Giftchild (20 page)

Mom didn't even let her say hello. "Are you aware," Mom said, "that according to federal law, you cannot discriminate against a pregnant student?"

Ms. Aston's eyes went wide. "I—" she said. "Well—"

Mom went on. "Are you aware that this means you are required to allow my daughter to continue in her regular classes, and any other school activities that were available to her before?"

I raised my eyebrows.
I
hadn't been aware of that.

Ms. Aston recovered. "We aren't kicking her out," she said. "We only
recommend
that our pregnant students go to Valley, for the increased support."

Mom looked at me.
Recommend
. I was pretty sure that was the word Ms. Aston had used with me, but a recommendation from the vice principal in charge of discipline sounded a lot like an order to me. "I thought it was a euphemism," I said. When I was the only one here, it probably had been.

Mom gave a sharp nod. "So you brought my daughter in here to scare her out of school, without informing her of her rights. Is that correct?"

Ms. Aston hesitated. Then she handed across the same flier she'd passed me about Valley. "If you look, I think you'll see that—"

"No," Mom said. "Do you know what year the law that protects pregnant students was passed?"

Ms. Aston looked stunned.

Mom cleared her throat. "It was 1972. That's before I sat in an office much like this, in Penny's exact position, and was told I couldn't go to school anymore." Mom set the flier back on Ms. Aston's desk. "I didn't know the law then, but I know it now, and you're not going to do to my daughter what was done to me."

My jaw dropped.
Go, Mom,
I thought.

Ms. Aston looked from Mom to me, and I saw her doing the math. Teen pregnant mom, teen pregnant child. Like mother, like daughter.

I bit my lip to keep from explaining. This was
so
not the time.

Mom dipped her head to the side. "If you'd like, I can get legal counsel."

Ms. Aston's voice was clipped. "No," she said. "Penny can stay in school. I only thought you might want to know about the resources available to her at Valley."

I sniffed. Sure she did.

"There are resources available," Mom said, "
only
if she's at Valley?"

Ms. Aston shuffled some papers. She wouldn't meet Mom's eyes. "No," she said reluctantly. "There's a support group that meets in the evening. It's district funded, but she could potentially—"

"So give me that information," Mom said, "and let my daughter get back to class."

Ms. Aston looked up at Mom, who stared her down with her very best don't-mess-with-my-child glare. Ms. Aston didn't have a clue what she'd brought on herself. Lily had been going to night school. The birth mom before that had dropped out. Mom was defending not just me, but all the birth moms she'd worked with who should have had better support.

Ms. Aston gave me a forced smile. "Get a pass from the front desk so you can go back to class."

Mom actually smirked at her as I got up and walked back through the hall to the front of the office for the pass, and I thought too late that I should have paused to give her a high five.

That
would have made Ms. Aston's day.

I smiled all the way down the hall, until I passed Principal Adam's door, and heard Rodney's voice coming from inside.

I paused, putting a hand on the principal's door frame.

"I'm not leaving," he said. "I deserve to be kicked out as much as she does."

My heart dropped.
Kara.
She'd told Rodney about this
already
?

Ugh. No doubt she'd told Ryan, and Ryan told Rodney. The rumor train traveled at the speed of text.

I kept listening.

Mr. Adam's voice was sharp. "Our policy is to give support for pregnant students at Valley. Are you pregnant?"

"That's discrimination. What do I have to do to be treated the same way as her?" Rodney paused. "I could bring a weapon to school. Would that do it?"

I took a sharp breath, and put my hand on the doorknob.

Mr. Adams spoke slowly. "Is that a threat?"

Rodney actually sounded proud of himself. "That'd do it, right? You have a zero tolerance policy for threats."

I had this picture of Rodney getting himself thrown out of school and working at a gas station for the rest of his life. And it would all be my fault. I pushed the door open.

Principal Adams raised a hand to protest, but when he saw me there, he lowered it. Rodney looked over his shoulder at me and sighed.

"Rodney," I said. "What the hell are you doing?"

He shook his head. "Nothing."

My ass. "I'm fine," I said. "Go back to class."

Principal Adams nodded. "She's a smart girl. You should listen to her."

Rodney crossed his arms. "I'm responsible for this, too."

I wondered if telling his parents that had caused him to start believing it. He was obviously out of his mind.

I could see Mr. Adams sizing up the two of us. Of the two of them, he was obviously the more reasonable one. I pointed at Rodney. "Can I talk to him? Outside?"

Mr. Adams waved a hand at me. "If you can get him to stop acting like a lunatic in my office, be my guest."

Rodney glared, and I grabbed him by the wrist and hauled him out. I wanted to shake him by the shoulders and tell him to be grateful that the principal had decided to ignore his threat, but instead I just pulled him to the back door of the building and onto the lawn.

My mom's car was still in the parking lot, so I walked around the side of the building, where she wouldn't see us talking when she left.

When I turned around, Rodney's jaw was set like he was ready for a fight.

At least fighting was better than being ignored. "You're trying to get kicked out of school now?" I asked. "What is
wrong
with you?"

Rodney gave me an agonized look. "It's my fault they're kicking you out. I told the lady in the office you were pregnant. That was stupid, but I was worried about you. You looked awful."

My glare softened. He was worried about me?

Ugh. This was so not the point. "You don't just get yourself kicked out of school because you feel bad. They would have noticed anyway. It's going to get pretty hard to hide."

Rodney took a step back. "So, what? You're just going to go to Valley, and I'm going to stay here? Like I had no part in this?"

I leaned against the pointed stucco of the building, staring at him. I knew I should tell him I wasn't leaving, but really. This was ridiculous. "You are the one who wanted no part in my life, remember? You are the one who agreed with our parents that this was the best thing."

Rodney looked at me like
I
was the one who was being ridiculous. "Yes," he said. "I'm the one who decided to have a child and exclude
you
."

I felt like I'd been punched in the gut. He was right. I wasn't the victim here. "I'm sorry," I said. "But you told me that you wanted space, and then I find you yelling at the principal about how you want to be kicked out of school. They'd probably let
me
come back after I had the baby, you know? You'd never be able to come back."

Rodney looked miserable. Obviously, he hadn't thought through all the implications. Though I guessed I couldn't blame him for that. He'd probably caught it from me.

"Still," he said. "It's not fair for them to make you go alone."

My heart cracked open. Why couldn't he have just acted like a jerk, and yelled at me? That was clearly what I deserved. "I'm not going to Valley," I said.

Rodney's face washed blank. "What?"

I bit my lip. "My mom chewed them out. Apparently kicking me out is illegal, but they conveniently leave that out of the pregnant student orientation."

I wondered how many girls the district had sent to Valley without informing them of their rights. How many of their parents didn't know the law, or didn't come in at all to fight for them?

So many things about this were messed up.

Rodney looked down at the ground. "Oh," he said. "You could have said that to begin with."

I should have. Obviously. "So, what now?" I asked. "You want to be a part of my life if I'm being kicked out, but if I'm not, you're just going to ignore me?"

"I'm not supposed to
see
you anymore, remember?"

"Yeah," I said. "And who agreed to that?"

Rodney opened his mouth, then closed it again. "Come on," he said. "You can't expect me to know how to handle this."

My voice rose. "No one knows how to handle it!" I said. "But you could at least
talk
to me."

"Yeah," Rodney said. "Like I'm talking to you now? This conversation is going
great
."

I felt like he'd shoved me. No doubt this was exactly what he was trying to avoid: a shouting match. "Fine," I said. "Have some more silence." I turned on my heels. Rodney's hand grabbed my shoulder, but I twisted away from him. This time, I didn't wait for Rodney to walk away from me. This time, I walked away from him. I only looked back once. He leaned against the side of the building, catching his breath.

When I turned to walk back into school, I caught sight of someone watching me, near the curb in the parking lot.

My mother. She met my eyes and raised her eyebrows, and I got the message.

We'd been yelling loud enough. She'd heard every word.

Chapter Fifteen

Weeks Seven through Twelve

When I got home from school, I shut myself in Dad's office and opened the photography folder. Rodney hadn't added any new photos, but there were still plenty in the folder I hadn't edited.

This time, though, I didn't open any of them. Instead, I slumped in my seat. I'd been working on Rodney's pictures, but I hadn't taken a single shot of my own in weeks. Sure, I was just emerging from a serious case of brain fuzz, but still. Why was
I
editing all of
his
work?

I shut down the computer. I was doing it because I felt guilty, that's why. Because I was begging him to still communicate with me.

I rested my forehead on the edge of the desk. Today, that was going to change. Today, I was going to send a message of my own.

I'd get right on that. Just as soon as I figured out what on earth I wanted to say.

For the next few weeks, I settled into a pattern. Mom drove me to school, and I tried to concentrate on schoolwork and not look for Rodney in the halls. We ran into each other occasionally, of course, and every time we did, he'd nod, and I'd nod back. I didn't want to push him, but since I'd been the one who'd run away from
him
, I tried standing nearer to him a couple of times, so he'd know that I wasn't avoiding him. Each time, I'd hesitate, wondering if this was the time he'd talk to me. But he'd just look away and keep walking, like I wasn't the girl he was sending all his pictures to.

I heard from Kara that he'd won another chess tournament. Maybe he was doing better without me around to distract him. Maybe he was glad I was out of his life.

I might have believed that, if it weren't for the photos.

The most recent set had been of the trees at the park—the same ones where we'd taken the pictures of the fallen leaves. Rodney had photographed the bare branches in black and white, layering over each other against the gray sky. There were so many branches in each shot, and yet they ached of loneliness.

I wished I'd thought of that. So, in the afternoons, between sleep and homework and more sleep, I tried to take pictures. I wanted to find something bright and growing to send. Flower buds about to blossom. New plants breaking the earth. But in December, things like that were scarce. I even checked the flower section of the grocery store, but their stock was low, and the leftover stragglers were turning brown at the edges.

I bought some wilting daisies, arranged them on a windowsill in the sun, sprayed them with a spray bottle to get some fresh dew drops, and tried to cut the brown parts out of the shot.

No luck. The pictures looked like a sad memory of something that used to be beautiful. I could edit them, of course, but Rodney would notice.

As Christmas approached, my brain fog began to clear, and I scrambled through school work, trying to catch up before my teachers started calling home. Mom hovered around me, like she was trying desperately not to micromanage my life. And in return, I tried not to snap at her when she assigned me meals and ordered me to bed.

It's fine
, I told myself. An uneasy peace was better than no peace at all.

The day of my first doctor's appointment was two days before Christmas break. I felt better than I had in weeks. I ate toast and fruit for breakfast, without the slightest urge to gag. My body hadn't changed yet—I could still button my jeans with ease. The doctor finally wanted to see me, and now I could almost pretend that there was nothing I needed to be seen
for
.

No, the point of the doctor's appointment was for Mom to hear the heartbeat. Once she saw that everything was fine—that I wasn't destroying her baby's life with my inability to eat a perfect diet—then she'd relax.

Please
, I thought in the car on the way there.
Please let her relax.

But she sat hunched over the steering wheel, gripping it with both hands. She even
drove
nervously. I could hardly blame her. I was digging my nails into the armrest myself.

When we arrived, Mom went up to the receptionist to check in as if she was the one with the appointment. I didn't mind, though. It saved me from trying to stammer out my situation to the receptionist, when obviously all she wanted was the information Mom gave her: my name. Mom returned with a clipboard that asked for everything else.

A woman with an enormous belly came into the office with a toddler trailing behind her. The girl looked like she was about two—probably the age Athena was when Mom was that pregnant with me.