“So, what is it you didn’t want to say in front of Amy?” The boy was sitting in the car with the girl. He examined her profile as she thought. “How would you tell somebody you were pregnant?” He was doing his best to keep his face smooth, devoid of emotion. “But, you aren’t pregnant.”
“I know, but how would you tell somebody you were?” The car was silent for a long time as he considered. “I don’t know. I’ve never had that problem before.” She didn’t smile. He exhaled. Pause. “I’m not really sure. I’ve never had to think of that before. Hmm”
“That makes two of us.”
“What’s happened exactly? Is this why you were upset at Amy’s party?”
“No. That was earlier. This was when you texted me and told me you were having a bad day.”
“I see.”
“You’ve got to promise me you won’t tell anybody. I know you won’t, but the only other person I’ve told was Sammie, that’s how big this is.” The boy didn’t say anything. She was right. He wasn’t going to tell anyone. He was good at keeping secrets. “Jamie even helped me figure this out. Kind of.” She turned back to him. She studied him for a moment. He hoped his face hadn’t betrayed any of his emotion. She hadn’t really told him anything other than the gravity of what was going on. She had mentioned the other day at Amy’s house she wasn’t sure how he’d take it. He inclined his head ever so slightly; suspicious he had betrayed his concern prematurely.
She turned back to look out the windshield, paused for a moment and then looked out the passenger window. “Remember how I told you about Mike? Well, after I had sex with him I found out he had HPV.” The boy’s eyes widened a fraction. “One of his friends told me. When I went to him he told me, ‘I didn’t say anything because you wouldn’t have had sex with me. Come on, I used protection because I care about you’ I was upset then. This was some guy I met at a party and just sorta hooked up with. He seemed like one of those wholesome guys. It was only earlier that I started to hear stories about how much of a scumbag he was.” The boy shifted in his seat to turn his body to the girl. “There was nothing after that between us, but I didn’t get tested or anything. I thought that it could never happen to me. I guess I should have gotten the vaccine while I was there, but I just figured I’d do it when I came back here. Use a doctor I knew, it’d be cheaper, and there was still that thought it couldn’t happen to me.”
The boy’s mind screeched like racing tires. HPV. Causes genital warts. Ovarian cancer in women. No cure. Image of an angry woman blaming scum for spreading HPV. Scum like Mike. Worse than cancer she said. Cut to black, lights in a heath classroom flick on and disgruntled teenage boys whisper words like ‘dyke’ and ‘man hater.’
The girl gave him a sidelong gaze. The boy’s eye brows must have been furrowed because then she said, “I know you probably don’t even know what I’m talking about when I say HPV.” He met her gaze. “No.” She understood. “So, yeah.”
So, yeah. The boy hadn’t expected this to be the problem. He never had expectations about what the problem was, but this was less expected. He realized he was holding his breath. Release. The boy’s frame sagged in the car seat. Both passengers stared at their laps. The boy couldn’t think. His thoughts were fractured like a broken mirror reflecting a splatter painting. Layers of question, emotion, and otherwise coherent thought shattered into pieces. “What now?”
“I don’t know. After I found out I did some research. A lot of people actually get HPV. Depending on the strain sometimes it clears up. I don’t know what strain I have.” Hope. “I won’t be having any more sex though.” She played with her keychain. “I’m getting a new in law who has HPV, so I guess I should talk to her about it.”
“That would be best. She’ll know what you’re going through. Help you deal.”
“Yeah. I just hope she won’t tell anyone, because if she tells her husband, then Colby will find out. He and my mom would go apeshit. That can’t happen”
“Ask her not to tell. I think she’ll understand. She’s the only person who understands what you’re going through.”
“You’re right. It’ll have to be after the wedding and the honeymoon. Until then I have other stuff to do.” The boy knew what she meant. “I’ve already called Jordan. That was terrible. God. I had to call him up after not talking to him in so long to tell him this.”
“How’d he take it?”
“I don’t really know. He didn’t say much.” The boy nodded. After a few moments he spoke, “being pregnant would be so much easier.”
“I know! I could just disappear for nine months and then it’d be over. I could just go to my Grandma’s and stay there. Nobody would have to know, and then I’d just find a family to adopt the kid.”
“Pull a Juno.”
“Exactly! I mean, I know that would be hard, but at least it wouldn’t be like this.”
The boy had relieved the weight from the girl. Only for a moment where the slow methodical speech was broken by excited conjecture. This break was crushed back though. The boy felt every organ in his body fight him in despair. There was nothing he could do to help her. His mind screamed and raged against his numb body. ‘I can’t even fucking comfort her!’ He wanted anything. Anything other than this. He wished he could carry this burden for the girl. He wished he could help her carry this burden. He wished he could take the burden away. He wished all these things but he knew there was nothing he could do. His counselor’s words echoed in his mind, “You take care of others. You see what you did there? You were worried about her, but since you weren’t sure you asked her in a way that let you try to take care of her!” Now, sitting in the car with the girl he longed to take care of her, like he took care of the other girl in the therapy office. The boy felt tears well up behind his eyes. They would not come and he wanted them to come. He wanted to hold the girl and be held in return and just cry and let it be ok to cry. “Would you like a hug?”
“No.”
“Ok.”
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It's been a few months since I've tried writing anything, a time during which I've read tons of Cormack McCarthy so I don't exactly trust my writing style right now. Feel free to leave some criticism. The story itself is in fact a real event in my life. I wrote the story for myself since I find writing therapeutic.
tl;dr
You're asking for a tl;dr on a short story? It's only two pages. I could understand if I posted this in some other part of the forum. I didn't write this as some blog post asking for advice. I just wanted to know how my writing style is after not writing for a few months. This just happened to be the latest thing I've wrote as a story.
HPV causes cervical cancer, not ovarian cancer.
The story itself is a little dull, but the writing style is fairly strong.
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