An Order of Coffee and Tears

13





Sleep. It is like our own personal time travel, but a forward direction only – never backward. When I got home that evening, I only closed my eyes for a minute. I told myself, just a minute, and then a shower and some food, and then to bed. A blink was all I remember. I saw my ceiling one second, and then it was the next day. Time travel.

Ms. Potts and I stopped at Suzette’s room after leaving the diner. It was near four in the morning, but I knew she wouldn’t care. Having become an honorary employee of Angela’s Diner, most of the time she was on our schedule, anyway. While Suzette didn’t care much about the time, Mrs. Quigly a door away did care. Rushing her apartment door open, she entered the narrow hall, where a glowing dome in the ceiling cast down a yellow light. Just enough light showed us the figure of an old woman, her robe half open, wearing slippers with little dog ears and a pair of eyes looking up at us. She coughed out a midnight holler for us to keep it down, and we slunk a step back from her with apologies. Suzette apologized, too, and the three of us stood there in a stand-off, as we waited for Mrs. Quigly to go back into her room.

Suzette asked us why we were there. Was something wrong, and was everyone okay? She asked with half a smile, and I could tell she was still up and just glad to have the company. Ms. Potts did her best to explain what happened, and I did my best to apologize for screwing up. I told her I wasn’t thinking. I remember holding my arm as I explained the mess I’d brought to her. The flower petals on my arm were swollen and bruised, and ached enough that I could feel my heart beating in them. When Suzette saw the bruises on my arm, she began to cry. She told me how sorry she was that he’d hurt me, and that this was all her fault. Ms. Potts shook her head, and explained as she’d done before.

“You can’t wrestle that kind of mean away. It’s down deep, and is a part of him. Always will be – no reforming a man like that.”

We left Suzette’s room twenty minutes later. She had plenty of food, and even picked up a small television using some of the store-credit from the pawn shop. Ms. Potts said the safest thing to do was for her to wait a few days. Wait him out. Reluctant eyes followed us to her door. She shook her head in disagreement more than a few times, but then finally nodded an okay. The eyes from the kitty-cat clock on the wall seemed to follow us to the door. I joked about it as Suzette repeated that it made her room look homey. Ms. Potts snorted a laugh, and said that I was right – the clock was creepy, especially the eyes. We all laughed a little at that, and then heard Ms. Quigly banging against the wall, yelling to keep it down.

I think Ms. Quigly must have been standing at her wall, waiting to hear a rustle of sound so that she had something to yell about. Suzette rolled her eyes, and we walked a soft step down the hall past Ms. Quigly’s door. Ms. Potts thumped one foot down just loud enough to raise more words from behind the door. When Ms. Potts turned to me, and said that the dogs must be barking, I lost it. In my mind, I saw the doggy slippers, their upturned eyes, barking up a storm, and couldn’t contain myself. Laughing helped, but I was tired and scared for Suzette. I was scared for all of us.

The diner was quiet the next day, very quiet, and I welcomed it. The imprint of a few quarters in my waist apron had me wanting some more tables. Not a lot, just a couple. When the bell rang out, I looked up to see Suzette. My eyes went wide, and, right away, I thought that when Ms. Potts saw her, Suzette was going to get an earful. She approached the counter and took to her favorite seat. She grinned a bubbly smile, and asked for coffee.

“What are you doing here? Did you hear nothing we said earlier?” I tried to scold her, but my smile got in the way. I wanted the company.

“Uh, excuse me – shouldn’t you be home?” Ms. Potts chastised from behind me. The corner of Suzette’s smile fell flat, and she answered,

“I know this is going to sound odd, but I think I’m safer here. With you guys and Clark. James is a coward. Always was.”

“D-Dunno about that, Miss Suzette. He l-looked willing yesterday. But, you sit and stay. I g-got you,” Clark expressed from behind his grill, and winked, nodding his head with confidence. I could see Ms. Potts shaking her head, but then stall as she considered what was said. She pushed her glasses up, and fixed a smile on Suzette, before saying,

“You good company, anyway. We’ll keep you,” she smirked, and then went to wrapping linens and silverware.

“Time to lean, it’s time to clean,” Mr. Thurmon announced as he exited from the back. His leg dragged a little, but not as bad as I’d seen before. Jarod followed him, a pen and paper in his hand, trying to write down what Mr. Thurmon was saying. Mr. Thurmon stopped and turned around. He put his hands on Jarod’s shoulders.

“Are you sure you are okay? I mean, all this can wait a week or two – no rush, son… none at all.”

Jarod held pensive eyes, and kept his attention to writing all the details down. When he stopped writing, I saw embarrassment, maybe some shame and fear, as he glanced around at us. He looked at me for a second, but then pushed his eyes back to Mr. Thurmon. Jarod wore white tape across the bridge of his nose, covering a jutting bump and a split in his skin from where the doctors straightened the bone. The skin around his eyes were blackish-blue and swollen, pooching out in a hang of heavy bags. His one eye was nearly full of broken blood vessels, leaving most of it a red wonder. Knots in my stomach had me reaching to rub the flower petals on my arm. I reached for Suzette’s arm to get her attention, but she was already a step away from Jarod, and tapping on his shoulder. Jarod looked at her, a half-smile forming as the red in his eye grew glassy, causing him to wince.

“I just wanted to apologize for the trouble yesterday. I am so sorry for my husband’s behavior…” Suzette tried to finish, but began to tear up. I’d hoped Suzette’s words would help Jarod feel better, but he looked worse. Sweat was beading up on his face as his eyes moved around. Attention, any attention, was probably the last thing he wanted. I told myself to stay behind the counter, but was already walking over to him. Regardless of what happened, he’d come to my side to help.

“Jarod, thank you for helping me yesterday. I thought it was one of the bravest things anyone has ever done for me.” His eyes lifted, and, for a moment, he saw me the way he’d seen me before, and I felt hope. Jarod pushed a smile, goofy, but good. I leaned in and kissed his cheek, and told thanked him again.

“Oh, Gabby, I almost forgot,” Mr. Thurmon started to say. From his pocket, he pulled a small white square piece of paper. “Got a phone call for you – an out of state call,” he continued, and slowly spun the paper in his fingers as he squinted his eyes. Trying to read his pencil scratches, he finally said, “Ahhh, here it is. Ummm… well wait, got no name, just that he was looking for Donut.”

I never saw Mr. Thurmon crumble the paper and throw it away. I never saw Suzette grabbing at my arm as I stepped back. I never saw Jarod reaching out as the air in the room became hot and poisonous and flipped my stomach and spun the room. I reached for the counter behind me, and sat at the stool, and studied the floor while the light green tiles turned and twisted. I hadn’t heard that name in almost ten years.





Ms. Potts assured Mr. Thurmon and Jarod that I’d be okay. They left soon after I fell back onto the counter and rested on a stool. Suzette stood behind me as Ms. Potts pressed a glass of water in my hand. The glass felt cold and wet, and I wanted to throw it on my face. Instead, I pressed the glass to my cheek, and counted in my head as I breathed deeply. I would be okay, and I told them that more than a few times.

“What is the name Donut? What does it mean?” I heard Suzette ask me. Ms. Potts joined a second later, commenting on the same. Memory bubbles surfaced once more, and erupted in a stream of images. All of it was fresh in my mind, as if it were just yesterday and not ten years ago.

“It’s what my father calls me. Or, what he used to call me, a long time ago,” I whispered, and drank half the water.

“Donut?” Ms. Potts asked, a genuine curiosity in her eyes. A small front of offense warmed in me, and I answered,

“Yeah… Donut. What’s wrong with that?”

“No, dear, nothing wrong with – just ain’t heard it before.”

“Well, you wouldn’t, my Daddy made it up,” I told them proudly. But then images and memories flooded my head again, and before I could stop it, I was crying. The memories were too vivid, and the feelings that came with them, too painful. Suzette walked around to stand with Ms. Potts.

“What is it?”

“My Daddy made that name up for me. Donut is a pet name. I was a little girl, and we went to watch how donuts were made. We even got to eat some. I remember how they tasted, they were hot, and melted on your tongue. I was so little then. My Daddy had to carry me on his shoulders because I was afraid to step on this raised metal floor. He didn’t mind though, and we walked along this long window, and we could see inside the donut room. A big machine was moving the donuts, and I asked my Daddy, where did the donut holes go? He started to laugh, and I thought he was going to drop me. He joked with me that maybe the donut holes were taken, stolen, and that we needed to go find them. So that is what we did. We went home and searched for the donut holes. I didn’t know what to look for, but I looked, anyway, because he was looking, and it made him smile. We had fun with it for a while, but finally I stopped looking. But my Daddy kept calling me Donut. And the name stuck. And then everyone started calling me Donut. When I grew up, everyone called me Gabby, and my Daddy was the only one left who ever called me Donut. I liked that. No, I loved it.”

Ms. Potts and Suzette laughed as I told them the story. I even giggled along, remembering being little and racing around the house searching with my Daddy. And then I started to cry again. Heat pushed up from inside of me, and I tried to stop it, but then I was sobbing, and I realized you can’t stop something after ten years. You can’t turn it off once it starts. Suzette rubbed my back while Ms. Potts did what my momma would’ve done: she picked up my hand, held it, and told me to let it out.

“Spill it all,” she said, and kissed my hand, then brought it next to her heart and cried with me. She said she’d try to take the pain if she could, but they weren’t her tears to shed, so she did the next best thing, and held me.

I only cried for a few minutes. No roads to get on before the sun comes up. No running from me in the next hour. I let myself cry, and I let my friends help me. And, thankfully, Angela’s Diner stayed empty – couldn’t imagine someone coming in and seeing the three of us huddled at the counter like we were.

“Gabby. What happened? What you running from?” I moved behind the counter, and fixed some coffee. Seemed necessary, considering how drained I felt. Suzette and Ms. Potts joined in. And I began to tell them. I told them why I left Texas. Why I left my family, and, at one point, why I made the decision to never see them again.





I woke up in my bed that morning, wrapped in my favorite comforter. Sunlight fingers squeezed through my window and tickled my eyes. Five more minutes, I just wanted five more minutes of sleep, but I had to do something that day, and the thought of it pulled me from my bed.

“Morning, Donut. Your momma left earlier,” my Daddy said, and handed me a few boxes of cereal.

“What’s your combination this morning?” I asked him, and watched as he studied his bowl.

“I think I’ve got some raisin something or other, and Sugar Smacks. Good stuff.” He playfully wiped a drop of milk from his chin. “What are you having?”

I studied the cereal boxes in front of me, and picked two of them. I looked over the selection again, and picked a third. We didn’t eat cereal like everyone else. That would just be boring, my Daddy liked to say. And he was right. So, we mixed up different combinations every morning.

“Gonna go with these three.” I held them up. He gave them a look, and then a thumbs up, as he dove back into his bowl.

“Listen, I have some things to do this morning before lunch, so I won’t be in the office for a little while in case you need to reach me, okay?”

“Sure. What things?” I was curious – he wasn’t the type to skip a day, or even a morning, of work. He stood up from the table, and reached his hand out to me.

“Don’t you worry. Gotta run – give me a hug.” When I stood up to hug him, I noticed his shoes. They were different colors. Identical shoes, but different colors. He had a black shoe on one foot, and on the other, he was wearing a burgundy shoe. I started to laugh. An odd thing about my Daddy: he always wore matching shoes and belts and eye-glasses. It was just his thing – and I loved that about him. As for the identical shoes? He didn’t like shoe shopping, couldn’t stand it. So, whenever he found a pair of shoes he liked, he’d buy two pairs, one for each color. But never brown, he hated brown. I loved that about him, too.

“Daddy,” I teased, and pointed to his feet, “you mixed up your shoes.” He lifted a foot to take a closer look, and let out a breathy laugh.

“You know, what, I’m not even going to change. Let’s see just how many people notice my shoes. Let’s see if anyone notices them at all,” he laughed again, and kissed me.

That was the last time I ever laughed with my father. The plans that day weighed on my shoulders and tore at my insides. With the house empty, I called Tommy. Tommy Grudin was more than just my first kiss. He was my first love. We were sixteen, in love, and pregnant. When I told him I was pregnant, he didn’t run like I thought he would. He didn’t scream or yell, or tell me I was ruining his life. He just held me, and asked me what I wanted him to do. I loved him for that. I loved him so much. When I heard his voice on the phone, I told Tommy that I was going to be late for school, and that I’d see him after lunch. He asked if I was okay, and I told him I was fine, just that I was feeling a little sick.

An older girl, Jessica, who lived up the street, told me what to do. She used to babysit me, and, one day, while walking by our house, she found me sitting in the front yard, crying. I was just sixteen. I had my entire life ahead of me. I loved kids, but I wasn’t ready to be a mom. Jessica told me about a place that I could go to. She told me that it was simple. She said that all I had to do was go in and, after a few minutes, it would be over. All done. No more baby.

When I told her that Tommy knew about the baby, she said that was simple, too. Tell him that it was a mistake. That I was wrong about being pregnant. That I was just late, and that I got my period, anyway.

It sounded so simple. The words were easy to hear: I didn’t have to be pregnant, and that made sense to me. I couldn’t handle trying to think about my next twenty years. But I could handle thinking that I didn’t have to be pregnant. Jessica told me I didn’t need an appointment, or a doctor’s note, or anything, just that I needed to go with money and have someone to drive me. This last part got me crying again. I couldn’t tell Tommy what I was considering. And there was no way I could tell my parents. I couldn’t tell them. My old babysitter put her hand on mine, and I remember thinking how soft it felt, how calm and reassuring.

Jessica drove me that morning. The sun that pushed light into my eyes earlier was now tucked away behind some clouds for a nap. I was so nervous and scared, and remember shivering. I was jealous of the sun, and wanted to join in the cloudy nap. I wanted the time travel sleep again. A quick blink, and it’d be over. But it doesn’t always work out that way. When we pulled up to the building, the nerves that had me shivering stretched and turned my stomach, and I lost my cereal as I got out of her car. Some Cheerios, Apple Jacks, and a kind of Shredded Wheat puddled on the asphalt while Jessica held my hair back and told me it would be okay. I think I was supposed to hold off on eating anything, anyway. So losing my cereal was fine with me.

The room was bright, but cold. Too cold. Jessica waited outside while I changed, and then held my hand as I pushed on my feet to get up on the table. The sound of paper crinkled under me as the shivering in me started again. Metal and plastic legs stuck out from the sides of the table, reminding me of a half-dead spider. They told me to place my legs in the stirrups, and I giggled at the sound of the word. I think I giggled more because of what they had given me, but then I stopped when I heard the sound of a machine come on.

The low mechanical rumble and the chatter of voices started to ache in my ears. Jessica rubbed my arm, and I heard her tell me again that it would be okay. And then all I could think about were these baby chickens. We were just kids when Tommy and I were in a class together, and they assigned us an egg. It was our job to take care of the egg. We had to make sure it stayed under a lamp and stayed warm, and had to turn the egg every day. And we did it. We did it together. We took care of the egg. And then one morning, it began to hatch.

I remember watching the egg when it moved. The shell had a smooth texture to it, and Tommy told me to put my finger on the egg. He guided my hand.

“Gently,” he said, and we touched the shell. I felt a thump from inside. The baby moved. We laughed, excited by what we were seeing. When the baby chick started breaking through the shell, we cheered the little thing on until it was free. We cheered together. Tommy and I had a baby chick, and the first thing it saw in this world was our faces. I remember wanting to cry. He smiled, and wiped my cheek, and said he thought the tears were sweet and kind, and I remembered loving him that day. And I think I never stopped loving him.

I put my hand on my belly, and knew I couldn’t do it. I couldn’t go through with it. I didn’t know what would happen to me and Tommy, and I didn’t know who we would become, but I knew this was his baby, too. I started waving my hands, and told the nurses and the doctor no. I told them that I made a mistake, and that I wanted to keep my baby. I screamed at them when a nurse tried to put oxygen on me, and again when she told me to settle down. She held my arm and told me that I only needed to relax and wait. Just wait, and it would soon be over.

Jessica yelled at me to look at her. She said, “Look at me, and tell me what you want.” I screamed through the mask on my face that I wanted to have my baby – that I wanted to have Tommy’s baby. She nodded and said something to the nurses and doctors, and they all helped me off the table. My knees buckled, and the doctor caught my arm and gave me and Jessica instructions. He said that I should be okay, and that he hadn’t started the procedure. I held onto Jessica’s shoulders as she helped dress me. By the time I reached the doors, my mind was clearing, and I knew my decision to keep our baby was the right one.

When we opened the door, the outside rushed over me, and I breathed it in. But then something red and wet and clumpy exploded at our feet. We both jumped back with a scream, uncertain of what it was. Some of the remains had splashed up on our shirts and faces, and left runny red streaks across the front of us. The smell of rotting food was immediate. The explosion was a handful of spoiled tomatoes with scabs of white fuzz and blackened skin.

Remains of the tomatoes were everywhere as we tried stepping over them. Men and woman were screaming, and holding large signs with words printed in bold lettering. A sea of white and orange and turquoise poster boards danced up and down in front of us. The posters were carried on sticks, dancing back and forth with a steady low chant and an occasional scream directed at us. We grabbed for each other. I could feel the anger coming from the people in front of us. Words stood out on the posters scribbled in black marker. I could read awful, terrible things, like “Baby Killer” and “Save the Unborn from Murderers.”

Another explosion of tomatoes landed in front of us, and I saw fear striking Jessica’s eyes. The confidence and the all-knowing expression that helped me get to the clinic disappeared as she mouthed a curse. The crowd of protestors chanted “Baby Killer” and bounced the posters up and down. The chanting was deafening, and Jessica yelled in my ear to hurry up. We huddled together, arm in arm, and made our way into the swarm of protestors.

She yelled in my ear again, telling me to keep my head down, and to just follow the lines in the pavement. She said the protestors would move as we pushed forward, and that they wouldn’t hurt us. But they did hurt us. I felt the first jab in my back, and turned to see an older man whose beard hung loose above his shirt collar. Long hairs waved around in the breeze, as he shouted,

“Bitch – Baby Killer,” and then spat at my feet while pulling back the end of his sign. Another jab of a signpost hit Jessica, and she wheezed a cough out and then barely choked that we needed to move faster.

I kept my eyes on the lines in the pavement. We moved toward our car. It was slow, but we were moving. Another jab hit my side as I watched the legs and feet in front of us part to the left and right. I remember starting to scream, and Jessica held me tighter. The “Baby Killer, Baby Killer” chant grew to a roar, and the smell of rotting food lingered from the tomato bomb we wore on our clothes. At one point, Jessica decided to yell back, and grabbed a protestor’s sign when they lunged for a strike on my leg.

“You Baby Killer!” they shouted at her.

“What the f*ck is wrong with you people? You don’t know us! You don’t know why we’re here,” she screamed back at them, and threw the sign to the ground. I hung onto her arm and winced when a heavier jab pierced the skin of my leg. My knees started to feel weak, and a hot wave of nausea choked my breath as the sedative wore away. I had to stop, but only for a second. Jessica pulled on my arm, and we pushed forward.

“Baby Killer, Baby Killer,” echoed in my ears, and a sudden urge to cry hurt more than the sign posts. I glanced at the sky, trying to pull the tears in, the sun was still napping, and I wished I could hide up in the clouds with it. When I looked over the sea of colored posters, as they continued to bump up and down, another fear came to me. What if they were moving with us? What if they formed a circle around us and were walking all the way to Jessica’s car? Jessica yelled for me to put my head down. And I did, but not before someone grabbed a fistful of my hair and pulled it out of my head. Screaming, I put my head down and followed the lines in the pavement.

The legs and feet continued to part ways and move to the sides of us. Relief began to settle in place of the nausea. The “baby killer, baby killer” chanting was softer. I could hear my own breathing, and realized I was crying, after all. We were passing the worst of the crowd. The remaining protestors continued to move around us, but then a pair of shoes stood in front of me. They didn’t move. A black shoe, and a burgundy shoe. And then I heard my Daddy’s voice.

“Donut?” My heart sank, and all I could do was look up into his face. His eyes were filled with confusion as he shook his head back and forth like the poster boards’ dance.

It was a moment we shared, a terrible moment, and it ended who we were. “Daddy,” I cried, and reached for him. He extended his hand, just enough to touch the paper and plastic medical bracelet the nurse had put on my wrist earlier. The confusion drained from his face. Deep lines emerged above his eyes, and his face turned red like the tomato remains on our clothes. He raged and cried and screamed at the sky, and pushed my hands away.

“But, Daddy,” I pleaded with him, reaching my hands to him, and again he pushed me away.

“I don’t know you. My God… Gabby, how could you consider this?” He sobbed. “I don’t know who you are – I can’t know a person that could do this! Who could do this to an innocent life?”

He stepped back into the pack of protestors, and screamed their chant.

“But, Daddy,” I cried out to him, stretching my arms to reach him, “I didn’t do…” and a hit came from my other side, and it was deep and under my ribs, and stole my breath. I gripped Jessica’s arm, and thought I was going to black out, but the stars that raced in front of my eyes rose up to the clouds.

By the time I could see clearly enough again, my Daddy was walking away from us and holding his face in hands. “Daddy!” I screamed after him. “Please, Daddy!” I screamed some more. But he only shook his head and kept walking.

My heart ached. My heart broke! I wanted my Daddy, I needed my Daddy, and he turned away from me. Jessica got me to my home later that afternoon, and then wished me luck as I got out of her car. When I went to my room, it wasn’t my room anymore. It wasn’t my home. How could I face my Daddy? How could I face my momma, or anyone? I wasn’t thinking, not at all. A voice in my head said to run, get on the road, and run.

My dog sat on my bed, his eyes were big, and his ears were pressed flat against his head. He whimpered, and I believe he knew there was something off, something wrong. Dogs know. Sitting next to him, he nuzzled my arm, as if trying to ask what happened. I wiped the silliness away from my eyes, and kissed him on the snout, and told him I had to leave. He whimpered some more, and nuzzled my chin. I kissed him again, and kept the tears in my eyes.

Run, I heard in my head, and poured the books out of my school backpack. My life as a teenager ended, and any evidence of it was dumped out onto my bed and remained there. For all I know, it may still be there. I raced around the house and gathered a few pieces of clothes, another pair of shoes, and whatever cash I could find. That is all I had with me. And that is all I left with. From the road, I looked back once to see my dog watching me through the window. I cried for the first mile, but then wiped that silliness away, too.





Ms. Potts and Suzette never interrupted. They never asked a question, or passed a look to one another. I didn’t remember seeing Clark come from around from the grill, but there he stood, a cup of coffee in his hands, and his eyes on me.

“Gabby, that is horrible…” Suzette started to say, and then an awful thought rushed though me, and it scared me. What would they think of me now? What would they think about what I did, or planned to do? A crash of feelings filled with pain and fear and sadness hit me, and I shook.

“Please, please don’t judge me,” was all I could get out before Ms. Potts pulled me into her arms.

“Shhhh, ain’t nobody here gonna judge anyone. That ain’t our place to do. You done nothing wrong in my eyes. What was done to you is unspeakable,” she finished. I passed a look to each of them.

“G-Gabby, your family – we love you,” Clark added.

Suzette leaned in when my eyes reached hers, and asked, “Gabby, but what about the baby?”

Images of Tommy and the baby chick raced across my eyes, only to be replaced by memories of a dank and musty motel room and a filthy bathtub.

“I lost the baby a few days later,” I said, and pushed back another wave of hurt. “The first cramps started the next morning. I had coin-sized bruises on my legs and around my back and my front,” I started, and circled my finger and thumb to show where the bruises landed. “They were a deep color, just sickening bruises. The protestors left their marks on me that morning, and, by that afternoon, I was losing my baby.”

I could only tell them some of what happened next. The images were still in my mind, and I suppose they would be the rest of my life. The cramping didn’t pass. Instead, a burning started inside of me. That is when I considered that my baby and I might be in trouble. My skin felt warm, and, with the blankets pulled away, I laid on my side and prayed for the pain to stop. I told myself it was nothing. I told myself it was stress, and that the cramping was normal. I prayed that my baby would be okay. My skin got warmer and sweaty, and I began to feel cold. That’s when the vomiting started. Something was wrong.

So much pain came then, and it was from deep inside. It was a pain like I’d never felt before. I prayed, and cried through some of it. I didn’t know if my baby would stay alive. I didn’t know if I could stay alive. I kept praying. Praying that we would be okay. I remember sitting on the floor against the bed, cold beads of sweat under my eyes and above my lip. I remember holding my belly and talking to my baby, and saying to hold on, to please hold on. But when I felt the wet between my legs, I knew it was blood, although I hoped it was sweat. I remembered hearing about bleeding in early pregnancy, and that everything could be okay. I prayed harder.

A hot twist of pain pulled me to the floor of the room, and I remember digging my fingers into the carpet and clutching fistfuls of shag, trying not to scream. But I did scream – pain pushed me on my knees and elbows with fistfuls of carpet as a run of sweat dripped from my nose. I felt lightning spasms inside, pulling me apart and holding me on the floor of that motel room. At some point, I blacked out for a few minutes. No time travel this time. When the room was in my eyes again, the spasms were worse, and a heavier flow started. I grabbed a towel and held it under me, and then started to shake. My baby was leaving me.

By the time it was dark outside, I had to lie down in the bathtub. I held the towel between my legs and waited to die. It was a white bathtub, but dirty and old, and it had a drain that was caked in black mildew. But I didn’t care, I couldn’t save my baby. I remember pushing my fingers along cracks in the lip of bathtub and into some of the holes where porcelain used to be. I remember waiting as the sweat ran down my face and the blood spilled out of me. The tub felt cold under my skin, and my teeth chattered. The pain that pulled my insides didn’t stop, it didn’t get better. A few times, I thought I’d pass out again. I wanted to call out for someone. I wanted them to get my parents, to get Tommy. But then I felt my baby leave me, and I shut my eyes and prayed that I would keep bleeding. That I’d bleed until there was nothing left of me.

There was a familiar pain in the eyes of Ms. Potts and Suzette. They knew this pain; they’d been where I’d been. It wasn’t the same, but, then again, it was. I didn’t realize it before, but we shared something, a loss. I felt closer to them for it. Looking at their faces, I wondered if there was something bigger than us, greater than us. Something that had brought the three of us together. Could there be? I’d like to think that maybe there was.

“But I didn’t die in the tub. I cried when it was over. I lost our baby. I don’t know if I was going to lose our baby anyway, or if the visit to the clinic was what caused me to miscarry. But I couldn’t go back. It wasn’t just my Daddy – I could never face Tommy again. And I think maybe I might have killed Tommy, too.”

Suzette pulled her hand to her mouth after I mentioned Tommy. She considered what I said, and I’d considered it more than a few hundred times since seeing his parents. If we had our baby, would Tommy have joined the Army after college? If we had our baby, would he have even gone to college? A blend of questions haunted me after hearing about his death. I didn’t dare explore more, or speculate what might have been if the decision I made had been different. One decision, a decision I made on a breezy afternoon while sitting in my yard changed our lives forever.