Be My Baby Tonight (29 page)

“Excuse me, Tim, but when did this all become
about
you
?” she asked, getting up from her chair. “What
about me?”

“Come again?”

“Me, Tim. Your wife. You know, the woman you
married because she was the lesser of three evils?”

“I explained that,” he said, putting down his
half-eaten cookie.”

“Sure, you explained that. Right after Dusty
spilled the beans, you explained that. Was that supposed to make it
all better? Tell me, Tim, what would have happened if you’d gotten
hurt? Couldn’t play anymore? Had to retire, like Jack? Would that
have meant that good old Suze had failed to come through for you
this time? Would I have been expendable then? You don’t want this
baby. We never even talked about babies, except when you got all
weird about birth control.”

He made a face. “That’s nuts. We’re married,
and we’re going to stay married. And I want this baby.”

“Oh, really? And I’m supposed to believe
this?”

“Yes, damn it, you’re supposed to believe
this.”

“Why? Because you
say so?
Let’s replay
this, from
my
side. I’m pregnant because my husband doesn’t
even speak to me enough about the
real
things in life to
tell me he doesn’t
want
a baby right now, and I’m going nuts
every moment, wondering why my husband married me, what else he’s
not telling me. Because he lies to me. Lies about why he married
me, lies about a damn cat. Lies, or hides, or just plain ignores.
You knew I was pregnant? Well, Tim,
I
knew you knew I was
pregnant. I even know you’re feeling so damn guilty you’re having
male pregnancy symptoms. But did you say anything? Ever? No, you
didn’t. Because we don’t
talk,
and when we do, you
lie
to me. Like you said, Tim.
Not a lot of fun.”

“Damn it,” Tim said, leaning against the
counter. “What happened, Suze? We used to be able to talk to each
other. Why has getting married ruined such a great friendship?”

“I... I don’t know, Tim,” Suzanna said,
heading toward the back stairs to the bedrooms. “Maybe it wasn’t
such a great friendship in the first place. Maybe it was all me,
giving, and all you, taking. Did you ever think about that?”

He didn’t follow her when she climbed the
stairs, and a few seconds later she heard the back door slam.

* * *

Tim cut around the house to the front and
headed for the bridge, and maybe Jack’s house. Because Coplay Creek
was just that, a creek, and not deep enough to drown himself
in.

He walked along, his hands dug deep into his
pockets, replaying his and Suzanna’s fight in his head.

She was right. Damn it, she was right.

Good old Suze.

God, how he hated that. How he hated himself
for ever thinking that, ever saying that.

Suzanna was right. He was a bastard. Selfish.
No good. Immature.

Nauseous.

But he loved her. He did, damn it.

At the hospital, when everything started
going south with Keely and little Johnny, he’d held his brother,
but all he could think about was Suzanna. What would he do if
something ever happened to Suzanna?

He couldn’t live without her. He didn’t want
to live without her.

And yet today, after three days of near
agony, when he’d decided it was time, way past time, for him to let
her know he knew she was carrying his child, everything had gone
from bad to worse.

He needed to talk to somebody. He needed to
talk to Jack.

No, not Jack. Jack was busy being a happy
father, he and Keely playing happy family. He couldn’t rain on that
parade.

So who was left? Not Mort, not this time,
because he had to be the one who had told Suzanna about his
pregnancy symptoms. Not even Jack knew about those.

Not Aunt Sadie, because she was at Jack’s
house, and not Mrs. B., because she was substitute teaching all
this week.

There was nobody. Nobody. He was all
alone.

“Hey, Tim—bo!”

“Oh, shit,” Tim muttered under his breath.
“Is the whole world out to get me?” he asked as Joey pulled up
beside him in his humongous four-by-four.

“Hey, thought that was you. I was just going
to see the kid; but when I saw you, I let Bruno out, and I kept
coming. We came to see the baby, ya know, but that can wait. What
ya doin’, walking around out here?”

“Trying to be alone?” he answered, knowing
there was little hope that suggestion wouldn’t just go zinging
right over his cousin’s head.

“You look pretty bad, Tim, like you just lost
your last friend,” Joey called out as Tim kept on walking. “Just
let me park this thing, and I’ll walk with you, okay?”

“Why not,” Tim grumbled. “God’s punishing me,
and I deserve it.” More loudly he said, “Sure, Joey, and then you
can help me with my troubles, right?”

Joey hopped down out of his vehicle, hit a
button on his key chain that activated the security system, and
jogged over to Tim. “Me? Help you? There’s a switch. Okay, let’s
try it. How can I help you?”

Tim looked around, and his gaze landed on
some boulders the builders had bulldozed into a pile on the lot
where a three-story Georgian colonial was almost under roof. He’d
have new neighbors soon after Christmas. “Let’s sit down,” he said,
motioning toward the boulders.

“Hey, sure,” Joey said, bounding toward the
boulders and hopping up on one of them, like a kid just offered a
treat. “Man, this is cool. We never talked, ya know that?
Never.”

“Yeah,” Tim said, selecting another boulder
for himself. “There’s a lot of my not talking going around.”

“Huh?” Joey asked, shaking his head. “You
been, ya know, tippling?” He lifted an imaginary bottle to his
lips.

“No, but it was going to be my next choice,”
Tim said. “Joey? Do you know that Suzanna’s pregnant?”

“Me? Naw, I don’t know—oh, okay, sure. I
knew. Everybody knows. Why?”

For the next twenty minutes, maybe longer,
Tim talked, and Joey listened. He told his cousin everything: about
the curse, about meeting up with Suzanna in Pittsburgh, about the
birth control—or lack of it—even about Lucky and Margo. And when
Joey just sat there, looking almost pontifical, he went for broke
and told him about the male pregnancy symptoms, and the fight he
and Suzanna had just had.

“You screwed up, Tim-bo,” Joey said at last,
nodding sagely. “Big time.”

Tim slapped his hands on his knees and stood
up. “Leave it to you, Joey, to tell me the obvious. Hey, never
mind. Thanks for listening. I think I needed to say it all out
loud, you know?”

He started walking away, but Joey clambered
down from his boulder and followed him. “Hey, wait. You want help?
I’ll help you.”

“You?” Tim shook his head. “Thanks, but—”

“No, really. I’ll help you. I’m taking this
psych course at the community college, and—what? Why’re you rolling
your eyes like that?”

“No reason. Go on, Joey. Let me have it. Tell
me how I’ve got to court her and take things slow, and prove that I
love her. I don’t know how to do any of that, now that she hates me
this much, but you can tell me anyway.”

“I’m not telling you anything like that,
Tim-bo. She’s just as in the wrong as you are.”

Jack stopped, tipped his head to one side.
“She’s
in the wrong?”

“Heck, yeah. You’re tossing your cookies.
Your nose is bleeding—you might want to dab at it there with
something, Tim-bo. You’ve got headaches, and cramps, and you’re
telling me you have a toothache? You’re telling me you read about
all these symptoms, and you’re having all of them? Sounds to me
like you’re already suffering plenty, ya know? So what’s she doing?
Except maybe busting your chops.”

Tim chewed on this for a few moments, after
getting over the idea that he was actually listening to his cousin.
“So, what you’re saying is, we’re both at fault? Not just me?”

“Hey, mostly you, definitely. But she’s not
being any walk in the park, now, is she?”

“No, she’s not,” Tim said, thinking about his
lonely bedroom.

“You wanna know what’s lacking here, Tim-bo?
I’ll tell you what’s lacking here. Trust. T-r-u-s-t-t, trust. You
can’t have anything else if you don’t have trust. I know that,
because we’re studying it.”

“Only two
T
s
,
Joey,” Tim said
absently, as the gears in his head had begun to spin. His wacky
cousin had a point, a real point. Hadn’t he and Suzanna just been
yelling at each other about how he couldn’t trust her to be there
when he came home, and she couldn’t trust him to stay with her for
any reason except that she was pregnant? Trust. Yeah. That was it.
There was no damn
trust.

“You’re nodding your head, Tim-bo. That means
you think I’m right, right?”

“Right, Joey,” Tim said, putting his arm
around his cousin’s shoulder. “Now, what do we do about it?”

“Well,” Joey said, hitching up his pants,
then swiping a finger under his nose. “First, you prove to her how
much you want this baby, but you want her even more, right? She
needs to know that, right?”

Tim nodded, wiping at his own nose, his
handkerchief coming away with a few spots of blood on it.
“Right.”

“And no pressure, okay? None of this chasing
her around the table, stuff like that. Women don’t want sex so much
as they want holding hands, and intimate dinners, shit like
that.”

“You learned this in psych class?”

“Naw, my mom told me, years ago, back in high
school. Right after she found the condom pack in my wallet on prom
night. So, you gonna listen to me? It’s going to take time, because
you two really screwed up, but I think you can do it. Trust her.
Give her time to trust you.”

“Okay. I’ll try it,” Tim said, looking over
his shoulder, in the direction of his house. His and Suzanna’s
house. “What have I got to lose?”

“What have you got to lose? You’re asking me?
Okay. Everything, Tim-bo. You’ve got everything to lose,” Joey said
with a shrug, and Tim looked at his cousin with new respect.

You can lead a horse to water, but you can’t stick
his

head in it.

— Paul Owen, player

Since Tim knew anyway, Suzanna finally broke
down and headed to the maternity shop in the mall, Aunt Sadie going
along with her.

“Fat clothes,” Suzanna said, holding up a
pair of jeans with a huge elastic front panel in them. “I don’t
want to wear fat clothes.”

“This from the woman who just downed two
hamburgers and fries? How much have you gained, dear?”

Suzanna hung her head. “Fifteen pounds, seven
of them this month,” she said, a sudden memory of her mother, years
ago, gently steering her away from potatoes and toward the broccoli
invading her head. “Dr. Phillips told me that the month I really
begin to show is the month I’ll gain the most weight. At least
that’s been her experience with her patients. I’ve got a
thirty-five-pound limit, so I’m still doing okay.”

Aunt Sadie began ticking off on her fingers.
“December, January, February, March, most of April. Five months,
divided by twenty, leaves four pounds a month. Can you keep to
that?”

Suzanna held up a knit, turtleneck top, cut
on the bias, and large enough to use as a couch cover. “I have to
do this, Aunt Sadie. I used to be fat, and I don’t ever want to be
fat again. It’s all Tim’s fault, you know.”

“Oh, good, let’s blame Timothy. He deserves
it.”

“No, seriously, Aunt Sadie. He used to feed
me. Constantly. His mom was such a great cook, and he always shared
with me so I’d share the great lunches my mom packed for me. Except
he got the home-cooked roast beef sandwiches, and I got the lemon
sponge cake. He’d eat two sandwiches, I’d eat two desserts. And,
believe me, the last thing I needed every day was two desserts. But
it didn’t stop there.”

Aunt Sadie pulled a nursing bra off the rack,
looked at it, quickly put it back. “No? Where else did it go?”

Suzanna sighed. “I started eating to feel
good. There’s really no other explanation, although nobody had that
one back then. It’s only in the last few years that science has
started talking about eating as a comfort in teenagers. Tim went to
a dance; I stayed home and ate a half gallon of chocolate
marshmallow ice cream. Tim gave Mindy his class ring, and I ate a
whole bowl of raw chocolate-chip batter. God, I was sick for three
days after that one. Not that I only started in high school. I was
already pretty hefty in grade school, thanks to my mother’s own
great cooking.” She looked at the other woman. “Do you suppose
that’s why I don’t cook? Because, if I did, I’d eat it all?”

“Could be, I suppose. But it was baby fat,
Suzanna, and gone now.”

“Only because I finally wised up, realized
what I was doing, and changed my diet. And moved away from Tim. Now
I’m back and what do I get—baby fat.”

“And a baby,” Aunt Sadie reminded her. “This
is entirely different.”

“Yeah? Explain that to my stomach, would you?
All I want to do is eat. Eat, eat,
eat.
When I’m upset, it’s
all I do. Eat.”

“Keely ate everything that wasn’t nailed down
for several months, as I recall, once the morning sickness stopped.
You know you’re trying to make a perfectly rational reaction to
being pregnant just another thing that’s wrong in your life, don’t
you, dear?” Aunt Sadie said, moving on to the rack of maternity
underwear. “Now, these don’t look so bad.”

“Am I, Aunt Sadie?” Suzanna asked, taking a
pair of underpants off the rack. “Darn, and I wanted to blame
Tim.”

“Hello, ladies. Which one of you is expecting
a great event?”

“Cute,” Aunt Sadie said, “but nothing but a
discount is going to get me to open my purse any wider than I’ve
already planned.”

“Oh, Aunt Sadie, that’s not why I brought you
with—”