Not My Daughter (6 page)

"She'll understand."

"And in the meanwhile, we have to suffer through Saturday mornings like this one? I don't know if I can do that, Kate. It's bad enough that I'm not calling Rick, but Lily wants to wait. Am I using her as an excuse? I'm such a coward."

Kate put a comforting hand on her arm. "You are not a coward. You're respecting Lily and Mary Kate and Jess by not telling Pam. Besides, there's a reason why Lily wants to wait to tell Rick. The first trimester is crucial. What if she miscarries?"

Lily didn't miscarry. She passed most of the next week as she had the eleven previous--going to school with no one the wiser, falling asleep at night with her books open and waking later to study, texting often with Mary Kate and Jess, though Jess was at their house more now, escaping her own.

Susan struggled to come to terms with her daughter's condition. She alternately obsessed over Lily's future and refused to think about it, but all the while, there was a pain in her gut. She felt betrayed.

Naturally, Lily sensed it, which perhaps explained why her morning sickness continued. At least, that was what Susan concluded guiltily when she got a call from the school clinic on Thursday morning. Leaving a meeting in the center of town, she quickly headed there.

Chapter 5

The clinic was in the basement of the school. Susan's preference had been for something more open and bright, but with so little available space, the basement was a necessary concession. Its proximity to the locker rooms was a plus; sports injuries were a fact of life in a school that fielded fiercely competitive teams. A direct entrance to the back parking lot also helped when a communicable disease was involved.

Using that back entrance now, Susan passed two students at the nurse's desk and checked the cubicles. She found Lily on a bed in the third cubicle, looking pathetically young. Her knees were bent. One hand lay over her middle, her other arm covered her eyes.

"Sweetie?"

Lily moved her arm and, seeing Susan, immediately teared up. "I'm sorry," she whispered.

One look at her and Susan's heart melted. "What happened?"

The words came in a breathy rush. "I was feeling sick, so I went to my locker for crackers, and Abby was there and announced, I mean, in a big, loud voice, that what did I
expect
, being pregnant. It was a
nightmare
, Mom. There were kids everywhere, and they all stopped walking and stared. I wanted to tell them she was wrong, only I couldn't. I was so upset--I mean, how could Abby do that? I've never actually thrown up before, but I did it then, in front of
everyone."

She looked green enough to do it again, but Susan didn't care. Sitting on the edge of the gurney, she pulled her into her arms. Lily was going through what she personally knew was trial by fire. A good mother didn't feel anger toward her child when she was in this kind of pain.

Besides, Susan blamed herself as much as Abby. She had been distant and cool when her daughter needed support. Rocking gently, with her chin on Lily's head, she tried to think.

Just then the nurse opened the curtain. Amy Sheehan was in her mid-thirties, attractive in sweater and jeans, and soft-spoken. Eminently approachable, she had been Susan's first choice for the job, no concessions there. Her voice was gentle now. "Lily told me. She said she saw a doctor."

Susan nodded, but her mind was racing. She had hoped for time. Now what?

Lily looked up. Her eyes were haunted. "I had last lunch. I thought if I got something in my stomach, I'd be able to make it 'til then. I didn't expect to feel so sick. The books said it would stop after twelve weeks."

Susan recalled suffering from nausea well past the magical date. "What do books know? But it is what it is. Time to go to Plan B."

"What's that?"

"Beats me." She eyed the nurse. "Any thoughts?"

Amy was apologetic. "You really can't deny it. Not if Lily's keeping the baby. It'll be obvious soon enough."

She didn't have to go on. Deny the pregnancy now, and when Lily begins to show, the denial itself will be an issue. Especially for the high school principal.

Lily looked at Susan again. "What did you do?"

Susan didn't have to fill in Amy on her history. Her age and Lily's, both, were a matter of record. Besides, Susan had laid it out when she hired Amy to head the school clinic.
I hid my pregnancy for five months. I risked my own health and my baby's because I didn't know where to turn. I want our students to have a place to go when they can't go to their parents. I don't want any sexual problems ignored
.

In answer to Lily now, she smiled sadly. "I was lucky enough not to throw up in public, so I had a little more time. My sport was track. I wore my top loose. But it's hard to hide things in a locker room. My teammates saw it first. They were my Abby."

"Why did she
do
that?" Lily cried, but Susan could only shake her head.

"It's done. There's no going back." She took the car keys from her pocket. "I think you should go home for the day. Let things settle. We'll have more perspective later."

What she was hoping, of course, was that Abby's announcement hadn't actually been heard. It was pure denial on her part, the mother in her. With her emotions seesawing between present and past, a part of her just wanted to hide.

But she had barely returned to her office when the questions began, first from the teacher whose class Lily had just missed, then from another teacher wanting to report what her students were saying. By the time she reached the lunchroom, the looks she received said that word was spreading fast.

Mary Kate and Jess avoided her--but they generally did at school, and with Susan's approval. They had discussed the issue of their relationship when Susan was first named principal. Her closeness to these girls was almost as tricky as her being Lily's mother.

The fact that Mary Kate and Jess were with other friends now--and that none were looking at
them
strangely--told Susan that Lily was the only one who had been outed. For now. Knowing Mary Kate and Jess as she did, she figured they were stressing about that.

Abby never made it to lunch, which wasn't unusual. A student whose schedule was tight often wolfed something down while running between classes. Not that Susan would have been able to talk with her here. What could she have said without making things worse?
How could you do that to a good friend--and knowing about this all along--and trying to get pregnant yourself?

She couldn't possibly be objective, not with her heart bleeding for her daughter. Lily would be on display, all alone, when she returned to school tomorrow. Susan could only imagine who else would know by then.

It was a long day. Only a few other direct questions came, which made Susan nervous. She knew her staff; news like this would fly through the faculty lounge. Friends might be keeping their distance from Susan out of understanding or perhaps respect, but others--her detractors--would be gloating.

She met with two teachers after school. Both, new hires, were in her office for evaluation conferences. Neither mentioned Lily--but, of course, they were more worried about their jobs than about Susan's pregnant daughter. After the teachers came a pair of parent meetings, one about a drug problem, the other about an alleged plagiarism. They, too, had greater worries.

It did put things in perspective, Susan thought, but by the time she got home, she was discouraged. She wanted to protect her daughter but couldn't, and though she knew that the girl had brought this on herself, her own heart broke.

Lily had been studying, as evidenced by the scatter of books on her bed, but she was sleeping now. Letting her be, Susan went to the den and turned on the TV. She had to wait through stories on the economy, a celebrity murder, and a report on global warming before Rick appeared.

He was covering post-cholera Zimbabwe, in as sobering a report as Susan had heard. Poverty, homelessness, hunger--more perspective here. Lily wasn't poor, homeless, or hungry. But that didn't mean they weren't in crisis.

Remote in hand, she waited until he was into his sign-off before freezing his image on the screen. Then she tossed the remote aside, picked up the cordless, and, with her eyes on his handsome, sunburned face, punched in his number. There was one ring, then another of a slightly different tone as the call was transferred. After five more rings, he picked up.

"Lily?" he asked with endearing hope, his rich voice remarkably clear given how far away he was.

"It's me. That was an amazing piece you just did."

"Sad that someone has to do it," he said, but he sounded pleased to hear her voice. "Hold on a sec, hon." She imagined him pressing the phone to his denim shirt while he spoke to whomever--his producer, a cameraman, the WHO agent he had just interviewed. When he returned, he spoke in an uneven cadence that suggested he was walking, probably looking for privacy. She imagined that he stopped on the far side of the media van.

"We thought things would be better after the cholera epidemic," he said. "It seemed like the world had finally taken notice of what was happening here. But conditions now are worse than ever. Tell me something good, Susie. I need to hear something happy."

Susan had only one thing to tell. "Lily's pregnant."

The silence that followed was so long, she feared they had lost the connection. "Rick?"

"I'm thinking you wouldn't joke about something like that."

"Well, it isn't cholera or poverty. But it is an issue."

There was another pause. Then a frightened "Was she raped?"

"Oh God, no."

"Who's the guy?"

"She won't tell. And no, she hasn't been dating anyone special," Susan rushed on before he could ask. "I see her at school. I see her on the weekends. Usually, if I miss something, I hear it from someone else."

"Why won't she tell?"

Because she's stubborn? Misguided? Loyal?
Susan sighed. "Because the guy was only a means to an end." She filled him in as best she could, but even after nine days, the story seemed bizarre. "She and her friends just decided the time was right to have a baby. Mary Kate and Jess are pregnant, too."

She heard a bewildered oath, then an astonished "They made a
pact?"

There it was, the word she didn't want to hear. "I wouldn't call it that."

"What would you call it?"

She tried to think of a better word. An agreement? A promise? A
deal?
But that was just a way to pretty things up. "A pact," she finally conceded.

"What do we know about pact behavior?" asked Rick the journalist.

"Mostly that Lily isn't your typical candidate," replied Susan the educator. Pact behavior was a school administrator's greatest fear. One kid with a problem was bad enough. But three? "Kids collaborate with one or more friends to do something forbidden. They do it in secret, and it's usually self-destructive."

"But Lily is strong. She's self-confident."

"She's also a teenager with very close friends. They convinced each other that they could be great mothers, better than the ones they worked for last summer."

"They did it because of a
summer job?"

"No, but that was the catalyst."

"They're only seventeen," he protested. Susan pictured his eyes. They were blue, alternately steely and soft, always mesmerizing. "How far along is she?"

"Twelve weeks. She only told me last week. And no, I didn't see anything. There's still practically nothing to see. I would have called you right away, only she asked me to wait. I don't know if that was out of superstition or fear."

"Fear?"

"That you'd suggest she terminate the pregnancy."

Quietly, he asked, "Is she there? Can I talk with her?"

"She's sleeping." Susan explained what had happened at school.

He swore, echoing Susan's feelings exactly. "It's all over school, then?"

"Not yet. But soon, I'd guess."

He let out a breath, audible over the many miles. "How does she feel about that?"

"Upset. She wanted to wait."

"But she isn't considering abortion."

"No. She's keeping it. She's been firm about that."

"What about you? You think she should?"

That was the question closest to Susan's heart, the dark one, the one she couldn't discuss with anyone else. "Oh, Rick," she said tiredly, "this is where I agonize. You know what I did back then. Once she was inside me, I couldn't bear the thought of not having her, so a part of me understands where she's at now." She paused.

"And the other part?"

"Just wants this to go away," she confessed, feeling like the worst person in the world. "Abortion, adoption--I don't care."

"But you haven't said that to Lily."

"No, and I won't. This is the ugly me speaking. How can I ask my daughter to do something I refused to do? And so what if keeping it changes our lives? We can deal. Who said there was only one way to live a good life?"

There was a longer pause this time, then a quiet "Your dad."

Rick always got it. "Right. So now you're the dad. What do you say?"

"I say
right's
the word. She has a right to want it, you have a right to want it gone--"

"But I
don't
want it gone," Susan broke in, feeling sinful, "at least, not all the time--only when I think about what a mess this will make of her life, or when I dwell on what an absolutely, incredibly stupid thing this was for her to do. I mean, are
you
proud of what she's done?"

"This minute? No. In five years, I may feel differently."

"Forget five years," Susan cried in frustration. "We're at a crossroads--here, today, now. If she's going to
not
keep this baby, this is the time to decide.
What do I do?"

"You just said it. How can you ask her to do something you refused to do? She keeps it."

As simply as that, Susan felt a tad lighter. "What do I do about the part of me that resents that?"

"You work on it. You're a good worker."

"Like I'm a good mother?"

"You are. A good mother does her best, even when her own dreams are shot to hell. So, Lily keeps the baby. Does she have a plan?"

"To raise the baby? Well, she says she had a good role model in me." Her voice rose. "Honestly, Rick, I never imagined this. She knows how hard it was for me. She knows what I gave up. I wanted everything to be perfect for her. Maybe I wanted
her
to be perfect."