By the fifth month I was starting to show a round little belly and had to wear baggy shirts and tie my jeans with an elastic band or wear sweatpants. Karen made sure I was eating right and taking vitamins. I found a new doctor. She knew I planned on giving the baby up but was nice about it, her hands gentle when she examined me, waiting for my body to relax. I would watch, detached, during the ultrasound as she talked about what stage the baby was at, pointing out the feet and hands. I tried not to think of the baby as mine, or his, but like I was carrying it for someone else and it was just my job to take care of it.
I’d met with an adoption agency but hadn’t picked anyone yet. No one seemed good enough. I didn’t want the baby but I didn’t like thinking of someone being mean to it, of its getting a dad like ours. It deserved a chance.
Courtney had started sleeping on the couch. She said it was because she didn’t want to disturb me when she came home late, but I was pretty sure she was angry. She never looked at my belly. Dani was okay, sometimes she was even a little nicer, making me herbal tea or bringing me an extra blanket. But I’d see her give me worried looks, the fear on her face if she glanced at my stomach.
My belly was getting huge and I’d stand in front of the mirror after a bath, staring at my bigger breasts, my disappearing belly button. The baby had started moving by then and I’d watch it roll around. In bed I could feel it kicking and stretching, sometimes clawing at my insides like it was trying to break out.
I was scared to think about what the baby might look like—who it might look like. The doctor had asked if I wanted to know if it was a boy or a girl but I’d said no. Sometimes when I closed my eyes I’d see Brian’s face and wonder if the baby looked like him. I felt sad for the baby—it hadn’t asked for this, an evil dad, a mom who didn’t want it. My sisters never even talked about it, though one time Dani did mention something we might do “after we give the baby away.”
I was hungry all the time but Dani never complained about our food bill. Patrick found me a job, doing laundry in one of the hotels—he’d helped the man’s kid out. As my belly got bigger, my hips and legs ached and I walked in a swagger, but I refused to let it slow me down.
Sometimes when the baby moved I’d put my hand there, feeling a foot or a hand. I felt guilty the first time and pulled my hand away but then put it back a few minutes later, sitting quiet in the dark. We had an old TV by then, and I started telling the baby what I was watching, sometimes resting a plate of food on top of my belly. I never did it when my sisters were around, never told them when I felt the baby kick or roll, my whole belly moving as though it were doing acrobatics.
When I got really scared at night, imagining what childbirth was going to feel like, I tried to imagine how happy some couple was going to be, how they’d been waiting for years and years. I’d imagine their house, how they’d decorated a special room, the nice things they’d do for the baby, how much they’d love it.
Karen tried to talk to me about our past once, sort of feeling around about our parents.
“Were things hard for you at home?” she said.
“Yeah,” I said. “We don’t like talking about it.” I hoped that would stop the questions.
“If you ever do want to talk to someone about what happened…” She held my eyes for a second. “I’m a good listener, and there are some great programs in the community, support groups—”
“We’re fine.”
She nodded. “Of course you are. But if you change your mind and think maybe there’s something you want to talk about, just let me know.”
“Okay, thanks.” I knew we’d never change our minds.
She was right, though. She was a good listener. She often sat and talked to the teenagers who came into the gym about their problems at home and school. I’d listen in sometimes and wondered why she and Patrick didn’t have children of their own.
“Did you want kids?” I asked.
She smiled. “I did, but I couldn’t have them. Patrick’s son was from his first marriage.” They didn’t talk about their past much, but a few times when we were alone together, she told me a couple of things. I figured it was because she felt bad for me or something. She said Patrick’s son had gotten into drugs while Patrick was in jail and had gotten killed by some dealers—shot in the head.
“It was hard on Patrick, really hard.”
“That’s why he helps other kids?” I said.
“And that’s why you’re all my babies.” Her eyes drifted to my belly, then looked away. “I better get back to work.”
* * *
Dani and Courtney stayed out of the apartment a lot. Dani was usually at the gym, and Courtney was working or partying. Sometimes I wondered if maybe they didn’t want to be home with me, like they were still upset that I didn’t get rid of the baby. One night Courtney came home drunk and stared at my belly.
“Why didn’t you say anything for so long?” she said.
“I didn’t know.”
She laughed bitterly. “Come on. You knew.”
“Leave her alone,” Dani said.
I hid in my room, crying, thinking about what Courtney had said. Had I known? Had I just not wanted to face it? I thought back to those first months of my pregnancy but I wasn’t sure, couldn’t remember feeling anything but fear.
Dani loved boxing and training with the other teens. She even taught a class for some little kids. I just helped Patrick in his office or worked at the hotel. When I wasn’t working I studied for my GED. Courtney didn’t get sad quite as often but she still partied too much. She and Dani would get in big fights. She also hung out with some of the boys from the gym who were former dealers and gang members. When Dani told her they were trouble, she just laughed at her.
“What else bad can happen?”
* * *
The months passed and I got my GED. I met with the adoption agency a couple of times, flipped through their photos of families, but I’d stare at the men’s faces, wondering if they drank, if they were mean. Dani got on my case about it a lot, said I had to pick a family soon. I told her I would, but the weeks drifted past.
Late in my last trimester, I still worked every day at the hotel, and sometimes an evening shift if someone needed me to cover. One night, in the middle of April, I felt a little rush of fluid like I’d peed myself but knew I hadn’t. I checked in the bathroom. My underwear was wet. I rolled it up into a ball and stuffed it in the trash. I was walking downstairs to find the manager when I felt more water trickle out between my legs. I used the pay phone to call Dani, who took me to the hospital in Patrick’s van. Courtney was out.
I was terrified, the first contractions worse than anything I’d imagined, the physical exam horrible, the doctor’s hands reaching up high into my body. They gave me drugs for the pain but it still hurt. I couldn’t find any position to escape it, could only moan and cry. I walked the hall, soaked in the bath, nothing helped.
My body labored all night and into the morning. Nurses stared at the monitor, making notes, adjusting the strap around my belly, murmuring that I should try to rest between contractions. But by early afternoon they were too close together for that—and coming harder and harder. My throat burned with each gasp, my lips dry and chapped. Dani spooned ice chips into my mouth, her face pale. She stroked my hair back from my forehead, put cool cloths on me.
“You’re doing great,” she said. “Not much longer now.” She’d said that hours ago.
“Is Courtney here yet?”
“She’s going to come later.”
Even in my haze of pain and drugs, I knew what that meant. She didn’t want to see the baby.
The contractions came in waves, urging my body forward. The nurses gripped my legs apart and told me to push. I bore down hard, felt something tearing.
They ordered me into different positions, rested my feet against a metal bar. I wanted it over, wanted it all to be over, begged them to help me, to make it stop. They urged me on. Dani gripped my hand, rubbed my for
ehead, whispering into my ear, “It’s okay, hang on, just push.”
The agony went on. I writhed on the bed, pleading for relief.
“Please, I can’t do it. Just get it out!”
Then I felt something breaking free, a release of pressure from my body, and they were putting the baby on my chest.
“It’s a girl!” the doctor said.
The baby was crying, her mouth open, searching. I gave her my pinkie finger, felt her little mouth latch on, marveling at the sensation. They took her away, examined her, weighed her, and cleaned us both up. I watched from the bed, her wails making me want to get up and hold her. The nurse brought her back and placed her on my chest again.
“She doesn’t want to feed it,” Dani said.
I was already guiding the baby to my nipple.
“I just want to see what it feels like,” I said, even though the adoption lady was waiting outside for me to make my final decision on a family. Dani, who had called her from the hospital, stood back, her face scared.
The nurse came over, stroked the baby’s head, adjusted her so her chin tilted back and her mouth opened.
“You’re doing great. You’re a natural mother.”
I was a mother. I stared in awe at the baby, her tiny mouth suckling at my breast, her perfect eyebrows, her damp, dark hair.
“I’ll get you something to eat.” The nurse left us alone.
“You can’t keep it,” Dani said.
I looked up at her. “I know.”
“Then what are you doing?”
“I just needed to feed her.”
“They have bottles.”
“You don’t get it.” I was crying now, my body weak from pushing the baby out, the emotions running through me, tearing me open again. “Once I give her away, I’ll never know if she’s okay.”
“It’s better that way.”
“For who?”
“For everyone. You’re fifteen years old, Jess. Think of the baby. She deserves someone who can take care of her.”
I felt a hot stab of anger. “I’d take good care of her.”
“You don’t have any money.”
I looked down at the baby again, blinking back tears. “I’ll do it in the morning.”
“If you wait, it will just be harder.”
“You don’t know,” I said, my voice rising almost to a shout. “You don’t know what’s best all the time. This is my baby—not yours.” The words hung between us. The baby mewled. Dani looked at it, tears in her eyes.
“I can stay at the hospital with you.” Her voice sounded sad, defeated.
“I just want to be alone.”
Now Dani looked hurt. “You sure?”
“Yeah.”
She got her stuff together, stood by the doorway for a moment looking like she wanted to say something else, then turned and walked out the door.
* * *
The nurse brought me dinner. I ate with the baby still against my chest, a warm lump. The nurse told me to get some rest, and I nodded, but I stayed awake for a while, looking out the hospital window at the skyline. The world was so big. I looked down at the baby, her tiny fingernails, the soft hair on her forehead. I studied her features, looking for him. But I just saw a baby, a fragile little baby. I thought about her alone in the world, hated the helpless feeling it gave me. Who would protect her? Who would make sure she didn’t get hurt?
In the morning, I reminded myself. I have to decide in the morning.
PART TWO
SKYLAR
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
JULY 2015
It was slow at the gym, just the occasional clang of barbells in the background, music pumping over the speakers, but I didn’t mind. It gave me a chance to search SoundCloud for some new beats—Patrick was cool with my using my laptop at the front desk as long as I greeted everyone. And it was better than sitting at home with nothing but the TV for company. Sometimes I came in on my days off to hang out. I loved talking with the regulars at the smoothie bar, hearing about their boyfriends or girlfriends, their work problems. One of them was signing in now, a guy named Dave who I thought had a crush on Dallas, but she never even looked at him.
“Have a good workout!” I said.
“Thanks, Skylar,” he said. “That mix you made for Dallas’s spin class was great. Think you could burn me a DVD?”
“Totally!”
I couldn’t play at bars or clubs yet, but I’d been sharing my mixes on SoundCloud and YouTube and was getting a following. I even had a DJ name, “Lark,” because my mom used to call me “Skylark” when I was little. It was fun, remixing popular songs or making mash-ups. I liked taking something already good and finding a new way for people to hear it.
I’d been working on a set list for the last hour, planning my next YouTube video, but now I was just doodling little stick figures all over a notepad. I needed to keep my hands busy all the time or I felt like I was going crazy. When I was a kid, Mom had taught me how to make origami birds because I drove her crazy with all my fidgeting—she’d grab my hands, try to hold them still.
I glanced up at a couple of boys sparring in one of the rings. One of them, Aaron, was always trying to talk to me. He caught me watching.
“Hey, Skylar! Why don’t you come be my water girl?” He pretended to pose, showing off his muscles with a big grin.
I rolled my eyes and looked away. He was cute, in a street kind of way, with a shaved head and tattoos and this awesome scar that stretched across the side of his face, but no way was I going to let him know I thought so, plus he wasn’t my type. Too macho, and definitely too full of himself.
I was dying to ask him where he got his scar from but that would be rude. Plus, he might think I was interested in him or something stupid like that.
I stared down at my stick figures again, drew biceps on the arms and gave them bulging quads, added a couple of double-D’s to some of them. I heard the door open and glanced up. It was my aunt Crystal. She looked tired, dark circles under her eyes, probably from partying the night before. She was a bartender at a bar near Kitsilano Beach and often went out after work with the other waitresses.
“Hey, Sky. Is Dallas around?”
“She’s in the gym.”
“Thanks.” She leaned over, looked down at my stick figures. “Nice.”
“Work out every day and you too can look this good.”
She laughed. “I’m too lazy.”
“You’re prettier than most of the girls who come here anyway.”
She smiled. “And that’s why you’re my favorite niece.” She grabbed a protein bar off the counter, ripped open the wrapper, nibbled on the corner.
“I’m your only niece.” I smiled back. I was happy to see she was in a good mood today. You never knew with Crystal. Sometimes she’d get into these funks where she was, like, really down, or she’d come into the gym acting all crazy and laughing too loud and pissing off Dallas and my mom.
“Wicked shirt,” she said.
“Thanks.” I glanced down at it. It was a retro Bruce Springsteen concert T-shirt Mom had found at the thrift store, which I was wearing with leggings. I didn’t like jeans because my legs were so long and it was hard to find a good fit.
“Is your mom working?” Crystal said, looking around.
“She’s at the hotel today.”
Dallas was walking by the front desk, carrying a box of sweatshirts. She looked at the protein bar in Crystal’s hand.
“You pay for that?” She said it like she was joking, but I could tell by the look on her face she was pissed. Crystal was always helping herself to stuff.
“I need to talk to you about something,” Crystal said, tossing her hair back. Now I could see the scar on her jaw where Mom burned her as a kid. When I asked Mom about it years ago she said it had been an accident with a pan, but I always figured they must’ve been fighting or something because she’d looked really guilty, her face flushing, and she asked me not to mention it to Crystal.
Dallas handed me the box of sweatshirts. “Can you put these up, please? The large ones go in the back, the small ones—”
“In the front, I know.”
Dallas gave me a look.
“Sorry,” I said, hating that my aunt could make me feel like I was five years old in two seconds. She didn’t smile often and she was one of the toughest woman boxers at the gym, but she was always there for me. If Mom was working late, it was Dallas who picked me up from school. When I was younger she’d looked after me a lot. I never messed around or tested her like I did with my mom—if she said it was bedtime, I hauled ass and got into bed.
“I have a class starting in a few minutes,” she told Crystal.
“It’s important,” Crystal said. “Please, Dallas.”
Dallas still looked annoyed but said, “Let’s go to my office.” So Crystal was in trouble again. I wondered what it was this time—she got fired from jobs, broke up with her boyfriends, got evicted, and took off for days. Although I liked hanging out with Crystal, it was still pretty new, ever since I got into DJing. We started talking about different bands, and I’d drop by her place after school just to hang out and listen to music. But she didn’t really talk to me about her problems.
Dallas turned to me. “When you’re done with the shirts, can you clean the mirrors?”
“Sure, Dallas.”
Dallas and Crystal went into Dallas’s office, which had a window that looked out onto the main floor. I tried to see what was going on while I hung the shirts. Crystal was talking, then she leaned her elbows on the table and put her head in her hands like she was really upset. Dallas was shaking her head and talking. I figured she was lecturing Crystal.
Dallas disappeared for a minute, then came back and handed Crystal an envelope. Crystal stood up and gave her a hug. Dallas looked like she was still lecturing, and Crystal was nodding. She must’ve been borrowing money for rent again. When I was little we lived above the gym with Dallas and Crystal. Then Crystal moved in with her boyfriend at the time, and Mom and I found an apartment a couple of blocks away. Dallas still lived above the gym.
I wondered how much money was in the envelope, daydreamed about what I’d do with an envelope full of cash. I had a digital mixer and some Rokit speakers on hold at the pawnshop, had to beg the owner a million times to let me put them on layaway. I went by after work sometimes just to look at them.