answer. My physical recovery was fine; the emotional recovery was a different matter. I was left with an emptiness inside me, and a very Catholic ache that told me I had sinned.
Maybe Lila and Joel are right to be upset with me. Maybe I’m self-destructive. Maybe I wanted this. Maybe on some level I had, despite a semi-consistent regimen of Ortho-Novum pills and Trojan ribbed condoms, tried to get pregnant. Maybe my body knew that this was my only path to redemption and decided, without consulting my brain, to go for it. I believe in my decision to keep this baby, but that doesn’t mean I think it’s necessarily the right decision, or that I recognize the girl who made it.
My sister raises her eyebrows. She has no use for ambiguity, vagueness, or long pauses. When something confuses her, she wants an answer. She is waiting; wanting to understand why I would veer so sharply off my life’s path. She wants to match up the sister in her memory—the one she’s known from early childhood to this Sunday morning—with the girl who stands before her now with the big, unwelcome news.
I wish I could help her. I always want to help Lila, although usually it ends up working the other way around. “Maybe I have lost my mind,” I say, as calmly as possible.
Then I turn my back to her and putter around the kitchen, trying to compose myself, trying to stay away from the coffee, trying to figure out where I am going to find the strength to stand behind this decision for another ten minutes, then for the remainder of this day, then for the rest of my life.
LILA
Two days after Gracie tells me she’s pregnant I catch her sneaking some guy out of her bed and out the back door. It is five in the morning. I’m barely conscious, huddled over a cup of coffee in the kitchen. I’m scheduled to be at the hospital by six.
I haven’t turned any lights on because I find it’s best to ease myself into the day. I am not a morning person. I feel I have been deeply wronged every time I have to wake up before seven A.M. It is probably for this reason—because I am already on the defensive—that at first the noise in the center of the house scares me. I straighten up and take a step toward the steak knives. I think: Burglar, rapist, six o’clock news, please don’t hurt me.
But then the noise draws out and separates into two sets of footsteps. I don’t bother to reach for the knives. I realize what is going on. No one is breaking in. Someone is breaking out.
I hear Gracie whisper, “The third step.” But he doesn’t hear her in time, and the third step gives a sharp whine. They both freeze for a moment, are silent, and then start again. She leads him not through the kitchen, which is directly under the bedroom I’m staying in, but through the dining room to the back door. My sister is good at this. At the door I catch a glimpse of him while they kiss good-bye. I’ve never seen him before. He’s a black guy, really skinny, holding his sneakers in his hand. Then the door is carefully, silently opened, and he is gone.
This pisses me off. It’s five fucking A.M., and all I wanted was a little peace and quiet with my coffee. But Gracie can’t help herself. Even when she isn’t trying, she’s throwing her life in my face, trying to make me share it with her. And the truth is, as she very well knows, I’m not interested. We used to understand each other, before I moved in here. We had a nice balance. We respected each other’s differences and we didn’t push too far. But when I moved in with Gracie, all balance was lost.
I think, If only I hadn’t lost my housing and been forced to stay here.
If only Gracie had kept her mouth shut. And her legs.
If only I could have slept until a civilized hour this morning. If only there wasn’t so much I had to do.
Gracie walks back through the kitchen and sees me holding my cup of coffee in the shadows. We give each other a good once-over. I see that she’s still half-asleep. Her face has that mushy look it gets after she’s been laid.
“Please lay off the self-righteous stare, Lila. I don’t need that.”