see this if he’s already looking for it. You’ll know what that means when the time comes.
Love always,
Meg
What the hell?
I’m about to tear open the book, but the parking lot is filling up, and there are more and more people walking past as it gets closer to game time. “Hey, Number One! Kick some ass tonight!” one guy says as he passes. I nod numbly and go inside. The halls are quiet and dark; it’s a nice night out, so no one’s taking the shortcut through school on their way to the field. I turn a few corners until I’m deep in the middle of the school, away from the people and the locker room, and I sit on the floor next to a water fountain.
I take a deep breath and flip quickly through the book. Sure enough,
Mabel
Alan
Ryden
is written on the inside back cover. What catches me off guard is that most of the book is blank. There are only a few pages with writing on them, right at the beginning. Maybe Meg really did run out of time before she could finish it.
February 5.
Ten days before she died.
I’ve been thinking about calendars a lot lately. I used to fill them with school assignments and plans and college visits and application deadlines. Doctor appointments too. But now planning, dates, schedules mean nothing to me anymore. I only have two things left to do: give birth to my baby and die. And I think I can remember that easily enough. No need to write it down.
Now that I don’t have many calendar boxes left to check off, I’m left wondering if the boxes I had were full enough. And every time, I come up with the same answer: yes.
I haven’t written about this yet, maybe because I had to get to this point in order to look back clearly. Or maybe I didn’t want to risk anyone—Ryden especially—finding out while I was still healthy enough to get mad at. We’ve finally gotten back to us these last few months—no more fighting. It’s been really nice. But I’m out of time. I have to write it down, otherwise no one will ever know, and it will be like it never happened. And it did happen. And I don’t regret it one bit.
So here goes:
I got pregnant on purpose.
I’m sorry, what? WHAT?!?
There, I said it. Or wrote it. Whatever. Whoever’s reading this, please don’t hate me. Just listen. Or read, I guess.
I didn’t even know if it would work, to be honest. I’d already done one round of chemo, and Dr. Maldonado said chemo can mess with your reproductive system. I wanted to try anyway. Because I knew when I got my diagnosis that I was going to die. Dr. Maldonado doesn’t sugarcoat this stuff. The cancer was advanced. It had spread. The odds were not good. Yes, there was a small amount of shrinkage after the first round of chemo, but not enough to matter. It’s my body, and I know it well. I’ve known from the beginning I was going to end up here, staring at an empty calendar. It sucks, but it’s the truth.
I wanted to take the time I had and really do something with it. I wanted to make my life matter, to leave behind a legacy. And after Alan said I should “live my life” that day in his room, it all clicked. I’m not an artist or a filmmaker or even a very good writer, but there was something I could create that would be important and make a difference in the world. A baby. I could use what was left of my life to give life to someone else. Like magic. And I actually had a boyfriend for the first time in my life. An amazing boyfriend who I wanted to be with on every possible level. It couldn’t have been more perfect.
So we did it. We had sex. And then we did it a few more times. We never used a condom, because as far as Ryden knew, I was on the pill, though I’ve never taken the pill in my life.
Ryden would never talk to me again if he knew I got pregnant on purpose. He didn’t want to keep the baby. I hate that I’ve been lying to him, but I can’t lose him. I need him. I love him so much. And I love our baby so much, even though I haven’t met her yet.