A Missing Heart(17)
“That’s not entirely true, AJ,” she says with tears bubbling in the corners of her eyes. “I was forced to make the decision I did. If I hadn’t, I would be living on the street with no money, no support, no job, no way to feed our daughter, and no way to keep her safe.”
“I don’t understand.” For so many reasons, I don’t understand. I wouldn’t have let that happen. We had this discussion a million times throughout the last few months. I was going to give up my scholarship and put off college, get a job, find an apartment—do everything I could to support Cammy and our daughter. She was okay with it and on board with every plan.
“If I kept her, my parents were going to kick me out. They were going to hunt down the father—you, and destroy your life, keep us apart, and make you pay every dime you ever earn to our daughter. Both of our lives would have been destroyed, and I was scared.” I want to argue with her, but I’m seventeen and she’s seventeen. Her parents could do whatever the hell they want to do until the end of August when she turns eighteen. Then at eighteen, they’d have no obligation to help her out, and if I didn’t help her out, she would be on the street if that was their punishment. While I can understand her fear, we’re talking about our daughter who we just mindlessly handed over to two strangers we know nothing about.
“Well, I guess you’re safe from that happening now,” I tell her, trying not to sound cold, even though it’s all I feel inside right now. I know I’m not doing a good job at hiding my emotions.
“Safe,” she laughs. “My parents are putting the house up for sale next week. They’ve found a tutor to homeschool me for the rest of the school year. I can’t walk the stage during our graduation since they have forbidden me from that too. When I move to D.C. next fall for college, they’re moving down there too, because Dad got some job opportunity he can’t pass up. So coming home for holidays and vacations like we planned is no longer a possibility. Maybe it was all a big coincidence with them picking up and moving out of the house I’ve lived in since I was born, but I’m pretty sure they’re doing it to move away from the embarrassment I’ve caused them in this stupid, little rich town.”
All of this is almost too much to take in. Everything that happened in this past week and year has been too much to take in. I’ve lost my daughter. I’m losing my girlfriend—the girl I am head over heels in love with, the girl I’m pretty sure was supposed to be my forever. Hours ago, I wasn’t sure I could ever look her in the eyes again; yet here I am, looking her in the eyes and still loving her as much as I did before she told me our daughter was being given up for adoption. All I feel is pain—a smothering pain that is stretching from the tips of my toes to the ends of each hair on my head. “What are you saying?” I’m not a goddamn moron; I know what she’s saying.
“This is it, AJ,” she says, pulling herself up to a better sitting position. I watch the pain wrench through her face with the slightest movement, and all I want to do is make it better—take away all of her pains, but that’s no longer a part in her life I will take part in.
“We’re over?” I ask, needing the heart-breaking confirmation.
“It won’t work. We won’t ever see each other,” she tells me.
I drop off the side of the bed to my knees and fold my hands tightly on top of her bed. “I’ll drive to you. We can make it work. We still have two months and the summer maybe—”
“If the house sells fast enough, we’ll be leaving a lot sooner than two months from now. My diploma will be mailed to me, as I’ve been told.”
“Why not make the best of it until then?” I plead. It’s never been like this with us. Everything was always easy. We enjoy the same things, think the same way, agree more than disagree. Until now.
“It will hurt too much,” she says, through a croak in her voice. “I love you, AJ. I love our daughter. I loved the thought of us being a family, and my parents took that away. They’re taking it all away. I regret it. All of it. I wish I hadn’t been bullied into their decisions. I want her back. I made a mistake.” Tears pour down the sides of her cheeks, and her erratic breaths are followed by a soft cry. I want to tell her not to go to D.C. To stay here. Or come to Rhode Island with me. We’ll get a place out there and she can find a new college to go to. But that’s idiotic. Her education is being paid for by her wealthy parents, and she got into one of the most prestigious schools in the country. Telling her to stay here for me would be the most selfish thing I could do. Yet, I want to do it. I want to beg her to give everything up for me. Maybe we could get our daughter back somehow. I don’t know how it all works, but maybe there’s a way.
“Let’s fix it,” I tell her. I shouldn’t have said that. I have nothing to lose, though. She shakes her head slowly, as tears completely consume her eyes, filming them and making them impossible for me to see through and probably impossible for her to see me, and the tears in my eyes. “I can’t lose you too.”
“We’re only seventeen. Our whole lives are ahead of us, and we’re only in this much pain because we don’t know of a greater pain yet. They said this pain will pass.” These words were all spoken directly by her parents and are now being regurgitated from her fragile mind. “We shouldn’t make this worse than it has to be. I’m sorry for everything, AJ, but we should make this our goodbye.” Her hands squeeze tighter around the balled fabric scrunched within her fists and they both tremble ferociously.