Giftchild (15 page)

I collapsed against the car door. "She said she can't adopt my baby. It would be too weird. Twisted, was her word."

Athena actually looked impressed. "I . . . didn't see that coming."

My voice pitched upward into a whine. "You say that like it's a good thing."

Athena wobbled her head from side to side. "Maybe it is," she said. "I didn't think there was anything as important to Mom in this world as a baby."

I threw up my hands. "But I'm still
pregnant
," I said. "What am I supposed to do? Give the baby to someone else?"

"You could get rid of it," Athena said.

My heart stopped. An abortion. That was still an option.

Athena spoke with a steadiness I hadn't heard from anyone all day. "Seriously," she said. "I can drive you to a clinic in the morning. I'd take you now, but I'm sure they're closed."

My limbs went cold. "Do you think Mom would ever forgive me?"

Athena rubbed her temple. "Maybe what Mom thinks shouldn't be your first priority."

I sat back, letting that sink in.

Athena punched the steering wheel with the heel of her hand. "I knew I shouldn't have left you alone with her."

"What?" I asked.

"When I moved to school. I knew I shouldn't do it. I couldn't deal with Mom anymore, but you didn't have a choice. And without me there to keep you sane—"

"Mom didn't ask me to do this," I said. "It was my decision."

"It was a bad decision," Athena said. "Really bad."

"Well, congratulations," I said. "For once you and Mom agree."

Athena stared at the road, in a mixture of frustration and shock.

"That's not supposed to be the surprising part," I said.

"No," Athena said. "The shocker is that I was too stupid to see this is what you were getting at when you brought it up before."

I slouched and pulled up my knees, resting my heels on the edge of my seat. "You're not going to tell Mom I did this on purpose, are you?"

Athena's eyes widened. "Are you kidding? I'm not going to breathe your name around Mom for the next nine months. You think I want to deal with the drama?" She was quiet for a moment. "Seriously, though, she didn't guess?"

I shook my head. "Only Rodney knows."

Athena glanced up at the ceiling. "Oh, jeez. Rodney. How'd you talk him into this?"

Raindrops blew across the passenger window in quivering streams.

Athena's eyes flicked to me. "You told him," she said. "Tell me you told him."

"I didn't tell him," I said quietly. "Until after."

Athena swore.

I knocked my temple against the glass of the window. "I know," I said.

Athena stared at the road, stunned. "Okay, that
does
surprise me. You've always been the one to do whatever you think Mom wants. But Rodney? I didn't think you'd give him up for her. He's been in love with you for years."

The glass chilled my skin. How was I the only person on earth who didn't know this? "I didn't know I was giving him up," I said. "You said sex didn't matter to guys."

She held up a hand. "Oh, no," Athena said. "You didn't get this idea from me."

"No," I said. "I'm just saying."

Athena's voice grew quiet. "I knew I botched that conversation, but damn."

"You said sex didn't change things, so I thought—"

Her finger stabbed the air. "I said be careful, or you'll get hurt."

"Well, congratulations. You were right. Again."

Athena was quiet for a moment. "Are you okay?"

"No," I said.

She spoke carefully, like she didn't want to make it worse. Not that she could. "So, Rodney broke up with you?"

I closed my eyes. "He said he needed some time to think."

Athena leaned forward. "He'd probably be relieved if you got rid of it, right?"

I thought about the way Rodney looked at me when he asked me to marry him. If I aborted the baby, it would be like telling him he didn't matter. He didn't get a say. Again.

"I'm not going to get rid of it," I said. "Mom will come around."

Athena sighed. "She probably will. But think about it, because that might make things worse, rather than better."

"Mom isn't a monster," I said.

"Maybe not," Athena said. "I hope you still feel that way in nine months."

Chapter Eleven

Week Five

I slept on Athena's floor that night, wearing one of her t-shirts and some gym shorts. Athena texted Dad to let him know I wasn't coming home, and he responded saying he'd pick me up before school in the morning.

"He's going to kill me," I told Athena.

"Ha," Athena said. "You wish you could get out of this that easily."

Sleep wasn't fast coming, though. I lay between two layers of fleece blanket with Athena's extra pillow stuffed under my head. I watched my phone, waiting. I wondered if Rodney was doing the same.

An hour passed as I listened to Athena and her roommate breathing. Then, finally, I grabbed Athena's laptop from her desk.

I checked my email, and then logged into Rodney and my online storage account. I half-expected to discover he'd deleted the thing. Instead, I found a brand-new set of photos with today's date. Rodney always kept the originals on his computer—he wasn't set up to automatically upload them. That meant he'd dumped them into the folder on purpose, and there was no reason to do that unless he wanted me to see them.

I opened the first one. It was a picture of the Golden Gate Bridge, taken standing on the walkway, looking up at one of the towers. The sky behind the tower churned with angry clouds. I immediately wanted to shift it into black and white.

The images traveled across the bridge. Here was one of the San Francisco cityscape, here was another of a tourist leaning over the railing, looking down at the water. There was Alcatraz across the bay, and several of cars with red cable lines towering above. Rodney must have been lying on the sidewalk for those.

He'd walked the bridge—photographed it from every angle. He must have driven up after school, maybe directly after talking to me. It was only a forty-five minute drive, but the walk was miles. He couldn't have gotten home before dark. He must have gotten caught in the rain on the way back.

I scrolled through the folder. I wasn't sure what the message was supposed to be. Was I supposed to feel left out? I'd have given anything to have gone with him. But also, here was a folder of carefully selected images that he wanted me to have. Like a gift—a glimmer of the friendship we used to have.

Maybe a suggestion that it wasn't quite over.

I checked Athena's software. She had an image editing program—not a great one, but one that would do in a pinch. I responded to Rodney in the only way I knew how; I imported that first image and went to work.

When Athena shook me awake in the morning, I was running on four hours of sleep, but I'd edited the first ten images in the folder. Rodney would be able to see the time stamp on the saved images. He'd know I'd stayed up working on them.

I hoped he got the message I intended to send. I still wanted to try, if he did.

Athena waved my cell phone in front of my face. "Morning, sunshine," she said. "Dad's waiting for you out front."

I looked up. Athena's roommate was still passed out on her bed, oblivious. And as I left Athena's dorm, yesterday's jeans sticking to my legs, fuzzy hair sticking out walk-of-shame style, I couldn't help but wish that were me.

Dad sat in his car in the pull-through next to Athena's building. As I walked toward it, I slowed my pace: there in the passenger seat sat Mom, her hair pulled back in a tight pony tail, her eyes safely shielded behind sunglasses. It was her uniform for the days after the disappointments, the days after her periods or miscarriages or, worst of all, lost children.

I took a deep breath, sucking air down into the tips of my toes. She might yell at me, but today, I wasn't going to yell back. Today, I was going to stay calm. She could scream like a banshee all she wanted, but it wouldn't change the facts. I had a baby; she needed one. Objectively, this should be easy.

Dad waved to me as I climbed into the backseat. But Mom didn't even turn to acknowledge my presence.

"Morning," Dad said. "Where would you like to go to breakfast?"

My stomach squirmed. Preferably somewhere where they didn't serve, you know, food. That answer wasn't going to fly, though, and if Dad wasn't taking me straight home, he must have taken the morning off from work.

At least we were going somewhere public. Mom couldn't yell at me in public. As much.

"Mom can choose where we go," I said.

"Hmph," Mom said.

Dad gave me a look in the rearview. "Waffles?"

Waffles were edible, and therefore disgusting. But a waffle place would have a menu, and a menu might have something I could nibble on without my stomach rebelling. "Whatever you want," I said.

Dad drove us to a corner restaurant with a checkered tile floor. The hostess took us to a booth by the window where the back of the vinyl seats shone with layers of oil from other people's hair.

The hostess handed us menus. I flipped through mine, trying to avoid looking at the links of greasy sausage and thick, heavy pancakes. I'd eaten food all my life. This would have looked delicious last week, especially after the nothing I'd eaten the last few days. I thought morning sickness was just supposed to make you puke, not turn you against all that was good and edible in the world.

I caught Mom staring at me over the top of her menu, and I tried to smile, but it came out stiff.

She didn't smile back.

The waitress had frizzy hair that escaped from her tight bun in puffs around her face. She smiled at each of us in turn. "What would you like to drink?"

"Water," I said, even though I wanted coffee. I already knew the fit Mom would have over that—she nearly crawled out of her skin when Lily came over drinking a frappuccino. Both Mom and Dad
did
order coffee, which meant I was going to have to smell it the entire meal, when it was, in fact, the only non-water substance that sounded okay to put into my mouth.

When the waitress brought my water, Mom held her hand out to me. In her palm was a pill the size of a cough drop.

"What's that?" I asked.

"Prenatal vitamin," she said. "I still had a bottle that I bought for Lily. Take one every day."

I picked the thing up and looked at it. I'd never liked swallowing pills, and this one was seriously enormous. "Okay," I said. I set it down on my napkin. If I drank a whole pitcher of water, maybe I could swallow the thing without gagging. At least I wouldn't have to chew it—only swallow.

"Are you ready to order?" the waitress asked.

"I am," Dad said.

Mom looked meaningfully at me.

I glanced down at my menu. "I'm actually not hungry," I said.

Mom looked at me over her sunglasses. "You are
not
just having water."

I set down my menu. "Food is disgusting, okay? I can't help it."

"I'll give you a minute," the waitress said, and she hurried away. No doubt she thought I was anorexic. Nope. Just pregnant.

Mom opened the menu to the breakfast page and skimmed over it. "Pick an omelet. You need some protein."

My throat closed up. "No," I said. "I could probably drink something. Maybe a grape juice."

Dad looked at the back of his menu. "They have orange and apple."

Ew. "It's not my fault," I said. "Whose idea was it for your body to reject food when it needs it?" Evolution was supposed to ensure the survival of the fittest, not the most obnoxious. It was a wonder that every woman genetically predisposed to morning sickness hadn't died before she could pass on that particular trait.

"At least get a salad," Mom said.

"Fine," I said. At least that sounded less disgusting than eggs. Even the idea of them felt heavy in my mouth. "Can we talk about the baby now?"

Dad gave me a warning look, and I rolled my shoulders back, readjusting my attitude. I was going to be chill. I'd be so reasonable, Mom wouldn't be able to argue.

Dad waved the waitress over, and Mom ordered a Caesar salad for me. If that contained anchovies I wasn't going to be able to look at it.

The waitress gave me a concerned look as she left, no doubt sizing me up. I didn't look anorexic, but I knew from health class that you didn't have to be underweight to have an eating disorder. I wondered if the waitress knew that, too.

"So your mom and I talked over your options," Dad said. "It sounded yesterday like you've already decided what you want to do."

"Yeah," I said, trying not to let my tone say,
duh
.

"So let's talk about that," Dad said. "Calmly and rationally." He looked pointedly at Mom, and she pulled off her sunglasses and nodded. "Obviously," Dad went on, "we need to sit down with Rodney and his parents. I'd like to ask them over so we can all talk."

My heart sank. Bad enough Rodney was going to have to tell his parents, I really didn't want to subject him to a sit down with mine as well. "Is that necessary?"

Mom cleared her throat. "If you want us to take the baby, we need to come to a legal arrangement."

Oh. Right. "Sure," I said. "But do we have to do it all together?"

Mom gave Dad a look.

"We'd just . . ." Dad said, "we'd feel better if we heard from Rodney's mouth that he's willing to give up all rights to the child."

I sighed. That's what this was about. "Okay," I said. "So we'll meet and you'll ask him to, what? Sign something?"

Mom stirred her straw around in her water glass. "We'll ask him to cut off contact with you until after the adoption is finalized."

Ice ran through my veins. "What?"

Dad took my hand across the table. "It's not fair to him, if he's not going to be involved after the baby is born."

Not going to be involved? "Wait," I said. "So Lily was a perfect stranger, and you were happy to invite her into our family, and you've known Rodney for
years
—"

"Penny," Mom said. "Try to be reasonable."

That knocked the wind out of me. "I am," I said. "You guys are the ones trying to push Rodney out of my life like he's nothing."