Sisters Don't Tell

by Deena Lipomi

  “So call him.” She’s had sex with him, so how hard can it be to pick up the phone?

  “I don’t know if….” She pokes a hole in a pancake. “If I’m going to keep the baby.”

  My head explodes with excitement that this could all be over. If Annie has an abortion, everything can go back to normal. No one at school besides Kasey would ever have to know she was pregnant.

  This thought is quickly followed by fear and sadness. I won’t be an aunt, won’t have a niece or nephew.

  I shake it off. In ten years Annie could be married to a guy who loves her, who is meant to be in her life, and they could have a million children then.

  Right?

  Suddenly I wish Mom was here and fix this for Annie, for me, for all of us.

  “Well,” I say, my voice wobbling, “if you don’t want to keep it, you don’t need to tell him.”

  “What if he wants to have the baby and I don’t?” she asks quickly.

  “It’s not his decision,” I say. “It makes sense that you wouldn’t want to keep the baby. You’re fifteen.”

  “I know that,” she snaps.

  “Well you’re not acting like it,” I shoot back, hating myself for the tone, and frustrated by her view of reality. Or lack of reality.

  “What if I want it to be our decision?” she asks. “Mine and Harris’s?”

  I scoop the pancakes from the griddle onto another plate, practically scraping off a layer of steel with a screech. “Then tell him you’re pregnant,” I say, exasperated.

  “Mel, please.” Annie’s voice is sad, scared, desperate.

  My heart hurts. I blink quickly and get the peach cobbler going in the microwave to collect myself.

  “I’m sorry for everything,” Annie says. “You’re right. My friends, sometimes they suck and say totally bitchy things. But they were my friends.”

  “Were? Don’t you mean are?”

  Annie shrugs. “Who knows after this gets out.”

  The microwave beeps. I ignore it, take a deep breath, and say, “You can have an abortion and have your life back.”

  She shakes her head, tears off a bite of burnt pancake, and pops it in her mouth, a peace offering since no one should be eating that charred crap. After she swallows she says with a tremble in her voice, “I don’t know what to do.”

  I haven’t heard Annie this unsure of herself since middle school, when she didn’t know if the kids at school would make jokes about her squinty eyes. And it scares me.

  “I don’t know what to do either,” I say, placing a hand on my chest like that will soothe my heart. Instead all I feel is a hollow thump that echoes the feeling in my head.

  Annie licks her fingers. “I still like him. A lot. Even though we haven’t emailed in a while. I want it to work.”

  I get sick of hearing the microwave beep so I retrieve the cobbler, split the salvageable pancakes between two plates, and top each with sugary peaches. I set one serving in front of Annie.

  “Do you think Harris…still likes you?” I ask, amazed at the depth of our conversation and sad that this is what it took for us to come together.

  Annie picks up her fork and stares at her plate. “I don’t know.”

  “I still don’t get why all this is such a big secret.”

  Annie shoves a giant bite of pancake into her mouth.

  “Mom and Dad know you’re pregnant, so what’s left to hide?” I ask. “Are you afraid Mom will be pissed because you lied about where you were the weekend you met up with Harris?”

  “No,” she says, and keeps eating. “I’m way beyond that.”

  I sigh. “Then why?”

  She downs the rest of her breakfast in quick bites and carries her dish to the sink.

  “Annie.”

  She heads for the stairs.

  “Come on, Annie.” I abandon my pancakes and block her way to the staircase. It makes me glad I’m a plus size to her petite. We stand there, our faces right up in one another’s for a long few seconds. “I can’t help you if you won’t talk to me.”

  “It’s not your job to help me,” she says, the fight out of her voice.

  The crush of pain in my heart jolts through my chest. “I want to help. Don’t you understand that?”

  “That’s just it, Mel,” she says. “There’s nothing you can do to change a thing. It doesn’t matter.”

  “Forget it.” I storm off to my room. Any time I start to care, start to get close, she plays this game. I’m about to slam my door shut when icy fingers grab my shoulder.

  “He’s in college,” Annie says. “All right?”

  “What?” I turn around.

  “Harris,” Annie says. “Harris is twenty.”

  Chapter 8

  My phone buzzes on my nightstand, just about knocking me off my feet. Not that it’s too hard to floor me since I’m still reeling from Annie’s confession.

  “Annie! That’s like, statutory rape!” I say.

  She shoves me fully into my room and shuts the door as if Mom and Dad are here to overhear. “It wasn’t like that – don’t say that. It wasn’t rape!”

  My phone buzzes again. I squeeze my eyes shut. “OK, OK.”

  Annie’s eyes drip tears. “We didn’t do anything wrong.”

  I fall back onto my unmade bed, the sheets and comforter tangled at the end. One pillow sags on the floor, covering a stack of half-read novels, magazines, and a page from the used car section of the classifieds. My life looks so simple when viewed from the bed.

  “Mel, you have to believe me,” Annie pleads.

  The buzzing from my cell grates on my last nerve. With a shaking hand, I reach for it. The screen says KASEY. Annie snatches my wrist before I answer.

  “Don’t say anything to her,” Annie says. “Promise?”

  “I won’t,” I say. “I promised.”

  Annie nods and backs away, leaving my room, trusting me more than she has in years.

  I have never trusted myself less.

  I put the phone to my ear. “Hello?”

  “Dude!” A parrot screeches in the background. “You’ve got to come down and check out the puppies. They are so freakin’ cute.” More parrots caw. “Quiet,” she yells at her zoo-ish household.

  Desperate to leave my house of melodrama I say, “I’ll be right over.”

  After a quick shower, I dress, reheat my breakfast, and eat quickly. But not fast enough. Mom gets home from her half-day of work and corners Annie in the living room while I wash my dishes.

  “Why don’t you call Justine? It’s not healthy to stay inside all summer, sweetie,” Mom says to her.

  “I don’t feel like it,” Annie says. I hear the TV flipping from station to station.

  “You could help me make some salsa,” Mom says. She must’ve stopped at the farmer’s market on her way home and loaded up on tomatoes.

  “Wrong daughter,” Annie replies.

  She’s right about that. I have a tasty new mango salsa recipe I want to try --

  “What if I gave you some money to meet Justine at Marshall’s for lunch?” Mom asks.

  Oh man, she’s even offering her cash? She hasn’t handed me so much as a George Washington since I started working last year.

  “Not hungry,” Annie replies.

  “You don’t have to say anything to Justine about…your situation,” Mom says. “You don’t have to give up all your friends over this. We’ll figure it out.”

  I cringe at the way Mom avoids using the word “pregnancy.” As much as part of me wants Mom to tell Annie to snap out of her funk and make some decisions about this baby, I can’t let her pressure Annie to dish with Justine after everything she told me. Not if there’s a chance Justine could get Annie to spill her secrets. The entire high school population would know about her baby in no time. I step into the living room.

  “Hey, Annie,” I say like I wasn’t eavesdropping, “want to come with me to Kasey’s? Her dog had puppies yesterday.”

  Mom’s face goes
into happy clown mode. “That’s a great idea.” She reaches for her purse and produces a twenty that she tucks into my hand. “In case you get hungry you can stop for some lunch.”

  Annie must realize I’ve thrown her a rope. She clicks off the TV. “Give me a second to change,” she says and heads off to get out of her pajamas.

  “That’s very nice of you,” Mom says, kicking off her USPS shoes. “You’re a good sister.” She squeezes my shoulder and takes her bag of vegetables into the kitchen.

  Knowing what I do about my own conflicting emotions and ideas of self-preservation, I don’t know how good a sister I am.

  Everything about this sucks.

  ***

  The ten-minute walk to Kasey’s is thick and steamy and I forgot to coat my shoulders with sun block, which doesn’t bode well after yesterday’s canoe burn.

  “Thanks,” Annie says, wiping sweat from her brow, “for getting me out of there.”

  “Sure,” I say. I imagine us walking to Kasey’s six months ago, with Annie not pregnant. It would’ve been nice. We could’ve talked about how annoying Dad was with his camera pointed at us all the time, or how fidgety Mom got whenever her father called from Florida, and how we hoped not to end up with their weird traits. Or we might’ve discussed college and where we wanted to go or if we wanted to move out of state. Maybe we even would’ve talked about Vietnam and if Annie would ever go back and research her birth parents.

  Except that six months ago, even one month ago, Annie would not have gone with me to visit Kasey.

  “Mom keeps pressuring me,” Annie says, her shoulders hunched.

  “Pressuring you about what?” I’m guessing it’s about the name of the baby’s father.

  Instead Annie says, “To figure out what to do with the baby.”

  I’d much rather be talking about college or Vietnam.

  “I don’t know if I could have an abortion,” she almost whispers. “I might need to keep the baby.”

  Only an hour ago she was thinking the opposite. “You really think it’d be a good idea to keep it?”

  Annie’s head snaps around. “Why not?”

  I flinch at her change of tone. “Do you think Mom and Dad want to raise another baby?”

  “What makes you think I wouldn’t raise my baby myself?”

  I tug on my ponytail, uncomfortable with the whole thing and wishing I’d kept my mouth shut and just let her talk. “Well, you don’t have a job or money. What do you think would happen?”

  “Women used to have babies in their teens all the time.” Annie takes off at a fast clip.

  I speed up after her, no longer caring if my words sting. “Fine. Keep the baby. It can have my room. I’ll move in with Kasey.”

  “Why are you saying such horrible things?” Her voice cracks.

  “Because you’re allowed to ruin your life but not mine.” I feel sick as the words leave my mouth.

  “I didn’t mean to,” Annie cries.

  A kid on a bike almost crashes into a parked car, his attention fully on us.

  “It’s not my job to make sure everyone else is happy,” Annie shouts back. “I’m nobody’s angel! Doesn’t anybody get that?”

  When I look up, Annie’s piercing me with wet eyes.

  I can’t think of one right thing to say.

  We keep walking, whistling cardinals the only sound between us. I wish I had a tissue but don’t so I wipe my nose on my arm.

  “I’ve made one decision,” Annie says calmly, a few blocks later as if she hadn’t blown up and I hadn’t said something completely thoughtless. “I need to tell Harris. I need to know if he wants…us.”

  I bite my lip so I won’t scream again, this time about what an asshole-statutory-rapist Harris is. How he should’ve known Annie was only fifteen. How he should’ve used a fucking condom. How he should at least be emailing with her now after having sex with her.

  He better not want to keep the baby because I certainly don’t want him in my sister’s life.

  ***

  I’m relieved when we reach Kasey’s porch and its familiar smell that borders on zoo. Annie wrinkles her nose.

  “Hey guys, come in.” Kasey opens her front door and we follow her to the back office where Barbie is tucked between blankets. Four pink and brown puppies squeak at her belly. Kasey lowers her voice. “Aren’t they adorable?”

  Annie and I squat far enough from the nest not to startle the new mother. I don’t know if “adorable” is the right word. More like alien. The puppies’ wrinkled, blotchy skin and closed eyes give them the appearance of something not from Earth.

  “They’re beautiful,” Annie squeals.

  Oh boy. A month ago she would’ve agreed with me.

  “Dude, I know. I hate that we have to sell them, but Mom knows a place that buys labs to train them to be helper dogs. That’s why she got Barbie knocked up,” Kasey says, peering down at the puppies. “Cherub and Snickers are jealous of all Barbie’s attention. Want to visit them out back?”

  Kasey’s rescued full-size poodles adore me. Maybe because I could sit there and play with their puffy hair for hours. “Sure,” I say.

  “I’m gonna stay here for a minute,” Annie says. Either she wants to get away from me or she really is into the puppies.

  “No prob,” Kasey says, and leads the way to the back yard where black-coated Cherub and white-coated Snickers bound over to us. They snuffle into my arms and legs like they’ve never smelled me before.

  “Hi, boys,” I say, running my fingers through their curly backs.

  Kasey refills their water bowls with the hose, then sits in one of the Adirondack chairs near the garage. Cherub puts his head on my knee when I sit, and Kasey picks up a twig from the shading maple and draws a tic-tac-toe board in the dirt. She makes an “X” in the middle square and passes me the stick.

  “I’m thinking about applying for early admission to UCSD,” she says.

  “You’re really going to go off to paradise without me?” I say for the millionth time about her beloved San Diego school.

  “If I get in,” she says.

  “You’ll get in.”

  A smile dances on her face. “I’d be closer to Carlos, too. I got the sweetest voice mail from him this morning.”

  I draw an “O” in the dirt. “And I’ll probably be stuck here, alone and single, in freezing New York going to Ridgecrest Community College.” I pass back the twig.

  “You don’t have to. You can apply anywhere,” she says.

  I draw my next “O” with my finger, leaning over Snickers. “I can’t see spending the money on some expensive school when I don’t even know what I would study.”

  “You don’t have to be so practical all the time.” Kasey draws her winning “X.” “You could totally come to Cali with me. Hey, it’s Dawn!” She waves to the back fence.

  Dawn lives in the neighborhood behind Kasey’s house. When she sees us, she climbs the chain link fence and jogs over. The dogs greet her with a series of barks.

  “Hey ladies. I’m on my way to work so keep the hound fur away from me,” Dawn says, backing away from the poodles. She works at the local grocery store and is wearing her black polyester pants and red apron. “Just stopping by to deliver a message.”

  “Oooh, like a telegram service,” Kasey says.

  Dawn lowers her voice, as if spies are lurking. “You guys should hit up Marshall’s for lunch.”

  “Why?” I ask.

  “I heard from a credible source that a certain Monsieur Rudnick will be there with his boys,” Dawn says.

  “Dude, we are so going. What time is it? When will he be there?”

  Dawn checks her blingy watch. “They should be there soon.”

  “How do you know?” I ask as Snickers licks my hand.

  “Pam’s brother is friends with Devon and when I was at her place this morning I heard them saying they’d meet the other guys at Marshall’s at one,” Dawn says.

  Kasey glances back at the hous
e. “Do you think Annie will feel like eating?”

  “Why wouldn’t she want to eat?” Dawn asks. “She’s not on some Justine-approved diet, is she? She only like 90 pounds soaking wet as it is.”

  “No,” I say, delivering a kick to Kasey’s shin. “She’s fine.”

  “Ow!” Kasey says. “Oh. Yeah.”

  Dawn checks her watch again. “I gotta get to work. Have fun and fill me in later.” She cuts to the front yard where she’ll walk the six blocks to the grocery store.

  Kasey grimaces. “Sorry.”

  I sigh, knowing it’s not her fault that my sister can’t keep herself unpregnant, and that I couldn’t keep myself from telling Kasey about it. “It’s OK.”

  “It is time for lunch,” she hints.

  I gather my courage and nod.

  Kasey jumps from her chair, exciting the dogs who follow her back inside. “Annie, we’re going for lunch. Come with us?”

  Annie’s on the floor, cuddling a puppy who squeaks like a mouse. “Where?”

  “Marshall’s. Mel’s man is waiting,” Kasey sings.

  “Her man?” Annie asks, finally looking excited at going out.

  “No, he’s just a friend,” I say, but my brain definitely is more pumped about going to Marshall’s than it should be.

  Kasey grins. Her radar into my brain is way too accurate.

  “I’m in,” Annie says.

  And with that, we’re on our way.

  Chapter 9

  When Marshall’s Deli comes into view, the reality of seeing Devon hits me. I wish I’d run some mousse through my hair to tame it before leaving Kasey’s. And washed the doggy drool from my shorts. I rub at it with my forearm. Definitely not a turn on.

  “Dude, where is he?” Kasey asks.

  An older couple spooning ice cream into each other’s mouths (which is cuter than it sounds) and a woman with four kids sucking down slushies (which are louder than it sounds) are seated at the outdoor tables.

  “Not here,” I say, and try not to sound disappointed.

  Then a swarm of perfume-scented bodies overtakes us from the doorway.

  “Annie, Annie, how are you???” Justine, Chloe, and Samara are among them.