by L. J. Stock
The music filtered up from below us, the volume loud enough to be entirely clear as he took my hand and guided me into the middle of the dark roof.
“Stay right there. Don’t move.”
After disappearing for a moment, Dustin’s position was given away by the creak of the door on the structure of the shack. I smiled in that direction, swaying to the music while I waited obediently.
“Dustin?”
“Just one…”
Light sprang up around me as his voice died away. There were little paper lanterns surrounding fairy lights dotted all around. They moved from Coach’s Retreat to an antenna over to the large air conditioning unit and back again. The cheerful colors all cast warm glows as I spun, my eyes open and taking everything in. It was beautiful but subtle enough to not glean unwanted attention from all of Dustin’s classmates below.
“Look what you did,” I whispered, grabbing his hands as he neared. “You never stop surprising me, you know?”
I rewarded him with a long kiss, my hands gripping and tugging at the freshly cut hair at the nape of his neck. I didn’t think there was anyone else who would do this for me. No one would know how much this would touch me, but Dustin did. Even if we had been able to join in with the gathering below, it wouldn’t have meant as much as this.
“You like it?” he asked, his arms pulling me close.
“I love this,” I said, beaming at him, feeling the happiness spread over me like the summer sun.
“Good.” Taking a small digital camera from his pocket, he held it at arm’s length and turned the lens on us. I could almost put money on the fact that he was just going to get some obscure body part, and when he didn’t check the small screen, I realized he didn’t care. Tonight was about us doing things our way, just like we always did.
We must have danced together in our secret paradise for hours—our bodies pressed together with almost as much frequency as our lips. The air around us was alive with the music and the random clips of excited conversation that drifted up to us from the open gym doors. We drank beer from champagne glasses and got tipsy. We laughed at the stories Dustin would tell me about the rest of his classmates as we peeked over the lip of gym at the couples who decided they needed a last hoorah with a girl or guy who wasn’t necessarily their prom date. Some left, heading toward after parties in the hotels that lined the main highway running through town. Others went home, and before long, the music died and left us alone with the quiet serenade of our radio as we continued to dance.
The night was perfect—more perfect than I could have ever imagined—and I didn’t want our prom to be over. I wanted to bask in our rebellion. We’d made one of our rites of passage together and no one had stopped us, or told us we couldn’t be there. It was a small victory, but ours, and that’s what counted.
“Can we just stay here?” I asked after Dustin twirled me out and pulled me back against him.
“I had Megan put some things together for you,” he whispered, rocking us from side to side. I knew he meant to stay the night in the retreat, but my wish was infinite.
“No, I mean forever. It’s been perfect.” I flung my arms out and fell back, trusting him to catch me and hold me as I stared up at the stars above us. I felt all floaty and light-headed from the beer, but warm and comfortable at the same time. “I haven’t thought about what’s coming next all night.”
Pulling me up and against him, Dustin swept his lips over my shoulder, the warm wash of his exhale bathing my skin until I shivered from the sudden heat that raged through my bloodstream.
“I would do anything for you, and if I could stop time, I would.”
“I know you would,” I admitted, throwing my arms around his neck and grinning at him. “Just for tonight, then?”
“Just for tonight,” he agreed, his fingers moving to the zip at the back of my dress. “We’re not going to waste a moment of the night sleeping, either.”
I was amused, but my chuckle came as more of a moan as he tugged the zip down my back and slipped his warm hand between the parting sides of material to claim every inch of flesh under his palm. He was heat and comfort, love and passion. He was the other half of the whole that made us… us.
We didn’t have to rush our lovemaking that night. I don’t think either of us so much as considered speeding through the act. We understood that this would be our time, our memories, and our one definitive moment in our high school romance. We took our time touching and exploring hungrily with our hands and lips. The only audience was the stars overhead, and we allowed them to bear witness until the field lights extinguished, forcing us to turn off our own beacon of light and move inside the small cabin before locking the world out completely.
We were fused together for hours. Moments of recuperation were filled with declarations of love between us until words melted into kisses–kisses that led to lovemaking, which brought screams of pleasure from my lips and grunts of unadulterated ecstasy from his. I didn’t know where I ended or where he began for most of the night. My damp skin was alive as we moved as one, the push and pull of youthful exuberance spurring us on and on until exhaustion finally claimed us both with the kiss of the sun on the horizon.
I felt alive as I lay there watching the sun fill the room. My body was well used and tired. My heart was full of love and hope, and my mind was running through images of our future together. In three short months, we’d be out of Childress and in a place where no one knew or cared who we were or whether we were in love. There was a promise of more nights like this, filled with endless lovemaking and laughter.
Maybe it was naive.
Maybe I was just too young and stupid.
Maybe I just didn’t care anymore.
I was happy, and in love, and I was getting out of a life I hadn’t chosen for myself, and running headlong into one I’d handpicked.
Maybe that was slipping through my fingers before I’d so much as had a chance to form a solid image of it.
Chapter Sixteen
July 2002
Camping had been the best idea ever, and the isolation in the mountains where no one we knew would think to come was even better. Dustin and I could just be. There was no judgment—no worrying. Up in the mountains, it was just the two of us being a couple along with our friends. Now that Dustin had graduated, he was more relaxed than I’d ever seen him, especially as his family had practically pushed him out of the door to enjoy his last summer of freedom before college. He didn’t stop communication with his mom, though. Every day he would call her, and the small consideration made me love him all the more.
Lake Trinidad was beautiful, and the summer heat in the mountains was gloriously lacking the humidity we’d have been suffering in Texas. The small RV we were inhabiting was just perfect, and Dustin and I had no trouble in imagining our life once we moved in together. We drifted around one another naturally and fell asleep curled up watching the tiny television by the bed. When Megan had come to us about extending our vacation for another week, no one thought to argue with her. I never wanted to leave the comfort of the mountains or the freedom to just be with Dustin.
The sun beat down on Megan and me as the guys threw a football around by the lake. The heat of the summer rays was addictive once we climbed free of the cool lake water and let the drops evaporate from our chilled bodies. I loved everything about those slow days spent at the edge of the lake, the sound of the water mingling with the radio, and Rob and Dustin’s laughter pouring free while we just soaked it all up, imagining our futures where we could do this kind of thing more often.
“Shit,” Megan’s voice cut through the ambient noise and had me pushing my sunglasses to the top my head. I glanced over at her with my eyebrows raised.
“What’s wrong?”
“Unwanted visitor gave me an unwanted gut-punch of a warning,” she grumbled, glancing at Rob. “Did you remember to bring anything?”
I shook my head, sat up, and folded my legs under me. “I didn’t think about i
t. You want to drive into town before things unfold?”
“We have to,” she grumbled as she pressed her hand to her stomach. “I completely forgot. Yours normally reminds me…”
As she trailed off, her eyes widened and caught mine, waiting for me to catch up with her thought process. It took me a moment to get where she was, but once the light bulb illuminated, reality slammed into place around me like a cage.
Two months.
At least two months had passed since I’d…
But no.
That couldn’t be right.
I watched as Megan hopped up from her blanket. I could feel the sudden stirring of this odd new reality inside of me. She was right. I was more than late. I just hadn’t noticed because I was too busy being in love to even think about what was missing the month before. Since prom, I’d been making plans to leave Childress, my emancipation, and to go away on vacation. The time had passed without much else penetrating the excitement of being able to get away. I’d had a second of thought when Jen had given me a grocery bag with my normal tampons in, but that had been fleeting and had disappeared as I’d shoved the box under my sink with the others. I had been late before, but never two months.
“Don’t panic,” Megan said under her breath, offering me her hand and pulling me to my feet with her body angled between the guys and me. Bending, she picked up my shorts and shirt and pushed them into my arms before turning me in the direction of the campground, giving a light shove in the center of my back. “Go and wait by the truck. I’ll get the keys and meet you there.”
“But…?”
“Go,” she said sweetly, offering a sympathetic smile. “I’ll meet you there.”
I heard Dustin call out for me. I heard the laughter from Megan as she approached and demanded the keys from Rob while reassuring them that a girly afternoon was much needed. The very suggestion of a girl-themed afternoon seemed to appease Dustin and Robert, but there was no appeasing me. I felt cold and numb, my heart pounding roughly enough that I could feel the echo of the staccato beat in my throat. I couldn’t pinpoint when I’d become so careless, but I knew I had… that we had.
I’d barely reached the asphalt of the campsites main thoroughfare when I felt the wave of nausea slam against me like a wall. The greasy wave of emotion was the shock, not the other kind, and I lurched for the trash can to empty my stomach inside with a cry of denial.
“Hey,” Megan said quietly, slinging her arm around my waist and guiding me toward where we’d set up camp. She glanced over her shoulder to where we’d left the guys, making sure they hadn’t witnessed my multicolored yawn. “Don’t freak out until you know for sure. Let’s just get out of here first. You’re okay. We’ll figure this out.”
That was easier said than done. I didn’t really need a test to confirm what I already knew. There was no other reason for me to be missing the second period in so many months, and intuition pretty much made the outcome a guarantee.
I could have kissed Megan as she continued her reassurances, guiding me to the truck and falling into a companionable silence once we were inside. I made quick work of pulling my shorts and shirt on over my bikini, my hands lingering a little longer than normal over my stomach as I buttoned the shorts.
This couldn’t be happening.
As much as I loved my mom and my plethora of memories featuring her as the star, I’d always sworn to myself that I wouldn’t make the same mistakes she had. I wouldn’t repeat the cycle. I wouldn’t let my heart overtake my mind. I would be smart. I would live my life the way she hadn’t been able to live hers… because she’d had me.
I’d barely made it six months past that milestone, hadn’t I?
Silent tears broke free and slipped down my cheeks, the drops jumping from the apple of my cheeks and staining the grey shirt I had instantly. Tracks of my tears heated my otherwise cool flesh as I gave up and stared down at my hands that were now balled in my lap.
“My bag…”
“I’ve got mine,” Megan cut in, concern and sympathy lacing her tone as she glanced between the road and me. “Don’t cry, Mik. Please, just be certain before you fall into sabotaging the rest of your life and begin to push Dustin away.”
I hated how well she knew me, how easily she could delve into my mind and see where my thoughts had taken me, all of my options lining a pin board in my brain and making me feel as sick as a dog. She was right that I needed all the facts before I made any big decisions, but like me, she knew the options for my future that were off the table if this was confirmed. She knew what I could and couldn’t do. The lessons I’d learned from my parents’ mistakes.
Parking outside the pharmacy, she didn’t pull the keys from the ignition or even ask if I was going to go in with her. She simply did what she always did as my honorary sister and took control of the situation, grabbing her bag and leaving me in the air-conditioned cab of the truck with my heart pounding out a painful beat in my chest.
I already knew the truth.
No test was going to tell me otherwise, and we both knew that.
This was just a formality.
A confirmation of what I already knew now I’d let myself think about it.
I was pregnant.
I stared out of the window at the people living their lives, going about their days like this was a completely regular day, when for me, it was anything but. My whole world was crumbling down around me, dream after dream peeling away from my mental to-do list while I sat hopeless, unable to stop them from fluttering to the floor. My life would never be the same again, my future was forever changed, and I no longer had any control over any of it.
Megan took forever to return. My body was frozen in place, staring at the doors of the pharmacy willing her to reappear. She eventually did, the bag she was carrying holding a box of tampons along with two different kinds of pregnancy test that she handed me the moment she was settled in the driver’s seat. Once glance, and she shrugged.
“Gotta be sure.”
Panic flooded through my system as I looked between her and the tests in the plastic bag on my lap. Where the Hell was I going to do this?
“Meg, I can’t do this with Dustin…”
“No, I know. We’ll go and get something to eat. Milkshakes will be needed.”
“Yeah…” There wasn’t much else to be said about that. I wasn’t sure I would be able to eat, but the sugar in the milkshake would probably help with the mental shock I was teetering on the edge of.
I kept my silence until we pulled into the first place we came across, Megan pushing all three of the boxes into her tote bag before locking the truck and looping her arm through mine when she met me at the front of the truck. She was my support system, my strength, and my only means of stability as we wandered into the cool building. She waved at the staff as we beelined toward the public restrooms.
Nerves made it impossible for me to pee on the stick, but I managed eventually, stepping into the small area with the sinks and praying we’d be alone for the two minutes or so that we needed to be. The seconds ticked by so slowly that the tremble in my fingers became a full-on shake as I glanced at Megan’s watch in question. She nodded after her own examination, and I took my fate in my hands and leaned forward with a lump the size of Texas in my throat. One glance at the stick, and I saw what I knew I would, the positive standing out against the white like a flashing light in a dark room.
I was definitely pregnant.
“Take the other one,” Megan said, pushing the box at me and turning me to face the stall. “Just to be sure.”
“I’m already sure.” My voice was devoid of any emotion. I had nothing left to give when all of the blood in my veins had run to my feet, making me sway on the spot. Was this how shock felt?
“Mik…”
“Prom night,” I said, already knowing the question. Looking back, that night was the first time we’d been thoughtless about sex and hadn’t used a condom. We’d been so caught up in the moment together, so drive
n to touch, to taste, to take… I was pretty sure we’d been careless since, but I knew that was the night. I just knew.
“Honey, that was in May.”
I nodded and dropped the box of tests on the counter, my shaking fingers turning on the cold stream of water as I leaned over the sink, and cupped my hands so I could splash my face a couple of times.
“Oh God.” Megan fell into silence for a moment, waiting for some kind of reaction from me. My silence, however, spoke volumes. “Miki, you can’t. I mean, what… you’re going to keep it, aren’t you?”
I started to sob then, the tears coming in place of the words as I tried my best to respond. This breakdown was a full shoulder-shaking, gut-wrenching sob that I couldn’t control even if I‘d tried to. I didn’t. Fighting this was pointless. I needed to get it all out of my system now.
Megan’s arms closed around me without care or judgment. It felt like she was holding me together, stopping my body from falling apart and splintering to the point there was no putting it back together. No words were needed between us as I fractured. What was there left to say, anyway? I was already beating myself up for my mistakes and carelessness, the self-flagellation was leaving scars that cut too deep to reflect on the surface, but they plunged down to my soul, crisscrossing with harsh white lines until my flesh was the only thing that kept me in place.
I was seventeen, knocked up, and had become a fucking statistic. I’d been so determined not to follow in my parents’ footsteps, and yet, there I was, reliving the past in a very precise pattern. The only difference for me was that I knew what I had to do to make this right, to stop the past from repeating itself in one full and ugly circle.