by Pepper Pace
“Didn’t you go?” I asked, giving her a peck on the cheek.
She nodded. “Yeah I didn’t feel like a movie so I came home early.”
“You okay?” I rubbed her arms. She looked tense.
“Y-yeah.” She nodded. “Um…I’m pregnant.”
“Um…what did you say?” I’m almost positive that I heard her wrong. What are all of the words that rhyme with pregnant…? I was silently straining for some ideas.
She smiled sheepishly and whispered, “I’m pregnant.”
I rubbed her arms again and I’m sure that I had a stupid look on my face. “Seriously?”
“I wouldn’t joke about this-”
“Wow…a baby.” I started chuckling, even though my heart was slamming in my chest. I pulled her into my arms and kissed her.
She gave me an amazed look. “You’re happy? We’ve only been together four months and…”
I kissed her again. “I don’t care. I love you.”
She smiled. “I love you, too.”
I frowned. “How?” She’s on the pill and has been since we got together.
She shrugged. “I have no idea. I mean, I’ve not missed my cycle.”
“You’re sure that you are?”
She pulled out of my arms and hurried to the connecting bathroom and brought back one of those pregnancy test sticks. I took it but it didn’t take a rocket scientist to see that the great big pink plus sign meant positive. She went back to the bathroom for the box and I spent fifteen minutes reading about false negatives…which did take a rocket scientist to understand.
“I’ll make an appointment with my doctor Monday.”
I grimaced. “Monday? Well it’s Friday. We have to wait until Monday?”
She shrugged. “We could go to the free clinic tomorrow, if their open on Saturdays.”
I nodded. “Let’s do that.”
It was hard to sleep that night. I kept thinking about how hard I’d fucked her today…Shit, I’d spanked her, too! And I couldn’t stop thinking about all of the rough sex we’ve had. Then I couldn’t reconcile the fact that she’s on birth control and has had a regular cycle. I mean…what the fuck?! But then there was the idea of a little baby growing in my woman’s body and that I’d placed it there. I was going to be a father. A little Asian, African-American kid would be looking up to me for guidance. The idea was frightening and awesome all at once.
The next morning, neither of us lingered in bed the way we usually do on Saturdays. We hurried to the free clinic, and as usual, was the center of attention. I held her hand nervously trying not to think about the reason that the other people were here.
The free clinic might be free but it is not fast! We finally got called back, they asked us a lot of questions, and then she finally got to pee in a cup. We went back into the waiting area to wait again.
We had skipped breakfast and Nikki was on her third bag of chips when they finally called us back.
The woman, nurse, doctor, whatever she was, looked at us from atop her bifocals. She smiled. “Congratulations. You are pregnant.” Nikki and I smiled at each other.
“How many months am I?” She asked.
“We can usually get a pretty good guess based on your last menstrual cycle but based on the information you’ve told me you will need to make an appointment for an ultrasound. We don’t do that here so you will need to set up an appointment with your regular physician. Now if you don’t have one, we can refer you to-”
“No, no. We have a doctor.”
She smiled at us again. “Any questions?” We probably had tons but we were both excited to get out of there. She gave us several brochures and we hurried out. Nikki just kept grinning.
“Where do you want to go for breakfast? Mommy’s choice.” I was grinning myself. I’m going to be a DADDY!
“I want to go to your Mom and Dad’s house.”
My smile disappeared. Oh shit…my mother!
NIKKI
We got to Tony’s parent’s house. We hadn’t called first. Mrs. Y liked our impromptu visits even if she always wore a sour expression. I liked her and I knew for a fact that she liked me. Maybe it hadn’t begun that way, but we were stuck with each other; for better or for worse.
Tony walked in the door as he always did, without knocking or saying hi. “Mom? Dad? Nikki and I are here.” They were in the kitchen having lunch and I was happy as hell! God, I was starving! We all exchanged hugs and kisses; something I’d introduced to them. I’m a hugger, can’t help it and T’s family was very reserved. But I know that they are very happy that I have pushed them into the realm of affection. I’ve even seen them touching each other a few times.
“What brings you two out to our part of the world?” Mr. Y asked. He was great. He always made things easy. He was finishing up a sandwich. Grrr…why couldn’t it have been fish fritters?! I would give my right arm for a fish fritter!
T had a mischievous look in his eyes when he spoke. “We were at the free clinic and that’s not so far from here so we figured that we’d stop by and see what you two were having for lunch-”
“Free clinic? Why you two go to free clinic? That for people with no money! You two got money!” Mrs. Y said, taking the bait.
“Yeah, Nikki needed to get tested.” I smacked his arm. “Kidding, gosh. We took a pregnancy test.” T got up and moved to the refrigerator. “What’s for lunch?” His mother smacked him in the back of the head.
“Toi! If you know what good for you, you won’t make me mad!” She said in broken English.
He chuckled. “Okay okay. We’re pregnant.”
Mrs. Y screamed. I mean, she literally bellowed. I think Mr. Y almost had a heart attack because she was so thrilled by the news…or possibly by the bellowing, I’m not sure. I was hugged and kissed by the both of them. Mrs. Y gave me a clandestine wink and I hid my smile.
“You men make us a real lunch.” Mrs. Y said while sitting down. “Nikki is going to be a mother and I’m going to be a grandmother!” She clapped her hands sharply. “Come on, get to it!”
Tony bowed good-naturedly. “Yes your majesties. Any requests?”
“Fish fritters.” I said quickly.
Mrs. Y gave me a quick look. “Oh no. No fish fritters for you! Mercury in the fish; bad for baby.” My mouth dropped. No fish fritters?
“Don’t Japanese women eat sushi?” I probed.
“Sushi fish is best grade fish! You eat sushi, then fine.”
“We can make the fish fritters from sushi grade fish…” I tried.
Mrs. Y scowled. “Fish fritters? I teach you correct cooking technique for fritters so you can cook correct for my grandbaby. No sushi meat in fish fritters!” I poked out my lip and T smiled at me as if to say, and you thought she drove me crazy for no reason. In the end we had a quick stir-fry with leftovers from the fridge. I ate so much that I was practically bursting at the seams. So in the end I guess we were all happy.
Tony
My secretary, Debbie rang my phone while I was sitting in my office contemplating the appointment that we had later today. It had taken a week for us to get the ultrasound appointment and though I wanted the earliest possible one of the day, Nikki made me see reason in that the both of us taking off work would be pretty suspicious. So we made an evening appointment.
I was thinking about the appointment when the phone rang. I pressed the receive button. “Yes, Debbie?”
“Mr. Milton is on the other line.”
“Put him through.” I kept it on speaker. Roger Milton was my manager and he answered only to the owner of the company. He and I were on very good working terms. He had helped me to get the Department Manager’s job in the first place.
“Hey Roger. How’s it going?”
“Tony,” he sighed. “I’m looking at some figures that have me concerned.” I came to attention. Getting a call from my boss was routine, getting
a call from him stating that he was concerned was quite another matter.
“Ok
ay. What seems to be the problem?”
“The Dura account.” Shit.
“Ahh.” I said.
“Underwriting had already approved it and then it was denied by Nikkita.” I picked up the phone, taking it off speaker.
“There were some…extenuating circumstances that had come to light. It raised some concerns with her, and after I reviewed the file I had to agree.” I waited quietly for the hammer to drop.
“Come to my office.” Wham!
“On my way.”
****
“Babe, you seem really quiet.” Nikki said, rubbing my hand as we drove to the appointment. “Are you anxious about the ultrasound?”
I hadn’t wanted to talk about work related things when we were on our way to something so important. I smiled. “No, I’m excited about that. We get to see the first pictures of our baby. Do we want to know the sex?”
“No! Besides, I think it will be too soon for that.”
“Hmmm, true. But we’re going to need to start thinking of blackanasian names.”
She laughed. “I think that will be easy.”
“Not for a boy. Japanese male names are very…anime; like Yoshi, Tanaka, Yuri. And those are just the common ones. Then there’s Akihito and Kiyoshi…and I just don’t want my son to feel ‘stuck’ like I felt, with a jacked-up name that didn’t match any of my friends.” Toi Yakamoto was not an easy name to have as a child growing up in an all black neighborhood!
She rubbed my knuckles. “We won’t do that to our child. But I want his or her name to represent both cultures.”
I nodded, proud that I’d found a woman that cared about such things. “Well our baby will definitely be representing the Japanese culture with the last name Yakamoto.”
“Mason.” She said casually.
“Mason?” I almost ran off the road.
“Yeah.” She gave me a smile. “My baby will have the same last name that I have.”
My face relaxed. Ahhh, fishing for a proposal. Well it had been a week since she announced her pregnancy. But I had to do things with a special
style. I mean, I only intend to propose to a woman once in my life and I want it to be memorable for the both of us. I was thinking about a trip somewhere romantic…
Nikki poked me and when I looked at her again she was sticking her tongue out at me.
“Be careful where you point that thing. I might put it to good use.” I pulled into a parking space and we went hand in hand to the radiology department where we were instructed to wait for our name to be called. There were a lot of pregnant women waiting, but very few men. I was being watched like I was some god. I intended to remember the looks and I intended to be here with Nikki throughout this process.
When our name was finally called I was feeling strange. I was getting into the idea of being a Dad, even though I hadn’t thought much about it before Nikki. I figured it would be a natural progression once I found the right woman—but I had been focused only on finding her. And now that I had, I just hadn’t thought further. Now it was all that I could think about; her, our baby, a family together. It was both wondrous and frightening.
Once inside the office, she climbed up on the examining table and the technician covered her belly with a towel, pulling down the waistband of her skirt and tucking the towel under so that it wouldn’t get wet.
Nikki lifted her blouse exposing her belly and the technician grabbed a bottle of gel. “Okay, Mom. This may be a little cold.” She liberally spritzed her belly and Nikki reached out and gripped my hand.
“Okay. So we are going to take measurements of baby to determine an age.” The lady gestured to a monitor. “You can watch the monitor but it will be unlikely that you will be able to see clearly at this stage. Mom, your last period was on the eighteenth of the month?” Nikki nodded.
The lady pressed a wand to Nikki’s belly and began rolling it, pressing fairly hard. Immediately we heard the whomp whomp whomp sound of a heartbeat.
“Baby’s heartbeat is very strong.” We were all glued to the monitor and plain as day, there he/she was! The technician was clicking away taking pictures and measurements and all I could think was that…this is freaking really happening! There is my kid…
Nikki looked at me and I didn’t care that the technician was in the room clicking away, I bent down and kissed her lightly. “I love you.” I mouthed. She mouthed it back.
“Alright.” The technician finally said. “We will have some pictures for you to take home. She took the towel and wiped off the gel and was about to pull down her blouse when Nikki stopped her.
“No no. I need another towel. This is a pure silk blouse and I don’t want a drop of gel on it!” The woman handed Nikki a fresh towel and she concentrated on finding every trace of gel, mumbling under her breath when she discovered traces of the potentially silk-ruining substance.
“Okay, Mom and Dad, you can go back to the office and I will work up the measurements.” I kissed her neck as we sat in the small plastic chairs. Is it normal for me to feel horny right now? I had this feeling of, ‘I am man! I have created life!’ Now I wanted to plunge into her and spread more life giving fluid!
Only a few moments later the technician returned to the office and proudly handed us the first pictures of Baby Yakamoto.
“The baby has your big head, T.” She said.
“Wow…” I couldn’t unglue my eyes from the sight of the teeny slope of the nose and the impression of eyes and little arms and legs. Damn…my kid…
“So you are sixteen weeks. That gives you a due date of November-”
“How many weeks?” Nikki interrupted, frowning.
“Sixteen.” The technician repeated. After that it was hard for me to hear anything else. Nikki and I have only been together for about thirteen or fourteen weeks. This wasn’t my baby. This was Dean’s baby.
Nikki
I felt sick. Not the type that makes you feel like you need to run to the bathroom and vomit, but the type of sick like you need to have someone pull the plug on life support because it can go nowhere but downhill.
“How accurate are those weeks?”
“Good question Mom. They are fairly accurate, give or take a week or two.” Give or take a week or two! The difference between a week or two was the difference between my life crashing down around me or soaring forward! Tony and I have only been together three and a half months. That’s not sixteen weeks!
I looked at the man that I loved with all of my heart and soul. He was absolutely motionless. His face was like a stone statue. His eyes were like two black chips of coal.
We left the office and I made an appointment for later that week to visit a prenatal doctor and then we went back to the car. Tony still hadn’t said a word. I didn’t know what I wanted him to say…I mean, I do know what I wanted him to say, but he just drove us back to my apartment. On the way, I finally had to break the unbearable silence.
“Tony…” He glanced at me. “She said it could be off by one or two weeks.”
“But she didn’t say off by two or three.” And there it was. He had already accepted that this baby wasn’t his. I felt like shit. When we got to the apartment I got out the car but Tony didn’t. I turned and looked at him.
“I need to clear my head, Nikki. I’m going to go back to my place.” I nodded. “Send Wu-Tang out, please.” Again I nodded. Wu-Tang got to be with him, but I didn’t. Right now I needed to be with him. But I know that he needed to be away from me.
Once Wu-Tang and Tony were gone I sank down on the couch and cried.
TONY
I dug the leash out of the glove compartment and then Wu-Tang and I went to the dog park. I put on my sunglasses and took off my suit jacket leaving it in the car. I wish I had stopped home to change into jeans or something but I wanted to walk the trails and think. My head felt crowded and I couldn’t put my thoughts in order.
One minute my brain had been filled with images of me, Nikki, and our child. The next was Nikki fucking Dea
n. God help me, but the vision disgusted me. I couldn’t stop seeing the three of us on the Murray Polvich show doing the big DNA reveal and Maury opening the manila folder and announcing; Toi Yakamoto--you are NOT the father…
I sat down on a bench and Wu-Tang cocked her head at me as if to say, ‘Iz gonna be ai’ight,
Boss.’
“I might be, you know. There’s a chance…right?”
Wu-Tang gave me a baleful look. I sighed. This day is going from bad to worse; first Richard chews my ass and gives me my first reprimand as a Department Manager, and now this. Worse is that I didn’t even want to face Nikki and I was going to be forced to give her an official reprimand as well.