Leah's Uncompromised Abstinence Read online

  I shared my closet with Jada and it held her wardrobe secrets. She couldn’t take the sleazy clothes I bought to her mother’s house so they needed a hideout. Anyway, we rode to school together so we had a chance to dress anyway we wanted to before arriving at school. When we left my house headed from school, we were sizzling hot.

  My father usually left for work early and was sometimes gone three or four consecutive days. Aunt Ree usually tried to keep an eye on me from her bungalow next door but was usually too busy with her men to watch me. I made a deal with her that if she didn’t tell my father what was going on, I wouldn’t tell him that she rarely checked on me. Good deal.

  I parked my car in Aunt Ree’s driveway. When my father was home, I had an easy escape. I would climb out of the window and disappear into the night. I always returned before he left for work, so everything was cool. He never suspected a thing. He was just too occupied with work and grieving mother’s death to worry about me.

  I called Jada and told her to get dressed. She was hesitant about riding to the dance in Will’s new hot red Ford Mustang. She and Will squabbled about his cheating on her. Will abused and dominated Jada’s life. As usual, I pressured her to come. I told her to put a pile of rags in the shape of her body in the bed. Her mother would assume that Jada was asleep.

  When Will and Austin reached my house, my father’s car was in the driveway, so they dared not get out of the car and ring the doorbell. Instead, Will aimed his headlights at my bedroom window. The headlights beckoned me with devilish shadows to come out and partake of the fun. There were dozens of girls longing for the opportunity to be with Austin. I was dressed in a glittering halter top and skimpy shorts. I was anxiously waiting to make my move. The headlights’ devilish shadows weren’t going to wait forever. I slid out of my window onto the ground. I hurried across the yard with my five-inch fire engine red pumps in my hand and jumped into the car. My father’s bedroom was in the rear of the house, and he evidently didn’t hear a thing. He arrived home exhausted from a long day at work.

  When we reached Jada’s house, she was standing in the darkness near the corner of the house. She sprinted across the lawn and did a shark dive into the passenger side seat and hid herself on the floorboard. She lay glued to the floorboard, until we were out of the neighborhood.

  We hit the makeshift dance floor at Victor’s parent’s house, and the night belonged to us. We were the envy of all of the girls at Central High. No one dared to tattle on us. Most of the girls stole their way out of their parents’ house to get to the dance. Jada was loose and rolled her butt like a whirlwind. Gyrating. She was overdoing it. Over-kill! I saw the excitement in Will’s eyes as she rubbed against him. I was at a disadvantage. I tried to get close enough to whisper – back off, but she kept dirty dancing. Tempting. She danced so close to Will that their souls became one. I knew this meant trouble.

  We left the dance at midnight, and we wasted no time getting in Will’s car. Will pulled away from Victor’s place and headed in an opposite direction from where we lived. I became alarmed because Victor’s parents lived in rural Friendswood and we weren’t going toward home. “Will, aren’t you going the wrong way?” I asked.

  CHAPTER III

  “Ah, don’t worry, we’ll get you home before too late,” Austin whispered in my ear, as we sped down the interstate.

  “Relax, Babe,” he said. “We’re just going to have a little fun. You’ve been wearing your sexy threads to school and begging for affection. Just relax, and we’ll have a load of fun.”

  He kissed me behind the ear, and I felt his warm and sensual breath. I tried to return a kiss, but his hands touched my bare knees. My heart trembled and my flesh cringed. I had to do some quick thinking. I knew that trouble lurked all around me like a prowling thief. The bright glow of protective lights from the highway drifted into obscurity, as the Mustang entered an isolated gravel road. Cars racing along FM 518 were the only visible signs of activity other than the drum beating of my pulsating heart. My heart left my chest and was beating intensely in my mouth. The Mustang came to a cascading stop, as the tires slid along the loose gavel. Will and Jada quickly engaged in a wild episode of necking and petting.

  “Now, let me see what you can do,” Austin teased. “I can’t wait forever. You’re suddenly a hot number, and I want to see what you’re made of. A few years ago, you were so different. You have blossomed into a hot little number. Lay it on me baby!”

  “It’s not going to be this easy,” I said, as I pulled my skirt down.

  “What do you mean?” Austin asked in a curious voice, while he dropped his pants below his knees. He attempted to yank them over his sneakers.

  This was my opportunity to flee. I nervously giggled, shoved the passenger side bucket seat forward, nearly pushing Jada’s head into the windshield. I violently yanked the door latch, and leaped out of the car onto the hard graveled ground while trying to pull Jada out of the car with me. Austin reached over and got a slight hold of my left leg. I yanked my leg away with all of my strength. I lost my balance and my face hit something soft, as I tasted dry cow dung on the dusty ground. My knees hit the sharp gravel, as I fell.

  A momentary glance revealed that Jada was still in her seat. She insisted that Will let go of her arm. My knees burned like fire, and I felt blood trickling down my legs while running swiftly down the road. “Catch me if you can,” I shouted. I ran along a gravel road into the darkness. It was a new moon and I could hardly see anything. All I knew for sure was that Austin was hot on my heels. When I turned my head and looked behind me, the lights from the car revealed Austin’s bareness below the waist. In an instant, he pulled the jersey over his head and flung it to the ground.

  I ran with all my might but my five-inch heels slowed me down as they dug into the graveled ground. My legs cramped under the pressure of running on the gravel. I searched my mind for a way to get out of this mess. I wasn’t willing to give up my most precious possession. My virginity. It belonged only to me. It was mine. Sacred. It wasn’t cheap, free, or easy. And…I was keeping it all to myself until that special day.

  Austin was closing in on me fast and if injuring myself would help me get out of this situation, I was willing to sacrifice myself. I pretended to trip and fall on the gravel. Then things went terribly wrong. I stumbled and rolled head-over-heels into the ditch. Something sharp scratched my back. My ankle ached.

  “Caught ya,” Austin boasted. “Now come back to the car. It’s time to pay up.”

  “My ankle,” I whimpered. “Wait just a minute, Austin. I am injured. I feel faint.”

  I pulled my cell phone from my pocket and gave it to Austin. He shined it on me and panicked when he saw my bloody legs. He lifted me from the ditch, and I allowed my eyes to close and my head to roll backward, as if I had passed out. Austin was hysterical. He ran with me dangling in his arms toward the car calling out to Will. Will drove up to us, jumped out of the car and flung the door open. Austin retrieved his jersey from beside the car. He threw on his clothes and yelled for Will to head for the hospital.

  Jada leaned across the backseat and slapped my face in an effort to bring me back to consciousness. A few minutes later, I regained consciousness and demanded that Austin call Aunt Ree. When Aunt Ree answered, Austin struggled to find the right words to describe my injury. I heard Aunt Ree yelling into the phone in a panicky voice. I grabbed the phone and spoke to her. She calmed down a bit when she realized that I was alive. I asked her to meet us at Walmart parking lot in Webster. I could not possibly show up in the emergency room with Austin. I pretentiously lay helplessly in Austin’s arms until Aunt Ree reached us.

  “What in the world happened?” she franticly asked Austin. “Leah, did Austin hurt you?

  “No, Austin did not hurt me,” I mumbled. “Aunt Ree, please calm down.”

  “Ron will be livid when he finds out about this,” Aunt Ree pointed out. “I have to get you to the hospital. My goodness, you are a bloody mess. Help me get her
into my car and leave the rest to me. I will take care of this myself.”

  When Will heard the words, “bloody mess”, he became frantic. “Did you bleed on my new seats? My mother will kill me if she sees blood in my car.”

  I paid little attention to Will. Jada left Will’s side and helped Aunt Ree and Austin placed me on the backseat. Aunt Ree sped out of the parking lot asking me to hold on, until she gets me to the emergency room.

  “Aunt Ree, please slow down,” I said in a soothing voice. “I fell and scraped my knees when I was running down a gravel road to escape from Austin. Then I stumbled and fell in a ditch and scraped my back and legs on something sharp. Believe me, it is only a scratch or two. I had to make my injury appear brutal so I wouldn’t have to give it up.”

  Aunt Ree broke out in a loud, weird laugh. “That’s my girl,” said Aunt Ree. “Don’t give it up until you’re ready.”

  She pushed the car’s cigarette lighter with a tug while searching in her purse for another cigarette. Jada giggled a bit and then became somber. Her somberness made me think that something had happened back in the car.

  “Leah, you darn near scared me to death!” Aunt Ree explained. “If you are sure it’s only a scratch or two, I’ll take you home and clean out the wound. I couldn’t imagine how I was going to explain this to Ron. He trusts me to look after you, and I am doing a horrible job. When our mother died, he finished raising me. He was so strict that I got married just to get away from him. Later when my life went all wrong, I realized that he only wanted the best for me. I love him with all of my heart. He’s a good brother.”

  CHAPTER IV

  I stopped reflecting on our past, and the soft music began to play. Then everyone stood while the family marched in. My knees buckled as I struggled to stand. I was a living corpse slowly withering in my grief.

  Mrs. Cheney and her sister, Sadie, were wrapped in each other’s sorrows as they marched in to take their seats. They had lost Jada and possibly Nan to Hurricane Rita. At least that’s what they thought. Now that Jada’s body had been found, the family could at least have some closure. Nan’s body remains somewhere in the marshes of Oak Island or possibly was swept out to sea. They were wailing like sicken doves and kept their heads down on the way to their seats. I knew that Hurricane Rita’s fury did not claim Jada’s life, but for now, I must keep her secret deep inside me. It was difficult to concentrate on the funeral because I was living in past memories. Now Jada lay silent in her closed casket probably in a white laced shroud - home bound. She was dead because of my silence. My fault.

  Soft music echoed above the stained glass windows, and resonated throughout the sanctuary, as we took our seats. My mind left me and soared out of the church back to the night of the first dance of the school season. We had dances at some of the students’ homes when their parents were out of town.

  About eight weeks after the ride in Will’s new car, Jada called me in utter distress. I had never heard her voice tremble that way. She sniffled and blew her nose as she spoke to me. I had seen her dozens of times since the incident, but today was different. She normally referred to me as her girlfriend. I wasn’t sure if it meant girl friend or good friend. Today she used my first name and I knew it was serious.

  “Leah, my girlfriend,” Jada said. “I am in terrible trouble and need your help.”

  “Sure Jada,” I replied. “Anything for my homie.”

  “Well, the rabbit died, and I don’t know what to do,” she whimpered. “I just don’t know what to do.”

  “What in the world do you mean, Jada about the rabbit dying?” I asked. “We are virgins, and we made a blood promise to keep ourselves pure until marriage. How could you be pregnant?”

  “Leah, I wasn’t completely honest,” she said. “I was afraid that if I told you the truth, you wouldn’t be my friend. Will forced himself on me shortly after I showed up at school in my new hot threads.”

  “I don’t believe this,” I replied. “Friends are supposed to tell each other the truth. That’s what homies do. Did it happen at school?”

  “No,” Jada replied. “It either happened at my house the week before we went for the ride in Will’s new car, or maybe at my house.”

  “What?” I responded in disbelief. “How could you get pregnant at your house?”

  “Well, Will and I use to go out on my back porch and watch the stars together,” Jada reminisced. “It started very innocently. Will asked me to tie a string around my finger and place a nail on the end of it. I dropped the end of the string with the nail on it out of my bedroom window. Sometimes during the night, Will arrived at my window and yanked on the string. We’d go into the backyard and dream many wonderful dreams. One night, things got out of control, and the rest is history.”

  “Jada, how in the world did you keep Chili from barking?” I asked. “Chili barks at everything.”

  “I kept Chili quiet by giving her a treat until I climbed out of the window,” Jada explained. “Soon she got Will’s scent and accepted treats from Will.”

  “Did you tell Will yet?” I asked.

  “Yes, I already told Will about my pregnancy, and he told his mother,” Jada cried. “Will’s mother was outraged and asked me not to tell anyone. She scolded me and told me that I wasn’t going to wreck her son’s life. He was a promising running back and had a bright future. Livid. She stormed out of the house and when she came back, she handed me $500.00 for an abortion. She knows of someone in the area that will take care of everything for me.”

  “Jada, you can’t possibly have an abortion without Mrs. Cheney finding out about it,” I insisted. It’s illegal, and it is dangerous. You have a heart murmur, and an abortion could be fatal. There are at least nine girls missing in our vicinity. We know that they were pregnant, but no one knows what happened to them.”

  “I don’t have any choice,” Jada claimed. “If you help me, my mother will not find out! Maybe those girls ran away after their boyfriends deserted them. That’s exactly what I want to do.”

  Jada asked me to drop her off at her Aunt Nan’s house in Oak Island the day after the abortion. The timing was perfect. Hurricane Rita was entering the Gulf. Jada mother’s didn’t drive, so Jada promised to get a ride to Aunt Nan’s house and meet the rest of the family in Dallas. Once Jada arrived at her Aunt Nan’s house, she pretended to fall ill. Riding out the hurricane with her Aunt Nan would give her a few days to heal before returning home. Anyway, if her aunt sees blood, Jada would just tell her that it was her time of month. She had everything figured out.

  “I don’t know about this, Jada,” I said.

  “Are you turning your back on me?” Jada asked.

  “Of course not, Jada,” I responded. “We are homies. I just need to figure it out.

  “There is nothing to figure out,” Jada said. “Just say yes or no. I’ll stay at your house the first night and go straight to Aunt Nan’s house afterwards.”

  “You are my homie and I love you very much, Jada,” I assured her. “Yes, I will help you out. I just need to know who is going to do the abortion.”

  “I don’t even know myself, Leah,” Jada replied. “This is all done in secret. I promised you that I will leave a letter for you in the event things go wrong.”

  That evening Jada stayed in the guest bedroom down the hall from my room, just as she had done so many times before. She brought her book sack and an overnight bag. She asked me to drop her off at Walmart in Pearland before I went to school. Jada could not look me straight in my eyes. I knew she was hiding something, but I could not grasp what she was actually hiding. She hid her eyes while she spoke to me that evening. Maybe she was embarrassed about getting pregnant and had difficulty facing me. Father made soup and sandwiches for supper, and he sat at the table with us. He tried to chat with us, but we didn’t have much to talk about. He washed the pot and utensils and put them away.

  “Leah, I’ll be out of town for a couple of weeks,” my father announced. “If hurricane Rita threatens
the Gulf Coast, I have arranged for Ree to drive you to Dallas for a couple of days. Have you and your family made any arrangements, Jada?”

  “Yes sir,” Jada nervously replied. “Mom has plans to go up to Dallas and spend a few days with Aunt Sadie.”

  “Aren’t you going also, Jada?” my father asked. “Yes, I’ll head to Dallas, but first I will go over to Oak Island so I can drive Aunt Nan up to Dallas to join the rest of the family. She has poor vision and refuses to drive on the interstate.”

  “Well, just be careful,” father said. “This is a very powerful storm. Leah, I have arranged for you and Ree to stay at the Hilton in Arlington for a few days. Here’s the confirmation number. My credit card information is on file, so you won’t need to do anything except relax. Oh, one other thing, make sure you put Trina in her cage. The hotel will allow a small dog to stay in the room as long as it is confined.”

  “Sure father,” I said. “Don’t worry about a thing. Aunt Ree and I will be fine.”

  “Well, young ladies, please excuse me,” he said. “I have to get an update on the storm and finish packing.”

  Jada and I joined father in the family room where he watched the storm update for a few minutes before excusing himself. He soon went into his bedroom so Jada and I watched television until around midnight. At midnight, the cuckoo clock chimed and an annoying bird appeared. Jada flinched.

  “It’s midnight already,” Jada said as her voice trembled. “This day brings uncertainty in my life, and I am faced with a life changing decision.”

  I didn’t want Jada to worry. I gave her a long glaring look, and we then went into my bedroom. Jada sat on my bed and asked me for a pen, paper, and an envelope. I gave her a pad, pen, and fetched an envelope from the computer table. She said that she forgot to bring the letter giving information on the abortion and needed to write another. I excused myself and took a shower. I came out of the bathroom dressed in a pretty baby doll set. When I returned to the bedroom, she had finished writing the letter and was lying on my bed holding her stomach. I asked Jada if she brought something to sleep in. For a moment she didn’t say a word. Then she spoke softly to me.