by April Fire
It had been a short, sharp shock, coming back home. I guessed that going out to stay with Jones had been my way of pretending that I wasn’t alone, that my fiancé hadn’t abandoned me along with my best friend. But now that I had gone, and been back home all by myself for a month, I was coming to terms with the fact that I was alone. It was an odd, new feeling, one that I wasn’t used to -- I would wake up in the morning and find myself reaching over to the side of the bed I was used to having a man on and wondering if I would ever wake up next to one again.
When I had this baby, I’d be a single mother, and I would come with baggage that a lot of men wouldn’t want to deal with, not that I could blame them. A woman who not only got dumped at the altar but was chucked by the father of her child too…anyone would have questions. I guessed most people would see me as undateable --which was a shame, but not the end of the world. I was too focused in on this child to think about picking up with someone new. I had so much setting up to do; cribs to buy, books to read, my Mom to consult about her own experiences, and dating was way at the back of my mind.
Well, at least it was most of the time. You see, I often found myself lying awake at night, staring at the ceiling, and thinking about Jones. And that wasn’t doing wonders for my self-esteem.
When I had packed up and stormed out that night about a month ago, I had convinced myself that Jones was no different from David -- just as mean, just as thoughtless, just as uncaring. I hated him- honestly, truly, hated him. And that hate continued all the way home, on the train, in the taxi back to my apartment, and on as I unpacked my things while muttering to myself in a fuming mess. How could he kick me out like that? And how could he think that what we had was…nothing?
And then, as the days went by, I began to soften slightly towards him. We had never had a conversation about our relationship, so how was he to know how I saw him? And…fuck, if someone had dumped the news I had on him, I think I would have fairly freaked out, too. Maybe he had been in shock, unable to come up with a satisfactory answer to the questions I posed him.
Maybe, just maybe, I had been a little hasty getting out of there. Maybe I should have given him more time. Because my feelings towards Jones, like our baby, were starting to gestate into something bigger and more real than before.
I tried to dismiss it as a case of “absence makes the heart grow fonder.” I was by myself for the first time, so naturally I was drifting off to memories of him because he was the last man I’d really been with and we’d ended things so suddenly.
But those feelings didn’t go away. If anything, they grew stronger, louder, in my head, until it felt like my brain was yelling at me to reach out to him again. I promised myself that as long as I didn’t hear from him, then I wasn’t going to bother getting in touch, The ball was in his court, and I didn’t want to hassle him with a relationship he clearly didn’t want. But, as the weeks went by and there wasn’t a word from him, I couldn’t help but feel hurt. Didn’t he care about the baby? Didn’t he care about me?
That was certainly what everyone else seemed to think about our relationship; I was pretty taken aback by the amount of times I would catch people peering over at me in coffee shops, obviously trying to read my expression for some sadness or regret or something like that. I wasn’t really sure what they were looking for -- after all, it had been four months since the wedding.
What, was I supposed to be sitting around still pining after David? I saw the way their eyes drifted down to my bump, their eyebrows shooting up as they squinted at the little converse shape under my shirt and tried to figure out whether their gossip-addled minds were just trying to find the juiciest new angle on the subject.
I would stare back at them until they realized what assholes they were being and backed the hell off, but it was hard. It was one thing for David to have left me at the altar; it was another entirely for Tam to have been the one he left me for. But to be a single mother in a town where everyone knew everyone? It was hard. Even Mom seemed worried about what the future might hold for me.
“Are you sure this is how you want to do this?” she asked, on an afternoon I’d come around to pick up the baby stuff she’d saved from when I was a kid.
“What do you mean?” I asked, finishing up my tea and cocking my head at her. She was so pointedly tactful that sometimes it was hard to figure out exactly what she meant, but I had long passed the point of wanting people to tiptoe around me.
“I mean…” she hesitated, tucking a stray strand of hair behind her ear. It had been a while since she’d had it done, and there were a few grey hairs showing up on her head -- just like a grandma, I’d been teasing her earlier. She observed me for a moment before speaking again.
“I mean, I know what people in this town can be like,” she went on. “And I was wondering if you wanted to go stay somewhere else till you’re less…”
She gestured in a circular motion towards my stomach.
“Less pregnant?” I filled in for her, and she shrugged.
“Well, yes.”
“Where would I go?” I rolled my eyes.
“Your Aunt has said she’d be happy to take you in if you want to—“
“Mom,” I cut across her gently. “I appreciate it, but this isn’t the nineteenth century anymore. I don’t need to be shipped away from the family in disgrace because I’m pregnant and unmarried.”
“I know that,” Mom shot back firmly. “You think I was married to your father when I got pregnant with you?”
“Don’t remind me,” I teased. “I’m a bastard child.”
“You certainly are,” she raised her brows at me, then softened. “But I know how hard it can be to deal with the…everything that comes with being pregnant at your age and in your position.”
“Thanks, Mom,” I squeezed her hand. I knew that when she got pregnant with me, the entire family pretty much turned on her and Dad; she was practically out on the street by the time I came along. Her side of the family was deeply religious, and that’s why I had been doing my best to avoid them in the past few months, and would continue to do so till I had the baby and they couldn’t poke me about finding someone nice to settle down with.
“But I’m staying. I want to be at home when the baby comes, and everyone else is just going to have to get used to the fact that I’m having a baby and there’s no man in the picture.”
She regarded me again, and I knew the question that she’d been holding back on was finally coming.
“Kyra,” she began, and I held my hand up.
“I know what you’re going to say,” I smiled at her, trying to be as understanding as I could. “But trust me, you don’t want to know who the father is. He knows about the baby, but he’s not interested in being a part of its life. And that’s fair enough.”
Mom frowned slightly, a little line appearing between her eyebrows as she did so.
“Are you sure?”
“Very,” I confirmed. “There’s nothing I can do to change his mind.”
“If you’re sure,” Mom nodded, but she continued to look at me with an unreadable expression.
I ignored the looks I got from the doctor’s assistant when I came into the office by myself for my check-ups and tried to go on with my life, but it was hard -- harder than I expected. Hard enough that one night, sitting in my apartment alone, I reached for my phone and pulled up his number. I could just…call him. Give him one more chance to set things straight.
My family would be coming up to visit soon, and part of me was nervous about facing them without having a man on my arm. I knew they’d be asking questions and demanding answers, and I wasn’t really in the mood to offer them. Having Jones with me would nullify all of that -- even if we weren’t married, they would be able to put two and two together and figure out who the baby belonged to. And, beyond that, I wanted him here -- even if he didn’t want to be with me, I wanted someone around to help me with the baby. That wasn’t so crazy, right?
I tapped the call button
before I could talk myself out of it any further,and held the phone to my ear. I took a deep breath as it rang a couple of times, closing my eyes and trying to keep my heartbeat in check, but to no avail. I hadn’t heard his voice in what felt like an eternity, and I was already panicking about what I was and wasn’t going to say to him. The phone rang again, and again, and one more time, setting my teeth on edge and making the back of my neck prickle with nerves.
And then, suddenly, it went to answerphone. A pre-recorded mechanical voice apologized to me, and offered me the chance to leave a message after the tone, but before I had a chance to think about what I actually wanted to do, I hung up. I wasn’t going to sit there in his messages, unlistened and ignored. He could call me back if he really wanted to talk to me. If he’d had a change of heart, I would be here to listen to it. But I wasn’t going to be overlooked. I threw the phone to the other side of the room, but found myself checking it repeatedly over the course of the night. Nothing, not a call, not a message, not a word.
That phone was stuck to my side for the next three days straight as I waited for him to get back to me. I even found myself watching one of his games on TV, feeling like a stalker as I wondered why he hadn’t called me back. I might or might not have actually said that out loud to the version of him on the television, but that was neither here nor there (and I was way too humiliated to admit it, even to myself).
His silence continued. I even called again, in case for some weird reason he hadn’t received my message, but it went to answerphone again. And that was when it really began to sink in -- Jones wanted nothing to do with this baby. He didn’t want to hear from me, or this kid, for the rest of his life. He’d made his choice, and that realization was a kick to the face.
I guess I had assumed that by the time the baby was due, Jones would come around and accept the fact that he had to take some responsibility for the baby but it was looking less and less likely. I mean, I had assumed that anyone, when they found out they were about to parent a child, would at least reach out to meet it, to support it, as best they could.
I wasn’t demanding that he fall at my feet and ask to get back together, or move back to our hometown so we could raise this baby as co-parents. I just wanted him to acknowledge me, acknowledge what we had together. I knew I had blown my chances to be in a relationship with him, but was he also giving up on our baby, too? Was this my fault? Had I cheated my child out of a father because I couldn’t keep my shit together?
Those thoughts tormented me over the next few days, and I found myself retreating, rejecting help from Mom and Dad has I tried to get everything in place. I just lay on the sofa with my hand on my bump, wondering what happened from there on in. I would be a single mother- not just a single mother, but one with no support and no help from the other parent of my baby.
How was I meant to deal with that? And, on top of all that, how was I meant to get it through my family’s head that this was the choice I’d made and I was sticking to it? I could already see the barely veiled looks of disapproval over Christmas dinner, the sniffs and head-shakes when they found out the truth.
And I would have no choice but to just…go on. For my baby. Because, apparently, no one else was going to. I’d never thought Jones would be this callous, but it seemed like you couldn’t trust anyone these days- well, at least any man.
With the reality of the situation setting in, it was all I could do not to go to pieces. And, of course, as they always did when things were already harder than they needed to be, my family came to town.
Chapter Seven
I looked in the mirror, smoothing down my dress over my bump. It wasn’t too obvious, right? Like, if you were to look at me, you wouldn’t immediately go “yeah, that woman is undeniably pregnant”. At least, that’s what I was shooting for.
It was time for the annual family dinner; everyone came in from out of town to go out for my grandmother’s birthday, to the same Italian restaurant that we went to every year It was a big deal, and it had been a tradition for as long as I could remember. My parents had pictures of me from when I was a little kid with spaghetti sauce smeared all over my face, pictures I couldn’t even remember taking. Well, that would be my kid soon enough, if they didn’t disown me when they discovered I was pregnant.
The taxi out to the restaurant was quick --irritatingly so, as I had hoped to kill some time stuck in traffic. But, much to my chagrin, I arrived early, and stood awkwardly outside as I waited for everyone else to get there.
Soon enough, the whole clan had arrived --- Mom, Dad, cousins, grandparents, aunts and uncles from out of town. We greeted each other in a flurry of niceties before we went to our table. Mom briefly gripped my arm and nodded at me supportively, and I could tell she was hoping as badly as I was that the pregnancy wouldn’t come out tonight. I didn’t think either of us could handle it.
“So, Kyra, what have you been up to?” My cousin Kimmy turned to me, a smile on her face, but I could tell there was something more going on. Her eyes flashed, as though she was testing me, so I met her gaze steadily and shrugged.
“Oh, you know, not much.”
“I’m so glad to see you out after the…after the wedding,” Kimmy whispered the last three words loudly, reaching over to take her husband’s hand pointedly. “We couldn’t believe when we heard.”
“Yeah, well, I’m fine now,” I dismissed her, wanting to move on. “Can you pass me a menu?”
Kimmy handed me the leather-bound menu, and I flipped it open and began browsing pointedly, hoping that no-one else would give me any more hassle. I knew that David and I would have been a prime gossip source for the last couple of months, but I wasn’t interested in giving them anything more to go on.
Eventually, the waiter came by, pen poised over his pad.
“Can I get anyone anything to drink?” he asked brightly, smiling around the packed table. One by one, we put our orders in, until he came around to me.
“I’ll just have a seltzer water, please,” I smiled politely. “Thank you.”
Before I knew it, Samantha, Kimmy’s sister, had jumped in.
“Are you sure you don’t want something stronger? I know that if I’d been through what--” “No, I’m fine.” The smile on my face was beginning to feel like a rictus grin, but I kept it there.
“If you can’t afford--”
“Samantha, I’m fine, thank you.” I cut her off, not wanting a second more of her faux-sympathy.
“What are you, pregnant?” Kimmy’s husband scoffed, and I felt a flush move up my neck. The entire table fell silent for a second, save for the sound of the waiter scuttling off to the kitchen to avoid the blow-up we could all see coming a mile off. Even though the rest of the restaurant was still bustling around us, everyone sitting around me was just staring at me in silence, waiting for me to laugh off his dumb comment and move on.
I exchanged a look with Mom, and she raised her eyebrows in a resigned fashion. Well, there was no getting out of this one. I had to tell them. I took a deep breath, but before I could get the words out, my grandmother jumped in.
“Kyra, am I to assume from your silence that you are pregnant?” Her voice was low and threatening, as though she might lunge across the table at me at any second. I glanced over at her, eyes wide, and finally nodded.
An almost comically loud gasp went up around the table, and I stared down at my menu, tears blurring my eyes. This wasn’t how I wanted everyone to find out. Hell, I’d have been happy with them not finding out at all.
“Is it David’s?” Kimmy leaned towards me, and I could tell she was just loving every second of this -there had always been a rivalry between us cousins, and me having a baby out of wedlock would put her firmly back on top of the list.
“It’s not.” I shook my head. My aunt and uncle were murmuring between themselves, looking over at me sadly, with an expression of such irritating sympathy I wanted to slap it off their faces. Kimmy’s eyebrows shot up.
“Who’s is it,
then?” Her eyes widened in faux-concern.
“It’s not important.”
“Why isn’t he here?” Grandma demanded. “Why haven’t we met him?”
“He’s, um, he’s not going to be part of the baby’s life,” I explained quietly. Grandma sucked in a lungful of air in horror.
“So, you’re going to be an unwed, single mother,” she clarified. I nodded.
“And how do you ever expect to find a man to look after you and your…child?” She spat the word out as though it was painful for her to even consider. “That’s too much baggage, Kyra.”
“I know,” I sighed. I’d already come to terms with all of this by myself, and I sincerely didn’t need my family reiterating the fact that it was going to be next to impossible for me to find someone to spend my life with once I’d had this baby.
“And you’re really keeping it?” My Aunt asked gently. I could tell she was trying to help, but it was hard to see what anyone was saying as anything other than an attack.
“Yes!” I snapped. She didn’t deserve it, but then, I didn’t deserve this interrogation either and all because I just wanted a sparkling water instead of a glass of wine. “Can you just leave it? I’m starving.”
“We just want what’s best for you, darling,” Grandma continued, and my grandfather nodded seriously next to her. I fought the urge to roll my eyes at them both.
“I’m doing what’s best for me,” I pointed out, but it was too late- they were not listening. “How can you say that?” Kimmy exclaimed. “You haven’t got anyone to raise this baby with, and babies without fathers--”
“Can turn out just as fine as babies with them,” my Mom jumped in, but everyone pretty much ignored her.