Nobody Girl by Leslie Dubois

thirteen-year-old student.  She had two kids from him.  Maybe three. She went to jail.  I’m going to jail!”  Delia started crying into her napkin.  Donna Lee reached across the table and grabbed her hand.
     
    “Oh my God, you’re pregnant? Dee, that’s not the worst thing in the world. I’ll help you. We can — ”
     
    “I’m not pregnant!”
     
    “Then what the hell are you talking about?”
     
    “Chase.  He’s in my math class.  He’s my student. He’s seventeen.  He just turned seventeen. I checked his file. I’m going to jail!”
     
    “Can I get a scotch on the rocks over here?” Donna Lee called to the waiter who was two tables away. “Okay, calm down. Are you sure?”
     
    “Of course, I’m sure!” Delia snapped. “I think I know what he looks like. I know what every part of him looks like. Oh God, I’ve violated a child.”
     
    “But how is this possible?”
     
    “I don’t know.  I’m going to jail.  I’m going to jail.” Delia burst into tears.  The drink arrived and Donna Lee finished it in two gulps.
     
    “ Keep ‘ em comin ,” she instructed the waiter. “You’re not going to jail, Dee.  He’s seventeen, not thirteen.” Although she had to admit that those two ages were eerily close, she would never say that to Delia.
     
    “What am I gonna do?  I can’t keep teaching him.  What if he tells someone?  I’ll get fired and go to jail.  I’m going to jail.”
     
    “For the last time, you’re not going to jail.  Sixteen is the legal age for consent.”  Donna Lee wasn’t sure about this, but she thought that was what she heard. Well, at least it sounded right. Suddenly her problems at the magazine didn’t seem like that big of a deal. She’d write a hundred figure skating stories if it meant not having to face possible statutory rape charges. Donna Lee started to feel that sex really just complicated life. Maybe she would look into that celibacy thing. Whoa, that had to be the scotch talking.
     
    “But I’m still his teacher.”
     
    “You need to talk to him and find out what the hell is going on.  How could you not know he was underage?  How was he drinking on the ship if he was underage?”
     
    “Pedophilia, contributing to the delinquency of a minor, statutory rape.   I’m going to jail.”  Just then Delia slammed her head down on the table and declared, “Oh God, he’s here.”
     
    “Here? Where?”   Donna Lee turned around and looked at the front door.  She immediately saw how her sister could mistake him for an adult.  He was over six feet tall and devastatingly handsome.  The only clue that he was a high school student was his uniform of navy blue pants and green Saxon Arms blazer. Chase spotted Delia and rushed over.
     
    He stood in front of the table for a moment and stared at Delia as she cried into her napkin. 
     
    “You must be Donna Lee,” Chase said, turning his attention to her and extending his hand.  “Delia told me all about you.”
     
     Donna Lee shook his hand weakly, not knowing what to make of him.  She should’ve been angry with him.  She should have hated him for lying to her sister, but for some reason she didn’t.  There was something in his eyes when he looked at her sister.  In just those few seconds she knew one thing for sure, Chase was in love with Delia. 
     
     
     
    ***
     
    “I’m gonna go take a leak,” Donna Lee said suddenly. Delia’s eyes expanded to twice their size when her sister bolted from the table before she could utter a word of protest.
     
    Chase/C.J stripped off his blazer and sat down in the seat Donna Lee had just abandoned. He stared into her emerald eyes, now wet with tears, and had to turn away. The guilt of how he’d misled her tore at his soul. He’d spent the last several weeks trying to forget her, but looking into her eyes now caused everything he’d felt for her on the cruise to come flooding back. He opened his mouth to speak, but no words