Dear Cassie (13 page)

Weeks before the day with Amy in the bathroom, the rumor Ruthie had been spreading about me came true. When I found out, I couldn’t admit it right away. For two weeks, I told myself I must have counted wrong. But when a whole month went by, I knew my period wasn’t just late, it was ridiculous.

Aaron was supposed to come and see me at Pudgie’s that night, like he always did during my break, so we could do the thing that did the thing I was now dreading was true. I knew I couldn’t see him, so I told him I was staying home sick. I needed to know before I could see him again. I needed to know
if
I could see him again.

That night, instead of meeting Aaron in his black convertible and driving to the park and moving into his warm leather backseat, I went to the drugstore across the street from Pudgie’s and bought a pregnancy test. I’d never thought about it until that night, but I guess it wasn’t a coincidence they were in the same row as the condoms. Maybe that was their way of warning you.

Apparently, I didn’t get the message.

I paid for the test with my head down and carried it in a lunch-size paper bag to the McDonald’s next door. I walked in to that familiar McDonald’s smell, fries and ammonia. I fought back the nausea that was high in my throat.

I went into the bathroom, locked myself in one of the stalls, and tried not to think how pathetic
that
was while I peed on a stick. I stood on the toilet for ten minutes while the test percolated—so no one could see me—while I waited to see if my shitty life was about to get exponentially shittier.

I had some time to think during those minutes. Some time to read the things written on the stall. Things about girls to call for a good time, about being sweet and wiping the seat. I thought about how my mother must have felt when she found out she was pregnant with me. She couldn’t have had any idea that one day, the baby she’d be having would be standing in a McDonald’s bathroom waiting to see if she was going to have a baby. Wishing she was not going to have a baby.

A baby she couldn’t have.

A baby I knew now was made with a boy’s lies.

The alarm on my cell beeped. It echoed in the stall as I got down off the toilet and picked up the test. It wobbled in my hand like it was one of those old thermometers that people were meant to shake. Like my mother standing over me as a child, while she told me I better not be sick because her bus route wasn’t going to drive itself so she could stay home with me.

I looked at the test. It had a blue plus sign and a circle on it. I didn’t even have to look at the box to know I was totally fucked. My head buzzed like there was a jet engine between my ears. I couldn’t think. I couldn’t see and I had to be back at work.

Soon.

Now.

I wrapped the test up in a tissue and threw it in the trash. It had done its job—tell me I was royally screwed—so what did I need it for anymore?

That night after work my mother picked me up like she always did. Her car was running while she waited in Pudgie’s parking lot, the headlights on, like she didn’t even want to waste the time to turn them off. I knew it was because she couldn’t wait to get out of there, so she could get home and drink.

I got in the car and tried not to think that there were three of us in there instead of the usual two, that there had been three of us in there for a whole month and I didn’t know it.

“I’m out of smokes,” my mother said, staring out the windshield. She didn’t usually say hello, so this was not surprising.

I didn’t respond. The only thing in my head was,
Holy fuck, I’m pregnant. Fuck me. Fuck me for letting Aaron fuck me.

I’m sure I looked white, whiter than I usually did, even with Pudgie’s dough flour all over me. I’m also sure I was shaking, not that my mother would notice anyway because she was out of cigarettes. She didn’t notice anything when she was out of cigarettes.

“I hope you don’t have to piss or anything, because I’m stopping on the way home,” she said, pulling out of the lot.

I still didn’t respond. I guess I was afraid to. Anything I could say would seem stupid considering what I was dealing with at that moment. How could I ask her why she didn’t stop off on the way to pick me up instead, now that there was something growing in my belly? I put on my seat belt. When I clicked it shut, I couldn’t help feeling my stomach. What was in there? A little me, a little Aaron. I looked at my mom. A little my mom?

God, I hoped not.

My mother turned out of the parking lot, her face as taut as a pulled-back rubber band. She was chewing on her lip, which meant she had been out of cigarettes for a while. I thought about having a cigarette when I got home, about being alone in my room and smoking as many cigarettes as I had left in my pack out my bedroom window, maybe even burning the insides of my wrists with them so I could
feel
something, but then I remembered the warning about smoking during pregnancy being harmful to your baby.

I was pregnant. I had a baby.

“I’m stopping here,” my mother said, pulling into Gas-N-Go. She didn’t really need to tell me, but maybe she’d noticed how silent the car was and felt like she had to say something. At least I didn’t have to.

I’d been to Gas-N-Go before. The place was a hole, but it was pretty lenient when it came to carding. Of course, no one was going to card my mom. On her best days her skin looked like a rotten potato.

She didn’t ask me if I wanted anything, simply slammed the car door and left me in the parking lot. Not like she usually asked me, but I guess it seemed weird because I was pregnant now. Not that she knew it, but pregnant women needed things, didn’t they?

She took her keys with her, leaving me sitting in the dark, quiet car. No music or A/C for me, but maybe she was afraid I would drive away. That night I might have considered it. I could just go. Drive far away and never look back. Maybe my baby and I could make a life for ourselves in North Dakota or some other state with two words besides New York.

Aaron, that fucking bastard. Of course, this wasn’t entirely his fault. We used protection, but obviously it didn’t protect me. I felt myself start to cry, hot, fast, and furious, like the steam coming from a whistling teapot. I never cried. I didn’t even cry on the night I was arrested. Lila cried like a fucking drama queen and Amy seemed too scared to do anything but stare at her nails.

But I was crying now, and that scared me more than anything because it let me know how scared I must truly have been.

I needed to get home, to lock myself in my room and get under my covers and suck on my unlit cigarettes.

What was taking my mom so long? I tried to look through the front window and into the store.

I saw my mother up at the counter. There was no one in front of her, she was already holding her cigarettes, so why didn’t she pay for them and get outside so we could go? I looked closer. She was talking to someone,
yelling
at someone.

Amy.

I went for my seat belt. Amy. I hadn’t seen her since our arraignment. I missed her. Missed how I knew she saw me, like someone strong. Like someone who could defend herself. Like someone who didn’t fucking cry. Then I stopped.

What was I going to tell her? And what would she say back? Considering she was working at Gas-N-Go, she had her own shit to deal with. Considering she was talking to my mother right now, she had more than her own shit to deal with.

And looking back, what I hated to realize was that Aaron had been part of it.

He probably used her, just like he used me. Or maybe he’d liked her and I was the one getting used. Either way, knowing what I know about them now, I am glad I didn’t go in to see her.

I watched as my mother continued to yell, and I couldn’t help wondering why she never yelled at me. Why was she picking Amy to yell at? I looked down at my lap. I didn’t want Amy to see me. All I needed was for her to look out there. For her to look at me and know something was wrong. Know something was very wrong.

Know that something happened to me that I could never take back, no matter what I did.

Know that she had been this close to being me, but was somehow stronger.

18 Fucking Days to Go

I
waited to wake Troyer until I could hear Nez snoozing. Luckily, Nez was very tired. I was very tired, too, but Nez was even more so. That day we’d learned how to pitch a tent and while Nez claimed she could easily make a boy pitch a tent in his pants, actual tent-pitching was beyond her. While trying to put hers up she had looked like someone dressed as a ghost on Halloween, with the tent as the bed sheet. She flailed around underneath it, like she couldn’t find the eyeholes.

As much as I would have liked it to be because Nez was an idiot, it wasn’t her fault. We weren’t allowed to use those easy pup tents that even someone without hands can put together. Our tents had lots of metal pole pieces and parts and stakes that looked like giant nails. By the end of the day Nez had almost said a real, actual swear word.

When we’d gotten back to the cabin, Rawe sat us on our beds and asked us if we wanted to talk, like the way she had seen me the day before had jogged her memory that she was supposed to be “helping” us in more ways than just Assessment Diary word count.

None of us had spoken. Not like Troyer would have anyway, but even Nez kept her mouth shut. It was clear that the more Rawe tried to get us to talk, the more we burrowed into ourselves. But it was impossible to burrow into yourself without thinking about why you didn’t want to talk in the first place.

I was starting to wonder if that was the whole point.

I stood above Troyer’s bed and shook her. Fortunately, I didn’t have to worry about her making noise, so I could be sure she wouldn’t scream and wake Nez up. Nez could not be a part of this mission. I needed Ben to myself. It would have made sense to bring her so she could have kept Ben busy while I snatched his cigarettes, but his cigarettes were hidden under his mattress. So I would have to be right there watching Nez keep him busy while I tried to snatch the smokes.

I definitely wanted his cigarettes, but I didn’t want them that badly.

When Troyer’s eyes opened, like white saucers in the dark, I said, “Come on, I need you.”

She didn’t move right away, just looked at me, her sleeping bag pulled up to her chin, her face peeking out like a pea from a pod.

“Troyer, seriously,” I said, showing her my flashlight. I swept it over me so she could see I was totally dressed, complete with my boots.

She grabbed her pad and scribbled,
Why?
Where?

“Please, Troyer,” I said. I didn’t want to get into why and where because the more time we spent in the cabin, the better chance Nez would wake up.

Troyer sat and indicated Nez across the room.

“Screw Nez,” I said.

She took out her pad and scribbled on it again.
If she finds out we went without her she’ll kill us.

“I’ll take care of her,” I said, even though I had no idea what that meant.

Troyer bit her bottom lip and got dressed.

We closed the cabin door quietly behind us and once we were far enough so our flashlights couldn’t be seen when we turned them on, Troyer held my arm.

“What?” I asked.

She looked at me. She didn’t have to write her question down. I was starting to understand her facial expressions. She was asking me why we were doing this.

“I need a smoke,” I said.

She continued to look at me, her eyes hooded.

“Yes, that badly,” I said, trudging in front of her. I heard her follow behind me.

We were going to get Ben’s cigarettes. I sure as hell didn’t know how, but we were going. If Nez could shimmy in that cabin twice and hook up with two different boys and not get caught, I was definitely going to be able to get in there and find the cigarettes hidden under Ben’s mattress. I didn’t even bother telling Troyer that I was bringing her with me because I knew what she had done at the stable. I was saving that in case I ever needed it.

“You’ll go in first and check things out,” I said. “You’re so quiet they probably won’t even notice you.”

I heard Troyer stop walking behind me. I turned and saw her arms smack at her sides.

“What?” I asked.

She tilted her head.

“Yes, I know this is for me,” I said.

Her head stayed tilted.

“Fine,” I said, “I’ll go in first.”

She nodded and we kept walking past the dining hall. I considered forgetting the cigarettes and breaking in there so I could sit on a real toilet. Flush a real toilet. Turn on a faucet with clean, cold water, not pump water. It was weird the things I’d started to miss. You would think it would be my cell phone, the Internet, music, even TV, but no, it was the feel of my ass on cold porcelain. It was a shower without a time limit. It was a bed I didn’t have to check for fleas.

It was froofy-smelling soap.

We hit the soccer field. The grass was high and wet with dew; I could feel the dampness coming through the legs of my uniform. I looked behind me—Troyer was still following. I could hear her breath, steady like the chug, chug, chug of a locomotive.