She hadn’t planned to talk to him. She needed a mother figure, not a buddy. Especially not a buddy who was young enough that he might actually know Brad Haley. But the words kept coming.
“My parents died in a car accident almost two years ago and now me and my sisters live with my grandparents. They have so much to worry about with all of us. My littlest sister is only five and my oldest sister is just getting through some major depression over everything. My other sister is dealing with everything her way—she’s a control freak and she makes everyone crazy. And I—I—well, I’m pregnant.”
She gasped at the sound of the words. She’d never said them out loud to anyone before, and the shock of them made her whole body tremble. Her fingertips moved in slow, circular patterns over the rounded shape beneath her skirt. “And I don’t know what to do,” she repeated, her voice shaking. Tiny lights flickered at the back of her eyeballs and she realized she was hunched over and holding her breath. She straightened a little, swiped at the tears spilling down her cheeks, and took some slow, deep breaths, in through the nose, out through the mouth.
Trevor didn’t speak. In fact, he barely moved in the aftermath of her little rant. Say something, she cried out in her mind. But he seemed completely stumped by her admission, and when he still didn’t say anything, she tried a different approach.
“Yesterday, the pastor talked about Mary and Elizabeth. About how Elizabeth was like a mother to Mary, even though her circumstances—Mary being pregnant and not married—would have been good reason for Elizabeth to turn her back on her. The older woman was there for Mary when she needed that mother-daughter relationship. Well, my mom is de—dead, and my grandmother has her hands full.” She paused, hating how childish her request now sounded. “I was kind of hoping I might find someone here who could be Elizabeth to me,” she finished lamely.
“Ah. I see. Well, that makes sense.” His voice remained low and gentle, but she heard the condescension in it anyway. Her head was still down, and she peered surreptitiously over at him through the waterfall of her hair that still hid most of her face from him. His eyes were narrowed, downcast, and he wasn’t looking at her. In fact, the longer she watched, the clearer it became that he was making a concerted effort to look everywhere except at her.
Phoebe’s heart sank. She straightened, pushed her hair back from her face, and made a show of glancing around the shadowy room. “Is there a clock in here? I may not be able to wait for Ruthie. I have a class starting soon and I don’t think I should miss it.”
He did look at her then, but the expression on his face only disheartened her more. He seemed closed off. Like he’d pulled back, separated himself from her on some level. He hadn’t moved in his seat, he still smiled, but the warmth was gone. He pointed to the wall at the back of the church. “There’s a big clock there. So the pastor can keep track of how long his sermon goes.”
“Oh. Okay. Thanks.” In the blink of an eye, her tears had dried up, and she now felt awkward and uncomfortable, her skin prickling with anxiety. “Yeah, it’s almost ten.” Was it only ten o’clock? “I have a class. I need to go.” Phoebe stood up and slung the strap of her bag over her shoulder. “Tell Ruthie I’m sorry I couldn’t meet with her. But thanks for sitting with me.” She started to shuffle down the pew, feeling clumsy and foolish.
“Wait. Please wait. I—I’m sorry.” Trevor stood, too, and stopped her with a hand on her arm. “You just kind of surprised me, that’s all. I—well, this is the first time I’ve had to deal with something like this, and I’m admittedly kind of at a loss. I honestly don’t really know what to say to you. Or the best way to help you.”
Phoebe tried not to be offended, but she couldn’t bite back the words in time. “The first time you’ve had to deal with this? Deal with this?” She waved a hand at her stomach. “Sorry, Mr. Youth Pastor Intern, but you’re not the one dealing with this. I am.” She tugged her arm free of his and pushed past him and out into the aisle.
“Please, Jo. I’m sorry. Really, I am.” He, too, had scrambled out into the aisle and was now walking backwards in front of her. He didn’t touch her, but he was clearly hoping to prevent her from leaving. “Please wait for Ruthie. She’ll know what to do. What to say.”
Phoebe stopped and crossed her arms, glaring at him. “You’re a youth pastor intern, right?” The question was redundant—he’d proudly introduced himself as such, and she’d already thrown it in his face once. She waited for an answer anyway.
“I am. Yes.”
“Well, a word of advice if you’re going to turn this internship into a career. You might want to come up with something other than silence to say to the next high schooler who comes to you with an unplanned pregnancy. Or does that not happen in your Tuesday Teen Nights?” She waved a hand in a wide motion indicating the expanse of the room. “Is your congregation full of perfect people who don’t have bad things happen to them, who never make mistakes?”
Trevor cocked his head at her and she could tell she’d stung his ego a little. He spoke quietly, but firmly, and with great conviction. “There’s no such thing as an unplanned pregnancy, Jo. If you don’t want to get pregnant, you shouldn’t be having sex.”
Phoebe felt her jaw drop and her eyes widen in stunned amazement. For a moment, she couldn’t even speak. Trevor filled the silence. The kindness in his eyes and in the timbre of his voice belied the condemnation he pronounced with his words.
“God designed sex to be between a husband and wife for a reason, you know. Because other than the virgin birth, pregnancy is a result of only one thing. Sex. So if you’re having sex, you’re planning—even if only in theory—a pregnancy.”
Phoebe knew if she didn’t leave at that very moment that she might commit a crime. She stepped forward, nearly plowing into him. “You pompous, self-righteous, arrogant windbag,” she hissed as she pushed past him.
“Hey, hey.” He didn’t reach for her, but he followed close behind her. “Jo, please. I was just trying to explain my point of view.” He had longer legs than she did, and he moved ahead of her to stand in front of the doors, blocking her exit. “I don’t mean to sound self-righteous or arrogant, really, I don’t. I just get weary of hearing people talk about unwanted or unplanned pregnancies because it doesn’t make sense, not when you really think about it.”
Phoebe stopped in front of him, not wanting to touch him either. She felt like she was on fire, she was so angry. The child in her belly seemed to tap dance in response to her elevated heart rate.
But Trevor wasn’t finished. “We humans are so ready to make excuses for doing the things we want to do, and then when they don’t turn out the way we want them to, or when we’re faced with the consequences of our bad choices, we’re so quick to point fingers at someone else. Or we simply refuse to take responsibility for our actions.”
Why wouldn’t he just shut up? Did he really think what he was saying would make her warm up to him? Feel contrite? Stick around so some other self-righteous windbag could speak condescendingly to her in the guise of prayer?
She took a step closer, and lifted her face so she looked him eye-to-eye for the first time. “I’m quick to point my finger at you, Mr. Youth Pastor in Training, because I want you to get. Out. Of. My. Way.” She punctuated each word by jabbing him in the chest with her finger. “And I refuse to take responsibility for the bad actions of the man who raped me and left me with an unplanned pregnancy.” She shoved a shoulder into him, effectively pushing him through the door ahead of her. “I’ll go find help somewhere else, thank you very much. Besides, it seems to me that God left the building when you started spouting your religious vitriol. The only one left here is you. And you can explain that to your church lady pal, Ruthie.” Then she bid him good riddance using the foulest language she could think of, wondering—hoping—God might strike her dead for swearing in his house.
A week later, Phoebe explained her situation to a doctor at a free health clinic. When she insisted she did not want an abortion, that she wanted to give the baby up for adoption to a family who wanted a child, the woman connected her to a non-profit program that would help her do just that.
She somehow managed to keep her pregnancy under wraps until the school year was over, then she informed her grandparents that she had signed up for a summer work program on an organic farm up near San Jose in northern California. She gave them the name of a real farm in that area, just in case they looked it up—she made certain it was a place that actually had summer work programs—but the phone number she gave them belonged to the folks she’d be staying with, for emergency’s sake. She made her grandparents promise not to call unless it was an emergency, and in turn, promised she’d check in with them at least every other night.
On June 10th, two days after Renata’s graduation ceremony, Phoebe got on a bus and headed up north to San Jose where she would spend the last month of her maternity with the couple who would be adopting the baby. They would participate in all the remaining doctor visits, take a series of childbirth classes with her; they would be present at the birth so they could witness their child coming into the world, and they would see to it that Phoebe had the best follow-up post-natal care, including counseling. The program also paid Phoebe a small stipend since she wouldn’t be able to have a job during the two months she stayed with the family. By the end of the summer, Phoebe would return home with a little cash in her pockets and no baby, and everything would be back to normal.
And she would never set foot in her grandparents’ church again. Or any other church, for that matter.