Dating Big Bird, page 11
“Well, that was a nightmare,” she said.
I sighed. “I know. But at least it’s over.”
“Over? It’s only Thursday afternoon. There are three more days left until Sunday.”
“That’s true, though the big fight is out of the way. Anything now will just feel like little aftershocks.”
“You’re right,” she said, putting her legs up onto the coffee table. “So. How are things?”
I shrugged. “They’re okay.”
She winced, then lifted herself off the couch.
“Shit!” She pulled out a hard plastic pointy windmill-wand and rolled her eyes. “It’s a good thing I’m so fat now, otherwise I would have really felt this.”
“You’re not fat.”
“Yes, I am.” She let out her stomach and let her arms and legs go limp so she would look as bloated and bloblike as possible.
“You’re not fat,” I repeated emphatically, thinking we sounded frighteningly like Karen and her sister Gail. “It’s just that you used to be really thin, so now you just look normal, like the rest of us.”
“Whatever.”
We smiled at each other. I loved sitting with Lynn like this. It reminded me of when we were younger and our parents would go out and we’d have the house to ourselves.
“So how are things going with …?”
“Malcolm? They’re fine. They’re the same.”
“So no change.”
“Nope.”
Though she and I were close and though we were never judgmental with each other, I had learned over the years not to say too much—otherwise she’d worry about me more than she already did.
“What are you going to do?”
“About him? I don’t know yet.”
“Maybe you should—” She hesitated, I knew, because she didn’t want to sound disapproving, or like she was going to tell me what to do. “I mean, since you want kids, maybe he’s not the most promising prospect. Not that it’s any of my business.”
“No, you’re right,” I said. “I should probably start thinking about finding someone else. Especially since I’m running out of time.”
“You’re not running out of time. You’ve got plenty of time. Lots of women don’t start having kids until they’re forty.”
“But I don’t want to be forty. I don’t want to be that old and doing it for the first time. I barely have enough energy now, for myself.”
“I know,” she said. “Maybe if I’d had Nicole earlier, I wouldn’t be so exhausted all the time.”
“Should I”—I blurted out suddenly, then held my breath—“have one? A baby?”
“Of course you should.”
Maybe she didn’t understand what I meant.
“I mean alone,” I clarified.
“Sure.”
The simplicity and surety of Lynn’s response took me by complete surprise.
“So you don’t think it’s wrong?”
“Wrong how?”
“You know, like, not good for the child. To have only one parent. Selfish.”
“No. It’s definitely something to weigh because it’s an important issue. But there are far worse things a child could have to deal with than that, I’d say.”
“I’ve been looking into it a little—you know, how I’d do it if I decided to do it. Someday. Do you think I’m crazy?”
“No. I don’t think you’re crazy. It’s just that it’s a lot of work, though.” She let her head roll back onto the sofa cushion. “A lot of work.”
“I know.”
“It’s hard enough having a child when you’re married. But at least there’s some help, some relief, at the end of the day, when you think you’ll shoot yourself if you’re alone with the baby for one more minute.” She reflected on it, and even the thought seemed to exhaust her. “I can’t really picture that. Doing it by myself.”
“I can’t, either, really.” I shifted uncomfortably on the couch. I couldn’t help feeling slightly defensive about having her tell me how hard it would be. As if I hadn’t already taken that aspect into consideration.
“I wasn’t trying to imply that you were romanticizing having a baby alone.”
“Because I’m not.”
“I know. It’s just that you have to really want a baby. Really, really want one. Having a baby changes everything. Everything. In your entire life. Forever. No one ever tells you that. Or if they do, you don’t believe them, or you’re not listening.”
“Changes it how? You know, besides the obvious ways—no time, no privacy, no selfishness.”
“Well, in those obvious ways, like you said. But there are other things that happen—things you don’t expect.” I waited while she gathered her thoughts. “Like, you lose yourself. You completely lose a sense of who you are. Not that it would matter, since you become a totally different person afterward anyway. But I don’t know, it’s almost like you forget who you were; forget what it was like to be the way you used to be. Your body changes, your mind changes, your marriage changes, everything changes so suddenly and so completely that it takes a while to realize the extent of what’s happened. You get glimpses sometimes, here and there, of how things used to be—late at night when you’re too exhausted to go to sleep after a feeding, or at the end of the day when you’ve just put them down and you have the first moment of peace and quiet that you’ve had all day—it’s like a flashback. You have this vague, distant memory of this person, this life, you used to know—I used to look like this, and I used to wear this, and I used to think about this and read about that—only it’s gone, and it’s been replaced by this other person and this other life. It’s not a bad thing. That’s not the point. It’s just different.”
“Do you ever—?”
“Regret it?” She shook her head emphatically. “No. Not at all. Never. I mean, now I can’t imagine not having Nicole. I just can’t imagine it. I’m only telling you because you should know. You should know before you make any decisions, so that when you decide—if you decide—to do it, you’ll be prepared. More prepared than I was.”
“Thanks,” I said.
“That’s what older sisters are for. Advice that sounds condescending but isn’t meant to be.”
“I didn’t think you were being condescending. I just get tired sometimes of people who have kids making it sound like people who don’t have kids can’t possibly understand what it’s like to have them. But to the extent that I can imagine it and based on what I’ve observed, I think I can make a fairly sound judgment on whether or not I want to get pregnant.”
“I’m sure you can. And it sounds like you really want to. I think you want to more than I did before I had Nicole.” She refolded her legs underneath her. “And you’d obviously be a great mother, seeing as how you can’t get enough of her.” She pointed toward the Pickle’s bedroom.
I picked up one of Nicole’s teddy bears and picked the fuzz off its fur.
“How would you do it?” she started. “Is there someone you could—”
“I have no idea. I’ve just started thinking about it. I mean, it’s not like I’m going to do anything about it tomorrow. I’ve got too much research to do first.”
“I know.”
We looked out the window and listened to the wind pushing through the trees. The sky was bright yellow and pink behind the naked branches; the sun would be going down soon. Just then we heard the front door open and close, then my parents talking as they took off their shoes and padded through the kitchen to where we were.
“Hey, Karen’s pregnant again,” I said, remembering suddenly that I hadn’t told any of them.
“So am I,” Lynn said.
My eyes went immediately and involuntarily down to her abdomen, looking to see if I’d missed the telltale signs of obvious pregnancy again, as I had with Karen. While my parents squealed with joy and smothered her with hugs and kisses I couldn’t help but feel a pang of jealousy swiftly followed by a sense that time was slipping away. I’d always dreamed of Lynn’s children and mine growing up together, and if I didn’t start soon, too many years would be between them.
“Wow,” I said, almost to myself. “That’s great. That’s amazing. Congratulations.”
She smiled and looked happy. Really happy. “We didn’t want to say anything until the first trimester was over. Until we were sure it was going to take.”
“So the Pickle is going to have a sibling,” I said slowly.
“And you’re going to have another Pickle,” my mother said.
“There’s only one Pickle,” I corrected, stating the obvious.
“Unless you have your own,” Lynn said.
My parents’ eyes—gaping, horrified, shocked—nailed me, while Lynn’s lips formed the word oops, and she covered her mouth with her hands.
“Is there something we should know?” my mother asked.
“Something you want to tell us?” my father added.
“Relax,” I said. “It was just a rhetorical statement. Meaning, like, someday, in the future. I do plan on having a future, you know.”
“Of course you have a future,” my father said.
“We never said you wouldn’t have a future,” my mother added.
I shook my head dismissively, but the idea of my having a baby was still shimmering in my mind like a mirage—receding and advancing; real and unreal. I turned back to Lynn, hoping to return the focus to her. “So when are you due?”
“July,” she said, smiling.
I could believe anything at this point—including the Pickle’s assertion, later that evening when I was putting her to bed, that the reason she’d peed in her Pull-Up this time was because she didn’t know where the bathroom was.
“You know where the bathroom is.”
She shook her head.
“Yes, you do. It’s right there.” I pointed at her bedroom door and beyond toward the hallway. “Maybe you should go now before you go to sleep.”
“No way,” she said.
“Yes way.”
“No way.”
“Yes way.”
I grabbed both cheeks and got in her face as close as I could without touching her.
“Nose kiss!” I ordered.
“Nose kiss!” she repeated, and then she grabbed my face, too, and we rubbed noses and wrestled each other and rolled around on the bed until I was exhausted.
It was time to go to sleep by then—Nicole’s bedtime, not mine, though I was so exhausted by the end of the day that I was ready to collapse. I got into bed with her, under the covers, and read her a pile of books. By the fifth story, our eyes were drooping, so I finished the one we were in the middle of, Blueberries for Sal, then slid out of bed and turned the Barney night-light on and the big light off.
I got back in bed and pulled the Winnie-the-Pooh comforter up under her neck and breathed deeply. It had been a long day, a very long day, and my mind was still racing from my sister’s news. Would they have a boy this time, and would they want to know beforehand, unlike the first time with Nicole, when they wanted to be surprised? How would Nicole react to a new little brother or sister, and how would I react to being an aunt for the second time? Could I ever feel for the new baby what I’d come to feel for Nicole, or was she always going to be my favorite? I wondered suddenly what she would be like in a few years when she was older. Would she always be as headstrong and opinionated and sure of herself as she was now? Would she keep painting and become an artist, or would a sudden fascination with Lego building blocks emerge and make her want to become an architect or a mathematician? Would we always be as close as we were now? Would she still like me? Or would her growing up inevitably mean our growing apart? And when I leaned over to kiss her, I couldn’t help imagining what my child would be like, look like, grow up into, if I had a child.
“Good night, my Pickle.”
“Good night,” she said. “I la loo.”
“I la loo, too,” I said back.
I went to sleep in tears, so moved by the simple bliss of her declaration that I was unable to think about anything else before I fell asleep—except wanting a child of my own, and what I was going to do to make that happen.
10
You’d think, from the way Simon was talking about it, that Karen’s baby shower was going to be the event of the season.
“It’s going to be the event of the season,” he said, the first week of January when we all got back after the Christmas/New Year’s break. He licked his lips and I knew he was eager to get back into the swing of things.
Unlike me. I was still staggering through the day, not having fully recovered from spending so much time with my family—first in November and then again in December. But it wasn’t just that. A lot had happened during that time: Amy’s meltdown and our agreed-on decision deadline; Lynn’s announcement that she was pregnant and her essentially giving me permission to have a baby alone; my knowing that a resolution of my relationship with Malcolm was drawing near. It had been a tough few months, and I felt exhausted and emotionally drained.
Simon chased me into my office, shut the door behind him, and lit up a Dunhill. He wasn’t allowed to smoke at his desk anymore now that Karen was pregnant, which was too bad since the pressure of the shower arrangements were clearly starting to overwhelm him.
“There’s so much to do, you can’t imagine.”
“It’s a baby shower,” I said, “not our spring show. What’s the big deal?”
He looked at me as if I couldn’t be serious.
“You can’t be serious. It’s for Karen.” He said her name reverentially, breathlessly, fearfully, as if he were the elected president of the Cult of Karen. “Everything has to be perfect. You know how she gets when it isn’t.”
I couldn’t help but smile. Simon was so weird.
“Gail wanted to reserve that muraled room at the Pierre, but Karen said she wouldn’t come if we had it there. Too old-ladyish. Then we all agreed on the Royalton—the restaurant and the lobby bar. But when Gail spoke to Martha, she offered to have it at her house in Connecticut, only the date didn’t work out.”
I was flipping through some message slips and only half-listening, so I looked up to get clarification.
“Martha—?”
“Stewart. She’ll mastermind the food and flowers, of course, as well as the overall concept.”
Concept? As in, celebration?
“But we’re going to have it at Gail’s.”
“In Oyster Bay?”
“No. At her East Hampton house. It’s going to need a complete overhaul for the party, but it’ll have to do. Anyway,” Simon continued, “Nora’s going to word the invitation.”
Ephron.
“Celine’s promised to sing.”
Dion.
“And we’ve already confirmed a few definites when we were choosing the date: Barbara. Julia. And of course, Demi.”
Walters.
Roberts.
Moore.
Karen’s A-list clients.
“So what is the date?”
“Sunday. May I. A save-the-date card will go out as soon as we finalize the guest list.”
A save-the-date card. Nearly four months ahead of time? Please.
Simon, by now, had pulled a note card out of his suit jacket pocket—presumably a to-do list. I cringed at the thought of getting sucked into the teeth of this thing.
“Annette’s overseeing the printing and mailing of the invitations,” he began.
And the postmaster general has already started designing a new set of fashion stamps to be issued especially for the occasion.…
“Gail and I are doing the first and second drafts of the guest list, which we’ll need you to look over and finalize.”
And then encrypt in a code that only our three secret decoder rings will be able to crack.…
“And Renee is in charge of the cake.”
Now that was a deeply ironic idea. I wondered if that meant seven naked men would come gyrating out of it in leather diapers, ready to be changed.
“And you,” he said, because of course we hadn’t given me my little job yet, “you’re in charge of the gift.”
“The gift?”
“From the staff. You know, ‘With love and obsequiousness from all your loyal worker bees.’ That sort of thing.”
“Slaves would be more appropriate.”
He waved me away. Clearly he didn’t have time for semantics right now.
When he and his ridiculous list finally left my office, I sat on the edge of my desk and wondered how I was going to summon the energy to participate in yet another baby shower—especially one that promised to be as high profile and full of ridiculously ostentatious gift-giving as this. I was also worried: What do you get for the Vulcan who has everything?
Not that I would have admitted it to Simon, but I was too distracted to become as obsessed about Karen’s gift as he was.
Since Thanksgiving, Amy and I had been spending most of our free time immersed in reading material—the first step, I always believed, in laying the proper foundation for making any decision—but especially a decision as hugely important and irreversible as having a baby. The pile on my desk at home and the other on the table by my bed was growing week after week, month after month—an irony I couldn’t help but appreciate—and on the nights and weekends I didn’t stay over at Malcolm’s, I would read a few general, theoretical, overview-type chapters from Penelope Leach’s oeuvre or Dr. Spock’s oeuvre or T. Berry Brazelton’s oeuvre before I fell asleep.
For my practical reading, I figured I’d start with the easiest book first—The Girlfriend’s Guide to Pregnancy—then work myself up to the What to Expect When You’re Expecting three-volume Proust-length trilogy. The Girlfriend’s Guide was self-described on its back cover in bright pink type as the book that tells you “what to expect when going from being a babe to having one” (my italics).
I eyed the roll of stomach flab on which the book was resting.
Well, at least in my case, the transformation from before to after wouldn’t be so dramatic.
I flipped through the pages and right off the bat eliminated the need to carefully read about half the book since it was chock-full of such useless sections as these:
