All These Things That I've Done

The Tuesday of the appointment came too quickly. It had felt like just yesterday Elaine was sitting next to Jeff at the Staal family dinner table and laughing about Jeff being a former figure skater turned hockey star. Now she was sitting in the parking lot of the clinic with Em in the passenger’s seat trying to stop crying long enough to make it inside the building.

“You don’t have to do this,” Em said placing a hand over Elaine’s and squeezing it tightly. “You’re a wreck, babe.”

Elaine shook her head and wiped at her eyes with the sleeve of her sweater. “No, I don’t have another choice, Em,” she sobbed. She pressed her face against the leather steering wheel and let another wave of sobs wash over her body. She didn’t have a choice. This was it.

Em placed her hand on Elaine’s back and began to try and console her as best she could, but it was useless. Elaine would have to go in to the appointment like this and everyone would know that this wasn’t what she wanted. She pulled her face up from the steering wheel and wiped her eyes again. “I don’t have a choice,” she repeated.

Em nodded in understanding before unbuckling her seatbelt. She reached over and pulled Elaine in to a hug. “I’m right here. Let’s go do this ok?”

Elaine nodded and pulled back from the hug. She unbuckled her own seat belt and pulled her body out of the car. She felt so heavy like she was walking a swimming pool. Everything around her sounded like white noise and her chest felt tight. She didn’t have another choice.

The clinic didn’t look nearly as depressing inside. It looked like any other doctor’s office, except the waiting room was mostly women. No one looked nearly as emotionally distraught as Elaine. There was an older women casually flipping through a magazine and another younger woman next to her fascinated by her cell phone screen. Em sat down across from them as Elaine slowly made her way to the receptionist counter.

“Can I have your name please?” a young woman with a voice similar to who Elaine had spoken to on the phone asked.

“Elaine Young,” she replied trying to keep her voice as level as possible. She knew her face was red and swollen from crying but she somehow was still trying to convince everyone she was alright.

The woman scribbled some writing down on to a pad of paper and handed Elaine a clip board full of standard medical paper work. She took the paper work and sat down next to Em in the stiff backed nylon chair. Em looked up from her cell phone screen and smiled. ‘How’re you feeling?”

“Sick,” Elaine mumbled as she began to answer the monotonous questions before. Em placed a hand on her shoulder and squeezed.

“Need me to get you anything? They’ve got a water dispenser. I can get you a glass,” she offered.

“That would actually be great, Em,” Elaine said with a weak smile. Her throat had nearly dried out from all the crying in the car on the way here. Em pulled herself out of the chair and crossed the room, leaving Elaine alone with her paperwork. Each question she answered made her stomach drop. She couldn’t stop thinking about whatever it was inside of her answering these questions someday.
Elaine hurriedly scribbled down the answers to the questions just as Em returned with her water.

“Want me to take this up there for you?” she asked.

Elaine nodded. She felt entirely too blessed to have a friend as good as Em. She wasn’t judging, just loving and Elaine could never thank her enough for that. She watched as Em handed the clipboard back to the receptionist and crossed the waiting room to sit back down. She let her body drop in to the seat letting out a loud sigh as she did.

“God damn, you’re about to make an important decision and they can’t even give you comfy chairs,” she growled as she rubbed at her lower back.

Elaine chuckled. “You’re right. You’re not going to get back pain from pregnancy but you will from these chairs,” she added with a full out laugh.

The woman sitting across from the two shot them a dirty look but Elaine couldn’t be bothered. She had to laugh. What else would she do? She couldn’t wallow anymore. She was out of energy.

“Elaine Young?”

She looked up at the open door next to the receptionist station where a woman, much older than her, stood with a clipboard in hand and clad in pale pink scrubs. She had a bright smile on her face. Elaine wondered how she could be so optimistic working somewhere like this.

Em gave Elaine a sympathetic smile. “Want me to go back there with you?”

Elaine shook her head no. “I’ve got to go on my Em, but thanks.”

Em squeezed her hand before Elaine pulled herself out of the chair and crossed the waiting area. “Hello Miss Young, I’m Sandra and I’m going to be your counselor today.”

“It’s nice to meet you,” Elaine replied. She suddenly felt shy and began to pull at the sleeves of her tear soaked sweater. Could Sandra tell she hadn’t been able to stop sobbing since she woke up this morning?

“Alright well have a seat,” Sandra said gesturing to a small folding chair next to a blood pressure monitor. “I’m sorry it’s not more comfortable. I’m sure you can imagine we don’t get a lot of funding.”
Sandra gave a chuckle but Elaine could not even must a smile. As she had the cuff fastened around her arm she felt her heartbeat begin to race and her mind grow fuzzy. The room was too hot and she felt like her chest would burst like a balloon.

“What’s wrong?”

Elaine pulled herself from her dizzying thoughts to see Sandra standing over her cuff in hand. “W-what?” she stammered.

“Sweetie, pardon me but, you look terrible,” Sandra replied. She placed the cuff on top of the machine and pulled her rolling office chair to sit in front of Elaine. “My job is to talk to you about the procedure and if this is your decision, ok?”

Elaine slowly nodded.

“And it is ok if this isn’t the decision for you,” Sandra continued. She removed a stethoscope from around her neck and leaned back in to her chair. “Tell me what’s on your mind.”

Elaine could feel the tears forming in her eyes the instant Sandra stopped talking. “I-I don’t really have a whole lot of a choice,” she started. “I’ve got to work and I’m young but, but…”

Elaine’s voice broke and she allowed herself to sob. Sandra responded immediately with a box of tissues and a comforting pat on the back. “Keep going sweetie, let it out.”

“I don’t want to,” Elaine finally stammered out through her sobs. “I saw these kids at a party and I want that someday and I want someone else to have that too.”

“You’re thinking about adoption?” Sandra asked for clarification. Elaine nodded with her head still in her hands trying to conceal her swollen crying face.

“I just can’t be pregnant and go to work and what if he doesn’t want to give it up?” Once she was able to get out her thought, Elaine tried to focus on her breathing. She went in through her nose and out through her mouth. “I…I just don’t want to regret this for the rest of my life.”

Sandra continued to rub her back and gave her another tissue to dab at her swollen eyes. “Honey, it sounds like adoption is what you want. Pardon my language, but fuck ‘em if he doesn’t want you to go through with it. Does he have to carry the baby? No.”

Elaine laughed a bit at Sandra’s response. Counseling was a good profession for her.

“Look, sweetie,” she continued. “You are brave for being here. You would be brave for doing the procedure and you would be brave if you chose adoption. Both choices are brave and they are yours. You know what you want to do.”

Death bothered Elaine more than anything. No, terminating the pregnancy wasn’t killing the baby, but it was an absence of life she couldn’t personally handle. Ever since her Dad, she’d been so sensitive, so shy, so alone and now she had the chance to change someone’s life. She had the chance to do something brave all on her own.

“Do you want me to give you some alternative material?” Sandra asked offering Elaine another tissue. Elaine looked at her with an honest smile and nodded.
-
“What are you actually thinking??” Em shouted as the two took off down the highway back toward Elaine’s house.

“Em, I’m not having this argument,” Elaine curtly responded with her eyes fixed on the road. She’d made up her mind. It was final. Em could support her or not but the decision was hers.

“Elaine you’re gonna get huge. You are literally going to have another person inside of you and then you’re just gonna give it away. You don’t think that’s gonna be hard?”

“It is, Em, ok?” Elaine gripped tightly at the steering wheel trying to keep her composure. Deciding to put the baby up for adoption hadn’t made this whole thing any bit easier. “You don’t get it and you’re not going to so just stop. It’s what I want to do and you don’t have to be ok with it. I have to be ok with it.”

Elaine’s final words silenced Em for the remainder of the car ride. She was filled with adrenaline from her choice. She was never bold enough to shut Em down, but things were changing now faster than she could even process.

“You think Jeff will be ok with it?” Em finally asked as the car pulled in to Elaine’s driveway.
“I was going to invite him over tonight and tell him,” Elaine said as she pulled herself out of the vehicle. “It doesn’t really matter if he is or not. It’s my choice in the end.”

Em nodded in agreement. The two stood in the open September air feeling the southern autumn wind wrap around them. Em heaved a sigh before giving Elaine a tight hug. “I’m proud of you,” she mumbled in to her hair.

Elaine wrapped her arms around Em in return and squeezed tightly. “Thank you.”

They broke away from the hug and Em ran a hand through her already messy hair. “Well I’ve got to take off but call me, ok? Let me know how things go with Jeff.”

Elaine swallowed hard and nodded. She watched Em walk back to her own car and sighed. How was Jeff going to take the news? She literally had no idea at all. Would he be mad? She laughed at the thought. Jeff hardly seemed like the type to be mad about anything.

She slowly made her way in to the quiet house. Her mother was at work so that was at least one person she could wait to tell. Elaine pulled of her sweater and threw it and her bag on to her living room chair. She unlocked her cell phone and began to search for Jeff’s number without taking the time to second guess herself.

“Hello?” he answered on the third ring.

“Hey, it’s Elaine.”

“Yeah, I have caller ID,” he laughed. Elaine immediately felt embarrassed. She’d been so ready to jump in to the conversation that she was now getting all of her words confused.

“Sorry,” she mumbled immediately returning back to her sheepish demeanor.

“It’s ok,” Jeff said continuing to laugh. “What’s up?”

“I went to my appointment today.”

Jeff’s soft chuckles almost immediately stopped. She could practically feel his nerves on the other side of the phone. Whoever let two super nervous people get together is an idiot, Elaine thought to herself.

“Well, how’d it go?” he asked trying not to let his voice catch in his throat. He was worried. She could tell even if she didn’t know for what.

“I was actually going to ask if you wanted to come over tonight,” Elaine said as she dropped down on to the living room sofa. “My mom is working a late shift and I wanted to talk.”

“We’ve been talking a lot lately, Elaine,” Jeff replied. His response took her off guard.

“What do you mean?”

“I mean…I don’t want to keep having all of these cryptic conversations and hearing ‘We need to talk’ every time I talk to you,” he said. His voice was tired just like hers.

“I don’t want to tell you this over the phone,” she pleaded.

“I know what you’re doing and you can just say it.” Jeff’s words came out like a sigh. They were slow and ragged like he was pushing each syllable out of his chest with every ounce of energy he had.

“Jeff, I’m not having the abortion.”

She could hear him go silent on the other line and hear his breath became more and more rigid.

She’d thought the news would relax him. “What are you doing then?” he asked in a small voice.

“I want to give it up for adoption,” Elaine replied. Jeff let out a long sigh. “Did you think I was going to keep it and milk you for child support?”

Jeff laughed nervously. “I mean no…but also yes. Ok, so adoption? Like you’re really going to carry the thing?”

Elaine leaned back in to the couch cushions and nodded. “I really am. Kind of weird huh?”

“I’ll say,” Jeff laughed. “You sure this is what you want? I don’t want to make…”

“You’re not making me do anything,” Elaine quickly interjected. “No one is making me do anything. This is honestly what I want. I just…I just wanted to know if you wanted to be involved at all. It’s ok if you don’t.”

It was Jeff’s turn this time to step over her words. “No! I…I want to be there. Elaine, this is huge for both of us. I’m not just going to run off.”

Hearing him say her name was so foreign. She’d hung out with Jeff a grand total of two or three times and she was having his kid, yet hearing her own name come from his lips was the strangest thing to her. “Thank you,” she finally replied.

“Do you still want to talk in person?”

“I think it would be nice,” she said simply. “So we can make a plan since you want to stick around all.”

Jeff gave out an audible laugh. “Oh Elaine Young, you’re not getting rid of me now.”