When I pulled up in front of the Teenage Life Counseling building on Thursday, I felt the real urge to pull the reverse on my car, go home, and do something else, but I knew Joslynn would be waiting for me; she'd probably have no more customers or patients for that day.
When I got out, I looked behind me, and in the back, Jace was bawling because he knew I'd gotten out and the dinging noise always annoyed him. I opened his door, shut mine, and pulled him out, grabbed his blanky and his diaper bag, my purse, and realized I should just bring his baby carrier.
While I was messing around with his baby carrier, I noticed someone familiar from the gas station from the other block. His smile, his body figure, the way he speaks, and all the painful memories soaked up inside me.
It was John, my first boy-friend, and he was in the military. We were dating when I was in school, but suddenly I got pregnant, and the distances cut off. When he'd be at a break for two days then going back for four months, we made love about twice, and I felt that I needed to move on, because I got so lonely and confused and I was fighting my own war. We used to write letters back and forth to each other; about two per week. I still love John. More than I ever did with Chad, or Jake or some other guys.
Then, I got myself thinking, tears rolling down my face, words forcing to come out. My heart raced, ached, and it seemed so small. I'd decided I don't want to be Jake's fiancé anymore. I don't want to be with Chad, either, and I certainly don't want to be that cliché girl I've always been.
I wanted nothing more than John. I wanted to marry John, to have beautiful daughters and sons with John. I wanted to be Mrs. Andersen. I don't want anything but John, Klarissa, Jace and my other future kids with John.
I walked over to that gas station, tears rolling down my face, Jace on my hip, my long blond hair down my back and behind my ear. I wanted John so bad, I felt like screaming.
As I got closer, John's head moved up, and until I was closer, I said his name. "John?"
He turned around, confused, then, with an expression that I missed, loved, and wanted to see until I died, he smiled. "Klarissa? Wh-wh-why are you here? I thought-"
"John, I made a huge mistake. Ever since we broke up, I felt lost, again. I hated myself and I dated two other posers and one got me pregnant. I can't live without you, I miss you, and I don't want to be apart again. Seriously, I'm not joking, John. I'm screaming inside because I know you'll reject me like I did to you stupidly through a letter I'd been saving for about a month or two and I got so lonely and desperate and I couldn't breathe. I don't want anybody else to judge me or anything! I just know this is quick and sudden and you're probably married or something but I just can't date anyone else. You were my first and my only one, and I hate sappy crap like this because I'm always ignored and rejected, but, I just can't do this anymore!" I started crying harder.
Oh great, I was crying in front of him and he probably thought I was an emotional freak but I didn't care about any other guy. John had everything I've wanted, and he had manners that I'd never learned. We're perfect for each other.
"Klarissa, to tell you the truth, I've not proposed or anything to anybody. I've been gone for nine months straight, and you've obviously accomplished a lot of things. And, well, I've got a lot of stuff to tell you, and apparently, you do too. And you've grown up from the past three years, I guess." He smiled.
I blushed, and blinked away upcoming tears. But he wanted me three years ago! Why not now? I thought.
My head spun nervously, until the familiar feeling whooshed over me. I recognized it, yes, but what was it? With my eyes closed I couldn't comprehend what was happening. I could, maybe, if life wasn't so complicated and so mushy, tender, and just plain cold.
All those times I've done this awkward and memorable moment, it just didn't click. What was happening? Would I find out if I opened my eyes? Then I remembered my physical feelings, like, what do I feel?
I suddenly felt a warm, soft baby hand placed on my face. I heard the laughing, the squealing, the sudden tears just all so fast for a confused moment that, incredibly painful as it was, is something that a memoir, kind of like me, would know.
And then I remembered it all from one thought after another. Should I open my eyes and fear or love what happens?
So I did.
John's arms were around my waist, my hand on his neck, the other holding Jace, and salty, warm lips were on mine. I closed my eyes, melting like never before. Jake could've never done this like John. Jake would've made some boob joke or something about me, and he'd playfully tease.
I'd usually slap Jake when he did that and told him to stop, stabbing my fake nails into his wrist, him wincing at the pain, and Jace either in an unconscious sleep or laughing his head off.
But John respects me so much more and I feel so grown up and alive instead of a child that's trying to find her pet unicorn. Jake was just such a jerk now. I used to be in love with him, but, John's just…..more in the picture than ever now that I'm nineteen.
When I was fourteen, I went on a cruise for a year and had no school, but there was supposed to be classes but they decided in December that school should be taken as one class a day. Then, nobody passed any tests and so when I got back to California, I had to re-do eighth grade. Then, when I turned fifteen, that's when I met John, so awkwardly though, because he was eighteen. Now I'm nineteen, and our relationship is getting even better because next year/this summer I'm not going to be a teenager.
We let go, and just hugged. Yep, just stood there, my tears stopping, and no words.
When I reached the front door of Teenage Life again, I was about twenty minutes late. I'd thought of some excuse to say to Joslynn, but that sounded a little rude yet protective. Yes, John and I are dating, and, when I get home, I plan to dump and -
Wait. Jake was my fiancé. I'd dump my fiancé after what we've gone through, when he just proposed and I rejected another past when somehow I thought Jake and I had the future? Ha! I wonder what not-needy and desperate Klarissa would do when, really, today is the first time I actually lost myself, balanced pros and cons, and learned that, well, time, space, and losing it all gives me/you everything you've ever wanted (a.k.a. for me: John).
"Um, I have an appointment with Joslynn and I'm about twenty minutes late," I said to the front desk lady.
She just smiled with her super cherry red glossy lips and her tons of make-up-and-aged face just glowed like she was Barbie and she just met Ken, while he'd just said that she was the most beautiful Barbie ever in front of his ex-girlfriend.
"You're fine, sweetie," she said in her super-squeaky voice. Jace blushed, giggled, and Barbie-desk-lady smiled, adoring my son and his little crush on her. "Joslynn!" she squeaked again, smiling.
I half jumped at the voice of Joslynn; her sweet, musical, innocent voice that reminded me kind of….something like me before I got myself into the whole growing-up-and-falling-for-the-boy-next-door scenario.
"Hello, Klarissa," she smiled at me, and tears pricked Joslynn's eyes again. WTF? Why am I the only one in the world she cries at? What did I do to her?
"Um, hi," I said.
"Thanks, Renée," she said. "Well, Miss Klarissa and mister Jace, do you want to come into my office?
"Uh, probably," I joked. She smirked, shook her head at my lame humor and sighed.
I sat down on the soft, foam-like baby blue sofa, sinking in with the white pillows on my back, and she smiled again at my love and gawking at the couch. "I'm in heaven!" I said, she started giggling, and so did Jace.
"Oh, Klarissa, dear," she said, calming down. "We have so much to talk about. I'm going to start first, because I'm just so hyper and aware of everything."
I nodded, and willingly gazed around the room. I'd looked at Joslynn closer now, without her sunglasses on. She looked a lot like me, just in a different age. Then I thought about my mom. She did have some of my jaw lines and face structure, some though, and my baby blue eyes and my habits are sort of alike, sort of like how she can fit into my clothes.
"Well, Klarissa, I'm starting from the very beginning. This may sound confusing, but I'm going to start from the first, very first thing." She looked at me, sighing.
"It was right after my wedding in Hawaii, well, at my honey moon, twenty years ago. I'd told my first husband, Anthony LeBayor, that I'd wanted one child. Just one and it had to be a baby girl. He asked what would happen if it wasn't a girl, or if I couldn't have any kids at all. I told him that I'd either adopt or keep, and have two kids, depending on what I felt like at its birth. The day before we left back to the states, and I was only nineteen, your age, and I had been sleeping in yesterday, and I was sick the day we needed to leave for home. Three days before we left, I'd been, you know, making love with Anthony deeply,"
Jace moved, and he started snoring a bit. His little body was so cute and her story got me confused. What did her getting pregnant at her honey moon do with me?
A tear rolled down her face, and she swiped it with a tissue. She went on. "Well, as you know I got pregnant. When I found it out officially, Anthony broke down and started freaking out. He didn't want a child, it turned out. He said those emotional words to comfort me in Hawaii, but he said he didn't want any child with the same genes as him. He said he wanted to abort the baby," she started crying a bit more.
"Then he said the baby was a mistake. He said buying a fifty-thousand dollar ring and giving it to me was a bigger mistake, and he said that marrying me was a mistake and every moment we had was a mistake. He started breaking things and he started packing," she cried more, and I wanted to comfort her but I just couldn't.
"He said, and I quote; 'I'm sorry but life with a child now is really bad for me. I don't have a job and I flipped a coin to marry you or not. I went by tails, but I guess a child for me is like the tail itself, worthless'.
"I didn't really accept it. Anything, especially after that. Now, on the baby's part, when I was six months pregnant and I got an ultrasound, they said it was a positive baby girl. I was so happy, and when I was eight months pregnant, Anthony came back. He knew I was devastated about what he did and I told him never to come back but he said he was so sorry on his life, and, thankfully we weren't divorced, I accepted it.
"Then, the harsh nine months came. I was super pregnant, as in I had a pretty big bump, and the baby gained me ten pounds. I'd been so stressed that month and I couldn't even realize I was about due in two weeks! And, well, on July fifteenth, at midnight, I went into labor. Anthony thank goodness was beside me, and I was in labor for about until six.
"You know the whole process, right? Pushing and pushing and all the screaming and pain?"
I nodded. Where was she going with this? She has a daughter and her birthday's the same as mine?
"Well, at six-thirty, when the sun was rising, Anthony swore he saw a pink flower bloom up from the sidewalk. The orange sun was peeking through, and the nurse smiled and said, 'This baby is very special,' and she was born." She looked at me and started crying again.
WOW. I wanted to ask why it included me, but she just went on.
"In the room across from mine when I was up and out of bed that night, there was crying and screaming of another mother. I went to see my baby in that huge baby area/room, and I saw she was curled up, sleeping with a smile. I turned next to me, and there was a woman crying and talking on the phone to someone and explaining things about the woman in the room. She said, 'the baby isn't coming and Kristine's crying and she's so upset! She's been in labor for two hours and she won't let the doctors do surgery on her.' I felt so bad for those two, that, I stared at my own baby. If I wanted to change myself and help others, I knew what to do."
"Joslynn, is there a meaning why this story now sounds like my mom's when she was giving birth to me and my mom's name is in it?" This is so confusing! This is my mom's story developing into hers!
"Well, it's going to be more confusing until it finally clicks," she smiled at me. "So, I was going back to my room, when I saw the doctor, that woman on the phone, and I believe her mother. The doctor was finishing his speech when he said, 'the baby isn't going to live, she's premature and we can't do anything about it now,' and they started crying. I went back to my room to tell Anthony something when he had a clipboard with him.
"'What do you want to name her?' he asked me. I politely smiled and said, 'Klarissa Mae',"
Omigod. This isn't –
A tear rolled down my face. "Then, I told him all about that woman and her family. I went back to my baby, and they said I could feed her. So, as I was walking around, done feeding her, and holding her, I searched for that woman with her phone. Once I found her, I smiled and said, 'I overheard what's happening in your family.' She said, 'Yeah, my sister's baby is dying of premature structure and some type of deadly sickness, and I'm Katie by the way,' I looked at Katie, then back at Kristine. I started crying. 'I want to give up my first child for Kristine. Being known because I'm a teenager and I haven't gone to college and I dropped out of Highschool last year. I know that giving her to Kristine will have about four hearts broken, so don't tell Kristine about her actual baby dying, and just tell the doctor I'm going to give up my baby to her or some excuse not to adopt. Make sure Kristine names her Klarissa Mae, because that's what I deeply wanted, and spell Klarissa with a 'K'.'
"She looked at me, cried, and smiled. 'Thank you so much, and when do you want to do this?' I said, 'Tuesday. That'll act like she's premature and their getting her healthy, and I want to spend some time with my baby,'"
"When Tuesday rolled around, I gave up Klarissa. Kristine was so happy, she was crying and saying that my baby's all right and everything. Then, Katie winked at me and asked, 'What's her name?' Kristine sat there, pondering. Then, I, at the door suggested 'What about Klarissa, with a 'K' like your name?' she smiled, and said, 'Perfect. Hey, what about Klarissa Mae? You know, Mae ending with an 'E'? Oh, I love that name!' And, well, my Klarissa Mae turned into Klarissa Mae. And, now, she's a mother."
She looked at me. "Klarissa, I have a confession to make. You may not like it, or you'll probably cry so hard or maybe you won't budge or move a muscle."
"Omigosh," I said, wiping my tears and under my eyes for dripping mascara or eyeliner.
"Klarissa Mae, I'm your mother."
