In this dream, Echo was slinking around in the darkness of that same living room. After Gram and Pop died, they’d left the house to my dad, their only living child left, after my mother had died. As she tiptoed carefully across the carpet, I was aware of Echo’s racing heart caused by both fear and excitement in equal measure.
“She’s sneaking out,” I exclaimed aloud as I realized what was going on.
I could always hear my own thoughts vocalized no matter whose dream or memory I happened to be in, mine or Echo’s. The ground beneath me shifted, and then I was riding on a school bus. At that moment, I knew for sure that this was not a dream, but a memory sequence from Echo’s life. Her dreams didn’t bounce around like her memories did. Every once in a while, I’d get a glimpse into who Echo had been and how she’d lived. It was like taking a trip back through time, only in her body, not mine. She looked around, and there was more than one face looking in her direction with expressions of malice and disgust etched to them. Clearly, Echo was the subject of some hot topic in this memory. The wave of embarrassment and shame that washed over her in the memory was so strong; I felt it might suffocate me. I wondered why Echo was feeling that way. That particular combination of emotion was something I’d felt myself on plenty of occasions, but never as strong as Echo was feeling it in the memory. To escape the slicing glares Echo dropped her gaze to the clasped hands sitting in her lap, and then I understood what had caused the unwanted attention. There underneath Echo’s white lace shirt was a small but very noticeable baby bump.
I was awestruck. “That’s me inside there,” I whispered in amazement.
I wanted to make Echo’s hand touch her belly, but I knew that in memories, it didn’t work that way. It didn't matter how much I wanted her to because if Echo hadn’t done it when the memory was in the making, it wouldn’t happen. Instead, Echo just stared out the window, and before long, the sadness she was feeling filled me, and I watched in the window’s reflection as tear after tear fell on Echo’s delicate shirt. Something made her jerk her head up, and I was able to read the other girl’s lips with the incredible skill of someone who was deaf. The girl was looking right at Echo when she made the meanest of comments.
“If you weren’t such a slut Echora, you wouldn’t be pregnant and have to get an abortion! I bet you don’t even know who the father is.”
The memory shifted again, and Echo was talking secretively with another girl over a lunchroom table. Echo had a flood of emotions coursing through her as she recounted the events of the night before.
“It was my first time you know—he was long, lean, and knew exactly what he was doing, just one of the many perks of being with an older man.”
“Did it hurt,” the other girl asked.
Echo grew quiet, and I felt a moment of disappointment reel through her. The fear of the pain she’d experienced the first time happening again sliced an emotional scar. She wasn’t sure if there’d be a second time.
“Honestly, yes, it was one of the most painful things I’ve ever felt—but it was fleeting, and everything I felt afterward was pure bliss.”
I bolted upright in my bed, sending pink throw pillows tumbling to the floor. Somewhere in the distance, as I became completely awake, I felt the remnants of Echo’s terrified uncertainty.
“What the hell,” I said as I sat there trying to slow my labored breathing.
I wasn’t a slut, but being pregnant had earned me that reputation. It didn’t matter that Danny was the only man I’d ever been with—would ever be with. Echo sounded like she wanted to cry.
I stuttered in disbelief. “Echo was that—did I just get a blow by blow…,”
I felt the embarrassment Echo was feeling and instantly felt sick to my stomach.
I’m sorry, Eden, but when we’re unconscious, I have no control over what memories you see, even the ones that give all the dirty little details of your father and I doing the deed. I understand why you are grossed out. To be honest, if I were in your shoes, I’d feel the same.
“Why on earth would you want to do something that hurt that damn much?” I was appalled.
I heard Echo giggle. It was the kind of giggle that said, “I know something you don’t know.” For once I wasn’t annoyed by it. Instead, I waited for Echo to ride out her amusement because I knew that my immature mother would not be able to resist the chance to one-up me. Sex was one thing Echo knew more about hands down.
Okay, in my defense, I don’t believe it would have hurt nearly that much if Danny had practiced more care and control. Instead of being gentle like he’d intended to be, his eagerness had him plunging rather than easing. As a result, it had been painful, but the pain was fleeting, like I said, maybe a couple of seconds at the most.
