Our New Normal (ARC)

by Colleen Faulkner

  And a part of me hates the idea that I have to tell him that Hazel’s pregnant. Because he’s going to be angry and hurt and disappointed. I don’t want to hurt him. And a part of me resents being the one who has to do it. Shouldn’t Hazel be the one to do it? Of course, I didn’t give her that option, did I? Couldn’t, because I know my daughter. It would be Christmas before she broached the subject.

  How am I going to tell him? How am I going to break his heart? In my mind, Hazel is still the daughter I knew an hour ago, but what if Oscar doesn’t see her that way?

  I walk to the Adirondack chair beside his and plop down.

  Our dog, a black-and-white Bernese mountain dog, who’s really not our dog at all but Oscar’s, lifts his head and looks at me, then lowers his head to his paws again. Oscar named him Willie Nelson. That’s what we call him, not Willie and not Nelson. Willie Nelson. A crazy name for a dog, but the kids thought it was funny and I gave in because I don’t have to worry about anyone grabbing the wrong Willie Nelson’s medical records at the vet’s office.

  Oscar closes his book, one finger inside to hold his place. He’s a big guy, six-four, not heavy, but sturdy. With big hands. Right now, I want to reach out and take his hand. Feel his warmth, but I don’t because things have been weird between us lately. We don’t hold hands like we used to.

  “Can you guess what Eleanor Roosevelt, Mahatma Gandhi, and Hitler all have in common?” Oscar asks.

  It’s a game we play all the time, more often when we’re here at the cottage. He’s an avid reader of nonfiction and he likes to share what he learns with me. He’s been reading books on World War II for more than a year now. The facts are interesting, but I liked his Genghis Khan phase better.

  My first impulse is to blurt out, “Your daughter’s pregnant!” Instead, I just say, “What?”

  “All three were nominated for a Nobel Peace Prize.”

  Ordinarily I’d find that little tidbit fascinating, but I’m still trying to wrap my head around the idea that in about twenty-six weeks, my daughter is going to push a baby out of her vagina.

  I must have a good poker face because Oscar doesn’t seem to notice that I feel like my life is imploding. Actually, shattering is a more accurate description. I can feel bits of me separating from my body and floating away without gravity to keep me together.

  “Nineteen thirty-nine.” He folds the dust jacket of the hardback book into the pages to save his place. He sets the book down and reaches for his beer bottle in a koozie. “Three months before he invaded Poland and started World War II. A guy in the Swedish parliament nominated him, calling him the “prince of peace on earth.” He was being facetious, trying to get people’s attention around the world, I guess. He withdrew the nomination, but . . .” Oscar shrugs. “I guess it was too late. Hitler already had incredible momentum.”

  He’s wearing an old New England Patriots T-shirt and shorts and is barefoot. He appears so relaxed. This place is his escape from the world and the critical, sometimes dying, patients he cares for as an emergency department physician’s assistant.

  Suddenly I have second thoughts about telling him about Hazel. We have to go home tomorrow night; he works Monday. Maybe I should wait, give it another day, give Hazel some time to think. Give myself time to fully wrap my head around the situation.

  But that’s never how Oscar and I have done things. We don’t lie to each other, and we don’t withhold information, not to protect our children, not even to protect each other. It’s something that’s always been good about our marriage. It was one of the things my friend Amelia felt was a problem in theirs; her divorce just became final, and after eighteen years of marriage, she’s suddenly single. It’s not as if I think not telling Oscar that our daughter is pregnant until after he’s had dinner is going to end our marriage, but it’s the principle of the thing.

  And I need him. I need him to see that Hazel cannot keep this baby. He knows her. He knows she’s not mature enough to be a mother and he knows that dipshit Tyler well enough to know that he’s not going to be any help on the parenting end. Oscar will agree that the baby should be put up for adoption and maybe he and I, together, can convince Hazel.

  Oscar sips his beer. He’s a Shipyard enthusiast and no fancy flavors; he’s a local guy, local beer. “Some people think Hitler was nominated as a way to provoke the Nazis—”

  “Hazel’s pregnant,” I blurt. I lower my face to my hands. Suddenly I’m fighting tears.

  “I’m sorry?” He says it as if he didn’t hear my fast-food order.

  “Hazel’s pregnant,” I repeat. Then I lower my hands and look at him. “About three months. Pregnant.” I repeat the word.

  His suntanned face turns visibly paler. I see him clench his hand into a fist.

  And then we’re both quiet for a moment. Which surprises me because it wouldn’t have surprised me if he’d shouted, “Pregnant?” loud enough for Sean to hear, even wearing his headphones.

  I look at him. Wait. When he doesn’t say anything after a minute or two, I go on. “She says she wants to have the baby. She and Tyler are going to,” I make air quotes, “ ‘get married, have the baby, and then figure out the rest.’ ” I laugh, but there’s no humor in my voice. “I think it’s a terrible idea. Even to contemplate.”

  When he finally speaks, his voice sounds strange. As if it’s someone else’s and not my husband’s. “I don’t know if this is your decision to make.”

  “Oscar . . .” I turn in the chair so my whole body is facing him, our knees touching. “Tyler is not going to marry her. We wouldn’t want him to even if he agreed to it. He’s lazy, emotionally detached, and . . .” I exhale. “There’s no question in my mind that Tyler will not be around for the birth of this baby. He might not even be around after she tells him she’s pregnant.” I search my husband’s face. He’s not meeting my gaze. “Hazel cannot take care of a baby. She’s just going into the eleventh grade! She wants to be a physician. She wants to see Greece. She wants to buy a new Nissan Cube. She’ll never get to do those things if she has a baby at seventeen years old.”

  His eyes tear up and a lump rises in my throat.

  “I don’t think any decisions have to be made today,” he says. “We have time, right?”

  I reach out and squeeze his hand.

  “Tell me what you’re thinking,” I say softly. “You don’t really think she can take care of a baby, do you? She can’t remember to feed the dog.”

  Willie Nelson opens one eye as if to confirm that he’s missed more than one meal due to our daughter’s lack of responsibility.

  Oscar sets down his book in the grass and stares out at the water. I stare at him.

  “I guess there’s no need for me to ask if you’re sure?”

  “Three missed periods, two positive home pregnancy tests.”

  He strokes his short red beard that’s sprinkled with gray with his thumb and index finger. “Abortion isn’t a solution here, Liv, and you know it. Not for her. And maybe she will be able to take care of a baby.” He hesitates. “But . . . if she can’t handle it, we can take the baby for a while.” He looks at me. “We’re not too old to be parents, Liv. Technically you’re still young enough to have a baby. We could do it.”

  I sit back in the chair, crossing my arms over my chest. This was not what I was expecting. Certainly not what I wanted.

  “I mean it,” he says, almost seeming excited by the prospect of dirty diapers and fevers of a hundred and four again. “After Hazel has the baby, she can go back to school. She can go on to college. We can take care of the baby until she’s old enough, until she’s ready.”

  “And what if she comes to the conclusion that she doesn’t want to be a mother?”

  He shrugs. “Then we keep the baby. We do whatever we have to legally to—”

  “Oscar,” I interrupt, feeling my ire rising. “We’re not equipped to have a baby any more than Hazel is. You’re fifty years old.”

  “Forty-nine,” he corrects me.r />
  “You know what I mean.” What I want to say is that when he’s talking about us keeping this baby, raising this baby, what he means is me. Because I’m the one who has raised our two children. Yes, he’s been a good provider, financially. And yes, he’s always been big on trips to the beach and to the movies and our annual trip to New York City. But Oscar has never been the kind of father who packed lunches, made sure homework was done, or waited outside a pizza place for two hours to pick up one of his children. He’s never cleaned up a one-thousand-and-twenty-two-piece LEGO starship off the back porch. He’s never cleaned up puke from a car seat and he’s never sat up all night with a barfing child with a fever.

  “Liv, we can do this,” he says, taking my hand in his. He looks into my eyes.

  “Oscar, I start work on the Anselin house in two weeks. And I’m preparing a bid for another restoration. And I have no idea what I’m doing with either house. I’m going to be working forty or fifty hours a week. How am I going to take care of a baby?”

  “We’ll find day care. My sister can help. She was just telling me the other day that she’s got empty nest syndrome.”

  I feel the warmth of his hand holding mine. I hear the desperation in his voice. He wants this baby. He wants me to want this baby and I feel terrible. Because I don’t. I love my children. I have never regretted for a moment having them. But I-do-not-want-another-baby. I’m forty-four and premenopausal. I want to sleep at night. I want to enjoy a glass of wine alone with my husband for dinner occasionally. And I want to work. I want something of my own now, damn it.

  And I feel like an awful person even admitting this to myself.

  “Day care?” I say. “You didn’t want our children in day care. That’s why I quit my job. To stay home with them.”

  “Different times.”

  “Oscar—”

  “Liv, this baby will be a part of us. A part of our daughter.” He takes my other hand. “How could you give away a part of us? Of our family?”

  “I’m not talking about giving the baby away on a street corner in Portland.” I pull my hands from his and wrap my arms around my waist. I hug myself, wishing Oscar would hug me and promise me everything was going to be okay. But he doesn’t. And it isn’t. I know that in my heart of hearts. Nothing is ever going to be okay again. At least not in the way things were going to be okay an hour ago when the reality of Hazel’s pregnancy wasn’t our reality.

  Oscar is watching me. “I can’t believe you’d even suggest adoption after what you went through.”

  “Not every kid is like me. Look at the Andersons.” Our neighbors who adopted two girls from China. “They’ve never had a minute’s problem with them. Grace is going to Stanford.”

  “Grace’s acceptance to Stanford isn’t a reflection of her emotional state.”

  “No, it isn’t,” I admit. “I’m just trying to think about what would be best for the baby.”

  “Right.” He gets up from his chair and Willie Nelson immediately leaps to his feet, too. “Liv, I’m not saying this is the perfect situation, but we have to do what’s best. For all of us. Hazel wants to keep her baby.” He opens his arms wide. “This isn’t 1952. We can’t send her off to live with relatives so no one knows she’s pregnant, take her baby away from her, and put it up for adoption.”

  “I know that, I just . . .”

  I just what? I wanted him to agree with me? I wanted him to be on my side, for once? Because it seems as if he always sides with the kids. Sean wants big bucks for some kind of software camp, I say no, Oscar says yes. Hazel accuses me of judging her, I say I’m being honest, and then Oscar comes back and tells me I’m being too hard on her. The same goes for my parents. I think they should start considering a move to a house with less maintenance, maybe even to a retirement community. Oscar agrees with them; he thinks they’re fine where they are. My mother criticizes something I’ve said, done, and when I tell Oscar about it, he doesn’t see anything wrong with her comment. It never used to be like this, but I can’t pinpoint when things changed. It seems like decades ago, but it was probably only a couple of years.

  “Oh, Liv.” Oscar stands there, looking at me, his hands at his sides. “Sean know?”

  I shake my head, getting up. “I don’t think so. I don’t even think she’s told Tyler yet. She’s in her room.”

  “Should I go talk to her?”

  I look up at him feeling so sad, so . . . defeated. “You can try, I guess. She might not be ready to talk to you yet. She’s going to feel awful about disappointing you.”

  “Right.” He runs his hand through his hair. “You want me to start the grill?”

  I look down at the grass, my arms crossed across my chest. Again I wish he would hug me. I wish he wanted to. “Um . . . sure. Yes. Thank you.”

  Oscar picks up his book and he and Willie Nelson head back toward the house, leaving me to stand alone at the edge of a cliff.

  2

  Hazel

  I lie on my bed staring at the ceiling fan, holding my phone over my head. I glance at the cracked screen.

  WHERE ARE YOU? TEXT ME BACK! I text for, like, the tenth time. All in caps because I am shouting. At least inside. I’m not a shouter—that’s my dad. He hollers when he’s called us for dinner three times and my brother and I still haven’t come downstairs, and the taco fixings are getting cold. He hollers when we leave wet towels on the bathroom floor. Also, when you back into his car with your mom’s. Which Sean said was totally Dad’s fault. He never parks behind her car.

  I drop my phone beside me on the bed and close my eyes, trying not to cry.

  I can’t believe I’m pregnant. I can’t believe I’m goddamned pregnant.

  Dad says I shouldn’t say goddamned because it offends people. Well, I’m offended, goddamn it. How could God let this happen? It was just the one time.

  Just that one time when Ty forgot to buy condoms. Or maybe he didn’t have the money to buy them. I told him “No glove, no love,” but he was so sweet and I’d had a couple of beers and . . .

  Oh, God, will my baby be born with fetal alcohol syndrome? I feel a sudden sense of panic, the kind that twists in your belly. We watched a movie in health class last year about fetal alcohol syndrome. It’s a horrible thing to do to a baby.

  I grab my phone and Google search “can my baby get fetal alcohol syndrome if I drank alcohol when the baby was conceived?”

  I scroll quickly through the hits and settle on one. Fetal alcohol syndrome and fetal alcohol spectrum disorders only occur in babies born to mothers who drink alcohol during pregnancy.

  I hold the phone to my chest. My boobs hurt.

  Okay, so if I don’t have any more beer, any more anything alcoholic, my baby should be okay. No learning or intellectual disabilities. No pinched face or little head. No coordination issues. No heart problems or kidney—

  My phone dings, notifying me of a text, and I lift it up, thinking it has to be Tyler. The jerk finally checked his phone. He’s supposed to be at his uncle’s, kayaking on Sebago Lake, but a person doesn’t kayak all day long. At least not Tyler. He’s not exactly athletic. Not into being uncomfortable in any way even for fun. Mostly he likes to sit on his mom’s couch and play video games. Not the kind like my brother plays, though. Ty’s into deer hunting and racing cars on a TV screen that takes up half of his mom and stepdad’s little living room.

  And getting me pregnant.

  The text isn’t from Tyler. It’s the manager at the drugstore where I work asking me if I can come in two hours early Monday. I don’t answer. I’m kind of in the middle of a crisis here.

  I keep thinking about the TV show 16 and Pregnant that Mom and I used to watch when I was a freshman in high school. I always thought those girls were such idiots to get pregnant. They seemed like idiots about everything else. I always wondered if the show was for real or if it was scripted, like did the producers tell the pregnant girl to throw the plate of spaghetti at her baby daddy? Did they tell the baby daddy to m
ake it look like he went out with some other girl, even though you find out in the next episode that he was just getting a ride home because he didn’t have money for gas?

  I don’t think I’m like the girls on the show, even if I was dumb enough to get pregnant.

  I understand why it’s essential that I get a good education. I understand that how I treat others influences how I’m treated. I know that if people my age don’t start protecting the planet, we’re all going to die. If someone doesn’t blow up the earth with nukes first. So, I get good grades in school and I try to be nice to people even when they’re not nice to me. And I use my brain. I can figure stuff out. Like I have common sense. When I hear something or read it, I can say, “Does this make sense?” and respond accordingly. My dad taught me that when I was little. Or maybe it was my mom.

  I’m smart.

  Too smart to be going into the eleventh grade and knocked up by my boyfriend who isn’t smart.

  We’re not really all that much alike, Tyler and I. We don’t even like the same things. I know that, but opposites attract, right?

  I like to read; he doesn’t. I like to watch stuff on TV like Game of Thrones, even though I’ve seen every season ten times. Tyler likes stuff like Sharknado 3, which is the stupidest movie you could ever imagine. A tornado made of sharks? Really? I told him that a wind tunnel that starts over the Pacific Ocean and hits California is technically a cyclone. That went right over his head. But he’s cute and he likes me and . . . And I love him. He’s my first boyfriend. Aren’t you supposed to love your first boyfriend?

  I close my eyes, mostly because the ceiling fan is starting to make me feel dizzy and a little nauseous. I’m dreading the conversation with Mom about Tyler. She doesn’t like him. She thinks he’s a loser. Which maybe he . . . could be if he doesn’t get his crap together. But she doesn’t see the possibilities I see in him. I’ve been helping him bring up his grades. He passed this year because of me and I didn’t let him cheat. I don’t even think it’s his fault, the school thing. His parents are weird. They don’t ask him about his grades. They don’t talk about him going to college, even community college. They want him to go to work with his dad at his uncle’s auto repair shop. His dad says stuff like if being an auto mechanic is good enough for him, it’s good enough for Tyler Junior. Tyler Junior likes driving cars but he doesn’t really like fixing them. Probably because he’s terrible at it. I’d be a better auto mechanic than he would.