“So what did she say?” I asked.
“No problem. She’s waiting for you.”
“I’ll be back in an hour-two at the latest. I’ll hurry.”
She reached back and grabbed me, laughing.
“Do that,” she said. “I have something to show you. You left so fast this morning…”
“Listen, I’ll give you thirty seconds…”
She turned around. She had a little glass tube in her hand. She tried to look nonchalant.
“I didn’t like the idea of keeping it to myself all day, but it’s okay now.”
She held the little tube up to my nose, as if it contained the secret of eternal life. It looked like something you’d find in a cereal box. Except for her eyes, her whole face smiled.
“Let me guess,” I said. “It’s authentic dust from the lost island of Atlantis.”
“No, it’s a thing that tells you if you’re pregnant.” My blood pressure suddenly plunged.
“And what does it say?” I said in one breath.
“It says yes.”
“What about your fucking IUD?”
“Well, apparently things like this happen…”
I don’t know how long I stood there looking at her, rocking from one foot to the other-at least as long as it took for my brain to start working again. The air went out of the room. I found myself panting. Her eyes were fixed on mine. This helped me a little. I gradually unclenched my teeth. Then she started smiling, so I started smiling too. I didn’t really know why-my first reaction was that we had committed the Supreme Fuck-up. Maybe she was right, though-maybe it was the right thing to do. I froze all the old demons in their tracks. We burst out laughing. We laughed so hard it hurt. When I laughed with her, you could have made me swallow a bucket of poison. I put my hands on her shoulders. I played on her skin with my fingers.
“Listen,” I said. “Let me get this appointment over with, then I’ll come right home. Okay?”
“Yeah. Anyway, I have tons of laundry to do. I won’t get bored.”
I hopped in the car and drove out of town. On the street I counted twenty-five women with strollers. My throat was dry. I had trouble getting my mind around what was happening-it was an eventuality I’d never seriously considered. Images raced through my mind like rockets.
To calm myself down, I concentrated on the drive. It was beautiful. I passed the cop ear, I was going eighty. A minute later he stopped me. Richard again. He had nice teeth-healthy and straight. He took out a pad and a pen.
“Every time I see this car I know it means I have a job to do,” he whined.
I had no idea what he wanted me for-no idea of what I was even doing on this road. I smiled at him dubiously. Perhaps he had been standing there in the sun all day, ever since dawn…
“Maybe you think that changing your tire gives you the right to drive like a maniac…?”
I shoved my index finger and thumb into the corners of my eyes. I shook my head.
“Jesus, I was somewhere else,” I sighed.
“Don’t worry. If I find two or three grams of alcohol in your blood, I’ll bring you right back down to earth.”
“If it was only that,” I said. “I just found out I’m going to be a daddy!”
He seemed to hesitate for a moment, then he closed his pad, with his pen stuck inside, and put it back in his shirt pocket. He leaned over to me.
“You wouldn’t have a cigarette, would you?” he asked.
I gave him one. Then he leaned against my door, puffing peacefully, and told me all about his eight-month-old son, who had just started crawling across the living room on all fours, and all the various brands of formula, and the thousand-and-one joys of fatherhood. I almost dozed off during his lecture on nipples. Finally he winked at me and said he’d look the other way this time, that I could go. I went.
During the last few miles I tried to put myself in a woman’s shoes, to see if I would want to have a baby-if I would feel a deep urge. But I couldn’t put myself in a woman’s shoes.
It was a beautiful house on a nice piece of land. I parked in front and got out of the car with my little black briefcase. I didn’t keep anything in it, but I’d found that it reassured people-I’d already blown a few sales by showing up with my hands in my pockets. A woman came out onto the stoop. I waved hello.
“At your service,” I said.
I followed her inside. On the other hand, if this was really what Betty wanted, I had no right to refuse her- maybe it was all part of the order of things, maybe it wasn’t death. And what was good for her would probably be good for me. Still, there was an air of terror surrounding the whole thing. It’s the kind of situation that’s always frightening. Once inside the living room, I glanced at the window and saw that the piano would make it through, no problem. I went into my spiel.
After five minutes, however, my thoughts got foggy, and I lost control of the situation.
“Does a woman really need to have a child to be fulfilled?” I asked.
The woman’s eyelashes fluttered a little. I went on to enumerate the conditions of the sale, then proceeded through the details of delivery. I would have liked to be in some deserted place, where I could sit and think everything over peacefully. This was no laughing matter. Looking around me, I wondered if this was any place for a child to be born-and this was only one small part of the problem. The lady was circling the living room, looking for the right place to put the piano.
“In your opinion, ought I to set it here, to the south?”
“That depends on whether you intend to play the blues or not,” I said.
Anyway, I was a true bastard-it was clear. Then again, lacking courage make you a bastard? I spotted the bar by accident. I gave it a sad look, in the style of Captain Haddock. Shit, I said to myself, to think that the fucking IUD slipped out of line and I didn’t feel a thing. I had an anxiety attack: Was I merely an instrument? In the end, was there only the blooming forth of the female, and nothing for me? Don’t guys ever get a break? The attack mysteriously evaporated when the lady got out the glasses.
“Easy,” I said. “I’m not used to drinking in the afternoon.”
I couldn’t stop myself from downing my drink in one gulp, though-the anticipation had been too great. I saw Betty in her panties standing in front of the bathroom mirror. Here I was, driving myself crazy, when all anyone asked of me was to rise to the occasion-it always pays to go all the way. I poured myself another finger of maraschino.
On the way home, I forced myself to not think about it. I drove carefully, keeping to my right. The only thing they could have given me a ticket for was obstructing traffic. But I was the only car on the road. I was alone and apart from the universe-a speck of dust sliding toward an infinite tininess.
I stopped in town and bought a bottle and some passion-fruit ice cream, plus two or three cassettes that had just come out. It was like I was going to visit a sick person. I must admit, I wasn’t too chipper.
When I got home she was ecstatic. The TV was on.
“They’re going to show a Laurel and Hardy movie,” she said. It was exactly what I needed-I couldn’t have imagined anything better. We plunked ourselves down on the couch with the ice cream and the booze, and let the rest of the afternoon slip away happily without bringing up the subject. She seemed in top form, completely relaxed, as if it were just another day of eating ice cream and watching television. I felt like I’d been making a mountain out of a molehill.
At first I was thankful that she didn’t talk about it. I was afraid that we’d be forced to go into all the gory details, while what I really needed was time to adjust. Yet as the evening wore on, I started to realize that it was me who was having trouble containing himself. After dinner, as she was busy gulping down a plain yogurt, I found myself cracking my knuckles.
Finally, in bed, I put my foot in it, while stroking her thighs:
“So, tell me… how do you feel about being pregnant…?”
“Gee, I don’t really know yet. It’s not really sure. To be sure I have to go get a test.”
She squeezed herself against me and spread her legs.
“Right, but what if it was sure…? Would you like that?”
I felt her fur under my fingers, but I stopped myself. She could try and squirm out of it all she wanted-I needed a straight answer. She got the message.
“Well, I’d really rather not think about it too much,” she said. “But my first impression is that it’s not so
