**I don't know if you want some context for this story, but I included the essay about Stephanie and Noelle at the bottom of this post.
* * *
My mother turned and shifted slightly in the booth, used her napkin for its intended purpose and asked again, "So what's new with you, Dad, nothing?" My grandfather, who we call Pop-pop, replied with something mundane and grandfather-like. The restaurant was packed, crowded, loud, and causing me stress; no one was sitting where they were supposed to sit, my mother had walked in twenty minutes late, and my sister and I are not conversation-holders, so before my mother's arrival my Pop-pop, sister, and I sat in silence broken infrequently and by bits of speech that didn't take much space in the landscape of conversation. I guess the tables around us with people expanding and buzzing with excitement and chatter equalized with the shrinking feeling within me.
The arrival of food and my mother presented me with an out, something to focus on other than the obliterating circle of silence forming between us. My mother immediately started reeling in a conversation, but the fish didn't want to be caught. Looking at her looking at me, I knew that she knew I was irked in this cramped, hot, and loud restaurant overfilling with crowds yelling to be heard; a buzzing filled my brain and my shrinking increased exponentially. "What's wrong?" she mouthed. I said nothing but looked left and right and then back at her, widening my eyes. (We had a similar experience a few months ago while packing my car. My mother kept saying things like, "Just throw it on top" and "I'm sure there will be room," which skyrocketed my stress levels, and I begged her to let us repack the car because everything was everywhere and I couldn't breathe. My mother kept asking what was wrong and telling me I didn't need to freak out, as if I had purposely decided to be anxious.)
After finishing most of my sandwich, I turned entirely and placed my feet on the rung of my sister's chair. Everyone else was still eating, but people were beginning to leave the restaurant and the line for ordering food was shrinking. The buzzing in my brain began to subside, but stopped entirely when I saw her. Over the booths across from our table, Stephanie became visible; the restaurant then seemed very quiet to me. Looking by chance in our direction, Stephanie didn't pause on my face, looked right through me; A
m I here? Has my face changed so much? I thought; tall, blonde, and smiling, I wondered if she still smelled the way she did when I was a kid. "Mom, it's Stephanie."
"Who?"
"Stephanie Dancy." The noise of the the restaurant had returned full-force and my mother's hearing is selective at best.
"Who-Oh. Stephanie. Stephanie Dancy?"
"No, Mom, the
other Stephanie," I said, rolling my eyes and after a few moments of leaning back and forth and saying "Where?" several dozens times, my mother finally found Stephanie. I don't know if Stephanie gave another thoughtless glance in our direction or if my mother began smiling and waving, but Stephanie found my mother's face and recognition inundated her countenance. We sat, finished with our meals, and my mother said, "Her little baby died," which answered a question I didn't want the answer to, a question I purposefully hadn't asked.
After ordering, Stephanie and Noelle, her daughter, came to our table. An arm around Noelle's farther shoulder, Stephanie told us how she was working as a nurse at BayState again to spend more time with Noelle, whose blue eyes were just as stark and bright as I remembered them. My mother then addressed Noelle directly, "Do you remember Kay, Noelle?" Noelle shook her head, but, pointing at me, said in a small voice, "I remember Sam." An image of Noelle, pointing at her shirt, which read in big, pink letters "BIG SISTER" and saying, "I have this because I am a big sister and my sister is the little sister." After that, the human traffic became disrupted by Stephanie and Noelle so they decided to wait for their food somewhere else.
We said good-bye to Pop-pop and my sister and I went to deposit our trash, silverware, and trays in the correct places. My mother walked over and stood next to Stephanie, asking her all the adult-y questions adults pretend to like answering. I leaned against a wall and faced Noelle, asking her how old she was (7), and her favorite subjects in school (gym, art, and recess). "I think I might be an artist," she said, looking at her shoes, which seemed to fit her better than the last time I saw her, her ankles seeming less tiny and her existence less bird-like and translucent.
"I think that's a great idea," I returned.
"I drew a horse--well, half of a horse--the other day and it, um, it really looked like a horse."
"Really? Did your mom put it on the fridge?"
"Noooo, my mom--"
"
Your mom," I interrupted; Stephanie and my mom looked at us. My mother laughed; Stephanie's look had chagrin.
Noelle continued, "Well, there's so many things on the fridge--too many things, so like, but I think my mom accidentally threw it out." Just then, my Pop-pop called to us, "Andrea, Andrea." He said he had special Easter bread for us in the car, so we started toward the door. We said good-bye, good to see you, will call soon, tell your parents we said hi, and all the other unfulfilled bullshit. But there was a horrible stone in my stomach; moving was more difficult than usual.
Stephanie's daughters--the lithe, little bird-child who became so tall and the one she buried--seemed to both hang in the hair; the slowly forming Noelle, who is incrementally growing into her shoes, into a person, filled the air with a happy aura of kindness and the childish selfishness I knew she had and Stephanie's "other daughter" remained undeveloped; who was she? Who would she have been? Beautiful and blonde and tall and thin like her mother and sister; determined, artistic, brilliant, revolutionary. The loss of a tiny life, fragile and holding an unfathomable gravity, debased me and I tried not to shake as I hugged my little sister and told her I loved her.
**Here's the essay I wrote last year in Creative Non-fiction:
“Can you push me
higher, Sam?” she asks, turning her little blonde head back to me as the
momentum of the swing takes her away from and back toward me. I sort of laugh
and say that yes, of course I can push her higher. She’s so small; her little
bird arms connect to her little bird fingers gripping tightly to the chains of
the swing. Noelle describes her upcoming sixth birthday party to me, blathering
on about her cousin and her mom and her new shirt. The constant stream of words
from her mouth, and her need to be looking at the person she’s talking to, make
her turn her head towards me as much as is possible as she swings. Her azure
irises reach into the furthest corner of her eye to meet mine. Her feet in
their sneakers look too large for her spindly ankles as she kicks them back and
forth with the momentum of the swing. Her tiny teeth are a stark white, a small
contrast to her fair skin, revealed when she smiles and giggles. Midsentence,
she looks down at the top of her arc and says urgently, “Not too high Sam!”
* * *
Stephanie Dancy,
now Stephanie Paull, has been my neighbor for as long as I can remember. She
used to babysit my sister and me when we were kids. She is tall and thin with
straight features, bright eyes, and blonde hair. When she was twenty-years-old she
became pregnant with her daughter Noelle. “I was in the middle
of nursing school, had a great social life, and pretty much ‘had it all’ in the
world’s view” (Paull). She had Noelle, who is now six, when she was twenty-one.
“[Noelle’s] father and I had been dating each other since we were 15… When he
and I first found out we were pregnant, he wasn't panicked like I was. I came from
a religious home where premarital sex was not just discouraged; it was
forbidden. I felt like a disappointment and a failure… [Noelle’s] father just
said, ‘It's ok we can do this,’ but in all honesty I was desperate for it all
to go away” (Paull). Stephanie found herself in a disadvantageous position and
considered the logical options to get herself out. “I was always against
abortion and I never thought I would have ever even considered it. However, I
did. I thought: what if I just make it all go away and pretend it never happened?
No one would ever have to know. I could go on and become the super nurse I
always wanted to be and live my life
the way I wanted to” (Paull.)
* * *
“Will you play
with me, Sam?” I kneel down on the concrete of the Dancy’s driveway and a
five-year-old Noelle pulls out a plastic tub of Legos and Lincoln Logs and
train sets that are to be sold in the tag sale the Dancy’s hold annually. We
divide up the Playmobil people and cows and I zoom my dumptruck over Noelle’s leg.
Her plastic horse neighs and jumps over the fence containing it. My father
stands near the garage with Noelle’s grandparents, Mr. and Mrs. Dancy. When he
finishes speaking with them, Noelle and I are just putting the finishing
touches on a Lincoln Log house, complete with a door, a few windows, and a
corral to enclose our cattle. My father had returned home and when I make a
move to follow him, Noelle clings to me and asks me to stay for just a few more
minutes, explaining desperately that the cows are going to break free and how
that would be bad because then cars could hit them. Mr. and Mrs. Dancy tell a
slightly grumpy Noelle that I have to go home, but, if she behaves, I will come
back over to swim later.
* * *
Stephanie feared being shamed by other people, most of all her
parents. “I was afraid of what young girls from church who looked up to me
would think, I was afraid everyone was going to see me as some ‘easy’ girl, and
I was terrified my parents would disown me… I called Planned Parenthood to ask
exactly what the abortion would be like… I do not judge girls or women who do
have abortions because I truly understand the panic and feeling that there is
no other option. However, even though I do not judge them for it, I will never
say it is right” (Paull). Though she doesn’t think it is the correct course of
action, Stephanie seems to sympathize with the three out of ten women who have
abortions before they are forty-five (“Abortion”).
Michael Gazzaniga
explains in his book, The Ethical Brain,
that at twenty-three weeks, a fetus can be placed on life support outside of
the womb and survive (Gazzaniga 7). But
before that time, it is not sentient and does not deserve the same rights as a
conscious human. “The brain at Carnegie Stage 23… is hardly a brain that could
sustain any serious mental life. If a grown adult had suffered brain damage,
reducing the brain to this level of development, the patient would be considered
brain dead” (Gazzaniga 8). Although a fetus has the potential to become a fully-functioning
human being, in the case of an accidental or ill-timed pregnancy, the woman is already a fully-functioning human being.
Generally, the pro-life argument is that the fetus could have grown into an
outstanding member of society, but the same thing could be said of the mother,
especially a young mother. The pregnancy may have been an accident and if a
mother must take care of a child, a huge responsibility, at a young age or at a
disadvantaged point in her life, she may never have the chance to mature
intellectually and live her life to its fullest. If that fetus were allowed to
grow into a child, it could make a huge change to life or medicine or science,
but if a young girl is burdened with a child she does not want and cannot take
care of, she may never have the opportunity to have a large impact on
technology or health or the way that we live.
The importance of
the autonomy of a woman’s body is paramount. If she wants to have the child,
she should be able to do so free of judgment. If she decides that, in her life,
a child is not what she needs or wants, she should be able to obtain an abortion
easily and, again, free of judgment. By granting a fetus, which only has the
potential to live, legal rights as a human, the woman, who is already living,
is denied rights. The right to decide should always be granted to the mother,
because she is the only one with control over her own body. Although an
eight-week-old fetus has the appearance of a small human, its brain
functionality is not close to that of a human (Gazzaniga 8).
“When I saw a little kidney bean shape on the screen,” Stephanie
explains. “With a heart beating at
only seven weeks pregnant, I knew there was a life that God had allowed to be
created. I knew that even if I had an abortion and no one else would know, for
the rest of my life, I would know and God would know” (Paull). Stephanie is an
extremely strong, intelligent person and she made a sacrifice. She was in the
middle of a rigorous nursing program and she worked hard between classes,
homework, and taking care of a newborn. On top of this, her longtime boyfriend
and Noelle’s father became a big partyer and seems to have abandoned Stephanie
when Noelle was about two months old. “I do not want to sugar coat this.
Choosing life was not easy… I slept about an hour a night with no help at all.
My parents wanted me to realize how hard being a parent was. I'm glad they did
that because it helped me learn from the choices I had made and change the way
I was living before. I was exhausted, broke, sad, and lonely. When you have a
child, your life is no longer about you. It is about self-sacrifice” (Paull).
Despite these circumstances, Stephanie graduated college with
high honors: phi theta kappa. “Being a young single mom is not something I recommend
to anyone, but despite how difficult it was, it was more than worth it. I named
her Noelle because its biblical meaning is ‘precious gift,’ and that is exactly
what she is to me. Noelle is my ray of sunshine. Watching her grow and change
is a privilege. She is a delight in my life and I love being her mother”
(Paull).
“I sacrificed the normal, free young-adult life, but I do not
have one regret about that. I know if I chose abortion I would carry the regret
of that my entire life… There were people who told us we couldn't be good
parents at such a young age, that our lives would never amount to anything,
that we couldn't possibly give her what she deserved. [Noelle’s father]
listened to that and then tried to convince me to have the abortion, but I
didn't care if he walked away or stood by me. I made my mind up that I was
going to have the baby” (Paull). Stephanie’s decision to keep her daughter is
an admirable one, but some women may not want her life. Some women may not
think that adding a baby to their list of things to take care of will be
advantageous to their career, and that can be true. “I now have other people,
and my own parents, tell me how incredible of a mother I am. I have a job at
the top hospital in this area, I have a wonderful husband who has taken Noelle
as his own, I have two beautiful daughters; we own our own home. I would have
to say, those people were very wrong” (Paull). None of Stephanie’s experience was
easy; she worked hard and struggled a lot to become who she is. Some women may
not have this kind of strength, this sort
of wherewithal, and they may choose to have an abortion or give up their child
for adoption. These choices are not weaker than Stephanie’s; they do not
require less strength. They are simply different. Having an abortion does not
make a woman feeble; she is strong enough to give up the idea of having a
child.
* * *
Noelle must have
been about three at the time; I was fourteen. She splashed loudly in the pool,
struggling against her floaties; the tips of her almost-white hair were a bit
green from spending so much time in the chlorine. Stephanie sat on the steps of
the pool grinning and watching her daughter swim and bare her teeth in a way
that resembled a smile. She turned to me, her smiling waning slightly. “Don’t
ever have sex in high school,” she said flatly. My eyes widened, mostly in fear
because people don’t say “s-e-x” in front of fourteen-year-olds. I simply
nodded. Stephanie’s smile returned full-force as Noelle shouted, “Mommy! Mommy!
Watch me! Watch me do this!”
Works
Cited
“Abortion.” Planned Parenthood. Planned Parenthood Federation of America
Incorporated, 2014. Web. 20 March 2014.
Gazzaniga, Michael S. The Ethical Brain: The Science of our Moral
Dilemmas. New York:
Harper,
2005. Print.
Paull, Stephanie. Letter to the
author. 18 March 2014. TS.
* * *
"I can change, I can change,
I can change, I can change"
