by Megan Walker
The last thing my wife needs is Dana’s particular brand of heavy-handed “advice.”
But formula-versus-breast debates aside, I like that I can be part of the feeding, too.
I walk into Rachel’s room, which used to be Ty’s room. We convinced Ty he was mature enough to move down to the guest bedroom that I was theoretically staying in—though barely ever actually stepped foot in—during the time when I first moved in and Alec was sleeping in a bedroom made out of Jenna’s closet.
I think of those days, sometimes, and especially the ones right before. When I came over and played games with Jenna and Ty and read to him before bed, and all I wanted in the world was to fit in to this family, to live in this house with and be part of them.
The reality of that is better than I could ever have imagined. Especially with Alec no longer in our closet.
Rachel is fussing and kicking in her crib, free of the burritowrap blanket that neither Jenna or I can ever seem to get tight enough.
“Hey, little girl,” I say softly, picking her up. She wails loudly at first, but then settles a bit in my arms, staring up at me with those big eyes of hers. I give her the bottle and she does more pushing it around with her tongue than eating, with an expression of perplexity that makes me laugh.
It hits me all over again how deeply I love her. I had been worried, on some level, that it would take more time for me to love her the way I do Ty, which was pretty instant. No matter the way we came to be a family, I was his dad and he was my son, and though he knew it first, I wasn’t far behind. It was hard to believe I could feel that kind of connection so quickly with a baby, even one with half my genes.
But there in the hospital, holding my little girl—lightly touching her full head of fine dark hair, letting her tiny hand grip my finger—I knew it just as deeply as when I knew about Ty. This is my kid. Rachel Gabriella Mays, named after Jenna’s sister and mine. A part of me, forever.
“It doesn’t mean I don’t wish my kid would sleep a little more,” I say with a smile. “Take it easy on your mom, okay?”
Rachel starts eating, and after a few minutes of walking her around the room, her eyes get droopy again, and I very, very carefully set her in her crib and pull my arms out from under her.
I creep back out of the room and head to the kitchen, where Jenna scrubs at a soapy pan. “Your food probably needs to be nuked again,” she says. She’s not looking at me, and I can’t tell if her knuckles are white from gripping the pan so hard, or if the soap just makes them look that way.
But I know what I saw on her face the moment Rachel started crying again—this kind of defeated exhaustion. Which has to be normal with a new baby in the house. Even Dana, who from what I’ve understood pretty much runs the chemical engineering company she works for and barely breaks a sweat, had a tough time with Ephraim in the months after he was born. It’s the only time I’ve ever seen Dana break down.
The problem is, I don’t know how much Jenna gets it. It’s worried me ever since she started talking about how having a baby would finally give her the chance to have all those moments of being a mom to a newborn that she missed out on with Ty—and still somewhat blames herself for.
I understand where she’s coming from. I’m eager to experience the parts of fatherhood I missed out on, too. Getting to be there from the very beginning, witnessing all the firsts—words, steps, all of it. But the way she talked about it, it was like she was going to be experiencing these moments in soft-focus, like in a Hallmark movie. My wife is far from naive, and has been an incredible parent to Ty for many years now, so I know she doesn’t really think there won’t be some difficulties.
But I still worry she’s putting too much pressure on herself.
“You know,” I say, as if I haven’t already suggested this about a dozen times before. “We could get someone in here to help with Rachel, even if just for a few hours. Especially now that I’m gone during the day. Your parents have offered, and I’m sure—”
“Felix,” she says, and those gray eyes of hers lock onto mine. “I don’t need someone to help. I can do this.” She scrubs harder at a crusty plate.
“I’m not saying you can’t, I just—”
“I can handle our baby, even if she’s not taking it easy on me.”
I blink. She must have heard what I said to Rachel over the monitor. Did that hurt her somehow?
Her expression softens and she sets the dish down. “Sorry. I know you were just—” She pauses. “I’m tired, yeah. But so are you.” Her lips tug up at a smile. “That’s the way it goes, right? “Really, I’m doing fine. But if it gets too hard, I’ll call my mom over to help, okay?”
I don’t think I can push it anymore, at least not tonight, without making it seem like I doubt her abilities. “Okay.”
She beams back at me, and tips up on her toes to kiss me, which I’m never going to refuse, even if I’m still worried about her.
“Dad?” Ty calls from the table. “Can you guys stop kissing and help me with my science experiment?”
Jenna smiles against my lips. “This one’s all yours. Plus, I’ve got a pie to take out of the oven.”
She does so, and I bring my plate over the table, not bothering to reheat it again, because chances are something will come up that will necessitate a third time, and I’m too hungry to care if it’s lukewarm.
Ty scrolls through a list of ideas on the iPad, describing in detail his reasons for rejecting each and every one.
“None of these speak to me,” he says in that perfectly serious, way-too-mature-for-his-age way of his.
“Yeah, well, unless you build a talking robot, it’s not likely to,” I say wryly.
Ty gives me a look that says he knows I’m not taking his dilemma seriously.
“Sorry, kid. You have musician parents, not scientists. I think you’re the lone great scientific mind of this family.”
That seems to mollify him. “So what did you do for your project?”
I think back. I’ve probably done a half-dozen science projects from when I was his age, since entering the science fair every year possible was a requirement in my family.
It didn’t mean I needed to actually do a great project, though.
I smile. “Well, my favorite one was a bunch of experiments I did on Twinkies.”
Ty’s eyes widen. “Twinkies? What kind of experiments?”
“Some things I saw on a website—like dropping them from high heights, putting one in water, setting one on fire . . . Pretty much seeing what destroys them, and how. It was fun, and even my parents were impressed by my post-experiment write-up. Even if Dana tried to convince them it wasn’t rigorous enough.”
Ty’s eyes have lit up, and I think he’s too busy coming up with his own Twinkie experiment ideas to have caught that last part about the lack of scientific rigor. “What do you think, Mom?” he asks, nearly bouncing out of his seat.
“Well, I’m never going to argue against dessert-related school assignments,” she says. “But if you’re blowing them up, you’re doing it outside, because I’m not cleaning Twinkie guts off our ceiling fans.”
At least she draws the line somewhere.
“I think we can agree to that,” I say. “What do you think, Ty?”
Ty grins. “We need to go buy Twinkies. Lots of them.”
And though the last thing I want to do is go back out tonight, this feels like a worthy goal. And I don’t want Jenna to feel like she has to do it tomorrow. “Twinkies it is, kid. After I eat.”
I only realize after we get back and Jenna’s already asleep that I never got the chance to tell her about my day, and didn’t really get to hear much about hers. I curl up next to her in bed, and even in her sleep she cuddles up to me, which feels so good, and I doze off myself—halfway through a little prayer that we get to stay that way for longer than a couple of hours
.
Four
Josh
After I drop Anna-Marie off at work the next day for her early call time, I find a text from my best friend, Ben. Any chance you could meet me for breakfast?
Sure, I text back. I was going to head to the gym before work—and I’ll still need to hit the gym for a shower—but it’s been a while since Ben and I got together, just the two of us, so it’s worth it.
When I walk into the Starbucks he wanted to meet at and order a coffee, Ben is already sitting at a table in the corner. He’s ordered a Danish and a coffee of his own, and he’s staring down at it like it’s offended him.
I’m guessing this morning’s breakfast is not just a social visit.
“You okay?” I ask as I sit down. But he’s clearly not. Ben normally dresses pretty casually, even for work—I don’t think the guy even owns a suit—but today he’s wearing an old stained t-shirt and sweatpants, and he has dark circles under his eyes.
Ben shakes his head. “Wyatt and I are separating.”
“What?” I pause with my coffee still in my hand, staring at him.
“We’re separating,” he says again.
I heard him the first time, but it doesn’t make any more sense the second. Ben and his husband Wyatt are one of those ridiculously happy couples, the ones who love each other unconditionally, who are still adorable even after years of marriage. I knew they’d had some fights lately, and I remember things being tense once or twice when I went over for game nights, but— “What?”
“Wyatt asked me to move out,” Ben says. “I’ve got my stuff in my car.”
He’s avoiding looking at me, and I don’t know if it’s because he’s in so much pain, or because he’s been hiding crap from me and he doesn’t want to face it. I’m guessing it’s both.
“What happened?”
Ben runs a hand through his already-mussed blond hair. “Look, I feel like an asshole for not telling you about it. But every time I thought about talking about it, I felt like an even bigger asshole because of everything you and Anna-Marie are going through.”
Shit. I’ve been so wrapped up in my problems that I completely missed this. It’s no surprise to Ben what a diva I can be, but seriously?
“I’m so sorry,” I say. “I never meant for you to feel like you couldn’t talk to me.”
He shrugs. “It’s not you. It’s just the situation, I guess. Things have been bad between me and Wyatt for a while.”
I take a sip of my coffee. “How long?”
“Maybe six months?” Ben says. “And quit blaming yourself. It’s me who didn’t talk about it.”
I barely hear this. I’m too busy thinking about Ben’s relationship struggling for six months and him not feeling like he could talk to me about it.
“Tell me about it now?” I ask.
“Yeah,” Ben says. “That’s why I asked you to meet me. Thing is, Wyatt is dead set on having a baby.”
I nod. I knew this—Wyatt has always wanted kids, but he’s gotten more enthusiastic about it lately. I feel bad for them that their options are even more limited than mine and Anna-Marie’s. “And how do you feel about that?”
Ben stares at his Danish again, sitting untouched on his plate. “I always thought I would want to, you know? I knew back when we were just dating that Wyatt wanted kids, and I thought, ‘Sure, someday.’”
“And you don’t want to now?”
“I don’t.” He looks up at me. “I’m sorry, I know this is a super insensitive thing for me to say after the way the last couple years have been for you.”
“No, it’s fine. I mean, obviously Anna-Marie and I want kids, but it’s kind of awful to think about people having them who don’t want them. I don’t blame you for that.” I pause. “But I’m guessing Wyatt doesn’t feel the same?”
“Kind of,” Ben says. “I think he gets it, on some level. But he also thinks I’m being selfish. Which I am, right? I like our lives the way they are, and I don’t want them to change. I love it being just us, and when I think about having a baby—I don’t know. I used to think I’d want it someday, but now I think maybe having kids of my own just isn’t something I want.”
“And Wyatt still does.”
“Yeah. Like, desperately. And I don’t think he can help that any more than I can help not wanting it, but it just sucks, you know?”
I nod. That does sound like a bad situation, but— “You guys are going to work it out though, right?”
Ben sighs and leans his elbows on the table. “I’m not sure we can. He can’t change how he feels, and I can’t either. We’ve had this argument so many times that neither of us have the energy for it anymore. And last night we went the rounds about it again and then Wyatt said he couldn’t believe I could be so selfish, and maybe we should split up.” His voice breaks the tiniest bit, and he clears his throat. “So I packed my stuff, and this morning I left.”
Oh, god. They both must be in so much pain.
“I know,” Ben says. “I’m not the good guy here. I don’t blame you if you side with Wyatt.”
He says this, but I know he would be on mine, no matter what. “I’m always on your side. But Wyatt is my friend, too. It’s not like I’m going to start hating him.”
“And you shouldn’t. This is my fault.”
“I don’t see how it can be,” I say. “When you just said you can’t change how you feel.”
“Yeah, well,” Ben says. “Wyatt doesn’t see it that way.”
“And you think he’s right?”
“You should see how Wyatt is about this. I’ve never seen him so desperate for anything.”
I see why Ben didn’t talk to me about this. I might know a little too much about how Wyatt feels.
“Have you thought about going to talk to someone? Like, couples counseling?” Anna-Marie has done a lot of therapy to work through her issues with her dad, and she and I have gone a fair amount as well. We’ve never been to the brink like this, and I think that’s at least partly due to the skills we’ve both learned in therapy.
Ben shrugs. “I don’t know that it would help. I’m standing between him and this thing he can’t live without. But god, I always thought I was that thing.”
Oh. I can see how easy it would be to feel that way, if Anna-Marie and I weren’t equally hurt by the fact that we may never be able to have kids. “You feel like you’re not enough for him.”
Ben holds up his hands. “Clearly I’m not. And I don’t really want to sit in some counselor’s office and talk about it.” He rolls his eyes. “I know that’s not fair. But I also think it’s kind of shitty for him to do this to me, you know? We always said we’d have kids someday, but I didn’t know it was a deal breaker.”
I nod. “Probably neither did he.”
Ben folds his arms and leans back in his chair. I can see why this hurts him. Ben’s parents lived down the street from mine, but he basically grew up at my house, because they were hardly ever home. He had nannies when he was little, but by the time he was school age he was coming home to an empty house—which meant he spent every afternoon with me. I remember his mom figuring out what was happening and offering to pay my mom to watch him, and my mom telling my dad that Ben was like her son. “I don’t get paid to feed the rest of them an after-school snack,” she said. “I don’t think I need to be paid for Benjamin, either.”
Even as a kid, I remember Ben feeling abandoned by his parents. I always made an effort to make sure he knew that we wanted him around. It’s been so many years since I had to think about that, but I know it’s still a thing. If Ben doesn’t feel like a priority to the people he loves, he starts to withdraw.
I wonder if that’s part of why he hasn’t been talking to me.
“Have you told him?” I ask. “That you feel like you’re not enough?”
“No,” Ben says, his v
oice bleak. “But every conversation we have now devolves into him begging me not to be a selfish bastard, and me hurting him over and over again.”
“Maybe you need to tell him how you really feel,” I say.
“I don’t see what it’s going to help.”
“I know. But in my experience, holding back is the worst thing you can do for a relationship.”
That eats at me. Even with our therapy skills, I’ve been holding back over the last year, and so has Anna-Marie. Truth is, I feel like we’ve had to, each of us, just to survive. And yeah, we’re being more open now, but that openness is painful, rather than pain-relieving.
I wish I knew how to fix our problems and how to fix Ben’s, but I know this much. “You have to talk to him. You still love him, right?”
“Of course I do,” Ben says. “I just don’t know that I can live with knowing that he loves the idea of having a baby more than he loves me.”
I stare at him. Ben and Wyatt have always been the paragon of a married couple, the image of the kind of marriage I wanted. “You can’t just give up.”
“I don’t know,” Ben says. “I don’t have any idea how to fix it.”
“But you have to try, right? It’s Wyatt.”
I can tell this strikes a chord. “I just don’t think we’re going to be able to work this one out,” he says. “But yeah. We’ll have to talk. We haven’t worked out the details of anything besides me moving out of the house.”
Wyatt must be going nuts. I wonder if he even wanted Ben to move out, or if he just wants Ben to change his mind. This would be a manipulative way to accomplish that, but I know what desperation feels like, and Wyatt has always been impulsive.
But I also understand Ben’s need to prepare for the worst.
“Where are you going to stay?” I ask.