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Truth

Jan Marquart

    Abortion? I was used to his lack of commitment: no marriage, no buying a house together, no friendship ring, even. I was used to his freak-out and irritability when we went on vacations and he had to go without the structure of his job. I was used to not counting on him when I had life changes like the year I couldn’t find work and the years I struggled with working and going to school full time, surviving alone, an uncared for island. But, this? The implication blindsided me. Abortion?
    I froze facing him. The room closed in. He didn’t move a muscle but instead remained leaning back against his yard-sale bed’s headboard, the one with three finials he diligently refinished and spoke about with such loving devotion it bordered on mental illness, legs outstretched and crossed in front of him. “You know what to do with it,” he calmly said without looking up, turning a page as he continued reading Shogun. I had prepared myself for his anger, for rage, for confusion, to be humiliated, but not this. Did he not hear me?
    My words echoed in my head. “I think I’m pregnant.”
    It? Did he say it? A child therapist whom everyone thought was perfect refers to a fetus as it? That’s what his staff said to me at the Christmas parties I hated going to. It’s how his mother talked about him. Perfect! We were monogamous, is that how he talks about a child he should assume to be his? It?
    My fingers gripped the door jamb. My voice tried to speak but – nothing. I was used to his tuning out when I spoke about his clothes, shoes, and books laying around the house I wanted him to pick up. I was used to his refusal to hear my pleas about turning his thirty T-shirts right-side out because it required me to stay at the laundromat longer than I wanted, exhausted from going to school all day and working a full shift. I had grown used to so much and now it all came crashing around me, slapping me in the face. The veil of my denial, dissipating into wide holes. Anger began erupting in slow waves then stopped for fear of what it would do. I usually yelled trying to get what I wanted, to be treated kindly, to be listened to, to be adored, to matter. I believed there was a way to get what I wanted if only I could make him see my aching need, meet him on a rational level. It seemed so simple. Now, darkness swallowed me whole. What have I done? I had been thrown away a long time ago. What did I expect now?
    So maybe it was my fault. I shuddered with shame. I hadn’t told him the truth for fear he would blame me, as he did every other thing that didn’t work out the way he wanted in his life, his so fragile life. The truth returned to somewhere deep inside me.
    Now it was time. Matters were at a crisis point. I ached to tell all, collapse in his arms, scream, hoping to be comforted, but I stood frozen clinging onto the door jamb. Hope is not a strategy. I couldn’t move my tongue. My thoughts were swallowed by the chasm. My body faced him like an old conch shell. I had to protect myself from this seemingly perfect man who couldn’t look up from reading Shogun for a second to allow room for anything but him. I took the truth and hid it deeper.
    “It isn’t yours,” I ached to say. “It’s the rapist’s.”

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