The Baby Battle

by Laura Marie Altom

  “Stop putting words in my mouth,” he said, using paper towels to scoop the food. “I genuinely care about you.”

  “And I genuinely appreciate having the same position in your life as a cherished collectible or piece of pricey art. I’m something nice to look at, but never touch.”

  “Are you deliberately trying to piss me off?” He threw the dripping wad in the trash.

  “Interesting word choice,” she said, wetting a dishrag at the sink, then washing the floor. “Your sister accused you of pissing your life away. Guess that kind of talk runs in the family.”

  “Leave my sister out of it.” He, too, grabbed a wet rag and began scouring the floor for stray bits of glass. “This doesn’t concern her.”

  “That’s where you’re wrong. Your family loves you, Tag. They’re tired of never having all of you.”

  “Yeah, well, I’m tired of them butting into my business. With Flynn, I’m feeling bloody fantastic.”

  “So what you’re basically saying is that if only I were out of the picture, your life would be perfect?”

  He sat back his heels. It took every ounce of patience left in him not to rail. “News flash,” he said, mocking her earlier usage of the word, “but I’ve been under the impression that my life was perfect. You’re the one giving me the cold shoulder.”

  “That’s right, Tag…” She opened the pantry and removed a granola bar and box of crackers. “Just keep burying your head in the sand and everything will work out fine.”

  “You’re some piece of work,” he hollered after her when she left the kitchen and started up the stairs. He wanted to shout more, but she’d already slammed the door to her room.

  AT LUNCH WITH HER FRIENDS on Tuesday at Farelli’s Pizza, Olivia took the cheesiest piece of pepperoni and crammed it into her mouth. It might not have been ladylike, but nothing medicated hurt feelings quite like mozzarella. The canned accordion music wasn’t conducive to peace, but it set a swift pace to eat by so she wouldn’t be late getting back to her office.

  “Has it been any better between you and Tag?” Gabby asked, taking minibites of pasta with pesto. She’d been on a diet for the past two weeks, but had gained three pounds. Looked as if now she was getting more serious.

  “Define better.” Mmm…the cheese was so good.

  Steph said, “We want to know if you two are back to laughing and making out?”

  After grabbing a third slice, Olivia signaled the waiter for a refill on her Sprite. “I stay in my room and Tag has the rest of the house. We split our time with Flynn.”

  Nose wrinkled, Gabby said, “That doesn’t sound like fun. Don’t you feel like a prisoner?”

  Laughing, Olivia said, “You should see my room. It’s amazing. Think superelegant hotel suite. Meaning, the only reason I need to leave is to forage for food.”

  “Sounds doable,” Steph said, starting in on her second slice. “Are there servants?”

  “A cleaning lady, but she only comes three times a week.”

  “La-di-da.” Steph sprinkled dried hot peppers on her pizza. “I’d love to have someone help for even an hour. Seems like I can’t ever catch up.”

  “You do have two times the mess,” Gabby pointed out. “Just wait until they’re walking.”

  “Way to give me indigestion,” Steph complained.

  Gabby used the Parmesan shaker as a gavel. “Back to the subject at hand. Olivia, please don’t take this the wrong way, but ever since you and Tag have been fighting, you look exhausted. Like you’re getting maybe a couple of hours’ sleep every night—if you’re lucky. Are you sure you’re so content being stuck in your elegant tower?”

  “I’m fine.”

  “Now that I’ve gotten a good look at you,” Steph said, “I think Gabby’s right.”

  “Would you guys lay off? I’ve got this handled.”

  “From what you’ve told us,” Gabby said, “in a certain sense, your situation with Tag is no different than the one you had with Phil. That can’t be healthy for you or Flynn.”

  Ignoring her friend in favor of a fourth slice of pizza, Olivia chewed.

  “Ignore me all you want,” Gabby persisted, “but deep down you have to know it’s true. Only, instead of cheating on you with a woman from the next office, Tag’s still essentially married to his dead wife. Her every photo is Tag’s declaration of love—for someone other than you.”

  Hearing it put in terms like that sickened Olivia to the point that she dropped her pizza to the plate. Mind and heart spinning, she fought stinging eyes and a tight throat.

  “Honey, I know you think you’re doing what’s best for Flynn, but pretty soon he’s not going to be just an easily fooled baby. He’ll sense the tension between Mommy and Daddy and take sides. For your sanity and your heart, get out now. While you still can.”

  “You mean move back into my own house? But—”

  “I know it’s going to be hard,” Gabby said, covering Olivia’s hand with her own, then giving her a supportive squeeze, “but not nearly as hard as the alternative. Living with a man who will never be emotionally available.”

  THE LAST THING Olivia wanted was to rehash Gabby’s words over and over in her mind, but since Tag had Flynn and she’d already finished the work she’d brought home, she was at loose ends.

  Venturing out of her suite, she went downstairs and into the living room. Typically, Tag took Flynn to the movie room, or to play with the pile of baby enrichment toys he’d set up on the carpet beneath the pool table.

  In the living area she stood before the hearth. The portrait of Maria presided over the room. “I never even knew you,” she whispered, “yet I find myself resenting you.”

  The built-in bookshelves sandwiching the fireplace were loaded with Maria’s vacation pictures and mementos. A first-place tennis-tournament trophy from the Little Rock Country Club bore her name in elegant script. A brass plaque read “To Maria O’Malley in commemoration of all you’ve done for the Little Rock Junior League Christmas Toy Drive. We love you!”

  Arms crossed, Olivia internalized everything before her. She recalled all the times Tag had declared his love for his memories. His refusal to let them go. His irrational fear that she, too, would die or leave him.

  The gravity of her situation hit hard and fast.

  Tag was playing her for a fool. Worse yet, because she’d been stupid enough to fall for him, she’d let him.

  She used to think of herself as smart. Savvy. She didn’t take crap from anyone—least of all a man. Yet look at her now. Legs quivering, she sank onto the plush area rug covering the tile.

  Hugging her knees, she tried thinking back to a time before Tag. What had she done for entertainment? What had made her laugh? Furious? Embarrassed? Not much of anything. Her days had been filled with work and caring for Flynn. There had been occasional play dates penciled in with her girlfriends. That was pretty much it. No great highs, but also no great lows. If a person could be described in geographical terms, she’d been the Great Plains.

  “You’re a smelly boy…” she heard Tag say on the back stairs. “Yeah, buddy, we need to find your mother ASAP to help us deal with a mess like—Oh.” Upon seeing her, he froze. “I didn’t know you were down here.”

  “That okay?” she asked with a teary sniffle.

  “Sure.” Shifting Flynn to his other arm, he asked, “Everything all right?”

  Nodding, she said, “As right as it can be, given the circumstances.”

  “I’m more than willing to start a truce if you are. Say the word and we’ll go right back to the way we were.”

  “Impossible.” She stood and held out her arms. “Let me change his diaper. I smell him from here.”

  “Wait.” He cut her off at the base of the stairs. “Do we need to talk?”

  Sadly she said, “It’s too late for that. I think it’d be best if Flynn and I move out.”

  Chapter Thirteen

  “Excuse me?” Eyes narrowed, Tag said, “I must not have heard y
ou right.”

  She marched up the stairs. “I think you heard me—you just don’t want to acknowledge what I said.”

  At the changing table she efficiently got their son smelling like his usual sweet self.

  “Well?” she asked upon finishing. “Don’t you have anything to say?”

  “You’d better believe it. What is this, some kind of ploy to get me to marry you? Did my mom and sister put you up to it?”

  From between gritted teeth she said, “If I weren’t a lady, I’d slap you for that.”

  “Okay, sorry, but if that isn’t the reasoning behind your announcement, then what is? Am I hogging all the hot water? You don’t like the food?”

  “If only the problem were so simple.” Handing Flynn to him, she asked, “Mind watching him while I run out to find some boxes?”

  “Liv, you can’t be serious?”

  “Dead serious.” She took her purse from the dresser. “I should only be gone about thirty minutes.”

  “Stop,” he said, setting Flynn in his crib. Chasing after her, Tag snagged her arm and urged her around to face him. “You owe me an explanation. You can’t just take off with our son without a word.”

  “Please don’t make this any harder,” she said, looking near tears.

  “Nothing has to be hard. You’re making it that way.” Taking her hand, he pulled her to the wing chairs in front of the bay window and said, “Sit. We’ll talk this through.”

  While Tag’s world was falling apart, Flynn remained blissfully unaware, plinking a toy piano that was fastened to the side of his crib.

  Liv sat, but not all the way. She perched on the edge of the cushion, as if readying herself for an escape. “There’s nothing left to say. The way I see it, we’re at an impasse.”

  “Oh,” he said, sitting in the other chair, “so this is still my fault? You’re expecting me to drop my wife’s memory like an old habit? Do you have any idea how awful that makes me feel? Like the worst kind of betrayal. How can I be here with you, living it up, happier than I’ve ever been, when Maria’s stuck in a cold grave? Worse yet, what if I lose you, too? I can’t chance it, and I resent the hell out of you for asking me to.” He swiped tears from his whisker-stubbled cheeks.

  Breaking down as well, Liv covered her face with her hands. “I love you, Tag. You. And the fact t-that you know how perfectly in sync w-we were, and yet you’re willing to throw it all away for memories—loyalty to a dead woman and irrational fear—is killing me. I can’t live like this—loving you, yet losing you to portraits and vacation snapshots and tennis trophies.”

  Seeing Liv cry was killing him, but he felt powerless to help. Rising, he went to her, kneeling in front of her chair, but she pushed him away.

  “The last thing I need is your false comfort.”

  Pling, pling, pling. Flynn happily played.

  “Nothing between us has to be false. Listen to him, Liv. Our son is content. Do you really want to take him away from his home over such a stupid issue?”

  Laughing through more tears, she said, “How is me falling for you stupid? I would never have asked you to forget Maria—just to make a small place in your heart for me.”

  “In order to do that,” he said, on the verge of crying again himself, “I’d have to be with you in every way. But I can’t. And I’m sure as hell not strong enough to resist you.”

  “Oh, that’s it.” She pushed herself out of the chair. “You’d have to be with me? Like I’m damaged goods? Look in the mirror, buddy, because the only one damaged around here is you.”

  IN HER CAR OLIVIA SHOOK so badly she could hardly drive. She’d never meant to say all those things to Tag. Hadn’t even realized how much he meant to her until all her emotions started pouring out.

  She loved him.

  Deeply, totally, crazily loved him, and there wasn’t a damned thing she could do to stop it.

  Which was why she had to do anything within her power to protect herself from falling into a depression the way she had after losing Phil and her unborn child. For Flynn’s sake, she must stay strong.

  Keeping this in mind, and not in the mood for scrounging for boxes, she found a U-Haul store still open on Kavanaugh. With her trunk filled, she steeled herself for more drama at the house.

  After pulling into the garage and dragging all the boxes inside, she grabbed a bottled water from the fridge and chugged it down.

  “You were gone forty minutes.”

  She jumped to hear Tag walking up behind her. Hand to her chest, she said, “I hate it when you do that. Where’s Flynn?”

  “Sleeping. I gave him his bath.”

  “Thanks.” She tossed her bottle into the recycle bin. “You didn’t have to.”

  “I wanted to.”

  “Okay, well, thank you.” She took two boxes and headed up the stairs.

  Tag took the rest and followed her.

  “I can get those.”

  “I’m sure you could,” he said from behind her, unnerving her with his proximity. “But what’s the need when I’m right here?”

  “Suit yourself.”

  In her room, Tag leaned the flat boxes against the north wall. “What can I do to help?”

  Olivia bit her lower lip almost hard enough to draw blood. Could he honestly be so cruel as to have just offered to lend a hand in order to get her out of his house faster?

  “Want me to tape the boxes so they’re ready for you to put the stuff in?”

  I hate you! she cried inside, refusing to give in to more tears. She wouldn’t give him the satisfaction.

  “I’m trying to be a good guy here. The least you can do is answer.”

  “No, Tag, I don’t want your help. I don’t want to see you or talk to you. I just want you to go away.”

  She could tell by his stare that he wanted to say more, but thankfully he didn’t.

  “Leave,” she said softly, not wanting to wake Flynn.

  While Olivia’s heart shattered, Tag opened his mouth, but then clamped it shut, nodded and walked out the door.

  “THAT’S RIGHT,” Stephanie crooned, holding and rocking Olivia, “let it out. Now that you’re home again, you’ve got to put that awful man out of your head. He won’t hurt you anymore.”

  “He’ll never stop hurting me,” Olivia wailed from her perch on the foot of her bed. Olivia and Steph had spent the morning loading boxes into Steph’s minivan. Flynn was at his Montessori day care, and Steph’s girls were with her sister. “He has half custody of my son.”

  “That’s okay. You’ll see, time will fly. When Tag has Flynn we’ll keep you busy. Gabby and I will take you shopping and out to dinner and movies. It’ll be fun.”

  Olivia knew she needed to calm herself, but now that she was back in her own home, an inner tremble had set in that she was powerless to stop. All that she’d gone through with Phil, and her miscarriage, came rushing back. Melding her past with her present into darkness she couldn’t breach.

  “Want me to call Dane?” Steph asked. “He has a knack for always knowing the right thing to say. I know you two are friends.”

  With a violent shake of her head, Olivia said, “No. I’m better. I’m not going to fall apart again. Not like I did in D.C. I’m older now. Stronger. I’ve had my mini-breakdown, and enough’s enough.” Straightening, Olivia forced a deep breath and squared her shoulders.

  Steph went into the bathroom and returned with a box of tissues. “Dry your eyes and blow your nose.”

  Nodding, Olivia did as her friend told her.

  “Better?”

  She nodded, forcing a smile. “Thank you. You’re a good friend.”

  Stephanie wrapped her arm around Olivia’s shoulders and gave her a squeeze. “I haven’t done anything you wouldn’t have handled on your own.”

  “That might be, but…” Laughing through lingering hiccups and sniffles at her histrionics, Olivia said, “Your hugs probably sped things along.”

  “TAG, HONEY,” ALICE SAID over the phone a full tw
o weeks after Olivia had left, “I know you’re having a tough time, but the work’s piling up around here and we need you to come in. At least to sign payroll checks and a few supply contracts.”

  Raking his fingers through his hair, he said, “I’ll be in soon. Promise.”

  “Is there anything we can do?”

  “No.” He pressed his index finger into the bread crumbs scattered over the kitchen counter. Maria always liked a tidy house, but lately he’d let the place go. “Call in case of emergency, but otherwise leave me alone.”

  Tag hung up his cell.

  He walked into the living room and stared out the big picture windows.

  Outside, it looked to be a beautiful day.

  Over the calm river, the sky was blue with cotton-candy clouds. It was the kind of day perfect for taking his son to the zoo. Or maybe fishing. Hiking, as he’d done with Liv at Rolling Rock.

  How simple everything had been there.

  Skimming his hand along his whisker-stubbled jaw, he closed his eyes and thought back to the night he’d gotten sick and Liv had been his savior, bringing him Sprite and crackers. He thought of her pot roast and the ham she’d made for his parents. The Doris Day movies she’d cajoled him into watching and that he’d actually enjoyed. Their afternoon in the rowboat when he’d used up all his self-restraint in trying not to kiss her.

  Eyes open, he spun around, bringing himself face-to-face with the portrait of Maria.

  He remembered as if it had happened only moments ago the day she’d sat for the artist. She’d been in the backyard, in the spring, sitting cross-legged with her dark hair long and free. More formal than the portrait in the kitchen, in this one she’d worn white. Her expression had been serene. Her face tilted back to catch the sun. Maria had loved the sun. Every vacation, he’d dragged her to some sweltering beach where he’d lain around feeling big and awkward while she’d pranced in a one-piece that managed to look sexier than a bikini. Her olive skin bronzed and never burned. He’d always teased her about having been born of the sun she so loved.