Our New Normal

by Colleen Faulkner

  “Will you keep it down?” I beg, looking at the door again.

  “Katy was afraid you might hurt yourself. That’s why she called me. And I hope you’d do the same thing for her.” She pulls off her cap and snow and droplets of water fall on the floor. She’s making such a mess I’m going to have to mop it up. Which might not be a bad thing, as dirty as the floor is. I just don’t know what I’ll use. I couldn’t find any towels when I washed my hands after I peed. I had to wipe them on my yoga pants.

  “Hurt myself? What are you talking about?” Then I realize what she means. Not hurt myself. She means kill myself.

  “Mom!” Now I’m pissed. More pissed at her than I was at Tyler when I locked myself in here. “I would never do that. I can’t believe Katy would say that. What would make her think I wanted to commit suicide? Mom, you know me. I would never . . .”

  She unzips her coat. “Somebody told her you said you were going to kill yourself.” She’s wearing her paint-splattered, stained hoodie that I hate. I can’t believe she walked into this house wearing that. I’ll never be able to go back to school. I’ll have to move out of state. Out of the country.

  I back up, trying to get as far away from my mother as I can, which isn’t far because the bathroom isn’t all that big. “Someone told her—” I roll my eyes. Had to be Marissa. She’s such a drama queen. Her Snapchats are beyond ridiculous. Always sad-face photos of herself. She’s always saying someone is going to kill themselves, usually about stupid things like failing a test or getting caught by their mom masturbating. Marissa is always saying she’s going to kill herself. “Mom,” I say. “I can’t believe you would think I would do that.” I just stand there, my eyes closed, trying to will her away.

  She walks up to me. I can hear her dripping on the linoleum floor. “You shouldn’t be here.” She pauses. “And you shouldn’t be drinking. Not just because you’re underage, but because—”

  “I wasn’t drinking,” I interrupt. A lie.

  “I can smell it on your breath, Hazel.”

  I’m so sick to death of her always being right. “One beer,” I tell her. I bite down on my lower lip, trying not to start crying again. I can’t believe tonight has turned out like this. All I wanted to do was see Jack.

  “What happened to upset you?” Mom says. She rubs my arm.

  I pull away. “Nothing.”

  “Katy said that Tyler and his new girlfriend were here.”

  “I swear I’m going to kill her,” I say under my breath.

  Mom waits. Which is worse than her talking.

  I tear up and wipe at my eyes, which make them sting more. I bet I look like a raccoon. “He . . .” My lower lip trembles. “He and Amanda were making out right in front of me. I know it was just to show off. To hurt me. Then he wouldn’t even talk to me, Mom. At school, he acts like I don’t even exist. He’s being so mean.” I close my eyes because I don’t want her to see that that dickwad can make me cry like this. “It makes me mad because he can pretend he never loved me, but I’ve got this.” I lay my hand on my big, fat belly. “And I can’t make it go away.”

  “Oh, Hazel.” Mom sounds like she’s going to cry.

  She tries to hug me and, at first, I don’t want her to, but then . . . Then I realize I really need a hug.

  “Mom,” I blubber, laying my head on her wet coat.

  “Sweetie,” she whispers, holding me tight. “Why didn’t you tell me Tyler was acting like this?”

  “And what were you going to do about it? Tell his mom?”

  “No. I’d run him over with my new truck.”

  I can’t help it, I laugh. And then take in a deep breath and let it out, sniffling. “I didn’t tell you,” I say, “because it’s all my fault. You didn’t think I should have gone out with him to start with. You knew he was a jerk.”

  “He’s not a jerk, sweetie. He’s a teenage boy.”

  “You know what I mean,” I say miserably. “It’s all my fault. I was stupid. Stupid. Stupid. Stupid.”

  “We all make mistakes, Hazel.”

  “Not you. You never do stupid things,” I blubber, getting snot on her coat that’s cold and wet against my face.

  She hugs me really tight and then leans back, taking me by the shoulders, making me look at her. My eyes are really stinging; I knew I was allergic to Katy’s eyeliner. I just wanted to look pretty for Jack, but now I know that’s stupid, too. He doesn’t like me. I’m going to have a baby. He could have any girl in the school. He doesn’t want one stupid enough not to use a condom.

  “I have made mistakes. Some bad ones.”

  “Mom, getting the kind of orange juice with pulp instead of without pulp is not a bad mistake.” I run my hand between us, my head still on her shoulder, and touch my belly. “I screwed up. I really screwed up.” I hesitate. “I know that’s why you’ve been so mad at me. Because you never screw up.”

  She laughs but the kind of laugh where what’s been said is so ridiculous that you’re half crying. “Hazel, do you really think I never screw up? Would you like the list of things I’ve screwed up? Big things? Like getting a useless degree, even after my parents warned me it would be hard to get a job. How about marrying your dad right out of college when I should have waited, should have been on my own for a while? And my parenting? I’ve done so many things wrong. How I’ve handled your pregnancy being one of them.”

  “You’re right to be mad. This is a screw-up of epic proportion.”

  “Hazel . . .” she says quietly. “I made the same mistake.”

  “What?”

  She smooths my hair. “I made the same mistake that you made, sweetie. I thought I was in love. I thought this guy I was dating in high school loved me and I had sex with him. And I got pregnant. I was sixteen. Just like you.”

  I pull back, as shocked as I would be if she said it had been proven that climate change isn’t real. Or that Dad wasn’t biologically my father, even though I look like a female version of him. “You? You got pregnant in high school?” I whisper.

  She meets my gaze. Nods. She looks so sad.

  “Mom—”

  There’s a knock on the bathroom door. “You comin’ out today?” some guy shouts.

  I turn around and holler at the door, “No. Go piss in the snow!” I look back at Mom, lowering my volume. Adjusting my tone. “You had a baby. What happened to it?”

  When she looks at me, I see that her eyes have tears in them.

  The guy knocks again. No, pounds on the door. “Hey! You got a medical problem in there?”

  I turn away from Mom, drop my hands to my sides, and scream, “I said, go piss in the snow, you ass—”

  “Hazel,” Mom says, definitely not approving of my behavior.

  I turn back to her, making a face. “What? He’s a guy. He can pee anywhere.”

  We’re both quiet for a minute then. Standing face-to-face, her in her wet coat, gross sweatshirt, and ugly glasses. Me with my big belly where an alien is growing.

  “I can’t believe you got pregnant, Mom. No, I can’t believe Gran and Granddad let you have an abortion.”

  “I didn’t have an abortion.”

  I stare at her. “Jeez, I don’t have a secret sister, do I? Please, Mom, tell me you didn’t put my sister up for adoption.” I’m staring at her, trying to read her face. “I always thought I had a sister, you know, somewhere out there. I thought you guys were going to have another baby. It didn’t occur to me that you could have had another baby.”

  She walks over to the toilet, unzips her coat the rest of the way, and plops down. “Your grandparents don’t know I got pregnant in high school. I’d prefer they never know.”

  I walk toward her. I can’t believe we have a family scandal. We never have scandals like other families. Well, we didn’t until I got knocked up. Turns out, Mom beat me to it. Just no one ever knew it. “Does Dad know?”

  She nods. “But no one else. I never told anyone. Not Aunt Beth, not my friends . . .” She hangs her head
and wipes her face with her hands. Then she looks up at me again. “Because I didn’t have the courage to tell my parents. I didn’t have the courage that you had to tell me, Hazel.”

  I chew on my bottom lip, looking at her. I think about what Mom is saying. I didn’t feel brave when I asked her to help me with the pregnancy test. I’d bought it at work at the drugstore days before, but I was too scared to do it by myself, or even with Katy.

  “What happened to your baby?” I ask.

  She puts her hands together and looks down at her feet. At the dirty floor. “When I was about eight weeks, I got lucky. I had a miscarriage.”

  “And you didn’t tell anyone about that, either?”

  She shakes her head. “Never, not until I told your dad, and that was after we were married.”

  I think for a minute. “What were you going to do? What was your plan? When you did have the baby?” I’m staring at her, thinking this isn’t the mom I know. The mom I know would never have been dumb enough to think she could get pregnant and then just never tell anyone.

  “I don’t know.” She shrugs. “I didn’t have a plan.”

  “Wow. How did you—” I cross my arms over my chest, resting them on my belly. “Wow,” is all I can think to say.

  She looks up at me. “I know you don’t want to hear this, but I’m going to say it anyway. You don’t have to keep this baby, Hazel.”

  I roll my eyes and groan. “Mom—”

  “Hazel.” She raises her hand, interrupting me. “Let me say this and then I’ll shut up. We’ll go home and I won’t say another word tonight.”

  I open my mouth to argue but close it. Because right now, going home, getting in my own bed, sounds really good.

  “I know I’ve said this before, but you’re in a different place now. And honestly, even if you don’t want to hear it, as your mother, I need to say it. So, just be quiet and listen to me.” She takes a breath, seeming to think about what she wants to say. “Somewhere, there’s a couple that desperately wants a child. The way Gran and Granddad wanted a child before they adopted me. After they were told Gran would never conceive. You could give a family a gift that might be the best thing you ever do for someone else, in your whole life, sweetie.”

  “Mom, I’m not—”

  “Hazel, I’m not done.” She pushes the hair out of her eyes. “I’m not saying you can’t raise a child. I’m saying I don’t want you to because it’s going to be so hard. So damned hard. Because it’s not easy when you’re married and you have good jobs and a decent house. It’s not easy then. But, sweetie, if you have a baby, you’re going to miss out on so much of life. You’re going to miss your senior prom, you’re going to miss spring breaks in college, and chances are, you’re never going to make it to medical school.”

  I cross my arms, thinking that’s a mean thing to say. Especially if you’re a mom who has told her daughter she can do anything.

  “You’re going to sacrifice all that, and so much more. So many things I can’t begin to tell you about. And . . .” She sighs. “I’m afraid you’re going to lose a part of yourself, Hazel.”

  “But you hated being adopted,” I snap, mostly so I won’t start crying again. Because the tone of her voice makes me want to cry. I point at her. “You told me you always hated the fact that you were adopted. It bothered you that your mother gave you away.” Tears are in my eyes again. “Mom, how could I even consider such a thing?” I beg, feeling terrible that even the idea of giving away Charlie would cross my mind.

  She stands up, taking both my hands in hers. “I was a kid. A lot of kids choose something to blame their unhappiness on, to blame their parents for. Not every adopted child feels the way I did. And now that I’m an adult, now that I’m a mother, I know my birth mother, whoever she was, did the right thing.”

  I stand there trying to imagine what it must have been like for Mom’s mother to hand her over to a stranger. To give her away to a stranger. Then I imagine handing my little baby boy over to some lady I don’t know. Some lady who would become Charlie’s mother.

  Tears run down my cheeks.

  I can’t do it.

  This is my fault. Not Charlie’s. I can’t punish him like that for my mistake.

  “I’m not doing it,” I say. “I’m not giving him away. I told you, Mom, I’m going to make this work. Even without a dad for him. I’m going to figure it out.”

  Mom just sits there, looking at me. Then she gets up. “Okay,” she says. She zips up her coat.

  I stare at her, suspicious that she’s given in so easily. “Okay, what?”

  “Okay.” She puts up her hands. “I told you, I had to say it. I said it. You’re going to keep the baby. You’re going to make it work. And I guess . . . I’m going to try to figure out how to accept that.”

  I just stand there, staring at her.

  “Let’s go home,” she says.

  I look at the door. “I don’t know if I can go out there, Mom. Everyone out there thinks I’m in here trying to kill myself.” I chew on my thumb cuticle that’s so raw now that I can taste blood. “And my coat’s in the kitchen. Everyone’s going to see me. They’re going to see you.”

  She stands there for a minute, thinking, and then unzips her coat and takes it off. “Here.” She holds it out to me. “Put it on.”

  “What—” I watch her walk over to the window. Open it. Then I realize what’s she doing. What she wants me to do. “Mom, I’m not—I can’t . . .”

  “Sure you can. It’s not far down. Look, the window goes to the floor. I just stepped in. Come on.” She holds out her hand. “I’ll help you.”

  I look at the window. At my mom climbing out of it. I look behind me at the door. Then back at the window, debating.

  I put on Mom’s coat and pull out my phone and text Katy.

  Went home. Will pick up my car tomorrow. Get my coat.

  Then I unlock the bathroom door, take Mom’s hand and climb out the window, big belly and all.

  27

  Liv

  I roll over onto my side, under the quilt, and rest my head on Oscar’s shoulder. “Thank you for doing this,” I whisper, kissing him lightly on his bare chest.

  He rubs my bare back and kisses the top of my head. “You’re welcome. Glad you like the place. Carol at work said it was one of Bar Harbor’s hidden gems. Perfect for a romantic weekend.”

  “Carol was right.” I rest my cheek on his chest, gazing at the crackling fire on the hearth. “Not many places where you can have a room with a fireplace you’re actually allowed to have a fire in.”

  “I’m sure the fire marshal will eventually get wind of it and close the place down.”

  I smile, still basking in the afterglow of our lovemaking. “This has been so nice,” I say. “I hate to go home tomorrow.” I close my eyes. “I don’t want to go back to my life.” I groan. “Our lives.”

  “We talking your crazy dad, your crazy clients, or your crazy seventeen-year-old pregnant daughter?” he teases.

  I groan and roll onto my back, my head on the pillow. I push my hair out of my eyes and stare at the ceiling. “She actually hasn’t been too bad this week. Hazel,” I say thoughtfully.

  “Our daughter? Because I’m pretty sure I saw her head spinning around last week.”

  I turn to meet his gaze in the semidarkness of the room and smile, glad we can laugh about this. Glad I’m laughing instead of crying because all the tears I’ve shed haven’t changed the fact that our teenage daughter will become a mother in less than a month. “I know. Right?” I’m quiet for a minute, thinking. “No, she’s definitely been calmer since the party intervention.”

  “More interest in the baby?” He kisses my bare shoulder. “I saw the box with the Pack ‘n Play in the barn and baby clothes in the dryer.”

  “I think she’s over the hump with the Tyler thing. In fact . . .” I hesitate, debating whether or not to say anything. But then I do because Oscar and I don’t keep things from each other. Even with our probl
ems over the last year or so, that was one mistake we haven’t made. “I suspect she might be ‘talking’ to another boy.” I do air quotes around talking.

  “What?” He pushes up on his elbow to look down at me. “What high school boy is interested in a girl who’s about to have some other guy’s baby?”

  I chuckle. “Teenagers are strange creatures. Thursday night before dinner she was texting with someone. She left her phone on the counter when she was setting the table and a text popped up on her phone from a Jack. Jack isn’t usually female.”

  “You read the text?”

  “No.” I give him a nudge and he flops back on the bed. “I didn’t read her text. I don’t do that.” I look at him. “Do you think I’ve become that person, Oscar? A person who reads other people’s texts?”

  “Of course not.” He gives me a quick kiss. “I wouldn’t blame you if you did, though. She’s not other people, she’s our daughter. She’s still underage. And we know for a fact that she makes poor choices because she had unprotected sex.”

  “Well, she can’t get pregnant now.” I raise my finger in the air. “But as soon as Charlie is born, she’s going on some form of birth control, I can promise you that.”

  “Hm, you’re calling him Charlie. Sounds like maybe you’re . . . resigned to the fact that we’re going to have a baby in the house. A grandson.”

  “We don’t know if it’s a boy.” I roll over to rest my head on him again, wrapping my arm around his waist.

  It’s been a good weekend. Oscar and I haven’t just called a truce, we seem to have mended some of the wounds of the past months. We’ve talked a lot, and not about my parents, or our work, or Hazel. We’ve talked about us. And it’s been good. So good, that we ended up canceling our restaurant reservations tonight and having wine and cheese and crackers in bed together for dinner. Living on love, as Oscar called it.

  But a two-hundred-dollar-a-night room in a B&B isn’t the real world. And we can’t stay here. No matter how much either of us would like to.

  “I know we don’t know.” Oscar strokes my arm. “But I’m with Hazel. I think it’s a boy.” I can hear his smile in his voice. “I think we’re going to have a grandson.”