Leap (17 page)

It’s not easy pretending you're not in love with your best friend. Keeping up the façade is exhausting, especially when I see him with other girls. If he were still with Veronica, I think that would be worse. She didn’t end up going to that college near us in Boston. She stayed home to take a few night courses at the local community college. Mack told me she called him during winter break. He didn’t say much about their conversation only that she wanted to see him. It made me a little sick knowing that.

Our schools are just a twenty-minute train ride apart. Mack and his roommate, Owen, pledged a frat and their house is always buzzing with parties. The rest of Mack and Owen’s frat brothers know me and know that I’m off limits. But, I bring girls with me so I’m always in their good graces. Frat boys love artsy girls.

Tonight I chose to be a school nerd and stay in and forgo a mixer at BU. I have a project due for my Alternative Techniques class and I’d rather get it done than put it on the back burner. Owen keeps calling to see if I’ll change my mind.

Not happening. I sit in the darkroom I have permission to use and listen to some music. My phone buzzes, and I see the front screen reads that it’s Owen calling. I roll my eyes and chuckle to myself. He’s as relentless as he is harmless.

I flip my phone open to answer.

“Owen, I told you I’m working on my project. I’ll meet you guys in town tomorrow for breakfast, okay?”

“Corrine?”

He sounds upset.

“What’s wrong, Owen. Is it Mack? Is he hurt? Is he okay?”

“He’s not hurt, but he’s on his way to see you. Please, Corrine, just listen to him. Hear what he has to say.”

So my stomach takes a tumble. If he’s not hurt, maybe he’s coming to tell me he finally realizes he feels the same way about me. My palms start to sweat so badly I almost drop the phone. This is it. Mack’s going to tell me he loves me and I’ll tell him the same thing.

A bang at the door of the dark room startles me, and I tell Owen I think Mack is here, and hang up. I turn off the darkroom developing lights and turn on the normal fluorescents. I unlock the door and open to see Mack’s hand covering his mouth. He’s pale and sweating. His appearance frightens me, so I pull him in the room and slam the door shut. Mack begins to pace back and forth. Suddenly, I feel as though this man is not here to tell me he loves me.

“Mack, is it Jocelyn?” He shakes his head no. Then my mind goes to my parents.

“Please don’t tell me it’s my parents.” He doesn't answer. He just cries, and I want to throw up. He turns and leans on one of the sinks. I grab him by the shoulders and spin him around.

“Is it my parents, Mack? Are they dead?” I scream.

His answer is no. Thank God.

I breathe in relief and settle my back onto the counter behind me.

“Then what the hell is wrong with you?”

He looks up but not in my eyes. It’s like he’s looking through me.

“Veronica’s pregnant.”

I shrug. “So what? What idiot would actually knock her up?”

“I’m . . . I’m the idiot.”

Words escape me. The world I live in comes to a screeching halt and Mack begins to weep.

No.

No.

No.

That’s the only thing going through my head. My chest heaves, and I run and push Mack away from the sink just as the bile comes up from my throat. I’m heaving and trying to catch my breath, but I can’t breathe. I can’t feel. I can’t understand.

I stutter out. “How? You haven’t been together. She’s lying, Mack. It’s someone else’s. You haven’t been together!” I yell, but I can’t hear myself.

He tries to touch my back, but I shrug him off. I don’t know whether to hit him or cry.

“When, Mack? When?”

“Winter break. I met up with her. We had coffee and talked about when we broke up. She said she needed closure. We wound up in her car and . . .”

I hold up my hand up to stop him from telling me all the gory details because I’m so afraid of throwing up again.

“Don’t, Mack. Just don’t. You . . . you need a DNA test or something. This cannot be happening. How do you know for sure it’s yours? Jesus, Mack.”

Mack grabs onto his hair and looks up to the sky. He stares upwards, and I’m wondering if he thinks the answer to my question is written on the ceiling. I yell out his name and he answers, finally. “It’s mine, Rinny. I know it is. And before you say a thing about it, I didn’t use protection. I thought that if I just . . . if I timed it right I wouldn’t have to use one.”

I turn away from him and press my hands to my chest trying to dull the ache in my heart.

“For being such a smart guy, Mack, you’re so fucking stupid. So stupid.” I still can’t catch my breath. All I can hear is his voice. I firmly hold the counter while my back is to him and bow my head.

“I know. It wasn’t supposed to happen, but she seduced me. I’m not weak but you were the last person I was with. I mean I’ve gone out with girls when I came to BU, but I’m not that guy. I don’t go out looking to get laid.”

When he talks about me being the last person he had sex with, the pieces of my newly broken heart chips away even more. I wanted to be the last, not the one before the last. I knew Veronica was evil. I just didn’t realize she’d sink this low. But I can’t blame her entirely for it all either.

“Rinny, I’ll get a paternity test after the baby is born, but for now in my heart, I know this is my kid. I can’t say how I feel it, but I do.”

I swipe at my nose and my eyes pretending like it’s not affecting me even more than it already is. My fear of all fears is that he’ll go back to her. He’ll be with her, and I don’t think I’ll be able to accept that. I don’t think I could have him in my life if he’s with her.

Not looking him directly in the eye, I go back to my work and put on my suit of armor.

“Well, I guess you’ll be doing eighteen to life then.” I sniff and make myself look busy even though I have no idea what I think I’m accomplishing.

I feel his hand on my shoulder. “Rinny, I need you. I need you by my side. I don’t know which way is up. I don’t know what to do.”

The weight of his hand on me feels heavy, yet so warm and safe. I can’t explain it, but I know as much as this hurts like hell I have to be there for him. He’s been with me so many times. He saved me from something that could have been catastrophic. How can I turn my back on him now when he needs me the most? But the question in my heart lingers.

I look at the negatives in front of me on the counter and ask, “Will you marry her?”

My breath is held and my heart pounds against my chest waiting for his answer. His fingers become firmer on my shoulder as he answers, “No, Rinny. I don’t love her but I have to be there for her. She’s carrying my child. I’m not going to marry her just because I got her pregnant. I know some people might think that’s wrong, and maybe it is, but I can’t marry someone I don’t love. What kind of life would that be for any of us?”

The air releases from my lungs after he speaks and, even though I still feel his hand on me, I am weightless with relief.

Thank you, God. Thank you.

“What are you going to do about school? Are you going to drop out? Get a job?”

Mack sits on a stool nearby and hangs his head.

“I don’t want to do that. I want to be a journalist. I want a career. But I want to do all the right things for this kid. I don’t want to be a deadbeat dad who is never around. I need to be there for my kid like my dad was.”

“You will be, Mack. You’ll be a good dad like John was.”

I see Mack’s shoulders shaking, and his hands go to his face as he cries. I do what I always do. I go to him. I crouch down so I’m level with his knees, and I run my thumb along the scar above his eye. Not because I’m sorry for something I did, but this time because I’m sorry for something he did.

Being back home for the summer kind of sucks. I was sad to leave Mass Arts because it meant having to come home, live under my parents rules once again, and watch Mack struggle with the fact he is about to become a father. Jocelyn did not take the news of Veronica’s pregnancy well at first. She wants a paternity test as soon as the baby is born. I don’t blame her. I’d like to know myself. Mack has no doubts. He said that in his heart he knows the kid is his.

Veronica has held Mack at arm's length. She let him go to doctor’s appointments with her in the beginning. He went to the first ultrasound and everything was fine. He doesn’t see much of her except, of course, when she needs money for her copays and maternity clothes. He calls every day to check in with her to see how she is, but she hardly answers. He followed her to an appointment a few weeks back, and they wouldn’t allow him to go in because of some kind of privacy law. He fought with the office manager, and he was thrown out for demanding to be allowed to go in. I waited outside the office building with him for hours waiting for her to come out after her appointment. We never saw her.

Veronica seemed fine in the beginning. She was fine with them not being together. She said she was interested in someone else. They came to an agreement that it was important for Mack to finish school. She would remain on Long Island with the baby and her mother, who, by the way, is a nut job and a half. Mack told Veronica that he would pay for an apartment up in Boston for her and the baby out of his inheritance. He wanted to spend it on her and a kid who may not even be his. Veronica refused to move to Boston. I, for one, was glad she made at least one good decision in her life.

Money this and money that. That’s what Veronica wanted. John had investments after investments. He and Jocelyn managed their money well and when he died, Mack inherited a lot of it.

And Veronica somehow knew that.

I haven’t seen Veronica except when Mack asked me to come to his house with him so they could tell his mom. Uncomfortable was an understatement. I didn't want to be there. Veronica sure as hell didn't want me to be there. Her mother was there, too, and she gave me dirty looks the whole time. But Mack wanted me to be there, and I didn’t give a damn who didn’t.

Lizzie saw her about two weeks ago with people she’s never seen before. She waitresses at some restaurant near Freeport, so maybe they were some of the people she knows from there. Lizzie said she looked thin except for the big belly. And she was very pale. Guess her sun bathing days in Long Beach were long gone.

I don’t really care about Veronica anyway. I just worry about Mack.

Like all of our typical Sunday dinners, they all start and end with some kind of debate. Owen is here for a visit so the poor guy gets a taste of what it’s like to have dinner with the Coopers and the Blanchards.

Mack and my dad debate about the upcoming primaries. Mack being a libertarian and Daddy being a democrat makes for some interesting topics. Owen’s eyes go back and forth between the two, while me, my mother, Jocelyn, and Lizzie—because Owen is here—just watch and laugh.

When August arrives in Long Island, it’s a sticky, sweaty, bug-infested mess. We eat out on the screened in porch because of it. You can smell the sea air and, once in a while, you get a breeze, but that’s not often.

As the debate gets louder, I notice Mack’s phone buzzing beside him. He and Daddy are yelling in a playful way to each other so loudly he doesn’t notice. I don’t recognize the number, but then it stops. Two seconds later it starts back up again.

“Mack,” I say quietly, but he doesn’t hear me. “Mack,” I say louder and swat at his arm. “Your phone is ringing for the second time. Stop and answer it.”

He grabs it, answers it, and stutters as he tries to listen to the information being told to him on the other line.

“I don’t understand, Mrs. Matthews . . . the baby isn’t due for six more weeks. I don’t . . . Okay. I’m coming now. Yes, right now.”

Jocelyn gets up from the table. “What’s wrong, honey? Is she in labor?”

“She’s . . . she’s unconscious and bleeding. An ambulance just took her to the hospital. I . . . I have to go.” Mack sprints out the door without hesitation and we all follow.