On Hope's Wings

“What about ‘Isabella?’” she asked, her green-eyed gaze drifting over to gauge his response.

Though her voice tore through his thoughts, Carlos was unable to muster up an answer at that moment. He knew this was important, a decision they’d have to make eventually, but at that time, he just couldn’t bring himself to focus on the task at hand. Instead, his eyes skimmed over his surroundings, and he couldn’t deny the sudden shift in the atmosphere. As the temperature began to slowly drop, the carefree and endless feeling that embodied the summer seemed to fade away as well, replaced by a return to the same old routines that they were so accustomed to.

Deep down, Carlos knew that his life would never be the same.

Only a few feet away from their blanket, a girl was sprawled out across the grass on her stomach, her textbook open in front of her and a set of headphones covering her ears as her long legs swung back and forth in the air. Angry spurts of a conversation could be heard from the sidewalk as a man in a pinstriped suit walked past. Carlos noticed the man’s expression was tense as he barked into his Bluetooth headset to another man he kept referring to as “Parker.” From the parts of the interaction Carlos was able to make out, apparently this Parker had ruined an important business deal.

In the midst of all this seriousness, there was one group in the park that stood out to Carlos, probably because their faces were so familiar to him. The four of them had grown up together, the very best of friends throughout their school years, and even though he knew that he could still go to them if he needed to, that the three other guys would always be there for him, Carlos was aware that his life had taken a different direction than theirs. This difference was made even more apparent in the scene that played out in front of him. While Carlos was in the park with his girlfriend, trying to decide on a name for their unborn child, his three best friends were engaged in a friendly game of S.K.A.T.E. on the sidewalk.

Kendall’s fists punched at the air, his golden blonde locks damp with sweat as he reveled in his victory. Though Logan had screwed up his trick, he took off his helmet and gave Kendall a friendly high-five, standing off to the side as he watched the other two guys get ready to start a new game.

Carlos kept trying to tell himself that he was growing up, that this predicament was actually good for him, but he couldn’t deny that spark of envy in the back of his mind. More than anything, he wished he could join them, but things were strange between them now. He knew he belonged there with Jennifer, but there was a part of him that wanted to go back to that time when he was just a energetic and carefree as his friends. Though Carlos had never been the best at skateboarding, especially when it came to mastering tricks, he still wasn’t the worst, and he had managed to win a game every now and then.

He didn’t miss the skateboarding or even just hanging out. What he really longed for was how simple the bonds between them used to be.

“Eh, I don’t know,” he admitted. “I feel like it would just get shortened down to ‘Bella,’ and that name’s way too common these days, with the whole Twilight craze and everything. Plus, growing up, my sister had a cat named Bella, and I’m pretty sure that thing hated me.”

Jennifer let her fingers slip into the spaces between his, giving his hand a reassuring squeeze. She knew all too well how isolation felt. The girls she’d thought were her friends were even quicker to cut her out of their affairs, but what hurt more were the rumors that they spread about her and the harsh look of judgment she received from total strangers on the street. If anything, these wounds only made her stronger.

The sound of his laughter brought a smile to Jennifer’s lips. “Well, we could always call her ‘Izzy.’”

Her faint smile was mirrored across his features as he pondered the suggestion. “I like it. It’s unique.”

“Yeah, it is cute,” she began, tucking a loose corkscrew curl behind her ear, “but I think that name would become a little awkward after a certain age. Like, I feel that it’s cute for a little girl, but I can’t really picture an adult that would go by the name Izzy.”

A sigh forced its way past his lips as his shoulders lumped in the motion. “You’re right. I guess I didn’t think this would be so hard.”

It was true. Carlos had expected that choosing a name would have been the easiest aspect of this whole situation, but it felt like trying to fit the pieces of a jigsaw puzzle together. For a moment, he shook himself out of his worried thoughts and tried to soak in every inch of his girlfriend. Despite the small bump that stretched at the seams of his worn gray hockey sweatshirt, she still looked as gorgeous as the day they’d met.

All of their friends thought they were an unlikely match. She had moved out to the city in hopes of pursuing a career in both modeling and acting, while he was a clumsy guy with no idea as to what he wanted to do with his life. To put it bluntly, Jennifer was completely out of his league. Though they both lived in the same apartment building, the two of them hadn’t officially met until they were paired together for a marketing project their senior year of high school. Despite their superficial differences, there was an obvious spark between them, and with each moment that they spent together, that spark burned even more brightly until they both realized that they were infatuated with one another.

Though their love had felt real back then, looking back on it, Carlos recognized now that what they had then had been nothing more than teenage lust masquerading as something more. If they weren’t having a baby, he knew that their relationship would’ve eventually ran its course. It wasn’t that he was only staying with her because he’d gotten her pregnant, but in a way, the unexpected obstacle had forced them to analyze their feelings for each other and put more effort into the relationship. They weren’t the same people they had been when they first met. Carlos and Jennifer were both evolving, but in their case, the change was a good thing. He no longer wasted his time staying up all night to play Xbox with his buddies, and she didn’t spend so much time overly involved in her appearance or what everyone else thought about her.

Jennifer tapped the tip of her pen impatiently against the blank notebook page, her eyes glancing over the open book of baby names balanced on her knee. “What about ‘Coral?’ Do you think that’s too weird?”

His nose wrinkled at the sound of the name. “It sounds too much like a crayon. How about we just name her burnt sienna?”

Jade eyes rolled at him, but he caught the corner of her lips turning upward in a reluctant smile. “What do you think of the name ‘Gabriella?’”

“Hmm.” His coffee-colored eyes tilted upward towards the tree branches that stretched out above them. A gush of wind rippled through the limbs, causing a few leaves to come spiraling towards the ground. “Little Gabby Garcia…” His voice trailed off as he contemplated the future.

He could see her so vividly in his mind. A head full of glossy brunette curls, her mother’s enchanting eyes, his own mischievous grin, all blended together to form a precocious little girl with a mind all of her own. Carlos imagined pushing her on the swing set nestled in the corner of the very same park they were settled in, her hair blowing in the wind, the sound of her laughter as she begged him to push her higher. It was a dream and a desire that he hadn’t known he had in him, but with each passing day, Carlos began to take to the idea of fatherhood more positively.

All she needed was a name.

“I like it,” he announced with a grin. “Add it to the list.”

She penciled in the name at the top of the page in her loopy cursive handwriting before her eyes glanced up to meet his gaze. “It does have a nice ring to it.”

It felt reassuring to have at least one name that they both agreed on, a name that was worthy of the life that they’d made together. If the two of them could just pick out a name, maybe things would feel like they were beginning to fall into place.

“All right, shoot me another name,” he said with a laugh as he rolled back onto the plush grass. Clouds drifted by slowly above him as he waited for the soft sound of her voice.

“Okay, what about ‘Faith?’ It’s a simple, pretty name.”

Since that night five months ago when Jennifer had first told him the life changing news, Carlos had been clinging tightly to faith. Faith that their budding teenage relationship would be able to withstand the strain of an unplanned pregnancy. Faith that they would be able to support another human being, someone who was entirely dependent on the two of them, two kids that could barely take care of themselves.

He’d known something was wrong as soon as he received the text message asking him to stop by her apartment. The words just didn’t read like her; the message was too quick and to the point. Despite his suspicions, he walked over to the apartment she shared with her two friends only to find her sitting on the edge of her bed with her head in her hands. Her eyes were bloodshot, her cheeks tear stained as she looked over at him. She didn’t have to give him an explanation; he automatically scooped her up in his arms and held her until she got up the nerve to tell him what was on her mind.

“Jen, sweetie, what’s wrong?” he’d asked, brushing her hair out of her eyes.

Without a word, he followed her stare to the at-home pregnancy test on her nightstand, focusing on that faint pink plus sign that had changed everything.

“Carlos, I’m pregnant,” she had whispered before pulling away from his arms. It was almost as if hearing her own voice say the words aloud somehow solidified things and made everything feel that much more real.

They didn’t speak for the rest of the night, but he stayed there in her bed with her, holding her delicate frame against his chest as the light from the television flickered against her turquoise bedroom walls. Despite the thoughts that raced through their minds and the fear that coursed through their veins, neither of them knew how to put their emotions into words. It was something so overwhelming and so unknown that they needed the time to think things through, to truly process how they felt about it.

Throughout it all, Carlos was an incurable optimist. There wasn’t a single doubt in his mind that they would be able to do this together, he just had to convince Jennifer and the rest of the world that they were capable.

The morning after, that same faith had echoed in his head to the watery thud of his heartbeat as he sat motionless in the stairwell. His phone rested in his lap, but no matter how long he stared at it, he couldn’t formulate the right way to tell his father. It was noon on the east coast, and Officer Garcia would be home on his lunch break, watching the news while eating a grilled cheese sandwich and sipping on a bottle of blue Powerade. His father was nothing if not predictable, and Carlos often found himself comforted by his own similar routines.

On the third ring, he answered.

“Hey stranger, I can barely recognize your voice.” Officer Garcia’s voice was joking yet warm over the airwaves. “How have you been?”

Carlos swallowed hard, his tongue suddenly feeling much too large for his mouth. As his eyes darted around the empty space, he struggled to find an answer that seemed normal but wasn’t a lie.

“Fine,” he finally spat out, quick to turn the focus back to his father. “How are things back home? Has Maria settled into her new place yet?”

“Same as usual. Maria’s all moved out now. She got a teaching job at the elementary school. How’s L.A. treating you? How are things with Jen?”

A hand raked through dark tufts of hair as Carlos began to break down, his pulse erratic and his breaths growing shallower with each passing second. “L.A.’s great, Jen’s….” There was a nervous waver in his tone as the words hung from the tip of his tongue. “Jen’s pregnant, Dad.”

The silence was heavy between them, the few seconds stretching out like an eternity as Carlos awaited a response. Though his father tried to hide it, Carlos could hear that exhausted sigh of disappointment on the other line.

“I don’t know what to say,” Officer Garcia forced the words out, and for the first time, Carlos detected uncertainty in the man he’d looked up to his entire life, the same man that had always seemed so sure of himself and was able to keep a level head in even the most intense situations. Twenty-five years on the force hadn’t prepared him for this. “I never expected something like this would have happened to you, Carlitos. With Maria, I had my moments of concern, but with you….”

All Carlos could offer him was an apology, a simple “I’m sorry.” It was all he had to give.

“We can work through this together,” his father tried to reassure him. His voice was steady, an underlying strength in his tone because he knew it was what his son needed. “As a family.”

Realizing his father couldn’t see his slow nod, Carlos replied with a mumbled “yeah” before he made an excuse to get off the phone.

As difficult as the conversation with his father had been, it was even harder for Carlos to reveal the burdensome secret to his friends. He’d played the possible scene over and over in his mind late at night when he was in bed, staring up at the ceiling in the dark as he struggled to fall asleep. No amount of rehearsal could have prepared him for their reaction.

Logan, James, and Kendall had known him since they were five, they could tell that something was wrong. They saw the stress that pulled at his features, noticed the way that he was spending more time locked away in his room in an effort to avoid them. With the guys, Carlos didn’t tiptoe around the issue as he had with his father, choosing instead to simply blurt out the words and stand there, completely vulnerable as he waited for the inevitable questions, the silent judgment, and the unspoken disappointment he knew was coming.

The reaction he was expecting never came. Shock washed out their expressions as three pairs of eyes gazed at the coffee table between them. As his eyes bounced around the table, Carlos found himself willing for them to say something, anything. Even Kendall, the fearless leader of the group since their sandbox days, was speechless.

As Carlos began to make his way back to his room, Logan yanked himself up off of the couch and rushed to his friend’s side, slinging his arm over the other boy’s shoulders.

“We just never thought this would happen to one of us, especially not you.”

There was a subtle honesty in his words. If they were taking bets on which of the four guys would’ve been the most likely to get a girl knocked up, everyone would’ve put their money on James. With his classically good looks and flirtatious charm, he was certainly the ladies’ man of the group. When it came to matters of the opposite sex, Carlos came in dead last. He was so awkward around girls, and when he got to the point where he was comfortable enough to be himself around a girl, he had a tendency to scare her away because he was so rough around the edges. His genuine and caring nature seemed to get overshadowed by his lack of boundaries. Personal space was no object in the world of Carlos Garcia, and whenever he let his guards down around another person, he often became too comfortable around them, to the point where girls found him obnoxious and immature.

On one particular blind date, a girl had stormed out on him because he’d made the mistake of displaying his “talent” of perfectly belching the beat of any top 40 hit.

Jennifer was his first serious girlfriend, the only girl that had been able to see past his imperfections.

Over the following months, Kendall and Logan had managed to accept the fact that their friend was going to have a baby, but James was still in denial of all the changes that were taking place. Out of the group, Carlos and James were the closest, but their relationship was beginning to fall apart. The less time Carlos spent with his friends, the more distant James seemed to become. All of these changes seemed to be occurring faster than he was able to keep up with, like his life as he knew it was slipping through his fingers, and the last thing Carlos needed was to lose James in the process.

His gaze wandered back to the game of S.K.A.T.E on the sidewalk, and his breath caught in the back of his throat as soon as he met James’s stare. Embedded in those hazel irises, Carlos saw the faintest hint of his own belief that things would eventually be okay between them before he looked away.

If there was ever a name more suited for their daughter, it was Faith, but somehow, the name still didn’t seem to fit.

“It’s a beautiful name, but I don’t feel like it’s hers,” he replied, his lips curving into a soft smile.

“Really? I was sure that would be the one,” Jennifer said. “Oh well, I’m going to add it to the list anyway since it’s my favorite so far.”

Carlos remained silent, his arms folded behind his head and his eyes closed as he listened to her flip through the pages. Just as he was beginning to relax, a familiar voice grabbed his attention.

“Hey, what are you guys up to?”

It was James, and Carlos sat up just in time to watch his friend take a seat across from them in the grass.

“Nothing much, just trying to settle on a name for the baby,” Jen said with a smile as she let her hand rest on her stomach. “But none of the ones I like seem to be good enough for Carlos,” she joked, narrowing her eyes at him playfully. “Maybe you could talk some sense into him.”

James chuckled as he leaned over, his eyes skimming the pages in Jennifer’s grip. “I doubt it. What do you have so far?”

“Gabriella and Faith. That’s it.”

“Hmm,” James mumbled, shoving his hand into the pocket of his jeans. “What about ‘Hope?’ My little cousins were named Hope, Faith, and Grace, and I always thought it was kind of neat how their names sort of went together.”

“I love that,” Jennifer replied. “I think that’s so adorable. What do you think of the name ‘Hope?’”

The word sounded like perfection as it fell on his ears, and he could immediately picture the fragile being in his arms, swaddled in a pale pink blanket, still so fresh and new as her tiny fingers curled around his thumb. A lifetime of memories that had yet to take place seemed to flash by behind his heavy eyelids, and even stronger than his faith in Jennifer and himself was his hope for the future.

“Hope Garcia.”

As soon as the name fell from his lips, it all seemed to fall into place.