21. Everly
21
Everly
I stare through the lens of my camera and make a minute adjustment, placing subject one in full focus with subject two just slightly blurred out behind and to the side. It’s perfect, and I snap the shot before straightening up. Like every photographer, I’m torn between checking the photos I’ve taken and keeping my eyes open for the next. I’ve been here for hours, and the final speeches are wrapping up for a local charity that provides a halfway service including homes for the unhoused. It’s equally heart-wrenching and impressive. So many of the homeless are battered women with children, and my stomach clenches when I think about the life I might have lived without my Aunt Sharon.
I visit my birth mom once a year on her birthday out of basic loyalty, but it’s never a pleasant experience. She has spent too many years depending on alcohol to help medicate the pain of an abusive man, a man long gone now. I’m grateful he left when I was just a baby and I never suffered at his hands, but Aunt Sharon tells me that he left my mom a shell of the woman she used to be.
My aunt always says that she took me in to let me go to a better school, but over these last few years I’ve wondered if I wasn’t a rescue case. Either way, she’s been more of a mother to me than anyone else in my life, and I thank my lucky stars for her every day.
Letting my camera hang from the strap around my neck, I lower my hands to my belly for a moment. It’s just begun to show a bit, nothing that would be obvious to others, but I can tell my pants are tight now and it won’t be long before I have to get new ones to accommodate the baby. Closing my eyes, I take a deep breath and picture the baby in my mind, fully formed, laying in my arms while I sing him or her songs and speak sweet nothings.
I picture Ryder as a daddy. I can’t imagine Ryder ever laying a hand on me in anger. He’s excitable and even wild at times but never violent. I rub my thumbs up and down and swear to myself that I’ll never be like my mom. I’ll never let anyone keep me from providing for my child.
I glance down at my hands on my tummy as I wonder at my fate. I think I’m falling for Ryder. I know he’s nuts about me, but the happier he makes me the more scared I get. I’m almost fourteen weeks pregnant, already in my second semester. What if he doesn’t want a baby? We’re hardly dating now, and it’s so fast, so backwards. It seems like we should have a few years together before making any decisions about bringing a child into the world.
How do I even tell him? We’ve only slept together once and we used protection. What if he doesn’t believe the baby is his? What if he thinks I’ve been fooling around with someone else, and I’m just trying to pin this on him? Oh my God, I don’t know what to do!
I glance around me and nod. My work here is done. Skipping over to a group of the organizers, I give my thanks and shake hands before heading out to my car. This was my last freelance gig for the local paper before I start with ABC, another little supplement to tide us over until I get a more consistent paycheck.
I set the map on my phone to the hospital and check for any messages. Nothing. As I pull out of the parking lot, I register the distance. It’s a good forty minutes to the Baylor Scott & White Charles A. Sammons Cancer Center in Dallas where I’ll meet my aunt for a doctor appointment. So, I dial Rachel and put the phone on speaker before setting it in my lap to keep my eyes on the road.
She doesn’t pick up initially, but she calls back when I’m halfway to the hospital.
“Hey Ev, you miss me already?”
“Always,” I respond. There’s no use denying it.
“And how are you treating my baby niece?” I roll my eyes at this. Once I told Rachel about the baby, she gave up on her ultimatum about crying and ended up sobbing in my arms at the thought that she would be an aunt again and that Ryder would be a daddy. It hadn’t hit me until that moment, but this would not be her parents’ first grandchild. Ryder’s older sister Rebecca has kids, but this one will still be a pretty big deal.
“Your nephiece is doing just fine, nice and quiet.” I know it’s silly, but I merged the words nephew and niece to cover all my bases until we know the gender.
“Please tell me you’ve made a doctor appointment, Everly Marshall.” I roll my eyes for the second time since we started our call.
“Yes! I’ve made an appointment, so chill, girl. I’ll send you the info when I’m parked. I just wanted to check in.”
“Have you told him yet?” she asks. I shift uncomfortably in my seat before answering quietly.
“Honestly, I don’t know how, Rachel.” I hear silence and then a heavy sigh from her end.
“Look, you know I got your back. If for one second he doubts you or challenges you or says any stupid thing whatsoever, or makes you cry, I swear to God I’ll come and kick his ass. I would do that for you, you know…To be honest, I’ve been wanting to do it for years anyway.”
“Oh my God. You’re just a delinquent.” I shake my head, and we sit in silence for a few more seconds until she continues, “You do know that you won’t be able to hide this much longer, right?”
“Yes, I know that.“ I mutter, because I’m half mad at her for bringing it up and half mad at myself for not being brave enough to just tell the man he’s going to be a father. We chat a few minutes more, and when I get closer to the cancer center, I hang up to focus on parking.
Inside the building my hands are shaking, and I focus on calming my heart and taking deep breaths as I ride the elevator up.
When I finally get there, Aunt Sharon meets me, and we walk to a private examination room where my aunt and I sit in relative silence. I give her hand a squeeze and she offers a small smile in return, but we both go back to our brooding thoughts until Dr. Lazario steps into the room.
“Hello, how are we doing today?” It’s the standard doctor’s greeting, and she hardly glances up from her board as she shuffles into the room and pulls up Aunt Sharon’s chart on the computer. When finally she seems to have everything showing on the screen properly, she turns toward us and squints over reader glasses.
“I see you’ve brought family. That’s excellent.” We go through the pleasantries, and at last the doctor starts into the report.
“So today we’re following up on your most recent lab tests. It shows here you’ve been cancer-free for almost nine months now. Congratulations! That’s really wonderful news, and so today we’re checking your organs. Now, we did find some unusual tracers in the urology report, and this is the results from your CT scan.” She pulls the screen closer and I feel my brow furrowing. What we need to do is schedule a few follow up tests, because the CT scan results are showing a mass growing on one of your kidneys.” I stare at the doctor in horror, the rest of her words hardly registering as she describes the size and the location and next steps to evaluate whether or not it is benign.
When we finally step outside and make our way to the parking deck, I stare at the buildings around us wondering what just happened. Turning my eyes to look at Aunt Sharon, I can see the lines of disappointment and worry around her mouth. And as much as I want to be strong for her something very selfish inside of me wants to cry, because I’m not sure if I can do this again. I don’t know if I can face the thought of losing her again so soon after she has recovered.