It Happened to Nancy

by Beatrice Sparks

  Wednesday, February 20

  6:17 P.M.

  Dorie and El and Red came over right after school. Since I saw them, it seems like a forever of forevers. We talked about everything and everyone as though I’d been away for years. Yet it was still like I’d seen them just yesterday.

  Everything is grand and glorious and exciting with everything and everybody except…Dorie still hasn’t had her period. That’s scary. She’s used those little packages that come out pink if you are…and it’s pink or vice versa. We were all so upset about her that no one really thought much about me, and that was wonderful for a change. I’m really glad I’m not her! I don’t know what I’d do either. She says she decides one thing one day and then changes her mind the next…. It’s ahorrible decision either way, and she’s only got weeks to decide if she’s going to have an abortion. That would be soooo hard…imagine the little tiny baby being sucked out kicking and screaming and thrown away. I wonder what they do with all those dead babies.

  Oh, now I’m being dumb. Abortion isn’t anything now…or is it? Oh, cheese. I’m so glad I’m not her. But if the baby were mine and Lew’s, I would never, never, never give it up. He wouldn’t want me to, I know. He wouldn’t let me. But what would I do? I’m just fifteen years old. Who would tend the baby? Would I have to live with my mother forever? Would I have to quit school? No wonder Dorie looks so tired and scared. What a horrific decision! I heard Mom use that word and loved it. I wondered when I’d ever use it. I certainly didn’t think it would be about anything this HORRIFIC. Not that babies are horrific—but, well, they’re not what you think.

  Once Mom’s sister, Aunt Milly, brought her baby over for us to tend while she and Uncle Charles went on a vacation for a long weekend. I looked forward to it so much I couldn’t sleep before. Then after Baby Bonny came, I couldn’t sleep because it seemed like she cried all night and because of her wetting and crying and pooping and throwing up and needing her bottle, and wanting to be rocked and walked and bathed and dressed and changed and changed and changed!! I found that babies are not like kittens that you can feed and water once a day and play with when you want to. They write the rules! Another thing, you wouldn’t think that a pretty, darling little creature like a baby could smell so bad or get poop up to their armpits…ukkie…it was gross—and so often!

  Before then, I sometimes felt if I had a baby it would give me something of my very own to love and to be JUST MINE. That if I had a baby, the two of us would start a whole new world. When Merry Beth; our sixteen-year-old neighbor, had her baby and decided to keep it, I remember I almost envied her. Someone to be with all the time, to love, to have her love me and be dependent upon me. Secretly, Self, I now know I don’t want that much dependence…at least not now…maybe someday when we’re more mature, huh?

  Tuesday, February 26

  5:59 P.M.

  I’m sooooo depressed. Dorie, my very dearest and kindest-hearted friend, just left. I’m so glad she had me to talk to and that Mom wasn’t here. I shouldn’t say talk to…I should say talk at, because I certainly didn’t have any profound answers.

  I can’t believe that Fred dumped her. How could that be? How in this world, or any other world, could a boy just dump a girl he’d made pregnant? I wonder if the stupid jackass thought she’d done it by herself.

  Imagine him meeting her at the bottom of the gym steps and, just out of the blue, telling her he didn’t think they should see each other anymore. Her pregnant and him just acting like it was nothing and all her fault and responsibility and like that.

  I think I’d have ripped his heart out through his eyeballs, or at least screamed and hollered so everyone in creation could have heard me and at least know what a lousy, uncaring, selfish, rotten, miserable, sleaze maggot he was. AND…to make it even worse…when she started crying, he asked her how he’d ever know it was his anyway…and it was her responsibility to take care of those things.

  I’m sooooo sad. I wish there was something I could do. I walked her to the bus stop, but I’m helpless…everybody is helpless. She just has to choose between horrific and more horrific.

  Thursday, February 28

  7 P.M.

  Dorie’s mom let her come over after school to study and have dinner. LET HER? Here she’s about to become a mother, and she has to ask her mother if she can come study. I keep thinking of her dragging that little baby around with her every minute of the night and day, but I don’t know how she can ever, ever give it up either. What if someone adopted it who abused it? Oh, the poor little kid. And if she’d had an abortion, then…I think I’m worrying about it almost as much as she is. I’m so glad she’s got me. El and Red are still their old happy-go-lucky, light-minded selves, and me and Dorie are…Sometimes I want to confide in her about my problem so much, it’s like a real hurting, aching, twisting pain inside me, but I can’t. She has enough problems of her own right now.

  Saturday, March 2

  7 A.M.

  Dorie’s going to sleep over, and tomorrow Mom’s going to take us to what we call Buttercup Lake. I’m so glad. Both of us need to go lie in a bright meadow and listen to the sounds of happiness and almost spring, with the lake’s waves flopping softly on the sandy beach in the background. Mom’s taking a big lunch, but we’ll stop at the Squirrel Corners Diner on the way back. Mom says both of us are always running on EMPTY.

  I finally got up the nerve to ask Dorie last night if she wasn’t even using birth control pills when…She said she was, but that sometimes she forgot. At first I was mad at her and wanted to give her RESPONSIBILITY LECTURE 997 that Ms. Marsden, our health teacher, gives us every so often, but I couldn’t. Who am I to lecture her on being responsible daily for taking the pill, when Mom has to nag at me half the time about feeding my bird? Besides, Dorie said Fred used a condom—well, most of the time he did…but they’re expensive. Dorie said they cost about $6.00 a dozen. That would be…but I don’t want to think about it. I won’t think about it. I won’t let myself think anything but Buttercup Lake and big fat curly French fries at Squirrel Corners.

  Monday, March 4

  5:30 A.M.

  I woke up really early this morning and just relived the weekend. It was so wonderful and quiet and beautiful and fantasy-world-escaping. Dorie and Mom and I chased each other through barely yellow meadows of budding buttercups. We pretended they were each a sunshine pocket about ready to open. We laughed and teased and sat on a log. Mom brought her guitar, which she hasn’t played in forever, and we sang all the songs she knew. Then Dorie and I taught her the new ones we know. It was glorious, it was heavenly. I wish every day of the rest of my lift could be just like it.

  Tuesday, March 5

  4:59 P.M.

  Lew and I took our sandwiches and ate as we walked down by the old firehouse. We sat on the lawn there and talked about how longgggg since we’ve really had any alone time together. He hugged me, and it healed every molecule in my body and brain and soul. We moved over behind the giant shrubs on the side, and he kissed me. It was like sparklers and Christmas and the Fourth of July and blessed Easter all mixed together.

  I hate to admit it, but I really wanted to…you know…but I didn’t, too. I know we shouldn’t and all that, but sex is such a powerful force! I’ve wanted to ask Dorie about all the details of it. It was so…gaggy and dirty…with *&=-+, but I can feel it will be beautiful and wholesome with Lew when he’s ready. I know it’s funny, at least I think it is, for the boy to be more hold-backish than the girl, but then maybe it isn’t, too. Boys think about their futures and their responsibilities and trade-offs in life just like we do, or at least they should! And Lew does! Thank goodness he does! I don’t think I would ever feel this way about another boy in the whole world…or would I?

  I dimly remember one of the “mother’s lectures on sex” Mom tried to give and I tried not to listen to. She said that sex could be the greatest force in life after self-preservation, and that often it became even greater than self-preservation, lik
e in war times when men would go into almost sure-death situations for a woman, and times when people just get carried away with their emotions, and their hormone output becomes greater than their brain input. I hope that never happens with me. Do you think it ever could, Self? Especially now when I might give…you know…oh, forget the whole thing. Sex causes more trouble than it’s worth, I think!!!!

  See ya, I gotta go start dinner. Mom’s bringing home a lady from the office so they can work on a project afterwards.

  Thursday, March 7

  Dear Self:

  I haven’t written for a couple of days because somehow you got put somewhere…and…well…I’m so disorganized. Besides, I’ve been trying not to think much, I’ve been feeling so rotten. Dr. S. says that lots of people who are HIV positive feel pretty good for five or six or even seven years, but because of my low immune system to begin with, I’ve got an infection in my eyes that just doesn’t seem to want to clear up.

  Friday, March 8

  3:30 P.M.

  Mom took me out of school early to see Dr. S., rather the eyes guy he had me go see. Another kick in the heart and head. How many more can I take? One medicine I can take will save my eyesight; another will keep me alive, but I can’t take both. I can take AZT, which is a medicine that slows the AIDS virus, or I can take Ganciclovir, a medicine that can stop this blinding eye infection. But since both drugs cause anmeia, most people can’t tolerate them together.

  Wow, what a choice! GO OFF AZT, WHICH KEEPS PEOPLE SYMPTOMLESS LONGER, OR STAY ON AZT AND GO BLIND. DECISION TIME. CELEBRATION TIME, RIGHT?

  The goofy, mutant-looking doctor, who even has a science fiction accent, LOOKED AT ME LIKE I was a straggly little mongrel puppy that had just been run over, and told me I had a third choice. I started to laugh and cry at the same time, I was so confused. After a while Mom got me calmed down a little, and Dr. Mutant was able to tell us that researchers had developed a new way of delivering the eye medicine so it won’t cause anemia. They implant minuscule sustained-release pellets inside the eyeball. Now doesn’t that sound fun?

  This keeps the drug out of the bloodstream and keeps it inside the eyeball, where it is needed. It’s released in a steady, slow rate, which means you don’t have the ups and downs of daily infusions. I don’t think I could stand that “daily” bit.

  Dr. Goofy Mutant gave me a copy of an article about Ganciclovir and about a dozen other new approaches being developed to control what they call “opportunistic infections.” They are the usually harmless germs that attack people with AIDS-weakened immune defenses.

  Lucky, lucky me, I get to be a guinea pig for some of the pharmaceutical industry’s more than 40 new drugs that are being tested against the viruses, bacteria and other microscopic invaders common among the UNCHOSEN FEW OF US.

  “Of all the AIDS-related illnesses, cytomegalovirus—CMV—retinitis is among the most frequent and devastating.” Dr. M. says it strikes about 20 percent of AIDS patients. Unless treated, it means certain loss of sight. I couldn’t handle that. I couldn’t write to you, dear Self. I couldn’t see flowers or trees or sunshine…or my friends…or LEW. I couldn’t, I positively couldn’t, stand not seeing LEW.

  I’ve got to choose between Ganciclovir and a newer medicine called Foscarnet by tomorrow. What a choice. Ganciclovir causes anemia and Foscarnet harms the kidneys.

  Given the old-fashioned way, both drugs require daily intravenous infusions, taking two or three hours to complete. Patients must have catheters permanently implanted to receive the infusions. And if that weren’t enough, the virus typically returns after two months of treatment, requiring still higher doses.

  I think I’ll opt for cutting open my eye and putting in the pellets. That will last for six months, and a year-long type will be tested soon. We’ll see.

  Happy dreams to you—I don’t know about me.

  Tuesday, March 19

  Dear Self:

  I’m glad we’re together. I need you. I really do. It’s amazing how I trust Mom, and my friends and Lew. I really trust Lew. But there’s still so much of me that I can’t even trust with him. But I’ve got to. Soon I will tell them all about me. Life is soooooo unfair. I wish I knew how to do it.

  Friday, March 22

  Dear Self:

  Sorry I missed writing in you Wednesday and Thursday. What kind of friend am I, even to you? Myself?

  Anyway, at school today a couple of kids were teasing Dorie because she’s beginning to show. I felt so bad for her I wanted to punch them into their lockers and throw away the combinations.

  Saturday, March 23

  10 P.M.

  It’s been such a fun day. Mom took the old gaggle to Wildwood, except Lew, who had to work as usual. We rode on the crazy, upchucking rides and chased each other with water guns. We were like little kids again, noisy and silly, loud and dumb. I wonder if there will ever be another day like this. El got sick and almost threw up on the Whirl-a-Wheelie; Red slipped in a mud puddle and had to go all day with the seat of her white shorts stained brown. I spilled catsup and mustard from my hot dog all down the front of my shirt, and Dorie got hit in the nose with a ball. It was like the old days when we were young and life was sweet and our problems were simple.

  I DON’T WANT TO GROW UP!

  I WANT TO GO BACKWARDS!

  Monday, March 25

  3:29 P.M.

  I’ve been sick again. Dr. S. says my HIV is progressing soooo much faster because of my lowered immune system. This time it’s a stupid kidney infection.

  Why couldn’t I be like other people who have five or ten or so years before they even know they have it? What I wouldn’t give for five or ten or so more good years.

  Actually, Dr. S. doesn’t even call it HIV anymore; he calls it AIDS. I don’t know when he started that. I guess, like usual, I just didn’t want to listen.

  I wonder how many good years I really do have.

  Maybe it’s time I should start doing some serious thinking about dying. I wonder what dying is like. Will it hurt? Where will I go? Is there really a Heaven, or will the particles from my body just join with the other particles of the earth for topsoil or dust bunnies or something else totally useless? I don’t want that! I WON’T BELIEVE THAT! THERE IS A HEAVEN…AND A GOD! AND IT’S WHITE AND CLEAN AND PURE, AND GOD IS CREATING OTHER WORLDS, AND I WILL BE A HELPER IN SOME WAY. AND I’LL GO ON AND ON THROUGH FOREVERS OF ETERNITIES…BEING ME…DOING WONDERFUL, CONSTRUCTIVE, HAPPY AND FULFILLING THINGS.

  In time, Lew and Mom and Dad and all the other people I love will come up to Heaven too, and we’ll have a wonderful and grand and glorious reunion with Great-Grandma and Grandpa Ivy and all my pets that died: Catsup, Red Dog and Fluffer, and…but what if I go to Hell? I don’t think I’ve been that bad…I haven’t been that good either…I guess I better start saying a few Hail Marys and Our Fathers just in case.

  Tuesday, March 26

  Dear Self:

  Sometimes I’m such a goof-goon-type person. For a while I’ll feel like a leper from Bible times; then I’ll be the old me, happy and witty and show-offish. Sometimes I’m conforming, then not conforming; and up, then down; me, then YOU! Wow! I think it’s gone to my brain.

  Wednesday, March 27

  11:12 P.M.

  Today everything started out at the top of the ladder. We had short classes so we could take the bus to Lakewood to watch Lew’s tennis team. He was mag…magnif…and magnificent!!! El and Dorie and Red and me screamed till we were all hoarse. We beat the Lake Lizards hands down. Then we all went to El’s for junk food, as though we hadn’t consumed enough during the game. Nick and Mandy came too, and Barney and Freddie Fields and a couple of team guys. We laughed till we cried as we went over all the game moves, both dumb and brilliant. Lew held my hand a lot of the time, and I was in heaven.

  Lew’s brother Mike, who was supposed to pick Dorie and Red and Lew and me up from our school, was late; so after the others had all gone, we sat out on the front steps and counted stars and wa
ited for him. I don’t know what happened, but after a while I just couldn’t hold it in anymore, and I told them about my having AIDS. It was hard to get the word out at first; then the whole thing flooded all over. It was a great relief, for in some scary way I expected them all to pull away. They didn’t, though. After a stunned moment, they were all on top of me, till I felt like I was at the bottom of a football pileup.

  Thank goodness we’ve had a lot of good educational stuff at school about AIDS, so they weren’t afraid of me and stuff like I guess, deep inside, I’d somehow thought they would be.

  We all cried together, and Lew kept holding my hand tighter and tighter and repeating over and over, “Why you?…Why you?…Why you?”

  I didn’t tell them then how I got it, and I guess they all believed I got it from blood at one of my hospital visits. Maybe someday I’ll tell them that too…but maybe I won’t.

  It’s such a relief. So much so that when I got home I had to wake Mom up and tell her. She pulled me down into her bed, and we snuggled for a while before I came in to write in you.

  Aren’t you relieved, Self? Isn’t it grand?

  Thursday, March 28

  4:53 P.M.

  Today I cut my finger on my locker and had to go to the school nurse for a Band-Aid. I’d immediately wrapped my finger in a Kleenex and then put the Kleenex in a plastic bag I had in my purse, like Dr. S. had told me to do. It was important to be careful.

  I wasn’t prepared for the look on Mrs. Maggleby’s face when I told her I had AIDS. She didn’t noticeably pull back, but I saw a strange look snap on and off her face, like I’d seen once on a little kid in the playground when a big kid had hit him and he didn’t know whether to run and hide in his mom’s protective skirts or to stay and fight. It was over in a second, and she again became the knowledgeable, in-control person who often talked to us about AIDS and herpes 2 and hepatitis B and all the other things we should be aware of.

  It was a great relief when she asked me if I’d like to stay and talk, and she offered to write me an excuse if I did.