The Summer of '98

by Tay Marley

  “Well, he did,” she said. “But like, I need more intimate details. Share? Are you coming back?”

  I shook my head with a sad smile. “I won’t be allowed to once Momma finds out. But it is what it is.”

  “Bitch, I’m gonna miss you,” she pouted.

  “I’ll miss you too.”

  “I’m coming to visit in Waco, okay?”

  “I would love that, Cass.”

  “Come on, babe,” Leroy called from the car. “As much as I don’t want you to leave, you’re going to miss the flight.”

  When I turned back to Cass, she was giving him a sympathetic look. I could tell she knew how he felt about the situation. Still, she gave me a warm smile and pulled me in for a hug before I left. During the drive out of town, I couldn’t help but watch the views that passed us with sad regret. I’d come to fit in so well in such a short time. I’d made friends and memories that I would keep forever. It was a town that felt just right. I felt like I belonged here, more than at my actual home. I’d never been so sad to leave a place before. And it was for more reasons than just Leroy.

  My flight was boarding, and I glanced at the woman who was checking the boarding passes. “Call me when you land?” Leroy said, quiet, defeated, as he had been since we’d left the house. It was obvious that both of us wanted nothing more than to turn back time and do things differently. Whenever I thought about how the rest of this summer should have gone, it winded me. It’s hard to accept how wrong a plan can go in the blink of an eye.

  “Of course, I will.”

  His jaw clenched as he stared down at me, a strand of hair falling onto his forehead. “Els,” he said, his voice hitching. “There is nothing . . . nothing I wouldn’t do for you. You need me, call me, and I’ll be in Waco in a few hours. You can call me in the middle of the night, whenever. I promise I’ll answer. I’ll be there.”

  He was going out of focus, blurring at the moistening of my eyes. “I know,” I inhaled a shaken breath. “I know, Leroy.”

  It wasn’t possible to keep a lone tear from falling down my cheek and he took my head in his hands, swiping it with his thumb before he pressed his lips against mine. I took a moment to absorb it all. The feel of his fingertips. The feel of his love. I was sure I couldn’t be soothed in such a way by anyone else on earth. He was one of a kind and no part of me wanted to lose him.

  “I love you, Leroy,” I sobbed, our eyes still fixed on one another.

  “I love you too, Ellie.”

  Amber was waiting for me in the airport lounge, just as she’d promised she would be. Her sweet, familiar face was a comfort that I needed after the longest two hours that I’d ever endured. But much to my surprise, she wasn’t alone. It was a nice distraction to see that Eric stood beside her, his arm around her waist. Amber had her hair in locs—she’d been wanting them done for a while, but the school wouldn’t allow it. She’d graduated now, so she could do what she wanted.

  Eric stood a head taller, his golden-brown skin a few shades darker, no doubt thanks to the Texan sun. They made a gorgeous couple and by the time I reached them, I’d had time to realize this must have happened after I had connected with them by phone last week.

  “Hello, gorgeous,” Eric swept me into a bear hug before I could utter a hello. “What’d he do? Do I need to head home and throw down with that mofo?”

  I laughed into his shoulder and shook my head when he set me down. “We haven’t broken up.”

  Amber touched a hand to my arm, concern all over her face. “What happened then, chick?”

  “It’s just complicated,” I told her, staring at the ground. It was hard to lie to Amber. She knew me too well. “I don’t want to get into it right now.”

  “That’s okay,” Eric gave me a light jab in the shoulder, and I smiled, grateful for their acceptance of my silence. My attention moved between them as we started heading for the exit, me pulling my suitcase behind me.

  “So, when did this happen? I thought you were off to college, Eric?”

  He threw his arm around Amber, absolute glee on his face as he kissed her temple. “I arrived last night, to be honest. We hit it off over the phone, talked ever since, and then I thought, what the hell, we’re going to the same college, might as well spend the rest of summer together before we go. Right, Prez?”

  “Prez?” I questioned.

  “Oh, I called her princess once,” Eric said, and Amber started laughing as we stepped out into the hot afternoon sun. I’d almost forgotten how damn unbearable the weather is here. “But she said she doesn’t want to be a princess; she wants to be the president. So I said, I get it babe, and Prez was born.”

  “That’s cute,” I said. As beautiful as their blossoming relationship was, beautiful enough to distract me from the grief that I was feeling from my own, I couldn’t help but feel a pang of envy. Now might have been a good time to insist that they use birth control. Knowing Amber, though, she was all over it.

  The closer that we got to home, to the inevitable truth that I would have to tell Momma, the more I slipped from reality, isolating my mind in order to keep from falling apart in the backseat of the car. Perhaps she would surprise me. Eleanor managed to remain calm when her son’s entire future was on the line. Perhaps Momma would tell me that I didn’t have to terminate the pregnancy. Perhaps she’d tell me that we should come up with some other plan because being a teen mom wasn’t the end of the world. She’d done it. She survived. Perhaps she’d tell me that I would too.

  “You told me nothing had happened with him,” Momma snapped, pacing the living room while she chewed on her thumbnail. “You promised me that it wasn’t physical. Lord, Ellie! You met the boy once! When did you even find the time to sleep together?”

  “I don’t think that you need to know that.”

  “I do,” she said with a hostile tone. “My daughter is pregnant by a boy that she’d met once.”

  “Momma,” I sobbed because I hadn’t stopped bawling from the moment she came home from work and found me in the middle of the living room. “You’re making it sound like it was a one-night stand.”

  “But it was!” she threw her hands up. “It would have been. If he hadn’t kept in contact.”

  “Well, he did.” I sniffed into a tissue and swiped at my cheeks with the back of my hand. “He loves me, Momma. So, leave it alone. What’s done is done and I’m going to deal with it.”

  “And who is going to pay for this termination?” She stopped pacing and folded her arms. “I sure as hell can’t afford it. You need to phone the doctor. You need to go through counseling. You need to have an ultrasound and tests done before you even get to the cost.”

  I hadn’t even thought about that, and as strange as it was, I felt this surge of relief move through me. It confused me because I knew that I wasn’t ready to be a mother, but the more time that passed, the harder it was to imagine going through with the termination.

  “You have savings, I assume?”

  I looked at my mother and couldn’t recognize who was looking back at me. Disappointment was nothing new, but this was something else. This was hostile disgust and loathing. She was furious.

  “Yeah,” I mumbled, standing up so that I could go to my bedroom, but before I could leave, she gripped my elbow to stop me.

  “I don’t think you should see him again,” Momma said. “He’s trouble.”

  “You don’t know a thing about him,” I bit back and pulled my arm out of her grasp. “He’s a good man and I won’t be told otherwise.”

  When I went to leave the second time, she let me go. I knew that Momma would be upset about the pregnancy, but I expected a little more support, a gentler approach perhaps. I hadn’t expected her to be so cold and awful, as if I’d done it on purpose. As I stormed up the short corridor and into my bedroom, which was a mess from the haphazard unpacking, I felt tears welling up again. The door s
lammed when I swung it shut and I collapsed into a heap on the single bed.

  Although I was home with my momma and in the place that I’d spent my entire life, I felt so alone, out of place. I already missed Leroy and while I was so distraught, I wanted him with me. Without even thinking about it, my hands moved up and cradled my stomach. I thought about the fact that a part of him was with me, and in some turn of event, it helped me not to feel so alone.

  “Hey, baby,” Leroy came in through the back door and set his gear down. “Smells good in here.”

  “I’m making your favorite,” I smiled and let him kiss me on the cheek before he leaned over and inhaled the aroma of fresh cooking. “The kids will be excited to see you.”

  “Ooh, where are they?”

  “Playing upstairs.” I arched backward so I could shout in the direction of the staircase. “Abby, Drayton! Daddy is home!”

  The sound of little footsteps came barreling down the staircase and my two blond darlings appeared with giant smiles and excitement. They bound into Leroy’s arms and squealed with delight.

  “How are you both? Did you watch Dad on television this weekend?”

  They both nodded with enthusiasm. “You play the best, Daddy,” Abby grinned when he gave her a big kiss on the cheek.

  “I wanna be like you one day, Daddy,” Drayton nodded, and I felt my heart flutter. It pounded so hard at the sight of my gorgeous family. My son and daughter were everything to me. The reason I woke in the morning. The reason I tried to be the best that I could be. Leroy looked up at me and his brows pulled together.

  “Ellie?”

  I couldn’t answer him. No matter how hard I tried. Nothing would come out.

  “Ellie?”

  “Ellie?

  I shot up in bed and gasped. My heart was beating as furiously as it had been in the dream. I clutched my chest and took a few deep breaths to calm down. The dream had felt so real that I almost expected to look around and find baby clothes and toys. But there were no signs to indicate that it was anything but fiction.

  Before I could forget it, I shot out of bed and ran over to the small desk in the corner of the room. I started writing it down. What had happened, what the cute names of the children were. Abby was the name that Leroy had used when we were grocery shopping in Castle Rock. Doubts had been clouding my mind from the get-go. As much as I wanted to be sure about what I wanted, there had been a niggling battle going on, my heart and head at war. I knew what was sensible, but what I felt was love—love for a child that I’d made with the man I love—and that dream felt like our future. A future that I wanted.

  Hope started to swell within my chest as I thought about phoning Leroy. We could do this, right? Together, we could do it.

  I was halfway through scrawling down the dream’s events when the door swung open and Momma walked in without an invitation. She pulled the curtains open and silently went about picking a few things up from the floor.

  “I made an appointment at the clinic for nine on Monday,” she said, her tone cold. “It’s a consultation but it’ll get the process going.”

  “Momma? I . . . I don’t think I want to do it now. The termination. I don’t think I want to do it.”

  I couldn’t even look at her, knowing that she would be fixing me with that stare. The one that would weaken my resolve and push me into doing what she said. She had that effect on me.

  “Ellie, you don’t have to go through with the termination,” she said. The weight off my shoulders was enormous, but alas, it was short-lived. “But you will be giving it up for adoption.”

  “What?”

  “You can’t raise a child. You are not having a baby under my roof. Are we clear?”

  I couldn’t think of what to say that would allow me to make a decent argument. She sighed and carried on speaking. “Think about this with some common sense, child. You don’t have a dime to your name, apart from the measly savings you have for business classes. Our house is small. You’ve got your whole life ahead of you. A child isn’t a smart idea and think about how immature you still are. You can’t cook. You can barely drive. What on earth good would you be to a baby?”

  My nose stung and my lip quivered as I slowly sat down on the edge of my bed, looking out into our minuscule back garden, a dry lawn, and the fence just a few feet back from the house. The view had never looked so imprisoning. She was right: I would do no good raising a child. I couldn’t expect Leroy to support us through it, even though I knew he wanted to. He didn’t understand what a burden it would be and how much of an effect it would have on his career. A dream wasn’t enough to go on. That sort of thinking was childish in itself. Getting excited over the idea of a happy ending couldn’t secure a happy ending, no matter how we felt right now.

  My shoulders shook with violent sobs as I realized that I had to do this alone. I had to give this baby up without involving him because he shouldn’t have to bear that burden or endure that hurt. He would believe that I’d terminated and that it was for the best. But it would mean losing him and that hurt more than anything.

  Ellie

  The following morning, after Momma had told me I wouldn’t raise my own child, I lay in bed and stared at the ceiling, feeling no motivation to leave the confines of my comforter. The phone in the kitchen rang, but I ignored it.

  My bedroom was my favorite place in the world. My own space. There was a bookshelf in the corner beside the closet. Old vinyl records made a mural on the wall, there were posters of music legends from floor to ceiling, my bed in the middle of the room was covered in throw pillows, a stack of CDs sat beside my vanity, and my drawers were covered in collectible stickers. The best part: I’d scored almost everything in here from thrift stores. Momma didn’t care for room décor. She said a bed and drawers were essential and extras were up to me to provide. So, I had.

  But now, looking around, it didn’t bring me the same joy that it once had. It was just stuff. Stuff couldn’t tell me it loved me or hold me or assure me we’d be okay. I missed Leroy to the point it was painful.

  “Ellie, Ellie, Ellie,” Amber’s friendly voice came from the hall a moment before my bedroom door swung open. She stood at the threshold and folded her arms. “Girl, I’ve been calling but no one’s answering. What’s doin’? You know it’s beautiful outside, right?”

  “Is it?” I sat up, aware that I looked like a creature. “Where’s Eric?”

  “He’s chillin’ at the music store. I’m going to meet him later, but first,” she came into the room and sat on the edge of the bed, “what’s going on? Something happened with Leroy, right? You’re a mess.”

  “I am.”

  She tilted her head. “What’s going on, chick? Talk to me. You didn’t come home for no reason. You looked so sad at the airport.”

  “I’m pregnant, Ambs.”

  Her brows shot up and her mouth fell open. “No.”

  “Yes.”

  “No.”

  “Maybe if you keep saying no, it’ll be true.”

  “I’m sorry,” she said and fell backwards, staring at the ceiling. “I just can’t even . . . that’s bananas.”

  I nodded and she twisted her head to look at me.

  “What are you going to do? Where’s Leroy? Girl,” she gasped. “Your mom must’ve gone postal.”

  “Yeah, she was pissed,” I said and proceeded to explain the events that had occurred since I’d told Leroy about the pregnancy.

  “He thinks you’ve come home for an abortion. But you’re just going to avoid him until you’ve given birth and said ‘see ya’ to the mini?”

  When she said it like that, it sounded awful. It was awful, regardless of its wording, but I felt short of breath when I nodded.

  “That’s not right, girl,” she said. “He’s coming here for college soon. What’s gonna happen when he sees you walking around with a massive bu
mp?”

  “Texas is huge. I might not see him at all.”

  Her expression fell flat, and she sat up. “That’s still not cool. You have to tell him something. Break up with him. Closure. Something. You can’t just disappear on the boy. That’s so mean.”

  My tears welled over for the millionth time and I buried my head in my hands. “I know, Amber, I know. I’m just c-c-confused and scared and Momma is—”

  “Your mom is wrong too. Straight up, that woman is worse than my momma. She’d smack me if I got pregnant but no way she’d kick me out if I wanted to keep it.”

  I looked at her. “You’re using protection, right?”

  “We aren’t stupid. No offense.”

  “None taken.”

  She let out a loud sigh and gave me a light tap on the leg. “Come on. Let’s go and do something. You need a distraction. And a shower.”

  As lifeless as I felt, she was right—I did need a distraction. After I was showered and dressed, Amber drove us into town, and we arrived at a rock-climbing hall, the biggest one in the city. There were dozens of walls for different skill levels and most of them were free at this hour of the morning. I hadn’t realized how early it was until I looked at the clock behind the front desk and saw that it was nine.

  “Rock climbing is good for the soul,” Amber said, while we waited for the clerk to bring us a harness and helmet each. “Good for releasing tension and giving focus.”

  “Ambs, we’re here. You don’t have to sell it.”

  “I would have suggested that we drink but I didn’t think that’d be a viable option right now.”

  Despite everything, I laughed. “Yeah, no.”

  After we were harnessed and told the safety procedures by the clerk, we wandered farther into the hall and looked around. There were three separate halls joined by double swing doors. The first hall was toddlers to beginners. There was a colorful area with a foam pit and a little rock wall about two meters tall that kids could jump off and then the walls became a bit bigger, but the rocks were still relatively close together. We wandered through into the second hall, medium difficulty, deciding to start in here and move into the difficult hall if we felt like an extreme challenge.