September, 24 weeks pregnant

Gab was looking for her keys in a flowerbed when her phone rang. She’d been sitting on a retaining wall eating a pulled pork wrap and thoroughly enjoying it when the keys had fallen from her lap. Face half buried in a sea of flowering dahlias, she found her keys and stood up, then pulled her phone from her pocket.

The vibrating screen read: MUM, and Gab’s appetite drained away. Damn, she thought. Guilt compelled her to answer however, because she’d already ignored the seven phone calls in the last three days, and it was really getting ridiculous now.

“Hi Gina,” said Gab.

“Gabrielle, Gabrielle, Gabrielle,” her mother was sobbing. “What have you done? What have you done?!” Gab cleared her throat, grabbed the remains of her wrap and looked for a secluded spot between buildings.

“What is it, Mum?” she asked quietly, her stomach having dropped to the ground, half-digested lunch and all.

“Oh Gabrielle, Gabrielle! How could you! I warned you!”

“MUM! What did you warn me about?”

“About the dangers of university, Gabrielle! The dangers! You ignored my warnings, and now this … THIS!”

“MUM! Please, what has happened?” Gab knew exactly what, but she sure as heck wasn’t going to say it.

“This … this … this DISASTER! This SIN! This PREGNANCY” squawked her mother.

“Oh,” said Gab, “you mean the one where I have a baby, just like you did with Jack and me?” Boom. She’d smacked that one out of the park, and she knew it. But the satisfaction was short lived, because it only made Gina wail louder.

“What will you do, Gabrielle? What will you DO? You can’t look after a baby! Oh, I can’t believe this has happened to me!”

“Happened to you, Mum? What the hell do you mean? Nothing’s happened to you, actually. What about me?”

“Oh, I think we know what’s happened to you!” Gab’s mother snorted. “We know perfectly well.” The only thing that stopped Gab from emitting an unhinged roar was the fact that there were plenty of other people nearby. She hung up instead, and stormed off towards nowhere, anywhere, she didn’t know where.

You might be reading a stolen copy. Visit Royal Road for the authentic version.

Her phone rang again.

MUM.

“Damn you!” cried Gab. But she was so mad that she wanted it to keep going. She was storing up retorts instant by instant, darts to send hurtling towards her mother one after the other after the other. She wanted a chance to throw them.

“WHAT is it, Mum? I don’t think you could improve on your own hypocrisy. It’s outstanding,” Gab said acerbically.

“Gabrielle,” her mother had flipped into her slow breathing, pseudo-guru mode. “I don’t want to fight. Let’s talk like rational adults.”

“O-kay” said Gab, with clenched teeth, not missing the irony in her mother’s words. “Go then.”

“What are you going to do?” demanded Gina.

“Why do you want to know?” Gab retorted.

“I’m your mother. It’s my right to know.”

“Being my mother doesn’t give you a right to know!”

“Blood is thicker than water,” said Gina, with that infuriating calmness.

“And milkshakes are thicker than orange juice! So what!” Gab rejoindered.

“Gabrielle.”

“How dare you tell me not to fight, Mum. YOU were the one who phoned me in hysterics!”

“Are you calling me hysterical? Are you blaming me for this situation? Are you saying I have problems?”

“Yeah, the ones you’ve regaled me with night and day my entire life! Mum, this is going nowhere. Yes, I’m pregnant. I didn’t plan it. It’s just how things are.” Gab burst into tears. “How did you find out?”

“Jack told me.” She was emphatic and breathy.

Gab couldn’t blame Jack, of course. She knew she’d been taking a risk in telling him, but she’d wanted him to know. Maybe she was even a little bit pleased that she’d been relieved of the task herself—of finding the right moment and the right way, which didn’t exist anyhow.

Then Gab took matters into her own hands. She took a breath and held her nerve. She didn’t vent anymore in reactive, entirely reasonable anger; but she contained the force of that anger within the bounds of herself, and that gave her whole being a greater presence, her words a greater weight in themselves, perhaps more than any screaming match could have done.

“Mum, I’m pregnant and it’s okay. I’m organising stuff and working it all out. I’m going to be fine and I don’t need anything from you. I’ll let you know when the baby arrives. Take care, Mum. Bye.”

And with that, she hung up and sat down again on a nearby bench. She stared at the last of her pulled-pork wrap. If she hadn’t been growing another human being inside her, she would have thrown it into the bin in residual disgust. As it was, she was still hungry and she certainly wasn’t going to let Gina take those last delicious mouthfuls away from her, on top of everything else she’d done. She shoved the last three mouthfuls in with a vengeance.

But it wasn’t over, because just as she stood up, Gina texted.

Just tell me it wasn’t an Asian boy. Or an Indian. They’re everywhere in the city!

Gab recoiled. She thought of Saanvi’s kindness and bristled with rage. She thought of Mr Cheng and shook her head at her mother’s absolute wilful ignorance.

You are so racist, Mum! Get a life! she texted back. She made a mental note to marry ‘an Indian’ or ‘an Asian’ in future.

And then, she looked at her mother’s number on her phone screen and tapped, ‘BLOCK CONTACT’.