Someone Else's Life

by Lacey Ann Carrigan

  Chapter Seven

  Like they say with all pregnancies, nothing much happens for the first two months. A woman may not even show until after the third month. Suella kept her promise and drove Toni to all the OB appointments. She’d chosen a doctor who was oblivious to the way the embryo had been implanted in her. He was also oblivious to the fact that when the child was born, the doctors at the Lifewind Center would deliver her. Why had they done it this way? Toni asked “Isn’t he going to find it weird when we tell him we want someone else to deliver the baby?”

  Suella shrugged. “He’ll probably be happy for being off the hook for the liability for delivering her.” For the rest of that summer, Suella jetted back and forth between Cincinnati and Los Angeles. When she was at her home, she would go over to see Toni frequently. Thanks to Toni’s naturally round, generous figure, it took her friends and co-workers five months to notice Toni was pregnant. The next time Suella went to visit her, Toni answered the door holding a drink in a wineglass. Suella almost fell off the front stoop. “What are you doing?”

  “Relax,” Toni said. “It’s sparkling cider.”

  Autumn came and went without Nathan getting a chance to pitch in October. He last pitched in the World Series during the last season he played for New York. Both New York teams played in the series that year, and Nathan won one of the games. That was the year, though, that his tooth was still healing from the shenanigans around the time of the steroid deposition. “At least I get a vacation,” Nathan said, as he lay in a recliner. He was watching football during his first Saturday off since the previous Valentine’s Day.

  The baby would be born around Easter. It was the spring, a time of rebirth. Suella attended Lamaze classes with Toni and barked at her as a breathing coach.

  A man in the class noticed this and approached Suella after it was over. He smiled disingenuously and said “I take it that you wear the pants in your relationship?”

  Suella didn’t know what he meant at first. It only hit her when they both walked out to the car to drive home. As they sat at an intersection waiting for the light to change, she exclaimed “That guy thought we were gay?”

  Toni chuckled. “Oh, honey, you’re not my type.”

  They rode the rest of the way home in silence. When the holidays arrived, they invited Toni over for their Thanksgiving dinner. Suella raised her glass of sparkling apple cider (if Toni wasn’t allowed to drink, she reasoned, then neither should she). She said “I’m thankful for the miracle we’re all experiencing together.” They all raised their glasses along with her. Later, she made sure that Toni ate only one helping of turkey with the trimmings. She shouldn’t gain too much weight!

  . By Christmas, Toni started waddling. One of the times Suella visited her, she was entertaining three friends. All of them drank beer or cocktails, while Toni drank seven up. Two of them were smoking cigarettes, though. “Could both of you do me a little favor? Could you both smoke your cigarettes out on the balcony?” They both did as she requested, closing the sliding glass door behind them.

  Toni looked at Suella with a hint of fiery anger in her eyes. “Who do you think you are, ordering my friends around like that?”

  Suella instantly realized she should have told Toni first and given her the option to take care of it. “Second hand smoke. It’s not good for you, you know that, right?”

  Toni waved a hand dismissively at her. “If it was up to you I’d be in a glass case until Easter. Sometimes I’m sorry I ever even said I’d do this.”

  Horrified, Suella backpedaled and tried to smooth things over for Toni. “You’re delivering such a wonderful gift!” she said. “I just want to make everything’s right.

  But more important than that, I care about you.”

  Toni shrugged.

  The Christmas season was a blur of parties and get-togethers, with people laughing giddily and eating and drinking too much. Through all of the partying and all of the fun, Suella told herself that next year and all the years after that, she’d have a daughter with whom to share the holiday. On Christmas morning she went downstairs in her silk lounge pajamas and found their tall, full tree blinking lights and flashing tinsel. She’d lain presents for Nathan down there, and he’d set down a few for her as well. Together, they also wrapped presents for Toni.

  Suella sat in the recliner at the array of gifts nestled atop a snow-white, glittery blanket. She squinted, meditating, envisioning the Christmases yet to come, with her darling girl opening gifts with her small hands. Her eyes would be wide with wonder, her skin radiant on the bright winter morning as she reveled in the love of her mother through all the gifts beneath the tree.

  2017 arrived. It was the year her child would be born, the year she became a mother. She made sure that Toni stayed sober on the New Year’s Eve holiday by inviting her to spend it with her and Nathan at Carolyn’s house. Toni had found a wonderfully festive knit ensemble and was the most glamorous and fashionable pregnant woman Suella had ever seen. At one point she overheard a conversation between Toni, a young man and a young woman in a corner. “So who’s the father?”

  Suella leaped across the room and dived into the conversation before Toni had time to respond. She put her arm around Toni. “This wonderful, beautiful woman is carrying Nathan’s and my child. Isn’t that fantastic?”

  Their faces lit up with approval and admiration, as the girl said “That’s so kind and thoughtful of you!”

  “Thanks,” Toni told Suella a little bit later. “I’m not sure what I would have said to them.”

  To herself, Suella said “Yes, I know. That’s why I jumped in there and said what I did before you replied ‘I’m carrying Suella and Nathan’s kid. Suella had herself cloned.’” Outwardly she said “I’m just so proud and thankful for what is happening that I want to shout it from the rooftops.”

  A few weeks later, Nathan arrived home one night with a bang. He ran through the house shouting “Honey, you won’t believe it!”

  Suella, who’d been on her hands and knees cleaning, jumped up and asked “What is it?”

  “I guess I’m not an old, washed-up has-been after all! San Diego just traded for me! San Diego!” His enthusiasm was infectious. He and Suella jumped up and down together in the middle of the living room. She had always liked going there, since it was more mellow and newer than LA and now, it would become a second home. When they calmed down enough, Suella poured glasses of wine as Nathan dished out all the details of the deal. “They want me to be a left-hand specialist and set up man.”

  It was the role she had discussed with Carolyn that summer before. “You’re sure you won’t mind not starting?”

  “Nah. I’m over that. This is better. I’ve got a definite role, I can help out the young kids, and here’s the best thing: TEN MILLION FOR THREE YEARS!”

  “Oh, honey, that’s fantastic!” She cried again, over the good news.

  Everything was falling into place.

  The next morning, though, she suddenly remembered their condo in Cincinnati. “Aw, let’s sell it,” Nathan replied. “We don’t need that thing anymore.” A condo like theirs, atop Mt. Adams, would fetch a pretty penny. Yet, Suella suddenly thought of her artist friend, Jillian, and all the hours they’d enjoyed, in one stimulating conversation after another: art, spirituality, fashion, and on and on. She suddenly felt anxious over the prospect of giving that up.

  “Would you let me handle the details?” Suella asked. “I’ll fly there next week.”

  The next week, when the plane landed in Cincinnati and docked at the terminal, Suella called Jillian. The artist lady answered quickly, as she always did since she rarely left her studio. Suella envisioned her in a spotty smock speaking on her Lips phone or the Mr. Mr. Pizza. “Are you free?”

  Jillian replied “I was working, but I can take a break, yeah.”

  An hour later Suella parked her
car and walked down the hill to knock on Jillian’s door. Jillian had tied her hair back with a handkerchief and wore a work smocked splashed with errant dabs of paint over a pair of capris. After the two women hugged, Jillian said “So how’s the baby?”

  “She’s fine. Say, Jill, I have a fantastic offer for you.” She wanted to rent the condo out and pay Jillian to be a landlady. “It’ll help pay for your paint and paint brushes.” More importantly, though, it would give Suella a reason to keep coming to Cincinnati to see her friend. Their visits together had always calmed her down so much.

  “What do you think the pitcher is going to think about all of this?” Jill asked.

  Suella marveled, once again at how her friend could be so down to earth.

  Artists, after all, were supposed to be passionate and flighty. “He’ll be okay with it.”

  When she called him later to give him the news, Nathan was less than pleased. “Rent the condo? To any low-life that comes crawling down the street? No. Being a landlord sucks.”

  “Jillian will be the landlady,” Suella said, weakly.

  “That dyke artist?” Nathan tended to think of any woman who habitually dressed for comfort as a ‘dyke’ whether they showed the other behaviors or not. “She’s going to be to busy painting her little pictures to be much good as a landlady.”

  “No she won’t. Jillian’s a kind, sensible person. Can’t we rent it to one of the rookies on the team?”

  Nathan laughed. “A twenty-two year old with lots of money? And watch them trash the place? Ha! We should sell the place and have the money for when the baby comes.”

  This had forced Suella’s hand. “Okay, the reason why I want to rent it out instead of sell it is because I like to visit Cincinnati. It’s a fun getaway from all the hustle and bustle back home. And it’s nice in October, when the leaves change. Plus it’s fun to have tea with Jill.”

  “Well then, ask her if she wants to buy the condo. “

  “She couldn’t afford it,” Suella said. “I think she can barely afford the place she’s in now. That’s why I wanted to make her landlady. Help her out a little.”

  “Then sell it and give your friend a hundred bucks a week or something. Jeez, you make things so complicated.”

  Suella knew Nathan was right, but her spirits sank anyway.

  She’d been hoping to hold onto the condo and even use it when it was between renters. But you can’t have everything. The next morning she told Jillian the bad news, while they drank tea at her studio.

  Jillian smirked. “I knew he’d want to just sell it. He seems like a very black and white kind of guy.”

  Suella told her how she wanted to keep having their chit chat sessions over tea, that holding onto the condo would give her an excuse to do this. “I have a feeling that over the next few years, I’m going to need it.”

  Jillian squinted. “I’m a childless old maid. I don’t even have cats. What could I possibly add to a discussion about child rearing?”

  “You’re a good listener.”

  Later that day, Suella met with a realtor about putting the condo on the market. For dinner that night, she met with Julie, her best friend from among the wives on the team. “That’s so cool, I’m so happy for you,” Julie said, while they both munched on their salads.

  In addition to the news about Nathan’s trade, Suella longed to tell her tall friend about the even bigger news. So what if the lawyer told her that she shouldn’t? Would it open up a whole pandora’s box if someone else beside her, Nathan, Toni, Jillian and the employees at Lifewind knew about their child?

  She wouldn’t have been able to tell her secret anyway. Julie talked non-stop about her kids and their pets. All of the wives in the clubhouse were like that, Suella had realized long ago. They talked at each other, about their kid’s achievements, about what civic offices they held and how they’d shopped Rodeo on their last visit to LA. What would happen if Suella did tell Julie, and then one day she brought her little daughter to meet the moms and other little girls?

  She would be treated differently. Julie would make sure of it. As they polished off their cannelloni and followed up with dessert, Suella just sat back, listened, and smiled. Her friend would never know how close she came to learning something cataclysmic.

  By the next day, Suella finalized the details of putting the condo on the market and paid Jillian a visit. “You were right, she said. The pitcher didn’t go for it. Guess you won’t get to be a landlady.”

  Jillian breathed a sigh of relief. “I don’t think I could have done a good job for you, anyway.”

  Instead, Suella told herself that she would just stay with Jillian if she ever wanted to visit Cincinnati. Her place was nice, in a bohemian, austere kind of way.