Bumped (9 page)

NOW THAT MELODY IS GONE, ALL I HAVE TO DO IS WAIT.

“Do me a favor,” Lib had said. “Skip school. Stay home today. Play NOOKY HOOKY. Because GUESS WHAT! It turns out our boy Jondoe was in New York City over the weekend to bump the mayor’s daughter. She pregged on the first try! What a pro. Anyway, now he’s got a few days free before he has to fly out to Los Angeles to promote his new fragrance. He can be there this AFTERNOON. Will you skip school so I can set up a one-on-one?”

I nodded mutely.

“THAT’S MY GIRL. I don’t want another day to go by, Miss Melody Mayflower. Let’s deliver what the Jaydens are SO WILLING to pay SO MUCH for. This is your FUTURE we’re talking about.” He stopped, assumed a more serious tone. “You do realize that your life is about to change.”

My life already had.

“Once this news hits the MiNet, the optics are gonna go OFF THE SPRING. Your pregg will be famous. Morning sickness is NOTHING compared to how green with envy they’ll be when they find out who’s bumping you. . . .”

I didn’t hear anything else Lib said. When he vanished from MiVu, taking my Morning Star with him, I fell to my knees, humbled by the task that God had put before me.

Lib believed that I was Melody—and it’s his job to know everything about her. It shouldn’t be too hard to lead a stranger into believing the same. I only have to pretend long enough to make him change his mind about . . . doing what he’s supposed to do with my sister and, if possible, forsake his sinful profession altogether. If Jesus could spend His time preaching to the prostitutes, so can I.

Because I’m being challenged to serve a higher truth.

And saving Jondoe must be part of the plan now too.

GAH. I HATE BIKING TO SCHOOL. BUT AS PRESIDENT OF THE
ECOmmunity Club, my parents say I have to serve as a conscientious example.

I arrive at school all windswept and slightly sweaty, just in time to see Shoko clamber down the steps from the bus everyone calls the Bumpmobile. It provides rides to and from school for all students with certified pregnancies, no matter how close they live to campus. Malia, Shoko, and I used to bike together every day and rant about the Cheerclones who can’t walk one-tenth of a mile to school but can still flip handsprings well into their third trimester.

“We’re gonna rock big bellies on our bikes!” we used to brag. “We won’t be like those lazy breeders taking the Bumpmobile.”

Now Shoko sits next to those lazy breeders every morning swapping cures for stretch marks. Malia is in lockdown. And I bike to school alone.

I don’t hold a grudge against Shoko. Really. She’s been an awesome president. There’s a lot of tension between amateurs and pros at school. Like, amateurs look down on pros for bumping with strangers, not boyfriends. Or they pity us for missing out on all the partner-swapping fun at the masSEX parties. And pros say amateurs are jealous because they aren’t good enough to pregg for profit. And even if they were, they probably wouldn’t have the willpower to keep their legs closed until it was time to fulfill their contractual obligations. That sort of cattiness threatened to end the Alliance before it even began. But as the rare amateur
turned
pro, Shoko has served as an inspiration and intermediary between both sides.

So that’s the good news. The bad news is that this second pregg has given Shoko a major case of what experts call “adolescent amnio-amnesia.” I swear she’s dropped at least ten IQ points per trimester. She’s at thirty-nine and a half weeks now and can’t stay focused on anything. If she’s carrying her third pregg in college, she’ll fail out for serious. Like right now she waddles right past me without saying hello. As her peer birthcoach, the only nonrelative allowed in the delivery room, I’d be offended if I weren’t so used to it.

I tap the bell to get her attention.

RING! RING! RING!
“Shoko, hello!”
RING! RING! RING!

“Oy!” she yelps, clutching her belly. “Don’t break my water!”

She’s joking. At least I think she’s joking. Bounding off the bus right behind Shoko is none other than Ventura Vida. She and her adorable six-month bump believe other-wise.

“Oh, no!” she trills. “You rilly, rilly can’t go into labor until after the vote!”

Ventura smiles with more gums than teeth. I guess she’s figured out that she’s prettier when she’s meaner.

“Don’t worry,” Shoko says to Ventura and the group of variously pregnant girls surrounding her, many of whom I know from the Pro/Am. “I just know Burrito will take it to forty-two weeks, just like the first one.”

“You’ve got a very
hospitable
womb,” says Ventura, which makes everyone, including Shoko, laugh so hard that there must be more to it than what I’m hearing, the punch line for a joke that began on the bus.

“Ugh. I hope Sugar Booger doesn’t go to forty-two weeks,” groans Celine Lichtblau, who, in my opinion, needs to tell her OB to adjust the dose on her AntiTocin. Taken in the right amounts, AntiTocin counteracts the all-natural chemical bond between biomom and pregg. Too much AntiTocin makes you a cranky bitch for nine months straight.

Ventura hoists her cleavage to get attention. It works. Her bra started as an A minus and is currently a D plus. With her luck, by the time she pushes, she’ll probably be a full F, the only time such a grade change can be considered progress.

“
My
donor has a flawless track record for making preggs that deliver within twenty-four hours of their due dates . . .”

If Ventura doesn’t stop bragging about how her RePro scored in the highest percentile in every category measured by the Standards for Premium Ejaculated Reproductive Material, I will tie my tubes.

“ . . . so I assume that Perfect will be no different.”

Same goes for referring to her pregg as “Perfect.”

Ventura picks up on my annoyance and runs with it as fast as a girl in her second trimester can run.

“All this bump talk must be soooooo booooring for you, Melody. . . .”

“Um, no,” I lie. “It’s fascinating. Braxton-Hicks and epidurals and Kegels and . . . stuff.”

I know I should be fascinated. But I’m not. And my trip to Babiez R U to try on FunBumps certainly didn’t help in this regard.

“I’m sure you do,” Ventura says crisply as the group around her giggles. And before I can make an effort to sound more convincing, she adds, “Oh, by the way, we passed Zen on his bicycle. . . .”

Ventura is obsessed with my friendship with Zen. She never fails to bring him up in conversation. “He’s so hot! I don’t know why you two don’t just bump and get it over with,” she says. “You’d really make such a cute pregg.”

Everyone knows why Zen hasn’t bumped me or anyone else: He’s a risky investment. It doesn’t matter that mixmatchy rainbow families are so on trend right now. High IQ can’t make up for his insufficient verticality. Apparently that hasn’t stopped him from giving gooooood everythingbut.

I stay calm. “I’m already under contract. You know that.”

“I bet he’ll be amped when you finally do pregg,” Ventura says, casting a look around at the crowd. “Then you and Zen can bump-hump all you want without worrying about breaking your contract. . . .”

On any other day, I could just let this go. But today isn’t an ordinary day, what with Harmony in hiding at my house and my parents trying to pimp me out and everything. I swear, if it weren’t a felony, I’d smack Ventura AND her adorable six-month bump.

Fortunately, if unintentionally, Shoko comes to my rescue.

“Hey, there’s nothing wrong with humping when you’re bumping. Raimundo and I went at it like crazy for the full forty-two and my first pregg didn’t come out all cock-knocked in the head.”

Doing it for
fun.
The one advantage to bumping as an amateur.

“Omigod, I was just
scamming
!” Ventura lies. “See you at the meeting!” Then she shoots me a departing smirk and leads the pregnancy parade into the school.

“Waddle with me,” Shoko says, taking my arm to hold me back. With an extra thirty pounds on her barely five-foot frame, she’s on pace with one of those giant prehistoric ground sloths. The journey from the parking lot to her locker is epic, like moving from one era of geologic time into the next.

I’m still seething. “She acts as if she’s the first girl in this school to go pro.”

“She’s scored a sweet deal,” Shoko says, adjusting her belly band. “Full college tuition, tummy tuck, a car . . . ”

“A car! She doesn’t even have a license! And what’s the big humping deal anyway? I’ve got all that written into
my
contract!”

Shoko levels me with a look that is barely more sympathetic than pathetic.

“Well, yes,” she says, patting my shoulder. “But you haven’t . . .”

Her eyes drop to my flat tummy.

“It’s not my fault!” I cry.

“I know it’s not.”

We inch our way up the steps before I say what I really want to say.

“You think Ventura is the future of the Pro/Am, don’t you?”

Shoko sighs with every ounce of extra poundage. “It’s not that I think she
should
be.”

“But you think she
is
.”

Shoko’s four chins nod.

“Oh, this is just breedy,” I mutter. “Not even my best friend thinks I’m qualified to take over.”

I don’t mention how I know Malia would feel about it:

Break your contract while you still can!

“There is a question of your commitment,” Shoko says.

“My
commitment
?”

No one shows more commitment to school activities than I do! I’m president of the ECOmmunity Club, cocaptain of the soccer team (though we had to forfeit half of our season because we’d already lost Shoko and Malia when our striker was diagnosed with gestational diabetes), coach for the Science Olympiad . . .

Shoko grimaces, rubs her lower back. “Commitment to the
cause
,” she explains. “To bringing together amateurs and professionals in the promotion of positive pregging.”

“
I
was the first girl to sign a contract at this school!
I
made it the cool thing to do! And
I’m
not committed to the cause?”

“Well, not to be painfully obvious or anything, but it’s not like you can, like,
authentically
represent the Alliance when you’re the only unbump—”

“
Pre
bump!”

“Prebump. Whatever. But you
did
just turn sixteen,” Shoko says with a sympathetic shake of her head. “You don’t have much time left. . . .”

For the second time today, I’m brutally reminded of the repercussions of my looming obsolescence.

This is all Lib’s fault. As my RePro Rep, Lib needs to man up and start earning his 15 percent. It’s his job to put more pressure on the Jaydens to hurry up and hire the Sperm to my Egg because my biological clock is ticking away.

I must look pretty depressed because Shoko abruptly changes the subject. “Gossip!”

My breath catches in my throat. I blinded the MiNet last night because I was studying—as always—but also because I felt like being antisocial. I don’t care if there are MiFotos of Melody Mayflower standing next to a veiled and anonymous Church girl at the Mallplex. I could easily claim that she came faithing hard at me as Churchies are known to do. But if the MiNet is surging with MiFotos of Melody Mayflower standing next to an unveiled Church girl who looks
exactly like her
, I wanted to avoid those pics as long as possible. Would anyone believe I was being fotobombed?

“Did you hear the latest about Malia?”

I can’t exhale yet.

If I take credit for making it cool for Shoko, Ventura, and everyone else to pregg for profit, am I also to blame for what happened to Malia?

THE DOORBELL RINGS.

I take a quick glance in the mirror, relieved to see more of Melody than myself. I inhale deeply, unlock and open the door.

It’s Him. I mean, him.

“Yes, it’s really me,” he says, removing his mirrored sunglasses and flashing a smile.

Haloed in a golden light of the late-afternoon sun, Jondoe is more glorious in person than he was on-screen. Or in my dreams.

“There’s no spontaneity in these transactions, nothing left to chance,” he says, with a wide, bright grin. “Lib said you’d be here, so I thought I’d just connect in your facespace instead of the MiNet. I know you don’t like the traditional trappings of romance like flowers, which you are
so right
in saying is ironic because you’re Miss Melody May
flower
and all. . . .”

I almost correct him. Then I remember.
I am Miss Melody Mayflower.

“So I brought your favorite brand of GlycoGoGo Bars and a sixer of Coke ’99 instead.”

He presents me with a clutch of soda cans in one hand and a box in the other. Then he gives me a knowing look and says, “We might need these later, you know, to keep our energy up,” and laughs in a way that is meant to encourage me to laugh along with him. But I can’t laugh, I can’t accept his gifts, I can’t do anything.

“I’m Jondoe,” he purrs. “But you know that.”

He bypasses the handshake and extends his arms wide, waiting for me to give him a welcoming embrace that I am in no condition to give. When I don’t respond, he makes a clowny frowny face.

“Oh, come on, I’m not
that
bad, am I?” He’s smiling again, teasing me.

He must know that he is the very opposite of bad. He is the finest evidence of goodness on this earth that I have ever encountered.

“You’re disappointed. You think I’m hotter in the ads,” he groans. But the smile is still there, fully confident that he could be no such thing to me or anyone. He speaks with cozy familiarity, as if we have known each other forever. “Oh, there’s not enough Tocin in the world to get you to bump with me. . . .”

“Oh my grace!” I gasp at this sudden reminder of Jondoe’s intentions.

His face softens for a split second as it registers genuine surprise. “Ha ha ha!” He laughs beautifully, musically. “That’s funny.”

“I mean, um . . .”

My head fills with scrambled poetry from the Song of Songs, a book from the Old Testament that I’ve never cared much for before.

His mouth is sweetness itself; he is altogether lovely . . .

I cannot say such things! I will not! I swallow to clear my throat and try to speak.

“You look just like . . .”

Jesus.

He looks just like the Jesus in my dreams.