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Chapters (47)
  1. Title Page
  2. Copyright Notice
  3. Dedication
  4. Epigraphs
  5. Prologue
  6. Part One
  7. ONE
  8. TWO
  9. THREE
  10. FOUR
  11. FIVE
  12. SIX
  13. SEVEN
  14. EIGHT
  15. NINE
  16. TEN
  17. ELEVEN
  18. TWELVE
  19. THIRTEEN
  20. FOURTEEN
  21. FIFTEEN
  22. SIXTEEN
  23. SEVENTEEN
  24. Part Two
  25. EIGHTEEN
  26. NINETEEN
  27. TWENTY
  28. TWENTY-ONE
  29. TWENTY-TWO
  30. TWENTY-THREE
  31. TWENTY-FOUR
  32. TWENTY-FIVE
  33. TWENTY-SIX
  34. TWENTY-SEVEN
  35. TWENTY-EIGHT
  36. TWENTY-NINE
  37. THIRTY
  38. THIRTY-ONE
  39. THIRTY-TWO
  40. THIRTY-THREE
  41. THIRTY-FOUR
  42. THIRTY-FIVE
  43. THIRTY-SIX
  44. THIRTY-SEVEN
  45. Acknowledgments
  46. About the Author
  47. Newsletter Sign-up

WORD SPREAD AROUND SCHOOL like a brush fire. Ann wasn’t the first kid at Riverside to get pregnant, that was for sure, but she was Ed Gordon’s kid, a straight-A student, the kind of girl who, a year ago, might have been the one to spread rumors about other teen pregnancies. The worst part was seeing that look on her teachers’ faces, many of whom were her dad’s friends. They’d been to the house for potlucks and barbecues, knew her mom, had watched Ann grow up. Such a shame, they seemed to say every time they saw her walk into the classroom, their eyes on her stomach. Even her mom’s friend Dawn, who was like an aunt to her, seemed to disapprove.

Her pregnancy became public as her college acceptance letters arrived. She was waitlisted at Harvard, which, under normal circumstances, would have been a big deal—maybe it would mean heartbreak, maybe it would change her life forever. Now it was just a stone dropping through water. Only Amherst sent a rejection. She could have gone to college out East after all: Boston College wanted her. So did Northeastern and Vassar. Vassar even offered her a scholarship. Ann insisted she could still go. “How?” her mother asked. “Honey, a baby is a lot of work. You have no idea.”

Poppy rallied to Ann’s side. She called the admissions offices, pretending she was Ann. Sorry, she said, while tears streamed down Ann’s face, I’m taking advantage of other offers. Ann grudgingly enrolled at the achingly familiar University of Wisconsin–Milwaukee. She had practically lived on campus her entire life. She’d even attended the day care there; now, in addition to her application, she was filling out forms for her own child to be taken care of while she attended classes.

This radical change in plans might have crushed her if she didn’t have bigger worries than school. She worried her father might never look at her the same way again, worried that Michael might have gotten into some trouble (why should she worry about Michael?), worried when she overheard some girls talking about snorting coke with Poppy in Mike Lassiter’s Pontiac Firebird during lunch. There was so much worry, and then she’d read she could stress the fetus, who’d already been exposed to so much of her anxiety that she was certain he or she was doomed to become a mental case.