His Best Friend's Baby

by Janice Kay Johnson - His Best Friend's Baby

  He’d been distant lately, Mindy thought with dismay. He seemed to enjoy Jessamine, but mainly when he could have her to himself. He never hung around when Mindy was nursing or changing diapers—although, the diaper part she could understand. Not that Quinn hadn’t changed a few diapers himself. He seemed happy on his days off to take care of Jessie for a couple of hours while Mindy worked in the garage or did errands.

  What was missing was the closeness she’d felt with him those last couple of weeks before Jessie was born, and even at first after she had been. Mindy couldn’t quite pinpoint when he’d changed. It hadn’t been abrupt, more like a gradual retreat.

  Did it have anything to do with the Christmas season? She couldn’t remember whether he had seemed any different last year. She had noticed that, despite Quinn’s talk about making Jessie’s first holiday special, he hadn’t even hung strings of lights from the eaves like his neighbors. Three days before Christmas, and he hadn’t suggested putting up a tree. Did he even have ornaments?

  She sighed. Blaming his mood on holiday-induced depression was wishful thinking on her part. Christmas had nothing to do with his mood. She had everything to do with it.

  Her sad conclusion was that the closeness had been an illusion. When he thought she’d needed him, he’d been there. Of course they’d talked—they’d spent an awful lot of time together that had had to be filled somehow. Now she didn’t need him, and he was following his preference, which seemed to involve avoiding her.

  Mindy knew she should be looking for a place to live. She had been looking—halfheartedly.

  He’d spoiled her. She’d been okay with scrimping until she’d come to live here. Now, her determination to save a substantial portion of Dean’s estate to put Jessie through college was flagging. After listening to Quinn’s bleak stories about his and Dean’s childhoods, she’d decided that she had to worry first about giving her daughter a sense of security neither man had had. She didn’t want Jessie learning to crawl on dirty indoor-outdoor carpet laid over a cold concrete floor, or paddling in a rusty bathtub. She especially didn’t want Jessie ever to be embarrassed about where she lived or feeling somehow less than her playmates. College...well, they’d worry about that when it came.

  Mindy had been looking through the classified ads in The Times and circling possibilities. She’d even called on a few. Secretly, she was relieved when they were already rented or had some feature that ruled them out.

  Now, looking down to find that Jessie had fallen asleep, Mindy thought, We have to find our own place. Quinn was trying to tell her he wanted his life back. She shouldn’t make him come right out and say it. She wasn’t sure she could bear it if he did.

  She and Jessie would have Christmas with him, such as it was, and then move.

  * * *

  SHE CIRCLED ADS IN THE PAPER and made a dozen calls, dismayed at discovering that all she could afford were apartments in complexes where she wouldn’t be able to set up a workbench a thin wall from someone else’s bedroom or kitchen. Nonetheless, she made appointments to see several.

  Would Quinn let her keep using his work area? she wondered with a flutter of hope. If she came only when he was gone, so she didn’t intrude, he might be willing. At least for now.

  At the sound of his key in the lock, she hastily folded the paper and put it on the chair next to her. She wanted to find a place and actually have a date set to move before she said anything. If Quinn saw she was looking, he’d feel obligated to tell her there was no hurry, and that would hurt when she could see he didn’t mean it.

  “Hi,” she said when he walked in.

  He must have showered at the gym, because his hair was wet and slicked back and his gray T-shirt clung damply to his chest. Mindy tried not to stare obviously, but he had such a beautiful body. He was muscular without being bulky like a weight lifter or stringy like a runner. He wasn’t super hairy, either, which she liked. Although his jaw was shadowed with evening bristle, he had only a dusting of dark hair on his forearms and no thick mat creeping from the collar of his shirt.

  “Hey,” he said. “Jessie asleep?”

  “Mmm.” She nodded. “I was tempted to try to keep her up, but she sleeps with such determination.”

  His expression softened. “Yeah, the way she scrunches up her face, I’d be afraid to try to wake her up.”

  “Won’t it be wonderful when she smiles?”

  “Yeah. A smile will be good.”

  He stood there, gym bag over his shoulder, and she sat at the table without even a book in front of her, as if she’d been staring into space.

  “Selene called,” she lied, indicating the phone.

  He nodded. They avoided meeting each other’s eyes for another awkward moment.

  “I should go to bed,” she said. It was almost nine. She might get a couple of hours of sleep before Jessie woke with an empty tummy.

  “Listen, I was thinking. Do you want to go pick out a Christmas tree?”

  “Oh! That would be fun.” Mindy hesitated. “Um...do you have ornaments? And lights?”

  “No, I thought we could buy some of those, too. Unless you kept Dean’s?”

  No Christmas decorations at all, she marveled.

  “No, he had sort of a designer tree with mauve and silver. I could never have hung a plastic spoon Jessie decorated with glitter in preschool on that tree. Anyway... Christmas ornaments didn’t seem like the kind of thing I needed to cart from apartment to apartment. So I sold them.”

  Embarrassed, even feeling a little guilty, as if she were tacitly criticizing Dean, she waited to see how Quinn reacted.

  He didn’t sound as if he’d even noticed her momentary discomfiture. “Makes sense.”

  Getting back to the point, Mindy said, “We’d better hurry up and do it or there won’t be anything left but scraggly trees and plain glass balls.”

  Quinn’s face was a study in conflict. He probably didn’t give a flying leap what kind of ornaments or tree they bought, but didn’t want to say so. After all, for whatever reason, he was determined to do this right.

  “Tomorrow? When I get home?”

  “That’ll be fun,” she agreed, without the slightest idea whether it would be.

  Another awkward pause ensued. “I’d better throw my stuff in the wash,” he said finally.

  She rose, phone in hand. “Sure. I’d better hang this up.”

  He shifted the gym bag on his shoulder and turned away.

  A minute later, she was heading for the bathroom when Quinn emerged from his room.

  “Going to bed?”

  Mindy nodded. “Do you want the bathroom first?”

  “No, go ahead.”

  She started toward it just as he came down the hall. They bumped right into each other.

  His hands gripped her upper arms.

  “I’m sorry...” died on her lips.

  Something flared in his eyes, and for an instant his fingers bit into her flesh. Then he all but pushed her away and went on down the hall.

  Breathless and shaken, she sagged against the wall. What had just happened?

  Nothing, she decided, on a wave of depression. She’d been imagining...well, she didn’t even know what she had imagined. Quinn was just in a mood. Disconcerted because she’d charged at him, maybe.

  She was the one who resonated at his touch and remembered the strength of his hand holding hers while she panted in labor, his gentleness massaging her back. She was the one who realized how careful he had been not to touch her since. Even handing Jessie back and forth, he seemed to try not to let their hands do more than brush.

  Swallowing, she continued into the bathroom.

  * * *

  “DO YOU LIKE LITTLE LIGHTS that blink on and off, or bigger ones?” Mindy’s tone was one of exaggerated patience.
r />   Quinn wondered if she’d already asked him. He knew his mind had been wandering.

  “Not blinking. Otherwise, whatever you like is fine.”

  “But...it’s your house.”

  He didn’t say, With you gone I won’t be putting them up next year. That would kill the Christmas spirit.

  “I’ve never bought any. I don’t know what I like.”

  She gave him a strange look, then wordlessly chose a box of lights from the shelf.

  The whole expedition was weird. They were in Fred Meyer. Mindy carried Jessamine in the denim sling and Quinn pushed the cart. They undoubtedly looked like any family out shopping.

  “Okay,” Mindy said, in a determinedly cheerful voice, “what about ornaments? Do you like a color theme, or a hodgepodge?”

  A picture flashed before his eyes: a tree decorated with what his adult eye realized was no aesthetic sophistication whatsoever, probably ugly by most people’s standards, but the child who remembered the tree was dazzled and thrilled. He’d helped string popcorn and wrap the string around the branches. And tonight was Christmas Eve! Santa would leave presents under it for him to find in the morning.

  “Quinn?” A hand squeezed his forearm. “Are you all right?”

  He shook his head to clear it. “Popcorn.”

  “What?”

  “Nothing.” He pretended to look at the boxes of ornaments. “I just remembered...” A long, long ago Christmas. Before his mother’s addiction had consumed her, when he still believed in childish fantasies like Santa Claus.

  Had there been presents under that tree in the morning? No memory of them surfaced, but neither did a ghost of the crushing disappointment that boy would have felt. Maybe, that year, his mother had managed a holiday to satisfy a child.

  Funny that he hadn’t remembered, hadn’t known there’d ever been a Christmas like other people had.

  “These,” he said, grabbing a box at random. Plain red glass balls.

  “Jessie would think those are pretty,” Mindy agreed, probably humoring him. “And shall we get some gold ones?”

  They finished selecting enough ornaments to dress a tree, a stand and the skirt to cover it, and a couple of rolls of wrapping paper and ribbon.

  He hadn’t bought Mindy anything yet and had no idea what she’d like. Dean had been a champion gift giver. Quinn couldn’t top the BMW. Anyway, she’d just had to get rid of most of what Dean had bought her.

  “I’ve gotten a couple of things for Jessie,” he said. “The other day, I was in Pioneer Square. There’s a toy store there.” Embarrassed, he shrugged. “I guess she doesn’t need toys yet, but I asked what was good for a baby.”

  Mindy smiled at him. “That’s sweet, Quinn.”

  Sweet.

  She laughed at him. “You don’t have to look as if I’d just insulted you.”

  “Yeah. Don’t let anyone hear you say things like that.”

  Her laugh rang out again, and despite himself his mood lifted.

  “Let’s pay for this stuff and go find a tree.”

  He’d passed a tree lot a block off California Street that day, and despite Mindy’s dire warnings there seemed to be plenty left to choose from.

  The night was dark and chilly. Forget the idea of having a white Christmas; Seattle was about to have another gray one.

  Garish lights made the lot as bright as day. He lifted Jessie from her car seat and inserted her into the snowsuit he’d bought as Mindy held it out. Then he zipped and put the bundle of baby and suit into the sling. Jessie was clearly awake now and probably needed a dry diaper, but she wasn’t yet squalling. She looked enthralled by the bright lights and strange shadows.

  Mindy stopped in front of some bushy trees that looked as if they’d been sheared.

  “I like those better.” He pointed toward crude racks of ones that were labeled noble and grand firs.

  “But they’re really expensive.”

  “Think of it this way. I’ve saved up my money from all those holidays when I didn’t buy a tree.”

  Her mouth pursed. “Oh. Well...I guess that’s true.” She wasn’t convinced, which amused him. “They are pretty.”

  He pulled trees out, one at a time, and Mindy circled them.

  “This one,” she said finally. “It’s perfect.”

  “We’ll take this one,” Quinn told the lot attendant, who proceeded to wrap the branches with twine and then helped Quinn load it in the trunk. Quinn paid and tied down the trunk while Mindy settled the baby in the car seat.

  At home, Quinn said, “Do you want to wait until tomorrow night to set the tree up? Or shall we do it tonight?”

  “Tonight,” Mindy said instantly, like a child unwilling to be denied a treat. “If you can wait while I nurse Jessie.”

  While she fed the baby, Quinn laid a tarp on the hardwood floor, then carried the tree in and set it in the stand, tightening the screws until the tree stood upright. He filled the cavity with water, then wrapped the red quilted skirt around to cover stand and tarp.

  When he returned from the car with the bag of ornaments, Mindy stood halfway into the living room.

  “Did we remember hooks?” he asked, even though he knew they had.

  “Yes.” Still hanging back, she did follow him to the tree.

  “Lights first?” he remembered.

  “Yep. You’d better do it, since you’re taller.”

  He plugged in the string they’d bought to make sure they worked, then untangled it and began wrapping from the top down. When he was done, they made adjustments, then clipped the small bulbs to branches. Quinn noticed Mindy was keeping the tree between them. Just as well.

  The Howies had always made decorating the tree an occasion. A couple of times, he’d tried to get out of it, but they’d been firm. He could hear George saying, “This is something we do as a family.” Quinn could remember making an effort not to feel anything. They could force him to be there, but they couldn’t make him get into the stupid Christmas spirit. He’d known, deep inside, that they were trying to breach his guard and that he was vulnerable.

  Carefully hanging a gold ball on a lower branch, Quinn wondered how different his life would be if he’d let himself succumb. Maybe he’d be married by now and have kids.

  Maybe he wouldn’t have to imagine that Dean’s wife and child were his.

  “Will you put the star on top?” Mindy asked.

  He summoned a grin. “You couldn’t do it without a ladder.”

  “I can get a kitchen chair,” she said with dignity. “I’m not that short.”

  “Uh-huh.”

  She tossed a pillow. He flung up his arms to defend himself. The atmosphere felt almost normal.

  She plugged in the lights while he found the box with the gleaming gold star. When he turned from putting it atop their tree, he saw her gazing at the tree in delight.

  “Oh, Quinn!” she breathed. “It’s beautiful.”

  He turned to look. She was right; it was pretty, especially considering they’d bought the ornaments tonight. They had more or less stuck to a color theme of red and gold, with a few striped and multicolor balls here and there. Mindy had hung a dozen white snowflakes that were made like Victorian doilies and then starched stiff.

  “Hey, we’re good,” he said.

  Mindy laughed, with a funny choking sound at the end. “Yes, we are.”

  Why, he wondered, did he have the feeling she was sad as well as happy?

  Later, after she’d gone to bed, he left the Christmas lights on and sat on the couch, gazing at the tree and trying to figure out why something as ordinary as celebrating a holiday evoked such a complicated swell of emotions in him.

  Frowning, he tried to separate these strands, as if they were strings of lights tangled after bein
g in a box together for too long.

  Grief, for his mother and for Dean and because he’d missed so much, some by his own choice. Images of other Christmases kept flickering through his consciousness. Quinn’s last Christmas before his mother died, when he’d sat alone in their apartment and looked at the blur of other people’s holiday lights out the window and felt afraid, because he knew she was slipping away and he didn’t know what would happen to him. That first Christmas at the Howies’, and Dean’s huge grin as he ripped the big bow from the handlebars of the bike and climbed on it. Drinks on Christmas Eve with Dean. An uncomfortable Christmas dinner or two at the Howies’. Pathetically decorated trees at the station, mistletoe in doorways, invitations tossed in the trash, murders committed on Christmas Day.

  And finally, last year, when he hadn’t been able to say no to Dean and had had dinner with him and Mindy. He’d felt stiff and uncomfortable, an outsider, and longed to be able to go home.

  Now he had all this new stuff knotted with the old: these feelings for Mindy, Jessie’s birth and his powerful love for her, this sense of his home and life being filled for the first time ever.

  And, most of all, the crushing awareness that it was all temporary, that one of these days Mindy would take Jessie and move out, that she might even remarry. When she created a family of her own, he’d be left forever outside the circle of her affection, with no right to have a part in Jessie’s life.

  Finally, feeling older than he had since he was that boy waiting for his mother to die, Quinn unplugged the Christmas lights and went to bed.

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  JESSIE SMILED for the first time on Christmas Day.

  Mindy said she hadn’t, that she wouldn’t be able to smile until she was six weeks old, but Quinn knew a smile when he saw one.

  He tickled Jessie’s toes. “You’re just jealous because you missed it.”

  “I didn’t have to see it. It was gas. A burp. A grimace. When she really smiles, she’ll light up.”

  “Jealous.”

  From the other end of the couch, she kicked him. “Am not.”

  Lazily content, he kicked her back. “Jealous.”