The Girl Who Couldn't Say No: Memoir of a teenage mom

by Tracy Engelbrecht

  “I’m … I’m … I’m going out! I’m leaving!” I declared, all overblown bluster and pretend confidence. The high-noon moment ticked away as we stood staring each other down, eyes narrowed and fingers twitching. The class sat breathless: who would fold first? As the adrenaline and anger drained away, it left only dismay and terminal embarrassment. I had to get out of there before I burst into tears. I started towards the door.

  “You’re not going anywhere, young lady! Get back here this instant!” yelled Ms H, nostrils flaring and panic rising. Clearly, this wasn’t how it was supposed to go. I ignored her this time – if I’d tried to talk, I would’ve cracked. I swept out of the class in what I hoped was dramatic fashion, tripping over a small wastepaper basket and nearly breaking an ankle. As I slammed the door behind me, the nausea and flashy lights started. I almost passed out then, but I staggered into the library and sat down to catch my breath. I skulked in the teen fiction section for two hours before anybody found me.

  Ms igh="ArialH didn’t drag me to the principal demanding a public hanging for gross insubordination. Oh no, it was far worse than that. She sat me down in her office (a grand name for the printing room, a dusty cavern with ancient printing machines lurking threateningly in the corner) and flicked the Concerned Mentor switch.

  “Tell me, Tracy. There must be something going on. This isn’t like you…” She was actually being kind, or at least trying. I was silent, sullen, miserable. I wouldn’t tell her, I wouldn’t. If I blabbed now, it would spoil everything. It would all be over. They’d send me away and our Plan would be ruined.

  I tried to hold onto my anger, hoping it would keep my mouth shut. I thought she was trying to trick me, acting concerned so I’d spill my guts all over her yellow shoes (they were yellow! I remember now! So she must have been wearing her yellow suit that day, after all! I knew it!)

  She started guessing.

  “Is everything All Right At Home? Are your parents getting divorced?” I shook my head. Good grief.

  “Are you eating properly? You haven’t been starving yourself have you? You know, you girls and your diets, I just don’t understand it.”

  Jay-zus woman! Do I look like a freaking anorexic to you? I nearly laughed at that one, but just shook my head again. It was the Spanish Inquisition without the instruments of torture, although I was beginning to wonder about those printing machines.

  She ran down the list of Society’s Ills, trying to get me to admit to something. Abusive parents, drugs, depression, bulimia – everything except pregnancy. I don’t know why she didn’t think of it. Perhaps, like everyone else, she couldn’t quite believe that Dreary Virginal Tracy had ever been within spitting distance of a boy.

  I was starting to lose it. Somewhere around, “Are You Trapped In A Polygamous Religious Cult?”, my strained self-control snapped and shot across the room like a cheap elastic band. Twang! I’d tried so hard to keep quiet, but she was like a Jack Russell with a bone and I was no match for her.

  “No! No! It’s nothing like that! I’m pregnant!” I barked. Shock. Horror. Damn.

  She opened and closed her mouth a few times, looking just like a goldfish. A yellow goldfish with purple hair. Sputter, gasp, dribble. “Are you sure? At your age, your menstrual cycle hasn’t settled down yet, you know. And these terrible crash diets can disrupt your periods too. Yes, yes, that must be it.”

  per height

  Jeez, she wasn’t letting go of this anorexia thing. I hadn’t been skinny to start with and at nine weeks I wasn’t huge, but nobody would be confusing me with Kate Moss any time soon. She was clutching at straws, a little frantic, trying to convince herself it was all a big mistake. I really did not have time for this. I spoke patiently and calmly, though I still felt like punching her in the nose.

  “No ma’am, I’m sure. I’ve been to the doctor already. It’s been confirmed; I’m about nine weeks now.”

  Panic gave way to haughty indignation. When all else fails, bully someone…

  “What about your parents?” she snapped. “Where are they in all this? Did they not love you enough that you had to look for love with this… this … boy?”

  How rude!

  “No! My parents love me! It’s not their fault. They didn’t do anything wrong!” I heard that childish shrillness in my voice again, but I couldn’t help it, she was beginning to annoy me. She could think what she liked about me, but I wasn’t having any interfering old bag disparage my parents, who had always done their best for us and were at no stage to blame for my misdemeanours.

  Ms H was having none of it. Her middle-school psychology seminars were quite clear on the matter. It was all down to not enough love, not enough discipline, not enough boundaries, not enough green, leafy vegetables.

  The cross-examination continued while I wondered where my next cookie was coming from. I felt sorry for her, eventually. She seemed bewildered, desperately scrabbling for some shred of sanity in a world gone mad. She’d never expected this of me, she told me. I had so much potential, she told me. I could have done so much better. She wanted to know where it had all gone wrong. Surely there must have been one traumatic, defining moment that had plunged me into this harrowing, downward spiral of degradation and self-destruction (big on psychology, even bigger on big words, Ms H). Repressed childhood abuse, perhaps? Unresolved weaning issues? Absent father, domineering mother? Surely there must have been something?

  I tried to tell her it wasn’t that complicated, but she wouldn’t hear me. I didn’t dare mention my Destiny and Providence theory. Nor the other popular hypothesis, the one where Shit Happens. I don’t think either would have gone down well. She leaped from one wild conclusion to the next, and I waited until she was ready to listen. I fantasised about ginger biscuits and calculated the distance to the nearest toilet. Recent experience had taught me that it’s best not to say too much at times like these. Best just to nod sagely with a suitably contrite expression, and let her get things off her chest. Rational thinking would return in a while, but for now it was all bluster and reproach. That was okay. I was familiar with the procedure.

  She eventually ran out of steam, as I’d known she would, and then I told her about The Plan. I told her I was planning to keep the baby, finish my schooling by correspondence and be a good mother. I told her that my parents were supporting me and we were going to be okay. It sounded real when I said it, it sounded like it could really work. It was a good plan. She seemed impressed that we’d managed to get this far without her.

  Then I broached the subject I’d been dreading.

  “Ma’am,” I began. “I … um … are you going to tell the principal? I know I’ll have to leave then. Please, please, if you could just let me finish this year, I promise I won’t be a problem. I really have to finish. Please don’t tell him.”

  Then I cried again. I was exhausted. Stress, hormones and the strain of acting as if everything was normal had wiped me out completely. My body was tired, my mind was tired. I just wanted to go back to bed and sleep until April. Now, on top of everything else, it looked as if I might have to quit school – all because I couldn’t keep my mouth shut for three lousy months. What jolly good fun.

  Then scary Ms H did the unexpected. She hugged me. I could hardly believe it. Ms H was human, after all.

  “You know, you remind me so much of my daughter. She was just as stubborn as you,” she said vaguely as she wiped my eyes. This may or may not have been a compliment. I didn’t know how to take it.

  “You know I have to tell the principal,” she continued. “But I’m sure he’ll be reasonable. I’m sure we can work something out for you. Don’t worry; it’ll be fine, you’ll see.”

  Another hug, my head still reeling from the first. You learn something new every day. Imagine learning that Ms H was really quite sweet. Our relationship changed overnight – we weren’t just teacher and pupil anymore, we became something like equals. It was good to have someone to talk to, someone who was genuinely interested and not ju
st for the gossip value. She became my friend.

  Much to the disappointment of my class mates, who were hoping for more live-action cat fighting, I was allowed to go home after our talk. When I phoned my mom to fetch me, I had to admit the jig was up. She was not pleased. I didn’t know it was possible for her to be more pissed off with me than she already was, but she found a way.

  My future – and my baby’s – was now in the hands of cranky bureaucratic fogies who didn’t know me, and whose main concern would be What People Would Say. Another sleepless night.

  Mr igh="ArialC was an intimidating man – tall and not very friendly-looking. Maybe he just had a naturally angry face. My mother and I had been summoned to his office and I was nervous. I’d never been in there before. Ms H had said I needn’t worry, but I was still wary. After all, this was the man who, the year before, had written a scathing letter to all the parents, exposing their children’s sordid shenanigans at all-night beach parties, during which drinking and fornication in the bushes had been the order of the day. Nobody ever asked how he knew what went on in the bushes, and perhaps it was better that way. And yes, he really did use the word fornication. I hardly expected him to be agreeable to letting me swan around school for the next three months with my growing belly and unpredictable mood swings.

  I thought I was in for a lecture on Standards and the School’s Good Name and Setting An Example, but it wasn’t forthcoming. Instead, Mr C asked what I was going to do. He asked about continuing my education and who would look after the baby, but he didn’t make us feel bad. He could have – we were expecting it and I thought I deserved it – but it didn’t come. Again, I was surprised to find that this forbidding man was just a person like me, muddling through life and doing his best. More and more, I was learning that adults were not the all-knowing, all-powerful supreme beings I’d thought they were. This was a confusing discovery. I didn’t know whether it made me feel better or worse.

  Mr C said I could finish the year and write my December exams, but I had to make sure the Governing Body (Mafia Gardening Lady and her tea-drinking cronies) didn’t find out, because they might not be so accommodating. They had to think of official visits from education department inspectors and government funding and stuff like that – they wouldn’t want a pregnant girl wandering around brazenly on the school grounds, where she could be a bad influence on anyone.

  He asked who knew about the pregnancy, and I fudged the details a little, I’m afraid. I couldn’t admit that everybody south of Cavendish Square probably knew by now. Well-known scientific fact: the closest thing to the speed of light is the speed of gossip in a suburban middle school. It was surprising that the teachers hadn’t heard this juicy piece of scandal. Of course, I said I’d only told one or two close friends and they would keep quiet. I just prayed that some nasty kid wouldn’t tell the head honchos, just for fun. I imagined certain other parents finding out; the outrage and uproar and emergency PTA meetings, the mob of angry pitchfork-wielding villagers baying for my blood.

  I’d expected it to be much harder than this. I’d prepared myself for expulsion. I was getting used to the idea of a life spent waitressing. I hadn’t expected sympathy and simple kindness from anybody at all, let alone my teachers. I kept looking for the pitchforks, but so far there were none. Ms H didn’t have to grill me for answers; she could have given me detention instead and thought nothing of it. She didn’t have to speak to the principal on my behalf. And he didn’t have to let me stay. None of them had to help me. None of them had to care at all, and yet they did. If they hadn’t, my life might have been very different.

  ***

  And so life went on. You wouldn’t think it could, but it did. I still went to school every day, I still went out with my friends, although this was becoming increasingly awkward. We were starting to drift apart, and I suppose that’s normal. Sometimes I found it hard to accept that things were changing between us, and sometimes I felt quite alone, even when I was with them. I know I wasn’t a very good friend during this time – my mood swings and self-absorption must have seemed bizarre and maybe over-exaggerated to them.

  Still, the sun came up every morning, and the weeks passed by as they always had. I planned, I daydreamed, I worried. I went to the doctor for monthly check-ups, the baby and I were both healthy. Things were going according to plan, mostly. We still had bad days sometimes, but things were moving on.

  One morning, I woke up with a tingly, nervous feeling in my stomach. I couldn’t place it for a minute. With a little shock, I realised it was excitement. I was excited to meet my child and to become a mother. I was excited about the future. It was a great feeling. Knowing that I was a proper mother with real maternal feelings, real love for my baby, and not a tragic planned parenthood poster child, me happy. It made me proud. I walked around with a silly grin on my face the whole day. Besides all the practical arrangements falling into place, now I knew that my baby would be safe with me. He would be loved. I wouldn’t let him down.

  Chapter Four

  1994: In which she chucks her man and finds her feet

  And so we come quite neatly to the subject of David, which I cannot avoid although I’ve been trying like hell to think of a way. It’s hard to talk about, because those were difficult days and I know they weren’t my most shining moments.

  We must go back a few weeks to when I first found out. As I said, David wasn’t with me when I found out I was pregnant. When I gave him the news over the phone, I told him I’d be breaking the news to my parents that night, and that he should do the same.

  Soon after that, a meeting was arranged between his mother and my parents. We were all going to sit down together and discuss The Situation. Nobody was looking fo mos lookirward to it. Everybody was stressed out and distracted, and nobody was thinking clearly. It’s no surprise, then, that things went so wrong that night. A comedy of errors, you might call it, if you were feeling jovial and didn’t mind being coshed over the head with an ornamental table lamp.

  What happened was this. You see, they thought we were meeting at our house, and we thought we were meeting at theirs. So while they were waiting in the car outside our house, we were waiting in the car outside theirs. Their house was in darkness, so obviously nobody was at home, unless they were hiding behind the couch. The thought did cross my mind. It soon became clear that they weren’t coming back –nobody wanted to say it, but we were all thinking they’d made a duck. We drove home in silence. I sat in the back seat and entertained evil thoughts. I was furious with David. I thought he’d let me down on purpose, and I hated him for making me look stupid.

  Imagine our embarrassment when we arrived home to find them sitting in their car outside our house. Somehow we’d gotten our wires crossed, each thinking the other lot were a bunch of inconsiderate twits, spineless jellyfish who couldn’t or wouldn’t keep a simple appointment. There was some awkward small talk about the amusing mistake, with fake-jolly comments along the lines of “Ho, ho, some miscommunication there, somewhere.” And then much glaring at the other side because of course, we didn’t miscommunicate anything – no, it must have been them. We said we’d meet at their place, you know. It was all arranged.

  This sort of thing never happens in real life. Just as you’re starting to think you had the date or time wrong, your friend or your train or your interviewer will saunter up nonchalantly as if you hadn’t been waiting forty minutes at all. And you still don’t know, do you, if they were late or you were early. And you never will. However, this time it did happen, and it happened in real life.

  We all sat down in the lounge drinking the terrible, weak coffee I’d made, and the adults spoke about what was to be done. There was no overt unpleasantness, but if looks could kill, determining who dunnit would have proved a forensic challenge, what with all those tiny daggers sticking out of everybody’s backs.

  We spoke about The Plan and they said they’d do their bit. Dad said he wasn’t concerned about What People Would Say, he and Mom
just wanted the best for me. My father, the hero. I wonder whether he knows how proudly I remember this. It meant a lot to hear him say it. In the end, not much was resolved that night at all. It was just a preliminary meeting in a spirit of general politeness and saying the correct things. A meeting to discuss the possibility of future meetings.

  Then they went home and we sat and drank more coffee and spoke about how that wasn’t so bad, how it could have been worse, and aren’t they a bunch of wallies for going to the wrong house? I’m quite sure they sat in their lounge saying exactly the same things about us. Comedy of errors, see?

  So David and I were still together, after a fashion. I found myself increasingly irritated by him, by his crying and his need for support and direction and his “yes-man” personality. He said the things I wanted to hear, but with no idea of the implications. People have said he was too young; he wasn’t ready for the responsibility. People have told me I shouldn’t be too hard on him.

  Fine, then. Maybe he wasn’t ready and maybe he was too young. But how does that explain me? I was four years younger and I was doing okay. As scared as I was, I was taking responsibility for my child and our future. If I could do it, surely so could he? But, then again, I do have that mule-headed resolve you can bounce rocks off. Maybe I was expecting too much from him. I don’t know. I just don’t have an answer for that one.

  Our relationship hobbled along on two broken legs for a few more weeks, but I knew it wouldn’t last. I needed support, somebody to lean on, and I knew he couldn’t give me that. We broke up. It was difficult and I felt guilty and mean. Hormones being the way they were, I may have been a bit nasty to him. Everybody seemed to think I was punishing him. He may have thought so, too. My friends were angry with me for breaking up with him. They thought I was cruel and unfair. But I still think it was the only thing I could have done.