27. Carrie
27
CARRIE
S itting around the house was boring enough, but add to that being tortured by the fact that Ryan hadn't responded to any of my texts asking to talk or the voicemails I left for him telling him I needed to explain what was going on. It wasn't something I wanted to discuss over the phone because I figured he would end up not even believing me and thinking it was a story.
So today I forced myself out of the house. I'd sat there for the past five days moping and feeling sorry for myself and eventually ceasing my attempts to contact Ryan. My heart was broken and overwhelmed, but it was for the best. It was inevitable, anyway. Ryan was always going to find out, and he was always going to be upset with me. When he eventually stopped hating me long enough to contact me, I could explain the baby wasn’t his and even submit to paternity testing if he wanted.
Now, I was following the advice Ethan gave me during one of my sobbing sessions on a video call. I could've decided to go home to Chicago and hide there, but I was home for Christmas now. And with just a week left, I needed gifts. I'd already decided I wanted to buy my father something special, a weekend getaway for him and Mom in the Twin Cities at the mall. I knew how much he loved it, and after the stroke, making memories was the most important thing to him now.
For Mom, I thought a new sweater would be nice. The tear in her old one made it look a bit shabby, and she was the sort of person who didn’t throw something out unless it's worthless. I knew she'd appreciate it too, and that was what mattered most to me.
I'd been to a few different stores looking for the perfect sweater, and I picked up a few different blouses along the way for myself. When I finally gave up the search at big box stores, I headed to the little boutique on Main Street down by the court square. I was trying to avoid it after the whole town saw Ryan and me kiss, but Mom had a very particular style. It was my best shot at finding the sweater she'd love.
The bell overhead chimed as I walked in, and immediately, I felt eyes on me. I tried to pretend I didn't notice, but Judy Baker and another woman I didn't recognize were already whispering. I moved toward the sweaters on the wall to my left and immediately, one drew my eye. It was a soft pink cashmere with a braided rib pattern around the hems and cuffs. When my fingers brushed over it, I felt how soft it was and smiled. I knew Mom would love it.
After spending the past few hours looking all over town, I was upset with myself that I hadn't just come here to begin with. I figured this place was the one where I'd find what I needed, and I assumed I would likely end up only finding what I needed here, but the thought of putting up with people's nasty comments deterred me. It was a shame, really, because they really did have beautiful clothing here.
After sorting through the sweaters to find Mom's size and checking the price tag to make sure I could afford it, I headed for the registers. Judy was still there, lingering by the woman at the register, and her stern look of disapproval was foreshadowing for what I was about to go through. I took a deep breath to try to anchor myself and then made the final few strides to the counter.
"That all for you today?" the woman at the register asked as I slid the sweater across the smooth wooden counter. Judy didn't budge. She stood staring at me like a carrion bird waiting to pick my bones clean.
"Yeah, just this." I avoided eye contact and reached into my purse for my debit card. The cashier rang me up but not without taking forever. Judy stared at me the whole time, and as I slid my card to the other woman, Judy started in on me.
"You know, the whole town saw you kissing Ryan Hawthorne under the mistletoe." I felt like I was back in high school with a bully who just wanted to humiliate me.
"Yeah, we got caught under it." I was nervous and feeling nauseous. Now would've been the perfect time for my morning sickness to flare up and I could vomit on her.
"Don't you think he's a little old for you?" she asked, and she rested her elbow on the counter. She was too close for me to be comfortable, but there was only one register in the shop, and I had to pay for the sweater before leaving. I wished she'd just go away.
"It's mistletoe, Ms. Baker. Everyone caught under it has to kiss. It's Christmas tradition." My tone was polite, but my words had an edge. I'd dealt with this sort of shit for far too long. It was why I never wanted to move back here. I wanted to be as far away from here as possible.
"And is sneaking out in the middle of the night holiday tradition too?" she asked, and I felt a chill run across my skin. I hadn't snuck out of my parents’ house in almost fifteen years. Any "sneaking out" that had been done recently had been done by Ryan, not me. Which meant either she was talking about my life as a teenager and hashing up old gossip or someone had seen Ryan sneaking in and out of my parents’ house.
I clenched my jaw and accepted my debit card back from the cashier along with the receipt, and Judy stood staring at me as if I were going to respond. I nodded at the cashier, said, "Thank you," and then walked out the door.
My chest burned with emotion, and I barely made it back to Mom's car before the tears started. People were horrible and cruel and mean, and little towns like this only seemed to collect them in hordes. They congregated like flies on a pile of dog shit, except my life wasn't that pile of shit. I was a human with emotions and I was tired of being the brunt of their gossip.
I was still crying when I got home. The way people thought they could judge me made me feel so angry, I couldn’t think straight. But when I walked in and Mom saw me crying, she stopped me. My heart was a little panicked over it, but I needed my mom more than anything. We weren't the closest, but when your heart is hurting, it's always your mom you want.
I set my bags by the front entryway and shed my coat, and Mom was there, saying, "What's wrong, baby? Are you okay? Did something happen?"
She glanced out the front window and returned to my side, ushering me toward the couch with a hand in the small of my back. I didn’t see Dad, which meant he was probably napping or something. I slumped onto the cushion and cried into my palms.
"Hey, shh," she soothed, rubbing my back as she sat beside me. "Tell me what's wrong, Carrie."
I sniffled and blubbed for a bit, and when I got control of myself, she pressed a tissue into my hand. I blew my nose and wiped my eyes, and the only thing I could even think of to use as an excuse for my crying was the one thing I never wanted to tell her. It was inevitable, too, as inevitable as Ryan finding out. My parents were going to be grandparents. They had to find out somehow.
"I'm pregnant," I blurted out, and then I sobbed more. Not because the idea of having this baby was traumatizing. Yes, I would be a single mom living hundreds of miles away from my parents. But the idea of being a mom had grown on me. I wanted this baby. I wanted the little human who would love me simply because I existed. The real reason I cried was that I had to do all of this without Ryan—have the baby, face the gossip, hear the backlash of my parents… All alone.
"Oh, dear," she breathed, but her hand didn't stop rubbing my back. She didn't pull away in anger or have a harsh reply. I sat there crying while she rubbed my back, and it only made me cry harder. I thought she'd snap at me, but she was comforting me. "Baby, it's going to be okay."
I used another tissue to wipe my face again and looked up at her. "Why aren't you shouting at me?" I was so confused and baffled. She wasn't acting like my mother. She was acting like a stranger, or even like a friend.
"Well, Carrie, you're a grown woman. Of course you're going to have urges…" I cringed. It was like listening to the sex talk all over again, but she wasn’t yelling so I kept an open mind. "And just because some of us didn't get caught, didn't mean we didn’t do it."
I sat thoughtfully for a moment realizing she meant she'd gotten pregnant with me before she was married to Dad. She was trying to relate to me, and while that was comforting, what was more comforting was her lack of anger. There wasn’t a trace of frustration or disappointment in her eyes. Only compassion.
"How are you so calm, though? I'm going to be a single mom in a big city." I sucked in a few breaths and swiped at my eyes again. My entire face felt puffy and hot. My eyes were tired of crying. I didn't ever want to cry again, except happy tears.
"Well, you don't have to be alone in a big city, you know. You could move back home." Mom smiled softly, and I knew she was doing that mom thing where she badgered me to move back home closer. Then she softened, her shoulders relaxed, and she said, "But if anyone can do it, it's you, baby. You've done so many amazing things already. This is just motherhood. You're going to be a natural."
My own smile returned, though I didn't know for how long. Ryan was always on my mind. I knew if I had to tell Mom and Dad about him, this would've been a very different conversation. But that ship had sailed. Nothing would ever happen between me and Ryan again. I just wished I had a chance to explain everything that happened. I didn’t want him to think I had lied to him about not getting pregnant. He didn't even give me a chance to say it wasn't his. God only knows what he was thinking.
"Alright, let me get some tea, and I'll show you how to keep that morning sickness in check.” She was already on her feet moving toward the kitchen, and I felt a lot more relaxed. It must've clicked immediately that my illness for the past few weeks wasn't my having the flu. I appreciated how intuitive Mom was, but I prayed that intuition didn't connect the dots that linked me to Ryan, especially since that was over.
When she came back with tea, we talked about pregnancy and motherhood. I confessed to the poor choice of having a one-night stand and what that meant for me and my baby. In my whole life, I never thought I'd connect with my mother like this at all, let alone over something I thought could've been so much different. None of this was happening the way I thought, none of it but Ryan. That happened pretty much how I expected it to. Now I just had to heal from it.
And this tiny baby would help me do just that.
When Mom and I tired of talking, I went to my room to rest. I sat down and decided to nap, but before I drifted off to sleep, my phone rang. I sat up and answered, not recognizing the number.
“Hi, this is Carrie.”
“Ms. Bennett? This is Tammy Sutton from Ogilvy in New York. Is now a good time?”
My heart froze when I heard those words, and despite having looked forward to this call for weeks, I suddenly felt nervous. I didn’t know if I wanted this.
“Yes, now is fine.” I bit my lip anxiously and listened as she went on.
“Ms. Bennett, we received your resume for our job posting here at our New York branch. We have a few interviews to go through with you, but our lead team has already made the decision that if you’re as amazing in person as you are on paper, we want you here. We don’t know how we’ve never heard of you. Are you open to scheduling an interview?”
My heart stopped and tears welled up in my eyes. They were both happy and sad tears. My heart was torn right down the middle. I couldn’t believe the good that was happening hand in hand with the bad.
“Uh, yes…” I set up an interview with them and hung up the phone, then curled into a ball and thought of Ryan. Chicago was a short flight away, or a six-hour drive. New York was an eighteen-hour drive. It took me farther from Mom and Dad, and Ryan too. Ryan—whom I had no chance with ever again, but still, being that far away from him would hurt.
I cried myself to sleep that afternoon, wishing I’d have just been honest with him from the beginning. But hindsight is twenty-twenty, and I wasn’t a superhero. Now, the best opportunity of my life was also the worst possible thing for my heart, and all I could do was cry.