Stolen Innocence - Lisa Pulitzer [146]
Not wanting to keep the news a total secret, I phoned Meg to tell her. I had been confiding in her about my relationship with Lamont, and now I squealed into my cell that I was pregnant. Meg was thrilled by the news, and then she told me that she was pregnant, too.
“Just leave, Lesie,” Meg instructed. “Leave and be happy with him. He’ll take care of you.”
I knew Meg was right. Ever since I’d decided that I wanted to be with Lamont, it was as if I’d been waiting for the right moment, the right reason, to present itself. Now I was pregnant with his baby; if this wasn’t the right moment, then there probably would not be one.
Lamont called my cell phone that day and said that he had something to give me for my birthday. I wanted to see him so badly, but I was a little nervous too. I knew that I would have to tell him about the pregnancy, but I didn’t want to scare him off. I was scared myself. This was a big step, and despite my excitement, I worried how it would affect our lives. This would be the first true test of our commitment to each other. When my shift ended, I hurriedly drove out to meet him at T.R.’s house.
I walked into his room, and Lamont greeted me with a single, red rose, an embrace, and a kiss. I was nervous, wondering if he somehow suspected the pregnancy. As if the flowers weren’t romantic enough, he walked across the room to put on some soft music for us. Then he came back over to me, kneeling down on one knee.
At first, I didn’t understand what was happening. “Why are you on your knee?” I asked, laughing a little bit at his silly pose. In the FLDS there is no such thing as an engagement or a proposal, and there never has been. This romantic tradition was something I had only encountered in the handful of movies and television shows I’d seen. I felt my heart beating faster as Lamont slowly pulled a ring from his pocket.
“You don’t have to answer right now,” he said cautiously. “But I want you to know that even if the whole world chases us away, I love you and nothing is going to change that.”
I placed my hand in his and allowed him to put the beautiful ring on my finger. It had belonged to his mother, which made it all the more special.
“I have news for you,” I said, smiling between kisses.
“Oh?” he said, still laughing with the joy of the moment.
“Um…I’m pregnant,” I said, hoping that he would be as thrilled as I was. I’d been betrayed so many times by the men in my life. And while I believed that Lamont was different, I still worried that this very serious situation might scare him off. “We’re going to have a baby.”
Lamont’s laughter subsided. “Say that again.”
“I’m pregnant,” I repeated.
The confusion in his face turned into a big grin. Lamont had been dreaming of becoming a father for years. Everything about the moment felt right, and in my mind I was completely ready to rid myself of the church, Warren, and Allen. Despite his happiness, I could see Lamont was also concerned about me. He knew my history with pregnancies, and we both knew what it would mean to leave the FLDS for real. It always would have been difficult, but now it would be necessary. It was time for me to stop talking about leaving and actually do it.
CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR
CHOOSING MY FUTURE
An apostate from this Work is the most dark person on earth.
—WARREN JEFFS
For the next several months I struggled with my inevitable decision to leave. I knew I couldn’t ride the fence and have a foot in both worlds. Eventually I would have to make that leap, but until that point, I could