by Katie Wismer
It seemed no matter where she tried to go, there were just some things that would always follow her.
11
Freshman Year - November
Johanna clamped a hand over her mouth to stifle a sob. She sank onto the cold bathroom tiles and pulled her knees to her chest, her eyes glued to the evidence in front of her.
Five of them.
She ripped another piece of toilet paper off to blow her nose and sucked in a calming breath. The moment her eyes landed on the pregnancy tests scattered around the floor, a new wave of hysterics threatened to drown her, so she shoved herself to her feet and pulled her phone from her pocket with shaking hands.
She and Grey had only exchanged a handful of texts since he left last month—barely a fraction of how much they used to talk. She’d taken the hint, but she couldn’t not tell him.
Because there wasn’t anyone else it could be.
The phone rang and rang, and she squeezed her eyes shut at the thought of leaving this on a voicemail. But if she chickened out now, she knew she’d never tell him. It needed to happen, and it needed to happen now.
“Johanna!” The phone crackled around his voice like he didn’t have good reception. “It’s good to hear from you! What’s up?”
You might not think that in a minute.
“Do you have a second to talk?”
“For you, of course.”
She pressed her forehead against the bathroom wall and squeezed her eyes shut until red stars burst behind her eyelids.
“Johanna? Are you there?” There was rustling on the other side of the phone, like he was walking around.
“Grey, I think I’m pregnant,” she blurted.
For a moment, there was just silence. And then, very clearly: “What do you mean, you think?”
The flirty amusement was completely gone from his tone now.
She swallowed hard. “I mean I have five positive at-home tests in front of me.”
Again, silence.
Her mind cartwheeled through a million possibilities of things to say.
I don’t expect anything. I just thought you should know.
I’m sorry to have to tell you this over the phone.
I’m scared.
But more than anything, she just wanted him to say something.
“Look, Johanna.” There was a coldness in the way he said her name this time. “I really can’t deal with this right now. We’re about to get signed with this label.” He sighed, and there was more rustling in the background. “Besides, it’s probably not even mine anyway.”
And then he hung up.
Jo stared at the phone in her hand, mouth open, eyes wide. Then her stomach dropped so violently she fell to her knees in front of the toilet, waiting for herself to be sick.
But all that came out were more tears.
Then she threw her head back and screamed.
She screamed and screamed and threw her phone against the wall, finding the smallest hint of satisfaction as it shattered and fell to the ground in broken pieces. She kicked the pregnancy tests on the floor, sending them flying against the walls. Then she crumbled to the floor once more, buried her face in her hands, and sobbed.
She froze at a knock on the door. No one else was supposed to be home right now. Kayleigh, Addie, and Liv all had class. She’d triple-checked before coming in here.
“Jo?” Miller. It was Miller’s voice. He knocked again. “Can I come in? Are you all right?”
There was absolutely no explaining away her current state, so she just rested her forehead on her knees and mumbled, “It’s unlocked.”
The door creaked open, but she didn’t look up. Footsteps drew closer, then she felt Miller sink onto the floor beside her. He must have seen the mess—the pregnancy tests, the dirty tissues, the broken phone—but he didn’t say anything. She sniffled and finally forced herself to raise her head, but Miller wasn’t staring at her like she’d expected. He had his knees tucked into his chest, his arms braced around them, and he was staring intently at the floor, his jaw flexing.
When he noticed she’d looked up, his features softened. “Do you want to talk about it?”
She wiped the back of her hand under her nose and stared at the pregnancy test closest to her feet. The plastic was now cracked down the middle, but its result was still perfectly clear. “I called Grey,” she said tonelessly.
Miller glanced at her phone’s remains on the ground. “What did he say?”
“That it’s not his. Then he hung up.”
Miller whipped around to look at her. “Are you fucking kidding me?”
She pressed her lips together and shook her head. “I just don’t understand how this happened,” she murmured, mostly to herself. “We used a condom.”
Miller shifted uncomfortably. At first she thought it was just talking about sex, but then a muscle in his jaw jumped again, and he opened and closed his mouth like he was debating saying something.
“What?” she asked.
“Are you sure?”
“I—what do you mean?”
He hung his head and pinched the bridge of his nose with two fingers. “Jo—I—just—well, did you see him put on the condom? Or did you see it afterwards?”
Jo stared straight ahead, that awful drop in her stomach returning, and fuck, now the tears were coming back too.
“I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to—” Miller touched her arm, and she collapsed into his side, the tears running freely down her face now. He wrapped his arm around her shoulders and pulled her tightly against him, his chin resting on the top of her head. “I’m sorry. I’m sorry. I’m sorry.”
“Fuck.” She covered her face with her hands. “I’m so stupid.”
“No,” he said firmly, his arm tightening around her. “You’re not.”
She swiped at the tears with the backs of her hands. His wide, blue eyes stared back at her. “I don’t know what to do,” she whispered.
He nodded, his brow furrowing. “Well, one thing at a time, right? We’ll go to a doctor to know for sure, and we’ll go from there.”
She didn’t know if he even realized his word choice, but just him saying we instead of you made the whole thing fractionally more bearable. She smiled, wiping the last of the tears from her face with shaking hands. “Right. Okay.”
“I can’t let you drive like this. I’ll take you.”
“You don’t have to do that—”
“Well, I’m doing it, so.”
She let out a shaky laugh and wiped her snot-covered hands on her jeans. “Miller?”
“Yeah?”
She leaned forward, threw her arms around his shoulders, and buried her face against his neck. His arms immediately wrapped around her back and pulled her against him, one hand stroking the back of her head. “It’s going to be okay,” he murmured. “It’s going to be okay.”
Jo sat silently in the car on the ride home from the doctor’s office. Day slid into night as the appointment became a procedure, and the day forever changed from being just another Saturday to The Saturday. It was dark now, the entirety of the day gone, but Miller had sat there waiting the entire time, first in the waiting room as Jo stared at the floor and pumped out a nervous rhythm with her leg, and then in the office as the doctor explained her options, though the static in her ears had drowned out most of what she’d said.
He didn’t say anything as they drove, and Jo stared out the window, wondering if she would feel anything, or if that wouldn’t come until after she took the second medication. What if it didn’t work at all, and she had to go through all of this again?
About halfway home, Miller flipped on the radio and hummed along. The low quality of his voice was calming, in a way. Jo closed her eyes, focusing on it, almost feeling the vibrations in her chest. It was about the only thing she could feel right now. The doctor had explained that all women reacted differently, emotionally. But for now, Jo just felt…numb. The kind of numbness that made her worry she’d never feel anyth
ing again.
They were just turning onto campus when the song on the radio ended.
“And now we have a new song from a local band!” said the host. “I think you guys are really going to like this one. Here’s ‘Johanna’ by United Fates!”
Miller slammed on the breaks in the middle of the parking lot, and Jo had to brace her hands on the dashboard to keep from pitching forward. She let out a small choking noise as the song trickled through the speakers. She stared at the screen where Johanna – United Fates scrolled across over and over again. The numbness in her chest cracked, like a splinter fissuring through a block of ice.
Miller slammed his hand against the radio, cutting the song off midway through the first verse. A shake grew in Jo’s chest, branching out from her chattering teeth to her trembling hands. But she didn’t cry.
She didn’t have any tears left.
“Let’s go inside,” Miller practically growled, but Jo was glued to the spot, eyes still trained on the radio. She couldn’t face Addie or Liv or Kayleigh right now. She couldn’t curl into a ball on her bed without questions and concerns that she didn’t have the slightest amount of energy to deal with. Suddenly she wanted nothing more than to be back home where she could lock herself in her room and be completely and utterly alone. Maybe she’d sleep in her car tonight.
She shook her head slowly back and forth. “I can’t—with them—”
“Come on,” Miller said, his voice gentle this time, as he got out of the car and opened her door. Shakily, she took his hand, and he wrapped an arm around her shoulders as he led her toward the building. “You can stay in my room. Alan went home for the weekend.”
She didn’t even bother arguing, and winced as they climbed the stairs, her hands wrapped firmly around her stomach as it started to cramp.
“Are you all right?” asked Miller.
She just gritted her teeth and nodded. Addie and Liv’s laughter reverberated through the hall as they hurriedly slipped into Miller’s room. It was the first time she’d seen it, she realized. He always came over to theirs. It looked like every other boy’s dorm room, though Miller’s side was noticeably more organized than his roommate’s.
“Here.” He rushed over to the bed and knocked off a pile of clothes. “You can sit up here. Don’t worry, it’s clean and everything. I just washed the sheets.”
She immediately curled into a ball on her side, the cramping in her abdomen subsiding now that she wasn’t moving around. It didn’t hurt, exactly, or maybe she was just used to severe enough period cramps that it wasn’t that far out of the ordinary. But there was a level of constant discomfort she hadn’t experienced before.
“What do you need?” Miller was asking, his movements frantic as he hurried back and forth across the room, cleaning as he went. “What can I get you?”
“Do you have any ibuprofen?”
“Yes!” He grinned, looking relieved to have something that could help, and quickly brought her a bottle of pills and a glass of water.
“Do you have a heating pad?” she murmured.
The triumphant look on his face faltered.
“Never mind. You’re a boy. Of course you don’t.”
“You know what? I’ll run to the store. There’s that one just around the corner. It’ll take five minutes. What else do you need? Give me a list.”
She pulled her knees closer to her chest. Maybe if she curled herself into a small enough ball, the cramps would leave her alone. “You don’t have to do that.”
Miller knelt down so his face was level with hers. “Give me a list, Jo.”
She grimaced. “I’m gonna need more pads.”
His expression didn’t change. “What else?”
She reached for her pockets, then remembered she’d smashed her phone against the wall earlier. “That’s it, but could I borrow your phone?”
He laid it on the bed, then strode to the dresser across from her, pulled out a pair of black sweats and a gray T-shirt, and laid them next to the phone. “Just, uh”—he shrugged—“if you want to change into something more comfortable. Okay. I’ll be right back.”
“Thanks, Miller,” she whispered.
As he left, she pulled up his phone and dialed the phone number she’d had memorized by heart since she was thirteen. She pressed her face into the pillow as it rang.
“Hello?”
The familiar voice on the other line tipped her over the edge. The tears returned in full force, and she hiccuped a few times before finally managing to squeeze out, “Hi, Mare.”
Miller returned to the room with four overstuffed plastic bags, eyes slightly frantic. He kicked the door shut behind him and immediately jumped into unpacking his purchases on the desk.
“So.” He pulled out four different packages of pads and laid them out on the foot of his bed in a neat row. “I had no clue what wings were, so I got some with and some without. But then I realized there are different sizes, and you’re tiny, so at first I thought, yeah, of course she’d be the smallest one, but then what if that was wrong and you wanted the bigger ones? So I got both. Then when I was looking for the heating pads—do you have any idea how many different ones there are?—so I got one that plugs in the wall, and this one you kind of just throw in the microwave.” He set them beside the pads, then returned to digging through his bags. “So then I thought maybe you’d want some candy. But then I realized I don’t know what kind you like! So I got all of them.” With this, he dumped out the rest of the bags onto the bed, which did, indeed, have one of every single kind of candy in the store.
Jo stared at the mountain of sugar on the bed with wide eyes.
“So”—Miller’s eyes flickered from the candy to Jo—“which ones do you like?”
She hesitantly reached forward and dug out the bag of Swedish Fish.
Miller’s eyes practically bulged out of his head. “Swedish Fish?” he demanded. “Of all of these, you chose Swedish Fish?”
She shrugged and ripped open the bag. He shook his head as if insulted, then pulled the heating pads out from under the mess. “I can plug this one in over here.” He ducked under the bed to find an outlet and handed her the pad, then grabbed the second one to throw in the microwave. When he was done and finally paused to take a breath, he turned to face her with his hands on his hips. “Is this okay, then?”
A small smile crept onto her face. “You’re a good friend, Mill. Oh!” She dug around in the blankets until she found his phone and handed it back to him. “Thank you.”
“You get your call made?” he asked.
“Yeah. Just wanted to talk to a friend from home.”
After clearing off the rest of the candy, he dug around in the plastic bins underneath his bed and came up with a handful of blankets and an extra pillow to make a spot on the floor.
“You don’t want to use his?” She nodded at his roommate’s bed.
Miller glanced up at her from the ground. “Trust me. It’s more sanitary down here.”
She rolled onto her side and adjusted the heating pad against her stomach. “You’re sure this is okay?”
“Jo, it’s fine. Just wake me up if you need anything else, okay?”
She rolled onto her back, trying to quiet her mind. The entire day was a blur, and she already couldn’t remember parts of it. Just bits and pieces. It almost didn’t feel real. But the more she thought about it, the more the worst of the thoughts crept in, and she clenched her jaw, trying to force them to the back of her mind. Trying not to focus on anything but the uneven surface of the ceiling and Miller’s deep, even breaths as he fell asleep.
12
Senior Year - March
Miller appeared around the corner with a plastic bag with Powell’s Books printed across the front. When he noticed Jo standing beside his locked car completely soaked, he broke into a run.
“What the hell, Jo?” he called, his voice barely audible above the rain. “Why didn’t you come get me? Or text me?”
She shook her
head, still unable to form words, and numbly climbed into the car. Water pounded against the windshield, blurring the parking lot in front of them. The entire sky was painted an angry shade of blue, and it didn’t look like the storm was planning to let up anytime soon. She could still feel the steady drum of water on her skin, the coldness seeping all the way to her bones. It felt like she was underwater. Just floating. Floating and numb and cold.
Miller slid into the driver seat and looked her over as he started the car and blasted the heat. Seeming to sense she wasn’t in the mood for conversation, he eased the car out of the lot, the wipers flashing across the windshield as fast as they could go. Once he merged onto the highway, he finally glanced at her and asked, “What happened?”
Jo shrugged and turned, watching the water kicking up beneath the tires of the other cars. Sandra flashed behind her eyes. Her easy smile. The warmth of her handshake. The light in her eyes as she talked about her son. “She offered me a summer internship.”
“What! Jo, that’s amazing! I don’t understand. Why don’t you look more amazed right now?” When Jo didn’t respond, he added, “Was she a total bitch or something?”
“No, she was really nice, actually.”
“Then what’s the problem?”
Jo faced forward again. A morphed version of her stared back at her from the windshield, her eyes not quite right. “Simone isn’t her real last name,” she murmured.
Miller paused, waiting for her to elaborate. “Uh—okay?”
Jo tilted her head, watching as her reflection mirrored the movement. Rain cut across her face, blurring all of her features, and she reached up to touch her own lips. They were still cold to the touch. “Her last name is Carter.”
“I’m not following.”
Jo closed her eyes. “Carter as in Greyson Carter.”
“You mean...? You’re fucking kidding me.”
A small, hard laugh escaped Jo’s throat. “I’m about to lose my mind. I’m losing my fucking mind. Like what the actual fuck?” Her voice broke at the end, and then she was laughing. She was laughing so hard she couldn’t breathe. She leaned forward, clutching her stomach with both hands, gasping for air.