Answers
March, 2003
“What are we gonna name him?”
“How do you know it’s a boy?”
Grabbing her magic wand, Kendall waves it in a circle and then taps my belly.
“Presto! It’s a boy!”
“Well I guess that takes care of that! What do you think we should name him?”
“Weo.”
Give me a bleeping break. Seriously?
“Sweetheart, why do you wanna name the baby Leo?”
“So he’ll pway snipes with me.”
Silently praying to Jesus, who I wish I started believing in a long time ago so that my prayers weren’t in vain, to pull some strings and make it so Kendall can play snipes with the real deal again one day, I kiss her on the forehead and turn out her light.
On the way to make the call I promised Barbara I would make, I enter the baby’s room and sit for a long while in the rocking chair to think over everything I need to say to him.
“Am I doing the right thing, Kelly?”
Silence.
“Your dreams were right, by the way. Every single thing you said to me for the last year and a half has been dead on. Oops, sorry…I mean, accurate. Anyway, the pregnancy, the needing to make a choice or one would be made for me…you were right about everything.”
Silence.
“What would you do if you were me? Would you tell Leo you were pregnant or would you live with this secret?”
Silence.
“I know, I know…you’d tell him. But you know why it scares me to do that, right?”
Silence.
“A lot of help you are.”
Before leaving the room, I open the dresser drawer to admire the baby clothes that the girls bought…Actually, I’m procrastinating. Sifting through the piles, I stumble on a roll of masking tape and a bottle of glue probably left behind when they were decorating the room. Looking up toward the Heavens...or were they? I think back to the one and only conversation Kelly and I had on her porch where she lambasted me for always trying to “fix my broken package.”
“Kel…are you telling me to stop fixing things or are you telling me to start again?”
Silence.
“C’mon, I need to know! What am I supposed to do?”
Silence.
Just then the phone rings and I quickly wobble to the kitchen to answer it before it wakes Kendall. The whole way mumbling at Kelly.
“Hello?”
“Will you accept a collect call from Kathmandu, Nepal?”
“Uhhhh, sure. I can’t afford my freaking mortgage payment and I have a baby on the way who I probably can’t afford to feed, but…what the hell.”
“Excuse me?”
“Never mind…I’ll take the call.”
“Just a moment while I connect you.”
The line is silent for about ten seconds and then all of a sudden it gets incredibly muffled and I hear a faint clatter on the other end of the line.
“Hello? Megan? Are you okay?”
“Not…Meg…Kur…I have to…you.”
“Kurt? Is that you?”
“Ye…Me.”
“I can barely hear you. Is everyone all right?”
“Good…here. Chri...we have…talk…the baby.”
For so long I didn’t want to know the truth about that fateful night at Kurt’s house, fearing it might reveal I betrayed Leo. Then recently, I convinced myself there’s no way I ever could’ve of. Like I told my friends, Kurt would never take advantage of me drunk, and like I told Dr. Maria just five hours ago, I know my baby is Leo’s. But why is Kurt calling me after not talking to me for months? I look up toward the Heavens and wonder if this is Kelly doing a little gluing and taping on my behalf.
“What about the baby? Kurt! What about the baby?”
“You need…know.”
“I need to know what? Kurt, what are you trying to tell me?”
“It’s…mine. I’m sorry…told…sooner.”
And then the line went dead.
I stand there for a moment, in total shock.
“Omigod…he thinks it’s his.” And then feeling my breath slip away, “Oh…my…God. I slept with both of them.”
Immediately, everything in my line of vision becomes blurry. I frantically reach down to the receiver to start dialing Slutty’s number and that’s when a huge fart explodes out of my ass. Trying to support myself on the countertop, I know exactly what’s about to happen next.