Immaculate (6 page)

“Seriously?” Izzy choked out, her voice sputtering. “What happened to our pact to not be more than three hundred miles away from one another? What about our weekend road trips? I can't exactly hop in my Jeep and drive to Mississippi for a night if I end up at Penn State, can I?”

I looked up at Hannah, her cheeks blazing deep pink. I was just as surprised as Izzy. Hannah was supposed to be the predictable one, the stable one, the anchor of the trio. She wasn't supposed to drop bombshells, not ever, and
especially
not in the middle of my own massive personal crisis.

“I . . . I know we've always said that, guys, but I thought that was just us being scared. And naive. I would never discourage either of you from trying to go where you really wanted to go. You're my best friends, no matter where we live for those four years. Nothing's going to change that.”

“Yeah. Okay. Thanks so much for the heads-up,” Izzy said, refusing to look at her. “Has it been three minutes yet, Meen?”

I hadn't let myself peek at the sticks once since I'd handed them to Hannah. No easy feat, though Hannah's shocking news had, at the very least, distracted me better than I could have imagined possible. A cold, clammy sweat prickled down my neck as I nodded and pushed myself up off the ground, turning back toward the bank where we'd laid the sticks.

“So just a reminder: it's a blue minus sign if you're not pregnant, and a pink plus if you are. And the other test is pretty self-explanatory: pregnant, not pregnant,” Hannah explained, her mothering instinct back in full force, as if the previous conversation hadn't ever happened.

I walked slowly, each footstep torn somewhere between running and freezing. I wanted the answer as much as I didn't want the answer. I could see the tests right below me, waiting to be read, but I didn't let my eyes focus at first, keeping the indicators a blurry haze. I closed my eyes and squatted down, taking a deep breath.

I opened my eyes.

Plus, plus, pregnant, pregnant.

chapter four

I was pregnant.

I, Mina Dietrich, an absolute and utter virgin, was pregnant.

Four tests couldn't be wrong, could they? Not with all the other symptoms I'd had during the past few months, and not with my fears about Iris's warning. But how could they
not
be wrong? How could any of this actually be happening to me?

“What should we do now?” Hannah whispered. She and Izzy were hovering over me, staring down at the evidence in front of us.

“I need to let Frankie know that I can't come in tonight,” I said without even pausing to reconsider. For some reason that was the first and only immediate reaction that came to mind. The only answer, the only step forward that made any sense. Even in the face of the most fantastical crisis imaginable, I could still be relied on not to forget to call out of work.

Under normal circumstances, Izzy would have made endless fun of me for being so dedicated to Frankie's, but now she was ominously silent. I was afraid to look up at her face, to see whatever was lurking behind her eyes. Izzy couldn't hide anything, not from me and Hannah, no matter how hard she sometimes tried. Her eyes always insisted on telling us everything we needed to know.

“Let's get you back to the blanket,” Hannah said, reaching for my hand. “Your cell phone is there in your purse, and then you can lie down while we . . . while we process everything.”

I gave a weak nod and let them pull me up and steer me. My stomach pinched at the sight of the leftover food, the basket that my mom had packed less than two hours ago for our special tree house picnic. My mom. My adoring, gracious, astoundingly perfect mom. How could I ever possibly tell her about this? How could she believe me? How could she keep trusting me and loving me and being proud of me?

Too much. The idea of telling my mom was more than my mind could begin to comprehend, not when I'd only known the truth myself for a few entirely surreal minutes.

I pushed those thoughts to the furthest, blackest corner of my mind, and reached for my phone. I brushed past a few missed calls and messages from Nate, clearing my throat as I dialed Frankie's. The phone rang five, six, seven times, and I exhaled in relief. A voice mail would be much easier and faster: no questions, no elaborating. Just as I expected the beep of the automated message, I heard a sharp click and a breathless gasp on the other end.

“Frankie and Friends' Pizzeria. This is Jesse. How can I help you?”

“Oh, hey. Hi, Jesse,” I said, flustered. I had barely talked to him since the night we first met. A few necessary words here and there about when to clean, what to clean, but nothing that didn't relate to dishes and mops and window spray. He was too intertwined with Iris in my mind. He was a witness—living, breathing, irrefutable proof that she had been at Frankie's, that I had talked with her. That she existed at all and wasn't a complete figment of my overactive imagination. Besides, I could only imagine what he thought of me afterward, running away from a harmless old lady, barely acknowledging his presence ever since. Though frankly, there seemed to be something a little off about him, too. He was friendly enough to the waitresses and to the other guys in the back, but he still seemed remote to me, distant, as if his body might be there, scraping pizza pans, but his mind was somewhere else entirely. I sometimes had to repeat his name a few times before he'd hear me, before he'd snap out of whatever cloudy daydreams kept him floating through his life.

“Mina?”

I almost dropped the phone, startled that he'd recognized my voice so easily. “Yeah. Yes. It's uh . . . me, Mina. I . . . I'm sick, Jesse. Really sick. Stomach bug or something. I was up all night puking, and I still am, actually, and really there's no end in sight, I don't think—” Hannah coughed, and I cut myself off. “So, yeah, please tell Frankie that I'm really, really sorry, but I just don't think I can make it in for my shift tonight.”

“Sure, no problem, Mina. I'll help hold down the fort without you here. Feel better, okay?”

“Thanks, Jesse.” I hung up and fiddled with the phone, pecking at random keys to avoid the awful, frightening silence that hung in the air between us.

“Say something, Mina,” Hannah said. “Please,
please
say anything that makes all this more reasonable. You have to know how confusing this situation is for me and Izzy. I want to believe you.
We
want to believe you. Don't we, Iz?” She looked over at Izzy for encouragement, but it was obvious that Izzy was avoiding both of us, staring off toward the creek instead. Hannah gave up on her and refocused her attention back to me. “Help us to do that, Mina.
Please
. Help us.” I barely recognized her voice, which was usually so warm and alive, like sunshine and bells. It was all hollow now, sad and desperate, begging for explanations I couldn't give.

“I don't know what else I can tell you,” I said, lifting my head up to face them. I refused to cry again. I refused to look away. “Iris . . . What Iris said to me is the only answer I can think of, and trust me, I know how absolutely crazy that sounds, I do. I really do. But I didn't have sex, not with Nate, not with
anyone
. I didn't have anything even remotely close to sex. That's all that I know. That's all the explanation I have.” I paused, grabbing, clawing at my mind for anything more I could give. “Maybe there's another reason besides pregnancy that I'd get those results? Some sort of sickness or condition that would cause a false positive?” I said it, but I didn't believe it. The words felt wrong, in my heart and on my tongue, but it was one small offering I could give them, however temporary.

Hannah looked almost satisfied, the corners of her tight, pursed lips relaxing as she considered this new and improved option. Izzy still said nothing. The silence had seemed best, preferable to confrontation at first, but it was starting to enrage me, scrape at my last bits of patience. Who was she to judge me? I had done nothing wrong, not to her, not to anyone. I didn't deserve her anger, especially not now, not on top of all the other emotions threatening to tear apart my entire world at the seams.

“Say it, Isabelle,” I said out loud, surprising even myself with the sharpness of my voice. “Say whatever you're thinking. Let's just get it over with. In case you didn't fully realize, I have a lot to deal with at the moment, so let's get this conversation out of the way. Okay?”

She breathed in and out, balled her hands into fists, and turned her gaze toward me. For the first time in my life, I didn't recognize the look I saw in her eyes. I didn't see my Izzy. Her dark chestnut eyes were so cold and accusing, so hostile.

“Fine. You want to know what I'm thinking, Mina? You want to know what I'm
really
thinking?” She was yelling so loud that I worried my parents would hear all the way up at the house. “I think you're a liar. I think for the first time in your perfect existence, you made a mistake. Mina Dietrich made a massive, ugly, undeniable mistake. And instead of just accepting it and admitting it and handling it like any sane, normal person would do, you've decided to make up the most outrageous story I've ever heard in my life to cover yourself. I can understand you not wanting other people to know the truth. I get that. But I can't understand you looking your two best friends in the eye and telling them such a huge fucking lie. I can't understand, and I won't understand. You're so obsessed with being this perfect Mina who everyone expects you to be, but you don't have to act perfect for us. I don't care about any of that
Menius
bullshit. I just care about you being
real
.”

She paused then, her eyes still drilling into mine, willing me to say something for myself. But there was nothing. She was wrong, but I had no way of making her believe that.

“Fine then,” she said, pushing herself up off of the blanket. “If you don't want to make this our problem, you want to keep this to yourself, then great. You handle it. Best of luck, Mina. I'm out of this. Are you staying or leaving with me, Hannah?”

Izzy had wasted no time in establishing the line, making it clear that there were two very separate, very distinct sides. There was her and there was me. There were the nonbelievers and the believers. There was no middle ground, no space to be found in between.

“I'm staying,” Hannah said. My heart banged against my rib cage, but I resisted the urge to fling my arms around her and hold on for dear life, at least while Izzy was still watching. I may have won the first battle, but I had the feeling that it would be a long, uphill fight.

Izzy stomped off toward my driveway without another word or a backward glance. I lay down on the blanket, knees tucked into my chest, and rested my head on Hannah's lap.

“Thank you.” I closed my eyes and burrowed more closely against her, breathing in the familiar scent of lavender perfume and plain Dove soap. “Thank you for being here.” She reached down and started stroking my head. We stayed like that for a long time: no talking, no analyzing out loud, just her hand weaving through my knotted hair, her occasional humming mixing with the soft ins and outs of our breathing.

I was just starting to nod off when Hannah's cell phone rang, breaking through our temporary peace.

“It's my mom,” she said, glancing down at the screen, and I nodded, lifting myself from her lap. While she talked, I busied myself by packing up the food and the plates, accepting the inevitable reentrance into my real life waiting outside of our woods.

“I should go soon,” Hannah said, squatting down next to me after hanging up with her mom. “I feel terrible leaving you, but my parents made these dinner reservations with my sister and our grandparents ages ago. It's probably the last time Lauren will be out with all of us before she has the baby.” She flinched at
baby
, a look of guilt flashing across her face. “Is that okay? I'll stay if you need me to.”

“No, you go.” I patted her hand. “Really. You've already helped me so much today. You've been so amazing. Beyond amazing. I'll be fine by myself.”

“Are you . . . are you going to tell your mom now?”

“No.” I shook my head, adamant. “Not tonight at least. I need a little more time by myself to let it all sink in, consider all the possibilities.”

“The possibilities,” she said, nodding. “So do you think . . . Does that mean that you might get an abortion? It might be the easiest way, Meen, as hard as it might be at first.”

“No,” I said, without even pausing to consider. The word sounded surprisingly sure and confident coming out of my mouth. But why? Why was that my answer? Hannah was right: it would be easiest. No one else besides her and Izzy would ever have to know about any of this. Not my parents. Not Nate.

But
I
would know. I would always know.

And I didn't think I could live with myself if I made the decision to make it all go away. I didn't feel as if it was even my choice to make.

“You don't have to decide right this second, Meen. But think about it, at least. Think about what it would mean for college, and for all your big plans, the books you want to write, the places you want to visit. Where would you get the money? And the kids at school . . . What will you tell them if you keep it? Or even if you give the baby up for adoption, everyone will be asking you for explanations once it's obvious you're pregnant.”

It was too much, too many questions all at once, and I wanted to shove my fingers in my ears and scream as loud as I could to drown it all out. But I saw the tears on her cheeks, and I knew that it was only because she loved me. She cared about me too much to watch me throw everything away.

I took a deep breath and squeezed her hand. “I don't know. I don't think I can decide anything until I see a doctor and get some actual tests done. I guess I'll just go from there.”

She nodded, satisfied for the time being. “Promise me you'll go soon, this week. I'll go, too, of course. I don't want you to be alone. And like you said, it really could be something completely different that caused those results. We don't know anything for sure, not yet.”

“Of course,” I said, though I hated leading her on.

“And promise that you'll call me absolutely whenever you need to talk. I don't care if I'm in the middle of dinner. I don't care if I'm sound asleep. Just call me.”

“Yes, yes, I will. Promise. Now let's go back to the house. I don't want you to be late because of me.”

While she folded the blanket, I walked to the creek bank and picked up the tests, stuffed them back into the boxes, and buried them at the bottom of my purse. I glanced up at the tree house one last time—we both did—and then we left, arm in arm, walking back through the trees.

• • •

Hannah was helpful in making excuses to my mom, building up the vicious stomach bug that had struck me down out of nowhere in the middle of our otherwise reportedly perfect picnic. I sat, pale and quiet, at the kitchen table. At least I didn't have to make any effort to act the part of the poor, sick girl.