Knocked-Up Cinderella

by Julie Hammerle

  Was she…jealous? Was that what this was? I’d assumed she was pissed at me for not bidding on her at the auction. Was she somehow going to take it out on Erin? “It’s complicated,” I said.

  Maria nodded. “I bet it is.”

  She was being snide, which probably meant I was right. She was jealous. “What’s that supposed to mean?” I asked.

  “You don’t do serious. You don’t do complicated.” She paused. “You don’t do attachments.”

  “I don’t.”

  “A baby’s a pretty big one.”

  “Yeah, and I’m ready for it.” She was the second person I’d told about the baby and the second person who’d questioned my preparedness. I ticked off all the things I’d done in the name of this child. “I’ve been to ultrasounds. I’ve learned how to change a diaper. I’ve read every single book I could find on pregnancy and childbirth. I’m ready.”

  “Sounds like you’re ready to be a birthing coach or maybe a babysitter.” She tossed the teddy bear at me, and I caught it. “What about the real stuff, the real decisions you’ll have to make—school, religion, diet, childcare, how you’ll handle the whole Santa thing?”

  “We’ll figure it out.” All those questions would be answered in time—really, I assumed Erin already knew the answers, and she just had to tell me.

  “Ian, you have an infinity fire pit in the middle of your living room.”

  “Which I’m getting rid of…by the time the kid can crawl.”

  “Okay.” She stepped over and picked up her folder. “Sounds like you have this handled.”

  “Wait,” I said. “Let me show you what I have done.”

  I led her to my home gym and opened the door. It looked like a bomb had gone off inside. Screws and chips of flooring were everywhere. The slats of the crib had been strewn across the floor. I had to keep starting and stopping this project to catch planes to wherever.

  Maria giggled, but not in a light, girlish way. This laugh was basically a snort in my general direction. “Wow.”

  “It doesn’t look like much,” I said, “but I’m trying. I’m making a place for him.”

  “That’s great, Ian.” She turned to me, eyes laughing. “I truly wish you the best.” No, she didn’t. That comment dripped with sarcasm.

  “You don’t think I can do this.” I pouted. I was a full-grown man, and I pouted because no one believed I had it in me to be a dad.

  “Ian, I barely know you. I have no idea what you can or can’t do.”

  “But you don’t think I can do this, be a dad.”

  She sighed. “I think you’ll be fine.” She started to walk away.

  “You’re being really rude,” I said. “Look, I’m sorry I didn’t bid on you at the auction, but don’t take it out on Erin.”

  Now Maria laughed darkly, like a super-villain, and turned around. “You think I cared for one second that you didn’t bid on me, and now I’m going to take it out on the mother of your child? How fucking conceited can one person be?” she said. “I’m a professional, and I’m trying to help your alma mater make a fuck-ton of money. I’m fine, Ian. I’m better than fine. I will continue to be fine. But now you’ve dragged a baby and Erin Sharpe—who’s great, by the way—into your hornet’s nest of shit—”

  “Hornet’s nest of…?”

  “—which is not fair to either of them. No, I don’t think you can do this whole good-guy-parenting thing, because in the two months we were ‘together,’ you made time for me twice.”

  “I’ve changed.” I pointed to my torn-up home gym as proof.

  “You bought a cheap crib and started tearing down a physical wall. That’s as close as you’ll ever allow yourself to get to anybody.”

  Ouch.

  “I understood what you were about when we met. You’re too busy to make time for other people because of your precious job. How in the hell do you think you’re going make room for a baby when you’re flitting off to Vancouver every other day?”

  “Tokyo,” I said. “And that deal’s almost done.”

  “Well, it’s Tokyo now. It’ll be something else tomorrow. And the next day. There will always be another deal to pursue, another business opportunity. Your kid is going to learn really fast who comes first in your life.”

  “Wow,” I said.

  “Yeah.” She pointed to the gym. “And maybe think about hiring someone to deal with this mess, because you suck at this, too.”

  Chapter Ten

  Erin

  Natalie and I faced off with loaded guns clutched in our hands. “On three,” she said. “One…”

  I grinned. “Two…”

  Katie, tapping away on her phone next to me, rolled her eyes. “Whatever. Three.”

  Nat and I spun around and started scanning everything in sight with our pricing guns, registering at Target for our wedding and baby, respectively. Since she was getting married only a few weeks after my due date, and we were near the end of the school year, our faculty had decided to throw a joint shower for all the teachers and administrators who were celebrating weddings, babies, or big-deal birthdays over the summer.

  “Diaper Genie,” I said. “Bam!”

  “Faux-artsy framed print of the Chicago skyline,” Nat said. “Bam!”

  “Bored millennial being dragged into some bullshit by her older sister and her friend.” Katie’s eyes were still down on her phone. “Bam.”

  I scanned a cute pair of sandals in Katie’s size. “There,” I said. “For you. Thanks for coming with us.”

  “What are your coworkers at the Academy going to say when they see a pair of size eight bejeweled espadrilles on your registry?” Katie asked.

  “My needs are as important as his.” I patted my ballooning gut as the kid kicked me, probably to remind me that, nope, for the next eighteen or so years, his needs would trump mine, full stop, and I should probably get used to it.

  My watch buzzed, and I peeked at it. There was a message from Ian, reminding me to scan the Beaba food steamer. I shot him a thumbs-up.

  “Is that Ian?” Katie’s eyes were still on her phone.

  “No,” I lied.

  “Yes, it was. I can tell because you’re grinning like a dork.”

  I leaned over and pushed her phone down. “You haven’t looked up from that thing once. How could you possibly know I was smiling?”

  “I see all.” And she was right back to texting.

  “Was it Ian?” Nat asked as she scanned a stainless-steel wastebasket.

  “Yeah.” I shrugged. “He was just making his opinion known on some of the registry stuff.” He’d done all kinds of research on everything from co-sleepers to diaper bags to swaddling apparatuses. He’d apparently also—all on his own—dismantled his home gym and decorated it as a nursery. And he’d even built a crib, and he’d sent me several videos showing him throwing heavy things into it—a weighted vest, a medicine ball, a sack of potatoes—to prove that it was structurally sound. He kept asking me to come see it, and I kept balking.

  “They text all the time.” Katie shoved her phone into her purse, gleefully outing me to Nat. “Every single night.”

  Natalie gazed into the middle distance.

  “What?” I said.

  “Nothing.” She grinned at me. “Just imagining everything I’ll be able to do in my classroom with that brand new SMARTboard.”

  I pretended to shoot her with my scanning gun. “I have a friendly relationship with the father of my son. Big whoop.”

  “Yeah, you might, but he totally wants to be more than friends.” When she noticed my death stare, Katie added, “I may have peeked over your shoulder—don’t judge me; I haven’t been out with a guy in months; and, aside from weight training and protein shakes, this soap opera drama between you and Ian is all I have. He’s asked you to hang out a bunch of times, and you always say no.”

  “Uh, yeah.” I scanned a box of glass bottles. “Because we agreed to live separate lives, and I’m keeping up my end of the bargain. W
e’re friends. That’s it. Not even friends. Friendly.” Just because two people, who happened to be attracted to each other, talked on the phone all the time, it didn’t have to mean anything. We were two adult humans who could definitely keep things platonic.

  “That’s good,” Nat said. “You have the right idea. Keep Ian at arm’s length. You’re strong enough to do this on your own, and tigers don’t change their stripes.”

  “Ian and I have been honest with each other from the start. He’s married to his job. He’s not looking for a relationship. And I’ve been burned so many times, I’m better off sticking with the one person who won’t let me down—myself.”

  If Ian really did want to be more than friends, it was only because I’d been playing hard to get. I’d become a challenge for him, a challenge that would end the moment we got together. “I have a history of picking the wrong guy.” I scanned a package of cloth diapers. Bam! “Ian is the very embodiment of ‘the wrong guy.’”

  “Maybe, maybe not,” Katie said. “He seems to really like you.”

  “Now,” I said. “He likes me now. He’ll bolt as soon as I give in to him. There’s no way this doesn’t end badly.”

  Katie raised her index finger. “Or, what if it ends with you two desperately in love and staying together forever?”

  “You’re just hard up for some romance,” I told her. “Go watch a rom-com on Netflix or something.”

  “It’s what happened to Nat and Chris,” she said.

  “But Chris is not Ian Donovan.” Natalie scanned a set of bed sheets.

  “Bingo.” Ian was who he’d always said he was—a workaholic who needed his freedom. I, as I had been since the day we met, was playing the role of “girl who took him at his word.”

  …

  Ian

  On a Friday night in mid-May, a sulky Tommy walked into my office and flopped down in one of my guest chairs. “Let’s go out.”

  “Really?” I’d just gotten back from another trip to Tokyo. I’d planned on texting Erin tonight to see if she wanted to come over, even though I knew she’d say no. She always said no.

  I saw right through her game. She was avoiding me—and doing a good job of it. I hadn’t seen her in person since March, since the day of the ultrasound. Yeah, I’d been out of town for a lot of that time, but when I was in town, Erin had made herself utterly unavailable.

  If her goal was to drive me mad, it was working.

  Maybe I should give her a taste of her own medicine.

  I texted Erin in advance of our Friday night non-date. “I won’t be able to chat tonight. Going out with Tommy.”

  She sent me a thumbs-up.

  I hesitated, finger over the phone. My mind said, “Back away from the cell,” but my heart said, “Just send her one more teensy message.” My heart won out. “Call you tomorrow probably?”

  With baited breath I watched the screen, but no little dots appeared. Erin had won yet another round in the battle for the upper hand that existed inside my head.

  I had to start taking the hint. Every sign glowed neon bright. Erin wanted nothing to do with me outside of parenting our child. And I’d been using her as an excuse to avoid going out, living my old life. I had to start being old Ian again.

  I told Tommy I’d meet him at the bar after I finished up at work. On my way out, I asked Scott to join us, but he had a date—a real date, like with dinner and everything. I begged him for details, but he only blushed and said, “It’s new.”

  In a trance, I wandered over to the bar atop the Chicago Athletic Club. The Ian of a year ago never would’ve predicted any of this—that Scott would be going on a real date or that I’d be weeks away from meeting my own son. The only constant was Tommy, who’d always longed for a family life.

  I found him at the bar, drinking scotch and talking to a woman with blond hair. I groaned inwardly. He was wingmanning for me, finding someone for me to hook up with. The Ian of one year ago would’ve been grateful. Tonight I wanted two drinks and my own bed.

  “Hey, Tom—”

  He cut me off. “Shelly, this is my friend Tommy.”

  My shoulders slumped. What. The. Fuck. “Hey,” I deadpanned.

  Shelly batted her eyes at Tommy. “Ian’s told me so much about you.”

  He wasn’t playing the part of my wingman tonight. I was his. And, what? He just expected me to go along with it, to look the other way while he chatted up other women—using my name—while his wife and daughter sat at home? “Hey, Shelly,” I said. “Can you give us a minute? Ian and I have some things to discuss.”

  We watched as Shelly headed over to her friends, a group of women all wearing skinny jeans and Uggs. Ugh. The whole thing was ugh. “Tommy, what the fuck?”

  He shrugged, eyes still on Shelly. “I’m just having fun.”

  “You’re using my name. I know what that means. That means you’re hoping to hook up tonight.” My blood boiled. How dare he put me in this position and expect me to go along with it, no questions asked.

  “No, it doesn’t.” He turned to me, eyes glazed over. Tommy had left work early today, and I guessed he was about four drinks in. “Flirting isn’t cheating.”

  “Sure.” I picked up his empty tumbler and shook it, rattling the ice. “But how many of these have you had? How long before you’re so fucked up the flirting morphs into cheating?”

  “You’re not my dad.”

  “I’m not.” I ordered two waters from the bartender. “But I am Maeve’s godfather and Susie’s friend, and damn it if I’m going to sit here and watch you betray them.”

  “You don’t know what it’s like,” he said. “You think everything is one way, but then on a dime”—he snapped his fingers—“you don’t even recognize your life anymore.” He widened his bloodshot eyes and stared at me. “I haven’t slept in months. I haven’t touched my wife in longer than that. Her mother is living with us now, and I’m not even allowed to hold the baby, except under very specific circumstances. I come home from work, and they just start yelling, telling me everything I’m doing wrong, berating me for doing my job.” He ordered yet another drink from the bartender. “All I’m asking for is one night of talking to women who don’t look at me like they hate my guts.”

  “But you and Susie—” They were the perfect couple. They wore matching ugly sweaters to every Christmas party. They had both separately picked out the same china pattern years before they got engaged. There was never any doubt that the two of them would make it to ever after.

  “She hates me. She’s done a complete one-eighty on me.” He downed his second drink. “She used to understand what I was all about. She loved that I worked so hard and fell in love with me because I was successful. I’m still doing the same work—trying to stay successful—and she throws it back in my face. She thinks I’m avoiding responsibilities at home.”

  “Well, tonight you kind of are,” I reminded him.

  “If I’m going to be blamed for something either way, I might as well have the fun.” Tommy ordered yet another drink, and I motioned to the bartender that we’d like some appetizers. I had to get food in Tommy, STAT.

  “Dude,” I said, “you don’t want to fuck this up. Things are hard right now, but you owe it to yourself and Susie to deal with this together—see a counselor, take a vacation.” My parents never talked about shit when they were together, and then one day my mom showed up—packed and ready to move to Hawaii with Blake in his Mazda Miata.

  “I’m only blowing off steam,” he said. “I’m not going to do anything.” Ah, but then he started to pull off his wedding ring.

  I shoved it back on his finger. “Fine, Tommy. Do your flirting bullshit, but keep your ring on. I’ll keep an eye on you.” Lucky me. If anything, this was good practice for after James was born, and I’d have to watch to make sure he kept his fingers out of the electric sockets. Tonight was all about keeping Tommy from putting any of his appendages in dangerous holes.

  Tommy bought Shelly and her friends in
the corner a round of drinks. The women weren’t from around here—the big hair and cheap purses gave them away. I knew their kind well. They’d bus into to the city for a ladies’ night out, leaving their boyfriends, husbands, and responsibilities at home.

  “Girls.” Shelly wrapped an arm around Tommy’s shoulders. “This is Ian.”

  “Hi, Ian!” her friends sang.

  “And you are?” The redhead next to me in a sleeveless midriff-baring top nudged me in the side.

  “Tommy,” I said.

  Tommy winked at me over the Irish Car Bomb he held to his lips.

  “What’s your story, Tommy?” the redhead purred.

  “I have a wife and child and I’m very happy in my life thank you.”

  She backed away.

  I sipped my scotch, ignoring the women, keeping one eye on Tommy and one eye on the TV broadcasting the Bulls game. My phone weighed heavy in my pocket. I had to physically keep both hands on my drink to avoid texting Erin. None of these women held a candle to her. They seemed nice enough, but they weren’t PhDs, they weren’t bleeding hearts for all children, they weren’t funny and tough and bold, they weren’t the mother of my own kid.

  Hand shaking, I lifted the tumbler to my lips and drank. My throat had constricted, as a wave of sadness hit me. This life wasn’t enough for me anymore. It might never be enough again.

  Tommy rose from his seat, downed another scotch, and turned toward the bathroom. Shelly followed him. Fuck. Shit. Time for Babysitter Ian to step up. This drunk dillweed was harder to deal with than Maeve with a loaded diaper. “Where are you going, Ian?”

  He made a point of not looking me in the eye, like a child. Like a lying-ass child. “Bathroom.”

  I stood. “I’ll go with.”

  Tommy shook his head. “No, no. I’m fine. I’ll be right back.”

  Shelly ran her goddamn fucking talons down his arm. Did she not see the wedding ring on his finger? The two of them took a step together toward the bathrooms. We didn’t cheat. Yeah, Tommy, Scott, and I had done our fair share of hooking up, but we drew the line at contributing to the delinquency of anyone in a relationship. Tommy had once faked breaking his arm to keep my drunk ass from leaving with a married woman. It was on me to return the favor tonight.