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My nod is soundless, eyes wide, almost daring not to breathe.
“It’s the glow, darlin’,” Patty chuckles. “I’ve been around a long line of pregnant ladies in my years and I can see it from a mile away. Your skin is bright; your hair is shiny. Expectant mothers just glow.”
Tears prick at my lashes. Patty puts her hands on my shoulders and looks me dead in the eye now.
“This world is complicated and messy sometimes,” she says seriously. “People have agendas, they play politics. They mess with each other to be cruel, or to get ahead. But those boys have been honest with you. They were honest with that Heather. And due to no fault of her own, she lost the men she loved. Sometimes things don’t work out. But that’s just life, and you have to live your best one. Yours, not hers.”
But that can’t be true. This is my business. This is how I’ll be treated if I can’t produce.
“I don’t agree,” come my slow words. “This is everything to me.”
Patty looks at me closely then, weighing her words carefully now.
“Honey, I never wanted to say this, but you’re not turning out to be very smart.”
At that, I jump in my seat, literally jerking backwards until my head bumps the wall painfully.
“What?” I gasp, eyes wide, whirling on my grandma. “What?” Nana’s never called me names before.
“Just sayin’,” she shrugs her thin shoulders. “I thought you were different from Marsha, but you’re not showing any promise.”
“What?” my voice almost screeches now. “What are you talking about?” It’s a nightmare to be compared to my mother.
“Haven’t you heard of leaving the past in the past?” Patty says forcefully now. “Move on! This woman is in their past. If I had a dime for every ex your grandfather had, I’d be a millionaire.”
I bite my lip. Of course. I shouldn’t be digging in my lovers’ romantic history, but still.
“Okay,” I say tightly. “Okay, I’ll try to put it behind me.”
“That’s right,” says Patty, nodding her head with approval. “You can’t help Heather anymore. And she shouldn’t be your business.”
Man, that’s an honest way of putting it. Slowly, I nod my head once. But Patty’s not done yet.
“Besides, you seem to be using them as well,” she tosses out casually, cocking her head once more. “You know, using goes both ways honey.”
I bolt up straight once more.
“What?” the shocked gasp escapes my lips. “What in the world? Of course I’m not using them!” comes my outraged sputter.
Because has Patty gone insane? What’s with these accusations and finger-pointing? I came to her house looking for comfort, not to be hurled into the fire.
But Nana continues.
“You’re using them too, honey,” she says calmly. “And you and I both know it.”
That’s not true.
“How am I using them?” I demand, hands balled on my hips. “How am I, a teen girl, using seven men? That’s preposterous,” is my vehement statement.
But Nana shakes her head wisely again.
“Marsha told me how you dropped out of college. She told me how you want a baby, even though you’re eighteen. She told me how you want to be a cook on TV, with a line of cookbooks to your name.”
I stare at my grandma.
“Well yes,” I say. “My ambitions are different from what my parents want for me. But that doesn’t mean I’m using the Morgans! It’s totally separate, a completely different issue. What does that have to do with anything?”
Nana looks at me closely once again, her gaze searching before shaking her head.
