AllFreeNovel
Share Us
Tria looked over to me, and I didn’t know what to say. In many ways, I knew Yolanda could be right. I’d been here before, said I was done with all the shit before, but eventually I had gone back. I didn’t want that to happen again, but I couldn’t deny that Yolanda had history on her side.
I also knew there were some things I wouldn’t be able to cope with. I looked at Tria.
“If you die because of this, I’ll buy as much heroin as I can and shoot it until I’m dead,” I told her. “But as long as you’re okay, then I’ll stay away from it. Both for you and so we can have a family.”
“You aren’t making me feel great here,” Tria said.
“It’s all I got for now,” I replied. “I’ll do everything we talked about. I’ll get better—I swear.”
“Heard it,” Yolanda snapped.
“Shut up!” Tria yelled back at her.
“You’re young, naïve, and stupid,” Yolanda told her. “Stay here with me, and I’ll make sure you and the baby are taken care of.”
“No,” I said. “It’s my baby, and I’ll be protecting her.”
“Stop it!” Tria looked at me and then Yolanda. “Both of you. I can’t take any more.”
I looked down at her face and saw how pale she was.
“Fuck, Tria!” I cried as I grabbed her and pulled her against me. “Are you okay? Do we need to go to the hospital?”
“No, no,” Tria said. “I’m fine. I just—I can’t take any more of this. Yolanda, I need my stuff now, and then we’re leaving.”
I moved quickly and even enlisted Damon’s help so it could all be done in three trips instead of a half dozen. Yolanda continued to make remarks, but Tria must have tuned her out. I just wanted to get all this done as quickly as possible because our next stop was the clinic.
“You’re going to regret this,” Yolanda said as we walked out for the last time, “but you still have a place here when you figure that out.”
“Thank you,” Tria said curtly as she took my hand and started pulling me away.
Part of me felt like I ought to say something else to the only friend in my life for many, many years, but I just couldn’t find the right words.
Our last stop was the clinic at Hoffman College.
“You’re measuring at about eleven weeks,” the doctor said as she poked around. “Was your last period in March?”
I stood over in the corner and chewed on the edge of my thumb and waited for the other shoe to drop. Or get thrown at my head. Or just tie itself to the laces of my other shoe until I fell over and smashed my nose into the pavement.
Wait for the other shoe to drop.
What the fuck did that mean, anyway?
“That’s about when I went on The Pill,” Tria said. “Um…they were just kind of spotty after that, but the nurse said that was normal.”
“It is, usually,” the doctor confirmed. “You were one of those that got the bad batch, weren’t you?”
“Yes.”
“I’ll give you some paperwork you can send in, if you like.” She dug around in a desk drawer before handing a form to Tria. “There are some people trying to organize a class action suit.”
“Okay,” Tria said. She looked at me with worried eyes, but I didn’t know what she was thinking. I couldn’t focus because the whole scene was horribly familiar. I’d been here and done all this before, just with a different doctor at a different clinic.
“Your due date will be in the middle of November.” The doctor checked a couple of charts. “November fifteenth, to be precise.”
“Is she okay?” I finally asked. “I mean, is everything all right with Tria? The baby…I mean…is everything all right?”
“Everything is just fine,” she said. She looked over to me with a slight smile. “Dad’s a little nervous, I take it?”
