Decision

Lisa stood in front of the kitchen cabinet where Lorraine kept coffee, tea and hot chocolate. She was dying for a cup of coffee, but she’d checked, and Lorraine didn’t have any decaf. She did have a bewildering selection of teas – Moroccan mint, English breakfast, ginger green, lemon echinacea. She sniffed the box labelled ‘Vanilla Roobois’. It smelled good, like dessert, so she popped a tea bag in a mug and poured boiling water over it. She carried the mug out onto the deck, dunking the teabag into the water by the little paper tag like she’d seen other people do, and sat down to wait for Lorraine.

It was quiet. There was never a lot of traffic on the road out here, and at this time of day anyone who commuted to Saint John for work would be well on their way to the city. Lorraine and Don lived just outside of the village of St. Martin’s, where Lisa and Lorraine had grown up. Their house was set back from the road, with a long gravel driveway that seemed made for a pickup truck and a four-wheeler. Lisa looked down the driveway, across the road, and saw the sea, variegated blue in the morning sunlight, coquettishly kissing the rocks of the shore before pulling away.

I miss the ocean, Lisa thought. Every time she came back home – funny how she still thought of it as coming back home, even though she hadn’t lived here for years – she would never feel like she was truly home until she could see the ocean. And then to go down to the shore, to experience the smell of it, the sound of it…there was nothing to compare it to in Ontario. Being this close to the ocean was peaceful. Mark would love it here.

The thought of Mark was like a reflex, unbidden but completely natural. She took a sip of her tea, exploring the unfamiliar taste, and tried to ignore the small ache in her heart.

Her tea was almost gone when Lorraine came home. She sat in the chair beside Lisa, putting a white bag and a tray with two paper cups on the table between them.

“I picked us up a treat.” Lorraine handed her sister one of the paper cups. “This is yours, decaf. Sorry I didn’t have any in the house.”

“I tried some of your tea,” Lisa said, gesturing toward her empty mug.

“And?”

Lisa wrinkled her nose. “Not bad. Wouldn’t be my first choice.” She flipped the little tab on the lid of her cup and inhaled. “Oh, yeah, that’s more like it,” she said, closing her eyes in pleasure.

“Here,” Lorraine held the bag out to Lisa. “Pumpkin scones from Joanne’s Bakery.”

“Mmmm, I love Joanne’s,” Lisa said as she selected a pastry and took a bite. She hesitated a moment after swallowing and then asked, deliberately nonchalant, “How’s Mom?”

“She’s fine,” Lorraine replied. When Lisa didn’t respond, Lorraine continued, “You have to let her know you’re here. It’s not fair to keep it a secret, not to us and not to her, either.”

“I know,” Lisa admitted. “But can you blame me for wanting one day of peace before I have to deal with her?” She looked out at the ocean, shaking her head. “And how much worse is it going to be this time, having to tell her that I’m pregnant with a fatherless child?”

“But your baby isn’t fatherless, is he?”

The question hung between them for a long moment as Lisa met her sister’s eyes. “I’m not telling him,” she said finally.

“You should,” Lorraine said.

Lisa put her coffee down on the table between them, hard enough that the dark liquid splashed up out of the hole in the lid and ran down her hand. She stood up, shaking the coffee drips from her fingers. “I thought you were on my side, Rainey. I thought you understood.”

“I am on your side,” Lorraine began, but Lisa cut her off.

“No, you sound just like Don- ‘tell him, tell him’. Did you guys sit down at breakfast this morning and decide to gang up on me or something?”

Lorraine held out her hand to her sister, but Lisa turned away. “I am on your side,” Lorraine repeated. “And so is Donny. We’re trying to think about what’s best for you, and for the baby.”

“And you think what's best is to tell Mark, to pressure him into making some kind of artificial family with a woman he doesn’t love and a baby he doesn’t want?” Lisa sat on the porch step and looked up at Lorraine. “I don’t want to raise a child with two parents who don’t love each other. We both know how that turns out.”

“He still deserves to know,” Lorraine said. “You might want his support.”

“I can do this without him.” Lisa’s voice was unyielding. “I’ve supported myself since I was nineteen, I can support us by myself.”

“Sure you can, but do you really want to?” Lorraine asked. “And I’m not just talking about financial support. It’s hard to be a single parent.” Lisa opened her mouth to speak and Lorraine cut her off. “I’m not talking about Mom,” she said firmly. “I know moms from Alex’s school who are doing it on their own. It’s not easy. Even if you and Mark can’t make it work as a couple, you might want him to be a parent to your baby.”

“He’s not ready for that responsibility, for that kind of a commitment.”

“You’re not even giving him the option.” The sisters stared at each other for a minute, blue eyes meeting blue eyes. Lorraine broke the silence. “Look, I don’t think any guy is really ready to be a parent. Donny wasn’t, when Alex came along. But something happens when they hold their baby. They fall in love, and they step up, and they become a dad.”

“Yeah?” Lisa sounded skeptical, and a bit sad. “So what happened with our father?”

Lorraine stood and picked up the bag of scones and her coffee cup. “It’s getting too cold to sit out here,” she said, and walked into the house.