By the time she was twenty-one, Rosa had realized that she was never going to be JLo, or even a plain old working singer or actress with a spot in the chorus or the ensemble. She’d been to too many auditions with too many women who were prettier, or more talented, than she was, and now, even worse, she was beginning to see women younger than she was. Her options, as she saw them, were limited. She could keep trying and find a man to marry who’d support her while she did. She could keep trying on her own, and resign herself to always having low-paying, exhausting day jobs. Or she could give up, go home, go back to school, and become the nurse or the paralegal her parents had always wanted.
Then the world handed her Option Number Four: just after her twenty-first birthday, Rosa had gotten pregnant.
She was almost positive that Benji the bass player was responsible. One of his friends had a place in the country, and Benji had invited Rosa to come with him for a weekend. They had stayed in a rambling, drafty old farmhouse, where almost all the bedrooms had fireplaces. It had been March, with gray skies and a raw, biting wind that made it unpleasant to be outside. Benji had built a fire in their bedroom, and they’d spent most of the next three days huddled under the covers, doing everything they could to keep warm.
Two weeks later, she’d missed her period. Maybe, Rosa thought grimly, the amount of sex they’d had during that freezing weekend had overwhelmed the hormones in her bloodstream. When the pregnancy test she’d bought at the Dollar Tree came up positive, and then the name-brand test for which she’d paid fifteen bucks at CVS gave her the same bad news, Rosa called in sick to work. She took a long shower, wrapped herself in her favorite robe, and sat on her bed. It was early in the afternoon on a Tuesday. The apartment was empty for once, all her roommates at work or at class or at auditions of their own. That rare solitude gave her an opportunity to think, but there was really no thinking to be done. Rosa was in no position to be a mother, with less than two hundred dollars to her name and an apartment she shared with three roommates, and Benji, even broker than she was, was in no position to help.
Instead of calling Benji with the news, she called her sister. Amanda had always been a schemer, the cleverest of the siblings, the one who could usually talk her way out of trouble. Rosa knew Amanda would know what to do, and Amanda did not let her down.
Find some guy with a wedding ring who looks like he has money, Amanda said. Screw his brains out. Don’t give him your real name. Make sure you know where to find him and that he doesn’t know where to find you. Wait two weeks and show up at his door. Tell him you’re in trouble, and that you don’t want to keep it, and that you need money to take care of it. He’ll be so terrified that you’ll tell his wife he’ll pay you, no problem. Rosa had considered asking how many times Amanda had used that particular scam herself, then decided that she didn’t want to know.
She’d followed her sister’s instructions, and they had worked just like Amanda told her they would. With the money in hand, she’d scheduled the procedure back home in Los Angeles, and bought the cheapest one-way ticket she could find. New York hadn’t worked, but there was still LA. She could get new headshots taken, find new acting classes, sign up with the agencies that cast extras, and start getting herself out there. But then, as the plane crossed over the Rockies, Rosa had a realization. I am never going to be a singer, she thought. I’m never going to be famous. I will never be a star. And a baby… a baby would be a companion, someone who adored her and needed her and would never reject her and never leave. Rosa pictured a little girl, with big dark eyes and soft dark curls, with Benji’s beauty and Rosa’s talent, a girl who would love her forever.
By the time the pilot announced the start of their descent, Rosa’s mind was made up. She’d had her big adventure, and now she would be a mother… and a good one.
She put her hand on her still-flat belly, her little question mark. “It’s you and me, kiddo,” she whispered. She was scared. But there was also, in the swirl of her fear and confusion, a thin, bright ribbon of hope. Rosa bounced a little bit as she made her way through the concourse, feeling the way she’d felt as a kid, picking up a wrapped gift from under the Christmas tree, wondering what was inside.
* * *
Glenn and Maria did not welcome their prodigal daughter home with fatted calves and open arms. Instead, it was sour looks and I told you sos in two languages. Rosa’s mother made it clear that she was not interested in being an abuela, that she’d done her time changing diapers and getting up in the middle of the night for midnight feedings. With her troublesome daughters finally out of the nest, Maria had retired, swapping the school district for the local casinos. She was happy spending her days at the San Manuel Indian Casino, in front of the nickel slot machines. Glenn still worked full-time at the garage; Amanda was still in beauty school; and Manny had moved to Phoenix, where he’d found a job in a lab.