulled up my lounge pants and flushed the toilet.
I balanced the applicator on the edge of the sink and washed my hands. Gripping the sides of the sink, I looked at myself in the shattered mirror. And if I was pregnant, then what? What could I do?
The situation had to have precedents. It was hard to believe that, in Mama’s nightclub, with the actual kind of work we did, that there would never have been someone who slipped up with her birth control. Of course, no one would know the answer to that but Mama, and I kind of thought it would be the best course of action for her to never, never find out.
So the father of my possible child would be Jake. What would he think? What would he want me to do? Would he even pick up when I called to tell him? I imagined him as a father. The baby would be fair-haired, like me, but with his dark eyes. I liked that image, liked the picture I drew in my head of us as a happy family.
Why didn’t it seem real?
If Jake couldn’t so much as text me for an entire week—and leave the nightclub without saying goodbye—could I even rely on him to change a diaper or burp the baby correctly?
It was just as strange to think of myself as a mother. I’d done it for all those years for my younger siblings, but I never thought I was their mother. They were still my brothers and sisters, not their mother. This child would be mine—mine to raise, mine to care for.
Mine not to fuck up like my parents had fucked me up, ruining my childhood and what was supposed to have been a bright future.
I took a deep breath, not breaking eye contact with myself in that broken mirror. Of course, all this worrying and all of these conflicting feelings could be for naught. Maybe I wasn’t pregnant. Maybe all that pining about Jake—as well as my missing those birth control pills—had thrown off my natural cycle. That would make sense, wouldn’t it? Maybe I had nothing to worry about.
Psyching myself up, I picked up the applicator and turned it over, squinting at the little window.
Pregnant, it read. Simple as that. Simple as it had to be.
Pregnant. I was pregnant.
The bathroom started spinning and I gripped the sink, panting for air. My chest constricted, my stomach roiled. I wanted to move to the middle stall, ride this motherfucker of a panic attack out in relative privacy, but I sank to the cold floor instead, unable to move a step. The applicator clattered noisily down beside me, landing upright.
Pregnant, it said, mocking. Pregnant! it shouted.
I grabbed at my throat, tried to loosen the zipper on my jacket, pressed my fist against my belly, thinking about the baby growing inside of me.
My baby. My baby and Jake’s baby.
I sobbed for breath, dry heaving, stretching out, reaching for the stall. I just needed to crawl over there, get the hell off this dirty floor, figure out my life, anything. But I was paralyzed with panic, gasping and retching, trying to calm myself down, trying to tell myself it was going to be all right.
“Blue?”
Pumpkin stood at the bathroom door, her eyes wide with fear.
“Should I call an ambulance?” she asked, her voice quavering.
I shook my head emphatically, coughing as I longed for good air. My hands trembled.
Sweet, sweet Pumpkin dropped to the floor beside me and took my hands in hers even though she was as scared as I was.
“What’s wrong, Blue?” she asked, her voice quiet but concerned. “You can tell me.”
I shook my head wildly, again and again. I couldn’t tell anyone. Not one person.
But Pumpkin spotted the applicator, knew it for what it was, knew what news it had, that damning “pregnant” still on the window.
“Oh, Blue,” she said, hugging me to her chest even as I struggled. “It’s going to be okay.”
I took deep breaths, drinking in her smell. I liked her perfume—petals and some kind of fruit. It suited her. I took deep breaths, smelling her a little creepily. The scent helped calm me, and I found my stomach stilling, my chest loosening. Finally, I hugged her back. I started shaking for a different reason.
Me. Blue. Sandra Webber, Webbed Feet, Weirdo, Dyke. Man eater. Me.
Crying. Crying over a little piss on a stick.
Crying over the most monumental thing that had ever happened to me.
“It’s okay,” she said, petting my hair. “It’s going to be fine. You’ll get it figured out.”
I took another deep breath and wiped my eyes and nose on my jacket.
“Thanks, baby,” I said, trying to smile at her. “Sorry for being such a drama queen. I get panic attacks sometimes. They’re not a huge deal.”
“I’d panic, too, if I’d just found out I’m pregnant,” she said softly.
“I might not be,” I said, forcing my voice to be cheerful. I grabbed the applicator and jammed it in my pocket as if it didn’t mean anything. “I’ve heard there are such things as false positives. I should probably go to a clinic. Get a real doctor—not some stick—to tell me for certain.”
“You definitely should,” Pumpkin said, nodding quickly.
“That’s a good idea, Blue.”
I smiled at her sweetness and we both stood up. “I think Shimmy was on mop duty this week,” I said, trying to make a joke. “I don’t trust these floors.”
Pumpkin smiled, but it was a sad, small one. “What are you going to do, Blue?” she asked. “Are you going to call Jake?”
“Who says it’s Jake’s?” I asked, trying to sound rakish but failing miserably. “I’ll get it figured out, one way or another. Could you do me a favor, though?”
Pumpkin nodded, setting her jaw. “Anything.”
“Don’t tell anyone, okay?” I touched the applicator through the material of my jacket. “I’m going to deal with this, but I don’t need everyone knowing.”
“I understand,” she said, nodding. “I won’t tell a soul.”
I crushed her to me, hugging her hard. “Thanks, baby,” I whispered.
I walked to my room, surprised I was able to still put one leg in front of the other, and picked up my cell phone.
Whatever happened, it was Jake’s right to have a say in it. This was his situation as well as mine.
I took a deep breath and pushed the button to his contact. It started ringing, and I sat down on the bed. He probably wouldn’t answer, I told myself. I could leave a message—that would be better. Maybe he’d —
“Hello?”
I covered my mouth in horror. He’d actually answered.
“Hello? Blue?”
“Hey, Jake,” I said, feeling sick to my stomach. “How’s it hanging?”
“A little perkier when I saw your number, I must confess.” There was shifting on the other end of the line, and a groan. I realized that I’d probably woken him up.
“I’ve got some news,” I said, plunging forward.
“Lay it on me,” Jake said.
I ignored the stab of anxiety in my stomach. “I’m pregnant. It’s yours. How do we proceed?”
His breathing was the only sound on the other end of the line for a full minute. Then there was nothing.
“Hello?” I said. “Jake?”
I pulled my cell phone away from my ear and peered at it. The call wasn’t connected anymore.
He’d hung up on me.
I gritted my teeth and dialed again, but it went straight to voicemail.
Feeling miserable, I put my face in my hands. Of all the reactions I thought he’d have, this was definitely not one of them. I wasn’t naïve enough to expect happiness from him, but silence was a completely different thing. He was ignoring me, turning his back on the problem.
On our problem. Our baby.
We’d talk about this, one way or another, I decided. If he wouldn’t talk to me on the phone, I’d talk to him when he came in this week to DJ. He’d hear me, come hell or high water. I’d climb on to the stage beside him if it came right down to it, and shout in his ear to be heard over his set.
Even if it was a small plan of action, it was a plan of action. It made me feel marginally better, even if I was carrying around something scary in my belly.
But on the night Jake was supposed to DJ, there was a different man preparing equipment on stage.
“Who’s that?” I asked Shimmy, lifting my chin toward the stranger.
She shrugged. “Never seen him before,” she said, continuing to put out silverware on the tables.
“You got a minute, Blue?”
I turned to see Mama, looking at me coolly, her hands on her hips. She was all business, despite the stink of liquor.
“I’ve still got some things to do before we open, Mama,” I said.
“They’ll wait, or the other girls will take care of them,” Mama said, her face implacable. “Let’s chat in my office.”
My mind cycled through what could possibly be the issue as I followed her, unable to say no. Maybe she knew about me cutting the amount of tip money I gave her each night. If that was the issue, I was in danger. Then again, maybe she’d put me out of my misery. Jake was missing in action and I was carrying his love child. It would be an act of mercy, really.
“Sit down, child,” Mama said, pointing at the lone chair in front of her desk. I took a seat, trying to swallow the panic threatening to rise in my throat. Mama perched on the edge of her desk, her hair beautifully done for the night to come and her makeup perfect. She was more put together than usual, but that didn’t relieve any of my fears.
“What’s shakin’, bacon?” I joked, trying to keep it light.
“You got anything you want to tell me?” she asked, crossing her arms over her enormous breasts, barely contained in her dress.
“I don’t think so,” I said.
Mama sighed. “I know I haven’t exactly been there for you girls recently,” she said. “I’ve had a lot of things on my mind, to tell you the truth. But I hope you know that you can come to me with anything.”
“I know that, Mama,” I lied. I almost preferred her scary drunk. I knew how to deal with that type of drunk. This Mama in front of me, tipsy, trying to be my friend, scared me more than usual.
“Jake Fraser canceled on us tonight,” she said, looking carefully at my face. “He said that he couldn’t DJ here anymore.”
I tried to swallow, but choked on it. “Is that so?” I rasped politely, coughing.
“That is so,” Mama said, uncrossing her arms. “I asked him why, and he said you’re trying to pin a pregnancy on him. Is that true?”
“Pin a pregnancy on him?” I repeated, leveling a stare at her. “Is that really what he said?”
“In as many words,” Mama answered.
“There’s no pinning to be done,” I said incredulously. “I am pregnant. It is his. I was never with anyone—customers or otherwise—after the time he paid for me.”
Mama stroked her chin, her sparkly manicure glittering in the lights.
“What are you planning to do about it?” she asked me.
“Well, I’d been planning on talking to him about it,” I said, “since it’s his baby. But that seems to be out of the question, now. He obviously doesn’t want to talk about it.”
I hated the angry tears that stung my eyes, and I wrapped my arms around myself. I flinched when Mama rose from the edge of her desk and enveloped me in a too-sweet, too-warm hug. I had to convince myself not to push her away, keeping my arms carefully around myself.
“It’s going to be all right,” she said, but I found her a lot harder to believe than Pumpkin. She released me and sat back down on the edge of her desk. “I know a place that doesn’t ask many questions. It’s safe, clean, and not too expensive. You have the money to do it. I’ll make an exception on the hundred-dollar rule. I’ll give you as much money as you need to get this taken care of.”
“You mean getting rid of it,” I said. “Abortion.”
“Are you religious?” Mama asked, peering at me curiously.
“Not particularly,” I admitted.
“Well, then it’s the smartest decision,” she said. “You can’t take care of a baby here. It just wouldn’t work.”
“I could so take care of a baby,” I argued. “I took care of my little brothers and sisters my whole childhood. I’d make a hell of a mother. I’d make sure the baby was clean, and fed, and I’d be with it all day. Babies sleep through the night, for the most part, once they’re old enough. I’d run up and check on it a couple times. It’d be easy.”
My words rang hollowly in the office, and I knew how stupid they sounded. Of course I couldn’t have a baby here. I’d have to leave Mama’s nightclub to have this baby—this fatherless baby—and go to God knows where, jobless, to keep it.
Mama watched my face and leaned back, satisfied when I knew how futile my argument had been.
“I’ll go with you, if you want,” she said, opening the safe and counting out the money. “Or you can take Shimmy. I know you two are close. But the sooner you take care of this, the better. Believe me. This isn’t the first time that this has happened here, to one of my girls, and it won’t be the last. But
you can’t have a baby here, child. I know you know that.”
“I know that,” I agreed tiredly, taking the stack of cash she offered me and sticking it in the pocket of my skirt. I felt exhausted, used, and so stupid that I could’ve vomited with disgust.
Of course Mama’s nightclub wasn’t a good place to have a baby. I knew that. I was just being an idiot. If I wanted to keep my job here, I was going to have to give up my baby.
Mama dropped one of her big hands on my shoulder. “Why don’t you take the night off, Blue?” she suggested, her face kind. “You have some things to think about, and I think it’ll be hard for you to serve with your usual smile.”
I had to bite my tongue at that. Mama might fool you into thinking that she cared about you, but it was really about the success of a nightclub. A bartender whose smile faltered at the thought of extinguishing the light growing inside of her might discourage people from buying more alcohol.
It was always about the money with Mama. I was a fool to think she cared about anything else.
“Okay,” I said dully. “I’ll go on back upstairs.”
“Good girl,” she said. “I’ll tell the other bartenders you’re feeling sick.”
I had to admit it was a relief to not have to pretend that everything was all right. A couple of girls shot me curious stares as I walked across the nightclub floor and back up the stairs to the boarding house, but I didn’t feel like explaining myself.
Pumpkin’s look lingered the longest.
I tried to call Jake in a terrible fit of desperation when I got back up to my room, but it still went straight to voicemail. Throwing myself down on my bed and setting my jaw, I waited until the message beeped.
“I would really like to talk to you about something extremely important,” I said, trying to keep my voice calm. “Please get a hold of me as soon as you can.”
I didn’t have an iota of hope of hearing from him again. I knew that. I just wished I had realized it sooner: Jake was a player, and he was in no way ready to be a father.
And maybe I wasn’t ready to be a mother, either.
I must have fallen asleep, because the next thing I remembered was a knocking at my door.
“Come in,” I called blearily. The light from the hallway made me squint as my door opened. I realized I was still wearing my work uniform—and still had the money Mama had given me for the clinic stuffed in my pocket.