Thin Love (46 page)

Vision blurred with her tears, her head muddy with fear, with heartache. She settled next to Luka, her head on his shoulder and she reached up to brush her fingertips over his open lids. They should be closed.

“I’m sorry,” she told him, feeling the tight clench in her heart twisting, burning until she couldn’t breathe. “I’m so sorry, Luka.”

The squeal of tires started again, became louder than the sirens chasing behind them. Keira heard Kona’s scream, the angry rage that pierced her ears, then with the rip of a crash, Keira’s body jerked forward and the silence took them.

Keira’s mother never wore slippers. Even at home, when no one was expected, when she wouldn’t be entertaining her friends or pretending that the shine of their lives was tarnished, she always took care with her footwear. Wedges, sandals, pumps and heels, all designer, all obnoxiously expensive, but the woman did not own a single pair of slippers.

It was slippers, though, that Keira saw when she blinked awake. They were pink, thin, and very clean, as though they’d just been pulled from cardboard and plastic. Her eyes shifted up her mother’s legs, over the charcoal slacks she wore and onto the pink cardigan slung on her shoulders. The sweater was fastened with a broach, diamonds that were as bright, as clean as the perfect polish on her mother’s pink nails.

Keira stared at that broach, gaze blurring at the sparkle reflected against the overhead light and she did not put much thought into the pounding that was drumming in her head or the burning ache of her shoulder. She pretended to feel nothing and Keira believed if she stared long enough at her mother’s polished appearance and that shining jewel below her throat, time would not press forward. She would not be in this hospital, sore and bruised.

Luka would not be dead.

“I’ve called the nurse, Keira. She’ll fetch you some pain meds.”

“I don’t want them.” She didn’t look at her mother when she spoke, didn’t move her eyes from that gaudy broach until the woman came to her bedside. And when she lifted her eyes, shot a quick glimpse at the scowl on her mother’s face, Keira returned to the distracting blur that dulled her attention.

“You’ve really done it now, haven’t you?”

“Mother, please don’t. Not yet.”

“When would you recommend we discuss this mess?”

The nurse came in and her mother stepped back, let the woman in the blue scrubs fiddle around with Keira’s I.V. and push a thermometer in her ear.

“How’s your pain?” the nurse asked, smiling down at Keira; a soft grip on her hand. Keira tried to return the woman’s smile; she had a kind face, wide mouth, teeth straight and clean, and hazel eyes that shone against the cocoa cream of her skin. But Keira could not bring herself to do much more than stare at her, blinking once before she shrugged. “We’ll need to monitor you tonight and in the morning you’ll go down for your procedure.”

“What procedure?”

The nurse exchanged a glance with Keira’s mother before she patted Keira’s arm. “There’s nothing to be nervous about. Dr. Mitchell does terminations every week and she’s very gentle.” The nurse picked up Keira’s chart and scribbled along the form, attention away from Keira’s open-mouth expression.

“Wait. What are you talking about? I thought I just sprained my elbow. What termination?”

Those slippers again, tiny feet that approached the bed and the dull ache in Keira’s chest smarted. “It’s fine, I’ll explain everything to her,” Keira’s mother said, nodding toward the door, dismissing the nurse.

Her nametag read “Renée” with a little accent over the first “e” and that kind smile dropped from her face. “You let me know if you want anything for the pain, okay, sweetie?”

Keira inched herself up, brushing off her mother’s attempts to help her and she moved her leg away from the edge of the bed when the woman sat down. She wouldn’t look directly in Keira’s face; didn’t seem interested in anything other than her long nails.

“You want to explain what the hell is going on, Mother?”

Finally, Cora rested her hands on her lap and when she looked at Keira, her eyebrows arched as much as the Botox would allow, she frowned.

“You’re pregnant. About five weeks.”

That revelation hit Keira like an anvil to the chest. She turned away from her mother’s frown and dates, weeks, flitted through her mind. When was her last period? When could this have happened? She took her pill religiously, every night, eight p.m. like clockwork and she and Kona were always careful.

The shower,
she thought.
The damn shower.

“Are they sure? How… wait, I don’t understand…”

“They’re sure. It’s one of the tests they ran when you came in. They had to know before they did the X-rays. You were down with the flu last month, remember? All those antibiotics.” Her mother rolled her eyes as though she thought Keira was the simplest, stupidest idiot she’d ever seen. “Antibiotics counteract the pill.” Keira could only stare at her mother, ignoring how deep her frown had pulled wrinkles on the side of her face. Keira didn’t care about the scowl the woman gave her or how her lip twitched with a curl. She was carrying Kona’s baby.

A baby?

It didn’t seem real; felt somehow like she was outside of herself; like this was a dream, a nightmare that was vividly, achingly detailed. She didn’t know how she felt. The news was raw, a gaping wound that bled as hard as Luka’s loss. Then a small thought came to her. Would this baby heal Kona’s broken heart? Would it be a small replacement for the brother that had been stolen from him?

Wait.
Termination
. The word felt dirty, bitter and when Keira realized what her mother wanted, what she’d already planned, and that small glimmer of hope in her chest dulled.

“I’ve spoken with Kona’s mother.”

“You did what?” Keira had never wanted to hit her mother more than she did then. What the hell had she done while Keira lay unconscious in the hospital? It was clear that she was rerouting Keira’s life, making attempts to change the course of how it would go. It didn’t surprise her in the least, but to reach out to Kona’s mother? Especially when their family was dealing with Luka’s loss?

“Steven saw her yesterday morning. She’d come to claim the body and arrange the burial.” Her mother waved her hand as though Luka’s death was a footnote to the point of her story. “I introduced myself and explained to her about your tests. We both agreed that terminating this pregnancy would be in both your and Kona’s best interest.”

“You both agreed?”

“Of course. You are too young to be a mother and that poor woman is dealing with far too much to be saddled with the role of grandmother. Trust me, you’ll thank me one day.”

Keira felt like a puppet. Her mother pulled the strings, twisted her this way and that until she danced, until she moved toward a long stage, one that her mother had set with checkpoints of expectations. She wanted to clip those strings. She wanted to clip them and wrap them around her mother’s neck.

She knew the open mouth, then the closed, hooded look she gave her mother was full of anger, but Keira didn’t care. Kona’s mother, her own, were thinking about this child’s impact on
their
lives; they wanted to snatch the decision, the responsibility from both of them and Keira wouldn’t have it. “Are you out of your fucking mind?”

“Watch your mouth, Keira.”

The laughter, when it came, moved up her belly. It was loud, rude and highly unamused and it hurt with the dull ache that tasted like bitterness. “You tell me you’ve decided that you want me to kill my baby and all you can think to say is ‘watch your mouth’?”

That laughter turned cold, tipped into the smart burn of tears that Keira let fall over her face. She took to holding herself around her middle, trying to comfort the small person growing inside her, the one she hoped would be a salve over the anguish of the past week. She wanted Kona. She needed his arms, his strength, his protection from the world, from her mother’s cruelty, that she’d come to depend on so desperately. Brushing off her mother’s useless touches, Keira rubbed her face dry with the back of her hand. “Where’s Kona?”

“You don’t need to worry about him right now. He’s got enough trouble.”

Keira knew her mother meant to disregard her question. She didn’t want Keira asking about Kona or caring what happened to him and when the woman moved away from her, sitting back in her chair as though she wouldn’t give Keira any news on what happened to her boyfriend, she reached out and grabbed her mother’s wrist, jerking her forward. “Where is he?”

Keira was past caring about the shock on her mother’s face or the way the threatening scowl, the flared nostrils and thin set of her mouth warned that she’d soon lash out, strike. “Orleans Parish prison,” her mother finally said, extracting her wrist from Keira’s tight hold. “He’s been arrested for accessory to murder. He was there when those boys were killed and won’t be getting out anytime soon.” The tears came so hard now that Keira could feel a knot working in the back of her throat and still her mother continued, voice impassive, uncaring. “His mother agreed that telling Kona anything about the baby would be a bad idea right now. He’s just lost his twin brother because of his own irresponsibility and by the time he’s out, the procedure will be over. No need to rub salt in wounds.”

The woman smiled, a pleased, contented expression that told Keira this baby, the loss and the irrevocably broken lives could be pushed under the rug, brushed aside as though none of it really mattered. Taking a breath, steeling herself for the argument she knew would come, Keira lifted the sheet from her lap and dried her face. Then, mimicking her mother’s unaffected tone, she smiled. “There isn’t going to be any procedure.”

“What?”

“I’m not having an abortion. How in God’s name did you ever get my consent?” She narrowed her eyes at her mother, knowing instantly that there had been more under-the-rug brushing. “You waited until I was out of it, didn’t you? You had Steven hush things over and then what? Told Dr. Mitchell that I’d consent? My God, mother, how low would you go to get your way?”

“I’d do whatever it takes, Keira. I’d do anything to make sure you don’t throw your life away like I did.” Keira’s mother sounded weak, pathetic, but behind the low whisper of her words lay the ever-present threat, the grasp of reason, purpose that only made sense to her mother. “Why do you think I’m so hard on you? I push you because I want you to make smart choices.”

The sad thing was, the woman honestly believed that. Keira’s body hurt. Her tears had clogged up her sinuses, had her breathing through her mouth and she wanted her mother to leave. She wanted her to know that the only thing that mattered to her now was this child, its safety and the hope she believed it would bring to their lives.

“No, Mother, you push me so I do what you want me to do. And when I don’t, when I show the smallest bit of free will, you smack me around until I fall in line.”

Her mother shook her head, frown heavy. “If I’ve been harsh, it’s because I want you to realize your potential. I want you to use your limited attributes.”

And there was the crux of so many of the issues Keira ever had with her mother. She blinked at the woman, measured the set of her impassive expression, the cold shift of her eyes and Keira was left helpless, struck dumb by the cruelty her mother held in every blink of her eye and unrestrained expression. Keira would always be nothing more to this woman than a visual shell, nothing of substance; women were to her nothing but pretty pictures fashioned by instance and urging.

“My limited attributes? You mean my face? My body?”

Her mother leaned forward, touched Keira’s chin, fingers soft and surprisingly kind against bruised skin. “We’ve worked so hard to make sure you grew into that face. How many times have I told you…”

The slap came sharp, loud; Keira’s palm against her mother’s hand and the woman jerked back, shocked, surprised that her daughter had lashed out. “Limited attributes?” Keira said again, her voice loud. “My face, my body, what I look like? Not what’s in my heart? Not if I’m kind or good or generous? Not my mind, God, no you don’t care if I’m smart. You just want me to smile and agree with whatever asshole you find suitable enough for me, right?” Her mother sat up straighter, glaring at Keira as though she didn’t recognize her. “You don’t care that I live and breathe and exist for music. You don’t care if I’m the Valedictorian a hundred times over or if I know Chaucer or Shakespeare or the stories a thousand years old that have changed what I feel, what I believe in. Those aren’t attributes to you, Mother.