Deadbeat

by Amy Sparling

  "Yes, I'm not sick," Elisa says. "I just throw up occasionally."

  We're sitting on a bench outside of the movie theater. We're an hour early since we didn't eat dinner. Elisa and I never have anything to talk about anymore, and the conversation dries up quickly. I had wanted to wait until I took her home to give her the birthday present I got her. Since we have nothing to do, I reach into my jacket pocket and take out a small velvet box.

  "Happy birthday," I say, handing it to her. She gasps and smiles, taking it from my hand. It's a necklace, but it's in a box the same size as one a ring would go in, so before she gets too excited I say, "It's not an engagement ring."

  "No, of course not." She closes her hand over the box, but doesn't open it yet. "I wouldn't expect that so soon."

  "Soon?"

  "Engagement rings cost money, and we have a baby to save up for, so naturally I wouldn't expect you to spend money on one right now." She says this methodically, as if it's something she's told herself repeatedly. It creeps me out to the core. I hadn't given one second of thought to engagement rings. I gave her a necklace because it's the kind of present you give girls when you're in high school. I had known I'd pick this same thing from the first day we started dating.

  Carefully, excitedly, she opens the box. Her smile melts at the three diamond tiered pendant. "Aw, Jeremy it's beautiful." She fumbles with the box to remove the entire necklace.

  I regurgitate what the sales lady had told me, "Those three diamonds symbolize the past, present-"

  "And future, I know." She holds it up and swoops her hair to the side so I can fasten it around her neck.

  "How'd you know?" I clasp the necklace and pull her hair out from under the tiny silver chain.

  "I've heard it before. It's very sweet." She reaches to her chest and touches the pendant. "Our past was fun, our present is, well –" Her eyes fall to the ground and her mouth closes, unable to finish the sentence.

  "Sucky," I say.

  "Sucky, yes." She frowns, rubbing a hand across her stomach. "But our future will be great."

  I nod – half-hearted and unconvincing. The thought of a future with Elisa makes me want to run off and join the Peace Corps. Inwardly, I cringe. Why, oh why had I chosen that pendant?

  And then for the first time in weeks, she takes my face in her hands and kisses me on the lips.

  And that's when I decide to break up with her.

  But I'll wait until after the movie.

  Junior high kids hang out in the theater lobby, throwing popcorn at each other, laughing and enjoying life. I hate them all. Some thirteen-year-old loser in an Atreyu shirt leans against the wall, an arm around the waist of some pre-teen skank who's sucking his face off. They only think they know what the birds and the bees are about but they are so damn clueless. They don't realize everything that comes with sex, like broken condoms and babies. Lies and vomit.

  "What's wrong?" Elisa asks on the drive home. I turn up the radio and blow off the question. For once, she doesn't fight back or demand to know what's wrong. For once, there's silence. I should probably try rehearsing my break-up speech in my head before we get to her house, but nothing comes to me so I decide to wing it.

  Once we're back in her driveway, I cut off the lights but not the engine. I'd like to make a quick get away after breaking up with her. Elisa dabs lip-gloss on her lips while looking into her visor mirror. "Thanks for dinner," she says.

  "Yeah, well it's your birthday."

  Either she's psychic or my intentions are written all over my face because Elisa catches on faster than lightening. "Just tell me what you have to tell me because obviously you're thinking about something."

  "I don't feel like giving you a long speech."

  "Fine. Get to the point."

  It's surprising, how much I just don't care about what I'm going to do. I don't want to talk about baby stuff. I don't want to be obligated to see her and I don't want to stay away from girls like Sarah just because Elisa's pregnant. The smallest part of my subconscious tells me that this is wrong.

  But I ignore it.

  "I want to break up."

  My words are tangible as they stab into her heart. She falls forward, hands grabbing the dash for support. Her hair is all in her face but I can hear the pain in her voice. "How did I know you were going to say that?"

  Unlike every other bad conversation we've had, she doesn't cry. She picks up her purse and steps out of my truck. I stare straight ahead, feeling two feet tall as the realization of what I just did sinks in. It's not regret - just - realization.

  "Well have a good night," she says. "I'll call you when your child is born."

  Chapter 16

  I get incredibly good at avoiding Elisa in the hallways at school. Like stealthy-ninja good. In English class, we each act like the other doesn't exist. No one says anything to me for a whole week. Austin is the only person I tell about the breakup, and he handles it like any best friend would. He tells me to go party with him this weekend.

  "McDonald's?" he asks as we leave the school for lunch. In my efforts to avoid the cafeteria table I used to share with Elisa, Austin and I have been leaving campus every day. Even though it isn't allowed, it's a pretty easy task when the oldest, most batty teacher is on parking lot patrol.

  "Sounds good." I hop into his car.

  Austin drums his fingers on the steering wheel. "So how are you handling all the bullshit from the cheerleaders?"

  "What bullshit?"

  "Dude, how are you always so unaware of what's happening in your life?"

  "Shut up and just tell me, what kind of bullshit are we talking about here?" Elisa is the only cheerleader I've ever dated, so I don't know why they'd have beef with me. Unless… "Is it about Elisa?" She was a cheerleader all throughout high school until this year when the doctor said she couldn't cheer anymore with her weak ankle. Even though they didn't hang out anymore, I guess they are still friends.

  "Maybe they just aren't saying it around you." He swerves to the right and cuts off two cars that then slam on their horns. "But they are talking all kinds of shit about you being a deadbeat dad and a shitty boyfriend for breaking up with Elisa."

  "Fuck, they know? How do they know?"

  He makes a gimpy hand and slaps it against his chest. "Elisa told them, they are all besties, ya know."

  "But she was so adamant about keeping our private life a secret."

  "Well maybe she didn't tell them, it's pretty damn easy to tell anyhow, since ya'll are never around each other anymore."

  He has a point. I can't believe the student body even gives a shit about me and Elisa's business. But then again, cheerleaders give a shit about everyone's business if it's juicy enough.

  "Who cares? I don't give a shit what the dumbass cheerleaders think about me."

  "I guess you're right. I just don't like hearing crap about my best friend."

  We get to McDonalds and there's a long line of cars in the drive thru. All of them are high school students. School rules are a joke.

  "Do you think I did the wrong thing?" I ask.

  "Give me a minute," he tells the microphone at the drive thru. Then he looks me in the eye, which is serious business for someone as laid back as him. "I don't think anything you did was wrong. You're just dealing with what life gave you."

  I nod, struggling to find meaning in his answer. I wished the words made some deep, psychological sense and opened up a euphoric waterfall of happiness for me, assuring me that I had done the right thing, but they don't. Austin is an eighteen-year-old high school athlete. He's no philosopher.

  We order our food and devour it on the five-minute drive back to school. I spend the rest of the day wondering who could give me good advice for how to deal with having a pregnant ex-girlfriend.

  During homeroom, I pull out my Calculus review and try to study. After a few minutes though, my mind wanders and I end up doodling. A crumpled wad of paper hits my desk and lands in the middle of my notebook. Startled, my hand f
lies across the page and messes up my half-hearted basketball diagrams.

  "Are you going to study or draw x's and o's all day?"

  A girl thinner than a toothpick is staring at me, eyebrows raised as high as her hairline. It's Kirsten – a cheerleader. "No thanks," I say, flicking the paper back in her direction. "I already know all of this shit."

  I don't know it actually, and I'm probably going to fail the midterm.

  Kirsten slides her chair over to my desk. "What?" My voice is filled with sarcasm.

  She rests her chin on her hand, and a smile tugs at the edge of her mouth. She knows something and she's playing me like a cat with a mouse. "I know," she says.

  "You know what?"

  Her smile gets bigger. "I know about Elisa."

  I try not to flinch. "So."

  "So… I think it's terribly romantic."

  "I don't know how the hell that's romantic." I try not to say much, just in case she doesn't know all of the details.

  "Oh it's romantic. You know Tabitha White?"

  "Sort of."

  "Well she's pregnant too, and today in gym class we were all sitting around and Tabitha and Elisa were talking about being pregnant."

  I groan. Of course she was.

  Kirsten ignores my groan and keeps talking a mile a minute – cheerleader style. "And Tabitha was saying that her biggest fear is that she'll have to marry her boyfriend and be with him forever."

  "So." I trace my pen along the review and pretend to go back to studying.

  "So," she says. "So, Tabitha says ‘My biggest fear is being with him forever' and then Elisa says, ‘My biggest fear is that I won't be with him forever.'"

  I look at her now. She's gazing at the ceiling, lost in thought. "And that's just romantic, if you ask me."

  "Hmm," is all I can say.

  Sarah calls me right after the final bell rings. We hadn't spoken since the night Elisa banned me from talking to her, so out of spite – I answer.

  "Hello?"

  "What's up, handsome?"

  My heart quickens. "Sarah?"

  "Of course, how are you?"

  "Good, I just got out of school actually."

  "Oh that's right," she laughs, mocking me. "I forgot you're still in school. I bet that sucks."

  "Yeah, well I graduate in a few months." I stare at the pavement as I walk to my truck. I don't want to see Elisa, but if she sees me, I hope she wonders who I'm talking to with this big ass grin on my face.

  "So now that you're single, I thought maybe we should hang out."

  "How did you know that?" I say it so loud that a group of girls in the parking lot turn around and look at me.

  "I heard it from a friend of a friend."

  "Chris?"

  She laughs. "Something like that."

  "When do you want to hang out?" I ask.

  "What about tonight?"

  "That won't work, I was thinking about going to the beach with the guys tonight."

  "Awesome, my friends are going there too. Why don't you pick me up at eight?"

  What am I getting myself into? "Okay," I say, wondering why I feel so completely guilty about this. "Where do you live?"

  "By the water tower, I'll text you the address."

  We get off the phone and I drive home. I turn down Elisa's road out of habit and when I slow down at her driveway, I realize my mistake. Embarrassed, I floor it and drive away fast, hoping no one saw me.

  Beach nights in January consist of campfires, making out and a few idiots who get drunk and try to swim in the frigid water. Normally, it's not a big deal. Tonight – it's a huge deal.

  Sarah is just some girl I met in a pool hall and now I'm taking her to the beach to hang out with my friends. What exactly does she want with me? I don't want a relationship, especially not so soon after Elisa, and probably not for a long time since I'm going to start college. But if all Sarah wants is to fool around – I'm game.

  At dinner, I sit on the edge of my chair just long enough to scarf down two servings of food. Mom says something about never seeing me anymore and how she hates that her youngest son is growing up. She's been saying this shit a lot lately, as if it's supposed to make me feel bad, and it doesn't; it's not my fault my body naturally grows from child to adult.

  Sarah texts me her address and I'm looking it up online when Austin calls.

  "You want to ride with me to the beach tonight?" he asks. Call of Duty noises filter in through his phone. He's the only person I know who can play Xbox and talk on the phone at the same time.

  "No thanks, man. I'll drive myself."

  "Why not? It's a waste of gas if we both drive."

  "Sarah asked me to drive her," I say, reluctant to tell him all of the details. He's a guy, so I doubt he'll tear into me for moving on so quickly. But what if he does?

  "Sarah? That hot chick from the pool hall?" He practically screams into the phone, in a psyched, not at all judgmental way.

  "That's her." I pause while he screams profanities at the bastard who shot him in his video game. "She called me earlier and asked me to bring her, so I don't really know what provoked it." I leave out the part about Chris telling her I am single now.

  "Well good luck. And don't fuck her."

  I laugh, unsure if he's serious or just screwing with me. "You don't have to worry about me. I don't need any more kids."

  "That's for damn sure."

  After saying goodbye to Austin, I search for Sarah's address online. Looking at the map, I realize her house is on the same street as the high school, so it won't be hard to find. I grab my favorite hoody – and then another one just in case Sarah gets cold, and head over to her house.

  Painful nostalgia grips me as I watch the mailboxes for Sarah's address. This is the exact street Elisa and I drove down a million times, and every time we talked about the elaborate mansions on the east side of the school. Big, overbearing mansions with well-manicured yards - where all the richest people within a hundred miles lived.

  We used to talk about how we were going to buy a house on this street when we grew up and made a ton of money. This was way before the pregnancy nightmare. Back when we were just teenage lovers without a care in the world. Virgin teenage lovers.

  I find house number 12214, a red brick home with white columns, a water fountain and an intimidating driveway. It's a block away from the high school and I remember Elisa and I talking about this same exact house on our drives to school. When we were rich enough to buy it, she wanted to turn one of the rooms into a paint studio and I wanted three man caves.

  And now, the fact that I was here without her felt so wrong. Like I am betraying her more than just going out with another girl – I'm also hanging out at her dream house.

  Turning, I pull into the horseshoe part of her driveway like her text had instructed. Now I see why Sarah didn't mind buying us drinks two weeks ago; she is filthy rich. Or her parents are at least.

  The front door is an archway made of two doors. One of them swings open. Sarah dances out of her house, in ripped up jeans and a black sweater with the sleeves going down to her fingertips. She has one of those wallet-sized purses sandwiched between her elbow and chest and she's texting on her cell phone with the other hand.

  She doesn't even look my way when she reaches my truck, pulls open the door and jumps inside. Then she leans across the seats and kisses me on the cheek, a quick peck mixed with the scent of her perfume that sends chills down my spine.

  "Hello," she says. It's hardly something to say after having kissed someone. Elisa would never be this promiscuous, and I like the change in Sarah.

  "What's up," I say, trying to be casual and not like a nervous virgin train wreck. Because I may be a nervous train wreck, but I am not a virgin. Sarah pulls down her visor and starts applying lip-gloss, and by the way she slides a tongue across her lips, I can't imagine her being a virgin either.

  We now have to endure twenty-five minutes of a boring drive through the back roads to get to the beach.
After three of them, I've run out of things to say. And when the silence gets too much to bear, she makes things even more uncomfortable by slipping off her seatbelt and moving to the center seat next to me.

  "I'm a lucky girl tonight," she says, arm on my thigh. "I get to go to the beach with you."

  "Riiiight," I laugh sarcastically. "Girls are just lining up and begging to ride with me to the beach in the dead of winter."

  "I don't see why they wouldn't be." She squeezes my leg. Her eyelids are sparkly. I want to lick off the strawberry-scented goo on her lips.

  From inside my hoody pocket, my phone vibrates. I slide it out just enough to see the caller ID.

  It's Elisa.

  I hit ignore and keep driving.

  "So how well do you know Chris?" I ask, trying to make conversation.

  "I know him slightly more than I know you."

  "Then why is he telling total strangers about my private life?" I ask, fishing for information and hoping to God that she doesn't know about my future child.

  "Calm down, he didn't say anything incriminating." She replies to a text on her cell phone – for the bizzillionth time tonight. I wonder why she's wasting time hanging out with me when she has so many other interesting people to talk to.

  "Well what all did he say?"

  "He told me you had a girlfriend, that first night I met you…when you were rude and left me without warning." She shoots me a fierce look. "And then last week I saw him at the pool hall again and he told me you were single now, so I thought I'd call you."

  If that's all she knows, then I'm in the clear. Though I'm relieved, I'm a bit embarrassed now for thinking that Chris would have narced my dirty secret to a hot girl in a pool hall.

  My phone vibrates again, and I check it only to see Elisa's name blinking across the screen. I know if I pull my phone further out of my pocket, I'll see the picture associated with her number and I'm not sure I can bare that now. Her eyes pierce straight to my soul, even on a two-inch cell phone screen.

  Ignoring it again, I keep driving.

  A few minutes later, Sarah is still sending text messages at a rate only girls can achieve, and when my phone beeps I think it's a message from her trying to be all cute because we're sitting next to each other. It's not.