When Kit returned, it was nearly seven in the morning and already heating up outside. She opened the door into the chilled, dark room. Manny lay on his side, facing away from her. She pulled off her jeans and lay next to him, studying the moles on his back.
“Where were you?” he mumbled without turning.
She paused, savoring the stillness of this side of the line she was about to cross. She bargained for more time before it all changed, because once she opened her mouth, the whole thing could fall apart. If she didn’t speak up, maybe today could be one of the good ones. They could sneak into a movie and eat popcorn with extra butter, they could drive to an open field and shoot targets, or they could just stay in bed, watch TV all day, and forget to eat. She felt tearful as she thought about the last time she was happy with him. They had snuck into the tail end of a wedding and stolen an expensive camera that was hanging off a pew. When they pawned the camera Manny saved the film and developed it for her. Some of the pictures were junk, but there was one beautiful shot of the couple walking down the aisle. The groom was laughing at something the bride must have said and Kit could feel the love between them.
“You deaf or something?” Manny said. “Where the shit were you?”
Her dreams of a perfect day dissolved. This secret wouldn’t keep.
“I’m pregnant, Manny.”
The silence that followed was tense, almost solid matter. Kit couldn’t manage a full breath.
“Whose is it?” he said, his voice dusty and cruel.
The insult hurt the way it was meant to. “It could only be yours,” she said.
He stayed quiet and still did not turn to face her, nor did she reach out to him. The space between them widened.
“What do you think?” she asked, the slightest waver in her voice.
At this he turned over, propped up on his elbow. He was laughing, but the scorn blew her back like she’d opened a hot oven.
“What’s to think about? You can’t keep it, dummy.” He tried to nudge her in the navel, but she swiftly blocked his hand. “It’ll make you fat and awkward. You never get your shape back, you’re never the same.”
She shook her head. He wasn’t taking her seriously. “I don’t give a shit about getting fat.”
Manny got up and ripped off the bedsheets.
Feeling exposed, she moved to the chair by the window and covered her lap with a pillow. “I could figure it out,” she said, convincing no one.
“That’s just the hormones talking,” he said. He opened the door, shook out the sheets, and let in a steamy gust, a licorice smell of tar. “Besides, you haven’t even asked me if I want a child.”
“Do you?” she asked and it pained her to realize how much she wanted the answer to be yes.
Now he raised his voice, paced like he was lecturing.
“I’m sorry, I just didn’t realize you were this na?ve. How would we raise a kid like this, motel to motel, ripping people off to survive? You ever think about school? Hell no, kids are a fucking drag. You’re not thinking straight.”
She turned in her chair away from him, afraid he would see the disappointment on her face. She hated how much sense he was making, but the fact that he was so clear, so righteous about getting rid of the baby, made her feel like she had to argue in favor of keeping it. She knew she couldn’t make the decision out of stubbornness, but she couldn’t just go with what he was saying either. She could hear him resume his bed making as he snapped and draped the sheets over the bed, then tucked them in tight. He always seemed a touch calmer after the bed was made. He walked around and squatted in front of Kit.
“Don’t think so hard, Kitty,” he said, pinching his eyebrows together. “Once it’s done with, you’ll see I’m right.”
He smoothed a wrinkle from the coverlet and sat across from her. He held her cheeks together between his warm hands. “I know a doctor. He’s clean, he’s good. He’ll take care of you.”
No, don’t make me do it. Don’t make me choose between you and the baby.
“What if I don’t go?” she said.
Manny clasped his hands together as if he were crushing a small bird between them. She tensed and glanced at the door.
“You’ll go,” he said.
The doctor, a pale-skinned man in his fifties, met them outside his trailer, which was parked a long way off the main road on an empty, overgrown lot. He wore overalls and had his stringy gray hair pulled into a loose ponytail. There were no outward signs of being a doctor, no scrubs or stethoscope or sterile white coat, nothing to balance the sketchiness of the setting.
He led them inside, and Kit saw the kitchen straight ahead, a medical cot and built-in benches to the right and a bed to the left. A pot of something boiled on the stove, lid jangling, and some instruments dried on a rack. An oxygen tank and IV pole by the bed, several cardboard boxes containing medical supplies stacked and half-open on the table. It was air-conditioned, at least.
Manny started up the stairs behind Kit.
“You’re gonna have to wait outside,” the doctor said.
“Hell no, I’m coming in,” Manny said and tried to edge around him, but the doctor blocked the doorway.
“I don’t think so,” the doctor said, waving him off. “It’s not sanitary, plus I only got so much room to maneuver.”
“How do I know you’re not gonna molest her in there?” Manny said, flushed around the collar.
The doctor shook his head wearily. “Look, man, I don’t know what to tell you. Do you want this or not?”
Manny held up his hands and backed down the stairs.
“I’ll be right outside. Just holler if he pulls a fast one on you,” he said to Kit.
He sat on a rusty glider and clasped his hands. Kit thought he actually looked worried, which only made her angrier at him for forcing this on her. She considered whether this was, in fact, all his idea. He hadn’t held a gun to her head, had he? It seemed true that once she ended the pregnancy, things could go back to normal. Manny would be happy, they’d carry on just the two of them, partners in crime. Until she got pregnant, she had only ever wanted to be with Manny. But now the balance was upset, now she had a little something separate, and she was beginning to want something beyond him. But the idea of walking out there and choosing the baby at the risk of losing him, the only person who ever loved her, it made her ill even to think about it.
The doctor closed the door and slid the lock, but she could still hear the tight creak of the glider, back and forth. Squick, creee, squick, creee.
“Here, have a seat,” the doctor said, gesturing to the special medical cot that had stirrups for her feet.
She hoisted herself onto the cot, the sanitary paper crinkling and bunching underneath her.
“How old are you?” he said.
“Nineteen.”
“Any health issues I should know about?”
“No, sir.”
“Ever had an abortion?”
She shook her head no, cheeks hot, feeling shorter and shorter of breath.
Squick, creee, squick, creee.
He wrapped a Velcro cuff around her bicep and pumped.
“Looks good. Before we begin I’m gonna give you something for the pain.”