Death Trap by M. William Phelps

at the Gulf Coast from the center of Alabama—a teenager, driving the entire way, scouting out the family van, just to see a guy she had just met.
    Alan felt a pang of intimacy. Maybe even love. He was special. At least in Jessica’s eyes.
    “It was shocking to him more than anything that she could just . . . that she had this freedom (as a teenager) to just do whatever she wanted,” Kevin said later.
    Had Jessica’s parents allowed her to travel all that way? She was sixteen. Out and about, running around the South.
    Chasing a boy.

    When Alan and his family returned from vacation, school was just about ready to begin. Alan and Jessica had some fun. The summer was filled with memories, but Alan wanted to refocus his attention on school. His future. College.
    “They were on the verge of breaking up,” one friend remembered later. “They weren’t really dating at this time.”
    But Jessica wasn’t going to let Alan get away. Not a chance. He was too good a catch.
    It was here that Jessica and Alan’s relationship took flight—that is, after Jessica went to Alan with the news of being pregnant. They were on the brink of a breakup, and Jessica just happened to get pregnant. Was it even Alan’s child?
    Soon after, Alan became more and more withdrawn from his family. He had always been a child—like his brothers—who felt comfortable going to his mother and father with the adolescent problems beleaguering most teens. They were a close-knit family. Philip Bates liked to tell his kids that any problem could be worked out: “Just come to us with it.”
    Be not afraid.
    “We’ll help you through anything.”
    As the fall came and school commenced, Philip noticed that the space between Alan and his family grew. Alan was clearly distracted. Something weighed heavily on the boy’s mind. What’s bothering him ? Philip and Joan Bates, and even eleven-year-old Kevin, often wondered. They’d watch Alan walk about the house, his head drooped, shoulders slumped. They could tell his mind was buzzing with an obvious problem he was trying to solve alone. Alan had never been like this.
    Joan encouraged Philip to talk to his son. Ask him what was going on.
    But Alan said nothing. He was fine. He could work it out on his own.
    The Bateses respected their son. What else could they do? Trust was an important family value in the Bates household. Alan would speak up when he felt comfortable. No need to push the boy.
    “Something was upsetting him,” Kevin Bates recalled, “and [my parents] kept trying to talk to him about it. But didn’t get far.”
    On the other end of all this, Alan was likely feeling pressure from Jessica. There was no way she was going to abort this child, she had told several of her friends. Alan was going to have to stand up, be a man and take responsibility.
    Alan needed his own time to process what it was that was consuming any serenity and confidence the kid had built up during his preceding years. Alan was a senior, heading into the year he had looked forward to since he was a freshman. It wasn’t nerves about graduation and college and beginning life as an adult. Although that all probably added to Alan’s sudden change. But there was more. Kevin, Philip and Joan were sure of it. Alan hadn’t even put in his nomination for class president. He was backing off his music. All of this was so unlike him.
    Alan made a decision to tell everyone. But he wasn’t going to sit down and explain to his mother and father what had happened. So he wrote “a nice long letter” and left it for them on his dad’s desk.
    Picking it up and reading, Philip knew he had raised a responsible son. A boy who cared about others. Could he argue with that? Could he be angry at the boy for wanting to do the right thing?
    Despite the uphill battle and obstacles Philip knew Alan now faced, he was proud his boy had decided to handle it like a man.
    “It was a very apologetic letter,” Kevin Bates later commented. “Alan was