Immaculate (14 page)

He shook his head at me, his eyes glazing over. “I didn't pay that much attention at first, and after I overheard them, I kind of rushed off before they could realize I'd been there. But they were our age, I guess. The girl who was talking had dark hair pulled back in a ponytail, and I don't really remember the other girl. She didn't say much, just a lot of gasping and squealing while she listened. I wish I could give you more. I'm sorry. I really am. I don't know anyone around here yet.”

Dark hair was enough evidence to clinch it. Though he could have said red or blonde or white or even hot pink for that matter, and I still would have found a way to link it all back to Izzy.

Tears started pricking at the corners of my eyes, and I turned toward the door.

“Thanks for telling me. Really. It was only a matter of time before it got out anyway, and you just confirmed my suspicions. It's almost a relief to know that there's nothing I can do to stop it now. Do you know how impossible it is to keep secrets in this town? Everyone in Green Hill will probably know about this by the time the first bell rings on Monday.”

“So . . . it's true then?” His question was so faint, I almost missed it under the hiss of the old air vent on the ceiling above us.

I opened my mouth to respond, but something inside of me snapped before I could speak. I couldn't be standing here in this dingy back room for a second longer, crying loud enough for everyone in the restaurant to hear me. I ran through the kitchen and out the back door, but I only made it as far as the stoop before I couldn't go any farther, not without completely falling apart along the way. I sat down on the cold cement step and cradled my head in my knees, rocking myself back and forth as the tears ran in sloppy streams down my arms and legs. I heard Jesse step out and close the door behind me, but I didn't move or look up to acknowledge him, even when he sat down next to me and put his arm around my shoulders. I heard Carl come and go, too, and heard Jesse mumble something about him needing to cover the front for the rest of the night.

After what could have been ten minutes or an hour, the tears finally seemed to reach their peak—all of the water had been drained from my body into a puddle on the pavement beneath me. The orange light of the streetlamps sparkled against the slick asphalt, lighting up my tears with a fiery glow.

“You didn't have to be out here with me,” I said at last, when I was able to speak again. “But I'm glad you were. Thanks for that.”

“No problem. I didn't want you to be alone. You can talk to me if you want. Or we can just sit here. Your call.”

I sniffed, wiping my dripping face and nose against the sleeve of my T-shirt. “You don't have to believe me, of course. I don't expect you to. But everything you heard that girl say was true, even the part about me claiming to be a virgin.”

He didn't say anything to that, just sat there staring out at the fields across the street, a faraway look in his eyes, as if he was on some other stoop, in some other place entirely.

I realized suddenly how much I wanted him to believe me. Needed it, even. It didn't matter that I barely knew him, that I'd ignored his existence for the last few months. There was something about him, the sense that he was so much older and wiser than his years, maybe, or the feeling that there was something so genuine and real and good about him, despite or even
because
of his quirks. He didn't seem to care about what other people thought, at least not superficial high school kids. I wanted him on my side. I wanted him to trust me. Before I could stop myself or rethink what I was actually asking, I opened my mouth.

“Do you remember your first night here at Frankie's? The old woman I made you more or less kick out while I ran away through the back door?”

He nodded, and I could see the surprise on his face, that of all the questions or things to say about what was happening, I was babbling about that strange old lady.

“I was running because she scared me. What she said to me scared me.” I paused, picking at a hangnail on my thumb while I collected my thoughts. “She told me that I would be pregnant, and that it was her job to keep me safe. To protect me. She said that it was time, and that they were ready—whoever
they
are—that the whole world was ready for it to happen. For me to have this baby. Then she asked for my approval, and I said yes. I said
yes
to her. You were there already when that happened. I ran out saying
yes
, just to make the getaway easier. I didn't have time to think about any of it. Not that any amount of time thinking about that question could have helped me to answer better.”

I watched his profile while I talked, trying to gauge at least some tiny piece of what he was thinking. There was no gaping jaw, no crinkled forehead, no squinting eyes. That alone gave me hope.

“Something happened that night. I don't know why or how or any of the questions that really matter to everyone, but it did. I had a strange dream afterward, too, strange but beautiful, with all sorts of bright, amazing colors I can still see every night when I close my eyes.” I sighed, wishing that those colors would suddenly light up the whole sky above us—that life and God or whatever and whoever was in control of all this would give me some kind of sign. Give me some kind of proof that I wasn't just creating some insane fairy tale in my mind. Didn't I deserve that? Didn't I deserve some reward for
trying
to believe? For fighting through the doubt? But the sky stayed dark, the same old stars and the same old moon shining down on me. I guess that was maybe how faith worked, though. Faith was trusting in the absence of all the facts; it was an active, constant attempt at believing in someone or something I couldn't understand.

Faith, I was learning, wasn't easy. But then again, wasn't I carrying around the proof of a miracle, every minute of every day for these nine months? Wasn't that why I had a bump that I couldn't hide anymore? Maybe it was selfish of me to think that I needed more evidence than what I already had. Maybe this baby had always been more than enough.

After all, people had believed—had had faith—without this kind of tangible proof for thousands of years. People had believed enough to start wars over it, to lose their lives for it. Faith in something more had been part of the human race from the very beginning of existence. If anything should seem strange to me now, shouldn't it be that I'd never believed in anything more than my everyday life before this baby?

“She talked to me,” he said, turning to face me, instantly pulling my mind back to that stoop. His cheeks were strangely white, drained of any color in the hazy light. “She talked to me after you left. I would have told you sooner . . . I wanted to, actually, but you haven't exactly seemed interested in talking to me, so I guess I sort of forgot about it somehow. Until now.”

“What did she say?” I could feel my heartbeat soar, could hear the rapid thudding in my ears. He knew something. He held another piece of the puzzle.

“She said that when the time came, I shouldn't be afraid to believe in you. That I should support you and trust in whatever you'd have to tell me.” He stared at me as if he was seeing me for the first time, his eyes scanning over every curve and every shadow of my face. I wanted to hide, cover myself with my hands, but I stayed still. I let him look.

He laughed then, but it wasn't the sort of hostile laugh that I'd come to expect. He sounded amazed, like a little kid almost, excited to have made some awesome new discovery.

“Well, now,” he said, one of his trademark grins slowly spreading across his face, lighting up the dark stoop. “I guess I have to believe you, right? No choice in the matter, it would seem. That solves that for us.”

I heard myself giggle in response. The sound was completely foreign to me after the last few weeks.

“It's that easy to convince you?” I asked, savoring the unexpectedly easy, happy moment. “For all you know, that was my grandma and I begged her to go along with this whole incredible, elaborate story, just to keep myself entertained. You never know.”

“I may hardly know you, Mina, but something tells me that you're not the kind of girl to take the risk of ruining your image quite so lightly, not for the sake of some ridiculously premeditated practical joke.” He paused to beam at me again, dimples on full display, and had we been anywhere else, talking about anything else, I would have thought we were flirting. But we weren't. We couldn't be, not here and now. “It all sounds pretty outrageous, I know it does. But it feels good to believe in something this crazy, you know? To believe that there's something in the world that we can't explain. I like it. I want a little crazy in my life.”

“Ha. Be careful what you wish for,” I said, though
crazy
didn't sound so bad to me, not when he put it like that. Maybe I needed more crazy, too. Maybe I always had, and this was life's over-the-top way of giving it to me.

“I warn you, once the entire school knows—and they will know very soon, I'm sure, because Green Hill plays a pretty vicious game of whisper down the lane—all bets are off. You'll be putting your whole reputation on the line to be seen anywhere near me. I don't want to suck you into my mess.”

“Reputation? Please. I don't have a good reputation now. I don't have
any
reputation at all, in fact. So you definitely don't have to worry about that, trust me. But this will all add some nice color to my first and last year in public high school, that's for sure. I've been homeschooled my whole life, up until my parents very recently decided that sending me off into the real world for senior year would be a good way to prepare me for college life. Just in time to be your bodyguard and knight in shining armor, it seems. Everybody wins.”

“How are you winning?” I asked.

“Well, now you
have
to be my friend, of course.” His lips were still curled up in a smile, but his eyes looked dimmer, as if part of him had crawled off into that other world he so often seemed to live in. “You probably haven't noticed, Mina, but I've yet to make any of those at our school. And if I'm being totally honest with you, despite my pretty tremendously charming personality, I've never had many friends to begin with. I blame the homeschooling, but I think it's probably my wicked intelligence and dashing good looks, too. Deadly combo. Scares people away.” He laughed then, softening the blow of such a sad, intimate detail about his life. It surprised me to think that the boy with the beautiful smile could be so lonely.

But I could see, I suppose, why people would be put off by his spacy, zoned-out way, his offbeat sense of style that made it clear he didn't follow anyone else's rules. As soon as someone reached out to him, he snapped out of his shell, and he was warm and friendly and interesting—but that was just it. Someone else had to make the effort first. And in a new high school filled with strangers, that could be a lot to ask for. After all, even I had taken this long to come around.

“I'm glad we have it all sorted out then,” I said, nudging him with my elbow as I looked down at my wrist to check the time. I'd gotten into the habit of wearing the gold watch I'd bought Nate for our anniversary—silly, I knew, but somehow having it there, on me, tracking my days, made me feel as if Nate wasn't lost for good. At the very least, it had been too expensive to just waste away in a drawer, and I couldn't bring myself to return it to the store. Just in case. Just in case Nate ever found a way to forgive me. But now, sitting so close to Jesse, the watch made me feel almost guilty. As if I was betraying Nate somehow, feeling this connected to a boy who wasn't him.

I spun the watch, hiding the face along the inside of my wrist. “We should probably go back in now. Save your uncle from the mountain of things I'm sure he still has to do. I believe there's a big box that needs carrying, too. But I promise to only watch from the sidelines while I direct you.” My hands automatically flew to my stomach as I said that, cupping the tiny bump that was hiding under my apron.

His eyes followed my movement, and we both sat there staring at my hands, thinking about what was actually under them, just inches beneath the surface of my skin. No matter how many times every minute of every day I'd thought about that baby, that little miniature person growing inside of me, it never felt any less mystifying or any less spectacular.

“I'm not far enough along for the baby to kick,” I said, filling the space with the first thought that came to my head. “But soon, I hope.”

“Can I . . . Can I touch it?” He looked away as he asked. “I'm sorry, that was probably a weird thing to say. I don't want to make you uncomfortable.”

“No. No, it's fine,” I said, though the idea of his hand on my stomach actually terrified me. “You can touch it.” My mom and Gracie and Hannah were the only people I'd let get that close. But I couldn't say no to Jesse. And I didn't want to, I realized.

He reached out and I moved my hands off to my lap to give him room. His fingers were light and cautious, landing on my stomach one tip at a time. Neither of us said anything for a minute or so, letting the full weight of everything settle on the stoop around us.

“Why do you think . . .” He paused, his hand still resting over the baby. “Why do you think Iris needed the child to be born from a virgin? Or from a person at all? Why not just have him or her delivered down to earth by, I don't know, an angel or something? Some kind of divine messenger?”

I sighed, so heavily that I felt his hand carried by the rise and fall of my belly. I closed my eyes, trying to be less aware of his touch, his warmth spreading through the thin layer of my cotton T-shirt. “Trust me. I've asked myself that question. It doesn't really make sense, does it? Why does there have to be a carrier at all? What am I? Why me? Why any of this? But I'll never understand. I don't think I'll ever get an answer.”