by Sara Ney
“Why’d he do that?”
“He assumed the baby was Rex’s.”
“Awesome.” Just great.
As if the fucking situation wasn’t fucked up enough, people are going to think this baby—my baby—is Rex motherfucking Gunderson’s, the biggest dipshit on campus?
Over my dead body.
I’ve never been jealous of a single soul before meeting that moron, but I’m jealous now—insanely so.
I can’t believe Anabelle is naïve enough to fall for his nice-guy routine after being shit on by him once before.
Jesus H. Christ.
“Don’t get mad, Elliot.” Her voice is cajoling, low and soft. “I didn’t want to tell you over the phone, and I was afraid I wouldn’t see you until December, because by then I’ll be huge and oh my God, this is so bad. First I’m fine, then I’m crying, then I’m fine. I’m a mess—I never would have known I was pregnant if I hadn’t gone to the doctor, and since I hadn’t been to a doctor in Iowa before, I was required to have a physical.” She’s crying and babbling at the same time. “And the doctor started asking me all these questions about being pregnant, and I thought there was no way I could be, no way, but the pill isn’t one hundred percent and I was devastated when I found out.
“And so scared. I couldn’t sleep and I looked like shit, but I had to go to class. I couldn’t stay in bed crying forever—that wouldn’t be doing anyone any good. So, I showed up to the lecture hall, and who walks in but Rex. There he was, said I looked tired and did I want some coffee? He made an offhanded comment about the way I looked then a wisecrack about me being pregnant, and what could I say? I couldn’t lie. Because I am.
“One time we went to Target and walked through the baby aisle looking at all the tiny clothes.” She laughs. “He thought it would cheer me up.”
I want to be sick, want to puke all over this white bedspread at the thought of Gunderson taking her to the fucking baby department at goddamn Target. What the actual fuck?
It’s like I went to bed last night and woke up in a parallel universe where Rex Gunderson has taken over my life and is filling my shoes.
You moved to Michigan, remember?
She doesn’t say it, but we’re both thinking it.
I shut my mouth and save my comments for myself. Run my hand over her abs, up toward her breasts, not daring to actually touch them. “Have these gotten any bigger?” I blurt out rudely.
“Oh my God, seriously?” Anabelle groans. “You just found out I’m pregnant and you’re asking if my boobs are bigger.”
“Well, yeah.”
“Well they aren’t, not yet, but they probably will be.”
“Huh.”
She yawns.
“Anabelle?”
“Yeah?”
“I just want you to know I’m…sorry, for this, for everything I missed.”
“You don’t have to apologize, we’re both responsible.”
“I know, but I should have known better.”
She tilts her head, trying to get a better look at me. “What do you mean?”
“Until you’re in a committed relationship, you should always wear a condom. That’s like, textbook common sense—Oz and Zeke lectured me about it all the fucking time.”
“I was committed to you, Elliot, in my own way, whether you wanted me to be or not.”
“I didn’t mean it as an insult.”
“What did you mean, then?”
“Unless two people are planning a future together, they should be careful.”
“You know what, Elliot? I’ve been living like this for weeks with nothing to do but lie here, by myself, and think about this baby inside me over and over and over again. I lie in the dark, dwelling on it, on what we could have done differently and how my life is going to change. How disappointed my parents are. My mother barely speaks to me, blames this whole thing on my dad.” She yawns. “Can we just sleep? This second trimester is kicking my ass.” Her hand reaches for mine, pulling it around her waist. “I’m glad you’re here.”
The lights are shut off and after Anabelle dozes off, I’m still lying in the dark, hands behind my head, staring at the ceiling.
I’m going to be a father at the age of twenty-two.
A dad.
Because I got a girl I’m not in a relationship with pregnant.
Knocking a girl up is something I would have expected my old roommates to have done before they found love and settled. They’re the ones who used to sleep around, not me.
What the hell am I going to do?
Anabelle
“So how did it go at your dad’s thing?”
He’s been gone for hours, having left the house late morning, looking dapper in black dress pants and a button-down shirt. I helped him with his tie, a periwinkle blue and bright pink paisley, my trembling hands so embarrassingly unknowledgeable on the task, I had to redo it four times.
Elliot stood patiently, smelling like a fresh shower while I fumbled. Then, with a self-conscious backward glance—as if he almost couldn’t make himself go—his black leather dress shoes carried him out the door and down the steps. Headed to some fancy hotel downtown when between us, there were so many things left unsaid.
But he’s back now, sitting in my kitchen, able to rationally discuss “the situation.”
The situation—is that what I’m calling it now?
“How did it go? I honestly have no idea—I could barely concentrate on anything my father or his colleagues were saying during their speeches. This baby thing is all I could fucking think about. I sleepwalked through the entire day.”
This baby thing…
I know he didn’t mean to say it like that, but still, a knot forms in the pit of my stomach and I resist the urge to put my hands on my belly protectively. I’ve been doing that a lot lately—touching my small bump, rubbing it and gazing at it in the mirror, watching it grow.
Gunderson calls it AnaBean, convinced that it’s a girl.
That thought puts a smile on my face.
“I’m sorry. I know it’s…I know I gave you the shock of a lifetime last night.” I fiddle with the straw in my water glass. “Rex thinks I should have told you sooner.”
“Oh?” His inflection is sarcastic, lip uncharacteristically curled. “Rex thinks so, huh? What else does he say?”
I sigh, frustrated, knowing Elliot can’t stand Gunderson, but still determined to make him accept the fact that Rex is in my life. I bite back a moody reply that would probably only serve to piss him off even further. The tension at this table is already palpable; no need for me to make it worse.
“When do you leave?”
“In the morning.”
Tomorrow.
That knot in my belly tightens; he’s leaving.
Again.
“I don’t know what else to do here, Anabelle. I have to go back and finish the semester. My hands are tied—I can’t stay, you have to know that.”
I do know it.
“I felt like a dickhead leaving before. This is going to kill me.” He reaches across the table, grasping for my hands. “I’ll be back for the holidays, and we can figure out what we’re going to do then.”
“What do you mean?”
“I want…I want to be here for you, dammit—I don’t want you relying on that fuckstick Gunderson.”
“Because you care or because you’re jealous?”
“Both! Jesus, both. That kid drives me fucking nuts—he shouldn’t be the one walking you around the baby aisle.”
Relief floods my body. “When did you decide this?”
“Last night. I couldn’t sleep for shit. And today, all fucking morning while I let my sisters race me around town to buy a gift for our dad, I wanted to pull my hair out.”
I’ve had a lot of sleepless nights myself, full of fear and worry and paranoia. “Are you saying you want to leave your master’s program?”
“That’s exactly what I’m saying. It’s not fair that you’re doing thi
s alone, and if the next words out of your mouth are ‘But I’m not doing it alone, I’m doing it with Rex,’ I swear to you Anabelle, I’ll lose my mind.”
“I am made of sterner stuff than that, Elliot. My father is the coach for one of the best college wrestling teams in the United States. He did not raise me to rely on any man. I can do this on my own. I can. I promise you, I’m strong enough.”
I’ve given it a lot of thought, day in and day out, until it was the only thing getting me through the week, the idea of having and raising this baby on my own while still going to school.
After this semester, I’ll only have one more to single-parent my way through.
“Anabelle…” Elliot hedges.
“Stop. We are not discussing it.” I squeeze my eyes shut, rather immaturely. “The best thing for your future—for this baby’s future”—I place my hand on my stomach—“is for you to get your master’s from Michigan. Make something of yourself—that’s what I want. You hate it in Iowa.”
“Is that what you think? That I hate it here?”
“I don’t think you hate it, but I don’t think it’s where you want to be. Before you left, you said there was nothing here for you.”
“I was an idiot,” he sputters. “I didn’t mean you.”
“Elliot,” I say patiently, “I like you too much to ask you to leave school, and I know you’re still getting over the shock of all this, but if you want to support this child, you’ll stay where you are and get your degree.” I pause. “We both know it’s the right thing to do.”
Elliot is quiet and I know he’s considering my words, thinking through their logic.
He knows I’m right.
The place for him is where he’s at, not here with me.
“Are you pushing me away on purpose?”
“I’m not pushing you away, I’m trying not to be selfish so we can do what’s right.”
Why does doing what’s right hurt so much?
“You need some time just like I did. You’re going to go back home, to Michigan, and it’s going to hit you all over again that I am pregnant. I’m pregnant, Elliot, and I’m having this baby and it took me an entire month to get used to the idea, an entire month until I stopped ugly crying.” I’m watching him carefully, eyes perilously close to welling up. “You’ve known less than thirty-six hours—you haven’t experienced the whole range of emotions.”
“I just feel…” He’s holding back, I can feel it.
“Tell me. Be honest.”
His head shakes. “I can’t say it without sounding like a fucking douchebag, but I’m relieved that I get to leave, okay? I also feel guilty that I’m going. Disgusted with myself. Ashamed. Jesus, I feel it all, and it feels like shit.”
My lips part wordlessly.
I wanted him to be honest, yes, but the kind of truth tormenting him is the hardest to bear. It’s raw and real and complicated.
Elliot runs his fingers through his hair, tugging at the strands, and I can tell without even feeling it that his heart is beating fast.
“Your flight leaves at seven in the morning, and when it takes off, we both know you’ll be on it.”
Elliot
“Anabelle? Are you sleeping?”
“No.”
“Me either.”
Obviously.
I feel the mattress dip as she rolls toward me. With the bright full moon shining, there’s enough light to make out the delicate features of her face, the slope of her nose and the curved jawline. The bow of her lips. The faint arch of her brows.
“I don’t know what to do, Anabelle.”
The room is silent as she gathers her thoughts.
“Me either, but…that’s okay.”
“How the hell are you so calm about this?”
“I’m not calm, I’ve just had more time to get used to the idea.”
I want to reach out and pull her close, touch her and kiss her and feel the warm press of her body against mine. Am I allowed to now that I’ve gone and gotten her pregnant? Would she let me hold her, or would she tell me to go fuck myself?
“Kind of wish you would have met my roommate this weekend.”
“Where has she been?”
“She doesn’t usually go home much, but this weekend her grandpa turned one hundred. Her family is only a few hours away, so…”
“Does she think I’m an asshole?”
“No. She knows the situation.”
The situation—is that what we’re calling it now?
“Good. I mean, you don’t need the added stress of having friends who think you’re irresponsible for getting…”
I can’t say the word pregnant out loud. Cannot.
“Madison hasn’t said anything judgmental, not that I know of, and definitely not to my face. A few of my friends back home in Mass…that’s a different story. You remember that I went to a Catholic college, right?”
I nod in the dark, mentally counting all the times I’ve used the Lord’s name in vain, just in the past few months—hundreds.
Thousands, and counting.
“I’d be lying if I said I hadn’t lost a few friends over this. It’s been rough. My freshman roommate Savannah won’t speak to me. She called me a charlatan.”
“What!”
Her voice is composed. “That’s how she was raised, Elliot, with the belief that we save ourselves for marriage. Touching and fooling around are for committed relationships. I miss her, but I don’t blame her.” Anabelle’s voice is the epitome of patience and understanding, and it occurs to me that this is how she’ll be with her child.
Our child.
The thought is rather mollifying.
She changes the subject, enquiring quietly, “When are you going to tell your parents?”
“Eventually. As shitty as it sounds, I might just call and tell my mom over the phone.”
“Elliot! Are you serious?”
“Look, Anabelle, I have to live with the idea a little while first. Plus, without sounding callous, I don’t think they’re going to melt down about it, not like your dad. I’m pretty sure they’ll be understanding.”
“How can you be sure?”
“I’m not, but I have older sisters and one of them—Jill—had a baby in high school. I don’t remember my mom ever yelling or crying about it. I remember her being super chill, considering.” My mom is the most caring and quiet woman I’ve ever met, the calming force in my father’s stressful life, and in mine and my sisters’.
Growing up, my mother would be standing at the kitchen counter when I walked through the door after school, always with a snack prepared and dinner in the oven.
Always.
Nauseatingly idyllic, my childhood was a goddamn Norman Rockwell painting of home-cooked dinners, perfect grades, and playing outside on our manicured lawn.
Anabelle hums in her throat. “What’s it like having parents who are relaxed and sympathetic? Mine are both so intense and intimidating. I was petrified to tell them.”
“Tell me about it—what happened?”
“Well, when I told my dad, the season hadn’t started and I picked a time I assumed he’d be less stressed out. I hadn’t been sleeping a lot, so I looked like complete shit when I went over there.”
Pfft. “I find that hard to believe.”
“That’s sweet of you to say.” Her hand finds mine in the dark, giving it a gentle pat. “In any case, Dad noticed the differences in me right away, right? It’s his job to be observant, and he started asking me all these questions. I’m convinced he thought I was on drugs.”
“Why?”
“All the sudden changes. I was slightly depressed at the beginning and wanted to be alone. Lost some weight from not eating. I got no sleep—it was tearing me up inside. And now…I know what I have to do to graduate and I’m not a fool. I know it’s going to be hard, but how am I supposed to do an internship with an infant? Who’s going to hire me? It’s depressing just thinking about it.”
“You’ll
get an internship, Anabelle—who wouldn’t want to hire you?”
“If you’re trying to flatter me, it’s working. Not to sound like a drag, but I needed someone to make me feel better.” In the dim light of her bedroom, I see her white teeth peeking through a grin.
“Is it too soon for me to put my hand on your stomach again?” I ask softly, determined to take advantage of the lightened mood.
“Sure, that’s fine. She’s not kicking or anything.”
“She?”
“AnaBean.” She laughs. “I don’t know that it’s a girl—we can’t find out until twenty weeks—but it’s the nickname Rex gave the baby.”
I stiffen, trying to ignore the fact that she used Gunderson’s name in reference to my baby, and smile because the name is so damn cute.
“AnaBean,” I repeat, somewhat amazed—amazed that being with her here like this isn’t freaking me out. Me, lying in the dark with my pregnant old roommate. Me, lying in the dark with a girl I left behind in pursuit of better things.
I’m almost twenty-three years old.
I thought I had my life mapped out.
Instead, I lay my hand on Anabelle’s stomach, letting her guide me over her skin, flesh different but the same. In the short amount of time I lived with her, I learned a few things I knew I’d never forget, like the fact that she smells good all the time, even without showering.
Her skin is always smooth.
She doesn’t hold a grudge and forgives easily—almost too easily. Case in point: Rex Gunderson, who, oddly enough, she let into her life.
I consider these factoids as my big palm caresses her stomach, basking in the memories we’ve shared in this bed. The late nights watching television, arguing over which show to watch…whether or not to eat in bed…who was going to turn the light off…whether there were too many blankets.
And the sex.
Sweaty and sweet and fucking fantastic.
Anabelle isn’t shy or self-conscious, which made it good—so goddamn good. I’m getting excited remembering all the times we screwed. Against the wall by the front door. She came home from an afternoon class wearing a yellow sundress and Converse, and I met her at the door, hands sliding down her waist, up the back of her flower-covered skirt.