Her jaw drops. “You’re insane.”
“We talked about this last night,” I tell her. “It was you who told me about wanting a baby.”
She grabs her glass and washes down her wine in one gulp. “I don’t handle alcohol very well.”
My skin pulls tightly across my scalp, and I feel a tension headache coming on. “Can you at least think about it?”
Before she can respond, Chad, a fireman, comes to our table and says hello, then turns to Marian. “Would you like to dance?”
Even before he finishes asking, she’s on her feet. “I would love to. “ She doesn’t even look at me.
She takes Chad’s hand, and they head to the dance floor. A slow love song flows from the speakers, and Chad takes her into his arms, holding her close. Something burns my chest, and I tear my gaze away.
I have no right to be jealous. She’s your wife, a voice in my head says. Well, she might be my wife on paper but not in real life.
After the dance, Marian goes to sit at another table with the guys. I need something stronger to drink apart from the white wine that is flowing freely. I leave the ballroom and head to the Lounge bar where Marian and I had a drink the previous day.
Mike, the bartender, is behind the counter, and he looks at me funny as soon as I slide onto a stool.
“Hello there,” he says. “Nice to see that you’re still alive after last night. What can I get you this evening?”
“I’ll have a bourbon on the rocks,” I say.
He turns away to prepare my drink, then slides a coaster and the drink in front of me moments later. He leans on the countertop. “Did you two get married last night?”
The ice clinks as I pick up the glass and shake it. I look up at Mike. “We did.”
He looks away and smiles, and I assume that another customer has come in.
“Congratulations,” he says. “I just heard the good news and was about to congratulate your husband.”
I turn to see Marian sliding into the stool next to mine. “Michael,” she says. “If you want us to continue being friends, don’t ask me about that again.”
He salutes her. “Yes, ma’am. What will you have?”
She looks at my drink. “I’ll have what he’s having.”
She doesn’t speak, and neither do I. When her drink comes, the silence reigns on, and we only start talking when we are in the second round.
“You live in Santa Monica, and I live in LA,” Marian says.
Lightness comes over my chest. I can barely contain my excitement. “I plan to open a second branch of Did you say Pizza? in LA,” I tell her. “We could divide our time between Santa Monica and LA. It’s only half an hour away.”
She takes a swig of her drink. She swallows and looks at me and then laughs, but it’s devoid of humor. “I can’t believe I’m even considering something like this.”
“I’m a believer in things happening for a reason,” I start to say and then shut up when she favors me with a dirty look.
“Don’t try to make sense of this madness. We were irresponsible, and that’s it,” she says. “How long do we need to be married for?”
“It will be up to you.”
A pensive look comes over her features. “Until I get pregnant. I don’t want you to be involved in the baby’s life. That’s the condition.”
My heart squeezes as a memory comes to my mind. Four years ago, I had been the first person to see my brother’s daughter Luna after she was born. My brother had been away in Afghanistan and had not even known that he would be a dad.
I had stood in for him, supporting Lexi, now his wife, throughout the pregnancy. I remember the way Luna left her mother’s body with her little eyes wide open, staring around as if the world and everything in it were hers for the taking.
That moment will stay with me for the rest of my life. I turn my mind to Marian’s proposal. I don’t know whether I have it in me to be a sperm donor. I love kids, and Luna, now three, turns me to mush when I see her. I don’t know if I can live with the knowledge that I fathered a baby and not be involved in her life.
Luna has taught me that kids are the only people who can give you unconditional love. Everyone else’s love has a condition attached to it, and if you break it, then the relationship ends.
Marian sees the war waging inside me. “That’s my condition even to consider this madness.”
This is easily the most difficult decision I have ever made. I’ve always wanted kids but never thought that it was part of my future. And now it is, except it’s not.
“I would like to be part of the baby’s life,” I tell Marian.
She shakes her head. “I’m not interested in a relationship.”
“Neither am I, but I would want her or him to grow up knowing who his dad is.”
“I can’t deal with the drama that will follow you being in our lives. Take it or leave it.” She turns to her drink, leaving me to stare at her in disbelief.
What kind of fucked up deal is this that she’s offering?
“So, you guys are going to try and make a go of this?” Mike asks.
I hadn’t even realized that he had been eavesdropping on our conversation.
“Go away,” we both say at the same time.
He smiles good-naturedly and goes to the other end of the bar to serve someone else.
“There’s one more thing,” she says, and by the way her eyes twinkle, I have a suspicion that she’s enjoying this.
“Go on,” I say dully.
“I hope you don’t think we’ll try to get pregnant the old-fashioned way,” she says.
“No?”
“Definitely not,” she says. “I don’t sleep with strangers.”
“So how will we do it?” I ask.
“Have you ever heard of artificial insemination?” she
