Later that night, after like fifty fucking rounds of charades, Lenny and I sat in bed about to watch a movie.
“So what is this? Am I going to like it?” We weren’t even five minutes into the show and people were already singing and dancing. I had a bad feeling about it. Still, she said it was one of her favorites, so I was willing to give it a try.
Even if that meant withstanding singing. And dancing.
“You said you were going to be honest.” Lenny huffed. Folding her arms and turning to me, she continued, “You said you wouldn’t lie or keep anything from me any more.”
“Okay…” I paused. “Well, to be honest, I really don’t think I’m going to like this. Do they dance the entire movie?”
Rolling her eyes, Lenny stood to her knees and made the cushions squish beneath her. “Vic, it’s been almost a month and you haven’t told me anything else.” I looked at the TV then back to Lenny, not sure which torture I would prefer. “Vic?” Lenny pressed. I thought about the iceberg, and then I thought about what it would take to turn the wheel so we could avoid it.
Well, here goes nothing. And everything. “I was adopted at five.”
“I already knew that,” Lenny said, shifting so the blankets did a whirlpool around her knees.
“Before then I was raised by my mother. I never knew my birth father. My mother was addicted to meth. She kept the shit out all over the place. One time I tried to eat it, because I thought it was candy and I was hungry. She beat me, so I knew to leave the candy alone.”
“Oh, Vic…” Lenny fell back to the bed, placing her palm on my forearm. She was offering me comfort but I didn’t want it. I didn’t want anything except to get the shit I’d been shoving into a tiny box out of my brain.
“I would go days without eating. I survived on flour and water, on paper some days, but mostly on whatever I found in the trash. Mom only cleaned up her act when the welfare ladies stopped by. Of course I didn’t know what that was back then. I was just happy to get a bath and some food.” It was flowing out of the box, out of my brain, into the air, and disappearing.
“The only reason anyone found out about me was because of the fire. One day she got so high she forgot about the stove. She was cooking popcorn, a rare treat for me, and smoke started filling the house. I tried to wake her but she was passed out. I tried to drag her but she wouldn’t budge. It turned out she was dead. A neighbor saw the smoke and called the fire department.” I could feel Lenny next to me, waiting for her cue to do something, but at the moment all I needed was to finish the exorcism.
“I might have had to go back if not for the fact that she overdosed. Instead I went to the Walls, which was okay at first.” I stopped for a moment, thinking back to the day I’d arrived on the Wall’s front porch. Mr. Wall was a racist son of a bitch, but in the beginning he put a roof over my head and kept me fed. That was more than I’d ever known. I think maybe all the drinking fucked his liver and made him delusional.
I don’t know. I’d shoved all the bad shit into the same box as the good, so it got mixed together. Maybe Mr. Wall was good once, maybe my birth mom was good once, but they all got shoved into the same, shitty box and I couldn’t recall. Now that the box was open, perhaps a little light could shine in.
Lenny reached another hand toward me. “Vic—”
“I’m going to go get some popcorn.” I cut Lenny off and stood up. It was the first time in years I’d spoken about what had happened to me. I wasn’t ready for waterworks or pity, or whatever brand of sympathy she had prepared for me.
I’d survived. I was living. That was enough.
I made a detour into the bathroom, grabbing a tissue. I needed something to ball up and crush, something to destroy, since I was trying to stop punching walls. You know, evolving and shit. Staring into the mirror, I was comforted by the fact that my outward appearance remained unchanged.
As I threw away the tissue, something caught my eye. At first I dismissed it, but alarm bells rung in my head, the sound eerily like sailors screaming. I could practically feel the boat crash beneath my feet. Wood planks splintered, ice chipped my cheeks, and water filled my soles.
Bending over, I brushed aside the refuse. It was fucking gross going through my trash, but I had to know if what I saw was true.
“Fuck…” I pulled the stick out, stunned. In my hand was a positive pregnancy test.
I held the pregnancy test in the air.
“What the fuck…” I turned the stick in my fingers, staring at it like it was an alien limb. I knew it was covered in pee and I should’ve probably tossed the thing back in the trash, but shit… It was definitely positive. Which meant Lenny was definitely pregnant.
“Vic?” Lenny called through the door. “Are you alive? I want to start the movie.” I stared at the door. On the other side she sat, waiting for me to come and watch a movie. A fucking movie. I looked from the door and back to the stick. How could she have kept this from me? It was a positive pregnancy test. It declared that she was pregnant with our child.
There was a knock on the wood and then Lenny’s voice followed. “Vic? Are you okay?”
“Shit.” I stuffed the test far back in the drawer and opened the door. “Everything’s fine.”
“You look weird,” she said, cocking her head.
“Thanks,” I mumbled, brushing past her. Once again, I thought about all of my training. Trained to lie, trained to hide my emotions, I’d been trained for anything. When it came to Lenny, though, I was practically a newborn.
Newborn.
The word blasted through my head like a loose ping pong ball. She was having a baby—our baby—and she wouldn’t tell me. Sitting on the edge of our bed, I nearly put my head in my hands—then Lenny placed her palm on my shoulder.