The Long Ride Home

by Tawni Waters

  “You’re super hot,” Matt said. Lightning flashed in the distance, and I almost wanted to laugh at Mother Nature’s timing, adding ominous natural phenomenon to the twisting warning feeling in my gut.

  I was suddenly less drunk.

  “I’m gonna go,” I said, reaching for the door handle.

  “Where?” he asked. “To hang out with the cows in the rain?” He pushed a button, and the automatic locks clicked into place. My skin went cold with dread. I know what you’re thinking. How did this nice guy turn into such a dick? Or at least that’s what I was thinking. I’m quickly learning that dicks almost always masquerade as nice guys. No one ever approaches you and says, “Hey, I’m a dick. Wanna hang out?”

  Matt leaned in to kiss me. I backed away. “Dude, unlock my door.”

  He smiled. That crooked tooth was decidedly not appealing. Whatever the opposite of cute is, that’s what that tooth was. Revolting? Chilling? Gag inducing? “Come on. Kiss me.”

  “No.”

  Matt insisted. And by insisted, I mean pushed me up against the window and stuck his tongue down my throat. His hands on my shoulders were hard and cold. They hurt. His mouth tasted like the car smelled. How did he taste like smoke when he hadn’t smoked in the past few hours? Was his flesh permanently saturated with nicotine?

  Detour: things you should know about me. As I mentioned, Mom paid for me to take martial arts classes the whole time I was growing up. She didn’t want me to ever be in a position where I couldn’t defend myself. When Matt kissed me against my will, those muted alarm bells started screaming. And thirty seconds later, when he stuck his hand up my shirt, my reptilian brain took over. You know the brain they say comes out to play when you’re drunk, the one that acts on instinct, not logic? Well, mine happens to be saturated with martial arts. Long story short, I broke cute little Matt’s nose with the heel of my hand, reached over him to unlock the doors, got out of the car, made my jacket into a sort of tent to protect my head and phone from the rain, and called 911, all in less than a minute. Lest he get any ideas about chasing me, I screamed, “I’m calling 911, asshole!” while dialing. His taillights disappeared before the operator said, “911. What is your emergency?”

  “I got in a fight with my boyfriend, and he dropped me in the middle of a freaking field. I need to get back to town.”

  “Where are you?”

  “I have no idea. There’s a water tower.”

  “Okay. By the tower. I’ll have a unit there in ten minutes.”

  I hung up, stunned that there were places in the world where your location could be precisely determined by the proximity of a water tower.

  7. A cop came and picked me up. She didn’t make me ride in the back like a criminal, which I appreciated. Her hair was wrapped around her head in a tight braid that reminded me of a traditional Dutch girl. As we were driving, she glanced at me, seeming to know something was very wrong.

  “You all right?” she asked. I didn’t tell her about Matt’s nose. I didn’t tell her how he stuck his hand up my shirt and the horror I felt when his dirty, clammy skin touched parts of me I didn’t let anyone see. I didn’t tell her that if my mom hadn’t gotten me those classes, I might have ended up raped, or worse—dead in Matt’s car.

  “I’m fine,” I said.

  “You have blood on your shirt,” she pointed out.

  “Oh, yeah. I had a bloody nose. Too much picking in the dry heat, I guess.”

  If you want someone to change the subject, start talking about picking your nose. At least that was my theory, but the cop kept going.

  “You look like you’ve been crying.”

  “My boyfriend is a dick. And I miss my mom. She died recently.”

  “I’m sorry, honey,” she said.

  Sorry, sorry, sorry. Everyone is sorry. What a fucking useless word. It can’t bring Mom back. It can’t make me not pregnant. It can’t do anything. It’s like a penny. You can’t buy shit with it.

  “Thanks,” I said.

  “Thanks for nothing” seemed like too much of a cliché, so I didn’t say it out loud.

  Ten

  It’s 4:56 a.m., approximately seven hours after the cop dropped me off at the Majestic Plains Inn. Shockingly, the rooms are not as luxurious as the term “majestic” implies, unless you consider vibrating beds built in circa 1972 a luxury. Yes, my accommodations boast a vibrating bed. No, I don’t use the vibrating feature, not for lack of desire, but for lack of quarters.

  I still haven’t slept, mostly because I keep reaching for my purse and digging for change (I really want to experience the vibrating bed while I have the chance), but also because what happened with Matt is eating at me. Also, did I mention I’m pregnant and hungover? (I’m keenly cognizant those two words should never appear in the same sentence.)

  It was hot when I got to my room, so I turned on the air full blast. It’s freezing now. I guess I could get up and turn on the heat, but I want to stay huddled under the blankets wearing Mom’s jacket, a Bob Marley T-shirt, and ratty jeans. Also a pair of toe socks Mom gave me. She bought me weird socks every year for Christmas. It was our thing. These have frogs on them. I happened to be wearing them the night of the fire. I don’t know why I keep wearing them now. It should make me sad, and it does, but it feels like a piece of her. If I let go of the physical evidence she was here, she really stops existing, right?

  Mom loved frogs because they had “fat eyes,” which was the term she used to describe anything that had big, kind eyes. According to her, all dogs, deer, and frogs had fat eyes. Also some aliens, but only the benevolent ones like E.T. Not the ones that anal probed people. She also described me as having fat eyes. I didn’t like it at the time, but I’d give anything to have her sitting next to me, telling me about my fat eyes. “I don’t mean it in a bad way,” she’d say. “There are some concepts human language can’t capture. Fat eyes is one of them.”

  “If there were a word for ‘fat eyes,’ what would it be?” I asked her.

  We were sitting at a vegan restaurant when we had this conversation. A giant mural of Ganesh hung over Mom’s head. Mom was eating tofu curry. I don’t know why I remember that, but I do. I can’t tell you what I ate that night.

  “I just said there is no word.”

  “I know. Make one up.”

  She thought for a minute, her chopsticks frozen in midair. “I can’t convey the concept with words, but I could totally express it through the art of interpretative dance,” she finally said, setting her chopsticks on the table.

  “Don’t you dare,” I whispered.

  She was already moving her chair and standing up. Some new-agey music involving flutes and bells was playing, and she commenced gyrating and swiveling her hips.

  “Mom, sit down!” I ordered. “People are staring.”

  She only danced harder, seemingly oblivious to the other diners’ disapproval. As much as Mom humiliated me sometimes, I had to give her kudos for not giving a shit what anyone thought of her. Mom was Mom. No apologies.

  I started to laugh. “You are such a dumb ass! What does this have to do with fat eyes anyway?”

  She laughed too, delighted I had found her antics amusing. Mom was like a little kid doing tricks at a pool. Clap for me! Tell me how cute I am! I loved her for that. “Fat eyes are like the eyes Hindu gods have. Benevolent. Divine. Beautiful.” She pointed to the Ganesh painting. “He has fat eyes.”

  “And this relates to you having seizures how?”

  She slumped into her chair, defeated. “I was not having seizures! I was belly dancing.”

  “That was belly dancing?”

  “Everyone’s a critic.” She picked up her chopsticks and started eating again.

  “Okay, let’s pretend for a minute that was belly dancing. I still don’t get how it relates to fat eyes.”

  “Hindu gods belly dance.”


  “They so don’t,” I said.

  “They do too. Ask Mercy.”

  Mercy was the all-knowing oracle we called upon to decide disputes regarding spirituality.

  A whoosh of freezing air brings me back to the present. Since Mercy is now on my mind, I pick up my phone from the nightstand and hit Mercy’s number. I texted her when I got to the hotel to let her know I was safe. I didn’t tell her about Matt because I didn’t want to talk about him. Or anything. But now, I’m ready to talk. It rings.

  “Hello,” she says. I can tell I woke her up. She sounds grumpy, but her voice still makes me feel less cold.

  “Hey, I have a question,” I say.

  “Okay.” I can almost see her rubbing the sleep out of her eyes, arranging her features into a patient expression even though she wants to kill me for calling so early.

  “Do Hindu gods belly dance?”

  In my imagination, her benevolent expression evaporates. “You seriously woke me up at three o’clock to ask me that?” Shit. I forgot about the time difference.

  “Mom said they do.”

  “Oh.” (She’s donning the kind expression again, realizing this is about me missing Mom.) “Well, I regret to inform you that your mother was full of shit.”

  “I knew it.”

  “Having a hard morning, kid? I was worried about you last night.”

  I roll over. “Yeah, sorry. I wasn’t ready to talk.” I contemplate telling her about Matt, then think better of it. She will be horrified that I drank while pregnant. Hell, I’m horrified. “I went to Planned Parenthood like we discussed.”

  “Good! What happened?”

  “I saw a doctor. She said I’m for sure pregnant and stuck the jaws of life up my hoo-hoo.”

  She laughs. “The jaws of life?”

  “I swear, Mercy. You should have seen these things. Vicious metal mandibles the size of a crane.”

  “I’ve seen them. I’ve been to the gynecologist before.”

  “Me too, but I’m pretty sure since my last visit, the gynecological association ruled to replace regular speculum with T-rex-sized instruments of torture. I thought for sure there had been car wreck in my vagina. Little people pinned in there screaming ‘Help!”

  “You’re a freak.” I can hear Mercy smiling.

  “You have no idea.” I say it like I’m joking, but I’m not. I mentally compose a list of my most recent freakish acts.

  Harley’s Heinous Deeds (Senior Year Edition):

  1. Killing my mom (that’s a doozy)

  2. Getting sloshed and fucking my best friend

  3. Getting pregnant by aforementioned best friend

  4. Kicking my best friend out of my life even though he’s the second nicest person I’ve ever known

  5. Drinking while pregnant

  6. Putting myself in a situation where I could have gotten raped

  “Your freakishness is one of my favorite things about you,” Mercy says. I hear dishes banging. She must be making coffee.

  I picture Mercy’s kitchen, wishing I was there now. “Yay! I have a fan club of two, and one of them is dead.”

  “Your mom is still in the universe, loving you like always.”

  I’ve never believed Mercy’s platitudes, but I want to believe this one. My throat gets tight. I stare up at the water-stained ceiling, trying not to cry.

  “In any case,” Mercy continues, “I’m a pretty cool fan club. One of me is better than ten other humans.”

  “I wouldn’t go that far.”

  The banging stops. The coffee must be brewing. “Do you have any idea what you’re going to do, Harley? Whatever it is, I’ll support you. You know that.”

  It’s just what Mom would have said. No wonder they were friends. “I’m not ready to be a mom, Mercy. Some shit happened, and, well, I don’t even think I could be trusted with a hamster right now.”

  “Are you still going to Omaha?”

  “Maybe. I don’t know. I think I’m going back to Planned Parenthood first.”

  I didn’t know that was what I was thinking, but when I say it out loud, I realize it’s a good idea. The best I can come up with anyway. If I can’t even make it through my first trimester without doing something that could seriously fuck up my baby forever, how can I possibly be expected to behave like a decent parent for eighteen whole years?

  • • •

  I make an appointment, and the next day, I go back to the clinic, this time to get an abortion. Because life is determined to treat me like a walking cliché, there is a protestor on the sidewalk when I arrive at Planned Parenthood. Just one, but this sucker is big. Six feet tall, give or take. He has a bald spot roughly the size of Texas, which he has attempted to disguise by styling his three remaining strands of wispy hair into a fetching comb-over. He’s holding a sign that says ABORTION IS MURDER. I try to get inside before he sees me, but he jogs over as I open the door, glaring at me like I’m Satan.

  “Abortion stops a beating heart,” he says, shoving a pamphlet at me.

  I don’t take it. “So does a revolver.” I nod at my boot, trying to look like a girl who may or may not be packing a pistol in her footwear.

  “Is that a threat?” he asks, stunned.

  “Nah, just an attempt at conversation.”

  “Get away from the door!” the receptionist yells from inside. “Or I’m calling the police.” She stands and starts to walk toward us. Mr. Comb-Over backs away.

  Trying not to look as scared as I feel, I rush into the clinic, grateful to hear the door close behind me.

  “I’m so sorry about that,” the receptionist says. “Are you okay?”

  I nod even though I’m nothing close to okay. I can barely breathe through the lump in my throat. Still, I don’t cry until a few minutes later. When the tears finally come, I’m lying on a table wearing my frog socks and a flimsy gown that hides nothing important. The sheet of paper between me and the metal table does little to mitigate the cold. Mopping my eyes, I try to focus on the kumquat with flippers. “Sorry, maybe-baby,” I whisper. “Mercy says we reincarnate. Next time around, you’ll do better. You don’t need a shit mom like me.”

  I know it can’t hear me. I know it is nothing but fetal tissue right now. But still, it must have a soul, right? I mean, if all living things have souls, surely my maybe-baby has one too. Maybe not a fully developed one like me, but a kumquat-size soul.

  “Hello, Harley.” Dr. Scapple’s voice is gentle as she enters the room wearing scrubs.

  “Hi,” I say, watching her walk toward me, thinking she’s way prettier than I gave her credit for the first time I saw her. She takes my hand and squeezes it. Her fingers are so warm.

  “How you holding up?” Her gray eyes are kind, surrounded with wrinkles like suns ringed by rays. I suddenly get what Mom meant by “fat eyes.”

  “I’m scared,” I whisper.

  “I know,” she says. “It’s okay to be scared.”

  “Do you think my baby will hate me?”

  She sweeps a strand of hair away from my face and tucks it behind my ear, like Mom would have done. This makes me cry harder. “Nobody is going to hate you, Harley. You are a good person making an incredibly difficult decision. No one has the right to judge you.”

  “I’m not a good person.”

  She smiles. “Yes, you are.”

  “How do you know?”

  “I can tell by your eyes.”

  I laugh. “Do you think I have fat eyes too?”

  “What?” she asks.

  “It’s something my mom used to say.”

  “It sounds like you really loved her.”

  “So much.”

  “Well, if she was here, what would she say?” Dr. Scapple asks me.

  I look away from her and stare at an ocean sunset taped to t
he ceiling. “She’d tell me to follow my heart.”

  “And what does your heart say?”

  I must be quiet for a long time because Dr. Scapple finally says, “Harley?”

  “I’m not sure,” I whisper.

  Dr. Scapple is silent for a minute. Finally, she says, “It sounds as if the question isn’t whether your baby is going to hate you. The question is whether you are going to hate you. Are you sure this is what you want?”

  I look up at the sunset again, studying the dying daylight seeping into the sea. I think about Mom and the beach. Closing my eyes, I picture us there together. I remember the words she used to whisper to me: But soft, what light from yonder window breaks? It is the east, and Juliet is the sun.

  What if this baby is my sun the way I was Mom’s? What if she is my home, and I don’t know it yet? Or what if Mercy is right? What if we do reincarnate, and this baby is Mom in a new body? I remember the way I felt on the freeway when I was about to kill myself. Knowing my maybe-baby was there saved me. This seems like a truly shitty way to return the favor.

  I open my eyes and look at Dr. Scapple. She smiles encouragingly.

  “I don’t think I can do this,” I say.

  Eleven

  By the time I reach Omaha, Dean has texted me again. Look, I can take a hint, and I’d totally leave you alone if you weren’t pregnant with a baby that is possibly mine. But under the circumstances, I can’t fuck off. Will you please call me?

  I want to write back, but I don’t know what to say to him, so I say nothing, which is probably a terrible decision. I try not to imagine him sitting in his bedroom staring at the Star Wars posters on the walls (Dean is a huge geek) wondering what the hell he did to deserve this treatment from his Princess Leia.

  “Yoda, your help I need,” I mumble to myself as I pull into a parking lot on the outskirts of Omaha.

  It’s a prayer of some kind, I suppose. Like I said, I don’t believe in god, but I’m desperate enough to pray anyway. I’d be rubbing a lucky rabbit’s foot if I had one. Anything that might sway the universe to be nicer to me. I feel way more comfortable praying to Yoda than I do any traditional god, and I kinda figure any god worth his salt isn’t going to get hung up on a nickname. What bugs me about religion is it’s so petty. I mean, if I decided to call Mercy “home slice,” she wouldn’t stop being my friend. But this deity in the sky is supposed to torture you for all eternity if you get his name wrong? I want nothing to do with that version of god.