And Baby Makes Two

She cackled. “Too stressed? You?” She flattened herself against the screen. “You think stress is breaking a nail or getting some mud on your jeans.”

“What do you know?”

I made a move towards the TV, but she pushed me back and I whacked into the coffee table. I screamed in pain.

She didn’t care that she’d wounded me. “I know you’ve been bunking off school, that’s what I know. And I’d like to know why.”

I rubbed the back of my leg.

“I hope you’re happy,” I snapped. “You’ve really hurt me.”

“Not yet, I haven’t,” she screeched. “But I will if you don’t start giving me some straight answers.”

I stood up tall. My tummy stuck out in the air between us.

“I told you. I didn’t feel like going. That’s all.”

“No, it isn’t all,” said PC Hilary Spiggs. “I want to know where you were.”

I was the same height as her. I stared right into those beady eyes.

“I was here, that’s where I was. Satisfied?”

She wasn’t satisfied. She started banging on about her responsibility as a parent, and my responsibility as a young adult, and what a mess my future was going to be if I got expelled for absenteeism.

“My responsibilities as a young adult?” I screamed back. “That’s a laugh. I’m not a young adult to you. To you I’m still a little kid.”

“You get treated the way you act,” said my mother.

And that’s when I told her. Just like that. It seemed like the right moment.

“Oh, yeah?” I gave her my smuggest smile. “Well, for your information it just so happens that I’m having a baby.” I stepped up my smile. “How’s that for acting grown up?”

She just stood there staring back at me, looking like I’d bashed her over the head with a dead fish. Then she smiled the way people do in films when they’ve been bashed over the head with a dead fish – or knifed.

“You’re not serious.” There was a squeaky laugh in her voice. “You’re winding me up. Aren’t you, Lana? You’re not really pregnant.”

“Oh, yes I am.” I held up my fingers. “Three months.”

“But you couldn’t—”

“S–E–X,” I spelt it out for her. “That’s how you do it, in case you forgot.”

I could tell she didn’t think I was lying now.

She took a really deep breath and chewed on her lip for a couple of seconds.

Then, as if we were discussing a school trip or something, she said, “I’ll make some tea. We have to sit down and decide what’s best to do. Have you been to the doctor?”

I shook my head.

She was already halfway to the kitchen.

“We’d better get you over there first thing. Make sure everything’s all right.” The kitchen’s just off the living- room, so I could see her grab the kettle and bang it against the sink. “It’s not too late to have it taken care of.”

You’d think she was talking about having the dog put down.

“I’m not having an abortion if that’s what you mean,” I shouted over the running of the tap.

She turned off the water and looked over her shoulder. “You what?”

“I’m not killing my baby,” I said loudly. “I’m having it.”

She cradled the kettle in her arms. She could do a pretty good blank face when she wanted to, too.

“I don’t suppose this means you’re going to put it up for adoption.”

She was dead calm, like a telly that’s been switched off.

“Of course not. It’s my baby. I’m keeping it.”

She suddenly realized she was still holding the kettle. She put it on the counter as though it was made of glass.

“And what about the father?”

“What about him?”

“Is this his decision, too?”

“It’s my decision. I’m the one who’s pregnant.”

“But what about the father?” she said again. She was nothing if not stubborn “Where is he?” Her mouth was a straight line. “Better yet, who is he?”

That’s all I needed. When I was in primary school, the neighbour’s dog got our dog pregnant. As soon as the puppies were weaned, Hilary Spiggs put them all in a box and left them on the Scudders’ doorstep. She said she’d done her bit, now they could do theirs. I didn’t want her leaving my baby on Les’s doorstep with a note pinned to its blanket, Your turn now.

“It’s none of your business who he is,” I said. “You’ll only ruin everything.”

She could still laugh. “I’ll ruin everything. And what is it you think you’re doing?”

I held my head high. “I’m a grown-up now. I can take care of myself.”

“You don’t seem to be doing a very good job,” said my mother. “If you could take care of yourself you would have taken some precautions.”

“Maybe I didn’t want to take precautions.”

She wasn’t expecting that. “Are you saying you did this deliberately? You deliberately got yourself pregnant?”

My expression was emotionless. Let her think what she wanted.

“I don’t believe this.” Her voice cracked. “You’re fifteen years old. You’ve got your whole life ahead of you. You don’t want to saddle yourself with a child—”

“You mean like you were saddled with me?” I shouted. I was probably lucky she hadn’t left me on someone’s doorstep. I started crying. “Is that what you mean?”

She went dead still for a second and then her whole face sort of caved in. “Oh, Lana, plea— I know I’ve made a lot of mistakes. It wasn’t easy after your dad left … at my age … living with Nan … trying to work out what to do next… We’d lost everything—”

“I suppose that was my fault too!” I shrieked. When Charlene and Dara’s dad died, he left insurance money and a house and things like that behind. When my dad went off, he left the debts of a small Third World country and a queue of bailiffs and policemen behind. Plus, Charlene and Dara were clever and motivated like their dad, and I wasn’t. “You’ve always blamed me for my dad. You look at me and all you see is a big mistake!”

“That’s not true, Lana.” She made a move to touch me, but I pulled away. “You’re the proof—”

I didn’t want to hear her lies.

“Well, I’m not like you,” I screamed. “I already love my baby. And I’m not killing it. Or giving it away. And it’s never going to have to be on its own.”

She looked like she was trying not to cry. She started saying all the usual stuff about how much responsibility a child is and how hard it is to bring one up on your own, but I wasn’t going to listen. I grabbed my jacket from the arm of the couch and shot out the door.

I went straight to Blockbuster.

There were a few customers strolling past the new releases, and a boy and a girl behind the desk with Les.

He gave me a wave.

“You read my mind,” he called. “I was thinking of taking a break. Do you fancy a coffee?”

We sat at our table in McDonald’s, in the corner by the window.

Les had had a big fight with a customer who said he’d brought back a video that he hadn’t brought back.

“People!” He shook his head. “You’d be amazed at what they try on.”

“I know.” I’d stopped crying by then, but I snuffled a bit so he’d know I was upset. “It’s incredible.”

He looked at me over his coffee. “You OK? Your eyes look funny.”

I glanced in the mirror behind him. I looked like a panda.