Nine Months

by Paula Bomer

  THE NEXT MORNING, DICK takes the kids to school. “Are you OK, sweetie?” Sonia looks ashen. Pregnancies can have complications, she knows from their various friends. They were lucky with their two boys in that although Sonia was a psycho-bitch when she was pregnant, she didn’t get high blood pressure, she didn’t get diabetes, she didn’t get any of the bad things that one can get when one is pregnant. But now Dick looks worried because Sonia looks horrible.

  “I think I’ve seen a ghost,” she says, and she thinks, I’ve seen the ghost of my future.

  “Call Dr. Silver, Sonia. And maybe go see your midwife and get your blood pressure and stuff checked.” He sits on the bed next to her. Sonia looks at him, but does not see him.

  “Yeah, maybe I’ll call Dr. Silver,” she says, and they kiss goodbye, lightly, and the boys run up to her and throw themselves at her and everyone gets kisses and goodbyes and she lays there and thinks, I’m not calling my shrink.

  I’m not calling my shrink because he can’t make me not be pregnant. I’m not calling my shrink because I don’t want someone watching over me, trying to get me to get through my days like a good person. Like a responsible person. I don’t want to cook dinner for anyone, I don’t want to do laundry, I don’t want to pick up milk. I don’t want to be that well-functioning person that everyone wants me to be. I want out. I want out of here. And my shrink won’t “support” me on that. My shrink’s on their side, even if he pretends to be working for me.

  The apartment is quiet. She pulls herself out of bed and she’s not shaking. She’s calm. This pleases her and she hums while she showers and afterward, after rubbing herself dry delicately so that it feels really nice, her flesh all damp and clean and the towel kissing her, then, then, she pulls on her new maternity black sweatpants. They are big and make her look and feel like a cow but hey, she doesn’t fit into anything else so what else is she to do? And she’s still relatively small, considering how far along she is. Then she attempts to put on her new blue maternity shirt and that’s it, her calmness is gone. Her rage has been triggered. The fucking shirt, the pale blue huge shirt. It is not what she is. She rips it off and scrapes her ear in the process and pulls on a Hanes wife-beater and then grabs her old black leather jacket from the closet, and dammit, she’s shaking again. Her apartment seems tilted sideways as she stands in the center of it. It’s a lovely apartment. Dick picked up all of the toys. The floor shines up at her, the dark brown wood serene and perfect in front of her. This is her home. She’s always loved this apartment but it’s too small for three kids. Exposed brick walls, the large open living room with a soaring ceiling. The loft, the privacy of the loft, their bedroom. The children’s room off the small kitchen. They’d had such a good life here. But she doesn’t belong here.

  She doesn’t call Dr. Silver. She doesn’t even call her husband. She calls Clara, who answers the phone.

  “Hello?”

  “Clara?”

  “Hi, Sonia! Wearing that blue maternity shirt I told you to get? It was the best color for you. It matched your eyes perfectly.”

  “Clara, I have to ask you a favor.”

  “Sure thing.”

  “I need you to pick up the boys from school today.”

  “OK.” Says Clara. “Are you OK? Is everything OK?”

  “Everything is not OK. Oh, and after you pick them up, call Dick at work, OK? His number is 212-652-7742. Got that?”

  “What’s going on Sonia. Are you OK? Are you going to the hospital?” Clara asks.

  “I’m not going to the hospital. Don’t worry. Thanks for doing this for me,” Sonia says.

  Clara can tell she’s about to hang up. “Wait, Sonia. Don’t go. What’s going on? You have to tell me.”

  “Thanks a lot, Clara. I gotta go.” And that’s it. She hangs up. She throws her new maternity clothes in a bag and heads out the door.

  AS SHE WALKS TO the garage to get the car, her legs feel like rotten vegetables, like mushy stalks of zucchini. Will they live without her? And she didn’t even say goodbye. How can they live without her? If she’s not there, she will be dead to them. They took away her life, they didn’t mean to, but they did. And now here she goes, pretending she can claim it back.

  AND AS SHE STARTS up the car, she thinks, where am I going? And then she thinks, it doesn’t matter. I’m going, I’m gone, I’m doing what every mother dreams of doing because I’ve always followed my dreams. I’m doing what every mother fears she’ll do, because I’ve always confronted my fears. I’m doing something really terrible and I’ll be punished for it, no doubt, but I’ve always been a troublemaker. And that’s it, her hands want to shake but they can’t shake too much because she’s driving. They want to freeze but she grips the wheel and it keeps them warm. And her mind starts to expand and then it stops, because she has to focus on the road. It’s called survival. Fear and flight. Our natural reaction to a bear in the woods. Sonia’s been in the woods. And the bear’s her whole fucking life.

  Once Sonia gets going on 95 going north, once she is definitely out of the city, it is all she can do not to slam on the breaks and turn back, or slam on the gas pedal and speed 100 miles an hour. She feels … extreme. She’s free! Every now and then she lets out a high-pitched squeal of delight and fear. But it is the beginning of her trip, of her adventure—indeed, the very first day—and so she’s not comfortable really talking or exclaiming out loud to herself. (That would come later.) Hence, the high-pitchedness of her squeal. Things had not gotten gutteral. Not yet.

  As the day wears on and she drives further and further into the New England countryside, past the suburbs, deep into the hilly, tree-laden world that is Massachusetts, she’s struck with how gorgeous the world really is. The sun hangs deep and yellow in the painfully clear sky, the trees sparkle every shade of orange and red. Autumn in the country. And she’s alone! Alone at last! No crying babies demanding she try to stick a bottle in their mouths while driving. No toddlers saying, “I’m bored. Are we there yet?” No young child throwing up from carsickness. No one demanding to stop because they have to pee so badly they are about to wet their car seat.

  Except that Sonia has to pee. And even if there are no children in the car—she glances into the rearview mirror just to make sure—nope, no children!—there are the car seats, accusingly empty.

  The miles accumulate. Traffic is sparse. The sun is setting and a darkness settles in. She turns on the lights and the road spreads out gray and weakly lit before her. Funny how lights on a car don’t feel important until it’s deep into the night. She’s been listening to CDs and, alternately, to the radio, and now her ears hurt. She turns down the music. A green sign saying rest stop in three miles presents itself. Good, she thinks. She can make it until there.

  And she does. But barely. She parks the Passat as near to the restrooms as she can and then rushes into the bathroom, whose smell reminds her of a pig farm she drove by on a family road trip combined with a dead rat she removed from the courtyard of an old apartment—a juicy, rotten stink. She sits on the toilet seat without thinking or looking and, immediately, her ass feels wet. Her wet, cold butt sticking to the toilet seat fuels the cancerous growth of self-hatred that Sonia has festering inside of her. She is disgusting and incompetent. But she is peeing and feels some relief. And it dawns on her that this is the first of many public bathrooms she will encounter.

  Afterward, she manages a decent cleanup job. There is toilet paper—hallelujah!—and even warm water in the sinks. She stares at herself in the mirror. She sticks her chest out. She has the glow. The pregnancy glow. The moist skin, the seemingly smiling face. The Mona Lisa smile that all pregnant women get. It’s not a real smile, but it seems like one to the outside world. She sticks her tongue out and leaves the restroom.

  It is a beautiful night. Even here, next to the highway. The air is crisp and cool and her nipples harden under her tank top. And even though cars whiz by on the highway occasionally, the rhythmic noises of crickets and birds overwhel
m the traffic. Sonia sits on top of her car, delicately though, as it feels a bit warm. She folds her hands in her lap and breathes slowly for a minute, her eyes closed. I’m here now, she thinks, that’s all. Nothing else matters.

  There are a handful of other cars. A few spots away from her Passat, with no cars in between, is a green Chevy pickup, with a young, dark-haired man leaning against it, holding a cup of coffee and smoking a cigarette.

  Sonia immediately likes him. His dirty hair, long but not too long, like a haircut gone neglected. His pants are tight, but not painfully so. He’s got tattoos, which she notices first. Then she notices his arms. They are big.

  “You’re staring at me.”

  “I’m sorry?” Sonia calls back.

  “You’re staring at me.” In the low light, it’s hard to see if he’s smiling, what his expression is.

  “Can I bum a cigarette?”

  Sonia hasn’t smoked since college. She walks over and every muscle in her body feels tight and strange, as if walking were something her body had never done before. He taps out a Camel filter for her. He looks older than he is. He has that reddish-tan seeming skin that has a bit to do with the sun, and much to do with cigarettes and alcohol. Sonia finds it sexy in him—decadent, reckless.

  “I haven’t had a cigarette in a long time,” she says.

  “Are you pregnant?”

  Sonia looks down at her bump. She feigns surprise. “Look! I am pregnant!”

  “Phew. For a minute there, I thought I had made a mistake.” He has an accent that Sonia can’t place. “That’s no good, saying a woman looks pregnant when she’s not.” He laughs, looking away from her.

  But quickly, he’s leaning toward her, flicking his lighter at the cigarette in her mouth. She doesn’t inhale, but she holds the dry smoke in her mouth. It’s too much. Her hand shakes as she takes the cigarette out from between her lips.

  “Where are you from?” she asks him.

  “From Hingham, the south shore of Boston. I was visiting my dad. He lives in Connecticut. Where are you from?”

  “From Brooklyn,” she answers, and then wonders if this is the time where she starts lying about where’s she’s from. Or if she’s pregnant. Let them think she’s fat! Who cares? Guys fuck fat chicks. Some guys do. Or if she’s married. The hand with the cigarette, her left hand, sports a wedding ring. She wonders if she should take it off. Hell, guys fuck married women all the time. In fact, Sonia decides, many may prefer to. Perhaps the sort of man Sonia is looking for prefers married women. If Sonia is looking for men, which she’s not quite sure about. Is she looking for men? For what? For laughs? She is looking at this man now. He is beautiful to her. The cigarette and his arms and his accent and everything about him, his truck everything, is making her feel weak, lightheaded.

  “Where’re you heading?” he asks.

  “That’s a good question. I guess to Boston. I’m on a road trip. And I don’t have a strict itinerary.”

  He smells good. She’s standing so close to him that she can really smell him. He smells salty and smoky. Like he’s been sweating a bit, but not too much. His biceps bulge, his tattoo is of a dragon, his arms are covered with coarse, dark hair.

  “Are you OK?” he asks and he puts a hand on her arm. “Yeah, the cigarette just made me dizzy.” But really, it’s his touch that pushes her over the edge. “Can I sit in your truck for a minute?”

  Now he looks at her strangely.

  “Please?” she says, weakly.

  “Sure.” She can hear a bit of nervousness in his voice. “I do have to be going soon.” He starts looking around himself, as if he was waiting for someone.

  She wants to scream, Fuck You! Pussy! What are you afraid of? Be a Man! Help Me Out! But instead, she says, “Thanks. Just for a minute.”

  Then she looks at his face. He’s chiseled. It’s as if she ran into Colin Farrell here on the side of 95 in deep New England. Except this guy’s taller, and smells. And he probably gets his cut arms from doing real work, not from hanging out with his personal trainer. God how Sonia hates actors, the whole concept of them, pretending to be real people. But she loves men. She loves real men.

  “Come sit next to me.” Her voice comes out smooth, a little deep.

  “Are you married?” He’s standing in the doorway of the driver’s seat, she’s already scooted over the bench—this truck has a bench!—to the passenger’s side. He’s got one leg crossed over the other.

  “Not really. My husband … my husband died. Just sit next to me.” Oh, boy, thinks Sonia, this guy is young. All the cigarettes and booze in the world can’t kill this hard, strong youthfulness underneath. Good lord, he could be nineteen.

  “Wow.” He sits next to her. “Is he the father of your child?”

  “Shh.” She puts a finger up to his lips and looks into his eyes, leaning a bit closer. He wants it, too. Or so she hopes. Prays. Dear God, please let this guy want to fuck me. “Don’t talk about it. I’m not so pregnant yet,” she says, rubbing her hands gently on her smooth, rounded belly. “I’m still toward the beginning. Not yet the middle. But feel this,” she says and takes his hand—God, the feel of his hand, so rough, this man is a laborer—and places it firmly on her right breast.

  He looks away, out the back window. With his free hand he slams the truck door shut. It’s dark out now.

  She reaches out to his face and she’s kissing him. He tastes sour, stale and dry. She’s nervous but she keeps at it and he’s kissing her and squeezing her breast. She lifts up her tank top and pulls up her bra over her breasts and takes both of his hands and puts them on her tits. Oh, God! This is so wrong! Now his mouth goes down on them and she moans—her nipples are so hot and painful, she almost comes just from his mouth on them, she’s bucking her hips up toward him now.

  Suddenly, he pulls back. “I can’t do this,” he says quietly. Then he grabs her breasts again and she sits on top of him and grinds against his erection. His dick is big. Everything about this guy is huge. His big arms are around her body now, now her neck, on her side. She hoists herself up and starts the awkward undressing, the ripping, the just a minute, the I got it, I got it, the wait, not yet.

  First she’s on top and he’s inside of her, but she can barely get him all in there. Then he pushes her down on the bench, she stretches one of her legs over the car seat and wham. He’s fucking her. It hurts some, in that good way that fucking hurts. She hates to look in the eyes of Dick when she’s fucking him, but for some reason, here in the dark with this stranger, she looks straight at him. His eyes glow like cat’s eyes in the dark. His mouth is loose and open. He looks right back at her and then spits on his thumb and puts it on the base of her clit and pushes very, very gently. This man knows pussy. He fucks her hard, his other free hand on her hipbone and her breasts start shaking in her face and she comes, the vision of it all, the sordidness, the feel of it. It’s so awful. It’s so right. God. God! To get fucked in a truck on the side of a highway by a man who doesn’t give a shit about her, about what’s for dinner, about their social life, about, about … how the kids are today. And when he’s about to come, she screams, “Don’t take it out! I can’t get pregnant! I am pregnant! Don’t pull out! Come, come inside me!”

  Which he does.

  AFTER, SHE WASHES UP in the bathroom again—she wipes the seat carefully this time—and when she comes back out, his truck is gone. Which is all fine and well. She heads toward the Passat. She opens the backseat doors and one by one, throws her sons’ car seats on the grass. She grabs her cellphone out of her purse and tosses it in the garbage can. Then she gets back in the car and drives, drives on, she sings to herself, deeply now, her voice coming out without that squeal, in her car without children’s car seats and maybe she is free, really free, for the first time in a very, very long time.

  What does it mean to have no plans? To be on the lam? Sonia stops at a branch of her bank in Connecticut. She withdraws everything in the savings account. Seven thousand dollars. Then she
keeps driving. It’s dark, she’s not a great driver in the dark, that’s what living in New York City does to you, but she has a feeling she’s about to get better at it.

  She checks into a hotel, a cheap Holiday Inn Express in Brighton, on the outskirts of Boston. Brighton still had a sort of Irish and immigrant vibe to it when Sonia lived in Boston, all those years ago, when she was actually free, free because she was young and had no real responsibilities, not free as she was now, because she was abandoning very real responsibilities. Ironically, when she was actually free, it felt just like life, not like freedom. But now that she was stealing it, it felt exhilarating and much more real and visceral. She felt it, coursing through her body.

  Nineteen. At first, she hadn’t been very good at being young. She was too earnest, too serious. She read anti-pornography feminist tracts and existential philosophy. She painted dark, morbid figures, writhing in pain and blood. Then she met Katrina. Katrina changed her life.