A Spark of Light(48)

“You would not—”

She folded her arms.

He frowned. “If you tell anyone that I’m stepping outside to let you do this, you will never get the cooperation of a single person in my department.”

“Cross my heart,” the lawyer said, and with a swear, the policeman left them alone.

“Nathan’s my cousin,” the public defender explained, and she grinned.

“Miz DuVille—”

“Mandy.” She walked to the side of the bed. “I’m going to need you to tell me everything that led up to this point. But first, you must have some questions.”

Some questions? She had dozens. Why were they treating her like a criminal? Was she really going to have to go to prison? What would her dad say, when he found out?

How long did she have to stay in the hospital? What would happen if she tried to leave? Where would she even go?

Instead, she looked at Mandy and said, “Is God going to have mercy on me?”

The lawyer blinked. “I beg your pardon?”

“What the judge said. Do you think God will have mercy on me?”

“I’d be more worried about whether Judge Pinot will,” Mandy said. “We call him the Pinot-lizer, because he has a fondness for maximum sentences. He’s not exactly a great justice to draw. You’re a minor, but you can be tried as an adult.” She sighed. “Look, I’m not going to lie. The odds are not in your favor. You ordered pills illegally on the Internet, and medical termination of pregnancy is something that can only be done with a doctor’s supervision. But that’s just the tip of the iceberg. We live in a state that considers an embryo a person, for purposes of a homicide statute. That means if you intentionally cause the death of a fetus growing inside you, you could be prosecuted in Mississippi for murder.”

Beth shrank back against the pillows. She closed her eyes, seeing the white tile of the bathroom floor and the blood smeared across it.

“You may not have known you were doing something wrong, but that’s not how the law sees it.”

“I don’t get it,” Beth murmured. “I thought abortion was legal.”

The lawyer took out a pad and pen. “Why don’t we start at the very beginning?”

Beth nodded, and suddenly she was back at Runyon’s, the market where she worked as a checkout girl. It was a tiny grocery, not a chain, the kind that sold slices of homemade pie right at the register. It was an ordinary shift, meaning that the patrons were old white ladies with hairnets on and their young black companions pushed the cart. Tessie, how much are those green beans? Beth would hear, and then, Well, Miss Ann, I think they are on sale. The bagger at her station was a Black man named Rule, and when Mr. Runyon came around and pinched Beth on her ass Rule would duck his head so he didn’t see. You didn’t have to go any further than the market to realize that America had not changed much in hundreds of years.

Every day at Runyon’s was the same, which was why, when the stranger entered, it felt like a lightning bolt. He was at least six feet tall, wearing a blazer—even in the infernal heat—with his button-down oxford shirt. He walked right up to her counter, holding a six-pack of beer. “Well, hello,” he said, looking at her name tag. “Beth.”

His accent rose and fell like birds with their wings clipped. “I’m going to need to see your ID,” she said.

“I’m flattered. But I could also just tell you my name, if you want to know.”

He had a smile that was a torch. “I’m guessing you’re not from around here,” Beth said.

“U of Wisconsin. We’re here for a track meet.” He smiled. “You go to the college?”

Beth was seventeen. She wasn’t at Ole Miss. She didn’t even know if she’d go to college. But she nodded.

“Then maybe you’ll come cheer me on.” He picked up a wedge of pie wrapped in plastic and frowned. “Buttermilk pie? That sounds terrible.”

“Actually, it’s sweet.”

“Not as sweet as you.”

Beth rolled her eyes. “Does that line actually work in Wisconsin?” she said. “I’m still going to need your ID.”

He fished in his pocket for his wallet and pulled out a license. Beth scanned the birth date and then the name. “John Smith,” she said dryly.

“Blame my parents.” He winked at her, took his beer and his pie, and then turned back just before he walked out of the market. “You should come to the meet.”

And then he was gone, and with him, all the air in the market.

She knew better. She had been counseled her whole life about how when the devil came to you, he would come in a form you couldn’t resist—like a Yankee boy who seemed to glow like a Roman candle when he grinned. The way Beth knew it was the devil was that he made her lie to her father, saying she had a double shift, when instead she went to the university and sat in the bleachers and watched him in the 4 x 100 relay. Every time he rounded the corner, it seemed he was running straight to her.

What Beth didn’t know—in spite of all the hours she had gone over it in her mind since then—was how, in the moment, it felt like a door had opened on a whole new world—yet, afterward, she was nothing but a cliché. He had spread his fancy blazer on the ground beneath the bleachers like a picnic blanket, he had given her her first beer, and when her head was full of stars, he had laid her down and kissed her. When he peeled off her blouse and touched her, she transformed into someone else—a girl who was beautiful, a girl who wanted more. When he pushed inside her, burning, and then suddenly he stopped, Beth panicked. She had not told him he was her first, but it wasn’t the only lie between them. I’m sorry, she told him, and he kissed her forehead. I’m not, he said.