by Jay McLean
Copyright © 2015 Jay Mclean
Published by Jay McLean
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Published: Jay McLean August 2015
Cover Design: Jay McLean
Dedication
To the dads in my life who prove time and time again that blood is not always thicker than water, and that your family is what you make it.
My non-husband Warwick McLean - who loves me, flaws and all.
My father-in-law Richard “Pa” McLean - who has always encouraged me to take a chance. (Fire truck cancer)
And last but not least, to a man I've loved since I was five, my (step) Dad Steve “Gam Gam” - whose only advice has and will always be: to do what makes me happy.
Dad, because of you, I am happy.
But most of all, I am.
Prologue
With my eyes closed, I could feel every stone, every bump, every crack of the pavement. The wheels spun—gripping tightly to form that perfect relationship with the ground.
The board, the ground and me—we were one—nothing to hide, nothing to lose.
I heard the dribble of the basketball and silence for a second, then the ball bouncing off the metal hoop. Hunter’s feet scraped across the asphalt, kicking loose gravel around on the half-court we’d been coming to since we were kids. I opened my eyes and set my foot on the tail of the deck, slowing down, and then finally coming to a stop. I didn’t join him in our usual game of Skateball. Instead, I sat on the bench; shoulders slumped from the proverbial weight that’d just been dumped on them.
“What’s wrong?” he asked, sitting down next to me.
He’d been my best friend since I could remember, so of course he could tell. Or maybe I was shit at hiding it. I looked down at the board beneath my feet as I moved it from side to side, itching just to jump back on, coast away, and chase that high of being alone.
Alone with just me, the deck, and spinning of the wheels.
“Natalie says she pregnant.”
Hunter’s foot landed on the nose of my skateboard, stopping it from moving. “Josh?”
I heard the weariness in his voice, but I didn’t look up. I didn’t want to see what his eyes would convey. Probably pity.
“What are you going to do?” he asked.
I shrugged. “She just dropped the news on me and told me to leave—that she didn’t want my input on her decision.”
“That’s bullshit.”
I shrugged again. “I didn’t know what else to do so I gave her what she wanted.”
“What do you want to do?”
“Not think about it.”
“You can’t ignore it.”
I lifted my gaze, but still avoided his. “I don’t want to think about it because I don’t want to have my mind or my heart set on something and she chooses the opposite.”
“I’m sorry,” he said, and I laughed. Because really? What the hell else could I do? He added, “I didn’t even know you were having sex.”
“Twice,” I told him. “Condom broke the second time.”
“Fuck.”
I sat back and crossed my arms. “Yeah. That pretty much covers it.”
He sighed loudly, but I still couldn’t look at him. “So we wait until she decides and we go from there.”
“We?”
“Always we, Josh. Whatever you need.”
I stood up. “I’ll see ya, Hunter.” And then I pushed off the ground with one foot, the other on the board, and headed home—wondering the entire time what Hunter’s face would’ve looked like when the word “pregnant” left my mouth. I laughed. It was dumb to laugh, but like I said, what the hell else could I do?
For two weeks Natalie talked and I listened. She went back and forth a thousand times over, repeating the same questions. Then one day, she sat down next to me in the school cafeteria and placed my hand on her stomach. My eyes snapped to hers. Her bright blue eyes seemed to sparkle when she flicked her blonde hair over her shoulder and pushed out her stomach. And then she smiled. “Promise me we’ll do it together?” she asked.
And I found myself smiling with her. “Of course,” I said. And I meant it.
We were sixteen and pregnant. And at the time—we were happy.
We told her parents first. She said it would be easier if she did it alone, but I refused. Natalie and the baby were my soon-to-be family, and I sure as hell would take responsibility for them. Her parents were disappointed. Her dad looked like he was going to punch me. Truthfully, I’d geared myself up for it. Natalie was an only child, like me, and she was their baby. But they weren’t around much. Her dad was a hotshot industrial realtor who traveled a lot. Her mom was his trophy, and she’d follow him wherever. We were lucky though—they understood that the decision to keep the baby was ours, and they said they’d support us to a certain degree. But they were done being parents, and not ready to be grandparents, so not to expect too much support.
My parents? That was a whole other story. My dad actually did what I thought Natalie’s dad would do. Yeah. He punched me. My mom cried. Natalie cried. My parents yelled some more. My mom kept mumbling about how she should’ve forced me to go to church with her every Sunday. My dad called me useless and told me to pack my bags and leave. Mom cried some more. I caught her gaze once, pleading with her to try to talk some sense into Dad. She knew what I was silently asking, because she said, “No, Joshua. This is your mistake. You deal with the consequences.” I did what they wanted. I packed my shit and left. No one would ever call my child a mistake. No one.
Natalie drove home.
I skated to Hunter’s.
He saw the bag in my hand and the fresh bruise under my eye and opened the door wider.
I slept in his guest bedroom for a while, walking on eggshells around his asshole dad. Then one day Hunter said, “You wanna look for an apartment or something? We could get jobs and split the rent.” And I knew what that meant without him actually coming out and saying it. His dad wanted me out. He added, “I’d offer you the guesthouse, but Mom’s moved in there.”
“What?”
“Yeah. I think it’s easier to hide her drinking.”
I called Natalie. She picked me up and took me back to her house. Her parents said I could stay in the bedroom down in their basement until I found something more suitable just as long as no one knew about it. They didn’t want to seem like the type of parents who encouraged sex and teen pregnancies. With them being gone so much on business, Natalie and I made a home for us in my temporary bedroom and played house during the day. We never argued, never had a bad thing to say to each other. It was nice. Actually, it was kind of perfect.
My parents never called.
We combined all our savings and the money that her mom had secretly given her to buy clothes and diapers and everything else the Internet told us we’d need. We went to all the doctor’s appointments together, and when she started trul
y showing, she stopped hiding it from the kids at school and everyone else. I was proud of her. I was proud of us. And on the day that Thomas Joshua Christian was born, I was the proudest damn man in the entire world.
She said she didn’t want to give him my last name. She wanted to wait until we were married and then she’d change it… something about not wanting to be looked down on when she gave people their different last names. I thought she was being stupid, but she had gotten ridiculously moody toward the end of the pregnancy so I chose my battles, and I let her win every single one.
I really wish I knew what happened between the months leading up to the birth, until the few weeks after. All I could think of is that we actually had the baby. Natalie—she complained a lot about everything: breastfeeding, exhaustion, having to do it all on her own, me not helping. I didn’t know how much more I could do. I changed every diaper, every outfit. Even when she was awake for feedings, I’d wake up with her so she didn’t have to feel alone. She was exhausted, and I understood that, which is why I helped out as much as I could.
So, gone were the days of playing house, of never arguing, of everything being perfect.
All of it gone.
And then, on Tommy’s one-month birthday, so was she.
I woke up to him crying in the middle of the night. I searched the house for her but I couldn’t find her anywhere. I even knocked on her parent’s bedroom door and asked them where she was. They said they had no idea and went back to sleep. All the while my baby cried, hungry, in my arms.
I tried to call her.
She didn’t answer.
I looked for her car.
It wasn’t there.
Then I saw it: the note on the nightstand next to the framed picture of my family.
I’m sorry, Josh. I just couldn’t do it.
★★★
It’d only been two weeks since Natalie took off when her parents asked to talk to me. I was still living in their basement, eating their food, using their water and electricity. I’d never asked for more of them. In fact, they barely even looked at their grandchild. “I know this is hard, Josh,” Gloria, Natalie’s mom, started. “But we didn’t agree to this living arrangement.”
I stared down at my son, not even two months old, sleeping peacefully in my arms. He had it tough for a few days after Natalie left. I had to buy special formula to wean him off the breast milk. He didn’t take too well to it. I had gone through three different brands before I found one that he could actually keep down. I’d stopped going to school. Hunter—he came around to bring my homework, even though he knew I wouldn’t do it. Honestly, I think he came just to see Tommy. He was kind of obsessed with the kid.
“Josh?” Gloria said, pulling me from my thoughts. “I hope you understand.”
I didn’t.
I couldn’t.
I couldn’t understand how anyone could turn their backs on their family… and yet here I was—facing nothing but backs.
I nodded and pushed back the tears threatening to fall. Never looking up from my son, I asked, “Have you heard from her?”
William, Natalie’s dad, cleared his throat. “Yes,” he said. “She asked for money.”
Silence descended on the table, my mind reeling, my rage building. Then I finally spoke. “Did she ask about us?”
Gloria answered, “No, Joshua. She didn’t.”
William stood up, bringing my attention to him. He pulled out his wallet and dumped two hundred-dollar bills in front of me.
“Thank you,” I said, standing up and grabbing the cash.
I called Hunter once I was in my room packing everything I thought we’d need.
“Where to?” he asked after I’d installed Tommy’s car seat in his car and sat in the back with him.
“Home, I guess.”
My dad slammed the door in my face. My mom cried.
When I got back in the car, Hunter looked pissed. “I’ll be back,” he said, and marched up to my parent’s front door. He pushed it open and walked past my dad, slamming the door behind him.
I don’t know what they spoke about, but it was loud. Mom cried harder. Dad yelled louder, but Hunter—he yelled the loudest.
We went to a hotel. Hunter paid for a week in advance on his mom’s credit card. “She’s too tanked to even know it’s missing,” he told me.
I didn’t argue.
After we unloaded his car and he helped us settle into the room, he sat on the edge of the bed, his shoulders slumped and head bent.
I asked, “What’s wrong?”
He looked up at me and I could see the sympathy behind his glazed eyes. “I hate that this is happening to you.”
I sighed. “Tell you what…” I removed Tommy from his car seat and handed him to Hunter. Hunter looked down at him, smiling as soon as my son was in his arms. “Look at him, Hunter. Look at him from my eyes and tell me any of this isn’t worth it.”
Hunter let me borrow his car, opting to skate anywhere he needed.
Thank God for Hunter.
I spent the week looking for jobs. Turns out no one wanted to hire a seventeen-year-old high school dropout who brought their baby to interviews.
Even though two hundred dollars seems like a lot—it’s not, especially when you have a baby.
“Your card’s been declined,” the clerk behind the register said.
My heart stopped. “What?”
She shrugged. “Sorry.”
I took out my wallet and fished around for cash. I had a twenty but that wouldn’t cover what I needed. I looked at the formula, wipes, and diapers sitting on the register, trying to decide which one I needed less. “Take out the wipes.”
She shook her head. “Still not enough.”
I ignored the grumbles from people in the line behind me. My heart was thumping now, finally cracking under the pressure. “I need the formula and diapers,” I pleaded with her, knowing it was useless.
She shrugged again. “Sorry.”
She wasn’t sorry. She didn’t give a fuck.
“Fine. Just the formula.”
I walked to my car in a complete daze, wondering what the hell else I could possibly do. I searched the diaper bag in the trunk of Hunter’s car, hoping Natalie may have hidden an emergency stash. Nothing. I searched my plastic bag of clothes and found an old T-shirt. I looked from the shirt, to Tommy, and back again. And then I had no choice but to use it as a diaper. I had no idea how to wrap it, or what to do, and this wouldn’t last long before he needed to be changed again.
I needed money.
And I needed it fast.
Then I saw it—hiding beneath Tommy’s port-a-crib. My IXO longboard. I’d saved up almost a year just to drop $1500 on it. I’d used it to compete in street comps. It was my pride and joy pre-Tommy.
I pulled it out without a thought and finished dressing him, then walked to Deck and Check, the skate shop two doors down from the grocery store.
“I’ll give you fifty for it,” Aiden said from behind the glass counter.
“Bullshit, Aiden, you know what this is worth.”
Aiden leaned forward to examine the board again. “I get it, Josh. But the punks around here—they don’t care for this kind of shit. Only you do.”
Tommy started crying.
I tried to soothe him.
Aiden added, “You’re the only one around here that knows what this is worth. I don’t want it for myself, and I can’t sell it. I’ll give you a hundred.”
I felt my heart tighten. Another crack. Tommy cried harder.
“Aiden, please!” I begged. “A hundred won’t cover his diapers. I need diapers. I need gas. I need a place to fucking sleep tonight. You gotta help me out, bro. Please.”
Aiden stood taller. “I feel for you, Josh, but this is my business. One fifty. That’s it.”
Tommy was wailing now.
I dropped my gaze. “One fifty will barely get me a hotel room.”
“I’m sorry.” He wasn’t.
; “Fine.”
I took his cash and in return, I said goodbye to my old life.
I bumped into someone waiting behind me, apologized, and walked out the doors to my uncertain future.
I took three steps around the corner and into an alley. And then I finally let the cracks from the pressure break me.
I placed Tommy, in his car seat, on the ground and I cursed.
I kicked the brick wall.
And I broke some more.
Tommy cried louder.
I slid down the wall until I was next to him and pulled him out of the seat and into my arms. Rocking him. Soothing him.
And I cried—tasting my tears mixed with his sweat on his forehead as I kissed him. “I’m sorry, baby. I’m sorry. Daddy’s gonna make it okay. Daddy isn’t going anywhere, okay? I’ll never leave you. Never. I promise.”
I wiped my eyes and nose with the sleeve of my hoodie and tried to calm down. But we were both crying, and his cries made me cry harder, because as much as I promised to make it right—I had no idea how to.
Then the strangest thing happened.
The tiniest ray of sunlight shone between the two buildings. The strength of it causing Tommy to flinch, then open his eyes, long enough to possibly see the outline of my face.
He stopped crying.
I stopped crying.
Then something dropped next to my feet. My longboard.
“What the…”
I looked up.
An old lady was smiling down at me. She had dark skin, like she came from an exotic island somewhere. “You need gas money? I need a young man to help me shop for groceries and give me a ride home.” She had an accent.
I sniffed and stood up, Tommy still in my arms. Then I looked down at my board. “What? How did—”
“Let’s go.”
“Wait…”
“What are your names?” she asked.
“Joshua.” I lifted Tommy slightly. “This is my son Tommy.”
She raised her arms, her eyes soft and pleading. There was a hint of pride in her expression—the way my mom used to look at me before everything went to shit. For that reason, I felt safe enough to hand over the only thing that mattered to me. She smiled warmly and looked down at my son. “He’s beautiful.” She motioned her head toward the car seat and my board. “Don’t forget your things. Let’s go.”