Blitzed(29)

I'm nodding and crying at the same time, and I push past her to go into my bedroom, where I throw myself on the bed, sobbing. I don’t need this shit right now. It's my senior year, I've got a great social life going and an awesome boyfriend, and it's not even Thanksgiving yet!

I'm still sobbing when there's a quiet knock on my door. "Go away, Mom! You made your point clear!"

"Actually, honey, I came to apologize," Mom says, coming in and sitting next to me. "Oh, sweetheart, I'm so sorry I yelled at you. I know you must be an emotional mess right now.”

"We were careful, Mom," I sob, half blubbering, I know, but not able to do more. "We were careful. He wore a condom, and we never . . . ah, gah!" I can't make any more sense, and I just bury my face in my pillow. Maybe I can suffocate myself that way. I think I've seen it in a movie once.

Mom sits quietly, stroking my hair, saying nothing while I sob. When it passes, I feel a little bit better. Life still is unfair and sucks, but I'm not going to die, am I? I mean, look at Mom. She got pregnant in high school too, and she made a great life for me. Well, until I went and f*cked it up, but she did a lot for me. I turned over and sniffled, wiping at my nose. "Mom . . .”

"No, honey, you don't need to apologize," Mom says, leaning down and kissing my forehead. "We do need to have a serious discussion though. Actually, you and Troy need to have a serious discussion."

"I can't, Mom!" I say, suddenly afraid. "Mom, if I tell him, it ruins his life!"

"Whitney Nicole Nelson, you’d better start talking sense. Or else I'm going to go over to the Wood house and get some answers from Troy and his parents."

"Mom, that's the thing, though. Troy . . . he's been getting beaten by his dad for years, and yesterday, he nearly got put in the hospital. His mom left . . . years ago, I don't know when. But he's got a bright future, Mom. He wants to get out of Silver Lake Falls, and he's got a scholarship to college. He’s on his way to his dream of going to the NFL. If he knows I'm pregnant, it’ll ruin his whole life."

Mom swallows and looks at me. "He got you pregnant, Whitney. He needs to take responsibility for his actions. And if he’s a half-decent human being, he’ll want to know.”

"Mom, it's my body. Isn't that what you keep telling me?" I plead, begging. "If I tell Troy, he's going to quit football and not go to college. He’ll get a job trying to take care of the baby, and that’ll ruin him—it’ll kill him. Worst of all, Mom, it’ll ruin the love we have, because he’ll come to resent me. I know it, Mom. I . . . I love him too much to ruin him like that."

Mom sits quietly, then sighs. "So what do you want to do? Whitney, you're only a few weeks pregnant, and I still want to talk to Dani Vaughn. I suspect I can even put a date of conception based off the now obvious lie you two cooked up . . . but that's for another time. It's only October. Graduation in June is a long way off, and no matter what, you're going to be showing by Spring Break at the latest. If you're like me, you're going to show a lot earlier than that. You can't hide a pregnancy from Troy until June."

I nod, then swallow. "I need to leave, then."

"That'll hurt Troy too, you know," Mom says, not unkindly. "If he loves you the way that you're saying you love him, you're going to break his heart."

"I'd rather break his heart that break his future," I whisper, looking out. "Besides, who says that, maybe after the baby is born, I couldn’t come back, you know?"

"That's a lot to talk about, Whitney," Mom says, stroking my hair. "I disagree with your thinking, but you’re eighteen and an adult. I’ll support you on whatever you decide.”

"Thanks, Mom. I . . . I'm sorry."

Mom shakes her head and kisses me on the forehead, like she did when I was little and she was comforting me after a boo-boo. "You don't have to apologize for anything, honey. I love you with all my heart."





Chapter 10





Troy





I thought the days before my first date with Whitney were hard, but they're nothing compared to the past week and a half. Coach not only kept me on the bench for the game against Hartsville, but he didn't even let me dress. I had to sit in my jeans and jersey watching as Roberts tried his best at QB, and Gabe pulled double duty, trying to fill in as linebacker, but it didn't matter. Hartsville's the sort of town that breeds one thing: nasty, tough as nails country boys who scrap and fight. They mauled the team and sent us to our first loss of the season. With only two weeks left in the season, we're now tied for first place.

The season comes down to this next game. The Sounders are the biggest school in our conference, only kept in our level of play because of geography. They routinely field teams that had ten or even twenty more players than the rest of our conference, and we haven't beaten them in years. Now, with one conference loss to our record, it comes down to the the Silver Lake Foxes against the Northern Sounders. If we win, we have the edge in the head-to-head matchup, and win the conference championship, and gain the home field advantage up through the entire playoffs until the state championship. If we lose, we're third, because Hartsville's going to have the edge on us, and we're totally out of the playoffs. Sure, we could blow it in the last week against Carlisle, but so far this year, they haven't won a single game.