Kaileen stared at the twin blue lines in shock, her free hand flying to cover her mouth. She couldn't be pregnant! They'd used a condom!
She flung the pregnancy test in the trash and wandered unsteadily out of the bathroom.
"Kaileen," called her mama. "Have you done your homework?"
She followed the voice into the living room and said, "Yes, Mama. May I talk to you?"
"Yes, you may," said her mama, not glancing up from her knitting.
Kaileen sat down on the edge of a couch and twisted her hands together. "I... I'm pregnant."
Now her mama looked up with fury in her eyes. "Who?"
"Jimmy Everton." Kaileen felt guilty, but then she felt anguish. Her mama would never let her see him again.
"That piece of scum. The Evertons were always trash. His father married a ballet dancer!" Kaileen bowed her head as her mama kept ranting about the poor social status of the Evertons. Finally she could take it no longer: she needed help. She didn't know what to do.
"Mama, what am I gonna do?"
Her mama stopped talking and glared at her. "What do you think you're gonna do? Your daddy will make that boy marry you, and you'll settle down and have a family! It's a little earlier than I'd planned for you, but those are just details."
This time Kaileen didn't wait for her mama to keep yammering on. "Why can't I get an abortion?"
"A what?" Her mama's face turned white, then purple, and then she shoved her knitting aside and began praying fervently. Kaileen ignored this and said plaintively, "Mama, what's so bad about an abortion?"
"Don't you ever say that word in this house again!" screamed her mama. "That's a creation of Satan, and you're falling right into his trap!"
"Why can't I decide what's best for me?" Kaileen wiped a tear out of the corner of her eye.
Her mama jabbed a knitting needle in her direction. "You're eighteen years old, you don't know what's best for you. Besides, there's a little boy or girl alive and growing in your stomach this very minute. Will you deny that poor child a chance at life?"
Kaileen had had enough. She stood up and shouted, "Yes!"
Dumbfounded, her mama stared at her.
"Yes, I will deny that child a chance at life, because my life is more important to me. I don't care if I'm killing a baby, I'm doing it to save myself. I think an awful lot of women would do the same thing, and men too. I know I'm being selfish, but in the real world, it's impossible to survive for very long without a degree of selfishness.
"Do you really care more about your potential grandchild than you do about your living, breathing daughter who is standing right here in front of you? Would you rather let this unborn baby take my dreams away from me than let me kill it? What kind of mother are you?
"I'm a legal adult, so you can't do anything to stop me getting an abortion, nor can you stop me from believing it's the right thing for me to do. That doesn't mean I believe it's the right thing for every pregnant woman, but I have dreams, Mama. Big dreams. I want to be a CEO someday, and with a husband and baby here, I won't be able to get what I want."
Kaileen stopped for breath, and her mama immediately cut in. "Fine. You do what you want, Kaileen, but you are no longer a daughter of mine."
Her daddy came into the room. "I heard shouting. Is everything okay?"
"Yes, everything's fine. Your daughter's got herself knocked up and wants to get an abortion and go off and become a CEO instead of being a housewife like all the other women in our family were content to be." Her mama huffed a breath in Kaileen's direction.
"Don't be so selfish, Leeann," said her daddy. To Kaileen he said, "It's your life and you can do what you want with it." Then he sat down next to her mama and tried to comfort her. Kaileen, sensing that this was all the support she could expect from her daddy, left the room.
