Deadbeat

by Amy Sparling

  "Yes."

  "Well how do you even know the meaning of love?"

  I sigh. I give her this look that says this is the best I can do. "I'm here aren't I?"

  Chapter 9

  The baby shock takes a while to settle in my mind. By Friday, I've still not completely adjusted to the fact that I'm going to be a father. Exhausted from spending every waking moment with Elisa, I'm stoked that it's finally game night. I hadn't had much time to think about basketball lately and had skipped practice for the last two weeks to hang out with Elisa. Coach Davis shouldn't let me play but he likes me too much to enforce the no practice- no play rule.

  In the locker room, far away from Elisa and engulfed with the stench of teenage boy testosterone and sweat, I still don't feel free. Before games I'm usually excited, a bit nervous and mostly pumped about playing. But today I feel nothing but a stabbing in the pit of my stomach, a constant reminder that I'm going to be a father.

  "There's the best damn point guard this school has ever seen!" A lanky arm wraps around my neck and fake-chokes me. It's Austin. He's my best friend so he can get away with this – anyone else would be punched. And like me, he's been in love with a girl all year so we hardly ever hang out anymore unless we're in the locker room or on the basketball court. Sadly, Elisa and his girlfriend Maci don't get along at all or maybe we'd do the whole double date thing.

  "Sup man," I say, shrugging off his chokehold and giving him a fist bump instead. He sits next to me on the bench and starts lacing up his shoes. "Dude, you're never going to believe this," he says.

  "Try me."

  He throws his jersey over his head and shrugs his arms into the armholes. "There's going to be another baby in my family."

  My jaw falls to the sweat-covered floor. He's having a baby too?

  "Maci's pregnant?" I ask in a near-whisper, because I'm sure he doesn't want anyone to know. His eyes roll. "Hell no, man. My mom's pregnant."

  "Oh." My quick burst of relief disappears and I bend down to tie my shoes so he can't see the pitiful look on my face.

  "Shit, I'm not that stupid." He stands up, tosses a sweaty towel at me. It smacks the back of my neck and falls to the ground. Austin ducks, expecting me to pelt it back at him, but when I don't, his expression goes from brain-dead jock to concerned friend.

  "You alright?"

  I nod. I'm about to tell him that life is perfect and full of butterflies and rainbows, but then I realize that I could really use someone to talk to. Someone who isn't Elisa or her Bible-thumping mom. I know I promised Elisa to keep our secret a secret, but shit.

  What she doesn't know won't hurt her.

  Our whole team is in the locker room, changing clothes and jacking around being the rowdy idiots that we are. This isn't a place to talk privately so we duck inside Coach's office.

  "Elisa's pregnant."

  "Shut the fuck up dude, you're kidding right?"

  I shake my head. I wish I were kidding.

  "What are you going to do?" he asks. With one look, he manages to look both sorry for me and happy that this isn't happening to him. I don't blame him though – I'd way rather be in his shoes than mine.

  "Get a job, I guess." A baby photo of Coach's daughter sits on his desk. I turn the other way so I don't have to look at it.

  "Does this mean you won't get to go to Cancun on spring break?"

  "So these are the concerns my best friend has when I tell him that my girl is knocked up?" I'm not really offended. He brings up a good point, and I'm still going on that trip. With or without Elisa.

  "That's pretty crazy," he says. "I'm going to be a big brother and you're going to be a dad." We sigh at the same time, but for different reasons.

  "I can't believe this is happening to me." I hold my head with my hands and stare at the ceiling. There are glow-in-the-dark stars on it, which is weird for a high school coach to have in his office. Austin steps closer to me, probably wanting to give me a hug but knowing that guys just don't do stuff like that. "I'm sorry," he says. "I'm here for you if you need anything."

  Two of our teammates run down the hallway toward the locker room. One sees us in Coach's office and stops suddenly. "Hey gaylords, are you two making out in there or something? The showers are this way!" he yells.

  "Shut up, Mark," Austin yells back, giving him the finger.

  Now that we've been spotted, the only non-gaylord thing to do is to leave and join the rest of the team. Before we're back in the locker room, I turn to Austin. "This is a secret okay? Don't tell anyone."

  He nods. "Of course, bro."

  Chapter 10

  Every time I look into Elisa's eyes, I am crushed by the guilt I feel about telling Austin our secret. She's not able to tell anyone and she's the one with a freaking baby growing inside of her, while all I do is sit back and watch. It was so selfish of me to tell him.

  Tonight, as we sit in my room looking up jobs on the internet, I am tempted to tell her. But unlike sex, this is the sort of temptation I can say no to.

  "What about this one?" she asks, turning her laptop screen toward me, pointing at an ad in the middle. "Fifteen dollars an hour, filling work orders at a warehouse."

  I look up from my Mac. "Part time or full time?"

  "Full." She squints and reads the ad to herself. "Its five ten-hour days so you'll get ten hours of overtime pay a week. That's awesome, baby!"

  "Hell no, it's not," I say, returning to my job search since that one is out of the question.

  "Why not?"

  "I can't work ten hour days, go to college full-time and play basketball." She wants to object but realizes I am right. College is the key to making good money, not some stupid warehouse job.

  "Maybe you could go to school part-time?" she suggests. I crinkle my nose and don't bother telling her what a stupid idea that is. She's smart enough to know how stupid it is, she's just grasping at straws here.

  "We're going to need a lot of money for this baby, Jeremy. Babies aren't free."

  Groaning, I say, "I understand that babe, I do. But I have a full scholarship to play basketball at the university, and if I go to school part-time, then I can kiss that goodbye. And college is way more expensive than a stupid baby, so I don't see how that would be a better idea."

  It's quiet for a minute, and I know I shouldn't have said ‘stupid' in reference to the baby, but I didn't stop myself because I am just so pissed off right now. She has no right to tell me to work instead of go to school. Slowly, she closes the screen on her laptop. It takes an eternity until I hear it click shut. She crosses her arms.

  "Well, I'm so very sorry that I'm making you lose your free ride to college."

  "You know it's not your fault," I say through clenched teeth.

  She purses her lips. "You're right. It's not my fault. I wasn't the one who begged and pleaded for you to have sex with me."

  "Don't pull that shit with me, Elisa. You made the choice for us to do it, not me."

  She stands up, her laptop crashes to the floor and neither one of us flinch. "Well you didn't stop me!"

  Instead of yelling, my voice cracks. "Of course I didn't, I'm in love with you."

  Her face softens. I've said the golden words to stop her emotional volcanic eruption. She moves over to me and sits in my lap, her arms slide around my neck. "I'm sorry."

  "I'm sorry too," I say, kissing her forehead.

  "I just really wish you'd think about working instead of playing basketball," she says, running her finger across the collar of my shirt. I sigh through clenched teeth. She holds my face in her hands. "I thought we were in this together?"

  "We are," I say. I don't know if I mean it though.

  "So, will you at least think about it?"

  "Sure," I say. "I'll think about it." I'm sure as fuck not thinking about it, but I don't want to fight right now. Eventually she will see things my way and realize that the best decision for us in the long run is for me to take this scholarship. Her kid's future depends on me making real
money, not warehouse money. I mean, our kid.

  Exhausted with job searching, we cuddle on my bed and watch TV. She lies on my chest and I can only stand so much of her boob touching me before I'm overcome with the urge to make out.

  And so we do.

  I run my hand over her belly and then under her shirt. She pushes my hand away. I try again – she rejects me again.

  "Babe, come on. We can do it all we want now-" I raise my eyebrows up and down. "There is literally nothing worse that can happen to us."

  She pushes away from me and I grasp her arms as a pitiful attempt to keep her close to me. "I don't want to do it," she says.

  "Why not?" I whine. I run my hand through her hair and down her back.

  "I'm just not in the mood," she says, rolling over onto her stomach. She props her head up on her hands. "I'm actually kind of nauseas."

  Ugh. Buzz kill.

  "Alright, well what do you want to do?"

  A mischievous grin spreads across her face. In a sing-song voice while tracing circles on my comforter, she says, "We could talk about baby stuff…"

  God. Since the mood is gone, I get up and sit at my computer desk.

  "Okay," I say, relenting to her pleading eyes. "So, baby stuff. What's up in the world of baby stuff?"

  She lets out a little squeal, happy that she's getting her way. "We should talk about baby names," she begins, eyes full of enthusiasm. "I was thinking Ian for a boy and Julia for a girl, but Caitlin said that name is too old fashioned so I've been thinking of another name-"

  "Caitlin?" I say, cutting her off. "You told Caitlin?"

  She gets the deer-in-the-headlights look and then quickly replaces it with shame. "I'm so sorry, Jeremy. It slipped. I didn't mean to tell her."

  My fist slams on the desk. "Caitlin? I can't believe you told her, of all people!"

  "I'm sorry," Elisa pleads with me, but I'm so angry and I've already started yelling and I don't feel like stopping now.

  "Fuck sorry! That bitch can't keep her mouth shut – she thrives on drama. And you just told her the biggest fucking drama of all, Elisa. I can't believe you."

  "She's not a bitch, and she happens to be a really good friend. And I made her promise me that she wouldn't tell anyone."

  "Right, well promises mean everything, don't they?"

  "What does that even mean?"

  I don't answer because I don't know. I just said it to continue arguing at her, trying to make her sorry for breaking our agreement. And although I know I broke it too, it doesn't seem nearly as bad as what she did by telling the biggest gossip in school. I told a guy, and guys can keep secrets. Girls can't. I grab my keys and put on my baseball cap.

  "Get your stuff, I'm taking you home."

  "Good," she says, scrambling to put all of her things back into her backpack. We can't even look at each other as we walk through the house and into the garage. Mom and Dad are having a beer on the porch swing. It's unusual to see them out here.

  "Jeremy," Dad calls as we're walking past him. "Could you and Elisa come here for a minute?"

  "I'm taking her home, actually," I say. Mom's staring at her hands. Dad's eyebrows rise a tiny bit, as if challenging me to disobey him. Elisa and I exchange a split-second glance, our differences put aside for now, and then cut through the grass to join my parents.

  "Hi, sweetheart," My mom says to Elisa. Dad cuts her off.

  "Kids, have a seat. We need to talk."

  Chapter 11

  Elisa and I sit on a bench, which up until now was only used for decorative purposes. She holds onto my arm with a trembling hand, and it's as if we weren't just fighting five minutes ago. Her touch means everything to me now that we're faced with a talk from my parents.

  Dad says, "We've come up with a plan for your situation. I think you'll approve of it, Elisa, because you want to keep the baby."

  "The plan is to keep the baby. There really is no need for another one," she says. My mom flinches and Dad gives me a stern look that I take to mean "get your bitch in line." Mom would never stick up for herself the way Elisa just did. Then he continues, "Since you two are teenagers and have no way to raise a kid, your mother and I are willing to adopt it."

  There is silence, and the air thickens and presses against my chest. I am clueless as to what I should think-or say-but Elisa takes the floor. "So you will adopt our baby, like for financial reasons until we're out of high school and on our own?"

  Dad shakes his head while Mom sits quietly, still looking at her hands. "No, we would adopt it legally and it would become Jeremy's brother or sister." I shudder at the use of the word "it" to describe a baby, my baby, but I guess it's the only word that makes sense at only three months along.

  Elisa says, "And where do I come into this?" Her voice is high-pitched and on the verge of panic.

  Mom speaks up. "Well we would be happy to have an open adoption, so you can still see the child."

  Dad says, "And this way, Jeremy can be in the kid's life without having to worry about paying child support or losing visitation if you two drift apart."

  Elisa lets go of my arm and grips the sides of the bench instead. "I don't think you understand at all, Mr. Lawrence." She looks to me for support, but I don't know what the hell I'm supposed to be supporting when she says, "Jeremy won't ever pay child support. We're going to get married and raise our baby together."

  Dad turns to me. "Are you engaged to this girl?"

  "No."

  "When do you plan to get married?"

  I hesitate and a small grin appears on his face. He loves being right. I hate him being right. And in this moment, I'm on my girlfriend's side, not his. But marriage?

  "I don't know," I say, defeated. Elisa grabs my arm again and I know she wants me to look at her, but I don't.

  "Well then." My dad looks at Elisa and her grip tightens tenfold. I don't know how she does it, but she holds her ground despite the overwhelming odds that we will lose this fight. "Mr. Lawrence, you are not adopting my child."

  Dad stands up. "You and my son are a disgrace to my family. And unless you change your mind about adoption or marriage, you are no longer allowed over here."

  Elisa stands up, pulling me with her. With her chin in the air, she seems a foot taller than normal as she says, "Your son is not a disgrace. And you can go fuck yourself."

  We take off toward my truck. I don't even want to see the steam that is probably coming out of Dad's ears right now. The front door slams just as I reach my truck, so I dare a glance back. Dad is gone but Mom is still sitting on the swing, silent tears rolling down her cheek.

  Chapter 12

  Two months pass. Elisa is now about four months pregnant, but she says it in weeks, which I never keep track of so I say four months. We could have discovered the sex of the baby by now, but she refuses. She wants it to be a secret. She also wants to talk about baby names all the time, which kind of contradicts the whole keeping the sex a secret thing.

  When Elisa's fully clothed, you can't even tell she's pregnant. When she's naked, on her futon when her parents aren't home, I can see a small baby bump. She's still hot though.

  Elisa still hasn't been over to my house since that day my parents gave us the ultimatum. What's worse is that she doesn't seem to care. So we spend all of our free time at her house. Her mother has accepted me as part of the family now, probably under the delusion that we are going to get married soon. My parents – well – they just don't say anything about anything.

  "How is the job hunt?" Mrs. Hardy asks me, taking out her homemade pizza from the oven. The scent of garlic butter and mozzarella fills the kitchen, causing my mouth to water.

  "I'm about to start working at a motorcycle shop after school," I say. Her eyebrow rises.

  "Motorcycle shop?"

  "X-it Cycles," I answer. I guess she doesn't believe me unless I give her a real business name.

  "That's good. Are you still trying to graduate a few months early?" Her smile is sweet, but I know it's
hiding her nosy motives.

  She cuts the pizza into slices and asks Elisa to make everyone a glass of tea. Everyone meaning the three of us – her dad didn't come home from work today.

  "Yes ma'am," I say. I hold out my plate and she piles on pizza slices. I've eaten dinner here every day this week. Before the pregnancy, I was lucky to be invited to say for dinner once a month. "I have to finish some paperwork with the counselor, but she said I should be able to graduate early, no problem."

  Elisa takes a seat next to me at the table, plate piled high with four slices of pizza. That's about four times what she usually eats. "Can you see your plate under all that food?" I ask, clearly joking, but she glares at me anyhow.

  "Shut up, Jerm. I'm eating for two, in case you forgot." She mimes stabbing my arm with her fork and I mime large amounts of blood bursting out of it, falling onto her plate. Her mom cringes. "That's gross, you two."

  "Sorry Mrs. Hardy."

  She smiles one of those motherly loving smiles. The kind of smile my mom always has plastered on her face, but it looks incredibly forced on Mrs. Hardy. "After graduation, will you still work at the motorcycle shop?" she asks.

  I know she's just being a caring mother by prying for information about how we're going to take care of this kid when it's born, but I'm incredibly annoyed. I don't know what I'm going to do after graduation. I still plan on going to college. I also don't plan to talk about that now, when we're having a delicious dinner and cheerful family conversation. Besides, if I graduate early, I'll still have until next August when college starts to figure out what we'll do. The baby will be born by then.

  I'll be a father by then.

  Then what?

  "Mark, the owner of X-it Cycles said he'd hire me on full time after school is out," I say hoping it will shut her up. And then I get an amazing idea. I say part of it aloud. "I'd have six months to work full time until I have to start thinking about starting college, so-" I glance to Elisa and she looks thrilled. "So, I'll be able to save up six months worth of paychecks. That should be pretty decent for the baby."