by Kyra Davis
“I noticed you always kept that photo on your dresser at your old apartment, so when you didn’t immediately unpack it I sneaked it over to Sibella Brandeis.”
“The woman whose paintings they show at Café Mode? Oh, Tad, it’s incredible.” I quickly brought the back of my hand under my eyes to wipe away the tears.
“You always remark on how much you like her work.” I turned to speak but words failed me. No one had ever given me something so utterly wonderful.
“Here’s the photo.” He pulled his jacket off the back of the love seat and took a small manila envelope out of the inside pocket. “I have something else, too.”
“Tad, this is more than enough, I…” I turned back to the painting. “I don’t know what to say.”
He briefly disappeared into the kitchen and returned with a gift the size of a shoe box and handed it to me reverently. I stared at it for maybe half a second before ripping into it. I opened the top and pulled out a white pig wearing a policeman’s hat. I felt the corners of my lips twitch.
“I looked everywhere for something as ugly as that rabbit and this is the best I could come up with. And look—” he tapped the slot in its back gloomily “—he’s a piggybank. The stupid thing actually has a purpose. The bunny just lived to be ugly.”
“I love him,” I said, the tears now too plentiful to wipe away with just a sleeve. “I love my ugly capitalist pig.”
“Are you talking about me or the piggybank?”
I started laughing and he gingerly took the pig from me before enveloping me in his arms. “That’s all I wanted. To hear you laugh.” He kissed the top of my hair. “So are we good?”
“We’re better than good,” I whispered. “We’re soul mates.” Tad tilted my chin up with his fingertips and I could see the twinkle in his eyes.
I opened my mouth with the intention of saying something romantic. “We’re also pregnant.”
There was a silence in the room. Those were definitely not the words of romance that I had planned to say.
Tad took a step back. “Want to run that one by me again?”
I squeezed my eyes shut so that I wouldn’t have to see his face. “I’m pregnant,” I repeated. “I took the test yesterday and I got a plus sign. I’m pregnant.”
I opened one eye and peeked. Tad had his mouth hanging open like one of those cardboard clowns at amusement parks whose teeth are designed to be knocked out by flying beanbags.
Finally he managed to bring his lips closer together, although they still weren’t touching. “Are you sure about this, April? Is there any chance the test is wrong?”
“Is there any chance we won the lottery?”
“I didn’t buy a ticket.”
“Well, then our odds are about the same.”
Tad turned his head toward the window. “I don’t understand how this happened. Weren’t you taking the Pill?”
Ah, good question. What should I tell him? Yes, I was taking the Pill but never at the same time of day and often not even on a daily basis due to my complete flakiness? Or should I tell him that the medication that I started taking for my mild acne had a warning label that I didn’t bother reading? I felt a new lump forming in my throat and I tugged gently at the ends of my hair. “No birth control method is a hundred-percent effective,” I said lamely. “I guess we just made love during a blue moon or something.”
Tad turned his head back to me and his eyes searched my face. I felt my chin begin to tremble and I clenched my teeth in order to stop it. He took a step closer to me and slowly, gently, put one hand on either side of my face. “We’re going to be parents.”
Now it was my turn to drop my jaw. He wasn’t panicked at all! He was in awe! Suddenly a huge smile burst onto Tad’s face and he lifted me into the air and spun me around. “We’re going to be parents!” he said again, this time with so much enthusiasm that even I had to laugh. He put me down on my feet and dropped to his knees in front of me, carefully raising my shirt so that it bunched around my rib cage. I felt the palm of his hand glide over my abdomen. Then his lips landed just to the right of my belly button. “I can’t believe this. We’re really going to be a family now. Our own family.”
I ran my fingers through his brown hair, watching as it fell back into place. “I didn’t think you’d be happy about this. After all, we said we’d wait.”
“But it didn’t happen that way,” Tad said without a hint of remorse. He stood back up and pulled me to him. “It will be wonderful, April. We’re married, we have a house, my business is taking off and then, of course, there’s you.”
“Me?” I spoke the word into his shirt.
“Yes, you. This child is going to have you for a mother.” He squeezed me a little tighter. “How lucky can a kid get?”
And the tears were rolling again. If I didn’t get ahold of myself I was going to start a flood. But how could I help but be overcome? Tad wanted me to bear his children. I guess I had known that before, but to be able to feel his excitement now…to be surrounded by his love and respect for me…“I’m the one who’s lucky,” I said between sniffs. “I have the most wonderful husband in the world.”
We made love that night and it was incredible. Tad had never been so gentle, so admiring…it was like I was some kind of living piece of art that was to be admired, explored and savored. I fell asleep as he spooned me, his hand protectively on my tummy.
That night I dreamed I planted a rosebush. Two seconds after putting the seeds in the ground the plant sprung roots, and vines and stems burst from the ground. Within minutes my whole garden had been completely taken over by this unruly plant. There were other things that were supposed to be in that garden: snapdragons, a tomato plant, an apple tree. I searched desperately for them all, but they were gone. There were only the untrimmed offshoots of my one remaining bush and they were covered in dangerous thorns. But the roses…my God, those roses were the most intoxicatingly beautiful things I had ever seen.
THIRTEEN
I pulled a copy of What to Expect When You’re Expecting from the shelf at Borders and handed it to Caleb, who was already weighted down with an armload of books. “You already have that one,” he grumbled.
“No, you’re thinking of What to Eat While You’re Expecting. It’s the companion book to this one.”
“April, you bought five books yesterday, you’ve selected eight books so far today and you’re still shopping. The Library of Congress doesn’t have this many books.”
“Well I guess the buyers over at the Library of Congress aren’t properly motivated.” I pulled out a book by Dr. Sears and tucked it under my arm.
“Whatever happened to asking the moms and grandmas for advice? Or has that kind of thing gone out with the family sit-down dinner?”
“I’m waiting until the end of the first trimester to tell my family about the baby.” I found yet another book and balanced it on top of the others Caleb was holding. The stack in his arms now reached his chin.
“Can we talk about this?”
I gave him a noncommittal shrug and he awkwardly directed me over to a reading bench where he happily dropped the books on the floor in front of us. We both sat down and silently stared at the pile for a few moments before Caleb spoke. “Usually when a woman buys this many books about pregnancy it’s because she’s thrilled to pieces about playing the mommy role but—” he made some kind of vague gesture with his hands as if he was trying to pick up some kind of psychic reading from my aura “—I’m not sensing a lot of joyous excitement from you. If anything, you seem…nervous.”
“Are you using nervous as a euphemism for scared shitless?”
“Okay, we can go with that.” Caleb put his arm over my shoulder. “Are you worried that you won’t live up to the Donna Reed standard of motherhood, or is there something else?”
I picked at a thread that was sticking out of the thigh-high slit in my skirt. “Of course, what else would I be scared about?”
Caleb picked up one of the books and
started casually thumbing through it. “You know it wouldn’t make you a bad person if you were worried about the impact this was going to have on your life.”
“I want this child to know that he or she is wanted,” I whispered. “I don’t want him to ever think otherwise.”
“The way you did.” Caleb closed the book and picked up another. “And right now you don’t feel like you want him enough.”
“Wow, Caleb, did you go out and get a degree in psychology while I wasn’t looking?”
“No, but I watch a lot of Oprah.” He tapped his finger against the book he had been perusing. “Listen to this. ‘Many men don’t bond with their unborn children to the same degree as their pregnant wives. This does not mean that they will be bad fathers. Many of these men turn into superdads the minute their children take their first breath. So don’t worry if your husband isn’t singing lullabies to your belly. We are all individuals and we all emotionally connect to our children at different times and in different ways.’”
“But Tad does sing to my belly.”
“Mmm, so we have a little role reversal going on.” He took hold of my index finger and placed it on the last line of the paragraph he had read. “‘Different times and in different ways,’ April. It doesn’t matter if it’s the mom or the dad, the message is the same. You can be a good parent even if you aren’t overwhelmed by feelings of maternal love the minute a sperm makes contact with your egg.”
I took the book from Caleb and stared at the words without reading them. “I’m twenty-six. I used to think that at this age I’d be getting ready to graduate with a Ph.D. in art history.” I shrugged. “That’s never going to happen. I’m going to be a buyer at Dawson’s instead, and even that ambition will be left unfulfilled if Blakely finds out about this pregnancy before promoting me.”
We both fell silent as we watched a harried-looking woman usher three small children to the escalator.
“You told me awhile ago that you didn’t want to be a curator anymore,” Caleb reminded me. “You said that you were happy at Dawson’s.”
“And you believed me?”
“No. But I was fairly sure you believed you.”
I looked away from him. I didn’t want to cry.
“Lots of moms go back to school, April.”
I shook my head. “Pregnant or not, I was never going to be a curator. It’s just that now I feel like I have to give up on the fantasy.”
“You don’t have to give up on anything.” Caleb checked my expression to see if he was reaching me. He apparently surmised that he wasn’t because he threw his hands up in defeat. “So what’s with all the books?”
“I know this is going to sound terrible, but I’m pregnant because I behaved…irresponsibly.”
“It doesn’t sound terrible, just honest.”
“Well, I’m going to be responsible about this. I’m going to eat the right foods, do the right exercises, select the right birthing center…the whole deal. This child is going to be well taken care of from day one.”
“Uh-huh.” Caleb pulled another five books off the floor. He checked the table of contents of the first one and turned to the page he desired. “‘It is important that women maintain a diet high in complex carbohydrates throughout the length of their pregnancies,’” he read aloud. He picked up the next and turned a few pages before reading, “‘Pregnant women should adopt a high-protein, low-carb diet.’” He reached for book three. “‘If you’re longing for a bagel and cream cheese, eat it, likewise if you have a hankering for prime rib.’ Your body knows best…unless you’re craving spicy foods, in which case you should throw yourself off the nearest bridge because you’re most likely pregnant with the Antichrist.”
“It doesn’t say that.”
“No, it doesn’t, but you see my point. You could read each and every one of these books and all you’re going to get is confused. Find three that are written with a viewpoint you relate to and stick to those.”
“So you’re telling me that moderation is key. Huh, where were you when I was buying out the shoe department with Allie last week?”
“What do you mean where was I? There was a men’s sample sale at the Fashion Center.”
I went home with only two books and several grocery bags full of the foods recommended in the latest issue of Fit Pregnancy. Okay, there was a Twinkie in there, too. I unloaded it first and held it up to eye level so that I could better admire it. Not one of the pregnancy books had recommended Twinkies. But maybe that was the problem with today’s youth. We were spoiling them with too much healthy food and exercise. Maybe we needed to toughen them up by teaching them how to survive the horrors of trans fat. I was using my fingertips to pull open the opaque plastic wrapper when the phone rang. It was a sign from God. I wasn’t supposed to eat this. I almost threw the treat away but I couldn’t quite get myself to do it. I ended up stuffing the Twinkie in my purse instead. That way it could be like the unsmoked cigarette carried around by a former addict as a badge of honor. I picked up the phone a second before the answering machine got it.
“Yello.”
“April, it’s Nick.”
“Hey, Nick, what’s up?” I hadn’t talked to our landlord since before Tad and I had moved into his place. Tad dealt with all the little details of our life, such as paying the rent.
“Is Tad there?”
“Nope, he may not be for a while. Can I help you with anything?”
“Well, you could pay me the rent for starters.”
“Oh…” I glanced at the calendar, February was more than half over. “I’m sorry, didn’t Tad pay you yet?”
“Not for this month, and he’s been late with it every single time. I know his business is going through a transition period but I can only be so lenient, even for a friend.”
I dropped onto a kitchen chair. Why would Tad fall behind on the rent? “I’m…I’m so sorry. Tad’s been busy, he must have done something silly like written the check but forgotten to send it out or something. He would never be late on purpose.”
Nick didn’t say anything.
I ran my nails up and down my leg self-consciously. “I’ll send you a check today. Twenty-five hundred for February, and how much is the late fee?”
“You owe thirty-one hundred for February.”
“Excuse me?” I was on my feet again. “I understand if you’ve attached a penalty for us being late, but seven hundred dollars is a little steep.”
“I’m not attaching any penalty at all, although I probably should. Your rent is thirty-one hundred dollars.”
“Are you even familiar with San Francisco’s rent-control laws? You can’t raise rent on existing tenants at a rate higher than, like, two percent a year. Give me a break!”
“I’ve been giving you a break by not demanding the rent when it’s due. Your lease agreement clearly states that the rent is thirty-one hundred dollars. Now, are you going to pay me or are you going to find a new place to live?”
I couldn’t believe this. I had only met Nick a few times but he had seemed like a decent and reasonable guy. Obviously my asshole radar had been malfunctioning on the days he’d been around. “I’m going to talk to Tad about this. If we owe you anything, we will pay you. Otherwise I strongly suggest that you rethink your extortion tactics because I will drag your sorry butt to court.” I hung up the phone and ignored it when it rang again. He was so not going to get away with this. I started pacing back and forth across the hallway. Tad thought Nick was his friend. Maybe not a close friend but certainly not someone who would screw him over.
Who did he think he was kidding? Just because my name wasn’t on the lease didn’t mean that Tad hadn’t told me exactly what it said. I walked into the guest room where we kept all our important files. I pulled out the top drawer of a wooden file cabinet with so much force that it almost came tumbling out. I reached the back of the files without being able to locate the lease. I then searched through the drawer beneath it. Finally I went to the drawer closest t
o the floor. I yanked it with the same force as I had used on the others, which almost caused the whole damn cabinet to fall on top of me. But the drawer didn’t open. I tugged at it again, more gently this time. It was locked.
I fell back from my squatting position and sat on the floor with my knees sticking straight up in the air. Why had Tad locked the cabinet? I studied the lock and laughed. If Tad thought that lock was going to keep anyone out he had some serious gaps in his education. I could pick that. I was actually pretty good at picking locks. My mother and I had been evicted on two occasions when I was a kid. The first time it had happened the landlord had changed the locks on the apartment, so when Mom’s boyfriend du jour escorted us back home from a weekend nature retreat we found ourselves unable to get to our things. Mom’s boyfriend had used the opportunity to teach us both how to pick locks…so we would be “prepared for next time.” I got to my feet and retrieved a bobby pin from the bathroom and stuck one end of it in the keyhole. “Easy peasy,” I murmured as the drawer sprung open. I flipped through a few files that pertained to Tad’s company. Finally I found the lease.
My eyes stopped when they got to the figure $3,100 per month.
I heard the front door open and close. “April?” Tad’s voice traveled through the walls that separated us, but I didn’t respond. I just stared at the lease.
“April.” This time he said my name in the teasing manner of a lover expecting to play some kind of flirtatious version of hide-and-seek. Still, I was silent. I listened to the sound of Tad’s footsteps as they moved through the living room to the kitchen and finally down the hall to where I was.