Lauren looked up at Angie through sad, tired eyes. “You’ll tell him about me, right? About how I was a good girl who made a mistake. And that I loved him so much I gave him away.”
It cut Angie to the quick, that question, hurt so much that for a heartbeat she couldn’t answer. When she did speak, her voice was strained. “He’ll know you, Lauren. We won’t just say good-bye.”
The knowing look in Lauren’s eyes made Angie feel like the young one. “Yeah. Right. Well, I better get some sleep now. I’m beat.” She turned her face into the pillow.
“Do you want to see your baby?” Angie asked gently.
“No,” Lauren answered, and there was nothing gentle in her voice at all. “I don’t want to see him.”
When Lauren woke up, her room was filled with flowers. If she hadn’t felt so terrible, it would have made her smile. From her bed, she tried to match the arrangements to the person. The African violets were definitely from Livvy and Sal. The azalea plant was from Maria. The pink carnations were probably from Mira, and the lilies and forget-me-nots were from Angie and Conlan. The two dozen red roses were pure David. She wondered what the cards said. What did you say to a girl who’d given birth to a baby she couldn’t keep?
A knock at the door saved her from the direction her thoughts had taken.
“Come in.”
The door opened. David and his mother stood there; both of them looked pale and uncertain.
As she looked at the boy she loved, all Lauren could think about was how flat her stomach was now, how empty. “Have you seen him?”
David swallowed hard, nodded. “He’s so small.” He crossed the room and came up beside her bed.
She waited for his kiss. When it came, it was over too quickly. They stared at each other in a heavy silence.
“He has your hair,” Mrs. Haynes said, walking to the bed. She stood by her son, touched his arm as if to steady him.
“Please … don’t tell me,” Lauren said in a throaty voice.
That silence descended again. Lauren looked at David, and just now, she felt as if he were miles away.
We won’t make it.
The realization washed over her. It had been there all along like a shadow in the night, awaiting sunlight to give it form and substance.
They were kids, and now that the pregnancy was past, they would drift toward their separate lives. Oh, they’d try to stay together at their different schools, but in the end, it wouldn’t work. They would become what the poets wrote about: first love.
Already David was unsure of what to say to her, how to touch her. She was different now, fundamentally changed, and he sensed that.
“The flowers are beautiful,” Lauren said, reaching for his hand. When he touched her, she noticed how cold his skin was.
David nodded.
Mrs. Haynes leaned forward. Very gently she eased the hair from Lauren’s eyes. “You’re a very brave girl. I know why my David loves you so much.”
A year ago that would have meant the world to her. She gazed up at Mrs. Haynes, unable to think of anything to say.
“Well,” his mother finally said, drawing back. “I’ll leave you two alone.” She backed away from the bed and left the room. Her heels sounded like gun blasts on the linoleum. The door clicked shut.
David leaned down again and kissed Lauren. This second kiss was the real thing.
“I signed the papers,” he said when he drew back.
She nodded.
“It felt weird … just signing him away like that. But we don’t have any choice, right?”
“What else could we do?”
He let out a relieved sigh and smiled. “Yeah.”
It hurt too much to look at him, so she closed her eyes. “I think I’ll go to sleep.”
“Oh. Okay. Mom and I are going school shopping anyway. Do you need anything?”
School. She’d forgotten all about that.
“No.”
He kissed her cheek then, touched her face. “I’ll be back after dinner.”
She finally looked at him. “Okay.”
“I love you,” he said.
It was that, after all of it, that made her cry.
In room 507, Angie sat in a thick wooden rocking chair, waiting.
Conlan sat in the chair next to her. Every few minutes he looked at his watch, but he didn’t say anything.
“She’s changed her mind,” Angie finally whispered. Someone had to say it.
“We don’t know that,” he said, but she heard in his voice that he agreed.
The clock ticked again. And again.
The door opened suddenly. A nurse dressed in orange stepped into the room. She was holding a small blue-blanketed bundle. “Mr. and Mrs. Malone?”
“That’s us,” Conlan said, rising. His voice was strained.
The nurse walked over to Angie and gently placed the tiny blue bundle in her arms, then she left them alone.
He was beautiful: tiny and pink, with his face all scrunched up like a fist. A few strands of red hair clung damply to his pointed head. His little lips looked for something to suck.