by Rea Frey
“Why can’t you just tell me over the phone?” she demands. She cradles the receiver against her ear as she shuffles through DVDs in the living room.
“I want to do it in person.”
Luca begs to watch Harry Potter in the background, and Mason says he will watch too. She has to be selective about what movies she chooses. Luca has already mourned the loss of the silly, loud, over-the-top movies they used to watch together. Now, they have Mason’s requests to consider, and they come with a slew of prerequisites: no egregious violence, no slapstick comedy, no romance, no superheroes.
Grace tells Noah to hold on while she loads the DVD and walks to the mailbox once the boys are situated on the couch. She gathers her mail and waves to Nancy, her neighbor, who is wrangling her Lab, Bailey, for an afternoon walk. “Then that’s fine, I guess.” She’s trying to be nicer to him, but it feels like a betrayal. There’s been so much deceit, so many lies, so many convoluted versions of the truth.
She looks up at the trees whose leaves stutter and tilt. A breeze tickles her neck and shoulders. Months from now, the leaves will detach from their stems, gathering in colorful clumps at the edge of everyone’s yards. Once fall is in full effect—her favorite season—she will let the boys rake for allowance and then separate the piles into color values. Mason will get a kick out of that. She flips through the mail and tosses a few catalogues and credit card offers into the recycling bin at the side of the house. “I’m assuming you’re on your way?”
“Yes.”
She sorts through a few pieces of Lee’s mail that have been forwarded. Should she just trash them? Save them? She lifts her head as a FedEx truck screeches by, and Nancy yells at him to slow down.
“It’s a neighborhood. There are kids here. Am I right?” Nancy shakes her head, yanks Bailey to the edge of her driveway, and lifts her hand as they set off in the opposite direction. Grace waves back and returns her attention to the phone call.
“Pulling up now,” Noah says.
On cue, he revs into the driveway, comes to an abrupt stop, and hops out of the car. His hand is wrapped around something small. What is that? Grace’s heart begins to pound.
“Hi.” He looks as nervous as she feels.
“Hi,” she says back. They haven’t seen each other all week, and the shock of him, standing in her driveway, takes her off guard.
“What’s in your hand?” she asks.
He looks down and hesitates.
“Noah? What is it?”
He finally looks up. “I had this whole idea planned. I was going to take you out somewhere romantic, or maybe get the boys to help. But I couldn’t wait. I couldn’t wait another second.”
The words register, but don’t click. “For what?”
Suddenly, Noah is down on one knee with a blue velvet box. “Grace Vanessa Childress, love of my life. I never knew what that word meant before I met you. I never knew what family or sacrifice was. I have never been more certain of where I want my life to go or who I want to spend it with. Would you do me the honor of becoming my wife?”
Grace presses a hand to her chest and tries to concentrate on the words as the beautiful diamond winks at her beneath the sun. The timeline of their relationship unfurls. It hasn’t been long enough yet, has it? She looks at him, uncertain. “Are you doing this just because of the baby?”
He falters, still on one knee. “Of course not. I love you, Grace. Will you marry me?”
Visions of Chad’s proposal float back to her mind. How in love she felt. How romantic his proposal was. How she thought everything would work out. No, she’s not ready for that again. She’s no longer an impressionable twentysomething. She’s almost forty-three years old. Life is not a fairy tale.
She pulls him up off his knee and stares into his hopeful face. “Noah, this is so thoughtful, and I appreciate it, but no.” She shakes her head. “I’m not ready for marriage. Not yet.” Maybe not ever.
His face crumples, and he closes the box. He clenches it in his palm and shakes his head. “Oh.” He pockets the ring and finally looks at her. Tears brim, and he embarrassingly presses both palms to soak up the impending tears. He paces away a few steps, turns, paces back. “Is this about Shirley? Do you still not believe me?”
“I’m still working through it.”
He sighs, and she sense his frustration. “Regardless of what happened in the past, we’ve got our own family to worry about, right? Can we please just find a way to move forward? We don’t have to get married. I’m fine with that.”
The desperation clings to every syllable, but she ignores it. She already told him she needs time. Why is he pushing? She’s got so many other things to think about than his wounded ego. “I don’t know. I really don’t.” She turns and leaves the door open for him to follow. Luca says something in the living room. Mason responds, and both boys laugh. Despite the situation, the confusion, the trauma, and the shock, Grace smiles at their easy banter.
No one will ever know the entire truth. She knows that now. About the party. About what Lee said versus what Noah said. But Mason is the important one in all of this. He’s safe. He’s thriving. He is adjusting to a life without his mother and without a father. He’s let go of his old house—after a torturous process—and is forming friendships slowly but authentically.
She washes her hands and then dumps popcorn into two mixing bowls and sprinkles them with sea salt and Parmesan. Noah stands at the edge of her kitchen and waits. She hands the boys their snacks, and they mumble their thanks. She kisses Luca on the head and wrinkles her nose at the slightly sour smell of his unwashed hair. Definitely a shower tonight.
“Can I get you boys anything else?”
“I would like some water with three ice cubes, please, madam,” Mason says.
“Right away, sir.” She bows in his direction. She loves their playful exchanges. In the kitchen, she presses his favorite glass against the ice dispenser and waits for three cubes to tumble out. She brings Mason his water and then reenters the kitchen. She opens the refrigerator, pulls out a bottle of white wine, and deliberately pours herself a glass.
“What are you doing?” Noah’s tone is sharp as she takes a sip.
“I’m having a drink.” She lifts the glass in an invisible toast. “Women in Europe drink while they’re pregnant. One glass of wine isn’t going to hurt.”
Before he can protest, she joins the boys and settles into the armchair. The chilled wine slips down her throat.
She thinks of Lee, as she does at least a few times a day. Her friend has literally taken her secrets to the grave. She can’t torture herself with one more puzzle she can’t solve. She has to focus on what is here, on moving forward, on her role as a parent.
She watches the boys, coexisting on her couch. Luca has become more compassionate, and Mason has become more social. It is all working out in its weird little way, despite what has happened. Despite losing Lee. Despite the secrets. They are all doing the best they can, given the hand they’ve been dealt and the partial truths she clings to.
After a few minutes, the side door opens and shuts. His engine revs as he backs swiftly out of her drive. At first, she’s offended. He doesn’t even want to say good-bye to the boys? But then she realizes she doesn’t want him here, that this is better. He needs time to come to terms with where they are. And so does she.
She does not miss him when he goes.
56
noah
Noah paces his apartment. He’s gone through his roster of friends, but he doesn’t feel like talking to anyone. He needs a drink. He needs a punching bag. He’s on the verge of detonating.
Noah changes into running clothes and laces his shoes. He steps outside, turns left down Twelfth Avenue South, and jogs toward the park. Grace turned him down.
She doesn’t want to marry me.
He grinds his teeth and picks up his pace as his quads burn and his lungs ignite. Grace hadn’t even cared that he left. She hadn’t said good-bye. She was cold, and
he isn’t sure how to snap her out of it.
He needs to give her space, but they have a family to think about. She’s even gone to a doctor’s appointment without him, and the betrayal is like a punch to the face. Regardless of what is going on with her apprehension, Grace is still carrying his child. He has as much a right to be there as she does.
He knows he can’t push Grace, that she will back away even more if he tries too hard. But the need is heavy. He wants to fix this. He wants to fix them.
He turns toward Sevier Park and decides to do some hill sprints. The humidity is high, and sweat pours off of him like it’s the middle of summer.
He doesn’t know how everything got so fucked up, but he’s going to figure it out. He’s one of the good ones, not a man who takes advantage of women. He loves Grace. He loves Luca and Mason and their life together.
That’s worth fighting for.
He cranks his phone to a different song and makes sure his wireless earbuds are in place. He stretches at the bottom of the hill and then races to the top, his arms scissoring, his body contracted with effort. He makes it to the top and jogs back down. He flies up the hill again and again in an attempt to clear his mind. With every sprint, he goes faster and harder. His lungs wheeze, but he keeps going. Who cares if his heart stops? Who would even miss him?
He finally stops on his tenth sprint and attempts to suck in clean air. He paces back and forth with his hands tented on top of his head. His entire body shudders until everything begins to normalize and come into focus.
He needs to get it together and stop feeling sorry for himself. He has a family to think about now. His family.
He walks back to his condo. He pushes that glass of wine from his mind. She just did that to bother him. He thinks about her resistance, how she’s still so hung up on that party and this version of he-said she-said that he’s suddenly a part of. He wishes he had a way to prove what happened that night. That he didn’t hurt Shirley. That she’d come on to him.
He has no proof. He just has to trust that their bond is strong enough to get through this. They love each other. They love the boys.
Eventually, Grace will come to her senses.
past
57
lee
Lee stood in the dirty bathroom stall with the box in her hand. She’d swiped the test without paying for it.
“Hurry up,” Shirley demanded.
It had been five months since the party, but everything was different. Shirley had all but abandoned her career. She never went out. She was moody. It was like her wild, vivacious friend had been replaced with a shut-in. Was Lee entirely to blame?
She’d bullied her at the party. She’d let her sleep with a stranger and hadn’t done anything to stop it. Since then, Lee had asked countless times if Shirley remembered anything about the guy, about those awful words he said, but she swore she didn’t.
Lee wasn’t convinced. Every time she came home from work, Shirley was whispering on the phone to someone in a heated debate and then would end the call in tears. She refused to tell Lee who she was talking to. She didn’t tell her anything anymore. She’d never known how two friends could go from being so close to so distant, but she was trying to fix what was broken between them.
Lee held the pregnancy test in her hand and flipped the box around to study the back. She unwrapped the loud plastic and wadded it into a ball. Shirley ditched the directions and removed the cap before slipping the plastic between her legs.
“Not my first rodeo,” she muttered.
Lee had never taken a pregnancy test. She’d barely had enough sex to even know how to take a pregnancy test. She watched Shirley hover over the seat, wondering how many women, girls even, had done just this very thing, shocked and unraveled by something as small as a plus or negative sign.
Shirley replaced the cap and wiped her fingers on her jeans. She left the stall and washed her hands.
“You look. I can’t.”
Lee plucked the test from the corner of the sink.
“Don’t shake it, or it won’t work right.”
“I’m not shaking it. I’m holding it.” She watched the test obsessively, wondering what would happen if Shirley was pregnant with her father’s baby. She couldn’t calculate all the ways that would change their lives, all the ways it would tie Shirley to their family forever. She’d known Shirley long enough to know that she didn’t do well with crises or surprises.
In the past five months, the initial shock of Shirley dating Harold had worn off. What she thought was a brief fling had turned into an actual relationship, and she knew that it would reach its natural conclusion in its own time. The more she fought against it, the more Shirley would want to stay. So she acted like she didn’t care and just waited until it would all fall apart on its own.
Finally, after counting to one hundred and eighty, Lee looked at the test again, and there it was. The word positive was digitized in the small, gray window, a word that meant the opposite of what it should.
She showed the test to Shirley.
“Shit.” She closed her eyes, took a settling breath, and leaned against the sink. “I can’t believe this.”
“Did you suspect anything?”
Shirley shrugged. “Kind of. But I just didn’t want to believe it.”
“Is it…?” My father’s baby. That’s what she wanted to know. If she was about to become a sister.
“Who else’s would it be?” Shirley asked.
Lee looked at her, eyebrows cocked. “The guy from the party? He … you know. Inside you.”
“No, no way.” Shirley dropped the test into the trash can. “That was five months ago. I’d know if I was five months pregnant, right?” She gauged herself in the mirror and placed her palms on her stomach.
“I have no idea. You know you hear about those women who don’t know they’re pregnant until they’re giving birth, so…”
Shirley pushed her arm playfully. “Stop. I’m not one of those women.”
Lee studied both of their reflections. “I know you’re not. But since the party, you’ve pulled away so much that I don’t know what to think.”
Shirley’s eyes locked with Lee’s in the mirror. “I know. I’m sorry. I’m just so pissed that I drank at the party, that you started drinking because of me and Harold. It’s all such a mess.”
Lee hadn’t thought about it like that. That night had not only been unpleasant for her best friend—it had caused a relapse and a horrible new habit for her too. What could she say? That it wasn’t Shirley’s fault? It was, to some degree. She never would have started drinking if she hadn’t learned about her dating Harold. Maybe she was more like her dad than she wanted to admit. Maybe becoming an alcoholic was inevitable.
“Let’s not worry about any of that. Should we take you to the doctor or something?”
Shirley dropped her hands from her stomach. “No.”
“No?”
“No.” She turned to Lee. “I can’t have a baby. Look at me. I’m in no position to be anyone’s mother.”
“So what does that mean?”
“It means I’m not keeping it.” She exited the bathroom before Lee could even collect herself.
This wasn’t the Shirley she knew. The Shirley she knew wanted to be a wife and mother someday. She wanted some version of the American dream: husband, house, career, kids. So why did she keep sabotaging herself?
Lee whipped out her phone and searched for an abortion clinic or Planned Parenthood in the area and found one not far from Walgreens. She punched in the directions. Shirley wouldn’t actually abort a baby … would she? She probably just wanted to know her options.
In the parking lot, Shirley waited to get into the car. Lee drove them the short distance to the clinic and grabbed a tissue from her purse to wax each tooth, hearing the squeak of Kleenex against her enamel.
“What are you doing?”
“My teeth are purple. From wine.” While Shirley had been sober since the party, Lee
had been drinking nonstop. Because Shirley kept her distance, Lee had been staying in with her new friend, Cabernet Sauvignon.
“Lee, Jesus.” She rolled her eyes lightheartedly. “We’re not getting our pictures taken.”
They used to always be a we, no matter what. Did she still feel that way? As they walked to the entrance, angry picketers gathered outside, holding signs with pro-life slogans. Lee stopped, but Shirley grabbed her elbow.
“Come on.”
Lee ducked around the protestors and stepped inside. Shirley signed in at the desk, while Lee scanned the room. Women of various ages fanned out in gray chairs, filling out forms, chewing fingernails, or staring at their phones.
While Shirley completed all of her personal information, Lee sorted through the money in her purse—she was down to her last few hundred dollars, because she’d just paid the mortgage. Would Shirley even be able to pay for this? She extracted her credit card and checked the expiration date. She had no idea of its limit, if it was even active. She paid so little attention to the details of her everyday life these days. Only her job, which she loved, the recent drinking, which she didn’t, and the guilt for what had happened to Shirley at the party. What if this was that horrible guy’s baby?
A nurse in pink elephant scrubs called Shirley’s name off a clipboard, and Lee followed. She nervously stood by her friend as she stepped on a scale and answered questions in her short, impatient clip. Lee tried to exchange pleasantries as the nurse uncapped a fat, silver needle and gripped Shirley’s arm. The woman hesitated, observing the old track marks—still visible due to unfortunate abscesses that formed during her last bout—and glanced in her direction. Lee shook her head as if to say, she’s clean for now, and looked away as the nurse pushed the needle into the wispy veins at the crook of Shirley’s elbow. The glass vials filled with deep, dark blood. Lee felt woozy as the nurse pressed a cotton ball to the small prick in Shirley’s arm and secured it with a tab of tape. Lee hated needles, had always despised watching Shirley get high. Next, she was handed a plastic cup and shown to the bathroom. Lee waited in the examination room.