Chapter Twenty-Four
ELLIE
17 years earlier
School started a week after I found out that I’m going to be having a baby. I actually tried to ignore that fact as much as possible. I needed to push through senior year and finish early because the baby was going to be here mid-February, according to my doctor.
Dad had a meeting with my school counselor, and she explained all the things I would have to complete in time to graduate early. I would still be able to walk across the stage with my class during the ceremony if I wanted to.
I was getting almost daily messages from Lee, and he’d sent me four letters. I didn’t listen to or read any of them, I just put them in the box in my closet. How was I supposed to move on if I let him hold on to me with his pretty words? I had a really difficult time accepting that he was going to be raising a child in California where it was only fair that his baby had both of its parents but then was it fair to our baby here that he or she didn’t have both parents? Dad kept trying to convince me that I needed to tell Lee about our baby or at the very least, let him talk to Mrs. Combs. I wasn’t ready just yet, I needed to get through this part of school before I let that stress me out even more. The doctor told me at my last appointment that my stress levels were too high; I needed to find more ways to calm myself – and telling Lee about our baby was not going to be calming.
* * *
Mallorie and I had gone out to lunch one Saturday afternoon and she tapped me on the arm when she noticed a guy staring at us.
“Who’s that?”
she asked.
“He’s been watching you for the last five minutes.”
I turned around to see who she was talking about and there was a blast from the past, I smiled when I recognized him.
“It’s Wes, from ninth grade Spanish class! Remember the guy I used to go hang out with on his work breaks? We never kept in touch after he moved to a different school. I’m going to say hi, be right back.”
I walked over and he immediately jumped up from his chair and hugged me.
“Wow! Wes, it’s good to see you!”
I stepped back after our quick embrace.
“You too, Ellie! I thought that was you over there, but I didn’t want to say hello and then be wrong.”
“Don’t do that – you never know what you’ll miss out on if you hesitate.”
I tell him.
“That’s true.”
He smiles.
“So, what have you been up to since I saw you last? Senior, this year, right?”
“Yeah, last year! It’s pretty crazy. What about you, did you go off and make the soccer team at a fancy college?”
“Hah, well it’s not a fancy college but, yeah. I’m just home for the weekend, right now.”
We talked for a few minutes, and he gave me his new phone number. I told him I was working like mad on my studies so I could graduate early and that it would be a nice distraction to hang out and talk like we used to. I didn’t tell him why I was planning to graduate early, and he didn’t ask. But he did tell me he would love to help me study if I needed him to; he was going to be home for a few weeks next month and he could come over to see what I needed to work on.
After he left, Mallorie and I talked about the baby. She’s the only one that knows besides Dad and the school counselor; I haven’t even told Amy or Steff. I’m not showing yet even though I’m about four months along so it’s easy to hide for now. She asked me when I was going to tell Lee and I told her I wasn’t sure and then, as if he somehow knew we were talking about him, my pager went off, displaying his code 1439914399. I muted the sound and sighed.
“You really should just talk to him, Ell. You never know what you’ll miss out on if you hesitate.”
She used my own words against me, and I just shook my head, laughing it off because I knew she was right. I was right, but I was just being too stubborn to take my own advice.
Mallorie dropped me off at home after lunch and I was reaching for my phone to make that call to Lee when the receiver started to ring. It was Dad, he was calling from work to let me know he would be home late and to make myself and my brother dinner; he would grab something on the way home. So, I set the phone down and began pulling things out to decide what I wanted for dinner and then I got sidetracked with doing the dishes and tidying up the kitchen. Before I knew it, I was lying in bed awake, staring at the ceiling when I remembered that I had wanted to call Lee earlier. I looked over at the clock; it was 2:12am – too late to call now, even with the time difference. I had made that mistake before, calling his house too late, and his parents were pretty upset at the late-night disruption. So, I put it off again and told myself I would call in the morning.
* * *
Wes has come over several times during his break from college and he’s been a big help with my math and government assignments. We sit at the dining room table, books, and papers all around us and he lightens the mood by cracking jokes. He makes me laugh; I can’t remember the last time I laughed and wasn’t crying. I can see Dad watching us sometimes, I can tell he’s wondering what’s the deal between me and Wes. He waited to ask until after Wes left one of our recent study sessions.
“He’s just an old friend.”
I told Dad.
“We met back in ninth grade, he moved away, and we just caught up last month. There’s nothing going on between us though if that’s what you’re wondering.”
“Ok, I was just curious.”
He starts to walk away, “It’s nice to see someone get you to smile every once in a while, Ell.”
He's been concerned about me shutting out the world, and I know he’s been talking to Steff, trying to get advice on how to handle my not talking to Lee. I haven’t felt like I could talk to her since I left her apartment that night. In fact, I haven’t really talked to anybody but Mallorie and Wes. I don’t even know if Dad’s filled her in on my current situation, but I really hope he hasn’t because I asked him not to and I know if she found out, she would absolutely tell Lee and I’m not ready for him to know about us.
* * *
The next night, Wes came over again and I was still up in my room, listening to music. Dad sent him up and he startled me when he walked in while I was looking in the full-length mirror on my wall. I had my shirt pulled up, rubbing my belly where just the slightest baby bump had started to form. I felt my heart start to rush and shoved my shirt back down.
“Oh damn, I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to barge in on you.”
Wes was embarrassed and started to leave.
“No, it’s okay.”
I told him, pulling him back into my room.
“I haven’t told anyone but Mallorie.”
I looked at him, assuming he knew what I was talking about.
“Told anyone what?” he asked.
I took a breath and held it in for a second, he didn’t realize what I was looking at in the mirror and I just blew my cover. He probably thought I was just getting dressed.
“Nothing, it doesn’t matter.”
I said and laid down on the floor in the middle of my bedroom, not ready to go study just yet. Wes came to lay next to me, propped up on his arm. He was looking at me curiously. I saw him in my peripheral, but my eyes were focused on a glow-in-the-dark star on the ceiling that I forgot to take down years ago, hands resting on my stomach. He was humming to the music from my radio when I felt a ripple in my belly and sat straight up, feeling around to see if I could find it again. Wes kept looking at me, confused, and I reached over and grabbed his hand, bringing it to my belly and smiling.
“There! Did you feel that?”
I asked, turning to see his reaction.
Wes pulled his hand back and tilted his head, “What was that, Ellie?”
“What I haven’t told anyone.” I said.
“Are you … pregnant?”
he asked in a whisper. I nodded my head once.
“Does your dad know? Oh my God, Ellie, this is big.”
He was standing up now.
“It’s okay. Dad knows. This is why I’m working on graduating early.”
I told him, rising to a stand next to him.
“I don’t know what to say to that.”
He’s shaking his head, looking down.
“You don’t have to say anything.”
I say, “I didn’t expect you to … you know, that wasn’t the reason I told you.”
“I – I know, I didn’t think that. Damn!”
He started pacing back and forth.
“What’s wrong?”
I asked him.
He stopped and looked at me, hurt edged in his eyes.
“I really like you, Ellie. I was kind of hoping we were starting something here, but now…”
he trailed off and lifted his hands up as if in resignation.
“I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to lead you on, Wes. I’m not really in a position to be dating right now.”
I searched his face to see how that hit him.
“But I could really use a friend.”
He raked his hand through his hair and looked down at the carpet in my bedroom, falling silent. I could tell he was at a loss for words; this wasn’t the type of situation he had thought he would be in when he agreed to help me out with my schoolwork. I didn’t blame him for being upset. I took a breath and shrugged my shoulders.
“I’ve finally accepted my reality, Wes. And it's okay if you’re uncomfortable with it.”
He stayed and worked with me on a project that we had planned on finishing and then he left without saying another word about my pregnancy.
The next morning, I went to school late because I had my thirty-two-week checkup. My doctor was growing increasingly concerned about my high blood pressure and kept asking me if I was stressed out about school or my situation.
Of course I was stressed out, this is an overwhelming time in my life right now.
I rolled my eyes at the question and just shrugged. She told me she didn’t want me going to school if there was any chance that I could get my work done at home and she also had me quit my job at the pizza shop. She was using her mom voice and telling me if lessening my stress load didn’t help with getting my blood pressure down by my next appointment, we might need think about an induction.
I tried like crazy over the next two weeks to take deep breaths, drink lots of water and not focus on how much more work I had left to complete in order to graduate early. That earned me a big smile and a job well done at my thirty-four-week checkup and I thought all would be well. The doctor did send me home with a list of warning signs to watch out for and said if anything popped up to call her on her after-hours phone number and get myself straight to the emergency room.
* * *
Wes continued to come over during his weekend breaks to help me with homework and he even called me a couple times to work through a few questions I couldn’t figure out while he was at school. I was caught up on everything and even ahead on some of my graduation requirements. I don’t know how I would have gotten to this point without all of his help.
On his last day of Winter break, Wes was getting ready to leave and he told me he couldn’t see me anymore after he went back to school. I was really showing now and was just about eight months into my pregnancy.
He told me he had tried really hard to think of me as just a friend, but he was getting too attached to me and the idea of the baby coming soon scared him. He wasn’t ready to be a dad and even though I told him over and over that I never expected him to be in the picture as a father to my baby, he felt wrong about it because he wanted more than I did out of this. I told him I understood and hoped he would find someone he could share this experience with, in the future. I was sad to lose him as a friend and told him if he ever changed his mind and could use a friendly hug, he should come visit and meet the baby. He smiled and kissed me on the cheek before stepping off my porch for the last time, “Bye Ellie.”
* * *
The weeks have really flown by and before I know it, it’s the middle of January. I’ve completed all of my graduation requirements and am officially done with high school. Thank goodness for the fact that I don’t have to go to classes anymore because I was starting to get looks from everyone at school now that I’m showing and unable to wear my regular clothes. Even my baggy pants and oversized sweatshirts were beginning to get tight so I broke down and asked Dad if he could take me shopping for some stretchy maternity pants. I would have bought them myself, but I had been saving all of the money I earned from my part-time job at the pizza shop for baby stuff and Dad insisted on paying for my clothes. He’s been extremely supportive throughout this entire ordeal, and I don’t know if I would have ended up keeping this baby at all had it not been for him.
My diploma wasn’t ready to be picked up from school until the day after I finished classes. The county had to confirm that I passed everything and had enough credits to be considered done before they would sign off on it. They would have normally had this done before graduation but since I was finishing early, there were some extra hoops to jump through to get my diploma in my hands and the meeting with my counselor was stressing me out. After all the work I had put in to get everything turned in early, I was nervous that I wasn’t going to be getting my diploma after all. More than anything else, I was thinking that my counselor would tell me I wasn’t actually finished with everything that needed to be done.
Dad cut in and got us back on track with the conversation, though, and in the end, I was told everything was fine. I had absolutely completed everything that I was supposed to and would be getting my diploma in the mail in the next couple of weeks.
I cleaned out my locker and returned the rest of my textbooks to the office and said my last farewell to the halls of the high school that had both held me up and tore me down for the past four years.
After we left the school that afternoon, I started to feel sick. My head was throbbing, and I felt nauseous. I kicked off my flip flops in the car, resting my feet on the dashboard and wiggling my toes to get the circulation moving because they were feeling numb. That’s when Dad noticed the swelling.
“Have your feet been swollen like that all pregnancy?”
he asked, pointing at them.
“No, just the last couple days.”
I told him.
“I don’t think that’s normal, Ell. Wasn’t that one of the warning signs on the paper your doctor gave you?”
He asked, looking over at me.
“I think we should call your doctor and let her know.”
“Yeah,”
I shook my head.
“I’ll call her when we get home. Do you have any water, I’m so thirsty all of a sudden.”
He handed me a bottle of water from the cup holder, and I took a swig but then sat there staring out the window.
“Dad, I can’t see straight.”
I told him, while blinking. I was trying to clear my vision because I was seeing spots, but they wouldn’t go away.
Dad immediately turned the car around and headed toward the hospital. I was scared; my vision was blurry, and my headache was getting worse.
By the time we had gotten to the hospital, I couldn’t see well enough to get myself out of the car. The blurriness had turned into flashes of light and more floating spots, so Dad ran inside to ask for assistance with a wheelchair. I told the nurse at the desk that I was eight months along and she quickly checked me in. When they wheeled me over to a room, and checked my blood pressure, the nurses were telling Dad that it was very likely I had what they call pre-eclampsia, and I would be admitted. We would likely be meeting the baby by tomorrow.
What is going on? This is moving too fast, I’m not prepared. Lee. I wanted Lee here with me, he should be here with me.
The on-call doctor called my OB/GYN and she rushed in to check on me. Luckily, her office is just around the corner from the hospital, and she arrived within minutes of being called. She checked my stats with the nurse and then checked my cervix.
“Ellie, I have good news and bad news, sweetheart.”
She told me, removing her gloves.
“The good news is that you’re going to be having this baby today. The bad news is that it’s a tad bit early and we’ll have to watch for any signs that baby is not fully developed.”
“Okay, but… where’s my dad?”
I asked, looking around the room for him.
“He was just here, I’ll have one of the nurses go find him while we’re hooking you up to some monitors, okay?”
She left my side and asked one of the nurses to look for Dad, then she began to explain all of the things she was doing: starting me on Pitocin, inserting a catheter, attaching a fetal heart monitor and a contraction monitor. I hadn’t noticed any contractions but once the monitor turned on, she showed me the small spikes on the screen and explained that as they begin to intensify, and I start to feel them, they’ll be able to see it on here.
Once my doctor left the room, Dad returned, and his face was pale and sad when he walked over to me. My heart skipped a beat, and I immediately began to think that the doctor had told him something was wrong with the baby. But this was so much worse than that.
“Ellie.”
Dad grabbed my hand.
“I have something to tell you and you’re not going to like it.”
“Oh my God, Dad, what? What is it? Is something wrong with the baby?”
I asked, freaking out.
“No, sweetie, it’s not the baby.”
He took a deep breath; he looked like he was going to cry. He turned away from me and let his breath out, preparing for what was to come out next, “It’s Lee.”
“What’s Lee? What happened, Daddy?”
I squeezed his hand.
“He’s gone, baby. Lee’s gone.”
The world stopped.
The room went silent.
All I could hear were the monitors beeping and the sound of my own heartbeat womp, womp, womp, skip, womp, womp.
Dad was still talking and his voice started to fade in and out, “There was a fire”…“plane ticket”…”a body”. Then everything went black.
I woke up and I felt numb. There were nurses rushing about the room and there was beeping, lots of beeping.
“She’s awake, she’s alert.”
One of the nurses had said.
“We have to get this baby out, stat.”
came another voice.
“Ellie?”
This one was my doctor.
“Ellie, the baby’s heartrate has dropped significantly, we have to get the baby out now. We’re taking you to the OR for an emergency cesarian delivery because you are not fully dilated, and we can’t wait, or we risk losing one or both of you. Do you understand?”
I nod my head; the tears are streaming.
I can’t lose this baby, it’s all that I have left of him.