“Did he ask for something so Oriental?” I remember asking Alexandra when she’d triumphantly finished the job.
“Of course not,” she’d told me. “He had no idea what he wanted. So I had to tell him.”
Alexandra, I have to admit, can be frightening.
“So?” she said now, fixing me with her violet, appraising gaze.
I took a deep breath. It was the first time I’d speak the words to anyone other than my reflection in the bathroom mirror.
“I’m pregnant,” I said. “I bought a pregnancy kit, and it says I’m pregnant.”
Alexandra calmly took a sip of her massive martini, set the glass down on the bar, and then looked right at me.
“Who’s the father?” she said.
“My God, Alexandra,” I cried, “Ross is the father!” I glanced around to see who was staring at me. No one.
Alexandra nodded. “Good. Just checking. I don’t like to make assumptions. No one is perfect, my dear.”
I needed a moment to get past whatever it was I was feeling right then.
“I wouldn’t cheat on my fiancé,” I said finally. “I’m not a cheater.”
Alexandra sighed. “Honey, I know you’re not a cheater. By nature you’re a good, moral person. You’re ethical, upstanding, all of that. You’re a downright Girl Scout. But sometimes passion takes a person by surprise and—”
“Not me,” I insisted. And then I wondered if that was something to brag about. Never having been swept away by overwhelming feelings. Never having committed a crime, not even a misstep, of passion.
“I don’t understand why you’re so surprised,” Alexandra said, matter-of-factly. “I mean, you bought the pregnancy kit, right?”
“Well, yes.”
“So you must have had an inkling that something was wrong.”
“But I’ve never been pregnant before,” I said. How could I explain my puzzlement? “I’ve always been so careful. How could this have happened? I’m almost thirty-eight years old, I’ve been on the pill for years, and every gynecologist I’ve ever been to has told me I’m a perfect candidate for intensive drug therapies and artificial insemination and all that other awful stuff. God.”
“They say He works in mysterious ways.”
“Meaning what?”
“Meaning that maybe He wants you to be a mommy. I don’t know. I don’t believe in God. Your hands and feet are going to swell, you know. You probably won’t be able to wear your engagement ring.”
I shot a glance at the three-carat emerald-cut diamond on my left hand. Not be able to wear that gorgeous piece of jewelry? It was unthinkable.
“Who says I’m still going to be engaged once Ross finds out that I’m pregnant,” I said plaintively.
Alexandra opened her mouth and closed it again almost immediately. She frowned. She folded her arms across her chest. She unfolded them. She leaned forward.
“Oh, come on,” she said, “you don’t really think ...”
“See? Even you think he’s going to be mad and walk out on me.”
“Or suggest that you have an abortion.”
I didn’t know what to say. I’d been avoiding using the a word even to myself. It isn’t that I’m against the idea of abortion. I’ve always been staunchly pro-choice; there are certain circumstances where an abortion is simply the wisest path.
It’s just that the word is so ugly.
Abortion.
It sounds like war. It sounds like a man’s word. More accurately, it sounds like an aggressive man’s word. Abort the mission. The enemy has found us out. Abort, abort, abort! It makes me think of characters played by actors like James Coburn and Steve McQueen and Arnold Schwarzenegger— faces I personally don’t care to associate with the image of a cooing bundle of joy.
“How can I get an abortion?” I said, lowering my voice, though I, too, was convinced nobody in Bodacious cared at all about two women over thirty-five talking about babies. “I’m financially stable, I’m certainly old enough to be a parent, and I’m engaged. At least for the moment. What’s my excuse for not going through with the pregnancy?”
“You don’t want children?”
“There is that,” I admitted.
Alexandra took another delicate sip of her martini and swallowed.
“Perfection. And by the way,” she added, “if Ross has the nerve to be mad at you for something he helped make happen, kick him. Hard. In the ass.”
“I don’t think he’ll be mad,” I protested. “Ross is rarely ever mad. He’s rarely ever anything but—”
“But what?” Alexandra smirked. “Bland?”
“No,” I corrected with some annoyance. “I was going to say he’s rarely ever anything but pleasant. And let me tell you, a pleasant disposition is a good quality in someone you’re going to spend the rest of your life with.”
Alexandra shrugged. “If you say so. Look, why do you even have to tell Ross right away? Why not take some time and think things through.”
Really, I thought, I wonder if she thinks about what’s coming out of her mouth.
“Alexandra,” I said with great patience, “human gestation is only thirty-six weeks or so. With maybe three weeks down I don’t have much time to hide the fact that I’m pregnant. Anyway, I have to tell Ross right away. He is the father.”
“So?” she said.
“What do you mean, so? He’s my fiancé. We’re getting married. Husbands and wives are supposed to be honest with each other, about everything.”
And yet, when Ross had called earlier that day I’d chosen not to tell him he was about to be a father.
“Besides,” I went on, “he’ll figure it out on his own soon enough.”
“Men can be dense,” Alexandra pointed out.
“Not that dense. Anyway, Ross is very body conscious.”
Alexandra popped a gin-soaked olive in her mouth and chewed. “He keeps track of your eating habits?” she demanded finally.
“No. But he notices a change in my weight.” I shrugged as if Ross’s uncanny attention to weight gain didn’t bother me, but it did. Sometimes. “It’s just the way he is.”
“Neurotic,” Alexandra suggested. “Controlling. Shallow.”
“He cares about appearances. So do I. There’s nothing wrong with that.”
“Assuming you’re not contractually obligated to undergo liposuction every five years.”
Really, I thought, Alexandra can be such a drama queen.
“I’m not saying Ross would leave me if I gained a few pounds. He’s not horrid. Would I be engaged to him if he were?”
“I don’t know,” Alexandra shot back. “Would you?”
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
“It means that there’s nothing wrong with marrying for reasons other than romantic love. Women have done it since the dawn of time. Well, you know what I mean. Since it was prudent for them to ensure their future by marrying up.”
It took me several moments to reply. “I should be furious with you,” I said, “for suggesting I’m marrying Ross for his money and his looks and his social connections. I really should. But for some reason I’m not.”
Alexandra shrugged. “Because you understand that marriage is a legal contract at bottom. And within the bounds of that legal contract every couple has another contract, a private contract, their own rules. For example, I support you financially and you keep your mouth shut about my mistresses. That’s a popular one. Just look at Tony and Carmela Soprano.”
“Do I have to? That’s such a depressing marriage.”
“Do you really think so?” Alexandra said. “I think it’s kind of sweet in a way. But here’s another private deal: I take care of your aging mother and do all the housework and the maintenance of our upscale social life and you don’t ask me for sex. I’m sure that deal has its fans.”
“I’m not one of them,” I assured my friend. I wasn’t even sure how that deal would work. Was the husband supposed to go elsewhere for his sexual pl
easures?
“How about this?” Alexandra said now. “I call this the Arm Candy Deal. You do everything within your power to keep your looks—diet, exercise, Botox, surgery, bulimia if necessary—and I’ll take you to Europe every summer and buy you diamonds from Tiffany for every little occasion.”
“Where did you get such a jaundiced view of marriage?” I asked, wondering again what life in the solidly working-class Boyd family must have been like for a rare orchid like my friend.
“I keep my eyes wide open. The sanctity of marriage exists only in a storybook, if there.”
I sighed. “You’ll never get married with that attitude.”
Alexandra put her empty martini glass on the bar with more force than strictly necessary. “Have I ever said I wanted to?” she snapped. “Really, Anna, it’s dangerous to assume everyone wants the same happy ending. It makes one a very boring person.”
“One?” I smiled ruefully. “Don’t you mean it makes me a very boring person?”
“Now, I didn’t say that.”
But she’d implied it. And I really couldn’t argue. Sometimes I did worry that I was becoming more of a bore with every passing year.
I shrugged, took a sip of seltzer, and wondered if I was wild and crazy enough to order a glass of wine. I wasn’t.
“Did I mention that I’m happy for you?”
I looked closely at Alexandra. I was suspicious.
“Are you trying to make up for the boring remark?”
“No.”
“You don’t even like children.”
“I like you, and I’m happy for you,” she said. “Assuming of course that you’re happy for you, and clearly your jury is still out. So maybe I should say that if you decide to be happy about this pregnancy, I’ll be happy for you.”
I sighed. “Will you be nice to my baby?”
“Of course I’ll be nice to it. The kid. Although to be honest it would be easier if the kid turns out to be intelligent. I’m not very good with dumb people.”
“Mentally challenged. Differently abled people.”
Alexandra’s expression remained bland. “That’s what I said. Dumb.”
“You’re incorrigible,” I said.
“And you’re the only one I know who uses that word. Outside of a romance novel, I mean.”
“You read romance novels? I find that hard to believe.”
Alexandra smiled coolly. “I might not have great faith in marriage, but I’m not immune to chocolate hearts, chilled champagne, and violins singing in the background.”
“You left out the most important element of romance,” I chided.
“I mentioned the champagne.”
“The man, silly. What about the man? And by the way, who are you dating at the moment? You’ve been oddly silent about your own life.”
“That’s because you’ve been oddly talkative about yours.”
“I’m sorry.”
“Really, it’s okay, honey. What you’ve got going on is big news. Me? I’m just passing the time with some tax attorney.”
“Don’t you ever get tired of Mr. Right Now?” I asked.
I’m not a prude; I didn’t care how many men Alexandra slept with as long as she played it safe. It’s just that I was concerned my friend might miss a window of opportunity and never find someone nice with whom to settle.
“Ah, but that’s the beauty of Mr. Right Now,” Alexandra explained. “He’s always changing, and change is always exciting.”
Let me be honest. I’ve never been a huge fan of change. Generally speaking, I crave stability. It takes people like Alexandra to force me beyond the comfort zones I so readily establish.
“I don’t like change for its own sake,” I told Alexandra, unnecessarily. “I think that’s why I’ve never had a roving eye. Monogamy seems very natural to me.”
“I’m not abusing loyalty to the familiar,” Alexandra pointed out. “Necessarily. In fact, honey, I’m not even preaching here. I’m just telling you that I’m just fine not settling down. At least for now. Who knows what will happen in the future? The future, my dear friend, is deliciously uncertain.”
I frowned. Deliciously?
“Of course the future’s uncertain,” I said. “Everybody knows that. It’s just that suddenly it seems more uncertain than it ever has. Like, I don’t know, like a big raggedy question mark ready to explode at the slightest inquisitive poke.”
“Hmm. The future as pendulant piñata. Very interesting, if a bit of a stretch. But seriously, Anna, with a baby you’re going to have to learn to deal with change. You’re going to have to learn to expect the unexpected. You’re not going to be in control of your life. Not for a while, anyway. So say goodbye to your current routines and habits, honey. Life is about to get weird.”
“Thank you,” I said, “for being so gentle with the truth.”
3
He’s Got It All
Let me tell you about Ross Davis. He’s the dream catch of every single woman over the age of thirty. At least, of every urban-based, professional, well-dressed, single woman, and there are an awful lot of them about town.
People say Ross looks like a younger Pierce Brosnan, and that’s true to some extent, but Ross’s features are a bit more pronounced. His eyes are pale gray and quite pretty for a man. His hair is thick and dark and wavy; he has it expensively and expertly cut every three weeks at a salon on Newbury Street by a petite, stylish young woman he considers his grooming guru. I was jealous of the grooming guru until I learned that her husband is even wealthier than Ross. My fears were immediately put to rest.
Ross is in perfect physical shape. Some of that perfection is due to good genetic stuff; the rest is due to regular trips to the gym and a diet low in both fat and carbs. Ross appreciates good looks in others, too. I wasn’t at all surprised to find that every one of his male friends is as well groomed if not as naturally handsome as Ross. No need for a visit from the Fab Five for that crowd. Ross is a born metrosexual.
Oddly, in those early days, Ross didn’t care quite as much about my appearance as he did about his own. Sometimes I wondered if he saw me all that clearly, in detail, or if he was satisfied that I presented an overall attractive appearance. Ross might notice a change in my weight, but he often failed to notice things like a new blouse or highlights in my hair.
No one can argue the fact: Ross is self-focused. He’s not selfish, exactly. I think of selfish people as mean spirited, and Ross is nothing if not generally pleasant.
Anyway, there’s no doubt that one of the reasons Ross was drawn to me was because of my physical attributes and my personal style. And he liked the fact that I have my own small but successful event planning business. He liked the fact that I’m on a first-name basis with just about everybody who is anybody in Boston, even if most of those people are not my friends but my employers.
Ross is drawn to glamour like a moth is drawn to a flame.
Actually, that’s not quite right. At first I wondered about the fatality of his attraction, but after a few weeks together I realized that while Ross might like certain accoutrements of glamour, like his XJ8 Jaguar, he’s not interested in glamour’s dangerous aspects, like drugs and high-stakes gambling and driving that outrageously expensive Jaguar over the speed limit. A healthy degree of caution is a good quality in a husband.
Overall, Ross is a nice guy—the right guy for a lot of women. But was he the right guy for me?
Here’s what I told myself about two months into the relationship: Every man has his faults and flaws. What does it matter if Ross rarely reads a book and grumbles every time his accountant suggests he make a substantial charitable donation to one of the city’s homeless shelters? He dotes on me to the best of his ability, and he’s generally fun to be with.
I had no complaints. At least, none of the magnitude I’d had with former boyfriends. Ross isn’t a cheater, and I knew this because before getting too involved with him I’d asked around. He isn’t a drunk. He isn’t a mama’s
boy. Well, he isn’t too much of a mama’s boy. He isn’t homophobic or racist or ultra right-wing conservative. He went to college and graduated right in the middle of his class. More, he swears he never belched the national anthem, something a surprisingly small number of male college graduates can say. He doesn’t chew tobacco.
Most people like Ross Davis on sight. He’s not intrusive. He’s friendly and remembers names and knows how to act at parties. He compliments women without being disrespectful. Men find him unthreatening; they want to hang out with him, have a drink with him, cheer along with him at a ball game.
Most men, that is. There is one man I know who never succumbed to Ross Davis’s charms. But more on him later.
I met Ross at a party. We were drawn to each other right away and left the party early for more private conversation at one of the last surviving cigar bars in town, quiet even on a Saturday night. Neither of us smokes; Ross told me he was thinking of buying a leather chair similar to the one this bar featured and was curious to know my opinion of the chair.
We were engaged after about nine months.
Before the age of thirty-five I never would have dreamed of getting engaged to a man I’d known for less than a year. But when Ross popped the question—along with the cork on a bottle of very expensive champagne—I told myself I was old enough to know what I wanted. Why wait? What was the benefit of passing up a real, in-the-hand option for a phantom opportunity?
I asked myself, What if no one else eligible ever comes along? Where will I be then?
I was fast approaching forty, and for the first time the idea of spending the rest of my life alone seemed unappealing. I liked my independence (which could be why I waited so long to accept a marriage proposal), but I’d come to believe that personal independence could exist alongside healthy mutual dependence. At least, I hoped it could.
Babyland Page 2