All the Better Part of Me

by Ringle, Molly

  I set my reservation for one week, figuring I’d find a way to extend it if need be. Or cut it short. Which would really be a lot worse, so I tried not to think about that.

  At the gate, I texted Andy.

  Sinter: Fiona’s in labor. I’m about to get on a flight. I hate how you and I left things, I really want to fix it, and I hope to. In the meantime good luck and let me know how your trip goes

  All I could do for now.

  Next, I opened my mom’s email, which I had completely forgotten about in the baby excitement. I reread it, then gazed out the window at the lights of planes taxiing around on the dark tarmac.

  I typed in an answer.

  Hi Mom,

  As it happens, I’m going on a trip too. Back to London for a couple weeks, on business having to do with the movie. I’m doing fine. I have a new place in Seattle. Address is below.

  Have fun in California. I’ll be in touch.

  Sinter

  I typed in my new address and sent the message. Not quite a support network yet, but being back on speaking terms was better than nothing.

  As for what kind of speaking they’d be doing when they learned about Verona, I filed that straight into “stuff I’m not going to think about right now.”

  Boarding wouldn’t begin for half an hour. In search of a distraction, I wandered into a gift shop.

  I hadn’t bought any baby items yet because, as I’d told Kam and Chris, it would be too depressing to collect onesies and pacifiers and bibs, only to come home alone, to a roomful of unused stuff, if something were to go wrong. But …

  No way could I walk in empty-handed. I had to bring her something.

  Most of the onesies for sale were for three-month-olds or above. Finally, I found one sized for a newborn, so tiny it hurt my heart to pick it up and spread it out on my palm.

  Someone in Seattle loves me, it said, in emerald cursive on white. Totally cheesy. But true.

  I bought it, rolled it up, and tucked it into my carry-on. Right next to Andy’s T-shirt, which I had brought with me even though luggage space was precious.

  Then, for Fiona, I bought a small duty-free bottle of crème de men-the. Surely she’d appreciate a drink after this ordeal.

  Our flight began boarding. On the plane, I bought the internet connectivity option and checked texts one last time before switching my phone into airplane mode, but Andy hadn’t answered.

  Stuffed mid-row between two strangers—who at least stayed quiet—I settled in for what was sure to feel like the longest flight of my life.

  London. It would be good to see London, at least.

  Oh, yeah. And my friends.

  I emailed Daniel and Julie.

  Hey guys, I’m on a flight to Heathrow. Fiona, my director, is in labor with my kid, so I want to be there. And hopefully take baby girl home with me. Fiona says it’s okay, but we’ll see. Lot going on. But I want to see you if you’re around.

  Our flight took off.

  It wasn’t long before Daniel and Julie woke up—first thing in the morning over there—and fired back an answer apiece.

  Daniel wrote, I’m sorry, Sinter, what? Could you start over please?

  Julie wrote, OMG Sinter, are you serious????

  I elaborated, typing in the story for them—at least, the part about my brief fling with Fiona and her lack of interest in being a mother, but not the part about my involvement with Andy. Their responses came another few minutes later.

  I can’t believe you didn’t tell us till now, Daniel wrote. You know we’d be thrilled for you, mate.

  In response to that, Julie emailed, Definitely! And we will help babysit while you’re in town. You must let us. I want to meet the wee one. :)

  I wrote back, You guys are awesome. Thank you so much. Can’t wait to see you.

  There was a reason I had chosen to hang out with people like them instead of my own family, I supposed.

  As we soared across the world in the middle of the night, I tried, at first, to catch an hour or two of sleep, because Chelsea’s latest message told me to. Labor can take a day or more, especially with one’s first baby, she wrote.

  So I dozed. But I kept opening my eyes and rechecking email.

  Two hours into the flight, Chelsea sent another:

  Spoke too soon! Her water’s broken and contractions are lasting longer. They’ve got her on the epidural, so she’s more comfortable. Still hard to say how long it’ll take, though.

  I sat up straighter and nibbled my lip in confusion, because I’d thought the water broke right at the start of labor. Web search time: Google told me that while it could happen like that, it often happened in the middle of the process instead. Okay then.

  I thanked Chelsea and told her to tell Fiona, from me, that she was doing a great job. Then I twitched my fingers on my thigh and jiggled my foot, while people slept with headphones over their ears all around me, none of them having the slightest idea that my life was metamorphosing right in front of them.

  I thought of the medical complications that had befallen newborn babies or their mothers, in movies and in real life, then wished I hadn’t. I tried to think good thoughts instead, everything will be fine thoughts.

  Toward dawn, somewhere over the ocean, Chelsea emailed again.

  She’s at 7 cm. Contractions less than 5 mins apart.

  Again I had to consult Google on the meaning of the centimeters. Ah, that referred to Fiona’s cervix wrenching itself open to fit a baby through. Ten centimeters would be “fully dilated,” which … I held my fingers roughly ten centimeters apart, about the diameter of a baby’s head, and my eyes bugged out. Yeah, no wonder it hurt like fuck.

  I sent a Wow, thank you, keep updating! to Chelsea, accepted tea from the breakfast cart, and fidgeted like a junkie, refreshing my email every twenty seconds.

  An hour later:

  10 cm! Think she’s in transition now. They say it’s going great, though F’s exhausted.

  Transition? Chelsea was apparently determined to keep me occupied with Google. Definition: the part of labor that hurt like fuck the absolute most. But also the part that meant the birth was imminent.

  Every square inch of my T-shirt was damp with sweat. Deep breaths, I reminded myself. Probably what they were saying to poor Fiona right at that moment. God, I deserved every sucky thing that life had ever thrown at me, to have put a fellow human through this.

  Nothing from Chelsea for an excruciating forty-five minutes. I was about to email her again and beg for news when the message came:

  It’s a girl! 6 lbs 11 oz.

  The nurses are taking care of her. Fiona requested not to see her, so baby’s in the nursery. F’s doing all right, though knackered.

  Verona is healthy and beautiful, sweetie. :)

  A huge smile stretched the airplane-dried skin on my face. I inhaled what felt like gallons of oxygen. The cabin smelled of coffee and toast; the sun snuck in through windows too small and far away for me to see out of. The people in the seats next to me chewed their breakfasts placidly.

  Chelsea had called her Verona, used the name I had chosen. And Fiona had sent the baby out of the room, hadn’t claimed her—at least not so far, which likely meant she would stick to her word, cut herself free, and let me have our daughter.

  I was in the process of writing effusive thanks to Chelsea, in which I also planned to beg shamelessly for photos, when another email arrived with attachments.

  Picture attachments.

  I’d seen photos of newborns before. Who hadn’t? They’d always looked kind of lumpy and scowly to me, not the “beautiful” that everyone congratulated the parents with. Babies got cute when they learned how to use their faces a few months on, I figured.

  But right then, I got it. Because this was my baby.

  In the first shot, she was pink all over, naked and screaming with her eyes shut as they weighed her. In the second, she was swaddled in a blanket and drinking from a bottle in someone’s arms, tiny snub nose in profile.
In the third, she slept on a hospital mattress with a pacifier plugging her mouth and a purple knit hat on her head.

  I might never stop smiling. Yes, she was lumpy and scowly. But also beautiful.

  Then I did stop smiling, because I suddenly grew sad at how she had been disavowed by her mother and didn’t have either of her parents there to hold her. Also, it hurt to think how Fiona must be feeling to have had to do that. Free though she wanted to be, it couldn’t have been easy, that actual moment of making them take the baby away, especially when exhausted after a night of physical torture.

  Then, with the hugest wallop of sadness of all, I knew what I should have known ages ago. I wanted Andy next to me at this tremendous moment, to kiss him in celebration, lean in tired happiness on his shoulder. I loved him, like a boyfriend or a husband, not like a goddamn friend. I’d been the densest and most in-denial person on the planet, but I was going to make it right.

  Coming-outs could be achieved. Asshole family members could be written off. Babies could be taken to Tokyo for extended visits. Sneering naysayers could be ignored. Love could win.

  Those steps had all seemed as insurmountable as the Himalayas before now. But after vicariously witnessing the magnitude of what Fiona had endured, after learning my daughter was healthy and beautiful and waiting for me, the fog had cleared and the path through the mountains had become obvious.

  All of it would be easier with Andy alongside me, not harder. The fog had kept me from seeing that sooner.

  Maybe he didn’t love me back. But maybe he did, and he simply didn’t say so the other day because he was scared too. For all his impatience, all his out-and-proud savviness, he could still be guarding his heart. He’d said he was, and I hadn’t understood.

  I would fix all of this. My head swam with the new determination, but I would, damn it. Every last item on the list, if he’d have me.

  Right now, though, stuck on this plane and headed toward London, I could only make Verona my priority—and I was still sparkling from the inside out with excitement about meeting her.

  Baby first. Boyfriend second.

  I emailed Chelsea.

  Thank you a thousand times. I love her already. Please tell her that, and let her know her dad’s on his way.

  And tell Fiona I’m so, so impressed and grateful.

  I sent it off, scarfed down tea and toast for breakfast, then sat twitching in impatience.

  Come on plane, land, land.

  CHAPTER 38: SO IN LOVE

  CHELSEA SENT ME ONE MORE MESSAGE AS OUR PLANE DESCENDED TOWARD HEATHROW.

  It’s been a long night, so I’m off home to get some sleep. Fiona’s mum is here with her, and Sebastian is to arrive soon. I might run into you at the hospital later. :)

  I’d never met Fiona’s mum, so that could be awkward, and talking to Sebastian was nearly always annoying. But I honestly didn’t care.

  When we landed, I switched my phone out of airplane mode, set up temporary international call capability, then froze. Andy had texted me back.

  Andy: I hope it gets fixed too. I wish you luck and hope you find what you’re looking for

  Though tempted to type in, I already have. I love you and I’m coming back for you once I have Verona, I restrained my impulsive thumbs and answered instead:

  Sinter: Thank you. Just landed and will be heading to hospital. She’s born! They sent me pics but I won’t spam you with them unless you say you want them :)

  I waited for a response while we shuffled off the plane, but he didn’t send one. Of course, duh—it was the middle of the night in Seattle. I shoved my phone in my pocket and disembarked.

  From the airport, I took a train straight to the hospital. I didn’t even spare half an hour to go to my hotel first and drop off my bag. In all my trips to London, I’d never looked with less interest upon the scenery flashing by. I zeroed in on my destination with tunnel vision.

  In the hospital, my bag on my shoulder, I found the maternity ward and gave the nurse at reception my name. I shouldn’t have been surprised, but was, pleasantly, when she said, “Oh yes, we’ve been expecting you.” She called over another nurse to escort me through the swinging doors into the ward.

  This nurse, hardly any older than me, asked, “Who would you like to visit first? Mum or baby?”

  “Uh …” I paused in the corridor. Voices, intercom messages, and the cries of newborns drifted from nearby rooms.

  Verona wouldn’t remember this day at all. Fiona would. I should go to Fiona first. But …

  I could not resist. Not even the littlest bit. “Baby,” I said. “Please.”

  “Of course.” She winked and beckoned me into a room a few doors along.

  What do other people feel the first time their child is put into their arms? There are billions of words devoted to the experience, in books and blog posts and diary entries, and probably carved into ancient walls in Rome. I’d read a few such accounts in my research recently. But I forgot them all in this moment.

  The rest of the world went into whiteout. The universe became a tiny, scowling face and a lightweight body wrapped in a warm flannel blanket. She had a swirl of dark brown hair on her head, silky to the touch.

  “Hey, you,” I greeted, my voice ridiculously high and delighted.

  She squalled and squeaked, her eyes shut.

  I jiggled her up and down gently to see if she liked that better.

  She opened her eyes—cloudy blue, a shade darker than mine—found my face, and locked onto it. She went quiet. We gazed at each other.

  “Yeah,” I said. “There you go. Hey, your name’s Verona, did you know that? I promise you can change it later if you hate it.”

  She mewled again, worked an arm free of her blanket, and flailed it in the air. I caught her fist, and she closed her tiny hand around my first finger. I had slender hands, but they looked coarse and huge next to hers. The fact of having grabbed something seemed to surprise her; she went quiet again and stared at her hand. I laughed.

  “She’s probably hungry,” said the nurse, whose entire existence I had forgotten about. “Shall I show you how to prepare her bottle?”

  I learned how to heat up the formula and test it for temperature, how much to put in the bottle, and how to feed it to her. I sat in a chair against the wall, Verona on my lap, and coaxed the rubber nipple into her mouth. She was hungry and wriggly, but didn’t have the hang of this eating thing yet, so it took patience. And some spitting up.

  Wiping off my shirt with the towel the nurse handed me, I told my daughter, “That was very rock ’n roll of you. Thank you.”

  I probably needed insane amounts of sleep, but I was too enthralled to feel it. I was completely in love. I could not wait to share all this with Andy. The only shadow over me was whether he really and truly wanted to be part of it. Well—we’d talk soon, and I’d be honest this time and find out.

  For now, I basked in the glow of my teeny kid.

  Other babies resided temporarily in this nursery too, and parents or grandparents kept roaming in and out, taking pictures and cooing at their new relative. I hardly noticed, except when someone paused to congratulate me, in which case I thanked them, smiling.

  When an older woman said, “Ah, you’re the father,” I glanced up with a grin and said, “Yes.” Then I paused, because on this stranger I recognized Fiona’s smile, the shape of Fiona’s jaw, and Fiona’s small stature and way of carrying herself.

  I rose to my feet, still holding bottle and baby. “And you’re the grandmother,” I added with deference.

  “Leela. I won’t try to shake hands. Yours are quite full.” She smiled. Pearls and beads sparkled in her earrings, bright against her honey-toned skin and silver-and-black hair. She wore a gray pantsuit with a red leather handbag over her shoulder, and looked just as perfectly put together and intimidating as I expected a successful TV-industry businesswoman to look.

  “Sinter,” I said. “Hi. I’m sorry I never met you until now.”

  Sh
e waved it aside. “These things happen.”

  Guys get women pregnant, break up, meet the ex’s mom for the first time at the hospital after the birth. These things happened. I supposed they did; they just certainly hadn’t happened to me before.

  “I haven’t been in to see Fiona yet,” I said. “I thought she might need to rest, and anyway, I …” I looked down at Verona. “Had to come see this one first.”

  “Who could blame you?” She smiled at the baby. “Fiona’s awake. She’s a bit upset. She and I …” She clicked her tongue, shaking her head. “We’ve a habit of setting one another off. I always say the wrong thing somehow. It happens, as a parent. You’ll do it someday too, I imagine.”

  Rocking from foot to foot as I fed Verona, I examined her closed eyelids and miniature lashes. “I expect you’re right.”

  “In any case, the exhaustion, the post-partum hormones—anyone’s liable to be upset. She’ll come round.”

  Concerned, I lifted my face. “I’ll go see her. As soon as this bottle’s done.”

  “No rush. The musician’s with her now. Long hair, high tenor.”

  “Sebastian?”

  “Yes. She prefers his company to mine, it would seem.”

  “Well,” I said. “I’ll check in with them in a bit.”

  “I do hope she’s told you that Alec set up a trust for the little one?”

  “Yes. She mentioned. Thank you.”

  “I’ve arranged a yearly contribution to it as well. We can’t have our granddaughter starving out there somewhere. Not that we don’t trust you, dear, but we know actors aren’t paid nearly as well as they should be, at least most of them, and it’s hard work raising a child.”

  “It … isn’t necessary, really, but it’s very generous of you.”

  “It’s the least we could do. But please don’t assume we’ll be interfering. I won’t be, and I’m sure Alec won’t either. I do only ask …” Her face creased into a smile again, looking at the newborn I held. “Photographs and news, perhaps? Once or twice a year? An email, or a webpage you can update.”