by Alice Carina
Chad and I did in fact study at the school library every day after school, until he said he couldn't help it anymore and kissed me. We went out almost every day on dates, normal dates. We went to restaurants, we went to the movies, or we just strolled across the park, holding hands and talking for hours.
The fact that we were away from our classmates didn't clear us from the judgment of complete strangers. Everywhere I went, my childish features contrasting my round stomach attracted shaming attention. With one glance, people thought that they knew everything about me, as if they'd been with me my whole life and I'd been intolerably horrible every second of it.
Nobody wondered that I might've done something uncharacteristically responsible for my age by keeping the baby, nobody wondered if I'd been raped or forced into my pregnancy, nobody wondered if maybe I'd been in love and the guy had lured me in with promises every girl wanted to hear at any age in her life, nobody wondered if I was tricked or used or abused, nobody wondered if maybe it had resulted from my first and only time, nobody wondered if maybe I'd been broken and thought that was how everybody mended – because they sure gave that illusion – or if I was still broken, nobody wondered if maybe I was a good person, or if I felt guilty, or if I noticed their eyes and unwarranted cruelty, and definitely nobody wondered about the father who escaped every form of judgment or responsibility or wondering simply because he didn't carry the evidence of what we'd both done.
They just saw me, carrying the proof of a sin committed by two and sentenced to suffer for three and wondered the most horrible things about me simply because they could, not caring whether I noticed or not because – according to them – I deserved to notice their hate for putting them through the sight of my stomach and probably corrupting the minds of their girls by my corrupted state, as if being in pain and judged and hated and barely being able to move was what every other teenage girl wanted to have.
Every time a stranger looked at me and glared disgustedly at my ring-less fingers, Chad lifted my hand to his lips while looking them straight in the eyes, annoying them into looking away.
When he held my hand in public, or kissed it, or kissed me, or took me out and pretended not to notice the people staring at us, or looked into my eyes, or called me his girlfriend, or told me the sweetest things, I couldn't care about anything or anyone around us, not even that one waitress who blatantly flirted with Chad while taking our orders and came back with only half of mine because she said I needed to lose weight if I expected a guy like him to stay with me – Chad ended up asking for the manager who fired her on the spot. Nothing anyone did or said mattered when he was with me.
We lasted about a week in our boyfriend-girlfriend nothing-else-in-the-world-matters phase before things fell apart.
I got home one day after one of our dates and found mom and Josslyn cooking in the kitchen.
"Hey," mom smiled at me.
"You and Chelsea have been studying a lot lately," Josslyn commented suspiciously, I just shrugged.
"You don't like those," I nodded at the vegetables she was cutting.
"Yeah, but Kyle does, he's staying over for dinner."
"Why?" The question came out ruder than I'd intended.
"His parents are away, so there's no one to cook, and dad doesn't like us going out alone at night because of somebody," she dragged while pointing at me with her knife humorously, "so, here we are."
"Oh," I swallowed. "Is he coming soon?" I hadn't seen Kyle since he came into my room with Josslyn to apologize under her supervision for laughing at me. Since then, we haven't been in the same room or addressed each other at all.
"He's already here," mom told me, "went upstairs to the bathroom."
"Oh," I swallowed again.
I decided to go to my room and later pretend that I was too stuffed for dinner until he left – he never stayed long when dad was around.
I went into my room and, standing near my bedlooking at a picture of his girlfriend and me on the nightstand, Kyle waswaiting for me.
*
Note: Do NOT try fish fingers with vanilla. I never tried them and honestly have no idea if they might be sickening together. If you do, it's at your own risk (but let me know if it's any good) ??
Mess Up
"What are you doing here?" I demanded as I entered my room.
He turned to me quietly, his shoulders drooped from a lost fight, his eyes tired, his face pale with fear.
His eyes never lifted towards my face, they were zeroed with horror and surprise on my stomach. He reminded me of my first day at school after I'd come back from the hospital and how everyone had looked at me for the first time; disbelieving, shocked, confused. It was as if he was noticing my pregnancy for the very first time.
"When I was a kid," he started, his voice choked and wavering, "whenever I won at some family game, I would gloat and rub it in everyone's face until some of the other kids cried and I got grounded or punished or something that made me feel like I'd actually lost and deserved to have lost."
"What?"
"I mess up everything good," his shoulders dropped ever lower, making him look smaller. "And I mess it up so well it makes me feel like I never deserved anything good in the first place." He was silent for a few seconds, his eyes still on my stomach. I didn't know what to say. "When I found Josslyn, I told myself that there was no way I could mess that up, it was too good that no matter what bad thing I did, it couldn't crack but a small fraction of it, it never occurred to me that if I built us on something bad, the cracked fraction would be at the bottom, and when it finally broke, it would take everything on top down with it. I'm just that good at messing up, aren't I?" His eyes were glassy with tears when he finally looked up at me. "I messed up real good, didn't I?"
I'd never seen Kyle look like that, I'd never seen any boy look like that, I'd never seen anyone look like that.
I instantly regretted having ever said anything.
He looked broken, shattered, dazed, helpless, like someone who lost everything and knew that he was the only one to blame, he knew that he'd given everything away for absolutely nothing. He reminded me of myself when I first found out I was pregnant. There was nothing that anyone could've said to me back then, there was nothing that I could've said to him.
"How far along are you?" He nodded at my stomach, but his eyes remained on me, his voice knowing, but his eyes a little hopeful.
Why had I snapped at him and asked him to redo his calculations? What good was that going to do me? Or him? Or Josslyn? Or my baby? Or anyone? Even if he knew, I didn't love him and he didn't love me, I didn't want anything to do with him and he clearly didn't want anything to do with me. What good was it going to do if everyone was as broken as me? Was I so bitter in my misery that I wanted everyone around me – those I loved and didn't love – to share it? Or had I been the foundation that he fractured and held on so long but eventually broke and couldn't carry the weight of everything else anymore?
"How far along in your pregnancy are you?" His voice was sterner, demanding an answer, demanding the truth.
"Seven months," I whispered, "and a half."
"Oh, God," he ran his fingers through his hair, looking away from me, as if my words where the last weight he could've handled before breaking. "This can't be, it can't be." He mumbled to himself, shaking his head madly. "I can't be..."
I didn't say anything, I couldn't say anything. I just watched him pace back and forth in my room, in a state I'd been through before and never quite got over.
"I'm...?" He tried several times but couldn't finish his question. "Just say it," he eventually begged me. "I need to hear the words. I can't believe them until someone says them."
"You're..." I couldn't say the words either, but I needed to. I needed that conversation to end, I needed him to leave, and he needed to know, or maybe I needed him to. "You're the father." My voice barely made it to my own ears, but he was close enough to hear it.
Almost as if he'd been expecting me
to confess the exact opposite and my admission slapped him, he turned to me with sudden fury and madness.
"No!" He squeezed his hands around the tops of my arms too tightly as he shook me. "I can't be. This can't be!"
I didn't say anything, just let him shake me and deny it and let it out in the ways I couldn't.
"How do you even know?" He pushed me away when I remained silent. "How do you know it isn't Chad's or Emmet's or somebody else's?"
The accusation in his words felt like a slap, and I felt the same anger and need for revenge I'd felt when I first hinted at the truth.
"How do you know your baby is mine?" He demanded more furiously.
Then, I said the words that both defended and offended my pride.
"Because no other guy has touched me that way,"
He blinked at me for several moments in silence, the words sinking in and quieting him back to his dazed surrender.
We stared at each other for a long time until I couldn't take it anymore. The conversation was over, and I needed to be alone, just like he needed to be.
"I think you should go," I sniffed and moved to open the door further for him, but found Josslyn standing at the other side.
For a moment, I thought I was looking at a mirror, my own face with my own expressions of fear, betrayal, disbelief, brokenness, but then she took a step back when I didn't, and my heart dropped.
"Jossly..." I tried to say her name, but I couldn't.
Kyle was quicker than me.
"Josslyn, baby," he started, rushing towards her.
She shook her head at him in bewilderment and made to run for the stairs, but her foot missed and I heard her scream as she tumbled down the stairs in excruciating slowness.
"Josslyn!" Kyle screamed as he ran after her, but she was already lying on the bottom steps at an awkward angle, her eyes closed.
"Josslyn! Look at me!" Kyle kept screaming.
"What's going o-?" I heard my mom approach, then I heard her gasp as she saw her daughter motionless on the ground.
"Call an ambulance!" Kyle screamed between sobs.
I watched from the top of the stairs as Kyle kept trying to revive her, or me; she looked so much like me wearing one of my old dresses that I couldn't fit into any more that I suspected the unconscious body was mine, and I was watching it lose everything from the top, unable to do anything for myself, or for her, or for my baby, or for anyone.
I was that good at messing up, too.
Truth
Josslyn began to wake up when the medics arrived, but they insisted on taking her to the hospital. Mom and dad both rode with her. I rode with Kyle. I don't think he noticed me getting into his car when he started it and he didn't make any sign of noticing me the entire ride as he pounded the steering wheel and cried.
My sister had a fractured wrist and some bruises, nothing serious; she'd only fainted from the shock of falling. The doctors discharged her in less than an hour, but dad insisted on keeping her at the hospital overnight, just in case.
Dad handled the payment while mom went with Josslyn to her appointed room. I didn't know what to do. I stayed near dad, but not too close to warrant his annoyance. Kyle was also close by, yet so far off in his mind he never once looked at me or tried to hide his tears.
Dad finished the paperwork too soon and made for the elevators, Kyle followed him, and it seemed expected that I did too, especially when dad kept the elevator doors open for me, so I walked after them.
Kyle paused when my dad entered the room and I found myself pausing outside the door with him. He stared at the numbers on the wall with glassy eyes. I didn't think he noticed I was there until he spoke to me, or to himself.
"Maybe she didn't hear everything," he whispered, "maybe she didn't hear anything."
He was shaking as he entered the room and I pitied him. When I first found out about my baby, I had some alone time to think, I had the choice of keeping her a secret, I had the time to let go of my old life and accept my new one, I had the time to subtly say goodbye to everything that I had, to everyone that I had, he was losing everything and everyone on the spot, and I wasn't sure if I felt avenged or guilty.
I lived at home with my sister, we went to the same school, we shared almost everything, so there was no way I could've avoided her or ran away from her. I had to face her sooner or later, and I chose to add my hopes to Kyle's and follow him.
Josslyn's wide, roaming eyes instantly found us. She looked at Kyle, her face an exact mirror of his; betrayed, hurt, confused, denying, dazed, but she only blinked at him once before her haunted eyes turned to me.
"Tell me it's not true," she asked me, her voice hoarse and pleading. "Tell me that Kyle is not the father of your baby."
It took a moment for her words to sink in before my parents gasped and exclaimed, but I couldn't look away from her.
I could feel Kyle's eyes burning me, begging me to tell her that he wasn't, but I couldn't.
I'd always thought that my sister deserved to know the truth, I just didn't know how to tell her. While it didn't happen in the most convenient way, she knew, and it didn't feel my right to take the truth away from her. I hadn't said anything before, but I hadn't lied either, to tell her that he wasn't would've been a willing, never-to-be-taken-back lie, and I couldn't do that to my sister, I didn't want to.
I blinked and tears fell from my eyes, blurring her.
"Joss, baby, I can explain," Kyle jumped in when he realized I wasn't going to say anything in our defense, but even he couldn't lie when she turned her hardened gaze towards him. "I-it was one time, I swear, so long ago, before we... Before I fell... You were with Luca that night, remember? I told you I'd been with someone else, and we both agreed that it didn't matter. It doesn't matter, Josslyn... I love you. It was a mistake, a one-time mistake, I swear. You have to believe me. It was before we got serious. You know I would never do that to you. I... Josslyn, please."
He left out the part that he'd only told her about kissing another to match her level of cheating and didn't mention that he'd slept with someone else, he left out the part that he never mentioned that that girl had been her twin sister, he left what he should've been really apologizing for; lying to her when he'd had a better opportunity to tell her the truth than I ever did and continuing to lie to her for so long.
"Why didn't you tell me?" Her voice was so weak, so tired.
"I-I..." I didn't know what to say, so I confirmed Kyle's confession. "It was only once. I thought you two had broken up. I didn't mean to-"
"That's not what I asked you, Katelyn." She snapped, though her voice remained calm. "Why didn't you tell me?"
"I tried," my voice was thick with held back sobs, but the tears were impossible to stop. "I tried to tell you, but I didn't know how. I didn't want to hurt you. You said you were falling in love with him and I..." I trailed off, the lump in my throat too thick for any words to squeeze through.
"And you didn't stop me." She finished for me. "You knew that he cheated on me, lied to me, and gotten you pregnant, and you..."
"I..."
"Just go," she shook her head and looked away at the blank wall. "You don't get to claim you hadn't wanted to hurt me when you knew it was going to hurt a million times more with each new day. You don't get to be the one playing the victim and crying and being hurt when I can't even make myself believe this enough to cry. You... Just go, I don't want you here, both of you."
I didn't need to be told twice. The moment she started talking in her cold, distant voice, I felt like I'd been punched in the stomach. The moment she finished, I couldn't hold it in any longer and rushed to the nearest bathroom, emptying my stomach from what seemed like a week's worth of food.
I had no idea how I got back home, whether I took a cab or a bus or just walked, but I found myself at home. My parents had clearly decided to spend the night with my sister, because it got dark and I was still home alone.
Chad called at the same time he did every day. I had no idea
if I answered or what I might've said, but he was knocking on my door a few minutes later. We somehow made it to my room. Then, I turned to him and told him; "Josslyn knows."
Something about the way he looked at me made me realize that I might've already told him over the phone, or up the stairs, or just a few seconds before. Something about the way he looked at me made me realize that I looked so pitiful that he couldn't help but look at me like that. Something about the way he looked at me made me not care that he was looking at me and I broke down.
He helped me to my bed and laid me down, then lied down beside me. He squeezed me closer to him, as close as my stomach allowed. He didn't whisper lies into my ears and tell me that everything was going to be alright, we both knew it wasn't. He just held me in his arms while I sobbed and cried and sniffed without a word, until I was all out of sobs and tears and he handed me a tissue so I was all out of sniffs as well.
Then, I just lied there in his arms for a very long time.
"I don't know what to do," my voice was cold and distant, like hers had been.
"There's nothing to do," he whispered back and held me tighter.
I fell asleep for a while, minutes or hours, but I woke up from a bad dream to my baby stirring inside me.
"Chad?" I nudged him.
"Hmm?" He breathed sleepily.
"Chad?"
"Yeah?" He slowly opened his eyes, but they widened when he saw me so close, as if he'd forgotten where he was. "Are you okay?"
"Yes," I nodded. "She's moving." I looked down at my stomach.
She'd moved countless times before, always at the most inconvenient times, but it felt different that night, saving me from my nightmares and my own mind, as if reminding me that she was still there, with me, a part of me, always to be mine even if I lost everybody else.
"Do you want to feel her?" I'd never shared that moment with anyone before, and I certainly couldn't with my family anymore, they were going to hate her more than they already did. And she didn't have a father. It broke my heart to think that she was going to be born soon, and no one else had felt her moving inside of me, nobody else had acknowledged her existence in me.
