High Heels in New York (6 page)

Angie’s eyes were bulging out of their eye sockets. What in the world did he just say? Melissa is pregnant? And she hadn’t told her? This was impossible. They told each other everything. How could she keep this from her?

“Thanks,” Melissa said bubbly, waiting for the doctor to leave the room.

“What the hell did he just say?” Angie asked furiously.

“I was going to tell you but… I wasn’t sure.” Melissa took off the hospital gown and started getting dressed.

“Don’t you piss on my leg and tell me it’s raining,” Angie said.

“I promise. I was going to tell you. It’s just that with everything that’s been going on I just don’t know…” Melissa finally admitted.

“Know what?”

“I don’t know if I’m going to keep it,” Melissa said. She was afraid to look at Angie. Afraid to see the look on her face
because she knew that if she did, she would see the look of disappointment in her friends’ eyes.

Angie was silent.

“And now with Jonathan out of the picture.”

She still didn’t say anything.

“Angie, please say something.”

“You know how I feel about abortions so I don’t know what you want me to say.”

This fact Melissa knew very well. A few years ago Angie found out that she couldn’t have children and she was devastated. She told everyone that God knew what he was doing but Melissa knew her friend well enough to know that her heart had been broken. “Under the circumstances I thought you’d understand,” Melissa said.

“I don’t,” Angie
yelled, grabbing
her purse off the back of the plastic blue chair. “And just because my views are different than yours it doesn’t mean you have to lie to me.”

“I didn’t lie,” Melissa said, putting on
her black Stella McCartney bra.
“I just didn’t tell you.”

“Omitting is the same thing as lying. A lie is a lie.”

Melissa stopped for a moment and looked at Angie dead in her eyes. “Look I didn’t tell you because I didn’t know
what I was going to do with it.
I still don’t know.”

“It?
You say that like it’s a… a thing.” Angie’s arms flailed around in the air.

Melissa had never seen her upset like this, but she wasn’t about to back down. “It’s a thing that’s taking up too much real estate without having even filed out a rental agreement. I don’t want to be pregnant. I never wanted to be. Jonathan
was the one that wanted kids,” s
he screamed.

Even if she tried really hard, Melissa couldn’t remember a time in my life when she had her I-want-to-be-a-mom moment. Her dreams consisted of traveling, writing and having once in a lifetime moments in Manhattan, not sitting at home changing dirty diapers and watching daytime talk shows. Even now, she wasn’t sure if getting
married had even been her idea.

“What did Jonathan say when you told him?” Angie asked, “You did tell him, didn’t you?”

Melissa’s silence was her answer.

“Melissa you have to tell him. He has a right to know.”

“He has the right to kiss my ass,” Melissa said, pulling her tank top over her head.

“You’re being so stubborn.”

“I’m being realistic. The last thing I need right now is a baby. And as my friend you should have my back no matter what
decisio
n I make,” s
he said, noticing that her jeans felt snugger than when she put them on earlier.

“So you lied to me, you’re keeping it from Jonathan and you’re not even sure you’re going to keep it?” Angie had to make sure that she understood what Melissa was telling her.

“That’s about right.”

“I got to give
it to you Melissa,” Angie said.
“You have more balls that I ever gave you credit for.”

“Why?
Because I don’t want to be a mom?
Newsflash, not everyone wants to be a mother. I’m sorry you can’t have children of your own, but no matter what anyone sa
ys, in the end it’s my decision.
” Melissa could see Angie’s eyes well up and the minute she finished fuming at the mouth and wished that she could take it all back. “Oh gosh, Angie I’m sorry. I didn’t mean it.”

Angie’s voice quavered, as if she
might cry. “You’re such a bitch,” s
he said and then stormed out of the room.

#

Turning the key to her apartment, Melissa hoped Jonathan had come to his senses. She pictured him getting on his hands and knees begging her to take him back and telling her what a fool
he had been and that he loved her more than anyone else in the world. Closing the front door behind her, she stood in the hallway for a moment, frozen. The silence was deafening.  She would have to create another fantasy because Jonathan wasn’t home. The questions begin immediately. Did he stay at Valerie’s place? Did they get married already? They were probably already playing house. She could picture them in their perfect little house with their perfect little life and her with her perfect little shoes. It made Melissa sick.

She
wanted to dig deep for the Brooklyn girl inside of her and burn all his clothes like Angela Bassett in
Waiting
to exhale. But she gave up that idea instantly. She simply wasn’t that brave anymore. If this would have happened to her back in
College
, she may have beat that chic to a pulp at the restaurant. But, she had come a long way from the streets of Brooklyn and wasn’t going to let anyone ruin her new life.

Mentally and emotionally exhausted, she turned down the long hallway, past the recently remodeled gourmet kitchen and crossed the sunken living room with its cozy fireplace and into the master bedroom. She plopped down on the queen platform bed and closed her eyes. All she could think about was that she had become obsolete.

She kicked off the plastic flip flops Angie was so kind to get her from the hospital gift shop, before she insulted her, and then hobbled to the bathroom. Her eyes sweep the room. Pieces of Jonathan lingered all around; his toothbrush was casually next to hers in the glass tumbler; his shaving cream, his bathroom slippers. He wasn’t just still there, he was everywhere. Her upper lip began to twitch. That nasty, dirty, bastard, she thought. Then it finally happened. She got angry. So angry in fact that she started grabbing all the things he left behind; his designer suits, the mechanical tie organizer and five pairs of GUCCI shoes. Everything she could find that was his was a goner. She took it all and put it neatly into a pile in the middle of the living room, walked into the kitchen and grabbed a pair of shears and a hammer. Then she opened the refrigerator and grabbed a bottle of white wine, opened it and didn’t even bother with a glass. Once she sat down in front the pile she started to smash it all into pieces.

Bam! She slammed the hammer down onto the tie organizer.

A visual of him kissing Valerie popped into her head.

Bam!

Bam!

Melissa had to admit, that this felt good and she was about to tear into one of Jonathan’s dress shirts when her phone started ringing.

“Hi ma,” she said, cranking her neck to one side so that the cell phone was held by her shoulder.

“Hi
mija
.
What are you up to?”

She chugged
more
wine.
“Nada.”

“I have some great news. I didn’t want to tell you over the phone. But, you don’t come down for a visit anymore. You’re too busy with that hot shot fiancé of yours.”

Fiancé?
Ha! She cuts a big gash into a black Calvin Klein blazer. “
Uhuh
,” Melissa said, wondering what new gossip her mother would make her privy too.

“You know how Dr. Lopez and I have officially been dating for a year now?”

She took another sip of wine, “Yeah.” Her mother waited ten years after Melissa’s dad died to even consider the idea of dating again. Then one day she surprised Melissa with the news that she was finally taking a stab at dating again. Melissa couldn’t have been happier for her mother. But then her mother proceeded to tell her that the man she decided to date was none other than Doctor
Lopez .
He was the same doctor who used to be Melissa’s gynecologist. It was and still is a little creepy
to Melissa, that her mother was dating a man who’d seen Melissa’s
vajayjay
.

“Si
mija
.
Well.” T
he line went silent.

“Ma?
What is it?” Melissa said, cutting a hole into one of Jonathans’
black slacks
.

“He proposed! I’m getting married!”

Melissa dropped the shears. “What?”

“I don’t want a big wedding. I already had one with your dad. Rest his soul. We’re going to h
ave a small one in the backyard.
” Her mother shouted with joy. Only her mother would call the twenty five miles of beach that backed up unto her house a backyard. You can take the Latina out of the country…ah well you know the rest.

Melissa began to pace around the apartment. “I don’t know what to say.” She took two more sips of wine, wishing it was something more pungent like vodka.

“It’s on Sunda
y,” h
er mother continues.

“A week?
You’re getting married in a week? Don’t you think that it’s too soon?” By now Melissa was in her bedroom. She couldn’t believe that her mother was getting married…again. And before her! This wasn’t happening.

“At my age there’s no reason to wait.”

You should wait. Wait until your little girl gets married! Melissa wanted to say. She didn’t. Instead, she opened the
closet and took out her wedding dress, placing it gently on her bed.

“Anyway, I have something very important to ask you,” her mother paused. “You don’t have to say yes.”

“Spit it out Ma.”

“Will you be my Maid of honor? It would mean so much to George and I.”

Hearing her call Dr. Lopez by his first name made Melissa just as uneasy as the idea of being her mother’s maid of honor.

“Ma, I would love to but I’m just so busy and wouldn’t Aunt
Joselyn
or Kathy want that privilege?” Seriously, her aunt and her sister lived minutes from her mother while Melissa on the other hand had to trek the hour car ride to make it to good old, over rated Seagate Beach, in order to have the privilege of hearing her mother torment her in person with her happy little life. She had to give her mother some credit though. Snagging a doctor at her age was something that was unheard of.

“Are you kidding? Little miss perfectionist will drive me insane and you know your sister, she’ll want to make it a big production and I don’t want that,” Her mother said, rolling the R’s considerably.

Melissa sat down on the bed and tried to get out of it. “I have to work.”

“Since when do you work on the weekends?”

“
Ughhh
, Ma!” She said, wining like a five year old.

“Okay, I’ll see you Sunday.”  Not waiting for Melissa to accept or decline the proposition, her mother hung up the call and assumed Melissa had accepted.  This was typical behavior for her. She always presumed because she was the youngest she would go along with every little whim of hers and sadly, Melissa always did. After all, daughters couldn’t say no to their mothers. 

Standing in front of her wedding dress, Melissa knew that she shouldn’t do what she was about to. It wasn’t the right time and it would just make her feel ten times worse than she already did. But she couldn’t help it. So, she stripped out of her clothes and put the thirteen th
ousand dollar dress on. It felt
like velvety perfection and she loved it more today than on the day she picked it out. She remembered how she must’ve tried on a hundred dresses before finally finding the right one and now she wouldn’t even get the chance to show it off. 

The anger inside of her returned and this time with even more vengeance. Dressed in her wedding gown, she walked back into the living room and continued shredding Jonathan’s clothes until the shears
were
rendered useless. She then grabbed the hammer. It aided her in smashing the tie organizer into little bits. Ironically, she found that her high stress levels diminished with every blow, cut and gash.

Say goodbye to daddy’s things, she said to the fetus.

The only thing left were his shoes. But she couldn’t do it. Not the shoes. She put them back neatly in the closet with plans on donating them in the morning.

In a matter of minutes she had filled three bags with torn clothing and broken gifts. It was exhilarating. The bags, along with the
Ab
Roller she got him for Christmas, spend the night in the hallway outside her apartment. In the morning
,
she would take it to the dumpster.

  She took one last look around her apartment and was relieved that besides the aroma of his cologne in the air, there was no sign of Jonathan anywhere. She had her apartment back. It almost looked exactly like it did pre-cheating ex-fiancé.