Chapter 12
The church parking lot was already half empty when we pulled in. Sunday service had let out twenty minutes earlier and people were standing around in clusters with paper coffee cups, kids running between cars in their good clothes. I saw my mom's Subaru parked by the side entrance, right where she always parked, and my stomach dropped.
I hadn't told her we were coming.
He'd asked that morning if I wanted to tell my family with him there. I'd said no. Then he'd said, "They're going to know anyway," and he wasn't wrong. I'd been avoiding her calls for two days, and the sonogram photo was folded in my purse next to the test I still couldn't throw away.
"You don't have to do this today," he said. His hands stayed on the wheel. He was still in his black shirt, sleeves pushed up, looking too formal for a Sunday in this town.
"I know," I said. "But if we don't, she'll just show up at the apartment."
He nodded and cut the engine. The air outside smelled like cut grass and hot asphalt.
My mom saw us before we were even out of the car. She was talking to Mrs. Delaney by the fellowship hall doors, and her face did this thing it always did when she was bracing herself — her mouth smiled but her eyes went still. She excused herself and walked toward us, her purse tucked tight under her arm.
"Anna," she said, and hugged me. She held on a second too long, her hand on my back, and I knew she felt how tense I was. She looked at him over my shoulder. "You brought company."
"This is —" I started, but he stepped forward.
"I'm the father," he said quietly. He didn't offer his hand right away, just waited to see if she wanted it. "Thank you for letting us come by."
My mom's eyebrows lifted just a fraction. She looked at me, then back at him. "I didn't know Anna was bringing anyone today."
"We weren't sure we were coming," I said. My voice sounded thin. The parking lot was too bright, too open. Two women near the steps were watching us.
My mom studied my face, then his. "Well. Let's get out of this sun. Diner across the street still has that corner booth. We can talk there."
The diner was one of those places with vinyl seats and a pie case that hummed too loud. My mom slid in first, I sat next to her, and he took the other side alone. The waitress brought water without asking and left menus we didn't open.
My mom didn't waste time. She looked directly at him.
"So how long have you two —" She paused and rephrased. "What's your intention here? For my daughter."
He didn't flinch. "To be there. For all of it. Whatever Anna wants that to look like."
"That's a nice sentence," my mom said. Her tone wasn't unkind, just flat and tired. She turned to me and lowered her voice. "Honey, I asked you on the phone if something was going on. You said you were fine."
"I was scared," I said. My hands were around my water glass. "I didn't know how to tell you."
"Tell me what, exactly?" she said, and then she stopped herself. She glanced at him, then back at me, and I saw her realizing she shouldn't push for details in front of him.
A bell jingled and the door opened. A woman in her early sixties walked in — his mother, I realized, even before he stood. Same dark hair, same set to her shoulders. She wore a navy dress and pearls that looked wrong in the diner.
"I hope I'm not late," she said. She looked at him first, then at me, then at my mom. "I'm Margaret."
My mom sat up straighter. "You're his mom."
Margaret slid in next to her son. For a second nobody spoke. The waitress came back and hovered, then retreated.
Margaret spoke first, to me. "He told me yesterday. I wanted to meet you properly, not in a parking lot, but he said it couldn't wait."
I felt both mothers looking at me, waiting. The sonogram was burning a hole in my purse. I could feel the weight of what they wanted me to say — whose it is, when it happened, what the plan is. Are you getting married. Are you keeping it.
I took a breath. My heart was hammering so loud I was sure they could hear it.
"I'm pregnant," I said. The words came out smaller than I expected. "About eleven weeks. I'm keeping the baby."
My mom's hand found mine under the table and squeezed hard. She didn't ask who the father was. She didn't look at him for confirmation. She just nodded, her eyes suddenly wet.
Margaret's hand went to her chest. "Eleven weeks," she repeated. She glanced at her son and I saw something pass between them — relief, fear, something older.
My mom turned back to him, her voice sharper now. "And you? Where do you stand on this? Because I've seen girls do this alone when the man decides it's inconvenient."
He leaned forward, elbows on the table. "It's not inconvenient. It's mine and I want it. But it's her decision how we do this. I'm not going anywhere unless she asks me to."
Margaret added, quieter, "We have resources. Medical, financial. Whatever you need, Anna. No strings."
I looked at my mom, then at Margaret. Two different kinds of concern, both heavy. I felt the old urge to make everyone comfortable, to smooth it over, to say we're figuring it out and it'll be fine.
Instead I said, "I'm going to be a mom whether we're together or not. That's not conditional. I need you both to understand that. I kept this to myself because I needed to know I could choose it for me first, not because someone told me to."
The table went silent. My mom let out a breath that sounded like it had been held for years.
"Okay," she said. Her thumb rubbed my knuckles. "Okay, baby. Then we figure it out around you. Not the other way around."
Margaret nodded slowly. "That's fair. That's right."
May you like
He was watching me across the table. He didn't reach for me. He just sat there and let my boundary stand, even while his mother and mine were on either side of it. Outside the window, families were getting into their cars, church doors locking for the afternoon. I didn't feel rescued. I felt seen, and it terrified me more than the parking lot had.
We didn't order food. We drank our water and agreed to talk again in a few days, somewhere less public. Paternity stayed between us — my line I didn't cross and they didn't push. But everyone at that table left knowing a baby was coming, and that I would not be moved off that fact. The pressure had shifted now from inside the apartment to everywhere else.
