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“I knew it,” her voice is full of triumph at being right.
“I guess I wasn’t that subtle.” I sigh.
“Not really,” she says. Her voice is a mix of serious and sad, and I remember what she said when she gave me her number. I cut the small talk and get right to the heart of it.
“Do you mind telling me what happened with the pregnancy?”
She expels a sharp breath. “I did say I would, didn’t I?”
“Yeah, but I won’t hold you to it. More than anything, I just want to say that I’m so sorry. And ashamed too, honestly. I was a kid doing things only men should. You deserved so much better.”
“It wasn’t your fault any more than it was mine. It wasn’t fair of me to imply it was. But, when I miscarried there were complications. And…I had to make some hard decisions that I hadn’t seen coming.”
“Like?”
“Removing my fallopian tubes. They were scarred and the doctor thought it was best.”
I wince because it sounds painful, but my knowledge of human anatomy is basically non existent. “What does that mean?”
“In short, I can’t get pregnant without IVF.”
“Shit, I’m so sorry.”
“I’m okay, now. And it wasn’t your fault. That was good old mother nature’s doing.”
“So, you’re really okay about the whole IVF thing??”
She sighs and hums briefly before she speaks again. "I guess. I mean, before I found out I was pregnant I hadn’t given any thought to whether I wanted to have kids. When I was faced with the choice to preserve my ability to get pregnant, but risk another complicated and potentially fatal pregnancy, it didn’t seem like a hard choice at all.”
“Really?”
“Yeah, I mean, I know first hand that giving birth to a kid doesn’t make you a parent. And look at you.”
I frown. “What does that mean?”
“You’re adopted and your family is tight knit as they come.”
"I’m not adopted, Beth.”
“Oh, I thought…I mean, yeah. I figured you had to be…seeing as Penn is Black, your father looked like he was biracial. And you look…like neither of those things.?”
“His father’s mother was Native American and German, his mother’s parents were from Haiti. My biological mother was someone my dad had an affair with. I never met her, but safe to say she was white.”
“Well, I guess I’m not the only one who kept important things to myself that summer.”
“Touché,”I concede the point with a good natured chuckle. But I feel like such a fool, again.
“I’m sorry about your dad. I know how much you loved him. I can imagine how hard it was when he died,” she says in a soft voice.
I bet she can imagine it too well after losing her sister. I rub at a spot on my chest where an ache lives just below the surface. “Thank you. I’m embarrassed because half the world knows I didn’t cope well with his passing.”
“Yeah, I saw it on the news,” she says vaguely and I appreciate her not asking me particulars. “Are you better now?’
“Yeah, I went to rehab to avoid serving a sentence and parole but I left there better. I don’t miss drinking. And I’m ready to make music again.”
"So, you came to fix up the house so you could sell it?”
“Yeah. It’s gonna be a lot of work. Half the ceiling on the main floor collapsed.”
