by S. Walden
I shrugged.
“This guy totally digs you,” Avery said. “Has he said he loves you?”
I nodded.
“He’s doing you in the closet and he loves you? Well, Cadence. It’s obvious this guy’s a keeper.”
I burst out laughing. “Can we go to class now?”
“Ugh. Whatever,” Avery said. “Listen, I know we have this rule . . .”
“I think we’re long past the rule, Avery,” I said.
“I’m dying to know more,” she confessed.
I grinned. Usually it was me begging Avery for more information. I was never on the other side. She knew everything it seemed. Experienced all of it. What could I possibly tell her that she didn’t already know?
She watched me as I grabbed my books from my locker.
“Well?” she insisted.
I closed the locker door softly. “I’ll tell you more. If you’re good.”
I stared at the little red “x” in the top right-hand corner of January 29 on my desk calendar. I glanced at my cell phone: February 9. I looked at the “x” again. Then I looked at my cell phone again. I squeezed my breasts gently. Not sore. Normally they were sore and swollen before my period.
“It’s fine,” I lied to myself. I wasn’t sure if I should call Mark or Avery.
“Eleven days?” Avery asked over the phone. She sounded mildly concerned. “Are you on-the-day regular?”
“Well, no. Usually a day or two before or after I’m scheduled to start,” I replied.
“Hmmm. You’re in a gray area, for sure,” Avery said.
My heart dropped.
“You’re gonna have to take a test,” she said.
And then I burst out crying.
“Cadence, I’m sure everything’s fine.”
“Stop lying to me! You know we didn’t use a condom!” I wailed.
“Well, were you ovulating?”
“I don’t fucking know!” I sobbed.
Avery sighed patiently. “You ovulate on the fourteenth day between your cycles. Normally.”
“I know when I ovulate!” I snapped and looked at my calendar once more. I dried my eyes, mostly so that I could see what I was doing, and counted back the days to when Mark and I had sex in his classroom closet. Unprotected. No birth control. No condom. No sense whatsoever.
January 15.
“I’m gonna be sick,” I gasped.
“No, you’re not. You’re gonna be fine,” Avery said. There was a tenderness in her voice I’d never heard.
“I can’t go to school!” I was beside myself with panic.
“Cadence, take a deep breath. You haven’t even taken a test yet. You’re freaking out prematurely.”
“I can’t have a baby, Avery! I don’t know anything about babies! Oh my God! My life is over!!”
“Calm! Down!” Avery shouted through the phone. “You’ll come home with me after school, and we’ll sort this all out. If—and this is a huge if—you are pregnant, we’ll deal, okay? But I think this is just a weird glitch in your body. I think you’re fine.”
I tried to focus on Avery’s words: “We’ll deal.” Like she and I were in it together. Maybe she felt responsible in some way, though I’m not sure why. She didn’t have unprotected sex with me and maybe get me pregnant.
“I’ve gotta go puke before school,” I said, and hung up before she replied.
I screamed when I saw Oliver standing in my doorway. I didn’t hear him at all.
“What are you doing?!” I screeched.
“I don’t know,” he said, shaking his head quickly side to side.
“What did you hear?!”
“I don’t know.” His eyes were practically bugging out of his head.
I grabbed his arm and pulled him inside my room, slamming the door. I don’t know why. Both Mom and Dad were already gone to work.
“What did you hear, Oliver?” I asked patiently.
“Just something about ovulation and how you might be pregnant,” he replied.
I hung my head and started crying all over again.
“Please,” I whispered.
“Please what?” he asked. “Don’t tell Mom and Dad? Do you really think for a second I would?”
I looked at him, tears streaming down my face.
“I don’t know. I don’t know what I’m gonna do.” I collapsed on my bed, and he sat beside me.
“It’s okay,” he said. He patted my shoulder awkwardly.
I wiped my eyes.
“Cay, how did this happen?”
I knew what he meant, but I burst out laughing anyway. It was exactly the question I needed to hear.
“Well, Oliver, when two people love each other, they—”
“Shut up. You know what I mean. Why are you having sex? And with whom?”
“Like I’d tell you that. And it’s not your business why I’m having sex.”
“It’s a sin, Cadence,” Oliver said softly.
“Not to me it’s not,” I replied.
Oliver looked shocked. “It’s, like, in the Bible and stuff, Cadence. Not to have sex before you’re married.”
“Is it?”
Oliver furrowed his brows. “Well, yeah. Isn’t it?”
“I’ve never read about it,” I replied.
“But, it’s, like, what we’ve been taught,” Oliver said.
“I know what I’ve been taught, Ollie.”
“Then why aren’t you following the rules?” he asked.
“Because I don’t believe them, okay?” I snapped.
Oliver reared back, looking at me like I was a stranger.
“You don’t believe in God?” he breathed.
“Of course I believe in God,” I huffed. “Will you just calm down?”
“You don’t believe what’s in the Bible?”
“Of course I do. Maybe I just interpret things differently from you. I’m sorry if you’re bothered by the fact that I don’t have a problem with premarital sex.”
“Well, you should. You might be pregnant,” Oliver said.
“Fuck you.”
“Cadence!”
“I don’t need your pious, condescending bullshit right now, okay?”
“Cay, I’m sorry. I’m really sorry. I’m just trying to understand.”
“I’m eighteen, Oliver! I’m an adult! I can have sex, okay? It doesn’t make me a bad person because I have sex outside of marriage? I don’t want to get married until I’m, like, thirty. Am I supposed to wait until I’m thirty to have sex?”
Oliver shrugged. “Well, according to the Bible—”
“Shut up about the Bible!” I screamed. “I don’t need to hear it! And anyway, people were getting married at, like, twelve years old back then! It freaking doesn’t even count.”
“But Cadence, don’t you feel guilty at all?”
“Do you feel guilty every time you jerk off?”
“Cadence!”
“Come talk to me about sexual immorality when you stop playing with yourself, Oliver,” I said, putting “sexual immorality” in air quotes.
It was the dumbest conversation I could have in the heat of this very real crisis, but I was glad for it. For one, it made me forget that I might be pregnant. Two, it let me voice out loud for the first time how much I thought the “sin” of premarital sex was bullshit. And it had nothing to do with me not loving God and wanting to be a good Christian. Three, it made me feel like I had an ounce of control over something. I got Oliver to shut his mouth, and he even appeared to be thinking.
“We’re gonna be late for school,” I said, grabbing my book bag and car keys.
“I’ll take the bus,” Oliver said.
“The bus is gone, Ollie. What? Don’t wanna be seen in the same car with your slut sister?”
Oliver rolled his eyes.
“Gosh, now all those hate notes in my locker are actually true!”
I love sarcasm. It’s such a powerful panacea, and the more sarcastic I was about the situation, the mo
re I felt like I could handle it. I smiled.
“Stop it,” Oliver said. “If you’re pregnant, I’m running away because there’s no way in hell I’m living in our house with you and Mom and Dad. I’m not dealing with your hormones and all that other crap that happens to women when they’re pregnant.”
I opened my mouth to reply.
“Shut up. I’m not finished.”
I closed my mouth.
“And I think it’s really freaking unfair to be an uncle at fifteen, okay? I don’t know all the uncle stuff I’m supposed to know yet, and you’re a selfish bitch.”
I was shocked. And then I burst into a fit of giggles.
“I’m serious, Cadence!” Oliver said, but then he laughed, too.
“I’m naming my baby after you,” I said, tousling his hair.
“Get off!” he cried, jerking away. “And no you’re not!”
“I’m sooo naming my baby after you. And I’ll let you help me change diapers, too.” I pinched his cheek as I pulled into a parking space.
“Gross,” Oliver muttered, and climbed out of the car.
We walked together towards the school building, and the silence was sobering. Suddenly it wasn’t so funny anymore, and I felt the same sinking feeling in my chest I experience every time I ride a roller coaster. It was flat-out fear. It cried, “You might die today!” And as I walked through the school doors, I wondered why the hell I even rode roller coasters. Peer pressure, I realized, and in that moment, I decided no more roller coasters. Fuck roller coasters, I thought, and my hand instinctively went to my belly.
***
“What’s going on?” Mr. Connelly asked, shutting the classroom door.
“What do you mean?”
“Cadence, you barely looked at me this morning,” he replied. “You’ve been nervous. You’re acting strange, on edge.”
I shrugged, hanging my head.
“Look at me,” Mr. Connelly said.
“I can’t,” I whispered, watching the first tear plop onto the tile floor.
“Cadence, what’s wrong?” Mr. Connelly asked. He took my hand and led me to the closet.
“I don’t wanna go in there!”
“Okay,” Mr. Connelly replied, and dropped my hand. “We don’t have to go in there.”
I wiped my face as I rocked side to side, waiting for him to do something. I was hoping he’d just say I could leave.
“Why does that closet scare you?” he asked warily.
I paused before blurting,” Because I think I got pregnant in it!”
I watched as Mr. Connelly furrowed his brows. That was the extent of his initial reaction. Did he not just hear what I said?
“So you don’t know?” he asked softly.
I shook my head.
“How late?”
“Huh?”
“How late are you?” he asked.
“Eleven days,” I replied.
He pushed a hand nervously through his hair. “Were you—”
“Ovulating? Yes. At least according to the schedule I was. I don’t exactly know,” I replied.
I heard him hiss as he drew in a quick breath.
“I’m sorry,” I whispered. Somehow I thought it was all my fault. It was stupid. I understood we both shared equal responsibility, but I didn’t believe it because I was the one who might be carrying a child, not him. It was unfair to put that on myself, but that’s how I felt.
“Sorry for what, Cadence?” Mr. Connelly asked. “You didn’t do anything wrong. I did. I’m the one who didn’t use protection. I was impulsive and out of control.”
“I was there, too,” I argued. “I was just as impulsive.”
“But I’m twenty-eight,” he countered. “I know better.”
I bristled. “So because I’m eighteen, I don’t know how to control my urges?”
Mr. Connelly shook his head. “I didn’t mean it like that.”
I nodded. I knew he meant it exactly the way he said it, but I didn’t want to argue. I was too frightened.
“I’m taking a test after school,” I said.
“I know,” Mr. Connelly replied. “You’ll come to my apartment.”
“Oh. Well, I could just take it at home,” I said.
“Why would you do that? I don’t want you to be alone. I’m just as responsible for this as you are. Come to my apartment after school, okay?”
“Okay.”
Mr. Connelly sighed heavily and walked to his desk.
“What if I am?” I asked.
“We shouldn’t worry about it until we know for sure,” he replied.
“Would you want me to get rid of it?”
“Would you want to?”
“What does that mean?” I asked.
“I’m just asking you a question, Cadence.”
“Isn’t abortion a sin?”
“You’re asking me?” Mr. Connelly sat down and picked up his pencil. “I don’t know if it’s a sin, but I don’t think it’s wrong.”
“So you want me to get an abortion?” I asked, panicked.
“We don’t even know if you’re pregnant yet.”
“But if I were, you’d want me to kill the baby?” I pressed. I felt lightheaded.
“It’s not a baby. It’s a parasite.”
I gasped and watched him shudder.
“A parasite?” I whispered.
“I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have said that.” He eyed me carefully. “Cadence? I’m sorry I said that. I didn’t mean to be offensive.”
“Why would you say something like that? What’s wrong with you?”
I’d never seen that look on Mr. Connelly’s face, and I prayed I’d never see it again. I thought he could slice my body in two with his eyes. They were daggers, and they were pointed at me.
“Don’t insinuate I’m some fucking asshole. You don’t know my past,” he said.
I was shocked and stared at him for several minutes. He stared back, but his eyes were softer now, and I wasn’t afraid of them.
“What are you talking about?” I asked.
“Cadence, I don’t wanna talk about this right now. You’ll come to my apartment after school, and we’ll . . . go from there.”
I couldn’t stomach his lack of emotions. I was a mess, and he was sitting at his desk about to grade another math test.
“What happened in your past?” I demanded.
“It’s not your business, Cadence.”
“The hell it’s not! I’m your girlfriend!”
“I’m not discussing it with you.”
“Stop talking down to me like I’m a child!”
“I’m not.”
“Stop acting like you’re in control! I know you’re freaking out as much as I am!” I screamed.
“I am!” he shouted, then looked around the room. He took a deep breath. “There’s nothing we can do about it here. We don’t know if you’re pregnant. There’s no sense in worrying about it.”
“How can I not?” I cried.
“Because we don’t have any other options right now!”
I took a step back, my head spinning. Fear and anger consumed me, and the only way I knew to deal with it was to lash out at him. “You won’t be there, will you? If I’m pregnant. You won’t be there.”
“Don’t you ever say that again,” he growled. “I will always be there, whatever happens.”
He jumped up from his chair and came at me. It was instinctual to flinch when he grabbed me, though I’m not sure why. He’d never done anything in the past to hurt me, even when he took me by force in the closet. He wrapped his arms around me, crushing me to his chest, and I cried as hard as I could all over his shirt while he stroked my hair and shushed me.
“It’ll be okay, Cadence,” he said tenderly, and kissed my head. He leaned over and murmured in my ear, “We’ll be okay.”
I smiled into his shirt and clung to him. I knew in a few seconds he would let go—he’d have to—but I wanted to trick myself into believing he would hold me
forever. He smelled safe. He felt warm. He was strong and tall and in control. I believed him when he said he’d always be there. I knew it even before I challenged him, but I had to challenge him to make sure. I needed it said out loud.
“I will always be there, whatever happens.”
***
I’m pragmatic only about certain things. It’s not part of my genetic design unless it has to do with hair or make-up products. And as I learned this afternoon, which pregnancy test is right for me.
“Cadence,” Mark said patiently. “Please choose one.” He looked around the Walgreens, but no one we knew was here.
We drove together to a pharmacy across town. I told him I could just stop on the way to his apartment, but he insisted on coming. He didn’t want me to be alone. He kept saying that over and over, and it was starting to annoy me.
“Well, I’m just deciding if I’d rather read lines or actual words,” I said, holding up two tests and comparing the pictures. That was important to me, too. If the graphics looked cheesy and cheap, I didn’t trust it.
“Darling, this is a perfect one,” Mark said, pointing to the test in my left hand. “But get both. Take two tests to be sure.”
“Did you just call me ‘darling’?” I asked.
“Focus, Cadence.”
“‘Darling’? Like what really old people call each other?” I asked. “Or rich people. I can totally hear rich people calling each other ‘darling’.”
Mark rolled his eyes and snatched both tests from my hands, walking to the checkout. I quickly followed.
The girl behind the register grinned as she scanned the items. She looked like she was dying to say something, and when Mark smiled politely at her, she took it as an invitation.
“Oh my God. I so love when couples come in together to buy pregnancy tests!” she squealed.
I couldn’t help but smile at her enthusiasm. I wished she could take the test for me. She’d have much more fun doing it, I imagined. It never occurred to me that her presumptions were totally inappropriate because there was nothing malicious in her demeanor. She genuinely and mistakenly thought we were a young couple trying to have a baby.
“And I know you’re gonna say, ‘Oh, we just want a healthy baby’ when I ask the question, but answer me honestly, will you? No one ever answers me honestly! Do you want a boy or a girl?” she asked, looking at me.
