by Peg Cochran
All she had to do was give them her baby when it was over.
Chapter 11
Rivka could barely concentrate on what Mrs. Baker was saying. Her eyes kept closing, and once or twice her chin actually dropped to her chest, waking her with a start. It didn't help that the room was sweltering, and the air was heavy and sticky with humidity.
Every night this week, when she told her parents she was at the library studying, she’d actually been out with Lance. And that meant she’d had to stay up well past midnight poring over her books to make up for the lost time. If her grades slipped, her parents would know something was up. Besides, she couldn’t settle for less than A’s, she couldn’t. She’d always been on the honor roll and had always made her parents proud.
A flare of heat suddenly made her face burn. Her parents wouldn’t be very proud of her if they knew she was lying to them and going behind their back. She could see her mother with her face going all long and sad. And her father taking off his glasses and polishing them the way he did when he didn’t want you to know how he felt. But it wasn’t her fault. If they weren’t so stupidly old-fashioned, they’d be happy for her—snaring a guy like Lance. All the girls would be jealous if they knew. Plus he was a Miller and came from an important family and lived in a huge, gorgeous house. Surely that ought to make them happy.
Rivka smiled to herself. She’d been so lucky on Saturday night, she could hardly believe it. Her parents had had a flat tire on the way home from the movies and even though a policeman had stopped and called for a tow truck right away, it had been after midnight before Rivka heard their car pull into the driveway. She’d only been home a few minutes herself but had run to the garage acting all worried and upset. That made her mother feel guilty, which made Rivka felt a little guilty too, but it wasn’t her fault that her parents were the only two people on the face of the earth without a cell phone.
The bell rang, and Rivka jumped up, banging her leg against her desk. She rubbed her knee and then stretched her arms over her head. One more class to go. Her whole body felt achy and tired. Thank goodness it wasn't much longer until the end of the school year.
She was starting down the hall when someone grabbed her arm. Rivka whirled around.
“Pamela!”
Pamela tucked her arm through Rivka’s—tightly, so she couldn’t escape. Rivka could feel the tips of Pamela’s fingers digging into the soft flesh of her upper arm. She squirmed and smiled nervously.
“Where have you been? If I didn’t know better, I would think you’d been avoiding me.” Pamela squeezed her arm a little harder and turned her lips up at the corners, but her eyes were cold, hard, ice blue.
“I…I’ve been busy studying,” Rivka stammered, trying again to free her arm. Pamela just gripped tighter.
“We’ve missed you. It’s time you joined us again.”
“I’ve still got an awful lot of studying to do with final exams—“
“Truth or dare.” Pamela cut her off with a snap of her fingers.
Rivka hesitated. Her first instinct was to choose truth, but what if Pamela asked her something about Lance? What would she say? She thought again about what Lance had told her about Pamela. It should have given her courage, or at least a feeling of superiority, but it didn't. Pamela was still Pamela no matter what.
“Well?”
“Dare.”
“I know your parents probably don’t want you hanging out with me, and that’s the real reason you’ve been avoiding me—“
“No—“ Rivka began, but Pamela didn’t let her finish.
“And that’s why I dare you to come to the beach house with us next weekend. No one else will be there. It’ll be you, me, Deirdre and Mary. It will be a wild time.” She gave a grin that made Rivka’s stomach do nervous flip flops.
Pamela let go of Rivka's arm and disappeared into the crowd of students rushing toward their next class. Rivka could see the bright orange of her t-shirt blending into the swirling colors until finally, she disappeared from view.
Rivka slammed her book shut and stretched. She looked at the clock—it was almost ten o’clock. She should get ready for bed, but she was starving. Her mother had made matzoh brie for dinner, and she’d only eaten a little bit of it even though it used to be her favorite. Thinking about what Pamela would say if she saw such a weird dish on their table had made her lose her appetite.
She tiptoed down the stairs as quietly as she could. Her parents usually went to bed early.
The light was still on in the living room which was weird. She could hear voices, too. It sounded like her mother and her Aunt Ruth. She paused on the bottom step, listening. She couldn’t remember Aunt Ruth, or anyone else for that matter, ever coming to their house so late.
It sounded like Aunt Ruth was crying. Rivka slid quietly down to the next step and pressed back into the shadows. She couldn’t make out their words, but it sounded like her mother was trying to calm Aunt Ruth down.
It wasn’t the first time. There had always been something different about Aunt Ruth as far back as she could remember. One time she had caught her father making that “crazy” sign with his finger when her mother wasn’t looking, so she knew he thought so, too.
Something bad had happened to Aunt Ruth when she was younger, but no one would tell her what. Her mother said that she would understand when she was older. Which probably meant it had to do with either sex or boys or both.
Rivka shifted on the step. She wondered when they would be done talking? She really was starving and wouldn’t be able to sleep unless she got a snack.
She tried to imagine what Aunt Ruth could have done that had been so terrible and had made her go half crazy like this. Personally, she thought Aunt Ruth had probably been born that way. It was part of the reason they’d moved out of New York City to the suburbs—so her mother could be closer to her younger sister. Her mother’s company moving out to New Jersey had been the excuse her parents had needed to put their city condo up for sale and buy a house on the other side of the river.
Aunt Ruth’s voice got louder, and Rivka could hear a few words. She scratched idly at a mosquito bite while she listened—something about sending a letter and not getting any answer. Why would that make her so upset? Her Aunt Ruth really must be crazy after all.
“Bubeleh! What are you doing still up?”
Her mother came around the corner suddenly, and Rivka jumped.
“Uh, just about to get a snack.” Rivka jumped to her feet.
Her mother made that annoying tick-tick sound with her tongue. “If you’d eaten your dinner, you wouldn’t be hungry.” She turned toward her sister. “Aunt Ruth is going to spend the night with us. I’m making up the bed in the guest room. If you look in the fridge, there’s some leftover matzoh brie you can pop in the microwave.” She motioned toward the kitchen with her chin.
Rivka nodded. Aunt Ruth’s eyes were swollen, and her nose was red. She was wringing a handkerchief with both hands. She nodded at Rivka, her eyes downcast.
Rivka nodded back and slipped away into the kitchen. She put the leftover matzoh brie into the microwave, heated it, topped it with sour cream and carried it over to the table. She could still hear her mother and Aunt Ruth’s whispered voices as they retreated up the stairs.
She thought about what she’d heard as she dug into the snack. Something about an unanswered letter. To a boyfriend maybe? Was that why her aunt was so upset?
It didn’t make any sense so she decided not to think about it anymore.
Rivka started up the stairs, but then remembered she needed some staples to refill her stapler. Her father kept all the supplies in his desk in the small alcove off the living room. She retraced her steps and felt her way across the darkened room. She stubbed her toe against her mother’s wing chair, and stopped for a moment to rub her foot. She could hear her mother and Aunt Ruth moving around overhead and the bed squeaking as her mother tucked in the sheets.
Rivka felt around until she found th
e chain on her father’s desk lamp. She pulled it, and a puddle of light slanted across the center of the desk. She was about to open the right hand drawer when she noticed a folder sitting out with the name “Ruth Weiss” printed on the tab in her father’s neat, careful lettering.
Curious, Rivka eased it open. Would she find the answer to Aunt Ruth’s craziness somewhere inside? She flipped through the papers, glancing over her shoulder quickly whenever the floor creaked or a shadow moved.
They appeared to be legal papers of some sort—long pages black with dense, gothic-looking type. Rivka was about to close the file when something caught her eye. She followed the words carefully, running her finger down the page.
It couldn’t be. She read the paragraphs again. There were a lot of legal terms she didn’t understand, but the meaning was still clear.
She closed the file and made sure she put it back in exactly the same spot on her father’s desk. Her heart beat extra fast, and her head swam.
If what she read was true, then everything she had ever thought or known was a lie.
Mary pushed open the door to Sobeleski’s News Stand that evening with more confidence than she’d felt in ages. Mr. Sobeleski hadn’t noticed the missing money at all. As a matter of fact, Mary had slipped another twenty from the stack on a couple of other occasions and—nothing, not a word. But that was it. She couldn’t keep pushing her luck. Even Mr. Sobeleski was bound to catch on eventually.
“I still can’t believe you got yourself in this condition.”
Deirdre followed behind her mother as she yanked clothes off racks and handed them to the sales clerk who staggered under a huge pile of garments, twisting her head to and fro to avoid the pointy ends of the hangers.
“Hopefully some of these things will fit. And hopefully they’ll hide your stomach until we figure out what to do.”
Her mother glanced in the mirror where her own trim and tanned figure flickered back at her. Deirdre hardly ever saw her mother eat anything—she didn’t even put an olive in her nightly martini.
“If you hadn’t waited so long to face up to reality, we’d have more options. As it is, you’re too far along for an abortion.”
“I don’t want an abortion.”
“You’re too young to know what you want.” Her mother slammed the door to the dressing room and began rifling through the clothes the clerk had put on a hook for them. “Try this on.” She handed Deirdre a babydoll top in a paisley print that reminded Deirdre of pictures she’d seen of girls at Woodstock back in the seventies.
She hated having her mother in the dressing room with her, but she didn’t dare say anything. She glanced down at her belly as she slowly pulled her t-shirt over her head. There really wasn’t much of anything to see yet—just a little puffiness like when she was about to get her period.
Of course her mother had noticed it right away. “Are you pregnant?” She’d demanded at dinner last night, pointing her fork at Deirdre as if it were a spear. It was one of the few nights they’d all sat down together, and Deirdre had been looking forward to spending some time with her father.
There wasn’t much she could say. They were going to find out eventually. Deirdre had read about girls hiding their pregnancy the entire nine months and then giving birth in a bathroom stall during prom, but she didn’t want to do that.
She’d ducked her head and looked at her plate where the piece of rare steak had made her feel sick. “Yes,” she’d finally admitted. When she looked up, she’d looked at her father, not her mother.
But he threw his knife and fork down and stalked out. A few minutes later they heard his car starting up and pulling down the drive.
“I told you,” Deirdre pulled the top on and disappeared momentarily in the swirling fabric. “I’m putting the baby up for adoption. I’ve already met the couple.”
“Well you certainly can’t keep it. Let’s face it, you can barely make your own breakfast—you’re certainly not ready to be responsible for a child. I raised you and that’s enough so don’t look to me to do it again for your little bastard.”
“That’s fine,” Deirdre pulled the top in place and smoothed it down over her hips. “I told you, Ed and Maureen are going to adopt it. If it’s a girl they’re going to call it Emily.”
Her mother snorted. “Emily? Well, I suppose it will be up to them to do what they want with it.”
“They’re going to take good care of it. Maureen promised.”
“Well, what would you expect them to say? Honestly, Deirdre, sometimes you can be so naïve, it’s frightening.” Her mother reached out and tugged on the paisley top.
“It makes you look fat.” She stepped back and eyed Deirdre.
“I don’t think so.” Deirdre peeked out from beneath her bangs and looked at herself in the mirror. “I don’t think I look fat. I haven’t gained any weight yet.”
Her mother sighed and rummaged in her Louis Vuitton purse for her glasses. She peered at the tag on the paisley top.
“Let’s face it. Everyone is going to know eventually. I don’t know why I’m bothering. By the time you go back to school in September, you’re going to be as big as a house. Everyone is going to have a field day talking about it.” She pushed her glasses up on top of her head and reached for the next garment on the hook. “Thanks to you, I’m going to be the laughing stock of the club.”
Lance was in the kitchen talking on the phone when Pamela came through the swinging door. The kitchen was darkened and put to bed for the night—counters wiped down, crumbs swept up.
He dropped the phone back into the cradle somewhat abruptly.
“Who was that?” Pamela demanded.
“No one.” Lance opened the freezer and pulled out a container of chocolate chip ice cream. “Don’t worry, I’m getting a bowl.” He grinned at Pamela, then yanked open a drawer and took out the ice cream scoop.
“It had to have been someone.” Pamela pulled a stool from under the granite-topped island and sat down. She swung her foot back and forth, idly kicking the cabinets along the side. She knew who Lance had been talking to, but she needed him to admit it. She drummed her fingers on the countertop, feeling the tension building in the back of her neck and head.
“It’s none of your business, okay?” Lance put two scoops of ice cream in the bowl and tossed the scoop into the kitchen sink. It rattled briefly against the stainless steel.
“It was Becky, wasn’t it?” Pamela grabbed his arm as he went by.
Lance shook himself free. “Yes. It was Becky, okay?”
“I told you to leave her alone.” Pamela jumped off the stool and stood in front of her brother, her arms crossed over her chest. She felt a rush of anger and frustration that filled her head with swirling, colored lights and left her feeling dizzy and faint.
“Who the hell do you think you are? Trying to tell me who I can and can’t see?” Lance slapped a spoon into the bowl, and it slipped, landing on the tile floor with a clang. “I like Becky, okay? I really like her. She’s smart and funny, and…and…”
“And she’s not right for you,” Pamela slammed her hand down on the counter. “Besides, her name isn’t really Becky, did you know that?” She hurled the words at him as if they were stones.
“What?” Lance stopped in his tracks. “What are you talking about, Pamela?”
Pamela laughed. “I named her Becky. Me!” She pointed at her own chest. “Her name is really Rivka.” She said it slowly and watched his expression from under half-lowered lids. She saw the look of surprise on his face and felt a ripple of triumph. So perfect, little Becky hadn’t come clean after all.
“You’re making that up.”
“No. I’m not. Her name is Rivka.”
“So what? Lots of people have nicknames. Some people change their name altogether. Besides, I like the name Rivka. It’s different.”
Pamela snorted. “It’s disgusting. It’s a stupid, foreign name, and I hate it.”
Lance shrugged. “I still like her
. I don’t care what her name is. And I don’t care what you think!”
“But you’re a Miller. You can’t just go out with anyone.” Pamela threw her last card down on the table. If being a Miller didn’t mean anything to Lance, then nothing would.
“I’ve told you before, this Miller thing is a bunch of crap. You know that. Besides, I told Becky all about it.”
“You…did…what?” Pamela grabbed Lance’s arm and shook him. He was saying that to upset her—he had to be.
“I told Becky. I don’t want there to be anything between us. Besides, we’re grown up now. Things are different.”
“You had no right, Lance. No right at all.” Pamela grabbed for the counter. She felt really dizzy and as if her head would burst. She couldn’t believe Lance had done this to her. “She’s going to tell everyone—“
Lance was already shaking his head. “Not Becky. She’s not like that, honest.”
Pamela stamped her foot. “Are you crazy? Do you know what kind of ammunition you’ve given her?” A bead of sweat trickled slowly down her back. She shivered.
“You don’t know Becky. You really don’t.”
“Girls are all the same, don’t you know that? Why are you so stupid?”
She had to do something to make the terrible feelings filling her head and burning in her chest go away, or she would die. She looked around the kitchen frantically then grabbed the bowl of ice cream from Lance’s hand. She hurled it as hard as she could against the wall.
The dish ricocheted off the pantry door and shattered into a dozen pieces on the imported Italian ceramic floor. Blobs of chocolate chip ice cream slid lazily down the pristine white walls, where it had splattered, and puddled below.
Why did her brother have to be such a jackass? Pamela slammed her bedroom door so hard one of the original watercolors hanging on her wall fell face first onto the carpet.
They had agreed never to tell, a long time ago when they were kids. She could remember it as if it were yesterday—the two of them sitting under the dogwood tree way out back where no one could see them. They’d made up a little ceremony and had taken a solemn oath to each other that it was going to be their secret forever and ever. They had clasped hands afterwards and gone skipping back toward the house, perfectly united in this one thing.
