Page 13 of To Hades & Back
There was no way, there just wasn’t. My ears popped as he talked about his mother. Hades stood there listening attentively while my mind wandered.
OVER SIXTEEN YEARS EARLIER…
“I can’t believe this shit!” My mother paced the floor like a mad woman. My father stood in one spot with his arms over his broad chest and his fire filled eyes on me. “David, do you know how the hell this will look? I told you that her ass was out here just being a fast ass little girl.”
I cried in my seat with my head down. I was embarrassed but not necessarily ashamed that I was pregnant. I’d been sick for over a week. When I told my boyfriend, Tyris, that I was sick, he bought a pregnancy test. Our first time having sex was a few months ago when it was his birthday. When the test came back positive, I wanted to die. Tyris told me that we would be fine because he was seventeen, had a job, and he loved me.
I believed him but found out rather quickly that I shouldn’t have. I went to a private school while he went to a public one. Although I went to a private school, we still played against public schools when it came to sports. I met Tyris at one of those games. We started sneaking around, and I felt loved. A month before his birthday, he started to hint that my virginity would be a great present for him. I wouldn’t say that I felt pressured, but he did bring it up a lot.
Tyris was around for about a month or so after we found out that I was pregnant. We were making plans about telling my parents about the pregnancy and what we were going todo afterward. One day I called him, and his phone number was disconnected. I’d never been to his house, so I didn’t know where he lived.
Every time I snuck out so we could be together, I went to his homeboy’s place. He was older and had his own place. When I went to his house, he acted like he didn’t know who I was. I fussed with him until his girlfriend came out and told me that she would beat my ass if I didn’t leave. I was devastated. It was like Tyris disappeared from the face of the earth.
My mind zapped back into the room at the mention of abortion. I jumped up from my seat. “I’m not killing my baby!”
My mother’s feet stopped mid pace. She rushed over to me and slapped me across my face. “Do you think that you’re going to bring your bastard child in this house? If that’s what you think, then you have another thing coming.”
I held the side of my face with tears streaming down it. My mother ranted about the news headlines saying that the daughter of Judge David Copeland was a pregnant whore. My father had yet to say anything, but I knew he would at some point. When he finally did, it was a question that I didn’t want to answer. “Where is the boy that got you pregnant?”
“Um, um, I’m not sure. I-I tried to get in touch with him, and his phone number was disconnected,” I said lowly. If I was ashamed about any part of this, it was that. How could I have been so stupid. Since Tyris and I had been together, girls had confronted me about him being with them. I was so in love that I believed him when he told me they were lying.
My father shook his head. “I don’t want to deal with this tonight. Well, I shouldn’t have to ever deal with the fact that my daughter is a pregnant whore, but such is life. Go to bed, Jin’jer.”
I didn’t say anything as I left our den to go upstairs to my bedroom. I was a teenager with a broken heart and a baby inher belly. All I could do was cry myself to sleep. I’d made a mess of my life.
“Oh God! It hurt so much!”
It was time to have my son. The next morning after I told my parents that I was pregnant, they woke me up and told me to pack my bags. I had no idea what was going on, but I did as I was told. We all got on a plane to Colorado. The next thing I knew, I was left there at a boarding school for pregnant teenage mothers. My parents wanted me as far out of sight as possible so that I wouldn’t disgrace our precious family name.
One of the nurses patted a cool washcloth against my forehead. “I know, Jin’jer. You’re doing so good. He’s almost here.”
I couldn’t say that being here at the school was horrible. The staff were really nice, the teachers at the school were great, and I had friends. I didn’t feel like an outcast. The girls around me at the school were either pregnant, too, or already had their babies. The purpose of the program was to teach the teenage mothers the necessary skills to be productive adults as young mothers. Once the child was born, they helped the mothers get the aid they needed, like government housing, healthcare, food stamps, daycare, a job, and anything else they might need.
When they told me to push again, I did. “Aah! Aah! Get him out! Get him out!”
“He’s out! He’s out, Jin’jer!” The doctor held my baby while the nurse cut the umbilical cord.
I felt woozy, but I wanted to see my baby. “I don’t feel good. Can I see my baby?”
“Hold on, sweetie,” the doctor said. She looked over at a monitor that was near my head. “Janice, her heart rate is elevated.” That was the last thing that I remembered before I passed out.
When I woke up, I was in a different room from the one that I had my son in. I was tired and confused. My confusion heightened at the sight of my parents sitting on a couch near the window. I hadn’t seen or talked to them since they dropped me off here. “What are y’all doing here? You came to meet my son?”
“We are here to take you home. The doctors said that you should be good to be discharged tomorrow,” my mother said. Her voice was void of any emotions.
I sat up a little in the bed. “Oh, okay. We need to go to the school first. They had a baby shower for me a few weeks ago, so all of my baby stuff is there. I want to take it with me.”
My father stood up then put his hands inside of his trouser pockets. “Jin’jer, you won’t need any of that stuff.” His eyes were unreadable. “Your son died.”
“What! No, that can’t be right. Wh-where is my son? I want to see my son!” I felt myself starting to hyperventilate.
Seconds later, nurses and the doctor that delivered my son came into the room. The nurses told me to calm down. When I asked about my son, they all had this eerie facial expression. The doctor came to the side of my bed. “Jin’jer, sweetie, after your son was born, there was a complication. We tried everything that we could to revive him, but he didn’t make it. I’m so sorry.”
This couldn’t be happening. I didn’t go through all of this to not have my son. I wanted my son. I loved my son. When I broke down, you would think that it was my parents who consoled me, but it wasn’t. Janice, the nurse who stood by my side during labor, consoled me. She threw daggers with hereyes at my parents. Yeah, they were the epitome of fuck ass parents.
Three days later, I was on another plane, headed back to Boston. When I got there, it took all of a week for me to find out that my parents set the narrative that I had been out of the country on a mission trip. That was how they explained my long absence. People actually congratulated me for being so selfless.
Two and a half months after I was home, I ran into Tyris in the mall. He was with a girl and a baby that looked like she was about one-year-old. When he saw me, his eyes almost fell out of their sockets. There was nothing to worry about because I was so dead inside at that point that I didn’t even have room to be hurt. I walked past them like they didn’t exist. After that day, there was nothing my parents could do with me. I busted my ass to finish school and get the hell out of Massachusetts.
