What Kind of Love? by Sheila Cole Page A

they’re taking next semester, and I wasn’t really listening to them. Out of the blue, Heather turns to me and asks, “Are you going back to school?”
    Her saying that made me realize that Mrs. Ikura wasn’t the only one. Everyone can tell. I didn’t know what to say to her because I haven’t been thinking about school at all.
    â€œI don’t know,” I said.
    â€œOh,” Sandy said in that know-it-all way she sometimes has, “of course she’s going to school. She can’t quit at the end of tenth grade.”
    â€œI don’t know.” I said. “I’ve been thinking about becoming a welfare mother and watching television all day.”
    She gave me one of her dirty looks and opened the freezer to see if there was any ice cream.
    I forgot that school starts in two weeks. I can just see it now. Me coming into class every day, and everyone watching me get bigger and bigger, pretending they’re not really looking. Some of them will feel sorry for me—they’re the ones who will try to be nice, but not too nice. Most kids will act like I’m not there, like I’m some kind of subhuman. Wouldn’t want to be contaminated by someone like me. I don’t think I could stand that. It would be too hard.

Thursday, August 22
    I told Mom when we were doing the dishes that I wanted to quit school and get a job. Though I wasn’t even talking to him, Daddy blew up. “Isn’t it bad enough you got yourself pregnant? Now you’re telling us you want to quit school, too.”
    First he tells me I have to have an abortion or go away because he can’t face people, and now he tells me I have to go to school. He’ll throw me out of the house if I quit. “I pay for the roof over your head and the clothes on your back,” he shouted. “And as long as it’s me who pays, you are going to finish high school.”
    Boy, he brings it up every chance he gets: “I’m supporting you, so you have to do whatever I say.” I wouldn’t take a nickel from him if I didn’t have to.
    It doesn’t matter anyway, because I can’t quit school until I turn sixteen, which isn’t for a month and a half. But they can’t make me go back to Irvine High, not even for six weeks. Even Daddy understands that. Mom’s taking off work tomorrow to see if I can enroll somewhere else.

Friday, August 23
    Saw Mrs. Garnet, my school counselor. It was humiliating. I knew it would be. Mom told her I was “… uh … expecting.” Mrs. Garnet said there was nothing to keep me from coming back to Irvine, but the district has a school-age mothers’ program in downtown Santa Ana. I could enroll now, and after the baby came, the school would provide day care while I was in class. There were classes in child development and discussion groups about being pregnant and raising kids, too. It sounded okay to me. But I could tell from the way Mom’s cheek muscle was twitching that she didn’t like it.
    Mom asked about home study, and Mrs. Garnet got all huffy. She said I’d have to have some medical condition that kept me from participating in regular classes and a doctor’s letter to be eligible. She admitted that some pregnant girls did home study, but she’s against it. “What you don’t understand, Mrs. Larch,” she said in that know-it-all way people like her have, “is that in home study, the girls aren’t forced to confront the deep intrapsychic needs that made them get pregnant in the first place. It has been my experience that if girls like Valerie don’t resolve those needs, they go right out and get pregnant again.”
    She made me so mad I stood up to go. But Mom didn’t move. She put one hand over mine and made me sit down while Mrs. Garnet went on.
    We decided that I would enroll in the school-age mothers’ program for the time being.
    Mom didn’t say a