The Stillburrow Crush

I'd finished my room and had all the plates and cups piled on the kitchen table while I stood on the countertop and wiped out each empty shelf. Mom sat at the table, apparently reading a book, though she never turned a page, just gazed sightlessly at the words and said nothing. When the phone rang, I immediately shimmied off the countertop. "I'll get it."

"You will not," Mother said, and slammed the book closed. She sent me a glare that had me climbing back on the counter, wiping away.

In the front room, I heard her say, "Hello, Luke...No, she can't come to the phone right now. Carrie's grounded...No...Thank you for calling. Have a nice weekend." She hurried the last part, like she was interrupting something he'd been saying, and then she hung up. When I saw her appear out of the corner of my eye, staring me down, I acted like I was pouring all my attention into scrubbing the top shelf.

"Do we need to get a pregnancy test taken for you too?" she finally asked.

After pausing a moment to discover I wasn't actually going to sink through the floor from mortification, I lifted my chin high and said, "No, we most certainly do not." 166

The Stillburrow Crush

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She sniffed at my bitter tone like she didn't believe me, but after that she turned away, left me alone in the kitchen, and never broached the subject again.

I spent the rest of Thanksgiving break cleaning. Through the remainder of Friday and all day Saturday, neither Mom nor I left the house. She kept busy by finding things for me to do. I polished windows, washed curtains, scrubbed the walls and dusted every inch of wood to a reflecting shine. Mom told Dad about the wine at lunch on Friday. He said nothing but looked at me with distinct disappointment, which made me lower my head in guilt. That man could pack more blame in one look than Mom could in two days' worth of cleaning duty.

On Sunday, she couldn't find anything else for me to clean. I sat between her and Dad through church. Marty didn't show but neither did any of the Eggrows. After lunch, I was sent to my room where I remained the rest of the day. We didn't hear from Marty. Mom and Dad didn't call him either, to see if he was all right. And I couldn't be freed to go search him out. So none of us knew how the Marty-Abby situation was progressing.

It was Monday morning before I got wind of any latebreaking news. I arrived late to school, ru

I lay in the dark, waiting for the discussion to come to a close, but it dragged on. I heard Marty's name mentioned a 167

The Stillburrow Crush

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few times. Sometimes, Dad would say, "He's got to live his own life, Andrea." Finally Mom said, louder than before, "He should've learned something from our mistake." Everything grew incredibly quiet after that. My eyes stung and I strained to hear my father say, "I didn't realize you thought of our life together as a mistake." Not much was said after that and their words grew increasingly quiet. Finally, I heard the door open. It clicked so softly I hardly caught the sound. But then muffled footsteps moved down the hall past my door and into the living room. They didn't return while I was awake. I wondered which one of them had stayed on the couch.

The next morning, I slept in. My eyes hurt when I woke. Dried tears were crusted to my cheeks. Dad was already out in the shop when I dared to leave my room and Mom was in the kitchen with her legs crossed under the table, sipping coffee and staring at an old family picture on the wall. I ate a silent and speedy breakfast with her but spent too long in the shower. I dawdled over getting dressed and didn't leave the house until Mom called to me, telling me it was getting late. I couldn't find all the homework and books I needed for school. It was hard to locate my stuff since Mom had made me clean my room.

Students were already clearing the halls and teachers were pulling their classroom doors shut when I raced through the front doors. It was a shock to see Luke standing next to my locker, pacing. His hands were in his pockets and he looked like an expectant father outside the door of a delivery room. He took a step in my direction when he caught sight of me. 168

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"What's going on?" he said instantly. He crowded in around me as I dropped my book bag by my locker and began working on the combination of my lock.

"I'm late," I said. My voice was breathless and harried. I opened the locker door and it covered his face. He made a sound of disgust and moved it so it opened the entire way and he could lean toward me as I dug inside my cubby.

"Your mom said you were grounded."

"Oh, yeah." I made it sound like I'd forgotten all about that torture, and I yanked out the supplies I needed for first hour. I glanced up at Luke and saw the concern on his face. Then I wiped my bangs out of my eyes and said, "She found out about the wine."

Luke glanced up and down the empty halls and leaned closer. "No wonder she sounded so ticked off on the phone." I blew out a breath and slammed my locker. "Let's just say it was a bad weekend all around."

"Why?" Luke followed close behind me as I started up the hall toward my classroom. "Something else happened, didn't it?" His fingers wrapped around my upper arm, pulling me around to face him.

"You're going to be late for class too," I said.

"What's going on, Carrie?" he said in a low demand. I sighed and checked the quiet halls. "I'll talk to you later, OK?"

He nodded, bobbing his head quickly, while giving me a concerned look. His fingers squeezed briefly, and then he let go, racing down the hall in the opposite direction toward his own class. The bell rang just as I eased inside the room. The 169

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teacher slid me a short, condemning look and then waited to start until I slumped into the first available seat. I noticed it immediately: the stares and the whispers. I saw more than one person glance at me and then away when I caught them doing so. The teacher also noticed the lack of attention and spent a couple of minutes lecturing us about talking while she was trying to teach. But as soon as she started teaching again, someone would turn around and whisper something to the person behind them. Finally, the teacher gave up and assigned us extra homework. Whispers continued to circulate around me and glances steadily hit in my direction. I figured it was about Abby and Marty. Pregnancy was big news in our school since girls so rarely came up pregnant before they left the twelfth grade.

There'd probably only been a dozen or so high school girls who'd gotten pregnant since my mom had had her turn years ago. Now it was the son she'd been carrying who'd caused the damage.

When the bell rang, students swarmed into the halls spreading gossip like a brush fire. I followed at the end, feeling like the spark that had lit the fuse. People stopped talking and stared at me when I passed. "That's her," I could almost hear them snicker behind their hands. "Marty Paxton's sister." I began to feel like I was the one who was pregnant. I caught E.T. near my locker. He seemed leery about approaching me, but I grabbed his arm and dragged him with me as I went by.

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"What's going on?" I hissed, even though I was already sure I knew.