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“Just what?”
“Well, you have, I mean, I hope this isn’t personal, Jessica, but you have your super-powers, don’t you? You could…outrun them? They couldn’t really hurt you…?”
“Okay,” Jessica says. “I mean, yes, technically I could, and no they couldn’t. But the dogs would still go nuts and make my presence known. And also…” She inhales tightly and then exhales again. She doesn’t want to tell anyone this, but equally, she cannot keep this to herself for a moment longer and for some reason Amber is the person she feels most drawn toward telling. “There’s a very slight chance,” she says, tautly, “that I might be pregnant.”
Pregnant.
The word sounds wild, crazy, surreal, ridiculous coming from her mouth. Amber will surely laugh at the very notion.
But Amber does not laugh and in fact the notion seems to switch her mood entirely and she responds in a brighter voice than Jessica has ever heard her use before. “Oh! Congratulations! I did wonder, I have to say, during those meetings with you in my club. The way you were with food. The pallor. It did occur to me. How far along are you?”
“Eight weeks, I think. But I don’t even know if I am. I was going to take a test, tomorrow.”
“Jessica, why wait?”
“I…” She pauses. It’s too complicated a question to give a simple answer to. “No reason really. I suppose I’m just not quite ready for it. The father doesn’t know. I’m not sure he’s going to want to know. And, well, I’m, as you know, I’m different. There are things I don’t understand about my body. About how it works. And the thought of making another body inside this body, it’s kind of overwhelming. Scary. And my life—that place I live, you’ve seen it. What kind of a place is that for a kid? And me really, just me. I’m not…”
“Not what?”
“I’m not good enough.”
“Not good enough, how?”
“I’m a mess. I sleep around. I drink too much. I don’t change my bedsheets, like, ever….”
She hears Amber sighing loudly. “Jessica. Listen. The powers stuff, I don’t know. You’ll maybe have to find a specialist OB-GYN to put your fears to rest. ‘Assemble the Avengers’ for help, if need be. And the father—give him a chance. He doesn’t know how he’s going to feel about it any more than you. But the other stuff? Seriously, you think mothers come off an assembly line, all shrink-wrapped and cookie-cut? Without histories? Without regrets? No mother does. No woman becomes a mother without some sense of fear and even some…distaste at the idea of themselves in that role. We all had mothers and those mothers left their own imprints on us, some good, some not so good. That’s a lot of baggage to bring to the check-in desk, y’know? So just be kind to yourself, Jessica. If I can be a mother, believe me, anyone can be a mother.”
Jessica makes a scoffing sound down the line.
“No,” says Amber. “It’s true. Bulimia, self-harm, sexual, ah, abuse. You know. Been there, done that, still here. So. Yeah. Get that test done, Jessica. Get your answer. Then move forward.”
Elliot looks up in surprise when Jessica walks into the pharmacy a few moments later.
“Hello again.”
She says, “Hi,” and then sidles away from him toward the aisle where all the baby stuff lives. She picks out a packet quickly and brings it to the counter. The boy doesn’t look at it, just scans it, heedlessly, while asking her about how her research is going. She puts her card through the machine and watches as he slides the packet into a paper bag. She smiles grimly as he passes it to her, relieved that he didn’t register the purchase. Or maybe he did and he’s too young to give a crap….
She slips the paper bag into her jacket pocket. “Oh, Elliot—?”
He frowns at her. “How do you know my name?”
“Er, I had lunch earlier with this woman. Named Debra? You know her?”
“The Old Farmhouse?” he says. “Loads of dogs?”
“That’s the one.”
“You had lunch there?”
“Uh-huh.”
“Wow. That’s surprising.”
“Is it?”
“Yeah. The woman who lives there, Debra. She’s basically a recluse, completely keeps to herself, gets all her food and provisions delivered. No one’s seen her for years.”
“That sounds about right. And what do you know about the girl who lives there. Belle?”
