Jumping Off Swings (10 page)

“What do you know?” I ask. My breath floats out in front of me and fogs up the window.

“Not much. Corinne told me.”

“How does she know it’s mine?”

“Don’t.”

“What?”

“Don’t be an asshole now, Josh. Not on top of everything else.”

“What the hell? It’s not like I’m the only one she did it with.”

“Yeah well, you’re the only one who couldn’t keep your condom on, OK? You’re the last guy she was with.”

He looks out his window, turning his face from me. Like I’m so disgusting he can’t even look at me. There’s blood down the front of his T-shirt, and he’s shivering without his coat.

“OK,” I say. “Sorry. But in case you didn’t notice, this is serious shit. I just want to be sure this is really my problem.”

“It is,” he says quietly. Like he doesn’t want it to be true, either.

“What’s she gonna do?” I ask.

“Get rid of it. What else?”

His words hang there, fogging up his side of the car.

Get rid of it.

I close my eyes and try to breathe. I rock back and forth, like my body’s nodding,
Yes, it’s true.
But I’m shaking my head at the same time. I feel her soft, warm body under mine, her quiet breath in my ear as I pushed inside her. She made a noise, and I hoped it meant she wanted me to be doing what I was doing, but, oh God, I didn’t care — she felt so good, and then I was moving so fast and then it was over in two seconds and I know the condom fell off but I thought it happened when I was pulling out, so it was OK. But oh, God. Oh, God. I was so stupid! She didn’t say anything about it. She just looked at me. And I . . . I looked away. I just left her there.

You’re the last guy she was with.

“Shit!” I slam my fist on the armrest again, but it’s already broken, and a screw hanging out of the door slices the side of my hand. I stare at it, waiting for the sting and the blood to surface.

Caleb groans, when it should be me.

I pull my sleeve down over my hand and hold it in a fist.

“Is she OK?” I finally ask.

Caleb doesn’t answer. He doesn’t have to.

“Never mind,” I say. “Just tell me what I should do. How much will it cost?”

“I don’t know.”

He moves a little and glances over at me. The blood around his mouth has gelled up. It looks like that face paint stuff we used to wear at Halloween when we were kids. I can feel my own blood soaking my shirt.

“The thing is, she doesn’t know you know. And according to Corinne, I don’t think she wants you to.”

“Oh.”

I know this is the part when I should start feeling relieved. She doesn’t want to involve me. It’s not my problem. So why does my chest feel like someone just punched me with an iron fist?

“What else do you know?” I ask. “When is she going to — I mean —” I don’t know why I can’t say the words.

“I’m not sure. Corinne doesn’t tell me that much.”

“Wait a minute. How long have you known about this?”

“Relax. Not that long. Corinne told me and swore me to secrecy.”

But he’s still looking out that damn window and fidgeting with his key chain. He’s not telling me everything.

“What the hell, Cay?
Corinne?
Why would you agree to anything that bitch says? I can’t believe you’re into her. You kept this from me for
her
?”

“She’s not a bitch! What is it with you and Dave? You don’t even know her! God, Josh. I didn’t have to tell you all this, ya know.”

Some fresh blood oozes out from under the stuff that’s drying.

God, I’m an asshole. Everything’s my fault. Everything.

“Sorry,” I say. I reach in the backseat for his jacket and hand it to him. “I’m a fuckup.”

“Forget it.”

“How’s your face?”

He touches his lip and flinches. But he smiles real fast and says, “It was worth it — that bastard.”

“Thanks, man.”

“I didn’t do it for you.”

“Right.” I should have known that. “How’d that prick find out, anyway?”

He groans, then reaches into his pocket and pulls out what looks like a letter.

“Ellie had it at school. She was really upset, so Corinne took her to the girls’ room to talk. I guess Kayla and Jessie overheard and blabbed to Kyle.”

“What is it?”

“Read it,” Caleb says, handing the paper to me.

Oh, shit. What now?

I open the folds slowly, trying not to get any blood on it. My hands are shaking so hard, I have to press the paper against my thighs to read the blurry note.

“Your
mom
knows?”

Caleb nods and looks up at the house as if she’s watching us from inside. “She knows about Ellie. I don’t know if she knows you’re the . . . you know.”

He doesn’t say the word, but it’s there between us anyway.

Father.

You’re the father.

I lean back into the seat and try to breathe. Oh, God, please just let this be some stupid nightmare. Please let me wake up now. But I have this very real note in my hand, and when I look down again at those blurry words, I know they’re probably like that because of Ellie’s tears.

I crush the paper into a ball with my good hand and hold it in my fist.

“I’m outta here.”

Caleb sits up a little. “Want a ride?”

“No, thanks. Sorry about the armrest. I’ll take care of it.”

I shut the door and leave Caleb sitting in the car. It was cold in the car, but it’s twice as cold outside. I put on my jacket and throw my backpack over my shoulder. The wind rips at my face and into my ears as I walk slowly down the driveway and toward home. When I turn the corner near the park, I look out over the playground where Caleb and Dave and I first met. Where I first saw Ellie that day after it happened.

The swings and slide and other playground stuff are covered with snow. I stand there like an idiot, wondering how this all happened. Cars go by me, splashing slush at the backs of my legs. My right hand is throbbing inside my pocket. I pull my other hand out and open my fist. The note is squeezed into a tiny ball now. I hurl it over the playground fence. It lands in the snow near the merry-go-round and disappears. I’m numb but stinging all over at the same time, and all I hear is my own voice in my head.
What have I done? What have I done?

“W
HY DID YOU DO IT?
”

My mom’s in her studio with her back to me, dabbing her brush to make leaves on a fallen tree, only the color is red instead of green.

She stops dabbing but doesn’t turn around.

“What did I do?” she asks calmly.

I force myself not to grab her brush and throw it across the room. “The
note
? To
Ellie
?” My lip and jaw throb when I talk.

She sets her brush down and turns toward me on her swivel stool. She jumps when she sees me.

“What
happened
?” She starts toward me.

“Nothing. Don’t get up. We have to talk.”

“You’re bleeding!” she says, reaching for my face.

I lean back. “I’m fine! Forget it! Just tell me about the note!”

“What note?”

“The one you gave to Ellie? The one you
shouldn’t
have given to her? God, Mom. Do you have to interfere with
everything
? You act like Ellie and Corinne are your kids. They’re not! They’re
my
friends!”

The concern for me drains from her face. “If they’re your friends, you should be trying to help them! Ellie obviously needs to talk to someone —”

“How did you know?”

“I can put two and two together. And I overheard her say something to Corinne that gave me a pretty big clue. I’m sorry. I should have talked to you first.”

I sink into the chair she uses for models in the once in a hundred years she uses one. When I was little, I used to curl up in this chair and fall asleep to the rhythmic sound of her brushstrokes.

She rolls toward me on her stool. When she sees my face up close, she flinches.

“You need to get some ice on that. Who did it?”

“It doesn’t matter. Stop changing the subject. You should have seen her, Mom. She looked . . . devastated. Holding that letter in her hand and crying? With everyone staring at her and thinking she was nuts?”

“I don’t understand. Why did she have the note at school? I thought she’d read it at home.”

“Well, you thought wrong. She read it in homeroom this morning. Corinne thinks
I
told you. She won’t even talk to me.”

“Oh.”

“Yeah. Thanks.”

“I’m sorry, honey. I was only trying to help.”

“Well, you didn’t.”

She sags in her own stool.

“Is Josh the father?”

I look into her watery green eyes and nod.

“Everything’s so messed up now,” I say. “But maybe it’s what Ellie needed. Maybe now she’ll do something.”

“Like what?”

“Get an abortion?”

She bites her bottom lip and nods. “Has she told her parents?”

“I don’t know.”

“What about Josh?”

“He just found out.”

“How’d he take it?”

I look out the tiny window in the studio, wondering how long it took him to walk home. “He’s pretty messed up.”

“Poor kids,” she says. She leans closer to me again. “Speaking of messed up, let’s take care of your face.”

But when we get up, we hear a car outside.

“It’s them,” I say quietly. “What should we do?”

“Let them in?”

I follow her through the door that leads back to the house and into the front hall. My mom opens the door before Ellie and Corinne reach the steps. The wind brushes their hair across their faces as they squint up toward the porch light. My mom steps back to let them in.

Ellie and Corinne glance at my face, but they don’t talk to me. I take their coats and scarves. They follow my mom into the living room while I hang up their stuff. When I join them, they’re sitting at their usual places: Ellie and my mom on the couch, Corinne in the chair nearby. I take my spot on the floor. When I bend down, my face throbs.

“Who wants to go first?” my mom asks quietly.

Corinne and Ellie look at their hands, the paintings, the coffee table. Pretty much everywhere but at me, my mom, or each other. I feel like I should leave, but I don’t know how.

“I know this is hard,” my mom finally says. “But I think we should get things out in the open so I can help you.” She turns to Ellie. “I’m sorry about my note. I meant for you to read it at home. I should have written that on the envelope.”

Ellie nods but stays quiet.

“And Caleb didn’t tell me,” my mom adds. “I just had a feeling.”

Corinne looks at me guiltily.

“How far along are you?” my mom asks Ellie.

Ellie grips the edge of the couch. My mom reaches over and lays her hand over Ellie’s. “You can say it out loud. Maybe that’s what you need to do.”

I wish I could sneak out of the room, but I’m trapped.

Ellie stares at my mom’s hand on hers like it’s a foreign object.

“I’m sorry, hon. You don’t have to say anything if you don’t want to.”

Ellie pulls her hand away. She crosses her arms at her chest and shakes her head. “I don’t want to talk about it. I just want it to be over. I — I want you to take me. Will you take me?”

Her mouth starts moving around in that frowny way little kids’ do when they’re trying not to cry.

My mom touches Ellie’s shoulder. “Of course. Of course I will. But, honey. You have to tell your parents first.”

Ellie nods, then hides her face in her hands. Her shoulders start to shake. A small sound comes out from behind her hands, all muffled and hidden.

My mom leans into Ellie in slow motion. She wraps her arms around her and rocks her, slowly, like she’s done to me a hundred times. “It’s OK. You let it out. It’s OK,” she says into Ellie’s ear.

Corinne’s crying now, too. The quiet kind of crying, when tears drip down your cheeks without anyone noticing, like my mom does when she watches sad movies.

My mom holds Ellie as if she’s her own daughter. Then Corinne gets up and sits on the other side of Ellie. The three of them huddle on the couch in one big hug. I sink lower on the floor, as if I shouldn’t even be witnessing this.

At this moment, I would give anything to disappear.