They’d done it this time.
The dreadful rush of adrenaline was so immediate that he clapped his hands. Just once. Some lizard-brain Texas hardwiring kicked in to where all he knew was to act out the caricature of a high school football coach in times of crisis.
“Okay,” he said in a purposeful tone. “How late?”
Clear eyes, full heart.
“I don’t know,” she said.
“What?” Sam squawked. “Aren’t girls supposed to, you know, keep track?” Sam understood that the female reproductive system was a mysterious universe, but this seemed far-fetched. Then he thought about the teen moms on TV who accidentally had their babies on the toilet.
“Did you take a pregnancy test?”
Lorraine rolled her eyes. “Yeah, Sam.”
“And?”
“Positive.”
Shitshitshit.
“How many?”
“Four,” she said. “No, three.”
Now, Sam wasn’t an ob-gyn or anything, but this seemed an irrationally small number of sticks to pee on before any thinking human could declare themselves in or out of the unwanted-pregnancy woods. In fact, Sam couldn’t believe she hadn’t taken at least twenty, and even still Lorraine should go to the doctor for a blood test to be completely positive. Positively positive.
Shitshitshit.
“Okay,” he said, placing his hands on her shoulders. “You have to take a bunch more. I’ll take you. We’ll go right now.”
He almost pounded her back in high-strung jocular cheer.
“Sam, you’re freaking me out.”
“No, don’t freak,” he shrieked. Sam smiled with all his teeth displayed. “It’ll be fine. You should go to a doctor, a specialist, eliminate any doubt. For peace of mind.”
“A specialist?” she said. “You sound insane.”
Sam wiped his palms on the tops of his thighs.
“What about your regular doctor? Don’t you go to some fancy guy?”
“I can’t go to Dr. Wisham,” she said, rolling her eyes. “He’s my pediatrician.”
Why was she still going to a pediatrician?
“Why are you still going to a pediatrician? It doesn’t matter,” he recovered. “I’ll pay for it.” Sam wondered about the going rate for plasma donation and how much a slightly underweight human male could spare before he keeled over and died. Maybe he could donate a toe to science.
Sam cleared his throat. He rubbed his chin. Most of the time they’d been good about condoms. Most of the time.
“I have an appointment with Planned Parenthood on Thursday,” she said.
It was Friday. Thursday was way too many nights away.
“I can’t miss work,” she explained.
“I’m sure they’d understand if—”
“I can’t,” she interrupted. “It’s a big deal. I’m the only entry-level team member, and I’m running production on three tent-pole activations for a client. Some random can’t cover for me because I’m . . . ‘worried.’?” Lorraine rolled her eyes. Sam found the rest of the word salad more offensive than “worried,” though he bit his tongue. “It’s not as if I work in fast food or anything.” She peered at him guiltily. “No offense.”
First of all, managing an artisanal coffee purveyor was not working in fast food. Second of all . . .
“You’re in advertising,” he said. “You’re not exactly saving lives. No offense.”
Shit. Tact. He needed to chill. Sam took another deep breath.
She glared at him.
“I’m sorry,” he said. “I’m still processing. So next week, do you need me to come with you?”
Sam considered the logistics. Maybe he could borrow Fin’s car.
“No,” she said.
Paul was probably driving her. Every time Sam thought about faceless, rich-ass Paul, he felt rage collect in the pit of his stomach in blistering pea-size sores.
“How late are you?”
“Three weeks?”
Jesus.
Three weeks was an eternity in the life cycle of late periods. Or so it seemed from everything he knew about periods. Which wasn’t much.
They stood in silence. Sam pulled out his cigarettes. Then he imagined pink, teeny-tiny, microscopic baby lungs coughing. He put them away.
“I wanted to take a morning-after pill,” she said. “But then I didn’t, and . . .”
Sam thought about how careless they’d both been.
“Why didn’t you tell me you were worried?”
Sam’s stomach lurched guiltily at the prospect of Liar dealing with this herself.
“I thought about it.”
“You waited three weeks to text me.”
“I figured it was only a little late.”
“Well, now it’s kinda very incredibly late,” finished Sam.
“I’m worried,” Lorraine said, not meeting his eyes.
Wow. Was she going to cry? As screwed up as the circumstance was, was this when Sam would get to see Lorraine cry?
“Well.” Sam held her and she let him. It made him feel strong and capable. “We’ll figure it out.”
“How?”
“Just that I’m here for you. I support you. I mean, it is mine, right?”
She pushed him away. Hard.
“Are you serious?”
“Well, Jesus, Lorr, it could be Paul’s!” His anger swelled red-hot and righteous.
“I haven’t been with Paul since before you!” she yelled.
Sam smiled before he caught himself.
Ha. Suck it, Paul.
Sam studied Lorraine then. Shit. He was in way over his head. Still, he couldn’t help focusing on how she was mad at him and how he was stupidly elated that he was capable of making her this mad. It was all quite possibly the most idiotic circumstance to bring a baby into. A blameless, chubby nugget of person caught in the middle of two selfish screw-ups. Sam could feel his anxiety thrum in the back of his chest.
“If you are pregnant,” he said slowly, “what do you want to do?”
He thought about the A word.
A-B-O-R-T-I-O-N
AH BORSH SHUNN
BORSCHT
As in the beet-red soup with soft bits in it.
Borscht. Borscht. Borscht.
“I don’t know if I could terminate,” she said.
TERMINATE.
Sam’s mind glommed on to the glimmering red light in the Terminator’s eye at the end of the movie, when the cyborg refused to die.
“I’m not a child, Sam,” she said. “I’m not some knocked-up fifteen-year-old. I’m twenty-three. That’s old enough to know better. My mom had me at twenty-four. . . . I can’t.”
He stared at her. Just drank her in. Blond hair. Small hands. Blue blouse. Black slacks.
It was a fair response.
It seemed exactly the sort of thing you’d know about yourself. Except Sam didn’t know anything anymore.
PENNY.
When Penny was in ninth grade, two events of great portent occurred. One, she read Art Spiegelman’s graphic novel Maus. Two, she figured out that she wouldn’t be popular until she was a grown-up and that was fine because life was a long con.
Penny had Amber Friedman’s birthday party to thank for this wisdom. Amber Friedman was a girl from French class who famously woke up at five forty-five every morning to straighten her curly hair only to set it in differently shaped curls. Everybody figured she was well off since her dad was a music journalist for Rolling Stone. And while life was tough for Penny as the daughter of a MILF, having a dad with more Instagram followers than God was also a monumental suck. Amber’s dad cast a long shadow. It didn’t help that his daughter wasn’t cute. Not that she was ugly. She simply had one of those faces where the features were crowded into the middle like a too-big room with tiny furniture.
Then there was her personality. Amber loved butting in to finish other people’s sentences—even with teachers—and sneezed with a high-pitched “tssst” at least a half-dozen times. To Penny it seemed a bid for the wrong kind of attention. Anyway, Penny hadn’t been properly invited to the get-together. Amber’s mom and Penny’s mom were friendly from an Ethiopian cooking class they’d taken years ago and happened to run into each other at the market.
“But, Pen, Amber’s going to be so disappointed,” said Celeste, adding, “I got you both the new nail gel kits from Sephora.” Celeste dangled two shiny black bags.