Soliloquies Anthology 30.1

By Coralie Olivier

You stare at Cynthia as she speaks, her words sticky like chewing gum. That was not what you expected her to say when the Time Square ball dropped on the small television. She watches you, eyes wide, like she can’t believe she had the audacity to say it. You are petrified by her declaration, your hand clenched so hard around your solo cup that the plastic shrieks and cracks. The cheap, tepid champagne seeps through the slit and pulls you back to reality.

“Shit,” you stammer as champagne drips over your hand, then falls on your sock and on the old carpet.

You hurry into the kitchen to throw the cup into the sink, then spool out a handful of paper towels to dry your hands. Outside the apartment, you can hear the dull thud of fireworks as everyone else celebrates 1998 the way you would have wanted to. In your small apartment, the only sound comes from the TV. You had decided, for once, to celebrate New Year’s Eve at home, nothing fancy, because you’d both grown tired of partying. Now you regret that there weren’t more people around. Perhaps Cynthia wouldn’t have said anything if you hadn’t been alone tonight. Her words echo in your ears. What a way to start the year. Happy New Year, by the way, I’m pregnant.

She’s followed you into the kitchen, her solo cup still in her hand. She hasn’t drunk a drop of alcohol all evening; you should have figured something was wrong. Your best friend sets her cup on the kitchen countertop and crosses her arms.

“Really?” you ask, your voice unsteady from shock.

“Yeah.”

She looks like she can’t quite believe it, but in a good way. This must be the glow your mother talked about. Pregnancy glow. You’ll know when you’re pregnant, she used to tell you, unaware that you had no intention of ever getting pregnant, that in fact your adoration for women was just one more obstacle to her grandmotherly aspirations. Cynthia is always glowing when you look at her, but there is something different now, as you stare.

“Who’s the father?”

She shrugs.

“Does it matter?”

Cynthia hooked up with a few guys at the various Christmas parties you attended. There was nothing wrong with that; you hooked up with plenty of girls at those parties, but now, to think that one of them could be linked to her forever like that. Your stomach twists. The mix of beer and Chinese food doesn’t sit well in your gut.

“Maddie?” she asks you. “Sorry, I didn’t want to drop it just like that, but I didn’t know when would be a good time.”

“I’m fine. It’s fine.”

You swallow the bile, brush your hand over your clammy forehead, and take a deep breath. You tell yourself you are not going to be sick because your best friend is pregnant. Heterosexuality doesn’t disgust you that much.

“So, what’s the plan?” you ask her.

She frowns. You’ve known her for almost ten years now. You know there’s a scar on her forehead that’s a shade lighter than her brown skin and it becomes trapped in the folds of her brow when she frowns. You watch it disappear and you know what she’s going to say next, but you don’t interrupt her.

“What do you mean?”

“I mean with the… Do you need me to come with you?”

You’re so hesitant to speak the words into existence, not as brave as she was five minutes ago. Your vagueness confuses her even more. You know, because now her nose is bunched up too.

“Like, to a clinic?” you spit out in a hurry to end this conversation.

You should be celebrating right now, just the two of you, without a care in the world. This is not what you had planned for tonight.

“What? No. I’m… I think I want to keep it.”

Your mouth falls open. This is the last thing you expected her to say after ‘I’m pregnant.’ It’s like Cynthia was switched with a clone who cares about family instead of her career as an engineer, which she worked so hard to force her way into. What happened to your best friend who used to say she would rather get her fingernails pulled out with pliers than marry a man and take his last name?

“Are you serious?” you ask.

She comes to take your hand. You let her, because even as you feel something climb in your throat—it’s either anger or vomit—you can’t push her away. You let her drag you back to the living room and sit you down on the sunken couch. Her hand is callous in the way a mechanic’s is. She fixes cars as a hobby, and sells them to collectors. Your hobby is helping her.

“At first, I thought about it, but… I don’t know. We’re going to be turning thirty soon.”

“Yeah, in like, two years.”

“I’m in a good place in my career-”

“And your boss is going to use it to take your career away.”

“And I’ll fight him at every turn, like I did before.”

You believe her, because Cynthia is a fighter. Nothing gets past her without a fight to the death. Even now, you can tell she’s ready to fight you, to parry every argument you might come up with to convince her that this is a terrible idea. And it is a terrible idea; you know it deep within your guts like birds feeling the changing wind in the fall. But she’s also rubbing her thumb against the back of your hand, and every brush on your skin sends little sparks into your brain.

“So, what?” you ask. “You keep it, then what? Do you need a paternity test?”

She shakes her head.

“You’re having such a fixation over this. It doesn’t matter who he was. I only saw my father on Sunday when he wasn’t working and he was too tired to take care of me. Your father was worse. This baby doesn’t need a father. I’ll be fine on my own.”

Your instinct is to tell her that you’ll be there to help too, because that’s what you do, you help her with everything she does, but this is different. Kids make you uncomfortable. You never know how to handle them, especially the little ones. You held a baby once in your life, it was your older brother’s son, Brock, and he started crying as soon as he was placed in your arms.

“So that’s what you have planned for 1998? You’re just going to get bigger and bigger and then you’re going to have a kid?”

She laughs at your discomfort.

“When you put it like that!” she laughs, then sighs, “It’s going to be a busy year.” She sounds like she’s looking forward to it. “Right now, I’m about six weeks along. I went to see the doctor a few days ago, to confirm.”

You chew over that fact. So not a Christmas party conception, more of a Thanksgiving thing. You went to a Thanksgiving party at one of her friends’ places, and she disappeared with someone and returned home the next morning while you were nursing a hangover. You search through your mind to try and remember what the guy looked like. Cynthia’s hand moves to your wrist, stopping you from thinking.

“I just want to make sure that you know this isn’t going to change anything between us. You’re still my best friend no matter what. I might have to move, but-”

The panic in your eyes stops her short.

“Move from here?” you repeat.

You can’t comprehend the thought. You two have been living together since college. You moved into your first apartment together, and you’ve been roommates in every subsequent apartment since. You can’t fathom living without her.

“Well, yeah. There’s only two bedrooms here. The baby is going to need their room eventually.”

“Eventually, but…” You’re scrambling. “But not right away. And anyway, you’ll need help with…” You can’t bring yourself to say it.

Cynthia laughs like she always does when you say something ridiculous.

“Maddie, you hate kids.”

“Not all kids.”

“I’ve never met a kid you didn’t dislike. Even Brock, and he’s your nephew.”

“I barely see him anyway. Look, finding a new apartment, moving and all, it’s going to be stressful, and it’s going to take time. How much space does it really need, at first? You can just put the crib in a corner of the room for a little while.”

Cynthia gives you a suspicious look. She can guess your fear as it’s quite transparent. You’ve learned to let her see the obvious, so she doesn’t find the truth, that nugget you keep hidden within you that no one else has ever seen. It’s become a part of you, like your childhood love for airplanes, or the song you always pick at the karaoke bar. You are in love with Cynthia.

One might think that years of unrequited love would assuage the feeling. You’d hoped for that, once—for the sentiment to go away, to free you from being in love with a girl who would never return your affection. Now, you’re content to let those emotions sit within you, secretly. You’ll never be free of her, but she found a way to free herself of you.

“I’m not moving out tomorrow. Relax. I’m sorry, I know I ruined the mood.”

“It’s fine,” you lie.

“It is still January first. Here.”

She takes two brand new solo cups from the pack on the metal coffee table, grabs the champagne bottle, and pours it in both cups. She hands you one and raises hers.

“To 1998. It’s going to be a great year.”

You purse your lips, but you can’t stay mad at her. When she smiles, you smile back. You tap your cup against hers. Before you can pull away, she holds your hand back, and pours the content of her cup into yours, giggling all the while. You shake your head in amusement.

“Are you trying to get me drunk so I forget this conversation?”

“You better not forget. It was nerve-wracking enough telling you the first time.”

You drink for the two of you. She’s smiling, genuinely smiling. You think she must be delighted by this pregnancy, to be smiling as she is. You think she’ll make a great mom, and it would be selfish not to be excited for her too. You’ve gotten used to pushing your true feelings down, it’s as easy as switching radio stations. You turn that dial, and you tell her you’re happy for her.