Great With Child

by Sonia Taitz

  Abigail hesitated, then spoke with her customary authority. “Excellent, Tina. Thanks. You absolutely did the right thing.”

  Now that she thought of it, Richard’s nondisclosure of evidence, if that’s what it was that led to his leaving the firm, made sense. It was consistent with what she now knew about the man. Had he told her he was married? No. Some more “nondisclosure.” And here he was, unashamedly trying to get through to her again. If she’d picked up the phone herself, she wouldn’t have been able to resist him, even now. That low, slow voice, and the hands that went with it. Despite everything, he tugged at her heart, and had made her feel that she’d tugged at his. That’s what makes him such a dangerous con man, Abigail reasoned. She should be glad Tina had cut him off and “got rid of him.”

  But now, with her working at the library, of all the people for Tina to patch through: Tim Vail. A stranger who’d picked her up off the street, literally. Yes, he had seemed nice—more than nice. But for all she knew, he could be as big a cad as Richard. In a world of romantic schemers and her own responsive weakness, she was glad to have real, important work to do.

  Still, the idea of Tim—the way he’d rescued her that day, his wheat-stalk hair—refused to let her concentrate on legal matters. And her awful conversation with Tina about Richard’s dubious past made this other man look especially good.

  Abigail stepped outside, took a deep breath, and called him back.

  “Are you that busy?” Tim said cheerfully, picking up on the first ring. “I’ve been sitting by the phone like a lovelorn teenager. But you’re worth waiting for.”

  “I’m always busy when I’m working.” She noted that most men would have been annoyed to wait for her for several minutes like that. Some would even have hung up when she did call, refusing to be inconvenienced by another person’s delays, however exigent. But Tim seemed easygoing. He seemed, moreover, to really like her. It was sort of nice to be pursued, especially when she wasn’t making the slightest effort.

  “Well, Abigail, I was working, too. In fact, I just finished a difficult spreadsheet and felt like taking a break and answering more of your questions. I find I like being cross-examined by you.”

  Abigail took a moment to feel out all the vibes. On the rebound from Richard, steeped in hormones, and against her better judgment, she decided to play on.

  “So you like being cross-examined, do you?”

  “Any kind of examined, I like, and the more thoroughly, the better,” said Tim.

  “Oh, you should try being exhaustively deposed by me,” she said.

  “You’re on.”

  “We could meet later. I’ll leave here around six thirty, six forty-five.”

  “That late?”

  “I’d usually work ’til eight, nine, sometimes ten. But this pregnancy really makes me weak and wimpy.”

  “Oh, you slacker! I’ll take advantage of that.”

  There was a pause on Abigail’s side.

  “Why would you want to take advantage of someone’s weakness?”

  “You mean, that’s not a nice thing to do?”

  “No. It’s a very not nice thing to do. So why are you stalking me in this condition?”

  He paused only slightly. “I told you, Abigail. Your condition interests me. You’re a hot little gypsy with a big round crystal ball in front of you.”

  “‘A big round crystal ball’—that’s actually a baby, Tim. The product of coition with a man, other than yourself.”

  “You mean there are other men besides me?”

  “In the big world, apparently, yes. In my little world—not currently, as I think you’ve worked out. But I don’t think you should feel this way about a mother.”

  “Only if you’re my mother, I think. You could look it up in the law library, though. To make sure.”

  “My field is death and taxes,” she said soberly.

  “Don’t worry, I’ll widen your horizons.”

  “Double entendre? If so, rejected. Seriously, what do you have in mind?”

  “I want to cook you a nice meal to bring back your strength.”

  “So you’re going to mother me?”

  “Just to prove it’s not such a dirty concept.”

  “You’re the dirty concept around here,” she said, cheering up at the idea of someone—particularly someone as cute as Tim—cooking for her. Now that her real mother was gone, she missed that.

  Later that evening, Abigail sat on Tim’s corduroy futon, sipping a grape juice–Saratoga spritzer. Tim, drinking a hearty merlot to go with the roast, bustled around his galley kitchen, separated from her by a counter. He lived on the ground floor of a brownstone, a space filled with faded denim cushions that blended with his baby blue walls. Tim, wearing well-worn jeans and a faded madras shirt rolled up at the elbows, seemed to blend in, too.

  As he chopped onions, whistling, Abigail peered around. There was a large white mica desk, with a computer on it. Just beyond it was a windowed door, leading to the backyard. What a luxury in the city. Your own fresh air. She walked over and saw several tricycles, scooters, and a small round trampoline outside. For his little computer club, she supposed.

  “Hot onions smell homey, don’t they?” said Tim. “They’re going on top of the rice. With some cremini mushrooms. Just another minute and I’ll come sit with you. But you’re not sitting. You’re standing and looking at my yard.”

  “So I am.”

  “Want to go outside?”

  “No, I’m good. Can’t I help you with anything?” said Abigail.

  “No, just sit back down and relax. Say, how’s your knee?”

  “Still smarts a little. I got some Betadine and this big gauze bandage, so I could graphically demonstrate my devotion at work. The picture says: I was on my last legs, but I still punched in.”

  “Did you get your just rewards?”

  “I spent the day in the library, so no one noticed.”

  “Show it to me then,” he said, wiping his hands on a tea towel and stepping over to her.

  Abigail sat on the couch, and Tim kneeled at her feet.

  She raised her hemline, revealing the bandage, surrounded by an aureole of orange-red liniment.

  “Tell me how brave I am.”

  “You are very brave,” he said, getting up from his knees and perching beside her. “What if a bus had run you over while you lay there? You could have been totally killed!”

  “Tim,” said Abigail, adopting the tone of legal counselor, “you have a point.” Tim had sat so close she could feel his body heat, and out of the corner of her eyes, she saw that bristly chin of his. She spoke quickly: “Speaking as a lawyer, we always advise young people to draw up some documentation about their disposition of property. Just in case a bus runs over them. On the other hand, you seem to have very little by way of personal property, and as for me—”

  Tim grabbed her. “Shut up, motormouth.”

  Abigail stiffened, expecting him to kiss her. She couldn’t wait. She was planning to try to resist, but only briefly. Tim let her go and walked away.

  “Too soon, right?” he said.

  “I think so, yes.” She was pregnant, she thought—what were the rules anyway? He was not only too soon; he was too late.

  Standing by the garden door, as Abigail herself had stood moments earlier, Tim nodded, as though readying himself for a challenge.

  “What is it, Tim?” She felt an intimacy in the air, as though he had, in fact, kissed her. Not kissing her was even more intimate, in a way. Getting so close and then swerving away.

  “What if I revealed that I was married, briefly, two years and three months, to an irresistible woman who looked a whole lot like you?”

  “Is that what you see in me? Someone else?”

  “She had the same Crazy Curl hair and neat little chin, but a completely different expression in her eyes. She had no ‘career,’ Abigail. She married to start a family—another major difference from you. And then, and this was the funny part, i
t turned out we couldn’t have children.”

  “Oh,” said Abigail, seeing Tim’s face darken, “that’s sad.”

  “Is that the word?” Tim looked down and pinched the tip of his nose. He seemed ashamed to be seen this way.

  “Yes. It’s really sad. But if you loved each other,” Abigail ventured, “why didn’t you compromise? You could have taken care of each other, comforted each other, cruised through the Panama Canal.”

  “Whom are you trying to convince?” said Tim, looking up through clouded eyes. “I wasn’t the one who dumped the marriage.”

  “She left you?”

  “She was fine! Just perfect! I was the one who couldn’t—”

  “Who couldn’t—oh, I understand,” said Abigail.

  “Dud sperm. Unlike the one that got to you. It turns out I shoot blanks.”

  Life was so strange, thought Abigail. Those that wanted didn’t get, and those that didn’t want—got. She walked over to Tim and looked into his eyes. With the tears in them, they looked green and clear.

  “You really wanted a kid, huh?”

  “I love kids.”

  “And she didn’t want to adopt?”

  “I would have! Whether they’re my ‘biological’ children or not, what’s the difference?”

  “I know it makes a difference to some people.”

  “Those people are narcissists, Abigail. It has to be their flesh and blood? Otherwise, no love capacities? God! Well, you’ve just described my darling ex-wife. She said she ‘wanted to feel life inside her,’ or she’d ‘never be a real woman.’ Her mother once told her that.”

  “That’s so cruel. Lots of women can’t—”

  “Can’t, or don’t want to. Exactly. But she had to be a broodmare. Filled up with sperm and a cloning bunch of cells. That’s the real deal to lots of people. Blood ties. The gene pool.

  “She’d have envied you right now. Look at you, so self-contained. It’s all between you and your own little tummy.”

  “Little?” Abigail patted the high, round sphere. The way Tim had described his ex-wife’s views, she almost felt privileged. The envy of some women, and even of some men.

  “You know what I mean. The way you pat it. And you don’t even mention the other party. Doesn’t he count at all?”

  A silence hung in the air. Abigail wanted to tell Tim about fertile, married Richard, who didn’t even know about her condition. But to embark on that topic would open her up to questions for which she wasn’t ready.

  “All right,” said Tim, sitting back on the couch and putting his arm around her. “Forget the details for now. I sense you’ve been abandoned, one way or the other. Right? You poor baby,” he murmured. “I honestly know what that feels like. No one’s ever loved me in my life, my adult life, that is. No one’s ever given me their total heart.”

  “Aw, that’s sad,” said Abigail.

  “No—I’ve learned a lot about being there for someone. You can’t just leave people in the lurch. So, you know what, I’m here,” said Tim, stepping back into the cooking area, “if you need me.”

  “Don’t worry,” said Abigail. “I won’t burden you. I—I really don’t need people very much.”

  The words hung in the air as Tim bustled in the kitchen.

  “Just a little, though?” Tim returned, putting a plate of warm and savory beef, accompanied by caramelized onions and sautéed mushrooms, in front of her.

  Abigail nodded, and started to eat. She ate everything, heartily. The warm food thawed her. And later, when she and Tim drank coffee on the couch, she let him take her mug away, and at last press his lips to hers.

  Wow, thought Abigail, he’s pretty good at this.

  7

  Not long after, Abigail signed up for a “course” in childbirth. It was a truism among the experts that no one could do it properly without a period of study and practice. Once they learned how to do it properly, they could go ahead and give birth with the full confidence that they had been professionally trained and would do it with skill and finesse, as they did everything else in their lives. They would be prepared like professionals to meet all the mysteries of life. Not for these women the screeching and the twisting in pain. They would know the secrets of birthing power.

  A partner, or “coach,” was also required. This coach would bring ice chips, a stopwatch, a tennis ball, and other esoterica. Also, of course, they would coach the woman properly, and with skill, until the healthy baby would emerge, awake and alert (and, ideally, ready to learn the alphabet). After that, they would all bond in some way.

  Abigail, initially partnerless, had put off thinking about these classes, but now she had Tim and could proceed. He had readily consented to accompany her. “I’ve always been curious about these things,” he’d said wistfully, which puzzled Abigail, who had never been.

  Now that she had a coach, Abigail had begun to research these birthing classes. She had learned that they taught people to control pain by varying their breathing rhythms. Concentration on something so simple as the air, flowing in and out, could lessen the deepest pains of life. She tried this theory out, breathing deeply as she considered the fact that she could never be with Richard Trubridge again. Somewhere inside her still hurt, no matter how many times she inhaled and exhaled. Abigail hoped that the actual classes gave you better information about pain management.

  As though to ward off an inner gnawing (estrogen, Abigail suspected—that hormone always gnawed), Abigail had also begun eating supper at Tim’s regularly. She grew fatter and happier, scarfing down his potpies, his casseroles, his seven-layer fondant-topped cakes. It pleased Tim to watch her need and, especially, her greed. He’d suspected her of having a deep yearning for love, and this seemed to be proof of it. She was passionate—now about food, but later, perhaps, about him. As the spindly trees in his garden shed their leaves and the air grew colder, Tim built a fire in the hearth. It gave surprising heat to his little blue cave of an apartment.

  They sat before the fire, holding hands. Tim brought Abigail’s fingers to his face so that she could feel the stubble. For some reason, she let out a tiny, encouraging (if involuntary) moan. Her condition, with its hormonal surges, multiplicity of neurons, and networking vessels, seemed to activate the sensual centers most especially.

  Cupping her face in his hands, Tim began kissing Abigail with force and need. Yes, he was amazing; he was gifted, even. Abigail enjoyed him, but a curious sense of detachment persisted. She liked the way she could passively lean her head back against the sofa and let Tim press his weight against her. His gorgeous wavy locks brushed across her face as he ravaged her mouth, searching for something. She felt limp, as though she had no needs of her own. True, she felt like yearning up toward him in truer abandon; she felt like grabbing that hair in a hunk. Somewhere inside her, a current was rising. How could it not be?

  But the baby inside was more compelling; it kicked; it was kicking her all the time now. Abigail put her hand on her stomach and pulled away from the embrace.

  “He’s probably jealous,” she said, to Tim’s confusion. He looked at her, pupils wide, bewildered.

  “Who?” She noticed that he was panting. “Who’s jealous? The real father?”

  The “real” father? Abigail wondered if Tim thought that he was now, de facto, some kind of father, albeit less real. He was not going to slide into being her partner this way. She would get good, professional help after this coaching business was over.

  “The baby is jealous, Tim. The baby doesn’t like us to do this.”

  “That’s not true,” Tim said, his voice weak and his gaze besotted. He began nibbling at Abigail’s neck, his warm tongue an interesting contrast to the cool pearls it lifted and dropped.

  “You’re just going too far here,” said Abigail, still feeling the baby kick.

  Tim mumbled into her neck, “But I’m your birthing partner.”

  Annoying. Sometimes Abigail wished she had asked one of her sisters to partner her. Tim had be
come possessive so quickly. But Liz never had time for anything but work, and even if she had “re-prioritized” temporarily—which she wouldn’t—she’d have overused the data, marking the length and strength of the contractions, as though this were some kind of uterine Dow Jones. And Annie had her hands full with her own little ones. Some days, she said, it was a victory for her just to get her hair brushed and her lipstick on. And some days, she had once told Abigail, she just sat on the Cheerio-embedded carpet, surrounded by noise and toys, and cried.

  “So we’re taking this on together,” Tim was saying. “Now listen, breathing partner: I’m noticing that you breathe differently when I do this,” said Tim, moving his face down the front of her sweater. “Let’s explore what happens when I touch you here.”

  He reached down into her V-neck and touched her breast. A light touch, but he lingered. His ear was at her mouth.

  “That’s a different sound,” he said. “Did you notice?”

  Below her chin was his mop of golden hair, shining in the firelight. She didn’t answer but gave a short nod, which he felt.

  “And if I do this,” he said, slipping his finger under her bra, “you might respond first by—”

  “Tim, that’s it for me,” she said, grabbing his hand in a fist.

  “What’s the matter,” he whispered into her ear, easily putting his hand back where it was. “What do you want to stop? This?”

  “I want to stop everything,” she said. She had never felt her body so alien before, such a clarion female advertisement. She felt fallen, and loosened, and weak—not so much by the pregnancy itself as by the knowing power it seemed to give Tim. If love was a wrestle, he could pin her now.

  Tim slid his body downward, bringing his mouth to her partly exposed breast. “It’s tidal, and you have to go along with it,” he said, pulling her sweater farther down, stretching the V below the point he needed to get to. He pushed her bra cup aside and licked her nipple. Like her breasts, it was different, swollen and more sensitive.

  “The baby!”

  “Mmmm?”

  “It’s kicking.”