A/N: I didn't forget about this story, I've just had too much going on. October was my Midterm Month. I literally had four midterms, one each week. It was crazy! And then I've also been sick. It's just nearing the end of the semester, so it's hard.

Turning Tables

Breaking Up Is Hard To Do

"I like where you're going with this," Adrian nodded as she reviewed a page from Ashley's essay. "Good grammar, good writing mechanics-"

"But?"

Adrian clicked her tongue to the roof of her mouth and handed the page back to the eighth grader. "Your argument's a little…" She held up her hand and rocked it slowly, like a boat on choppy waters.

Ashley folded her arms and leaned back in her seat. "How?"

"You mention the Third Wave quite a bit, but it's a pretty hotly contested subject. Not that there's anything wrong with that, but…they really have an emphasis on 'Grrrrrl Power!' which is sometimes seen as extremely problematic because of its reemphasis on 'femininity,' which is a subjective topic in and of itself."

"The point I want to make is that women have a right to be okay with their bodies and they shouldn't have to cover them up; they should be able to embrace themselves, no matter what they look like."

"Which is a fantastic thesis, but it does bring up a whole host of other issues that you haven't covered."

"Such as?"

Adrian tapped the page with the tip of her nail. "Such as: where does the male gaze begin and how does that factor into what women actually want and what they think they want? For example: do girls and women wear mini skirts because they actually like wearing mini skirts and are proud of their figures or are they doing so because they think others – typically men – think they look good in them, even though mini skirts are hard to walk in, sit in, and near impossible to bend over in without flashing someone? Or, why are you proud to show off your stomach in the first place? You say that you're proud of your body, sure, but why are you proud of it? Because you have a nice, flat, white skinned stomach and tiny waist? Perhaps because you're closer to the feminine beauty ideal than, say, a woman thirty pounds heavier than you would be?" Adrian held up her hand. "I'm not trying to be mean, but…"

"I hadn't thought about it like that before." Ashley scrubbed her chin. "But I do have one question: what's the male gaze? How would you define that?"

Adrian licked her lips as she snapped up her pencil and spun Ashley's essay page around, scribbling something at the bottom. "You should check out Laura Mulvey's article on the male gaze. It's called 'Visual Pleasure and Narrative Cinema,' it might help, especially with the class presentation. Or at least round out your thoughts if nothing else."

"Alright…" Ashley absently licked the tip of her pencil and inclined her head to scribble the note onto the paper.

At the front of the library, one of the double doors swung open, accompanied by a chilly burst of air. "Ashley! I've been trying to call you for the last five minutes, Mom and I-"

Adrian inclined her head, but it was too late: the sudden dead end of Amy's voice told Adrian that she had been spotted. She closed her eyes and flared her nostrils, taking in an extra long, slow breath as she heard Amy's shoes tromp up to the table. When she looked up, she saw the elder Juergens standing protectively beside her sister.

"What the hell are you doing here?" Amy snarled, practically biting the air like a Rottweiler on a chain. Then, as an afterthought, she rounded on her sister. "Ashley! What the hell is going on?"

Adrian stood up, revealing her full stomach in all its glory. "If you're after someone to blame, you can take it up with your old principal, I hear she's a fan."

Amy's slender fingers flexed and the bones could be heard crackling in the thick silence. "Ashley, Mom's waiting for you in the car."

Ashley shifted her eyes to the farthest corner of her face, shooting a sympathetic look at the Latina. "It is Principal Miller's fault," she finally spoke up.

"You're on her side now?"

"I'm not on anyone's side." Ashley snapped up her notes and stuffed them into her backpack. "I'm just stating the facts. Neither one of us asked for her to tutor me, it was all Principal Miller's idea. Probably on purpose, too." She tossed the backpack over one shoulder and cast a glare on her sister. "And anyway, I already told you if I don't go to tutoring, then I'm going to fail English. Do you want me failing English on top of everything else going on? How much do you think that would stress Mom out?"

Amy grit her teeth. "I'll meet you at the car."

"Amy-"

"I'll meet you. At. The. Car."

Adrian felt the tide turn in her stomach as she watched Ashley stomp out of the library. The last thing she needed was a confrontation with Amy. "Look-"

"Shut up."

Adrian closed her mouth, surprised by the short fused words. She'd never pegged Amy for that type of girl. In that instant, watching the wrestling match of emotions struggle for dominance as they rolled across her face, Adrian felt pity for the girl. Again. And possibly empathy, too.

"I do want to take it up with someone, but it sure as hell isn't Principal Miller." The Freshman extended her finger to the Latina. "You're the only one here that deserves blame! You and your mother. If you hadn't gone and seduced Ben-"

"Ben's a big boy!" Adrian hurled back, but even as she said the words, she still knew no matter what Ben had said or done, she would have gotten him to have sex with her at some point. As the guilt found its way into her throat, she decided to change tactics. "And for that matter, so is your father! For your information, he's the one that pursued my mother! And you know why?" Despite the crushing look in Amy's eyes, she barreled on: "Because your mother couldn't be bothered to give the time of day to her own goddamn husband!"

At that point, the school librarian approached. "Girls, I'm afraid I'm going to have to ask you to leave. This is not the place-"

"Don't worry, I'm done here!" Amy cut in. She spun on her heel and blew out of the library like a tornado.

Adrian collapsed back onto the hard chair, allowing her hands to pile protectively onto her stomach. Having Ben on the receiving end of Anne's rage when she had confronted George with the divorce papers, she should have expected something like this, but still, she had never expected to see Amy blow her fuse like that.

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"I don't want her with Ben."

Dr. Fields folded his arms across his chest. "Is that because you want Adrian to be with you?"

Ricky hugged the pillow to his chest. "She just shouldn't be with him," he replied, evading the question. "I don't like her talking to him."

"Why?"

"Ben's – Ben's just a kid."

"And you're not? You're only a year older."

"Ben was born with a silver spoon in his mouth. Me? I've grown up; learned to take care of myself. Adrian, too. We may only be sixteen, but we're still years older than him."

"Do you have feelings for Adrian?"

Ricky looked down at his knuckles, still faintly bruised from the assault on his father. He closed his eyes, mentally going back to that day. "He pulled her out of the trunk and carried her back to the car."

"And why tell me that?" Dr. Fields probed.

"Because," Ricky whispered hoarsely. "That should've been me."

"Because it was your father who put her there?"

"No."

"No?"

"Because I want her to see me the way she saw him…as the kind of guy she can depend on." Ricky abandon the pillow and pulled his feet up onto the couch. "Sometimes I can't sleep at night," he admitted quietly. "I just lie awake thinking…thinking that maybe I want that baby to be mine."

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"What is this?"

Adrian skirted into the living room, chomping on a turkey sandwich. She saw her mother staring at a medium sized delivery box with a picture of a fair skinned woman peering over the edge of a bassinet at a cuddly baby with blue eyes. "Advertising aimed at the mythical norm?"

"Excuse me?"

Adrian swallowed a mouthful of her sandwich and smirked. "I've been spending too much time on this tutoring job," she explained. "Just never mind." She crossed into the kitchen and set her plate down in exchange for a receipt which she handed to her mother. "From 'D.A.D Enriquez,'" she read aloud. "It's a bassinet. Assembly required, but still. A bassinet! Can you believe he just sent me a bassinet?"

Cindy crumpled the end of the receipt in her hand. "Dad?" she hissed.

Adrian snorted. "Yeah, I guess someone fucked up and put an extra '.D' at the end of 'D.A.' Kind of ironic, considering my real dad's a deadbeat." She shook her head. "But anyway," she motioned excitedly towards the box. "I can't wait to set it up and see how it looks! It must've been pricey. And here I was believing that random acts of kindness don't actually exist."

"Random," Cindy repeated as she crumpled the receipt and forced a smile. "Yeah, how nice of D.A. Enriquez," she replied through pinched lips. Raising her manicured index finger, she pointed to the door. "I'll be right back," she said suddenly. "I think I forgot phone in the car."

Adrian narrowed her eyes as her mother's form retreated out the door. "Mhmmm," she murmured. She and her mother had kept enough secrets from each other over the years that she knew something was up, but she couldn't quite put her finger on what. Possibly the idea of getting a handout from some hot shot district attorney; her mother had always despised pity gifts. She hated pity herself, but strangely, D.A. Enriquez's gift didn't seem like pity because he had seemed to genuinely care about her well being. Looking to the box again, she grinned and patted her protrusive stomach.

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"Ricky! Hey, man!"

Ricky spun around, broom in hand, to see Jack jogging towards him. He felt the muscles in his shoulders tense up. "What are you doing here?" he demanded.

Jack grinned, holding up a pink and white Baskin Robbins bag. "I'm volunteering here!"

"At a Big Brother program?" Ricky asked skeptically.

Jack shrugged. "Yeah, Coach says it looks good on the college res. They assigned me to this one kid, Duncan. Sweet kid, a bit mischievous though." He held the bag up to the side of his face and leaned in. "Hot older sister too!"

Ricky felt his stomach curdle. "Good for you," he said sarcastically.

"What are you doing here?" Jack asked curiously. His eyes fell to the broom in the other boy's hands.

Ricky grit his teeth. "I – am volunteering too."

Jack lifted his eyebrows skeptically. "Really? I, uh, never pegged you for the type…what's with the broom?"

"I'm not volunteering with the kids," Ricky explained as he skillfully avoided eye contact. "Just with cleaning and chores, lunches…I'm easing the burden on the staff."You +1'd this publicly. Undo

"For you résumé too?"

"Yeah, something like that," he said out loud. Though silently he thought: Otherwise I won't have a résumé because instead I'd be in jail for beating my rapist father senseless.

Jack shrugged at the drummer's vagueness. "Well, cool running into you. Good luck…I guess. I gotta go! See ya 'round!"

Ricky exhaled upon the jock's departure. There was no way he needed the whole school to know about his community service. On one hand, he was grateful to D.A. Enriquez, because he had gotten off easy. On the other, he hated himself, because the hours that he was spending sweeping floors after school for free to ensure he didn't suffer a worse fate on his permanent record could be better spent hunting for and making money.

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Ben had to do a double take when he saw his ex-girlfriend's little sister couched down on his front porch step when he got home from work. "Ashley?" he questioned, jogging up to her. The wind had picked up into a good storm in the last half hour and her hair was billowing about her face, but she was like a boulder, shouldering Mother Nature stone faced. "How long have you been waiting here?" he asked, offering a hand to help her up.

Ashley ignored his hand and pushed herself up by herself. "Couple hours."

Ben punched his key into the door and shoved it open. "Come in, come in!" he hollered over the sound of the wind.

Ashley shoved her fists into her pockets and sauntered inside, glancing about as she did so. "Nice place," she said monotonously.

"What are you doing here?" Ben leaned his body weight against the door to close it. "How did you get here?" He was sure Ashley had never been to his house before, not formally anyway, though she had been with Anne and Amy on occasion when Amy had been dropped off.

"I took the bus," Ashley explained as she flashed him her bus card. "I need to talk to you."

Ben frowned. "Yeah, sure," he said awkwardly. "Uhm," he motioned her towards the kitchen, "about what?" When she didn't say anything right away, he began to fidget. He'd never exchanged more than a few sentences with Ashley, as she always excused herself from his and Amy's presence.

"About Amy."

Ben gulped as they made their way into the kitchen, where he dropped his backpack on the table. "Is she okay?"

"What do you think?"

"She won't talk to me. I see her at school, but she avoids me."

"Well you need to try harder."

"Excuse me?"

"She – she needs you."

Ben was sure if he squinted, he might be able to see the chips in Ashley's tough exterior. "Didn't you hear what I just said? She won't to me. It's not my choice, Ashley. She's the one who broke up with me."

"Haven't you ever done something stupid because you're hurting?" At his silence she continued, "It doesn't mean that the choices you made are the ones you really want."

"True," Ben agreed, "but that still doesn't mean I can make her do something she won't." He pulled out a chair at the table and sat down, shoulders slumped. "Besides, I…I've been getting more involved with Adrian lately. Even if Amy did want to be friends again – or something else – I think that would only continue to hurt her. And I don't want that. I care about her a lot, Ashley. But I can't ignore the fact that I might be a father for her."

Ashley moved to the table, wordlessly removed a rectangular object from her pocket, and dropped it in front of Ben.

"What's this?"

Ashley shrugged. "Voice recorder, what does it look like?"

"Yeah, I see that, but what's the point of it? Why are you giving this to me?"

"Listen to it," the middle schooler replied simply. "Don't stop, listen the whole way through." She turned and, without looking back, added quietly, "And then tell me you can't try harder."

Ben stared at the recorder, almost afraid to find out what secrets it held. When he looked up, Ashley was gone. He bounced up and raced to the front door, where he found her unlocking it. "Do you need a ride back home?" he asked.

"I'm fine."

Ben hesitated. "My driver could-"

"I've got it!" Ashley insisted. "Just focus on my sister."

Ben shivered as Ashley slammed the door against the brutal wind. He hugged his arms all the way back to the kitchen, where he sat down in front of the voice recorder. His eyes washed over the buttons for an eternity and then he lifted a single bony finger to the play arrow and pressed it.

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As soon as George came through the door, Adrian knew something was up. He never came home from the furniture store so early and since he wasn't heading towards her mother's room, she assumed it must have to do with her. To avoid him, she ducked her head into the fridge and pretended to be looking for something.

"Can I talk to you?"

Adrian leaned her forehead against the edge of the fridge door and sighed. "Uh, sure," she muttered. "I made some raviolis if you want some," she added, pulling out a pot in the hopes of distracting him.

"No thanks." George slid into a chair on the opposite side of the counter and grabbed a pear from the fruit bowl. "Ashley dropped by the store today…with her new friend."

"Oh?" Adrian replied brightly. "You mean Thomas? Sweet kid, huh? Well, so I've heard."

"You know about Thomas?"

"Yeah, I've been-"

"Tutoring Ashley after school, yeah. I know. She told me."

Adrian pushed her hair over her shoulder and moved to the dinner table, so she was sitting across from George, as the chairs opposite the counter were too much of a struggle to climb onto with her full belly. "And?"

"She also told me what happened today."

"Look, I don't know what they told you, but I didn't do anything wrong! All I did was-"

"I know. And for the record, it was just Ashley. She said she wanted to explain things before Amy did. I understand. This divorce, many actions…it hasn't been easy on anyone, especially Amy and Ashley. I understand why Amy acted out, but please don't hold it against her, it's not her fault, it's mine. And above all, I just wanted to thank you."

Adrian blinked. "For what?"

"For helping Ashley. She showed me her essay so far. It's really good! I'm really proud of her. And you too. So thank you. And I hope you're able to continue tutoring her, it's been beneficial to both of you. Maybe even more than you know."

Adrian frowned, unsure of what he meant by that. But the look on his face told her that he was sincere in whatever it was. Finally she smiled. "You're welcome."

George smiled as well. "So how are you doing? With the pregnancy and Ricky and Ben I mean." He pulled his cell phone out of his coat pocket. "Your mother left me a voicemail about the package you got today," he chuckled.

"Let me guess: a twenty minute rant?"

"More like ten, my voicemail cuts off after that."

Adrian smirked. "She hates anything she thinks is a handout," she explained. "And anyway, with Ben and Ricky it's…going. I guess."

"Relationships are never easy, are they?"

"Sometimes they are," she said wistfully. "But…but that's not my situation."

"Mine either." George slid off the chair and tossed the pear core into the trash. "So, what d'ya say? Do you need any help assembling that bassinet?"

"You'd do that?"

"Sure, why not?"

"How about incurring my mother's wrath?"

George winked. "I think I can handle it." He motioned his hand. "C'mon, you've been helping out a lot lately, now it's time to return the favor."

Adrian stroked her tummy as she followed George over to the bassinet box. For a split second, her mind flashed to an idyllic future, where her mother was still with George and he was a proper father and grandfather figure. For a second, it was nice, until she remembered Ashley, and where would that future leave her?