JUNO

MINDEN, LA

1986

Whatever sleep I hoped to catch up on quickly dwindles from my sight. I keep the stick close to me and remain on the cold bathroom floor all night long, my back against the toilet. I forget I’m in the Brunswick house. I forget that I may possibly go to jail today once the authorities start knocking on their door. I forget about my busted lip and swollen eyes. I forget about the burning, overpowering taste of bile on my tongue.

All I can do is stare at those two blue lines.

When the first rays of sunlight start to peek through the window, I finally rise to my feet. I don’t look at the mirror—I don’t recognize the person who will stare back at me. There is a pen and a notepad on the dresser. I scribble a thank-you note, quickly make up the bed, and slip on the dirt, sweat stained clothes I had on yesterday. I take great care to fold Georgia’s nightgown; her elaborate stitches alone shows she takes great pride with her work, and I do not want to disrespect her or her family anymore than I have already have.

I don’t have any shoes, since all of my things are crammed at the back of my car. I slip the stick deep into my left pocket and, as quietly as I can, make my way down the hallway and out the front door. The heat is especially worst today, and I already sense another headache settling in. The pavement of the driveway burns the soles of my bare feet, and I’m about halfway past their garden when the screen door abruptly swings open.

“Juno!”

I jump and turn around at the sharp voice.

Georgia rushes down the porch steps. She’s wearing a bright pink robe and fuzzy slippers. Her hair is braided down, and I can see the circles resting under her eyes. For a moment, I worry that my vomiting all night may have kept her up. She swats away a fly as she marches over to me. Even though she couldn’t be more than five feet tall, I can see exactly where Rana got her intimidating nature from. My stomach hurts.

“Where the hell are you going?”

“I…” My throat is dry. “I…I’m heading out. I appreciate all that you—”

”No, you don’t appreciate shit. Don’t start that with me, girl. What the hell is the matter with you? You don’t just get up and leave without telling nobody.” Georgia makes a sucking noise with her teeth as she stares at my feet. “For the love, child. Get back inside.”

”I can hitchhike a ride down to my house,” I quickly say. “It’s not a big deal. Really.”

The old woman gives me a side-eyed glance. Before I know it, she is leading me up the porch, her frail hand guiding me down the hallway in the cool house. She surprisingly has a lot of strength, and I struggle to keep up with her fast pace. I flinch as the screen door slams shut behind us, worried that Tom might wake up. But his wife doesn’t seem to care. She nudges me to the bathroom and gestures to the tub. “You’re not wearing these dirty things around my house. Bathe yourself.”

“But—”

Georgia yanks the shower curtain to the side, flings open the small closet and pulls out a few folded towels. She shakes her head. “I don’t want to hear another word. That’s the thing with this generation. You’re all so stubborn. When I was your age, we never put up such a fuss with our elders. My mama would’ve whooped my behind. A good dress is what you need. Who the hell wears pants in a hundred-degree weather anyway?”

As she rambles, my hand instinctively wanders down to my pocket. Before I can pull it away, Georgia pauses. Sweat is building up behind my neck, gathering around my forehead. She takes a step forward to me. I try not to look at her, focusing on anything else in the room. She wrinkles her freckled nose.

Please, don’t ask. Please don’t—

“What you steal from us now?” she snaps.

My chest grows tight.

Georgia sets the towels down with a thump. “I’m askin’ you a question. What you take?”

“I didn’t take anything,” I say. The walls of the tiny bathroom are closing in on us. My heart is thumping harder than a drum, so hard I’m surprised she doesn’t hear it. I want to push past her and leave through the front door—but it’s like my feet are fused to the ground.

Georgia’s large hazel eyes narrow. She holds out her wrinkled palm. “Give it here.”

“I didn’t—”

”Give to me.” Her tone is sharp. “Now.”

My fingers are clammy, sticky as I fumble into the fabric of my jeans. She abruptly snatches the white stick out of my hand, not apparently bothered that I had pissed on it only hours ago. After examining it for a moment, she glances at the bottom drawer beneath the sink and picks up the open box. Deep chills are running up and down my spine, and I wish she’d yell at me. It would be a lot better than the silence that had fallen upon us.

Georgia finally speaks. “You just find out?”

I slowly nod.

”Last night?”

I nod again, since I don’t know what to say.

The old woman sighs. “That’s why you were in such a hurry to get out of here, hmm?”

“I was…I was going to go to the pharmacy and buy a couple more to make sure,” I stammer. “I didn’t want to be a bother.”

“A bother?!” Georgia examines, slamming the the test against the sink counter. She spun around and stuck her index finger into my chest. “I don’t mean to pry into your business, but you’re about to be a mama now. You’ve been running from a lot of things, but you can’t run from this. You better get used to being a bother, because this young’un is your main priority now. It’s no longer about you—what you think or how you feel. Those days of selfishness are over. You have someone depending on you. It takes a village to raise a child, and you must learn to find and use the necessary resources. You understand?”

“Yes, ma’am,” I whisper. My hands are shaking. I’m wondering if I’m in a dream.

Mother. I’m going to be a mother.

“Good,” she says, although I can still see how disgusted she is with me. I don’t think she wants to be friends anytime soon. “Now, get into that tub. You must be crazy, planning to leave like this. Leave the clothes out; I’ll wash them. You are going to drink some honey ginger tea to settle that stomach of yours, and then we are going to have a conversation, before you go or do anything else stupid.”

A gentle knock on the partially open bathroom door startles both of us. Tom sheepishly stands in the doorway, dressed in a gray robe similar to Georgia’s. His hair is tousled over his head, and he’s fighting back a heavy yawn. I can barely comprehend this. Didn’t anybody sleep proper last night?

This tale has been pilfered from Royal Road. If found on Amazon, kindly file a report.

”I can hear you both down the hall,” he mumbles, his voice thick with fatigue. He checks the watch on his wrist. “It’s only five thirty. That’s way too early for any sort of bickering.”

”Oh hush, you old fool. Stop flapping those gums,” Georgia replies. She folds her frail arms. “Actually, now that you’re up, I need for you to do me a favor. Can you run to the drugstore and pick up pregnancy tests? As well as diapers and formula? Bottles, too. If they’re on sale, that’s even better.”

”No, no, no, you don’t—” I begin.

“And if you happen to come across the supermarket, I need some good chicken broth. This girl has been throwing up all night—we need something she can keep down.”

My face burned. She knew. They both knew. “Really,” I try again, “I’m alright—”

Georgia glares at me. Her hazel eyes appear golden in the light. “Why aren’t you bathing? I told you get into that shower!” She shoves one of the towels into my arms, places a kiss on her husband’s cheek, and marches down the hallway, her slippers pattering loudly against the wooden boards. A few moments later, we can hear pots and pans clanging in the kitchen, and then the radio turning on.

Tom chuckles. “Don’t mind her. Once she has her coffee she’ll be good as rain.” He then excitedly smiles. “Well, you’re just full of surprises, ain’t ya? You’re gonna be a mama, I see. My Georgia, she love babies. Been wantin’ grandchildren herself for a while. Make sure to bring the little one over here sometime.”

Before I can respond, he shuts the door. I hear him go down the porch steps, and start his engine. His red taillights glow in the dim morning air. I stare at my reflection in the mirror, before placing a hand on my stomach.

* * * * * * * *

After a few days, I finally make it home.

Tom said he was going to swing by the next day and look at my car, check out the house as well. He had given me a new map of the town—showed me where the buses were.

I had taken one close to the edge of town, then walked the remaining three miles back through the twisted path that led to the woods, down near a couple of deteriorating sheds, broken wood hanging by rusted nails. I’m carrying two bags—one with my freshly washed tank top and jeans—the other with jars of soup and canned foods. I’m wearing the New Balance sneakers that Georgia has given me. They’re a little loose, but I’d take them over my worn flip flops any day.

I hike through the thick grass. The house looks the same as it had when I left. I’m dressed in T-shirt dress that hangs above my knees, but the fabric is soft against my skin. It lifts when the wind blows beneath it. I don’t think the real estate lady is coming here.

My dead Camaro is parked in the same spot, covered in dozens of leaves. To my relief, none of my windows are smashed in. I set down my bags and clear the stuff off the windshield with my hands. I even locate my car keys, where I had last found them. There is not another soul, just the trees that sway in the wind, directly below the graying sky. I pop open my trunk and start carrying out my boxes to the porch, one by one. My mattress surprisingly isn’t that dirty, so I bring it into the house, releasing a heavy sigh as I set it in the middle of the living room. I keep the lights on.

I try to sweep all the stuff out the door on the first floor, but I’m sneezing so much that I decide to take a break and sit on the porch steps. There are cobwebs every corner, and I want to get this place in somewhat decent shape before Tom comes down here and sees how run down it is. The last thing I needed was for him to worry.

And finally, I will be able to look for a job.

I study my flat stomach, and, for the first time in months, smile to myself. It’s an amazing yet very odd feeling—to have someone growing and sleeping inside of you. Depending on you. After many tests and a visit to a clinic, the doctor had informed me that I am six weeks pregnant. I recall hearing the rapid whooshwhooshwhoosh during the ultrasound, knowing how close my child’s heart is to my own. I won’t be so lonely as I was before—and I already had ideas of what I wanted for the baby’s room to look like.

Instead of crying myself to sleep, I plan to whisper thousands of promises to my child, to let them know that I will never abandon them, no matter what mistakes they will make, as my own mother had done.

I have no idea who the father is, and I hate myself for it. It could be one of my many former clients, my drug dealer, as I had spent many long nights with him the previous month. But I would make sure that my child had a positive male role model in that regard—I could only offer this precious little one so much, but it would be everything that I had. I’m curious to know whether they will have my mother’s strong, round chin, or my father’s broad nose, dark eyes always sparkling with laughter.

I wish my parents were here.

My stomach grumbles; my appetite has been slowly coming back. I reach into my bag and pull out the chicken soup Georgia has made, still warm in the thick glass container that she has carefully wrapped to avoid it spilling. I pry open the lid and am digging in with a spoon when I hear a thump upstairs in the house, like someone has dropped a shoe or a book.

I glance towards the open doorway.

It’s mostly silent, but I place down my still warm bowl on the top porch step. My finger wraps around the handle of my pocketknife as I ascend up the stairs. If there is someone bigger or stronger than me, hopefully I could get them into the eye before making a break for it in the woods. I ran track in high school—maybe it would finally pay off. I just hope that Rana has not found my address.

The wood is rotting, groaning with each and every movement I made. I see dark green moss on the ceiling. My fingers dig into the curved, flimsy railing. The top floor of the house is the most vulnerable, and one bad move can send me crashing through the ceiling, so I walk carefully in the shadows, trying not to breathe in too much dust.

Above me, the ladder to the attic is visible.

After a moment of hesitation, I go up the first couple of rungs. I clear a giant cobweb and push up the attic door. The smell of damp wood and grass is stronger, yet strangely euphoric. It’s pitch black once I crawl through the attic space, and mud streaks my dress. I feel around until my fingers wrap around a small, overhanging chain. I yank on it, and to my relief, yellow light floods the room.

The rafters that form the shape of a triangle to support the roof loom above me, and there is a gaping hole in the corner where a small plant is growing, after receiving years of sunlight and rain. The room is mostly empty, expect for a couple of dust covered cardboard boxes, a bicycle that has rust growing on it, and a stack of old comic books, yellowed with age, which I guess dated from the early and late sixties.

My right sneaker scuffs against something, and I bend down to take a closer look. A grainy black and white photograph of a man and woman is visible underneath the smashed glass frame. The man has a very stern expression on his face, matching his stiff suit, while the woman wears a patterned dress. She has a soft, but wary smile. I see that there’s space for a third person in the picture, seated in front of them, but it’s ripped cleanly in half, leaving crooked lines behind.

Carefully, I pick up the photograph from the broken glass and flip it over. In spidery cursive, a date is written.

March 1956.

I find myself studying the photo for a long time, wondering if this belonged to the previous owner of the home. What were the man and the woman doing at the moment? Were they still together? If they saw their house in its current state, how would they react? I can’t help but trace my fingertips over the woman’s gentle face. She has such lovely pale eyes—yet there was a hidden anxiety present in them, almost like she didn’t want to be in the picture. I’m curious who the third person in the photo is supposed to be, but like their relatives, they are mostly gone, only distant memories of the past.

Vanished.

My eyes wander to a black rectangular item resting on top of one of the cardboard boxes, coated in thick cobwebs. I place the photograph in a safe space and reach out with both of my hands, dusting it off. It’s slightly heavy, bulky almost. Nearby, a dust covered joystick rests a few feet away from me. I see the peeling words, ATARI 2600– VIDEO COMPUTING SYSTEM–visible in the middle of the rectangular box, its twisted, tangled cord jammed between two dented cardboard boxes. Mouse droppings line the floor. Behind the flimsy joystick is a plastic container stuffed to the brim with ROM cartridges, labeled on a piece of wrinkled tape from ‘79-85.

A few wrinkled pieces of graph paper, written neatly in some sort of advanced programming code in pencil, catches my eye. C++, C, BASIC. Assembly language. The only reason why I recognized any of it is because I distinctly remember taking a couple of introductory coding classes during the summer of ninth grade, as my mother had wanted to keep me off the streets. And for a while, it worked. It wasn’t something that I was particularly good at—in fact, I was terrible at it—but it had definitely captured my attention, working with computers for the first time. I wasn’t able to continue the following year because she could no longer afford them. But I had still enjoyed every single moment of it.

Buried beneath these pages is a notebook consisting of multiple design character sets. Hundreds of them. Sprites. Pixelated sprites.

Before I can get a closer look, the lights in the attic turn off, trapping me in complete darkness.