sneaker in the watery muck of the pond. I was mortified, because there were other kids from my school at Sarachi’s Pond who might have seen me get hit in the head, and because my sneakers were brand new. It took ten minutes for Dad to convince me that if I took off my other sneaker I would look fine, and I calmed down enough to return to the blanket.
Our parents sat between Lila and me while we played Monopoly. There were strong and sudden gusts of wind, so we had to tuck our cards under our feet, and clutch the fake money in our fists. Silence fell over us, and the game dragged on and on. I began to think I would turn fourteen still sitting on that blanket. Lila kept pulling her favorite article of the day, about a car wreck in South Jersey, out of her sock and then sliding it back in. At one point, just before I threw down my cards and begged to go home, I grew aware of what we must look like to other families, couples, and children in the park. Unhappy, and ill-suited to one another. I realized, in that moment, that even though we were a family, we did not necessarily belong together. We did not necessarily work.
I LAY my hand on my stomach and watch the ducks flap their wings and quack. I visited Sarachi’s Pond often as a teenager and then later during college vacations. I lost my virginity here, to Billy Goodwin, when I was sixteen. Soon after, I became an expert on having sex in cars. I knew how to do it in the front passenger seat, with the guy on the bottom, me sitting facing him, pelvis to pelvis, my legs spread as wide as they’d go. I learned, after a few bad bruises, how to avoid the stick shift.
But sex in the backseat was always the best, my head against one door and my feet propped against the other. That was my locked-in position, where I shimmied and quaked beneath the boys. “Free Fallin” or “Brown Eyed Girl” or something from Billy Joel’s Glass Houses album played on the radio. The inside of the car smelled like an overripe mixture of Naugahyde seats, sweaty towels from wrestling or football practice, and a sweet hint of the red Slurpee we’d shared earlier at 7-Eleven. I would bury my face in the plush seat and breathe that smell in. I have to say that having sex in bed is overrated. Sometimes it is better to have less space, less range of motion, fewer options. Cramped spaces lead to greater acts of creativity and a special kind of intensity. I had some very good evenings at Sarachi’s Pond.
I slide my hand down and touch myself, through the fabric of my pants. Just a soft pressure to say, I haven’t forgotten about you. I miss you. Then I pull my hand away, and cross my arms over my chest. Unborn little girls or insanely jealous redheads could approach my car at any moment. Even alone, I’m not safe.
I suddenly hear Grayson’s question, Why do you want to have a baby?
His voice, in the still car, is inescapable.
I don’t try to come up with an answer. I don’t have one. I am obviously good at getting pregnant, no one can argue with that. Maybe I have found my gift. Maybe this is what I am meant to do. Maybe I will be like Gram and spend the rest of my premenopausal life bearing children.
The problem is, I am not as uninformed as that reasoning sounds. For my own peace of mind, I wish I were. After all, I have written numerous Dear Abby responses to teenage girls telling them that having a baby is not an answer. When the girls complain of a feeling of emptiness inside, I have told them in no uncertain terms to find another way to fill the void. Join a team. Be the creator of something— an art project, or a play. Write in your journal. Try to have a conversation with your parents. Wait until you have grown up and into yourself.
That is what I would have told my teenage self as she was steaming up Billy Goodwin’s mother’s Volvo at Sarachi’s Pond. But I needn’t have bothered. I knew better back then. I was vigilant with birth control. I went on the Pill three days after I lost my virginity, and took