S.

My phone rang and her name flashed across the screen. I answered.

            “Hey,” I simply said. “What’s up?” There was no way she had called to casually chat. Her usual quiet voice started to speak the same familiar story I had heard before.  He was out, and he had been for a while now. The baby was asleep after crying for an hour straight. We both knew that he was going to come back home, most likely smelling like alcohol and maybe bringing people into their house. But for now she was alone, and I knew what was coming. And it did.

"Can you come over?" She was a city away and I honestly couldn't. I felt terrible. I told her I couldn't, and she gave the sad "Okay," but it continued. I stayed on the phone with her and listened, like I usually did, supporting her along the way.

18 years old, 19 in the summer, with an infant child. For now, she was living in an apartment she rented with her fiancé. They had just moved out her mother’s house. The rent was an issue for them, and they were trying to make it work. They had recently moved in, even though it was snowing out. But here she was, alone again, even though they just started something new.

“I’m outside,” she started. “I have been for a while. There’s snow covering me.”

“What about the baby?” I quickly asked, concern hitting me right away.

“She’s asleep.”

“What if she wakes up?”

“Oh, she won’t. She sleeps through the night. We’re pretty lucky.”

I wasn’t really at ease, but then my next issue came out.

“Why are you outside? You’re going to get sick. It’s freezing.”

“Well…” she started. “I was hoped he’d get back soon and see me like this and realize how long he’s been gone. He said two hours, and it’s been five. I just want him to feel bad for something.”

I could understand that reasoning, but there was a baby inside and she is the mother. I knew that she really did love her baby, and was trying to get the father’s attention by doing this, but it still wasn’t the best move.

“Babe,” I said. “You need to get in there and warm up. Check on your daughter. I don’t want you getting sick because of him. If you need some sense knocked into him, I’ll just get him with a baseball bat for you.”

She let out a small laugh.

“I wish that would work,” she said. I could hear the tinge of sadness in her small voice.

“Well, what else is going on?” I asked “How are you two settling in?”

“Oh it’s fine…”she simply said, but I knew her little voice was about to go on a rant. “But he keeps bringing his friends over, like, after they go out drinking and stuff. And he doesn’t even care. And there’s this girl, and she just… She gives me this bad vibe. I don’t know what she wants. But it’s annoying. And when they’re over, he just doesn’t care about our family.” Her quiet little voice was getting louder and angrier.

“You know, he didn’t help unpack. I did a lot of it. Well, his friend helped, but that’s it. I’ve been in the hospital and I was doing all of it. But he gets all mad at me for everything. He even threw me the other day. Just shoved me across the room.”

“That’s it,” I interjected. “I am beating him with a baseball bat.