Laura, I quickly discovered, was in the habit of using the “us” and “we” pronouns whenever discussing baby matters. The way she put it - to family, friends, or physicians - was we were pregnant; we were ecstatic; we had a question.
“We’re having a baby shower,” she told me one afternoon. “My mother and Stevie’s idea. They’re planning the whole thing for us.”
Her mother and sister cut no corners with the shower. They rented out the private dining room in Les Nomades, a swanky French restaurant in the city. They made favors, baked a cake, and organized games. And though the gathering wasn’t a surprise, they placed me in charge of compiling the guest list of friends and co-workers. Laura’s sister Stevie reminded me that after this charge was fulfilled, my service, as well as presence, was no longer required.
“Just disappear from noon till around three,” she reminded me. “And be sure to pick up your wife in that Jeep of yours. You’ll need it.”
That Jeep of mine was able to hold about half of the gifts we received. Though some deviated from our tastes and needs - three of Laura’s co-workers chipped in on a menagerie of snowbabies - most were practical and tasteful.
Laura saw to involve me in the registry as well. Clothes; bedding; a highchair; a stroller; a carseat: My involvement was to accompany her to stores and provide reassurance that she was making the right choices. She had carte blanche. She could’ve told me we needed a laptop for the newborn and I would’ve driven her to the nearest retail store and watched her select one without question. The truth is that Laura did all the research on what we needed. So aside from allowing her to appease me with my role, I took delight in watching her register. She maneuvered around the merchandise with ease, like she stocked the shelves and racks herself and knew the arrangement most suitable for making women like her blush with elation. She would examine a bassinet or peel some pajamas from a hanger and then look at me for my reaction.
After the shower, the next task was the baby’s room. We decided to use the small bedroom closest to our own. Laura hired a coworker’s son to paint the walls a neutral greenish color called Creeping Willow. Then she learned how to stencil and in a single afternoon accented the room with clouds and stars and the Man in the Moon. My father told me over the phone that he wanted to buy us a crib for his first grandchild.
“Christ!” he cried over the phone, “I haven’t even been out to see your new place.”
“It’s definitely been a while.”
“Don’t sound so heartbroken.”
I was fine with our arrangement. We both were. He tended to the needs and lives of strangers’ kids while occasionally expressing contrition about missing out on mine. And I helped flesh out his excuses so he wouldn’t have to embarrass himself with half-assed apologies. He ended up sending me a check with an accompanying note that told me to read Consumer Reports for safety tips. Laura’s parents, not to be outdone by Rollie, furnished the rest of the nursery.
The room, with its “Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star” theme, was completed three months before our due date. There were times when I’d find Laura in the room by herself, quietly rocking in the chair her father had rescued from their basement and refinished himself, or examining the board books we bought, or reorganizing the closet, which was well stocked with outfits for all seasons and stages, boxes of wipes and diapers, and more bedware and blankets than we knew what to do with.
Then there were the classes and groups we joined. Through our hospital, we obtained a catalogue of the many offerings. Laura was advised by her sister-in-law on which classes were useful. We avoided the Moms and Emotions class, which, according to the description, stated that “14% of pregnant and postpartum women become clinically depressed.” It commented on new mothers as well, citing that a similar percentage develop serious anxiety disorders. Laura, admitting naiveté, blasted these statistics.
“Depression and anxiety? This is the happiest I’ve ever been. It’s only going to get better from here.”
We opted for Prepared Childbirth and Newborn Care. Each class, which met one night a week at our hospital, was taught by Elaine, a middle-aged hippie stick-figure. Everything, according to Elaine, was “far out” or “out of sight.” The courses, attended by other young couples expecting their first, should’ve been called Tips Only Shell Shocked Imbeciles May Not Know. Massages, easy breathing, pleasant thoughts, relaxing music: This was the substance of the first course. The other one - slightly more useful - involved little more than learning how to diaper and hold a newborn.
My baby experience was limited to giving up my seat on the ‘L’ train for a mother holding her sleeping infant or toddler to her breast. Laura’s was a bit more extensive. Her brother Rick and his wife Juliet have a small daughter, Ashley. And her other brother, Lyle, and his wife Pam, have a daughter, Morgan. Not to mention, she reminded me, babysitting all through high school and even some in college was how she earned enough money to buy her first car.
I was content to follow my wife’s lead with all baby matters. Her instincts. Her knowledge. The only expectation for me was that I’d listen. Despite my novice status, I found myself filled with confidence and even a strange nostalgia for my own childhood. I secretly wished we were having a boy, so I could buy him Matchbox cars and sports cards and throw a baseball around with him in our backyard. Then I would secretly wish it was a girl, who would look and act just like her mother and love her daddy with an undying forever kind of love and stare at me with big blue eyes as though I was her one and only.
I had heard about men who feel suffocated by impending doom when they’re about to embark on fatherhood. They feel fear and uncertainty. They long for their single life. They look at their wife with secret disdain - as though her eventual machination to sabotage their freedom has nearly come to fruition - and they become aloof and sometimes lustful of other women. This was not me. I knew what kind of father I was going to be. I knew what kind of family we were going to be. So I ignored the cynicism of some of my male coworkers - tired, jaded slobs with energy only for scare tactics veiled in banal jocularity - who would harass me about changing shitty diapers, being awoken at all hours of the night, and barely finding the time or stamina to resume any kind of sex life. I humored them. Widening my eyes as if to exude shock or incredulity, I’d listen and smile and then change the subject. How could I tell them I was so taken with the experience? Which I was. I loved looking at my wife more than ever; she was sexier and more magnetic than I could remember. We were closer now than ever before. I loved hearing her tell me in our second month that our baby had a heartbeat; that in our third, our baby’s bones were ossifying and ears had formed; that in our fourth, our baby made its own insulin and was urinating in the amniotic sac.
I became accustomed to riding this high, to having my senses sharper than ever, to plotting my family, that it was startling when it was all challenged. It began during Laura’s second trimester with a routine checkup with our OB/GYN, Dr. Rose, who, upon our first visit, told us to call her Hilary. Hilary, a subdued woman with short graying hair and a voice like a barely audible woodwind instrument, told us things were looking fine. The ultrasound, she said, was showing all the appropriate developments. As she consulted her chart, she asked if the nurse had gone over the upcoming test that was available. Laura shook her head, but said she had read about it in one of her pregnancy books. She knew it was referred to as a maternal serum.
“That’s right,” said Hilary, “maternal-serum-alpha-fetoprotein test, or MSAFP.”
Hilary explained the test to us:
“The MSAFP is a routine blood test that screens for certain fetal disorders. It’s generally offered to women between the fifteenth and twentieth week of pregnancy. It’s most accurate when performed between fifteen and eighteen weeks gestation. Which is right around where you are. Abnor
mal MSAFP levels are associated with genetic conditions, birth defects, retardation, and late-pregnancy complications. Because seventy to eighty percent of all trisomies - a type of inherited genetic defects - occur in women under the age of thirty-five, MSAFP is typically offered to pregnant women of all ages. Which is to say that the test is optional.”
Laura spoke up almost immediately:
“I think we’ll pass.”
I looked at her. She was wiping the ultrasound lubricant from her belly. I asked Hilary if most couples opted for the test. She told me some did and some did not.
“But it couldn’t hurt,” I said. “Right?”
“Some people like to exercise their right to gather as much information as possible about their unborn child. And others—”
“And others don’t,” I said.
“Right.”
“What would you do?” I asked.
Laura slid off the examination table and began to dress. She was looking at me. Dr. Rose smiled a polite smile, the fragile, weightless kind you extend when you’re in a hurry or when you’ve decided not to waste many words.
“I’d talk to my spouse about it,” she said.
Then she wheeled around and drew the curtain, separating herself from me and Laura. Opening the door to the examination room, she told us to let her know our decision, that she would schedule the appointment for us should we choose to go that route.
“It’s a routine blood test,” I said quietly to Laura.
“An optional routine blood test,” she said.
“I think we should do it.”
“You mean you think I should do it.”
I watched her slide her shirt over her head and pull her hair out from its back. She was looking down towards her belly.
“Yes, I think you should do it.”
“I honestly don’t see a point,” she said, picking up her purse from the floor.
“The point is that I’m one of those people who likes to gather as much information as possible about his unborn child.”
“Would the results change anything?”
Laura looked beautiful standing there in that office. Like the life inside her had at that moment produced a magical energy that surrounded her and multiplied and couldn’t be tampered with or turned off.
“Of course not.”
She studied my face for a moment. I wasn’t sure how I looked. Yet I’m positive I did my best to give off an air of insouciance.
“A routine blood test,” Laura said, sighing.
She moved past me towards the curtain. Following her, I offered to take her to our favorite restaurant, Great Caesar’s, a quaint and charming tavern we recently discovered in the center of town.
“A bribe?”
“Absolutely.”
“Shameless.”
“Absolutely.”
Laura turned to face me as she opened the door, declaring that I would have to sweeten the deal further. She was smiling.
Laura took the test two days after our visit with Hilary. The results would take up to seventy-two hours. We waited. Life went on. Distractions arose. I came home early one evening to find Glenn Kilburn sitting in my family room, hunched forward, a drink dangling from one hand, talking to Laura. He stayed seated when I entered the room.
“There he is,” he said, swigging from his glass. “I was just telling Laura here that your place is looking good. Classy. Sharp. Good taste.”
He looked around and pointed out what he liked: the matching jelly cabinets, the medallion Oriental rug, the green paint, which he knew, thanks to Laura, was called Mountain Botanical.
“Classy,” he said again, nodding his head this time. “You should see what we’ve got going on over there at the Kilburn residence. Antiques, antiques, and more antiques. I should call it a museum and charge admission.”
Laura stood and walked over to me. She explained that Glenn stopped over not too long before. So she offered him a few drinks and they got to talking.
“Just wanted to plead with you folks not to call the authorities on me if you see it getting too wild over there,” he said. “A frat party or two might be in my immediate future.”
It was difficult to tell if he was drunk or not. Laura turned to him and then back at me. Then she told me in a sobering tone that Glenn and his wife had split up.
“She went back to Maryland,” Glenn said, raising his glass. “Moved in with her parents.”
“It happened this past weekend,” Laura said.
Finishing his drink, Glenn began to suck on the ice. Laura walked to the liquor cabinet and removed a bottle of Irish whiskey I received as a secret Santa gift from a coworker. Then she filled Glenn’s glass and set the bottle on the coffee table. He thanked her and told me I was lucky to have a wife who didn’t love antiques. Leaning back on the sofa, Glenn sipped his drink and sighed to himself. Laura announced she had an idea: Glenn should stay for supper. She told him we were having lasagna.
“It’s become my latest craving,” she said, rubbing her stomach.
“I appreciate the offer,” Glenn said, “but how about a rain check?”
He was looking at me when he said this. I turned to Laura. She insisted again that Glenn join us.
“Maybe another time. But this was just what I needed, and I’m grateful.”
I wasn’t sure if he meant the alcohol or the company of a woman. He stood up as he drank his whiskey. Laura told him to call on us if he needed anything. Then she looked at me and smiled as she ran a hand through her hair. Glenn moved past me and I could smell the booze on his breath. He suddenly turned around and put his hand on my shoulder.
“You’re a lucky man,” he said, slurring a bit over his words. “Laura here has good taste. You ought to see my place.”
Then he leaned in towards me and softly cursed his wife, telling me the interior of their house was painted in the most antiseptic, lifeless color called Cool Gray. He looked around the room again as he finished his drink. Then he turned back to me and extended his hand, mentioning that he forgot to congratulate me. He asked if we had names picked out. We told him we had a few. He nodded and said goodnight. As he walked out the door, he still held onto the empty glass.
Laura said two things that night that bothered me. The first was that she was beginning to find Glenn Kilburn charming. It was his wife, she said, who must’ve been the supercilious one. The second was that Glenn agreed with her about maternal-serums. They both felt strongly that they were unnatural. And after all, she mentioned, he’s a doctor.
. . .
A nurse named Jody called us with the test results. It was early on a Tuesday evening. She spoke with Laura while I sidled up next to her so I could hear their conversation. The results were positive, she said.
“Which only means that the risk factor for Down Syndrome has increased,” she explained. “It does not necessarily mean your child will have Down Syndrome.”
Jody explained that the initial risk factor for serious birth defects is about 1/700. After Laura’s test results, the risk factor was now 1/71.
“Understand, though,” she said in a reassuring voice, “I see more false-positives than anything else.”
Jody explained our options. The next logical step, she said, was a fetal ultrasound. This would look for abnormalities like the lack of a nasal bone, overly thick neck skin, webbed feet, and so on. Without thinking, I blurted out that we wanted the next available appointment. Laura pulled the phone from her ear and threw her forefinger up in front of my face.
“Make the next available appointment!” I shouted.
Lau
ra apologized to the nurse while shooting me a deadly look. I hurried upstairs to my laptop and went online to find any information I could about these prenatal tests and birth defects and percentages of this and that. I was deluged with information. After a few moments, I gave that up. I sat on the edge of our bed, listening. Laura was off the phone and I could hear her quietly below me on the first floor. I heard the refrigerator door open and a chair being pushed in and a dish being set in the sink.
I wondered what she had told the nurse. Or if her attitude had changed - if she was now grateful for the maternal-serum. Or if she would oppose me when I demanded that we move forward with the next test. Laura and I didn’t see one another for the rest of that evening. She slipped into some quiet activity downstairs while I fell asleep earlier than I had in years.
Chapter 7
Dan Hart is a campus celebrity. First there’s his promiscuity, which is well known - and even well documented. He’s rumored to have seduced handfuls of female students, both younger and older, and has been seduced himself by many more. At only sixteen, it appears he’s well on his way to penicillin and paternity tests. A nice looking boy, Dan stands nearly six feet tall, has shaggy blonde hair, a slight build, and deep green eyes. His smile, which he wears on most occasions, looks like a magnet he’s crookedly fixed to his face and forgotten to remove. Some of his peers call him Dan Juan.
Another reason for this fame is that he is the one to have discovered the dead body of the local girl. Never a suspect himself, Dan cooperated with the police and with Rollie. He and his female companion, a sophomore named Jessica Levesque, answered the questions put to them before they slipped back into campus life.
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