Our New Normal (ARC) Read online

  I walk out into the driveway.

  Oscar is standing there barefoot, holding the hose on his Subaru, watching the water hit the side panel. His hair is a brighter red in the sunlight, as is his beard. Willie Nelson is lying in the stream of water running down the driveway, lapping it up.

  “He’s drinking the soapy water,” I say.

  Oscar glances in the direction of the dog, but then returns his attention to the spray of water.

  I hook my thumbs in the back pockets of my jean shorts. I’m wearing my Graceland Tour thirtieth anniversary sweatshirt the kids gave me for Christmas. My dad took me to see Paul Simon on tour. Boston, June 1987; Mom stayed home with my little sister. He was that kind of dad. I know every word to every song. And my kids do, too.

  “I don’t know if Hazel talked to Tyler or not.”

  He glances at me, then back at the car. Doesn’t say anything.

  “Oscar.” My voice catches in my throat and for a minute I think I’m going to start crying. I fight it because I don’t do well expressing myself once I start crying. I don’t like crying. I don’t like the way it makes me feel out of control. And vulnerable. “I need to talk about this with you. I can’t let it season any longer.” I don’t say it in an accusatory way. I say it in a scared, I-need-my-husband kind of way.

  He stands there with the hose, still staring at the point where the water is hitting the car.

  I take a step toward him. “Oscar . . .”

  “What, Liv? What?” He says it loudly, not exactly shouting at me, but certainly not in a tone we usually speak to each other with. Which shocks me a little. Oscar can lose his temper over lights left on in an empty room or the freezer being left open a crack so his ice cream melts and runs onto the kitchen floor. But he doesn’t lose his temper on big things. Important things.

  “What do you want me to say?” he asks . . . no, demands. “You already know what I think.”

  “No. I don’t know—” I start to speak over the sound of the water, but he turns it off at the spray handle and suddenly it sounds like I’m shouting, too. “I don’t,” I say, lowering my voice, “know what you’re thinking today. I know what we both said yesterday, but . . . but we were in shock. Now . . . we’ve had some time to think.”

  “I’m not going to change my mind.” He shakes his head stubbornly. “I’m not giving in to you, Liv. Not this time.”

  “I’m not asking you to give in,” I say, prickling. “When do I ever ask you to give in? About what we’re having on our pizza? Sure. But not when we’re talking about something like this.”

  “You’re right.” He starts curling up the hose on the pavement at his feet. “Because you’re always right. I never give in. You never ask me to.” Sarcasm.

  “Oscar, that’s not fair.” Tears spring to my eyes and I take a step closer. Now I’m standing in the water the dog is lying in. “You and I need to talk about this. Think it through.” I take a breath, exhale. “It’s not that I don’t want our grandchild, but . . .” I look down and then back up at him. “I can’t do another baby. I cannot stay home with another baby with the diapers and feedings and the endless crying while you saunter off to work every day and be a part of the world. I did it once for you, I cannot do it again.”

  “Saunter off to work?” He runs his hand over his mouth. “What the hell are you talking about?”

  “Please keep your voice down.” I glance back at the house. Hazel has enough to deal with right now; she doesn’t need to worry about her parents fighting.

  He takes a step toward me, the green hose still in his hand. “I don’t know what we’re talking about here, Liv.”

  “We’re talking about the fact that I finally have a job again. A good job, a job I’ve dreamed of for a long time, and you’re not going to convince me to give it up and stay home with kids again.”

  He stares at me for a moment, then he knits his brow, shaking his head. “Are we talking about when you left Lauder and Jones sixteen years ago? ”

  I look down at the black asphalt of the driveway. This was not the conversation I came out here to have with him. But we’re here now. And ordinarily I’d just let it go. But I’m tired of letting things go, even for the sake of my family. “Yes, I’m talking about sixteen years ago. When I left my job to be a full-time mother and wife,” I add, raising my voice to match his fervor. “You knew I didn’t want to quit my job. You knew I didn’t want to be home all day with the kids. I wasn’t suited to that.” I open my arms wide to him. “You knew I wasn’t.”

  “Nope. Nope.” He throws down the hose. “Not acceptable. You cannot be pissed at me sixteen years after the fact when you didn’t say anything then. When you agreed to it then.”

  “Oscar, I agreed to it because—because—” I look away. I agreed to it why? I can’t even remember. Because I wanted to make him happy. Because I’m an adopted child who always wants to make everyone happy. Who wants everyone to love her.

  “Have you been angry with me about this for all these years?” Suddenly he sounds hurt, not angry.

  When I don’t answer him, he says my name.

  I look up at him. Tears are running down my cheeks. “I cannot be the mother to another infant, Oscar. I can’t do it. I will not stay home and take care of another baby. For once, I’m going to do something I want to do. Something that’s good for me. I’m going to do this renovation, and then another and another and another after that if anyone will hire me.”

  We’re both silent for a few seconds. He’s the one who crosses the imaginary line we’ve drawn in the driveway.

  Oscar exhales audibly. “I’m not asking you to give up your job, Liv.” He looks down at me. “I’m not asking you to give up your business and stay home. We’ll hire someone. My sister can help. You heard her the other night, she says she’d have another baby in a second if Sai would agree to it. She’s going to be lost when the twins go back to college. I’m not asking you to be a stay-at-home mom,” he says, lowering his voice until it’s a rumble of emotion. “I’m just asking you not to give our grandbaby away.”

  I stand there shaking my head slowly. I know that Oscar means what he’s saying right now. But I also know him well enough to know how this will go down. I know me. Hazel and Tyler will keep their baby. Tyler will abandon them before the baby is three months old. Hazel won’t be able to handle the baby and high school and, before we know it, she’ll be going to soccer games and I’ll be home making bottles.

  “We need to get home. I have to go see Mom and Dad,” I say, unable to look up at him. “Leave here in a half hour?”

  He stands there looking at me and then leans over and picks up the hose. “Ayuh.”

  I hesitate a few heartbeats and then I turn around and walk away. As I go, I feel the distance between us doubling exponentially with every step I take.

  6

  Hazel

  “So . . . you had a good time kayaking with your uncle?” I ask Tyler.

  He doesn’t answer.

  It’s Monday afternoon and we’re sitting side by side on the swings behind the church that’s a few blocks from my house. I didn’t get to talk to him in school today, things were crazy, first day and all. So we agreed to meet here.

  I live in a little town called Judith that’s not too far from Rockland. We live just outside the city limits in a house that used to have farmland around it. The house is one of those cool ones with the barn attached. I guess it was a mess when Mom and Dad moved in when I was a baby, but Mom redid the whole thing. That’s how she ended up starting her business. Because she did a fantastic job on our house and people told her she should do it for other people.

  Tyler lives a few miles away; he doesn’t have his own car anymore since his truck engine blew up so he’s always borrowing someone’s. Sometimes his mom’s, sometimes his dad’s, or a friend’s. He borrows his grandfather’s truck sometimes, too, but then his grandfather forgets he gave Tyler permission and Tyler gets in trouble for stealing the truck again.
>
  I look over at Tyler. He’s spinning around and around on his swing, shortening the chain until his sneakers are barely touching the ground. I’m just sitting there watching him, trying not to think about what an idiot he looks like right now. His girlfriend is trying to tell him we’re going to have a baby and he’s playing on the swing like we’re in the fifth grade? Which isn’t fair because he doesn’t know that I’m trying to tell him I’m knocked up.

  “No, you didn’t have a good time? Yes, you did?” I close my eyes and have to stifle a groan. God, I sound like my mother.

  “It was fine.” He picks up his feet and the swing spins in the opposite direction. His feet hit me in the leg and I push myself out of his reach. “Saw this badass Bayliner on Sebago Lake. One thirty-five hp Mercruiser. I bet it goes forty-five miles an hour. I think I’m going to buy one.”

  Like he has any money to buy a boat. And if he did, he needs to be saving for college—or a baby—not a boat he can dick around on the lake with his friends in. But I don’t say any of that because I don’t want to piss him off. We need to talk, seriously talk, and I know that’s not the way to get him to talk to me. Instead, I just nod and wait for his swing to unwind completely. “Tyler, I need to talk to you.” I stare at my flip-flops. “To tell you something.”

  He comes to a stop and reaches over and tugs on the sleeve of my Earth Day T-shirt. “Okay. Tell me.”

  All of a sudden, I’m scared. I don’t want to tell him. I mean, obviously I have to tell him, but . . . I look up at the sky. The sun is setting over the trees in the west. Maybe I should wait until I see a doctor or something. Maybe the pee tests came from a bad batch. That has to happen sometimes, right? This girl I knew in my English class last year thought she was pregnant and she just had a stomach virus.

  Except that I don’t feel sick, just stupid. And I know I am pregnant. And I know I need to tell Tyler. I can’t stall any longer. I told Mom I’d be home in a little while. Told her I was meeting him. She didn’t ask a single question, she just said, “Okay,” in a really quiet, sad voice that made me sad. Then she kissed my temple as she walked by me, carrying a basket of dirty clothes, which was really nice. It made me think about when I was little and how she used to kiss me and snuggle me when I was sad and it always made me feel better.

  “Tyler—” Before I can get out the next word, he’s spinning in the swing again. I reach out and grab the chain and stop him. “Tyler.”

  “What?”

  I wait until the swing unwinds. Until he’s looking at me. “I’m pregnant.”

  “What?” His second “what” has an entirely different tone.

  I just sit there staring at my feet that are dusty in my flip-flops. My toenail polish is chipped. Katy and I need a mani-pedi night. “I’m going to have a baby.” I punch him in the arm, only half playfully. “That night you didn’t have a condom. Now we’re going to have a baby.”

  He’s quiet long enough that I look up at him. He’s just sitting there, staring at me.

  “Shit,” he finally says.

  “Yeah, shit,” I repeat, returning my gaze to my teal toenails.

  Then he’s quiet for so long that I look up at him again. “You going to say something?”

  “Yeah, I . . .” He looks at me. “You’re sure. Like, you’re not just . . . you know.”

  He sounds uncomfortable even talking about my period, which I realize is kind of weird because he doesn’t have a problem taking my panties off.

  “Late or whatever,” he mumbles.

  “I took a pregnancy test. Two. You pee on a stick and it recognizes a hormone that kicks in when there’s a baby.” I whisper the last words because I’m still having a hard time connecting the fact that me being pregnant means I’m actually going to have a baby. Like a screaming baby with poopy diapers. Me. I’m going to be someone’s mother.

  He chews on his bottom lip. “You . . . you want to keep or . . . or do you think maybe you should get—”

  I interrupt him before he can go any further. “I’m not getting an abortion.” I hesitate and then go on. “I’d never judge a girl who made that choice, but . . . I’m not doing that. I’m just not and we’re not going to talk about it because I know it’s your baby, too, but it’s my body and—and no, Tyler.”

  “You wanna have a baby?” Now he sounds scared.

  No, I don’t want to have an effin baby. That’s what I want to scream at him. But I don’t because what would be the point? It would just freak Tyler out. Instead, I shrug. “Doesn’t matter what I want. I’m having a baby.” I think about it for a minute. “I guess I could have a miscarriage or something. It happens sometimes. When the baby’s not right. Chromosome issues like Triploidy or Trisomy 13. We talked about them in the genetics chapter in biology class. Some genetic disorders are incompatible with life. A baby can’t live and a lot of times the body just miscarries on its own.” I shake my head. “But I don’t think I’m going to get that lucky.”

  “Shit, Hazel.” He reaches between us and takes my hand.

  It feels good. Like maybe things really could be okay. I know this isn’t the best situation, but I think Tyler can come through here. This will be his chance to show everyone he’s more than what people think he is. With me helping him, he can do it. I’m sure he can. And for once, Mom won’t be right.

  We’re quiet again.

  “You tell your parents?” he asks me after a while.

  I nod. The sun is setting fast and the breeze is picking up, making it cooler. We’re two miles from the ocean here, but I can smell it. I love the salty smell of the ocean. Tyler sometimes talks about moving somewhere, like going to Montana where a cousin of his lives. I could never live that far from the ocean. Where I couldn’t smell it.

  “Shit,” Tyler says again.

  “Yeah,” I agree.

  “So . . . what . . . what’s gonna happen?” He gets up out of the swing and walks away.

  Like he doesn’t even give his pregnant girlfriend his hand to help her out of the swing. Not that I need help, but could he at least wait for me?

  I watch him go, then follow him. “What’s going to happen? I’m going to get really fat and then, sometime in March, I’m going to push a baby out of my V, Tyler. And you’re going to be there when I do it because you put it in there.” I poke him in the shoulder as I catch up with him. Then I take his hand. He squeezes mine and we walk toward the parking lot where his dad’s truck is parked all crooked in a handicapped parking place. Nobody is at the church, so it doesn’t matter.

  “And then we have to figure out how we’re going to finish school and take care of a baby. You graduate in June, so the next year won’t be as bad, depending on what you do,” I go on. “I thought maybe you could get a job and go to the community college at night. It takes a lot of money to care for a baby. Did you know diapers are, like, twelve dollars a pack? I looked it up on Amazon. And you have to have butt wipes and bath stuff and T-shirts and sleepers and, and a lot of other . . . stuff,” I finish because I’m freaking myself out just thinking about it.

  We reach his dad’s truck and he leans against the driver’s door. He and his dad are supposed to be repainting the truck so it’s an ugly matte-gray color right now.

  “How do you know all this?” Tyler asks.

  “The prices? I told you. Amazon. Pacifiers are, like, seven bucks apiece. The ones the kids will keep in their mouth. I know what you need because I take care of the Dorseys’ kids sometimes. Down the street.” I point in the general direction of our houses. “Lilly was only, like, six months old when I started watching her. I know about babies.”

  He lets go of my hand and reaches through the open window of the truck to get the pack of cigarettes off the dash.

  “We’re not going to be able to afford those when we have the baby,” I point out.

  He lights up. He knows I hate that he smokes. It makes his breath stink and it’s so bad for you. Cancer linked to tobacco use makes up forty percent of all cancer
diagnoses and three in ten cancer deaths are directly related to tobacco use. Like, how can you be so stupid?

  Not that I have a right to be calling anyone stupid. I’m the one who’s three months pregnant.

  I watch him light up. He watches me watching him.

  “I gotta go,” he says as he exhales a big puff of stinky smoke. “Gotta clean up the dog shit in the backyard. If I don’t, Mom says she’s turning my phone off again.”

  I step out of the way of the smoke. Secondhand smoke is no joke with a fetus: low birth weight, premature birth, learning and behavior issues in a child. I lean against the truck, crossing my arms over my chest. My hands fall flat across my abdomen. I wonder what it will be like when the baby starts to grow. When my belly gets big. “You’re going to have to tell your parents,” I say.

  He takes another drag, digging up gravel with the toe of his sneaker and sending the little pieces skittering across the parking lot. “My stepdad is going to freakin’ kill me.”

  I’m afraid he means his stepdad is going to hit him. He does that sometimes. Mostly when he’s had too much beer. Or when he and Tyler’s mom are really fighting. He’s not a bad guy, I don’t think. Just a bad parent. And his mom is a bad parent for letting her husband hit her son. If Dad ever hit Sean or me, I think my mom would take him out. When she does something she thinks she’s justified in doing, she always says no jury of her peers would convict her. I think that’s what she’d say as she hit Dad back with the lid of her Le Creuset pot.

  I look up at Tyler. “You can wait a little while.” I brush his arm with my fingertips. Sometimes I feel bad that he has such a shitty home life and I have such a good one. “Maybe we’ll get lucky and I’ll have a miscarriage or something.” I sort of laugh even though I don’t think it’s funny.