By March, I couldn’t say for sure whether I still had a boyfriend, there remained a child growing in me that I wasn’t sure I wanted to keep, I hadn’t heard from my mother in weeks, and I had little money in the bank. The only thing in my life that seemed to be going well was my job. At least until the day my boss left me a note: “Lisa, you and I need to talk tomorrow. Come in twenty minutes early.”

Jenna had been the last person summoned to his office like that, and for some unknown reason, he fired her. Jenna had been an experienced assistant manager who made sure customers were happy, vendors held accountable, and the store stocked and cleaned. I stocked and cleaned well too, but I didn’t have Jenna’s way with customers. Once or twice, customers had accused me of having an attitude.

With my mind on the meeting the next day, I could barely focus on work that evening. I flooded the backroom by leaving the faucet running, I attached the wrong slushy flavor to the machine, and I had to chase a guy down the street to retrieve the extra twenty I had given him by mistake. My mind was stuck on the likelihood of losing my job just like Jenna—nearly perfect Jenna—had.

∞

The next day, I sat in front of Mr. Bennet, my body trembling with anxiety.

“I’ve been watching you closely for some time now, Lisa,” he began.

This was strange. Mr. Bennet and I seldom worked together. He worked the morning shift Mondays through Fridays, whereas I mostly worked nights and weekends. “Watching me?” I asked wide-eyed.

 “On camera,” he said innocently as if that were supposed to make me feel better. I shifted in my chair to conceal my breasts as best I could. “Lisa, I know about the altercation you had with that customer last Thursday.”

My heart skipped a beat in anticipation of me losing my primary source of income. I also worked part-time at a restaurant, packaging customers’ to-go orders and carrying them to their cars, but that didn’t guarantee any money—most of my pay came from tips. Working for Mr. Bennet at the gas station covered my bills. I could never take care of myself or my child without it. I looked into Mr. Bennet’s eyes. “The customer wanted me to refund him for a carwash he claimed to have paid for. He didn’t have a receipt, and he said he purchased it a month ago.”

“I’m well aware of that,” he said.

I zoned out in anticipation of reproach. I didn’t think I had done anything wrong. Giving the customer his money back would’ve made me an accomplice to cheating the store out of profit. Sure, the customer and I disagreed. Yes, the man swore he’d never come back. But who cared? “I’m sorry, Mr. Bennet, but I thought it would be best to deny him the refund. If I hadn’t, he and every other customer would’ve seen how easy it was to get something for nothing. I did what I believed our policy to be.”

He threw his hands up as if to protect himself from an attack. “You’re right, it is.”

“And I thought that’s what you would’ve done in my place.”

“It’s exactly what I would’ve done,” he said.

I pressed my lips together in confusion. I didn’t understand why I was there if we agreed. “Then what’s the problem?”

“There isn’t one,” he affirmed. “You did what others had not. It’s important to be friendly with customers, but not to the point of just handing them what they demand without proof of purchase. You know that, which is why I want you as my new assistant manager.”

I gasped.

“Of course, I can give the position to someone else if you don’t think you can handle it.”

I knew that I could handle it. I had already been performing managerial duties: Opening and closing the store, ordering things, inputting data in the computer, etcetera. I just didn’t have the title and pay that went along with those duties. “I know I can handle it,” I said, a broad smile spreading across my face.

“Okay. You do know you’ll have to quit your other job. You’ll be my second-in-command, so I’ll need you closing more nights.”

I nodded in excitement. I hated working at the restaurant. And the gas station was offering me a promotion, which would look good on a resume and one day help me fulfill my dreams of self-sufficiency. With a baby coming, autonomy was essential. Accepting the promotion was crucial.

∞

A Skype call came through on my computer while I was washing dishes. I didn’t have to guess who was calling. The only person I ever Skyped with was my mother. I looked around in a panic for a towel to dry my hands. If I wanted to speak with my mother, I needed to get to the computer now.

Unable to find a towel, I rushed into the living room, water dripping onto the floor. I wiped my hands on my pants to prevent water from getting between the keys of the computer and answered it. The screen blurred for a minute, and I was sure I had hit the button a second too late. Then, I heard her voice.

“Lisa, it’s so good to see you.”

I stared at a picture of her wearing a lovely green gown, sparkling emerald earrings, and a smile that beamed from ear to ear. It was nice, but I preferred to see my mother in real-time. “Why aren’t you using the camera, Mom? I want to see you.”

“It’s broken. How have you been?”

“Not too good. I’ve been trying to contact you.” I honestly didn’t know why I still tried reaching out to my mother. She had never been the type to answer my calls. Time and time again, I’ve attempted to contact her in desperation, before and after getting pregnant, only to wind up disappointed. My mother and I spoke only when the time was convenient for her.

“I’m busy, sweetheart.” This response came as no surprise, for I had heard it more times than I cared to remember. My mother had always been too busy to take care of me, to see me, to call me regularly, and to answer my cries. If we were ever going to get closer, I knew I had to move my world closer to hers as I had initially planned.

I started to sulk because of the distance between us. “Lisa, don’t whine. Complaining just brings on tears. It isn’t good for the skin. Haven’t I taught you better?” The truth was, she hadn’t taught me much of anything. “I just miss you, Mom. I need to see you more now than ever.”

“What’s going on, baby girl?” It was strange that she had chosen that as a pet name for me. It was the kind of nickname worthy of a child who had at least one of her parents by her side. I never blamed my father for not being present; if anything, I was the culprit for my dad not being here. He died when I was five, trying to save me. My mother’s absence was another matter. I don’t recall committing any grave actions against her. Nothing I’ve done was horrific enough to keep her away unless she blamed me for taking her husband from her. She had never mentioned it. Though I had tried talking to her about my father several times, he was a topic she never cared to delve into, at least not with me. So, I was left not knowing why she abandoned me, only feeling that I must’ve done something to deserve her abandonment.

I did my best to brush off my inner turmoil and wondered how to deliver the news of my pregnancy. “I don’t know how to tell you, Mom.” I looked down at my belly.

“Don’t tell me you’re pregnant, Lisa,” she said in a disappointing tone.

I nodded, feeling too ashamed to confirm it verbally. In my family, a baby followed marriage. My mother married before having me, my uncle married before having his kids, and my grandparents married before having their children. As far as I knew, that was how it had always been on my mother’s side. I was now pregnant without a husband, or a boyfriend for that matter, to stand beside me.

“Oh, Lisa,” she said. “I would’ve preferred you wait until you were older.” She spoke as if I had planned this. If my mother had known me better, she’d have known that a baby was the last thing I wanted right now. She’d have realized that what I really wanted was to be with her. “Having a baby is no light matter,” she continued. “Your life changes overnight … I’m sure it already has.”

 How could she, of all people, say that? As far as I knew, my birth didn’t change her. She acted as if I didn’t exist. And still, I kept her in my heart, waiting for the day when she would treat me like her beloved daughter.

“I already feel changed,” I said to her. “Sometimes, at night, I find myself staring in the darkness, thinking about my future as a young mother. I wonder if I’m eating the right foods, or if I should be doing more physical activity or just taking things easy. There’s so much I don’t know about carrying a child, and I know even less about raising one. Do you remember feeling this way?”

“Oh, yes! I was scared too.” She paused for a moment. “Are you going to the doctor regularly?”

“Yes. I’ve been twice so far, and I have another appointment next week.”

“Good! And the father? Tell me about the father.”

I looked away from the screen for a moment. I couldn’t tell my mother that the father of her future grandchild wanted nothing to do with me. At some point, Matt would be back in our lives, and if I were lucky, my mother would be more involved too. Telling her he abandoned me right after discovering I was pregnant could ruin their relationship before it even started.

“He’s loving and charming, Mom. I know he will make a great father.”

“That’s good. It always helps to have a supportive father around.”

“Was my father very supportive of you when you were pregnant?” I asked, hoping she was feeling sentimental enough to give me information for a change.

She cleared her throat. For once, she was going to share some warm memories of my father. Perhaps, getting pregnant wasn’t such a bad thing; in some unexpected way, it had the potential of becoming the catalyst that drove mine and my mother’s relationship in the right direction. “Your father,” she began. “Oh, hold on.” I heard rustling in the background. “Lisa, a call I’ve been waiting on is coming in. I have to take it.”

“Mom, wait…”

“You be sure to do what the doctor says, okay? Talk to you soon, baby girl!”

“Mom, wait!” The Skype call shut off without her saying, “I love you.” Without her waiting for me to tell her that I loved her. My eyes began to water as I thought of my mother, always more distant to me than I wanted to be to her.

∞

I saw Matt today strolling across the university lawn. At first, I thought my eyes were playing tricks on me because most of Matt’s classes were online, and the only one he had on campus that semester was on Friday mornings. But who else stood at six-five with broad shoulders? “Matt,” I called out. He turned to me, narrowed his eyes and curled his lips.

“Not today,” he yelled, turning his back to me and walking away.

“If not today, then when?” I shouted, chasing behind him as fast as my tired legs would allow. He’d avoided me long enough. He had denied the child he’d planted in my belly long enough. I was determined to catch him when I heard someone call out “Lisa Scurry” from behind.

I stopped dead in my tracks. “Is that Lisa Scurry in a hurry?” I looked back, already knowing who the country drawl belonged to—Rebecca, a girl I befriended in middle school.

I hated middle school. During my first month of seventh grade, I was running at full speed trying to beat the bell when I tripped and fell. One of the star football players, rather than helping me up with compassion, laughed as I shamefully got up and walked away.

The next week, I scurried my way down the hallway again, the same football player watching me. The last thing I wanted was to give him the satisfaction of seeing me tumble again, so I moved about conscious of my every step. A few hours later, I learned that tripping was the least of my concerns. The flap of my skirt was up as I hurried through the halls, and that football player, that grotesque adolescent boy, snapped a photo of my backside with his phone. By lunchtime, a poem was already going around: “Lisa Scurry, always in a disgraceful hurry.”

I learned that day just how quickly one’s world could crash down. In a day, I went from being unknown and overlooked to worse than popular. Suddenly, I had a tarnished reputation. This lasted a while, and even when people stopped laughing at the picture, the phrase “Lisa Scurry” was sufficient to incite a clamor of laughter.

Not once during my notoriety did Rebecca, the same Rebecca who’d once claimed to be my friend, come to my defense. She never told her other friends that I deserved to be treated like a human being, not mocked for a mishap outside of my control. Finally, when she did approach me, she brought along her cheerleading squad, who stood in the background sneering at my expense. It was pointless for Rebecca to pretend to be my friend at that point. I knew she had contributed to the scandal. The only person who knew my middle name began with the letter “S” was Rebecca.

“You shouldn’t be rushing while pregnant, Lisa Scurry,” Rebecca said, smirking. “You don’t want to have an accident or something.”

Rebecca’s concern wasn’t for me falling and harming my unborn child. She had said “Lisa Scurry” to hurt me. Rebecca remained childish in her ways; her words nothing more than a reflection of the immaturity that characterized her. But I was no longer in middle school, and both she and that joke had become irrelevant. Turning my head and rolling my eyes, I scoffed at her and continued in pursuit of Matt.

By the time I reached the parking lot, Matt was already in his car, pulling out of the parking space. He directed a disappointing stare my way, yet he didn’t stop. After all the love that had been between us, Matt just rode off into the distance.

About a decade ago, superficial classmates named me Lisa Scurry. They used that name to hurt me for something I couldn’t control. Today, I was reminded of that pain by a woman who’s as fake and disloyal as the man I had been chasing, the man I thought loved me. But I would not allow unworthy people to hurt me anymore. Matt was now as dishonorable to me as that conniving Rebecca, and neither of them was worthy of my time. Neither of them deserved the power to elicit pain within me. Yes, I was Lisa S. Curry, and I was strong enough to raise my child myself.

∞

Until recently, I had considered myself fortunate during this pregnancy. Because of asthma and hypertension, I thought I’d have a harsher pregnancy, anticipating heart palpitations, excessive coughing and wheezing, and shortness of breath. Yet, my baby and I survived the first eighteen weeks without a problem. I didn’t even have nausea or lightheadedness. My body was coping well, until the nightmares began.

My non-existent social life was always a cause of tension, so, at twenty-one years of age, I could genuinely say that I was accustomed to a certain degree of loneliness and darkness. But the dark dreams I was getting now were unlike any I’d had before. In all of them, I was yelling at a screaming kid trying to escape my grasp. The child and I seemed to be in constant discord with each other.

“No,” I screamed, waking up from one of them. I grabbed the damp washcloth I kept beside my bed to wipe the sweat trickling down my face.

A tap sounded at my door. “Lisa, is everything all right in there?” It was Samuel, my loving cousin, and the only person who had always been there for me.

“Yes, I’m fine.” I lied. I couldn’t stop worrying that my child would push away from me the same way others had done. I was terrified I’d be unable to give this baby the attachment all children deserved and craved. The skills to care for a child came from a mother’s instincts, which are supposed to come naturally to women adequately cared for by their mothers. I shuddered to think where that left an abandoned girl like me.

I turned on the lamp beside my bed as an invitation for Samuel to enter.

He came and sat on the foot of my bed. “Another nightmare?”

I nodded. “This time, my baby looked about seven. I drove her to school and reached in for a hug. She pushed me away, fighting to get out of the car.”

“That doesn’t mean anything,” he said. “Lots of kids don’t like kissing their parents at school.”

I sucked my teeth. “Just two days ago I had a similar dream, only the kid was a boy, younger than five, and he didn’t want me hugging him or tucking him in his bed. Before then, it was a toddler, not sure the gender, who wailed and wailed in my ear and slapped at my face. All the dreams have their differences, but the one common factor is that my child hates me.”

“That’s just your subconscious fears playing tricks on you. The best way to get over them is to trust that you and your baby will be fine. Once you do, you’ll start having good dreams.”

I shrugged, hoping Samuel was right.

“Listen, there’s something I think you should know.” His voice fell to a little more than a whisper. His facial expression turned serious.

“Is everything okay?”

“It is,” he said without hesitation. “This isn’t bad. It’s just a change. As you know, I’ll be going back to Charlotte in a few months for my last year of law school.” He looked at the walls and ceiling surrounding us. “I’ve had this place for a long time, but I don’t see myself returning. I want to sell it.”

This was news. I had been living in Samuel’s condo for the last two years. I had planned on bringing my child home from the hospital here. I couldn’t imagine living anyplace else. I didn’t have the money to afford anyplace else. “When are you thinking about selling?” I asked, nervous to hear the answer.

“Not any time soon. I’ve always wanted to fix this place up a bit. I think I can get more for it after renovations. I’m going to search for a contractor and go from there.” He looked me in the eye. “We should discuss what your plans are. Bringing a baby here won’t be ideal once construction begins. Maybe you should move up to Charlotte with me. There’s still time for me to forfeit my dorm and get us an apartment.”

It was a kind offer, but he didn’t need a baby keeping him from studying and sleeping while he was in the most intense year of school. Even if he was open to the idea at the moment, what if things didn’t go as planned? What if he were to discover that living with my screaming child was too much? I didn’t want my struggles to ever put a rift in our relationship. “No, I’ll see what I can find around here.”

“Are you sure? It’ll be difficult being here alone with a baby.”

I smiled at his concern. He was always supportive of me, something I hoped would never change. “I’ll figure it out.” I gave Samuel a confident smile to relieve him of any possible guilt he might have felt. But I felt my stomach turning on the inside as my worry about the stability of mine and my baby’s future intensified.