Fortunately, that was the last word anyone spoke about Cap that day. Soon after Anthony's mother arrived and she and the Minnellis took over labor duty, Leah felt like she had been cast aside. She and Anthony sat in the corner like caged puppies making idle conversation until it was time for Aimee to push. Then everyone got kicked out of the room except for Anthony, who was clearly out of his element and appeared as though he would have gladly traded places with any of the women.
Leah was ushered into the waiting room along with the rest of the clan. Mrs. Minnelli made an attempt at conversation by asking how Leah's family was and how things were at work, but otherwise Leah was left to listen to the thoughts bouncing off the corridors of her brain.
That evening, around 7 PM, Anthony finally emerged from the delivery room, his face glowing and eyes wet with tears. It was just like a scene in one of a hundred movies where the proud papa comes out to announce the birth to the rest of the family. “It's a girl!” he proclaimed. Leah expected her heart to leap with excitement but she just drew it in, trying to reconcile the image of her best friend holding a newborn to her breast with the one of her downing tequila shots during some sort of harebrained drinking game in college.
I guess we've grown up, she thought as she commanded her legs to lift her from the small peach fabric-upholstered chair she'd been seemingly glued into for the last several hours. I know I'm a responsible adult now with an important job and people I oversee and lots of responsibility, but being solely responsible for a tiny helpless human being seems a lot harder.
She knew Aimee was well-prepared having read tons of books and she had no less than five women close by who could show her the ropes, but still, the consequences of a mistake...a tiny oversight...a misjudgment...could be fatal. Leah was bludgeoned by the realization of all the things that could go wrong while raising a child, everything from choking to accidental poisoning to drowning. She scolded herself for having morbid thoughts during such a happy occasion. Why does my overactive brain have to ruin everything? she wondered.
When it was finally her turn to hold that precious bundle in her arms she looked into the tiny red, scrunched up face with her eyebrows and eyelashes delicately painted on and remembered how many billions of people had been born and lived and gone on to pass their genes down the lines of history. Somehow we make it through, Leah thought. I don't know what's the bigger miracle, conception and birth or just life itself, the way we figure out how to survive despite everything stacked against us.
Leah turned the key and pushed open the back door to the small house that Aimee and Anthony rented so she could feed their cats and stay the night. She'd go back to the hospital in the morning to visit with the newly minted family of three. She heard her phone buzzing from her purse as she was dumping the cat food into the dishes whilst three hungry felines crossed between her legs, rubbing against her calves and shins appreciatively. “Hey, Cap, how's it going?” she knew her involuntary smile shone through her voice.
“All's well here. Just took Glory and Keeper for a run down the boardwalk and they are all tuckered out,” he laughed. “What's the scoop? Baby come yet?”
“Yes, I was just getting ready to call you. She was born tonight at about 6:42. Seven pounds, seven ounces. She's absolutely gorgeous with a head full of black hair. They named her Natalie, which means Christmas. I even got to hold her! She's so tiny and sweet!” Leah gushed.
“Uh oh,” Cap grunted. “Guess your biological clock was activated, huh?”
“Oh,” she said, surprised that Cap would assume something like that. She spent a moment trying to decide whether or not she should be offended. “No,” she finally decided, “nothing like that. I don't think I have one of those.”
“Really?” Cap asked. “I pegged you for the domestic type...you know, someday, when you're bored with the world of hotel management...figured you'd want to pop out a couple of babies.”
“Nope, you couldn't be farther off. I've never wanted children,” Leah corrected him. She decided she was definitely offended now, if she hadn't been previously.
“You just haven't met the right man,” he asserted, further delving into the Disfavor Zone. “Trust me, when you meet the right man, you're gonna want to have his baby.”
Well, that's it, he's hit rock bottom now, she thought. She felt the blood rising to the surface of her skin. “Of all the stupid, misogynistic things I've ever heard! Seriously, Cap?!”
He chuckled in response to her ire. “Calm down there, Sugarplum, I'm only teasing. Thou doth protest too much!” He delivered the line in his best Shakespearean accent. Then after her silence, his native eastern shore tongue was restored. “I'm sorry, I didn't mean to offend you, Leah. I was only kidding.”
“Alright,” she managed. The angel on her shoulder felt vindicated. “I'm going to go now. Give Glory a kiss for me, okay?”
“Will do, although I'd rather be giving you a kiss,” he admitted. “Or something more...”
She hung up without responding.
ELEVEN
Besides this you know the time, that the hour has come for you to wake from sleep. For salvation is nearer to us now than when we first believed. The night is far gone; the day is at hand. So then let us cast off the works of darkness and put on the armor of light. Let us walk properly as in the daytime, not in orgies and drunkenness, not in sexual immorality and sensuality, not in quarreling and jealousy. -Romans 13:11-13 (ESV)
Leah had left Cap's subsequent calls and texts unanswered. If he says anything about Glory, then of course I'll call back, Leah decided. Otherwise, for the next few days, I belong solely to Aimee.
Leah washed and put away all the baby clothes, piled diapers in the diaper stacker, and sterilized every item that could possibly come into contact with the newborn. She made sure that the new mom was comfortable and had everything her heart could desire at her fingertips. They don't call me the Guest Experience Strategist for nothing, she mused.
She knew when she left Philadelphia a few days after Christmas that Aimee would undoubtedly be getting her adventure into motherhood started on the right foot. Even Anthony admitted he wasn't sure how they would have managed without Leah's help. “You know,” he remarked, “if you ever decide to leave the hotel business, you could probably make a killing providing this service to new moms!”
“I promise I will return the favor when it's your turn,” Aimee vowed in their last few moments together before Leah made the three hour trek back to Maryland. Aimee saw her friend's brow furrow and then immediately qualified her promise, “You know, if you ever change your mind about having kids.”
Cap's statement from their last conversation burned in Leah's ears. Trust me, when you meet the right man, you're gonna want to have his baby, he'd said. That's the most sexist thing I've heard in a long time, Leah thought.
She had considered venting to Aimee about it, but she remembered her decision not to say anything else about Cap during the visit, which had prompted her to change the subject each time Aimee had tried to pry out more information. Fortunately little Natalie was the baby version of “saved by the bell.” Her tiny lips would curl into a pout, signaling that a huge wail of discontent was about to be unleashed on all within earshot. And then all discussion regarding Cap was abandoned, much to Leah's relief, while everyone scrambled to try to soothe the little one's pitiful shrieks.
Leah patted Aimee's hand and shook her head, “Can't see that happening now, but you never know, right?” She smiled to show it wasn't a sore subject. Then she stroked the newborn's silky black hair as she finished her breakfast, her blissful face revealing that she was about to be lulled back to dreamland now that her belly was full of milk. “Although this little angel...she's so sweet, she's liable to make anyone want a little doll baby of their own!”
Aimee broke the suction between Natalie's mouth and her nipple with her index finger. “She's asleep again mid-feeding. I never know if I should wake her up, burp her, or just let her sleep.”
> “I vote let her sleep,” Anthony said, eavesdropping from the doorway. “I'll take her so you two can say a proper goodbye.” He stepped toward the bed where Aimee was propped up with a half dozen pillows and a yellow gingham Boppy decorated with tiny bees and butterflies and scooped up the tightly wrapped pink bundle from her mother's arms.
“It would be so much fun for our kids to grow up together, wouldn't it? Can't you just see them running along the beach together? Laughing and darting in and out of the waves?” Aimee asked with a dreamy look in her dark eyes. She still looked worn out from the delivery, which had apparently been pretty intense. Leah was not particularly regretful that she hadn't been allowed to observe.
She sighed, wishing she could stare into her future via the proverbial crystal ball. She wondered if Cap's sexist statement was a one way street or if he felt the same was true for men: when they meet the right woman, they want her to have their babies. It wouldn't sound nearly so sexist in that case, she thought. She wondered if Cap had felt that way about his ex-wife. And she suddenly wondered if Cap was still able to have kids, or if he'd had a vasectomy after his daughters were born.
All the way home, she beat herself up for wondering, especially that last item. And she ignored another call from him too.
She drove south through Ocean City all the way to the inlet. Despite not knowing what she should say to Cap, she wanted to be reunited with her puppy as soon as possible. She hoped she would be able to slip in, retrieve Glory, and be back on her way in a flash, but she had a distinct feeling a certain pair of ocean blue eyes and irresistible dimples would work in tandem to detain her as long as possible.
She was disappointed and irritated to see that Cap's truck was not in its usual parking place in front of his shop. “Oh, that's just great,” she muttered under her breath as she dug her phone out of her purse. She punched the green phone icon next to his name and impatiently waited for the call to connect. Waiting was not her strong suit. Neither was having anything deviate from the plan.
“Oh, so you're alive after all?” was Cap's way of answering the phone.
“Where is my dog?” Leah cut right to the chase.
“Relax, Sugar, we're on our way back from Salisbury. We had to pick up some stuff at Gander Mountain. I called earlier to tell you but you didn't answer.”
“How long?” Leah snipped. Ugh, why am I being such a bitch? she thought helplessly. But she knew it was because her expectations had not been met. Glory was supposed to be licking my face and telling me how much she missed me by now.
“Ten minutes. Go on upstairs; the door's unlocked.”
Leah tapped her screen to end the call without saying goodbye. He leaves his door unlocked? Who does that? she wondered but when the fishy smell in the entryway smacked her in the face, she realized it was probably deterrent enough. She held her breath as she made her way up the stairs and pushed the door open. Marlina the cat, greeted her by brushing against her legs affectionately but skulked away as soon as she realized she wasn't getting any food out of the deal.
She glanced around his small but tidy apartment, realizing that it resembled a ship the way each precious square foot was maximized to its greatest potential. Built-in cabinets flanked each side of the living room, lined a wall in the bedroom, and of course were in abundance in the kitchen and bathroom. She assumed he had all of his personal items stashed away because very few things were visible except a couple of fishing magazines and a cup and bowl from his last meal. Cereal, she observed.
No pictures or paintings hung from the wainscotted walls, but spread on top of the cabinets in the living room was a collection of small framed prints, each of them featuring a grinning person holding up a rather large fish. He had a small laptop stowed in a bin beside the sofa alongside a remote to the TV and a few dog toys. The Christmas tree they'd made love under a few nights before had already been whisked away, not even a single pine needle remaining to prove its existence.
The window from his kitchen looked down on the street below. The lone streetlight guarding his block cast its orange glow onto the sidewalk and the pavement, revealing that it had begun to snow. Leah could see the tiny flakes streaming down under the light. She shivered thinking about having to clean off her Jeep before leaving just to drive sixty-some blocks to her painfully cold, lonely apartment.
How many more days till summer? she sighed and before she could snoop any more around the apartment, she saw Cap's navy truck whip into its usual space along the curb. Out popped Cap with two leashes wound around his hand attached to two dog collars on the other end. She watched the pair of canines bound toward the door pulling Cap behind them like sled dogs getting the heave ho on the arctic tundra. And with the snow coming down, that analogy isn't really too far off, Leah thought with a smirk.
She watched the door handle turn and the two dogs leaped over the threshold before Cap could fully swing the door open. Glory jumped into Leah's waiting arms and soon her face was covered with wet puppy kisses. “She looks pretty happy to see her mom!” Cap observed as Keeper sniffed Leah for a moment and then indulged in a series of loud gulps of water from his bowl.
“Awww, I missed my baby girl too!” Leah cried, not even bothering to wipe the puppy slobber off her cheeks. She gave her wiggly beagle a kiss, and plopped her back down onto the wood-planked floor so she could scurry off toward the water bowl to join Keeper.
“Those two have been pretty much inseparable. It's sorta made me feel guilty for not having a little sister for my boy all these years,” Cap confessed. “I sent you a few pictures of their shenanigans. Did you get them?”
Leah nodded. “Sorry I wasn't really in touch. I was trying to focus on Aimee and the baby. I just wanted to...” She let her voice trail off as the tension in the four feet of space between them rose up like a tornado, making her almost dizzy with a sudden onslaught of emotions she hadn't been expecting: frustration, resentment and regret, spiked with a surprising dose of arousal.
He took one giant step toward her and in a tick of the clock his arms were wrapping around her and drawing her to his chest. Her nostrils filled with his scent and she instantly remembered what it felt like when he slid inside her, when his heavy, lust-laden breaths were falling on her cheek. There was something miraculous about his touch; it dissolved every emotion in the tornado that had been spinning around her. Every emotion except for arousal.
One thing about Cap, she noted, was that he didn't need words. Not that he didn't have an impressive vocabulary, even if his words were colored by his twangy accent, it was that his most effective communication required no words at all. His mere presence, his skin against hers, spoke volumes more than his lips could ever utter. She felt all of the words he might have spoken sinking into her in his embrace. After several minutes of silence, he offered a sincere apology for his statement about her biological clock, but it was unnecessary at that point. She'd already felt it through his touch.
He guided her to the loveseat in his living room, and all she could think of was how she'd straddled him on the cushion closer to the window and he'd gripped her hips while he'd relentlessly drilled his cock into her. She felt those dizzying impulses of arousal travel up and down her spine again as she took a seat on that exact cushion, reeling with disappointment that she wasn't sitting on his lap again instead. What is wrong with me? she questioned. One rendezvous and I can't even control myself in his presence.
“So I'm just curious, and if it's something you don't want to talk about, just tell me to mind my own business,” Cap started, “but I really am kinda surprised that you don't want kids. Have you always felt that way?”
Leah allowed herself a deep breath while she contemplated her answer. She told herself there was no reason to feel defensive. It was a legitimate question, after all. “I know it seems weird, coming from the Bible Belt and a pretty big family. All that was expected of me growing up was that I'd find a man, settle down and make big, healthy babies. I guess I am sort of denying my roo
ts, but I've never felt like I had any maternal instincts. I just felt like it wasn't for me.”
Cap laid his hand on her knee and leaned toward her. “Fair enough. Not everyone is cut out to have kids, and a lot of people who do shouldn't have, you know?”
She nodded. “What about you? Did you always know you wanted kids?”
“Hell no,” he laughed. “God no.” He crossed his leg so that his ankle rested on his thigh. He was wearing his heavy work boots which were wet from the snow that had begun to stick to the ground. “My ex...her name is Sharon, by the way...I always kinda figured she trapped me. You know, got pregnant so I'd stick around? I thought she was on the Pill but come to find out a few months later...we had a baby on the way. It was right then that I made up my mind. I wanted to be the best daddy ever.”
“I've always wondered about women who do that...seems like a pretty big risk...the guy could just run away, right?” Leah conjectured.
“I suppose. But you should know me well enough by now to know I'd never do that. And besides, my father was a great man. I was his shadow my entire life. He taught me everything I know and I spent at least eight hours a day out on the water with him until he had a heart attack at age 42...and...” He stopped abruptly and she could see that the memory still choked him up, decades later, leaving a tear glistening in the corner of his eye.
It dawned on her that 42 was Cap's current age. She tried to imagine being the same age as one of her parents when they'd passed. She could only guess at how that would weigh on someone, always feeling like you were living out time that wasn't afforded to your parent. She expected Cap to swallow hard, push that memory back down deep inside him and go on to talk about raising his daughters, but instead he continued to speak of his father.
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