Jade (Wildflowers 3)

I sighed deeply, lifting and dropping my shoulders.

"I guess in a sense this legal war and my status as a trophy is my story," I said and truly began.

"My parents didn't have me until almost six years after they had gotten married. I always had a suspicion that I was a mistake. My mother forgot to take her birth control pills or I was one of the small percentage of pregnancies that can't be prevented. I like to think they had some wild passionate time and threw all caution to the wind, that the both of them, normally well-adjusted, perfect and organized people, were impulsive and made love when either least expected it. And, as a result: moi."

I held out my arms. Misty laughed. Star let her lips soften into something of a smile. Cat just continued to stare wide-eyed, as if it was incredible to even think of such a fantasy.

"When I was about nine, I used to sit on the floor in the living room and look through their vacation albums and actually envision love scenes. As I told you, they went to so many romantic places. To me they seemed to have lived in a movie. I could even hear the music."

Misty lowered her chin to her hand and stared at me, a dreamy haze in her eyes as I continued.

"There they were in the gondola in Venice listening to the music and the singing and then afterward, rushing up to their hotel room, laughing, my mother throwing herself into my father's arms, and as the moonlight poured through the window and someone sang in the street below, they made me:'

"Right," Star said. "It probably happened in the back- seat of some car."

"Maybe for you," I snapped at her. "My father and mother would never. . ."

"Why are you lying to yourself? Don't enough people lie to you as it is?" she asked, angrily.

I stared at her and then looked at Dr. Marlowe, who raised her eyebrows, which was something I noticed she always did when she thought a valuable thought had been dangled before me, or any of us, for that matter.

"I'm not lying to myself. It might have been that way once. Both of you talked about your parents loving each other once and doing and saying nice things. Why couldn't it have been the same for mine?" I asked, my voice sounding almost like I was pleading.

Star looked away. In my heart I knew that she wanted to dream the same sort of fantasies, but was afraid of them after what she had been through. I guess I didn't blame her. Maybe she was right.

"My mother got pregnant:' I said dryly, "and she was about to be promoted at work. That I know for a fact because I've heard it too many times for anyone to have made it up. So that's why I think I was probably an accident."

"Why didn't they just have an abortion?" Star asked. "Sometimes, I think they did," I said.

It was like I was looking in three separate mirrors and saw my face in each of theirs. How many times recently had each of them felt the same way, a burden, unwanted?

"They wanted me and didn't want me. Their lives were less complicated without me and yet, I guess, grandparents, friends, society, kept them thinking about having children, starting a family. My mother was thirty- two and hovering over her shoulder, she says, like the good and bad angels, was this biological clock, the hands pointing at her like two thick forefingers, warning her time was running out.

"Anyway, once she discovered she was pregnant, they had the first of their many, what should I call them?" I wondered aloud looking at Dr. Marlowe. "Post-nuptial agreements?"

"What's that?" Star asked quickly.

"Lots of people today sign pre-nuptial agreements before they get married. Some do it to protect their personal assets or to guarantee things they don't want to change won't change just because they get married." I paused and laughed.

"As you see, thanks to my parents, I'm practically a paralegal.

"Anyway, my parents didn't have a pre-nuptial, but after they got married, they agreed certain things would always continue.

"Namely, my mother could pursue her career and my father would do what he could to ensure that happened. Nature, and shall we say unprotected sex, had thrown a new ingredient into their lives, a fetus they would name Jade. I threatened their wonderful status quo so they had to reassure each other, understand?" I asked Star. She didn't look like she understood. "Do you?"

"I feel like I'm a nail and you're a hammer. I'm not stupid," she quipped.

"Well, I just want you to appreciate my situation."

"Appreciate?"

Frustrated, I looked at Dr. Marlowe. Couldn't she see how much more difficult this was for me? These girls were so . . . unsophisticated.

"You were telling them about the post-nuptial," she said

firmly, insisting I keep trying. I sighed and continued.

"Yes, the post-nuptial. So they sat down and wrote out what they expected of each other if I were to be permitted to be born," I said.