Scar Girl (The Scar Boys #2)(21)

I just lay there and cried. The doctor left the room so my sisters and I could have a few minutes. I don’t know how long I cried, but it was a long time.

I had only just decided to keep the baby, but maybe I’d been leaning that way all along. I mean, I’m definitely pro-choice and all—who am I or anyone else to tell girls what to think or what to do with their bodies—but given who I am and how I was raised, I don’t know if I could’ve made any other decision. It was my choice to keep the baby. I mean, think about the words to “Lullaby.” Of course I was going to keep the baby.

By that point, though, none of that stuff mattered.

The doctor’s words—There’s no heartbeat—were stuck in my brain like a skipping record. What the hell was I supposed to do with that?

Once I calmed myself down enough, I had only one thought. I squeezed Theresa’s hand and said, “Get it out of me.” She nodded and went to get the doctor.

An hour later, after more paperwork, after Agnes went home to get her money and had come back, the doctor was administering a local anesthetic.

The procedure for getting a dead baby out of you is pretty much the same as for an abortion. Either way, it’s fucking awful. It’s called a D & C. I didn’t want to know anything about it, but Agnes kept asking questions.

“What does that stand for?”

“Dilation and curettage.”

“What do you actually do?”

“We’ll dilate Cheyenne’s cervix and then remove the entire contents of her uterus.”

“How?”

The doctor was explaining all this while she was doing other things to prep for the procedure. She reminded me of Richie’s dad, Mr. Mac, who never seemed to have a moment when he wasn’t doing something.

“We use something called a cannula tube. It creates a gentle suction that allows us to draw out any tissue.”

I couldn’t help but notice that she never referred to what was inside me as a baby.

“Wait,” Theresa said. “You mean you, like, use a vacuum cleaner to suck the baby out of her? Gross!” Agnes looked at Theresa like she was going to kill her.

“Okay, girls, time for you to go to the waiting room,” the doctor said abruptly. “This will take about thirty minutes, and the anesthesia is going to make Cheyenne feel a bit woozy. She’ll need your help getting home.”

“Of course, Doctor,” Agnes said. Theresa rolled her eyes at Agnes’s perfect way of speaking, and then the doctor and I were alone.

“Does the father know?” she asked me as she started the process of dilation.

“What? Oh, no. I can’t tell him.”

Dr. McCartney looked at me. “Did he hurt you?”

The sedative was starting to kick in, and it took me a minute to understand what she was getting at.

“Hurt me?”

“Is that why you can’t tell him?”

“No, no, it’s not like that at all. He was in an accident a couple of months ago and lost his leg. He’s dealing with his own shit. Sorry.” I corrected myself, “Stuff.”

The doctor smiled at me and went back to her work.

“Can I ask you something?” I asked.

“Shoot,” she said.

“Johnny, the dad, stood up without his prosthetic leg, lost his balance, and fell on top of me yesterday. We landed on a bed. It wasn’t too hard or anything, but could that have made this happen?” I couldn’t keep the fear out of my voice.

“No, Cheyenne,” she answered. “I don’t think so. It would have to have been a pretty big trauma to your body, and what you’re describing doesn’t really fit the bill.”

“Then why did this happen?” I started crying again.

“Look.” She held my hand. “There could be lots of medical reasons, some of them hereditary—”

I chuckled under my breath, but loud enough to cut the doctor off. “My mom has seven children, all girls,” I explained, and then remembered that wasn’t the whole story. “But my sister Theresa lost a baby last year. It was a stillbirth, at home, in bed.”

“That could be an indicator of the hereditary nature of what’s happening here. Is your sister okay?”

“Actually, she’s usually a pretty big bitch.” Dr. McCartney smiled but didn’t play along with the lame joke I was trying to make. Given how nice Theresa was being, I knew it was a pretty crappy thing to say. “Maybe that’s harsh,” I added, trying to redeem myself. “I mean, she’s here now. That’s more than I’ve ever done for her.” I paused before adding, “Maybe I’m the bitch.” Dr. McCartney chuckled with me at first, but noticed almost right away that my laughter was morphing into sobs. I was totally losing it.

Squeezing my hand one more time and letting it go, the doctor went back to work while she talked to me. “There are genetic markers that we’re only just now beginning to understand. But like so much of what can go wrong with the human body, sometimes there is no rhyme or reason. It is what it is. That doesn’t make it better or easier, but it also doesn’t preclude you from having children someday in the future—far in the future. Speaking of which, you should probably make an appointment to come back and talk to me about birth control.”