Choices

It was a boy, and an “it” only because it was an embryo
And only because I can’t bear
To call it by any other name.

My only tangible reminder is
A tiny freckle perched atop my right breast,
Barely the size of a pinhead
That wasn’t there in December.

And my friend, six years my junior, was right
When she said that it would hurt.
Not the pain,
But the indescribable ache that would follow
And follow
And follow.

And when I looked at the pink vertical lines
Crossing first one
And then another
of the milk-white sticks,
I was sixteen again:

Stumbling drunk from the driver’s seat
Of my car

And sobering up from the shock
And the echo of sirens

Flooded with relief that I hadn’t killed anybody.