Giftchild (14 page)

"Mom?" I asked.

She turned wide into our driveway, slammed on the brake, and turned off the key.

"That," my mother said, "is the single most twisted sentence you have ever said in your life."

I sat back in my seat, stunned. Yelling, I'd expected. Hyperventilating. Maybe even crying.

Not being called twisted.

Never that.

"Um," I said again. "I'm still pregnant. And you want a baby, so . . ."

"Penelope Overman," Mom said. "Do not even try to pin this on me."

Pin this on her? I was trying to
give
it to her. "But—"

"No," Mom said. "There is no way in hell I am adopting my daughter's baby. Do you not see how ridiculous that is?"

My body seized up. She could
not
be saying that. I'd thought so long about what I was going to say to Rodney, but clearly this was the conversation I should have been rehearsing. She had to take this baby. She had to. I'd turned Rodney away for her. That's why I was in this mess in the first place.

I struggled for air. I just needed to pitch it in the right way. Then she'd see. "People do this all the time, don't they?" I asked. "Grandparents take care of babies when teen moms can't. This will just be more . . . official."

Official, yes. Her baby, not mine. That was the plan.

But my arm tingled, like I could still feel Rodney's hand holding on. Offering to marry me. Offering to raise our child. I'd only thought I'd be giving up a baby, not a whole alternate future.

I looked over at Mom, and found her shaking her head angrily at the steering wheel. When she spoke, her voice was a low growl. "Do you know what people will think? They'll think I asked you to do this. No one will believe that my own daughter would make a mistake this stupid on accident."

For the first time in my life, I wanted to punch my mother in the face. "
That's
what you care about?" I asked. "What people will
think
?"

"No," Mom said. "I just meant—" She shoved the tips of her fingers into her mouth and bit down on them.

I stared at our front door. She said that because part of her knew what I'd done, and she just didn't want to believe it. "I didn't hear you tell Lily she was stupid," I said quietly. "You told her she was
brave
, and
selfless
and—"

Mom gave me a dark look. "I didn't mean for you to take that as
advice
."

I gripped the door handle. "So you'll accept help from a girl who burns you, but not from me."

Mom held up her hands. "STOP."

My mouth watered and my stomach rose. I cracked open the door, but my body didn't retch. She had to take this baby. She had to.

I'd given up everything for her.

But Mom didn't see it that way. And I couldn't tell her the whole truth. She already thought people would think I'd done this on purpose. How much more angry would she be if she knew that I had? Would she refuse to take the baby, just to punish me? If she did, what would I do then?

"I'm calling your father," Mom said. And she got out of the car and stalked away.

I shook myself, trying to loosen my locked muscles. Calling Dad was probably a good move. Maybe he could talk some sense into her.

I trudged into the house. Mom had gone up to her room, so I sat at the kitchen table, my backpack slumping on the floor. Mom spoke so loudly that I could hear every word, even from downstairs.

"Come home right now," she said. "You need to talk to your daughter. Yes, right now. I don't care what you're doing."

She must have hung up on him after that, because she yelled down to me from the top of the stairs: "You're telling him. Not me." And then she slammed her door.

I rested my head on my arms. She sure wasn't winning any awards for parental maturity today. I understood why she was upset, but couldn't she see that I'd done this for
her
? Couldn't she see all that I'd given up so that she could be happy?

My heart sank as I thought about Rodney walking away from me. What was he doing, now? I checked my phone, but of course he hadn't texted me. I wondered if he'd gone straight home, or if he was out somewhere, wandering around, hating me.

I'm sorry,
I texted. But I deleted it without sending. He knew I was sorry. It didn't change how I'd hurt him.

Dad's work truck flew into the driveway fifteen minutes later. I heard him slam on his squeaky brakes, and stomp up the front steps in his heavy boots.

He opened the front door and rushed to the stairwell. When he spotted me sitting at the dining room table, he stopped. "Are you okay?" Dad asked. "Where's your mother?"

"She's upstairs," I said. "You have to talk to her."

He looked me up and down, as if counting my limbs. "That's what she said about you."

Things weren't going to get better from here. "I'm pregnant," I said. "And she says she won't take the baby."

Dad's knees literally buckled. He dropped into the chair across from me.

"Sorry," I said. "I guess I should have told you to sit first." At least he wasn't driving.

Dad gave me an exhausted look. "Back up. You're pregnant?"

I buried my face in my arms. "Yeah."

Dad sounded like he wanted to kill someone. "Who's the father? Rodney?"

My stomach dropped. How could he need to ask that? "Of course it's Rodney."

Dad's eyes flicked up the stairs. "I think we should call your mother down for this."

I rested my cheek on my forearm. "She didn't want to talk about it. She said there was no way she was going to adopt her daughter's baby. But you'll talk her into it, won't you?"

Dad pressed both of his hands over his face, and he didn't answer.

"Dad?" I said. "Seriously. Why doesn't anyone see what a good thing this could be? This is your baby we're talking about."

Dad dropped his hands to his knees, his eyes meeting mine. "No, Penny," he said. "
You
are my baby."

My body deflated.
Oh
.

Dad shook his head. "Where is Rodney?"

Maybe gone forever. "I don't know," I said. "I told him earlier today."

Dad's hands balled into fists. "And then he left you to face your parents on your own?"

Ugh. Now, on top of everything, I was making Rodney look like a jerk. "No," I said. "It's not like that. He said he needed time to think."

Dad sat back in his chair. "Time to think about what? Did he push you into this?"

My eyes widened. "No," I said. "Never. It's my fault, okay?"

Dad crossed his arms. "It takes two."

But only one of us was the liar. "Please," I said. "Things are complicated enough with him right now."

Dad glared at the empty chair next to me, where presumably Rodney should have been sitting. "Seems pretty simple to me," he said.

I sighed. At least I'd spared Rodney this. "Can we talk about what's going to happen now?"

Dad settled back into his chair. "Okay," Dad said. "You want your mom and me to adopt the baby."

My voice came out as a plea. "That's the obvious thing to do, right?"

"Maybe," Dad said. "What about Rodney? What does he want?"

Blood filled my cheeks. By now he must have rethought his proposal. It had been a knee-jerk thing. Hadn't it?

"I don't know," I said.

Dad gave a sharp nod. "We'll have to talk to him. And his parents."

My stomach dropped. "His parents?" I hadn't even thought about the conversation that he had ahead of him. They didn't care much about what Rodney did, as long as he kept his grades up. He said all they really wanted was for him to stay out of their way.

How could I not have thought about this? I told him I loved him, but I
still
wasn't anticipating his feelings. "Do we really have to bother them about it?"

"Of course," Dad said. "They should all be involved in these decisions."

I closed my eyes. The least I could do for Rodney was leave him out of awkward conversations with my family. I ran my nails around the under edge of the table. "Does he?" I asked. "Lily's boyfriend wasn't involved."

Dad raised one eyebrow. "Lily's boyfriend made her get out of the car on the highway when he found out she was pregnant."

Jeez. Poor Lily. "Rodney's not like that," I said.

"I know," Dad said. "That's my point." He stood up from the table. "I better go talk to your mother."

I stood along with him. By now, maybe Mom had calmed down enough to be reasonable. "Can I come?"

"From the way she sounded on the phone," he said, "I'd say you'd better not."

My shoulders sank. "You have to convince her."

Dad shook his head at me. "You know how sensitive your mom is about these things," he said. "She never wanted this for you."

My vision blurred. She never wanted my life to be like hers, having kids so young. But it
wasn't
. I was having a pregnancy, not a baby.

Unless she refused to take it. And Rodney refused to forgive me.

Where would that leave me then?

When my vision returned, my eyes focused on a picture in a photo collage on the dining room wall. Mom couldn't be much older than me, and she held a one-year-old Athena in her arms.

I sank back into a chair. Mom had to get over this. If she didn't I'd be just your average pregnant teenager, with no real options except bad ones.

Dad trudged up the stairs, leaving me sitting at the dining room table. Clouds passed over the sun outside the kitchen window, and the room grew dim.

I pulled out my phone. Still no word from Rodney. He said he needed time, but how much time? Hours? Weeks?

Months?

No. He couldn't possibly let this hang between us that long. He had to be going as crazy as I was.

I brought up another text message. There must be something I could say to make things better. But everything I could think of was something I'd already said. Rodney wouldn't talk to me, and Mom wouldn't talk to me, and Dad needed to be there for Mom.

So instead I dialed Athena. She would freak out, but at this point, that was preferable to the ringing silence of the empty downstairs. I needed to tell her before she heard it from Mom or Dad, but more than that, I just wanted to talk to someone who wouldn't walk away.

The phone rang twice before she picked it up. The blunt approach hadn't worked well with anyone else, but with Athena, it was the only way to go. She had no patience for beating around the bush.

"Hey, Penny," she said.

Rip off the Band-Aid. "I'm pregnant," I said back.

Athena was silent for a long moment. "Where are you?" she asked.

"Home," I said. "Mom and Dad know."

She swore. "Are you grounded?"

"Um," I said. "I don't know. They're not really talking to me."

"Typical," Athena said. "I'm coming to get you, okay?"

I looked up the stairs. Mom and Dad had their door closed. "Do you think they'll let me leave?"

"Convince them."

"Okay," I said.

As we hung up, I stood up straight, rolling my shoulders back. Finally. A response I could get behind.

I went upstairs and knocked on Mom and Dad's door. Their voices hushed inside. Dad opened the door; Mom sprawled on the bed behind him with a washcloth over her eyes.

"I'm going to Athena's," I said.

"No, you're not," Mom shouted from the bed.

Dad lowered his voice. "It might be a good idea for you to go," he said.

"Tony!" Mom said. "If you're going to undermine me, at least do it where I can't hear."

He looked over his shoulder at Mom, who peeked from underneath the washcloth. He spoke to her in his reasonable voice. "I think you two could both use some space from each other."

"If it's up to me," Mom said, "she's never leaving the house again."

"That," Dad said, "is exactly what I mean."

Dad and Mom looked at each other, having one of those moments where they communicated only with their eyes. "Fine," Mom said. "It's not like she's going to have fun breaking
this
news."

Athena was probably already preparing her speech about what an idiot I was. But at least
she
would stick around to yell it at me.

Probably for hours.

I sat on the porch swing, under the awning, waiting for Athena. A drizzle of rain floated onto the lawn and grew gradually thicker until a stream of water pumped through the drainpipe at the edge of the porch. Rodney loved the rain, mostly because droplets of water were so much fun to photograph on almost anything.

Was he out shooting in it now, without me?

Athena had her headlights on when she pulled into the driveway, windshield wipers still thumping away. She pushed the side door open and waited while I sprinted through the rain to the car.

I sat down, wiping the rain from my arms, and Athena pulled backward out of the driveway again, looking up toward the house for Mom and Dad. "We had a fuzzy connection, right?" Athena said. "You're perfect. Or paraplegic. Not pregnant."

"Pregnant," I said. "Unfortunately."

"Okay," Athena said, holding a palm up to me. "I'm going to say this out loud, and then you're going to tell me I'm wrong. Ready?"

My nails dug into the armrests. "Ready," I said.

"Tell me you didn't do this on purpose."

The windshield wiper blades squelched across the window. Swish, swash.

Athena focused intently on the road. "Tell me," she said, "that you weren't planning this when we had that conversation about sex."

Swish, swash. Swish, swash.

Athena pulled up to a stop sign and put her hand on my arm. Her voice softened with a kindness I rarely heard from her. "
Penny
," she said. "You know how psychotic that is, right?"

I tore my arm away. "Mom needed help," I said. "Why am I the only one who sees that?"

Athena waved a finger at me. "Mom is crazy," Athena said. "She'll do anything to have a baby. She's sacrificed all of our happiness over it. She needs
professional
help. She—"

"She won't take my baby," I said.

Athena's mouth fell open mid-rant. "What?"