The Roe-v-Wade Home for Unwed Mothers

“Patient pregnant, being seen as out-patient; living at Roe vs. Wade Home for Unwed Mothers.”

I considered the paradox of her residence with befuddled amusement as I confiscated the car keys that hung so unprotected in the cupboard.

I darted for the door. As often as I had dreamt of tearing off in Ava’s Piranha, I had realized that I’d know just when that time would be—and this was definitely the time. I popped out of the side door of the house that opened into the carport where the red and brown sports car sat, hopefully the battery still at the ready. Four doors in a “sports car,” I thought; some racy. It was pretty ugly, actually, but did look fast. And heavy. It was perfect for the predatory streets of this alternate world, but would sink like an anvil in the Amazon where its namesake inspired its verve. Its front grille was an expected design for a car so named. Its vertical chrome shafting did look like long, slender, sharp teeth. The hood release was through this dentition, which was bound to make any serviceman a little nervous when sticking his hand into the mouth of this beast.

The rain was heavy enough to spray in through the sides of the carport. I got my back wet as I entered the car at the driver’s door. The engine began turning over so loudly I almost expected the Ava here to come running out to stop the rip-off. It strained as stale batteries often cause an engine to do, and I began to sweat when my doubts started, but luckily my frequent trips to the carport paid off as there was enough juice to finally get it started. I prudently buckled up and then pulled backward down the wet driveway. The rolling water raced me down the gentle incline toward the curb. I reversed the car into the street, and when I was in the drive straightaway I took off, occasionally spraying a curtain of water to the left or to the right as I plowed large street puddles that had been collecting for the last few hours.

My Abby awaited me; she would get her surprise tonight at the Roe-v-Wade Home for Unwed Mothers. I couldn’t wait and my driving showed it.

During my time at Ava’s, I was grateful I had at least looked around outside once in a while. I had noted vehicular protocol. I knew which side of the street to drive on from my attention to this detail, as it had been months since I had last been at the helm in traffic. In addition, there was no traffic here in which to flow this late at night, so this knowledge proved crucial.

I knew the way to the Roe-v-Wade Home, because I had seen the TV commercials for it so often. It was on Esplanade Avenue, a once lovely street in bygone worlds when stately mansions, the same as were characteristic of the Garden District, stood proudly, defining the street’s milieu. Now the thoroughfare was dotted with gas stations where the ghosts of the homes were, a few bars languishing among them at points. The surviving houses needed work, no longer kept up so meticulously as in nicer worlds ago. The oaks, with their draping moss, seemed their only protection now.

The Expressway of New Orleans was terrifying enough, and when a passenger for this part of the ride I always just closed my eyes. This time, I was driving, I would have to take the Expressway in full view, in pouring rain, taking that exact route backwards until Esplanade presented itself as my destination instead of my starting point.

It’s funny that as many times as I had been down the street, I had never noticed the home for unwed mothers. From the pictures on the commercials on television, which was how I was familiar with it, it had an unusual front that involved a lot of burglar bars.

It was an easy drive to the Expressway for the car but not for my mind. The mist that inundated the torrents cloaked me away from what I knew was outside. As the Piranha sliced dreamily through the inclement night air, lulled by the distant sirens of this world, it only seemed to protect me. The reality was that it announced me—made me stand out as an invader into the alien realities and machinations here. The false sense of serenity of the closed-in climate-controlled cabin was claustrophobic.

Only an occasional car was encountered, typically gaining on me rapidly from behind and then firing past me. When I was able, I tried to identify the model. One car had lettering shaped like flames along its side that said Aghasteroid. Beneath these letters it boasted “electronic cruel-injected.” Another one that flew past me quickly had a customized license plate with too many letters crammed together that read, DYING ANYWAY. I was glad to see that one go, for I knew he had nothing to lose. I never did see a posted speed limit but felt safer breaking the minimum rather than the maximum. I went fifty-five.

An evil-looking vehicle came up on my left and then used its brakes to match my speed. It was black and had fins and spikes all over it and wore at least five differently-sized antennas. I nervously looked over repeatedly but couldn’t see because all of the windows were darkened. This guy must have taken his car out of gear or played with his clutch in such a way as to rev up next to me while moving alongside. I declined the challenge by slowing down further. This was obviously annoying, for he swerved in front of me, making me hit my brakes hard to avoid a collision. He began to slow more, drawing me provocatively into his harassment. I was very panicky by this point and searched the console for a button that would signal my emergency flasher. Maybe that would work, I thought. There was still no letup in the rain, and I strained to be watchful for his brake lights ahead of me.

Unable to readily identify the flasher button, I fumbled open a panel of shellacked hardwood and saw a set of hidden controls. One of them was a button labeled, AUTODIGESTION. What did I have to lose?

I figured it was only a matter of time before I got myself PincerLocked or worse, so I punched the button. It must have been important, because to do this I had to flip up a little hinged rod that lay over it, obviously designed to prevent accidental use. It was time to see what a Piranha could do. If mainstream America could afford cars with PincerLock or whatever, then I was curious to see what a car like this could muster—a car that a rich guy could afford.

The message on the dashboard screen read, ARE YOU SURE? I hit it again, quite sure.

By this time we were crawling on the Interstate, occasional cars whizzing past, saluting our imminent confrontation with horns. I patiently waited for autodigestion, whatever that was.

All at once I heard a grinding creak, a straining of metal against metal. Then, as I was least expecting anything like dislodging, I was stunned when the entire passenger compartment snapped upwards. My head hit the roof when this happened.

This thing was opening its jaws!

The car lurched forward on its own. I couldn’t see a thing, the top of the hood angled upward as it was. The digital tachometer faded away and a diagram of my victim appeared in the soft glow of the green monochrome screen. A schematic of the vehicle, actually depicted as moving in real time, was labeled PHASE B HADEAN AVATAR, ALUMINUM/TITANIUM: CAN BE DAMAGED, CAN BE SORRY.

Even the steering wheel went rigid as it was locked on target. I rechecked the firmness of the connections of my seat belt. Abruptly the whole front of the car clamped down. It felt like a collision, and with the hood down again I could finally see. My car was taking a bite out of his car! It must have been something for him to see, my car opening its jaws and then chomping down.

So, O.K., how do I disengage? I wondered.

Enough was enough, and I didn’t want to miss my exit. The Piranha had other plans. Up I went again, down crashed the hood again. I was bouncing wildly as my car chattered its grille on its prey. I could hear the clanging of loose pieces of tailpipe and bumper knocking under my car as I rode over them. Up and down I repeatedly was jolted by the couple of tons of machinery that so valiantly defended me. The rumination ended as the car seemed to punch its delicacy away with a final blow not unlike spitting it out. The controls, that is, the steering and speed, were once again returned to my control. I saw the other car, the Hadean Avatar, run like hell, its tail end unable to be placed between its legs, because it was a horrible twisted mess of both shredded metal and dangling naked bulbs.

I pulled my car over to the shoulder and got out. I got soaked, but this wasn’t bothersome. I was surprised, and yes, proud to see that the ol’ Piranha had only lost a couple of teeth. I paused to reflect that it felt good, for once, to be the one doling out the beatings. I had left the motor running, because I didn’t want to take a chance on the car not re-starting. The Piranha seemed to share my pride, its running motor idling at varying speeds which gave it a growling sound.

I was back at fifty-five in no time, and a mile or so after the biting attack I took my exit. I passed the old cemeteries now—the really old ones. All of those little white houses sat unsinking on the reclaimed marsh that was New Orleans, because something as narrow as a buried casket had no chance of avoiding the eventual bobbing back up. They surrounded me as I slipped onward, now rolling down City Park Avenue toward my eventual destination of Esplanade.

The rain was finally letting up enough to put my windshield wipers on an intermittent setting. I thrilled at the chance to hold my Abby again.

About a mile or so later I was deep into City Park itself, knowing I must be crazy to be there by myself at such an hour. I pressed on. There were no boogeymen, or if there were, they respected my hungry vehicle. I was finally on Esplanade, moving slowly toward the river, the French Quarter coming up on my right, the lower French Quarter approaching on my left. The Roe-v-Wade Home for Unwed Mothers would be soon, I hoped. It was late and I was rattled, my eyes shifting right and left to catch a glimpse of that austere building’s facade of mail that enwombed its unwed mothers. As it turned out, I didn’t need such a keen eye, because the riot pointed the place out splendidly. It was on the other side of the street. I didn’t know what was going on, but it was wild.

There were hundreds of people, mostly women it seemed, jostling about with each other. There were police cars authenticating the incident, even paddy wagons. I made a U-turn at the end of the avenue, where Elysian Fields met it, crossed around the neutral ground, and approached the site by creeping along the street until the fighting got in my way. The Piranha lay perched at an angle determined by the crowd, not in any way subscribing properly to any correctly designated parking spaces.

I jumped out of the car to tell a non-pregnant woman that that was no way to treat someone who was. She was handling her rather roughly, and I hated to see it. I saw the blows these two were dishing out. And this brawl was not the only one. There were dozens going on. But this was the one that I could stop or so I thought.

“Ladies! Ladies! Stop! C’mon, break it up,” I shouted as I made the mistake of getting between them. They both grabbed me and threw me right into the on-coming policeman.

“Oomph!” he blurted at the time of my impact.

“Hey, watch it, fellah,” he said. I kept myself from falling by catching on to him. He helped me and then eased away as I caught my balance. I was somewhat beaten up myself and the policeman assumed my swelling and lumps were from the issues being entertained here.

“Look, you gotta stay out of it. These women’ll kill you.”

“Trouble here?” I asked.

The cop looked curiously at me. “Yea, well,” the policeman explained in good faith, “the union’s at it again.”

“Excuse me?” I asked.

We both backed up a little when the mob extended for a moment toward us, then retreated back like some hostile amoeba. The policeman was in black, with one of those bullet-proof vests on his chest. He wore a helmet that hosted several skulls on it to indicate how many times he had done something apparently extreme in the line of duty in this terrible place.

“The union,” he repeated. “The abortionists’ union.”

“I’m sorry, I don’t follow,” I admitted, only half-way paying attention as I spied every pregnancy I could for signs of Abby, all the while praying she was not in this free-for-all.

“The abortionists’ union,” he said again. Just then a pop bottle flew past both of us at head level. We ducked. “See this clinic right here next to the home?” he asked, pointing to the green single-story facility where we stood curbside.

“Yes,” I answered, still searching the faces.

“Well, that’s the abortion clinic here.”

“Right here?” I asked, temporarily halting my search. “They put it right here, right next to a home for unwed mothers? That’s a bit tacky, isn’t it?”

“Actually, Mister, you’ve got it backwards. They put the home right next to the clinic, and not the other way around.”

“Who did?” I asked him, as I was still confused. Another projectile went past. We ducked again.

“The abortionists’ union did,” he answered me.

“The abortionists’ union put up a home for unwed mothers?” Now I was really baffled.

“This is a movement of the last wave of ’em who went on strike about a year ago. You know, the abortion workers wanted more benefits, went on strike; the corporation fired them, hired scabs; you know the story. Typical union fare.”

“And?”

“And their plight became a national concern, then a shit-in-the-fan movement, and now if they all ain’t getting themselves pregnant just to make a statement.”

“Abortionists? Getting pregnant just to make a protest?” I was astounded.

“Oh, sure,” said the cop. “Right-to-lifers all the way. They know the clinics hate that shit with a passion.” He paused to regard the fighting, and then he spoke again. “It’s kind of beautiful in a way. If it weren’t for abortion, these babies that’re gonna be born of these ladies here would have never been.”

Somewhere, maybe even here, this might have made sense.

“So what’s all the fighting about? It sure makes it harder, 'cause I’m looking for someone who’s pregnant.”

“Then you came to the right place. This here’s the Roe-v-Wade Home for Unwed Mothers."

"Yea, yea, I got it."

"It was put up by the national chain owned by the sympathizers for the abortionists’ union. It’s the place they put you, right here next to the clinic, when you’re protesting. Of course, you gotta be knocked up. And ya gotta need to protest.”

“And that’s why the hostilities,” I surmised.

“Sure,” he agreed. “It’s great. We break up one of these things two or three times a month.”

“But it’s almost dawn. What time did they start this?”

“Are you kidding? This’s been going on for a couple days now. It’s a good one. What’s really great is when sometimes a couple of the abortionists’ll hijack one of the knocked-ups outside on the sidewalk and drag her fightin’ and screamin’ into the clinic. And they’ll say, ‘Whoops, accidentally aborted another one.’ It’s hilarious if ya stop to think about it.”

A bullet shattered the picture window of the clinic, the putty around the edges of the window still not having been razored away properly from the last installation. The policeman reflexly hit the dirt with the sound.

“Look out,” he warned as he stood back up, “it’s gettin’ pretty serious.” He stopped talking for a moment while he seemed to be looking for anyone with a gun. “And then sometimes,” he finally continued, “one of the clinic hopefuls’ll get kidnapped by the home and you never hear from her again.” He chuckled. “Not until you hear her in the beauty of natural childbirth. From up there.” He pointed up to the top of the home, three stories up, where towels were hanging out from an attic window to dry.

The pregnant girl in the fight closest to us finally retreated away from her opponent and toward us. She was bleeding on her knees from where she had been pushed down. In our protection, she sat on the cement, cursing the clinic in front of her.

“Excuse me,” I said to her.

“What!” she yelled.

“Uh, I’m looking for a pregnant lady named Abby.”

“Who are you calling a lady, you life support system for a scrotum.”

“Not you, that’s for sure,” I answered angrily.

“Oh, and I suppose we, as ‘ladies,’ have to live our lives as defined by you, huh?”

I could tell she was still a little upset by her fight. The policeman loved it. She continued her diatribe.

“You worthless gun barrel for that ‘contribution’ fired out of you. Look at me!” she sneered, referring to her enlarged abdomen. “This is true existence—that I can do this. Not you. You’re a ghost, mere fertilizer!” She seemed satisfied that she had made everything clear to me. I considered her “true existence.”

“Ah, yes,” I taunted, “but you still can’t do that without me.”

“Oh yes I can,” she beamed. And that’s when she stood up to slap me hard. I reacted before I could think; I pushed her.

“You want to be autodigested?” I threatened. Then the policeman slapped her back.

“Answer the man,” he commanded her. “Who’s that you’re looking for?” he asked me.

“Abby. Abby Bentley or Bartley or Brinkley or something like that. Or maybe even Ava or Ana.” I sure sounded stupid, and they both knew it.

“Yea,” she said as the cop held her elbow in that hurting way taught taught at police academies. “We have someone like that. She wasn’t even union, just a knock-up. She went to stay at her boyfriend’s apartment just this morning. She said she’d come back to us if the sonuvabitch ever showed up there again.” The pregnant girl eyed me up and down. “You’re him, aren’t you?” she asked, with some newly found respect. “You’re the sonuvabitch she hated.”

“Uh-oh,” murmured the officer.

He feared the mob that was moving our way. We backed up farther and farther until it was obvious they were stopping to encircle Ava’s Piranha. They began rocking it back and forth attempting to roll it into the front of the clinic. The clinic supporters, the scabs, considered protecting the building with themselves, to be ready to catch the car and rock it back. They reconsidered, however, and dismissed this plan, but not all at the same time, as several got themselves pinned by the vehicle. From under the car, lying on its side on bricks and glass and them, could be heard their shouts for help.

“Forget it!” shouted one of the pregnant women. “We just aborted you!”

“I love it,” shouted the policeman. And then to me, jab in my ribs included, “Women, who can figure ’em?”

It would be a twenty-minute jog to my apartment, to my Abby who was still carrying my child. I was thrilled, which distracted me from this whole insane episode. My movement was in leaps, in spite of how sore I was from my fight while out-of-body as well as between the women. I couldn’t believe I pushed that woman, I thought, as I rushed on. It was just a shove, but still I couldn’t believe I did it. Men hurting women—was I at home here? I cried.

Demoted to pedestrian status by the riot, I ran to my building. I sprinted down Decatur, crossed Canal Street, and was nearing Riverscape. I thought of the real Ava. She had been on her own, I figured, in her own mission to find her Ralph. I could feel her wishing me luck the way I wished her the same. Real me, real her...just the typical fare when sliding between alternate realities.

I continued my run. I ran faster than I’d have ever thought possible. Injured as I was from my hovering knock-down drag-out in my out-of-body experience earlier, my bruises haunted my jaunt. Before too long I had developed a definite limp, but I pressed ahead, driven by my desire for Abby, although I could have had some help from the internal combustion engine of a Piranha.

Finally...finally I reached my penthouse-turned-condo-turned-apartment-turned-tenement-turned-slum. The elevators, well...forget it. Although exhausted, I ran up the stairs, flight after flight. On a particular landing was a heap of human wretchedness that at one point in my travels had been Mr. Robinson, my neighbor. Father of a banker way back when, I last saw him as the homeless Mr. Robbins. Now he lay crumpled in handicaps, one-legged, apparently blind, speaking nonsense out loud to no one.

“Mr. Robbins,” I called to him, leaning over him with a hand on his shoulder. His beard was matted. His skin was yellow.

“Rubens. The name is Rubens,” he corrected.

“Of course. Mr. Rubens, you’re sick. Isn’t there anyone who can help you?” He smiled with his whiskered cheeks, seemingly enjoying the onset of a lucid interval.

“Just you, my boy, whoever you are,” he said, not joyful for a possible rescue, but panhandling.

I felt like someone who had run over a dog in the street while late for an important appointment. Should I stop and find the owner? Should I scoop up the poor thing and carry him to the vet? Should I just run him over again so he doesn’t suffer?

But this was deterring me from my mission. Why should this be my problem? Why should his impairments be my concern? I wasn’t the one with handicaps; I had my own life to live and my own problems to deal with.

I kept going.

Guilt? That was almost completely gone by the time I had reached my apartment. I tried the key, but it didn’t fit. I tried the knob and to my relief it turned, the door easing open.

The slow creak was an unwelcome announcement. As soon as I had enough of an opening, I stuck my head in as if it were the most unimportant part of my body.

It was my place, alright, even though it was different, as expected. I wondered about me, though, because the place didn’t look half bad. The plastic covers on the lamps were gone. The whole place had an art deco motif that could be considered either hideous or stylish, depending on this alternate world's most recent Southern Living issue. There were no lights on, but the dawn light filtered through windows throughout the layout.

I was home.

Kind of.

My universe was shrinking, and I would soon feel it's walls pressing against me. Alone, without Abby. Again--what you get when you travel like I had. My worlds were getting worse and worse. I wondered how many more I'd have to go through until I landed in one where God Himself didn't exist. Seemed like not so many more.