Pregnant Pause (11 page)

"Well, so what?" she says. "I'm closer than anybody else."

"Yeah, but close is only good in horseshoes and heart attacks."

"Huh?" she says.

That's an expression I learned from Robby, my sister's husband, and after I say it I want to go wash my mouth out with soap. If there's anybody I don't want to be like, it's that old stuffed turkey.

Then Banner, still on the floor in the split the whole time the girls are trying, turns her body forward, so instead of one leg being behind her and one leg in front, her legs are sticking out on either side of her, and it's awesome.

"Wow, I didn't know you could do that," Robin Ettlinger says, and all the girls just stand around and look. They don't even bother to try to imitate her.

Banner wears this shy smile and wipes at her dry eyes. The class time is over and I haven't even told them my idea, but I let Banner have her moment. My idea will keep.

OKAY, I KNOW I'm not the best teacher in the world, and it was so wrong of me to pick on Ashley Wilson the way I did, but everything came out all right, and Banner topped all of them, so I feel in some way proud of myself. I guess it's because I'm actually getting to teach something, even though I don't know what the hell I'm doing most of the time. I'm still doing it, and the girls are listening to me. It's wicked cool. I like that they seem to like me. I want them to like me. I imagine myself someday being like Leo. The kids drape themselves all over him, and they hang on every word he says, and he's so casual about it, like it's natural that they should want to be with him and listen to him. I wonder how it is that he never gets anybody acting snotty in his classes. Is it because he's a boy? I don't get it. I think how if I were one of the kids at this camp, I'd be making fun of the way he dresses, and the stupid, sign-the-back-of-his-shirt thing, but then I think maybe I wouldn't, and I wonder why I wouldn't. I decide it's because I respect Leo. I don't know why, exactly, but I do. I decide to watch him closely to see if I can figure out what it is, because if I have this baby and if we do decide to keep it, I'm going to want it to respect me, and I know I can't be picking on the kid just because he or she is snotty, the way I did with Ashley Wilson, even if it did turn out all right.

My mom and dad would say that God put me in this camp to teach me how to become a good parent, because they're real religious like that. I don't know if God put me here or not, but I think maybe it's good I'm here, because I'm learning stuff that might be useful with my baby someday, and knowing this gives me a better attitude about being here.

In the crafts hut some kids are making dulcimers. Yeah, real live musical instruments! So now we have knitting and shipbuilding and dulcimer making going on all at the same time, and I'm frazzled, but Leo's his usual cool, calm self. He and Ziggy do a demonstration on two already-made dulcimers to show everybody what they sound like. Leo's pretty good with the dulcimer, but Ziggy's fantastic. The only thing is, he's looking at me the whole time he's playing, and it makes me wonder if he likes me, too. I mean, I don't
like
him, like him—but maybe he likes me? I try to look away, but then I catch myself looking right at him again, and I blush. Shit! I look away again and wish he'd stop playing and go away already. Finally, after lots of ap plause, he leaves, but I know he'll be back to demonstrate for the next class, and I decide that's definitely when I'm going to have to go to the bathroom.

***

The dulcimers sound a little like guitars and a little like auto-harps or zithers—kind of like all three instruments mashed together. There are only four strings, and three of the strings are tuned in the same key. I don't get it, but the dulcimers do sound kind of cool, and they're pretty easy to play. I think they're a lot easier to play than to make. Yep, I'm making myself one. I don't have to make the whole thing from scratch. The dulcimers come in a kit, but still there's some sawing and sanding and gluing and stringing to do. So far I've cut out the front and back pieces of wood, and I did a really crappy job of it. Now I'm trying to sand the edges, but as jagged as mine are, I'm going to need to sand this thing for a month to get all the edges smooth. It's embarrassing, because some of the ten-year-olds do a better job than I do. Still, I'm proud of myself for doing a craft, even if it does end up looking more like a wooden banana with quills than an instrument.

Toward the end of the third week of camp, I get a promotion. It turns out Haley has appendicitis. The ambulance came, and everything in camp stopped while they loaded her into the truck and rode off again. Then an hour later a camper comes by the crafts hut to tell me that the ILs want to see me in the main cabin. The FIL does most of the talking while the MIL sits beside him in a director's chair, looking sour. He says Ha ley's most likely going to be away a couple of weeks and that they're still very short-handed and that if I feel up to it and if my doctor says it's okay, they'd like me to take over Haley's cabin duties as well as the dance class for the next few weeks. "Leo tells us you do a good job with the campers at the crafts hut. He believes you can handle the cabin on your own, and, well, we have no other choice; we have no one else," the FIL says again. He looks worried, and I don't know if it's because he's worried about me taking over a cabin, or he's just worried in general about Haley and being short on counselors this summer, or what.

Then the MIL shakes her head and says, "I don't know what it is about dancers at this camp, but they're always getting sick or injured, or they're just plain nuts. Honestly, this is the last year we offer dance."

"So, it's okay that I'm teaching, uh, interpretive dance instead of ballet?" I ask. I had looked through some dance books at the library, and "interpretive dance" is the closest kind of dance that I could compare my class to, so that's what I've decided to call it. I don't know what I wanted the MIL to say. Maybe, "Oh, yes, it's so much better than ballet. You're the greatest teacher we've ever had." She's come to my class a couple of times now, and both times my mind has just gone numb while she was watching me, but still, I want to hear something positive from her.

"What choice do we have, really?" she says. "At least it's active, and the girls seem happy enough."

Coming from the MIL, that's high praise.

Anyway, I'm so pleased that they asked me to take over for Haley that I lie and tell them my doctor says I'm fine for any kind of activity. I feel fine—clumsy and ugly, but fine—so I figure it's safe until I don't feel fine.

So we set it all up, and now I'll be living in the cabin with the girls and I'll be a full-time counselor and dance instructor—hah! What a laugh. I got cabin seven, the eleven- and twelve-year-olds' cabin, which means it's Banner's cabin, which also means it's Ashley Wilson's cabin. As if I don't get enough of the two of them already. I think I hate Ashley Wilson, and I wonder what I'll do if my kid turns out to be just like her. Can you hate your own kid? If Sarah and Robby raise it, will it turn out to be all stiff and uppity and judgmental like they are?

Ashley Wilson's really good at turning all the other cabinmates into mini she-devils. They treat me the same way I used to treat substitute teachers in school, meaning they completely ignore me.

"All right, everybody, fifteen minutes till lights out. You should all be in your pajamas," I say on my first night as a full counselor. I have my new list of "Cabin Counselor Rules" the ILs gave me, and rule number 7,845 is that all campers should be in pajamas and on their beds by nine thirty and lights out by nine forty-five. Well, only a few of my campers are in pajamas, and they all ignore my lights-out warning.

"Don't worry about me; I sleep in the nude," Ashley Wilson says to me in this aren't-I-clever voice when I yell once more for them to put on their pajamas. Then she runs up to Banner, who's heading for her bunk, and yanks down her pajama bottoms so her butt's showing. "Banny-fanny!" Ashley Wilson sings.

All the girls in the cabin laugh, except Banner, of course, who's pulling up her pants and looking at me with this helpless expression, waiting for me to fix what just happened.

"That's not funny! How would you like it if I did that to you?" I say, marching over and getting in Ashley Wilson's face. Her friends, who had been gathered around her, back away.

"Okay by me," Ashley Wilson says. "Anyway, Banny-fanny hasn't lost any weight. She's
gained
weight, and our whole cabin has to pay for it, so it serves her right," she yells in my face. Then she turns around, bends over, and moons me.

Some kids laugh at this, and some kids yell, "Woo-hoo!"

"Well, now,
that's
butt-ugly," I say, and the whole cabin laughs at that, and the war is on!

I can see Ashley Wilson is seething and probably plotting something evil in her pointed little head as she pulls up her pants and trots off to join her buddies in the back of the cabin, but I can't worry about that now, I've got to get some discipline around here.

I clap my hands to get everybody's attention. The girls ignore me. I shout, "In bed now, or you'll all miss breakfast in the morning."

That gets about half the campers into bed—the ones who actually heard me—but Ashley Wilson has flitted over to where the sinks are, and she and her evil cronies have started a wet-towel fight. I turn off all the lights, yanking on the strings hanging from the ceiling as I march to the back of the cabin. It's dark by the time I get back there. I grab the towel out of Ashley Wilson's chubby little hands and yell, "Get in the bed! Now!"

The girls giggle and scurry off to their bunks—everyone but Ashley Wilson. "I don't have to listen to you," she says. "You're not a real counselor. You're just a counselor-in-training—so I don't have to listen. You're just a pregnant-nobody loser."

Behind me I can hear some of the girls climbing back off their bunks. I'm furious. I know it's a war between me and Ashley Wilson, and I figure I had better win.

"Well, nobody has to listen to you, either," I say. "And nobody
should,
especially not the rest of this cabin. They're all smarter than you are, and prettier, and none of them have your beady little pig eyes. They're all nice girls, unlike you."

I hear the girls gasp, and I know I've gone too far—way too far. And even though I know it's a total act when Ashley Wilson bursts into tears, I know I shouldn't have said what I said. She just totally pissed me off.

"You pig whore. You aren't really twenty years old—you're just a teenager who got knocked up, so there! Everybody knows you're lying," Ashley shouts through her tears, which gets more gasps from the other girls. "I'm going to tell on you, and you're going to get into so much trouble. My dad will have you fired for what you said to me." Then, like the true drama queen that she is, she cries harder and rushes out of the cabin to go tell.

By now I can see pretty well in the dark, and I pad back to the front of the cabin to my little bed by the entrance door. The girls are all whispering, but I don't say anything. They could light the place on fire, and I wouldn't say anything. I know I'm a terrible counselor, and I'm going to make a terrible mother, and this is my final decision—I am giving my baby to my sister.

Twenty minutes later, Gren comes to get me. She tells me I'm wanted up at the Lothrops' cabin and that she'll watch my girls for me.

I head up to the ILs' cabin, and on my way I see Jen strutting herself toward my place, where Lam is supposedly fast asleep. I call out to her, "Hey, Jen, don't wake him up. Leave him alone, why don't you? He doesn't want to see you."

Jen stops walking and stands so still it's as if she figures if she stands completely frozen, I won't notice she's there.

"Uh, hello. I see you," I say.

Then Jen comes back to life. "Yeah, okay," she says. "I was just going to ask Lam if he could get down to the lake on time tomorrow morning, because we have a written test to give for the lifesaving kids."

"Uh-huh, sure," I say. "Like I really believe that one." I take a few more steps toward her, and Jen moves away from the cabin a little.

"You can believe what you want. What do I care? Anyway, maybe you ought to be asking Lam where he is every morning, because he's not at the lake, and we're all getting tired of covering for him." She says this and walks off, leaving me to stare after her wiggling little butt.

Oh, boy, the night has already been such a great success, I just can't wait to get up to the ILs' cabin to see what nice surprises they have in store for me.

***

I open the ILs' cabin door, and before I can take a step inside, they start in on me. They're both sitting in front of coffee mugs at the round oak table they've got in their kitchen/dining room/ living room. The camp cat, a tabby named Rufus, sits in the middle of the table like a centerpiece. The FIL looks upset but not furious. There's a softness that's always there in his eyes, and it's there tonight. The MIL is furious, as usual, and her eyes are pure steel.

"Did you call Ashley Wilson a fat ugly pig?" the MIL asks.

I step inside and pull the cabin door closed behind me. No need to let the whole camp hear this. "Well, not exactly, but that might be what Ashley Wilson heard," I say. Then I add, "Look, I know I went too far. But that girl's a little devil and she pushed the wrong buttons on me. I was just trying to get control of the cabin and she was calling another camper and me names, so I called her a few back." I try to remember if she called me a pig whore before or after I told her she was ugly and stupid. What does it matter? I know I'm in the shithouse either way.

"You're expected to act like an adult, not sink to their level," the MIL says, spitting her words out every time she hits the letter
t.
"You're
expect-spit-ed t-spit-o act-spit
like an adul
t-spit
."

Even Rufus looks mad, the way he's squinting and blinking at me while I'm getting yelled at.

"I was wrong. I know, I know. Come on, it's my first night, and they were ignoring me, and Ashley Wilson was the ringleader, and she just started acting out for some reason and—well, I have no excuse. I stink as a counselor. I know. You shouldn't have given me this job."