“I-I’m not sure,” she stammers. “A few days? Maybe a week? I don’t really keep track?—”
My heart plummets to my stomach. “You’re pregnant?”
“No,” she says quickly. “I mean, I don’t know.”
“What do you mean, ‘you don’t know?’”
“I haven’t taken a pregnancy test or anything,” she explains. “I just know I’m late. And I was wondering if?—”
“What the fuck, Teeny,” I shoot back, my voice growing louder. This shit cannot be happening right now. Not rightfuckingnow. “How could you do this to me?”
She starts to cry and a desperate sob breaks from her quivering lips. “Everett, I’m sorry.”
She reaches for my hand, but I recoil. I’m so fucking angry. So pissed at my dad, at myself. I rise from the booth, and stand there, needing to put some distance between me and her.
Another sob cuts into the space between us. She inches closer to me. “Everett, please,” she begs. “Please. Just sit down so we can talk.”
“I have to go,” I say angrily. My entire body starts to tense and spiral into a bulging knot of frustration, and I don’t want to say something to Teeny that I’ll regret. “I can’t be here.”
“Everett,” she cries.
“I’m sorry, Teeny.”
* * *
I don’t remember getting to Jake’s. I barely remember the four shots of Jameson I practically funneled down my throat within the hour I arrived and the bottles of beer I drank after. Even once I’ve slumped onto the couch in the living room, the TV playing some music video on MTV with the sound blasting through the surround sound speakers, my memory feels muddled in a foggy haze.
“Everett!” A high-pitched squeal, one that’s overzealous and fake, grates through my ears. It sounds stretched, like there’s four extra syllables to my name in addition to the given three.
I lift one eye wider, taking in a blurry figure with dark hair and a red dress, to see Angelica hover over me.
“Where’s your girlfriend?”
A zap zings through my chest at the mention of Teeny. A garbled sound gurgles up my throat. Something like, “I don’t know,” though it sounds closer to, “Ah uh no.”
I feel hands on me, sloppy grazes against my shirt reaching across my chest to my shoulder. A thud of a head landing on my arm followed by giggles. It’s so loud, I can barely make out anything aside from Angelica’s wobbly laughs with her cheek pressed against mine. I smell the acrid scent of alcohol on her breath, and my stomach churns. I try to turn away, lifting my arms to shove at her, but all I do is flop my hands. By the time I’ve given up on my fight, my hands land on her bare thigh, and my fingers itch to create some distance between us.
My head feels like it’s resting on a spring instead of my neck. The cushion behind me catches the back of my head as it lands with a soft thump. Everything starts to spin, and I feel like my insides are liquifying, making the alcohol spread all the way down to my toes. I don’t think I’ve ever been this drunk.
But who the fuck cares. Who the fuck cares if I end up in the hospital, my stomach pumped with my mom by my side, realizing how much of a fucking disappointment I am. How much I’ve become my dad with an illegitimate child on the way. I’m going to be a fuckingdad. Right alongside my own. The man who single-handedly ruined our family is going to share this experience with me with his own baby. How did things get so fucked up? How the fuck am I supposed to be a dad? Oh god, my childandmy brother or sister are going to be the same goddamn age. They’re going to grow up not knowing who’s Dad and who’s Grandpa. I feel sick just thinking about what our family dynamic will look like. All the judgy stares and whispered gossip about all of us. My dad, my mom, Teeny, our child. This is such a fucked-up situation.
And Teeny. I ruined her life. Forget her art, something that she’s passionate about with her entire heart. Forget college, not just for me but for her too. I can’t believe how I treated her. Leaving her in tears while she begged me to stay. I should’ve stayed. I should’ve held her and told her we’d figure things out. That we’d be okay as long as we stuck by each other. Regardless if this was a mistake, we’d make it work. Because I love her. I love her so fucking much, and if a surprise like this was the result of how much we love each other, then so be it.
There isn’t a problem with me wanting to be with Teeny. The idea of spending the rest of my life with her, living in our own home while watching our baby grow, springs this sudden thrill to course through my body. Forget my dad and his affair. Forget all the shit my parents are going through. My priority is with Teeny and our baby.
Everything feels dark. In the flurry of my epiphany, I see flash images of our future. Bringing an infant home, gingerly moving the car seat from the car to a rented apartment somewhere north of San Diego. Somewhere close to home yet far enough that we have a sense of independence. Me working and juggling school, tired but focusing on the reward of coming home to my family every night. Teeny finding time to paint in the moments I carve out for her by taking on responsibilities at home, so she doesn’t lose her zest for her art.
“What the fuck!” I hear a grating screech next to me. I start to sputter, ice cold water hitting my face and shooting up my nose. The darkness suddenly clears, a burst of cold and light crashing into me like a Mack truck.
I feel the heaviness of limbs over my chest and thighs, scrambling against me in a clumsy manner. My eyes pry open, and I see Angelica right next to me, her red dress darkened with water stains as she wipes away at it with her hands. I barely register her standing from the spot next to me and walking away. That’s when I see Teeny standing over me, an empty cup dangling from her fingers.
Even in my drunken haze, my blurry vision obscuring not only my sight but my judgment too, all I see is how beautiful Teeny is. Her face is red, the anger making her cheeks flushed. Her hair is tied up in a messy knot, and she’s swimming in my hoodie, and all I want to do is wrap my arms around her. I want to tell her how sorry I am and how badly I regret how I reacted to her news. I want to tell her about what happened with my dad so she’d understand and hopefully see how troubling it was for me to handle the news of our own possible pregnancy. I want to tell her that we’ll go right now to take a pregnancy test, just so we can confirm her assumptions and celebrate instead of dwelling over all the scary things that come with this unexpected surprise.
I want to tell her that I love the name Daniel for a boy because it was my best friend’s name in kindergarten, and the name is linked to so many happy memories for me. And last, I want to tell her that I can’t wait to watch her become a mother. To see her stomach grow bigger knowing it’s our baby in there while anticipating the day that I get to see her holding him or her.
But I don’t say any of that. Instead, my mouth moves in slow motion when I say her name. “Teeny,” I slur, barely lifting a hand.
Then she chucks something into my chest. My hand moves by reflex, catching it as it tumbles down to my stomach. I lift it up to my hand, using a monumental amount of strength to clear my head and register what I’m looking at.
