Tales From the Crib

by Jennifer Coburn

  There was no surgery that could be performed in utero. JJ would most likely die in my womb within the next two weeks, they said. There was no chance of a healthy delivery and no surgery that could ever bring JJ back to the healthy baby I assumed he was.

  “What if I take my chances and see what happens?” I asked the doctor.

  “It would be extremely dangerous, perhaps even fatal for you, Mrs. Klein,” he said.

  Three years later, in our kitchen, I told Jack that I desperately wanted to have this baby. He nodded furtively and agreed that it was probably my last chance to have a child. If the pregnancy even makes it to term, neither of us said aloud, but could not help thinking.

  “That makes sense,” Jack nodded. “I respect that decision.” Funny, the qualities I once found so attractive about Jack were the very ones that now infuriated me. When we first met, his pragmatism was so incredibly sexy. Because I was raised by a family ruled by passion and contradiction, Jack’s measured demeanor was like a rare delicacy for me. I found it intriguing that a man who was in a Master of Fine Arts program for visual arts could be the polar opposite of what I expected an artist to be. He reminded me more of my mother’s boyfriend, a businessman, which is what Jack wound up to be, so I guess I wasn’t too far off.

  After the second miscarriage, I asked Jack if he blamed me for losing the babies. “Don’t be ridiculous,” he said, half listening as he ate a sandwich. I know what he meant. I did nothing to cause the miscarriages. Of course, they weren’t my fault. Intellectually we could both understand that. But deep down, on a purely emotional level, wasn’t there part of him that was angry with me? “No way,” he dismissed. I thought perhaps he was just trying to spare my feelings by shielding me from the truth. I definitely got the sense that Jack harbored some resentment toward me, but he felt guilty about feeling this way because it was so illogical and patently unfair. So, I thought I would open the door and reveal a deeply vulnerable truth to him.

  “I do,” I barely was able to utter.

  “You do what?” Jack asked, genuinely concerned by the tone of my voice.

  “I am so angry, and so incredibly disappointed, and sometimes I do wonder what’s wrong with me that I can’t make it through a pregnancy. So, I guess what I’m trying to say is that if you have anything you need to talk to me about, I’m listening. I mean, about your feelings about the miscarriages, you can tell me because they’re probably some of the same thoughts that have crossed my mind too. Maybe it’ll help us get through this together. So, Jack, let me just put it out there: sometimes I wonder what’s wrong with me. I wonder if I’m being punished. I wonder if this is God’s way of telling me that I’d be a really shitty mother.”

  “That’s silly, Lucy,” Jack said kindly. “Don’t feel that way.”

  Don’t feel that way. That was Jack’s advice. I shouldn’t feel that way. But I already did. And the only thing worse than feeling this way was telling him about it, reaching out for some sort of emotional connection, and discovering that I was alone.

  Chapter 3

  Jack and I were both enrolled in the same MFA program at the University of Michigan when we met. He was a painter, but also did disturbingly insightful charcoal sketches of the grittiest side of street life. I remember one sketch he did of police officers taunting a hooker that just brilliantly captured a moment of cruelty and humiliation. Jack was never a happy-go-lucky kind of guy, least of all in his art. He did a sculpture of Jesus on the cross made entirely of two-inch nails bent and twisted every which way. That won a prize at the Ann Arbor Art Festival the town put on every summer. His art always had a similar theme-death, pain, and isolation. Not exactly the most commercial stuff. I mean, who wants to decorate the family room with Jack’s painting of a nude street urchin held captive in a church basement?

  I was in for creative writing, and had planned to write women’s fiction, short stories, and eventually a novel. Jack’s and my first date lasted two days. I don’t think we stopped talking for a single waking moment. The deal clincher for both of us was when we both shared the same fantasy—to start an artist colony where musicians, painters, sculptors, and writers would stay with us anywhere from six months to two years. We would provide food and housing, and artists would be free to focus on their art. People from all over the world would stay with us, creating a rich cultural Mecca. I pictured myself wandering the property in a white gauze dress, popping into studios and watching painters capture onto canvas every wonderfully insane image they conjured up. I’d hear music as it was being composed, watch glass being blown, and run my hands through raw, wet clay that would soon become sculpture. Of course, I imagined my children being beneficiaries of this explosively creative environment as they learned about social studies by living it instead of reading about foreign lands in textbooks. Jack and I planned to home school our three children. He would paint. I would write. Other than the occasional anxiety over our eldest daughter being seduced by the visiting French poet, it seemed like our own personal Valhalla.

  We used to spend hours drinking sangria on the upper balcony of Dominic’s, a woodsy-looking pizza place popular among University of Michigan students. When we agreed with each other, we completely agreed. I’d squeal, “I have always thought that!” It was like Jack had flown to Manhattan one weekend and read ten years’ worth of my journal entries. When we disagreed, it was always with great passion. We seemed to be the only two people on the planet who hated the Breakfast Club and Breakfast at Tiffany’s even more. And yet our favorite meal was breakfast. At every meal, we always agreed on the best two entrees on the menu, so we could always share. Food was as important to Jack as it was to me, so we never wasted a meal on drive-through or bad take-out. Meals were our foreplay. Neither of us needed poetry or slow caressing. The better the food, the more likely we were to sweep our dishes off to the side of the table and make love right there next to a casserole.

  That was life in our early twenties. In our late thirties, Jack was no longer painting, but owned a gallery and represented a handful of enormously talented artists. I had spent the last ten years writing incredibly important literary works. Perhaps you’ve heard of my best-known work: Peanut Butter Cheerios; you’ve never tried nut, nut, nuthin’ like ‘em! Or maybe you’ve seen my television work where two gaggles of blond ‘tweens face off at a skateboard park because they each want the last of the Sunny Delight. The script that nearly sank me into a job-related depression was one where an overly amped-up man with a mop of red hair completely lost his mind over how sticky Doubly-Sticky adhesive tape is. He was thrilled because it solved his huge problem of tape insufficiently adhering to surfaces. (Doesn’t that just happen to you all the time?) Thank the good Lord for Doubly-Sticky! No wonder Red was willing to risk head injury running around crashing into walls with excitement. A combination of severe budget cuts and an obvious repulsion for my job put me at the top of the list for layoffs at the advertising agency where I worked. For the last year, I’ve been writing freelance for second-rate magazines and drafting newsletters and annual reports for small businesses.

  As I mentioned, we live in Caldwell, New Jersey. Suburbs, that is. Not an arts community where our precocious children wander freely and critique the painters for being overly influenced by Goya and inhibiting the development of their own style. Jack hasn’t painted in years. My novel has yet to be outlined.

  We bought this house in the second trimester of my last pregnancy, the one we were sure would last. The suburbs are the last place on earth I ever imagined myself, but Jack insisted that we move from the city to raise our kids. His adamancy was a tad insulting. It was as if he thought being raised in Manhattan was the worst thing you could do to a child. I spent my early years on West Eleventh Street in a brownstone building in Greenwich Village that my mother bought when she divorced my father. The building had four apartments, one in which we lived. She rented the other three.

  My mother took the nicest apartment, which was a triplex six-bedroom with a
common area that rose through all three stories. My bedroom was on the top floor and I used to love peering from the wooden rail and looking down forty feet into our living room. In the center of the living room was an enormous brick fireplace surrounded by a leather sectional and chairs so comfy they could absorb you. Some walls were brick, while the others were a light wood that continued up the rails and on to the upper floors. On the brick wall, my mother hung a dark-blue neon light outline of the Manhattan skyline. The rest of the space was covered with posters of shows she produced.

  My mother owns the Drama Queen bookstore in the theatre district and has the Midas touch when it comes to producing off-Broadway gay theatre. Her most recent success was with the all-male musical Oklahomo! The entire cast was clad in tight leather overalls or fringed chaps.

  Jack and I rented an apartment in my mother’s building for the first eleven years of our marriage, but then he insisted that we make a “real” home for JJ. My mother hardly comes to see us because she claims she’s allergic to the suburbs. She also is lactose intolerant, and sneezes uncontrollably in the presence of flowers that aren’t for her. We visit her every month or so, enjoy a slice of Ray’s Pizza from the corner, then drive back to the house in the suburbs we bought for our ghost baby.

  The night I announced my pregnancy, Jack offered what he called a radical idea. I called it insanity. “It’s not like we hate each other, Lucy. Look, the marriage has ended, but we get along well enough to be around each other.”

  For the most part, I didn’t say.

  “Let’s stay married, live together as friends, you know, do our own thing, and raise the baby together.”

  “Do what?”

  “Look, I said it was a radical idea,” he shot back. “Didn’t you see the article in the Times a few months ago about how couples couldn’t afford to divorce anymore because running two households was cost-prohibitive? Plus they had children they didn’t want to upset, so they hung out together till the kids went to college. Co-parenting, they called it. Everyone seemed pretty happy with the deal.”

  “Jack, have you lost your mind?!”

  “Lucy, I don’t want to be a Sunday father.” I knew his father left Jack’s family when he was eight, visited every other Sunday for three years, then remarried and disappeared into his new life. Jack hears from his father once every few years when something major happens, like a wedding or a funeral. I knew Jack’s greatest fear in becoming a father was becoming his father, too busy with other things to care about his children’s lives.

  “Jack, you can visit the baby any time you want. We can share custody.”

  “I don’t want to share custody. I want to be there every day. Seriously, Lucy, be practical. Where are you going to live? Anjoli has three-year leases on all those apartments. What about health insurance?”

  This pissed me off! Where was I supposed to live when I wasn’t carrying his child? Didn’t he care about my dependence on his health insurance when it was just me?

  “Come on, Lucy! It’s the perfect solution and you know it. We each have a built-in babysitter for when we go out. We’ve got a friend in the house to help. You’ll do the child care. I’ll pay three-quarters of the bills. Hey, you can finally write your novel with all your spare time.”

  “Jack, you can’t bribe me like this!”

  “How can I bribe you, then?”

  “You said you wanted a divorce. Now you suddenly want to be my husband again?!”

  “No,” he answered too quickly. “I don’t want to be your husband. I want to be a full-time father to our baby, and want to make you an offer that will suit your needs as well as mine. I think it’s a fair deal.”

  Why couldn’t he see that being asked for a divorce is an unsteadying event? I needed time to absorb the rejection I felt. All he wanted to do was close the deal.

  “I don’t want a divorce,” he said.

  “You did ten minutes ago.”

  “Things are different now.”

  “Because of the baby?”

  “Well, yes, because of the baby. If everything . . .” he trailed off.

  “Go ahead, you can say it.”

  “Say what?”

  “Jack, you were about to say that if everything goes well this time.”

  “No, I wasn’t. Come on, Luce, let’s stay married as friends,” Jack said.

  “Could I date other people?” I asked.

  “Absolutely!” he answered, again too quickly.

  “I’m not sure.”

  “Lucy, let me run this article off the Internet for you. We aren’t entering uncharted territory. Other couples are living separately ever after, and it’s working well for them. Ask any single parent whether they’d like an extra set of hands around the house and they’d take it.”

  They’d take it if it weren’t the set of hands belonging to the rat bastard who asked for a divorce the same day the pregnancy test read positive.

  “I’m not sure,” I said.

  “What do you need to make you sure?”

  “Time to think about it.”

  “How much time?” Jack pushed.

  “I will need exactly as much time as I need, Jack. That’s my answer. If you don’t like it, I can help you pack a bag, call a realtor tomorrow to sell the house, move back into Anjoli’s apartment, and apply for public prenatal care. Back off and I’ll have an answer for you in a reasonable amount of time, okay?”

  “Okay,” he said, upbeat. “Great meal, by the way. Absolutely superb!”

  Shut the fuck up.

  After a month of lobbying, Jack convinced me to try this new arrangement for one year. I would have a friend and co-parent in the house, medical coverage, and complete freedom. Plus, we’d get to keep our house and not sell it in a down real estate market. Jack put together a graph that showed our separation of duties and responsibilities, and even drafted a mission statement for our family. It wasn’t exactly how I’d envisioned bringing a baby into the world, but it seemed more practical than going it alone. And Jack was a good guy. I understood his motives were pure. He wanted to be a part of our baby’s daily life. How could I begrudge him that? It was just for a year.

  Chapter 4

  In my seventh month of pregnancy, my friend Zoe insisted on throwing a baby shower, and I reluctantly agreed. Given my history, everyone had an opinion as to whether or not this was a wise move. My two aunts, my father’s sisters, reminded me that in the Jewish faith we weren’t supposed to accept gifts until after the baby was born. My mother was born Catholic and is currently a convenient practitioner of New Age philosophy. That means whenever her minister advises her to do something she doesn’t want to, Anjoli notes that it is merely a suggestion. When it is something she agrees with, she insists everyone follow the advice religiously. She said that having a baby shower was a positive affirmation to my baby that I believed he would be born. “Act as if,” Anjoli said, “and so it is.” Kimmy said whatever I decided she would completely support me.

  Kimberly Fawn is my cousin who’s one year younger than me, six inches taller, twenty pounds lighter, and three shades blonder. There is no measure that can really capture the difference in our overall appearance. I’m not altogether horrible-looking. In fact, when I put on makeup and do a little something with my hair, I can look quite attractive. But mere mortals like me can’t compete with Kimmy, a former model who currently sells corporate jets. When Kimmy and I were thirteen and fourteen, we sneaked into Studio 54 with fake identification that we probably didn’t even need since they gave out free passes to the club in front of our prep school. It was fabulous getting out of the taxi and watching the velvet rope drop, along with the jaws of every guy in the snaking line for admission. We were in the ladies’ room when Kimmy was discovered. “Do you have an agent?” an anorexic flapper asked Kimmy, then handed her a business card.

  “Do you need a towel?” an overweight bathroom attendant asked me, then handed me a square of Bounty.

  About the baby shower, Ki
mmy said she would “support” my decision, which is pretty much her standard answer when she’s asked to weigh in on an issue. She’s a recovering alcoholic and cocaine addict who’s been clean for twenty years but still attends meetings every night. She and Anjoli get along famously because there are so many similarities between the language of recovery and New Age. Kind of like Spanish and Portuguese. They take healing workshops together; they chant for inner peace together; they even get French manicures at the same salon.

  Between my mother, a platinum blond, pale version of Sophia Loren, and Kimmy, I’ve always felt a bit like a garnish.

  Zoe wanted to have a baby shower for me I think partially to redeem herself for the last one. Again, it’s one of those things that doesn’t make any sense, but was clearly the case. “Let me throw you a proper shower this time,” she said. Her last shower was quite proper. It’s the pregnancy that wasn’t.

  Her parties at college were far beyond the standard kegger. We had a Super Bowl party where Zoe went all out to create the ultimate football party. She put white tape all over our kelly-green carpet to mark the yard lines. We served Denver fans Bronco Brew, a mixture of Everclear and orange Kool-Aid. Redskins fans drank Bronco Blood, which was the same drink in red. She wanted to give our guests a party favor, so she designed a pigskin purse that was the size and shape of an actual football. As luck would have it, our pal, Dan Alcott’s girlfriend, went mad for the purse and showed it to her father who happened to sit on the board of directors at a trendy clothing manufacturer. So, if you ever wonder who designed those adorable leather purses in football, bowling ball, soccer ball, and basketball shapes, it’s my friend Zoe.