Lessons in Laughing Out Loud by Rowan Coleman

her shoulders, and let it fall to the floor.
“I’m up the duff,” Chloe said, putting her palms on her rounded belly. “About six months I think. And when Dad finds out he’s going to kill me, so I’m moving in with you, okay?”
It was Willow’s turn to sit down on her bed.
“Chloe . . . you’re fifteen.”
“Nearly sixteen . . . -ish,” Chloe said as if that made everything fine. Willow stared at her. “Okay, yes. I’m fifteen and pregnant, yes. And I knew about contraception, and I knew the risks of what might happen, but you know. I’m fifteen, how sensible do you expect me to be? Anyway, the UK has the highest incidence of underage pregnancy in Europe and like about fourth or fifth in the world, so, you know, are you really that surprised?”
“Yes.” Willow nodded. “Yes, Chloe, I am that surprised. I haven’t seen you for five years. The last time I saw you, you hadlong dark hair that you refused to get cut because you wanted it to be as long as Rapunzel’s, and forty-three pink teddy bears called Pinky, Pinky One, Pinky Two, Pinky Three . . . and then you turn up here with a . . . a . . .” Willow nodded at Chloe’s swollen abdomen, unable to articulate further.
“Baby,” Chloe finished for her. “Although, the technical term until it’s actually born is fetus. I read that. Oh, and I got thrown out of school for drinking. Dad’s supposed to be having me homeschooled until I can start at some boarding shit-hole in January, but I’m horrible to teach, a proper bitch. So he’s gone through more tutors than fucking Mr. Rochester, and five years is a long time. A lot can happen in five years. Maybe if you’d kept in touch you’d know.”
Willow rubbed her hands over her face.
“So, you haven’t told your dad about the . . .” Willow still couldn’t comprehend what was blatantly obvious. It wasn’t only that her former stepdaughter was standing pregnant in her bedroom. It was that Chloe had come here, she had gone to the trouble of somehow finding out where Willow was five years after she had been abandoned by the woman she was now seeking out. Which could only mean one thing; there really was nowhere else for her to go. And that was the kind of desperate dead end that Willow understood. The unexpected joy of hope and fear of failure blossomed in Willow’s chest. Please, God, don’t let me mess this up, she prayed silently.
“Okay.” Willow thought for a moment, choosing her next words very carefully, getting the distinct impression that picking the wrong one would be like cutting the wrong-colored wire on an unexploded bomb. “Okay, you know I have to call your dad.”
“No!” Chloe’s protest detonated instantly. “No, I don’t know that. I know that if you call my dad I’ll be out that door in a second and into drugs and teenage prostitution beforeyou know it. And when they dredge my cold lifeless body out of the Thames, that’ll be your fault too.”
Willow glossed over the barbed comments, they weren’t exactly undeserved. One thing at a time. Priority: what was the right thing to do with a pregnant ex-stepdaughter? Bracing herself, Willow tried again.
“He’ll be worried sick, Chloe.”
“If he can get his head out of his new tart’s cleavage for long enough to notice I’ve gone,” Chloe said bitterly. “Which he won’t, because it’s only”—Chloe looked around the room for a clock, spotted Willow’s alarm clock—“six. He never gets home from work till after nine, and by then she’s there hand-making fucking ravioli and decanting wine. She’s such a bitch. Every fucking thing she cooks is covered in fucking arugula.”
“Oh, you poor neglected child,” Willow muttered. Chloe sat beside her on the bed, a handsbreadth of cold air between them. Sitting that close, Willow caught the faintest scent of the little girl she’d last embraced underneath a slew of patchouli and cheap deodorant. This girl, this strange present-day version of Chloe, wasn’t