by Teisha Mott
“You don’t think I know that?” Andie was getting cross herself. She looked around to make sure no one was eavesdropping on their argument. “That’s why I brought him here. You realise Samantha is going to kill me, right? And please lower your voice before you let someone overhear and report to TATTLER!”
Nathan sighed. “So what’s the plan? Now that he’s here, what are you going to do?
“I don’t know.”
Nathan rolled his eyes. “You don't know! I see that ‘I don't know' has become rote with you and your sister!”
“Don’t be snarky, Nathan. I’m not exactly equipped psychologically to deal with a situation like this!”
“No kidding!” Nathan raked his fingers through his curly hair. “I’m just concerned about how adept at lying you have become. What else are you keeping from me, Andie?”
Andie did not respond. Really, she did not have the time for Nathan’s preachiness. She had bigger fish to fry right now. Bianca had finally managed to convince Samantha to see an OB/GYN. She had recommended Dr Creary, one of the consultants at the University Hospital. Samantha had not wanted to go alone. She wanted Bianca and Andie to go with her, but Andie told her she had some UWI check-out things to sort out, but she would meet them at Gauchos for lunch.
Andie sighed. Why oh why did she call Jeremy? But what other choice did she have? Samantha was evidently hormonal and not thinking clearly. She had to do the thinking for the two of them. Now that Jeremy had arrived in Kingston, she was not sure how to proceed. Andie wished she had asked Klao or Bianca for counsel before acting. She had only told Nathan because she wanted the company to go to the airport, and really she had to tell someone. Now he was pissed that she had not thought to tell him before, and she was going to be in so much trouble when Samantha joined them for lunch and found Jeremy waiting for her. She looked up as Jeremy reclaimed his seat at their table at Gauchos. He had disappeared to the restroom ten minutes earlier, and Andie half thought that he had hightailed it back to Montego Bay.
“Are you okay?” She asked, relieved that he was still there.
“No, actually, I’m not!” He replied honestly. "This is unbelievable!"
For the first time in his life, Jeremy understood what his grandmother meant when she used to talk about not knowing if she was ‘a fish or a fowl’. At that moment, he was feeling just that way.
He had been sitting at the kitchen table sipping his chamomile tea at six-thirty in the morning when Andie phoned him. At first he wondered why Andie Persaud would be phoning him. After all, their last conversation had taken place almost three years before, following that ugly betting incident with Nathan. She had not believed him, and had a total meltdown when Nathan had admitted it was true. He had felt sorry for her when he saw her crying, and for a moment wondered what he would have done if Jasmine had been in that situation, but his compassion had fizzled when Nathan chose her over their friendship… Her voice brought him back to the present.
“I’m really sorry to call so early…” she began. “Did I wake you?”
“It’s six-thirty in the morning!” Jeremy said, being harsher than called for. “What do you think?”
“You sound very much awake to me!” Andie countered.
Jeremy was getting annoyed. “Did you call me for a reason?”
“I need a favour…” Andie ventured cautiously.
“A favour from me?” Jeremy repeated incredulously. “What kind of favour could you possibly want from me?”
Andie was quiet for a moment. Suddenly, she wished she had not called Jeremy after all.
“Anne Dru? Are you still there?”
“Yes, I am. Do you think you can come to Kingston? Today?”
“What?” Jeremy wondered if he had fallen asleep and this conversation was a part of a really weird dream. “Why?”
“Because Samantha isn’t telling anybody, and she needs to – or at the very least she needs to tell you and…”
Andie Persaud was not making any sense. “Wait, Samantha isn’t telling anybody what?”
“About the baby! Not even our parents! She’s totally freaking out, and you have to come here and talk to her…”
“What baby?”
“Your baby! Aren’t you listening to me?”
“My baby? What the hell are you talking about?”
Andie sighed. How this idiot graduated from Columbia and gotten a position in Investments at Persaud Financials was beyond her. He was as thick as a brick. “Jeremy,” she said slowly. “Listen very carefully. A month and a half ago, you and your very efficient sperm came into close contact with my sister, and neither of you thought it sage to use a condom, so yes, your baby!”
Jeremy felt that he had been kicked in the stomach. “Samantha is pregnant?”
“Bingo!”
Jeremy was beyond flabbergasted. “How—how – how…”
“I just explained how, Jeremy!”
“Don’t get sardonic with me, Anne Dru!” Jeremy warned. He forgot his tea and started pacing the kitchen floor. “Samantha is not pregnant! I made sure that wouldn’t happen. And if she is, why didn’t she call me herself?”
“Yes, she is!” Andie insisted. “And she is totally freaking out, and that is why I’m calling you.”
This was all too surreal, Jeremy thought. Samantha was pregnant? For him? He was going to be a father? He did not want to be a father, at least not right now! What the hell did Andie expect him to do? He asked her just that.
“I want you to come here and help her figure it out!” Andie almost shouted. She felt like she was the only sane person left in the world. “This is a problem that the two of you got into together because you couldn’t hold your alcohol and keep your clothes on! You need to be grown up and sort it out!”
Jeremy instantly went into defensive mode. “Samantha obviously has it all ‘sorted out’ since she decided not to tell me. Sorry, Anne Dru, I can’t come to Kingston. I have commitments here in Mobay…”
“What?” Andie could not believe her ears. “You’re not coming?”
“Of course I’m not coming!” Jeremy exclaimed. “I can’t just drop everything and run up there because you said so. That’s not how this works!”
“Then how does it work, Jeremy?” Andie raged. “Tell me how it works. Tell me, because I thought that after I tell you that my sister is pregnant and that you are the father your first response, or the response of any responsible man, would be to come right away. I thought being here would be your first priority… I thought that was how it worked!”
Jeremy was silent for a moment. “Look,” he said finally. “I don’t… I can’t… Anne Dru, you call me at six-thirty in the morning and tell me that your sister, who I had a drunken one night stand with, is pregnant and you expect me to have all the answers right away? Well, guess what? I don’t have all the answers right now. I don’t know how to figure it out … This is nuts!”
“Listen to me, you moron!” Andie snapped. “I asked you to come to be polite, but now I am changing my tune. I am telling you that you better get your virile backside to Kingston today, and you and my sister better start sorting this out today, or I am going to my parents, and I am sure you don’t want one of them coming for you bodily!”
“Anne Dru…”
“Today, Jeremy!” Andie repeated. “You take down my number and you call me and tell me what time I should pick you up at the airport!”
Jeremy found himself that afternoon on an Air Jamaica flight from Montego Bay to Kingston. He had neither the heart nor the desire to explain to his mother what was actually happening. He was not even sure what was happening himself. During the half hour flight, all he could think about was that Sunday morning when he last saw Samantha. She was supposed to take the Plan B. How the hell could she possibly be pregnant? Andie and Nathan had come to fetch him at the airport, and now he was sitting in Gauchos Grill with Andie and Nathan, waiting for Samantha and Bianca to finish at the OB/GYN and meet them there for lunch. Jeremy
wasn’t hungry. He thought he would either throw up or pass out. Samantha was pregnant?
“Samantha and Bianca should be here soon,” Andie said, breaking his thoughts. “They are probably caught in traffic. I’m really sorry for all of this...”
“What are you sorry about?” Nathan asked crossly. “He’s the one who should be sorry!”
“It wasn’t like that, Nathan,” Jeremy began.
“Really, Jeremy? Really?” Nathan was getting angry all over again. “It wasn’t like what, you reckless, self-centred, immature jackass! Do you realise what you have done? I hope Dr Persaud shoots you when he finds out!”
“Nathan!” Andie exclaimed. “Don’t say things like that, and for Heaven’s sake, lower your voice!” She looked at Jeremy. “Where are you staying, Jeremy? You will stay in Kingston for a while, right?”
“I didn’t…” Jeremy began. In his confusion, he had not even made any plans for his stay in Kingston. He couldn’t even think of one friend that he could mooch off for the night. His only option was probably to stay with his father, and that was the last place on earth that he wanted to be.
“It’s okay. You can stay with Nathan…”
“Excuse me?” Nathan was not impressed. “He can stay with who?”
“He can stay on your sleeper couch …” Andie began.
“No. Absolutely not!” Nathan was beyond chagrined. “You think my apartment is the Hotel Four Seasons?”
Andie glared at him. “Why are you being mean?”
Nathan glared back at her, not caring that Jeremy was sitting right there. “Look, I don't want him in my apartment. I don’t like him, and I’m not going to pretend that I do. And I really don’t understand why you’re being nice to him. He marred your sister!”
“He didn’t ‘mar’ her on his own! They both marred each other, and at least he’s here and trying to figure it out. Doesn’t that count for anything?”
“Guys, don’t…” Jeremy tried to interject. He did not like the idea of Nathan and Andie fighting because of him. They ignored him.
“No, it doesn’t, and he’s not staying with me!”
“Why are you being a punk?”
“I’m being a punk?” Nathan was turning red. “I am being a punk?”
“Andie, I will try to find a hotel,” Jeremy tried to interject once more.
“No, you will stay with Nathan!” Andie was indomitable. “Nathan, he cannot sleep under a bus shed!”
“He can go to a hotel or stay with his father!” Nathan suggested.
“Or you can stop being an infant and let him stay with you!"
"I said no!"
"Really, Nathan!" Andie was definitely not backing down. "You're going to be like that? Man of God, what would Jesus do?”
Nathan furrowed his brow. Andie had mashed his corn. “Oh, so you’re playing the Christian card? Nice, Anne Dru!”
“Well, I didn't know you could pick and choose which attribute of Christ you wanted to have!" Andie declared. "You are only being mean to Jeremy because of the bet, and that was forever ago. How can you go to church every Saturday and call yourself ‘converted’ when you can’t even forgive?”
“Andie…” Jeremy began, but Andie cut him off.
"If anybody should be angry it’s me, and I’m over it. Jesus says you must treat each other the way you would want to be treated. You think if the tables were turned Jeremy would hesitate to put you up? Would you, Jeremy?”
“I…” Jeremy began, but Andie did not allow him to finish.
“See? He wouldn't. Be a good Samaritan, Nate!” Andie continued, softening her tone. “Just let him stay with you.”
Nathan knew when he couldn't win. This 'Christian' thing he had committed himself to a year ago was certainly not easy. He shrugged. “Fine. Whatever. But just one night. And I’m serious!”
“Thank you, Nathan,” Jeremy said humbly. He was too tired to even be offended that Nathan did not want him in his apartment.
“Sorry we are so late, guys!” Bianca Persaud hurried over to the table. “Traffic was unbelievable… Oh…” She noticed Jeremy. “Andie, what’s going on?”
“This is Jeremy,” Andie introduced them. “Jeremy, our cousin, Bianca.”
“Nice to meet you, Jeremy,” Bianca glanced at her cousin. “Does Sam know he’s here?”
“No. Where is she?”
“Parking. She’s going to kill you!”
“That has pretty much been established Bee!” Andie responded tartly. “I’ll go meet her in the parking lot. If I’m not back in ten minutes come look for me.”
***
Samantha pulled on her sunglasses and armed her blue Rav4 SUV. It had been a gift from her parents four years before when she had just started undergraduate at the University of the West Indies. They had bought it for her as a reward for earning 5 A’s in her A’Levels. A simpler time, Samantha thought, before she had lost her mind and made the biggest mistake of her life, and was now stuck in the place where nightmares were made. She had just, with Bianca by her side, gone through her very first prenatal visit. Dr Creary told her that she was nine weeks pregnant and her ‘new resident’ was the size of a cherry. Every time, she said ‘new resident’, Samantha felt like punching her. On a regular day, she was not a fan of euphemisms, irrespective of how clever they were, and on a day when she felt like an emotional pinball, Dr Creary’s perkiness was making her even more nauseated than her ‘new resident’.
Nevertheless, the visit brought home to her the fact that she had to tell her parents sooner rather than later. According to Dr Creary, the ‘new resident’ would cease being a resident sometime between Christmas and New Year. While Bianca had been thrilled and mesmerised by the heartbeat of ‘the new resident’, Samantha had been mortified. It was real. Too, too real, and she had no idea what she was going to do. Even after Dr Creary, in her perky singsong voice that made Samantha think she would be more at home on the other end of a telephone sex line, explained all the changes that she would undergo over the next 31 weeks, and after Bianca insisted that they stop and pick up a copy of ‘What to Expect When You’re Expecting’ and all the prenatal vitamins that had been prescribed, all that Samantha could think about was how she was going to deal with it all. She had planned every aspect of her life from the time she was a teenager. Being a 22 year old single mother was never a part of the equation. And Andie was not helping, by constantly digging into her skin like a flea, insisting that she tell her parents or Jeremy or Grandma Sylvia and Grandpa Ravi, the world’s least judgmental people.
She hoped that lunch with Bianca and Andie would help to calm her frazzled nerves. She would order a thick juicy Gauchos turkey burger with a spicy jerk sauce and while they ate, she and her sister and cousin would come up with a way to break the news to the rest of the family. She wondered whether she had to tell them who the father was. Telling them would only make matters worse, she thought. They would insist that he be there, Phillip would freak out, not to mention Dylan and Darrin. They were never members of Jeremy’s fan club. She would tell them it was some random guy from school ... which was only a half lie... Except how was she going to explain to her family her transformation from the girl who insisted she was going to remain a virgin until she got married, to this girl who managed to get impregnated by some random guy from school... No matter how she looked at the situation, she was up to her ears in crap.
She briskly walked across Gauchos parking lot, deep in thought, and almost ran over her sister.
“Where are you going?” She asked.
“I was coming to meet you,” Andie told her. “Are you okay? How was it?”
“Absolutely mortifying!” She pulled the sonogram from her Kate Spade tote and handed it to Andie. “That is your niece or nephew, and apparently, she or he will be arriving sometime around December 27.”
“Oh my goodness!” Andie gasped. “A Christmas baby! Are you excited?”
“I am ecstatic on the inside!” Samantha replied tartly.
Andie frowned at her sister’s sarcasm. She looked at the sonogram. “Where is the baby?”
“I have no idea," Samantha told her honestly. "Dr Creary and Bianca kept pointing at it, but..." She closed her eyes, thinking that she was already a bad mother. She could not even recognise her own child. "Let’s just go eat."
Andie studied the blurry black and white image. She did not see anything that remotely resembled a baby either. She would have to ask Bianca to show it to her later. But now, it was more real than before. A baby. Her niece or nephew. Nephew, she decided. She wanted a nephew, and they were going to name him Sebastian. She looked at the image again. He was in there somewhere, and she loved him already. She was going to be the best aunt in the world. Her first official job as Auntie Andie was to get her nephew’s stubborn mother to talk to his mortified father. She stuck the sonogram into the pocket of her jeans and looked at her sister.
“I need to tell you something.”
“Tell me while we eat, please,” Samantha advised, walking away. "I’m starving!"
“Samantha, wait…”
But Samantha did not wait. She crossed the quaint little bridge that served as the entrance to Gauchos and scanned the patio for Bianca. She smiled when she saw her cousin, but her expression faltered into anger when she saw who was sitting next to her. No way! No frigging way! Jeremy Malcolm? Questions were flying around inside her head at the speed of light. She began to feel nauseated again, and this time it was not because of morning sickness. It was way too late in the afternoon for that.
“What is he doing here?” She seethed, looking at Andie.
“I called him,” Andie confessed.
“You what?”
“I called him,” Andie repeated. “I had to. Look, I don't blame you if you are pissed, but you are wrong to keep him out of this. He needs to know what’s going on!”
"And Nathan?" Samantha asked. "Did you tell him, too?"
"Yes!"
"What the hell is wrong with you?"
"What's wrong with me?" Andie questioned. "You're the one not taking this seriously!"