Kitabı oku: «The Baby Chronicles»
The Baby Chronicles
Judy Baer
MILLS & BOON
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For Tom, who is patient beyond measure.
I love you.
Contents
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Chapter Sixteen
Chapter Seventeen
Chapter Eighteen
Chapter Nineteen
Chapter Twenty
Chapter Twenty-One
Chapter Twenty-Two
Chapter Twenty-Three
Chapter Twenty-Four
Chapter Twenty-Five
Chapter Twenty-Six
Chapter Twenty-Seven
Chapter Twenty-Eight
Chapter Twenty-Nine
Chapter Thirty
Chapter Thirty-One
Chapter Thirty-Two
Chapter Thirty-Three
Chapter Thirty-Four
Chapter Thirty-Five
Chapter Thirty-Six
Chapter Thirty-Seven
Chapter Thirty-Eight
Chapter Thirty-Nine
Chapter Forty
Chapter Forty-One
Chapter Forty-Two
Chapter Forty-Three
QUESTIONS FOR DISCUSSION
Chapter One
Monday, March 1
My assistant, Mitzi, cancelled the office waiting room subscriptions to Vogue and Elle and replaced them with Fit Pregnancy and American Baby. I realize now that I should have appreciated it when she was only giving me fashion advice.
Frankly, the one magazine Mitzi should be allowed to read is her signature publication, Harper’s Bizarre (sic).
My name is Whitney Blake Andrews, and today I’m starting a new volume of my personal journal. It’s been quite a ride since that first day two years ago when I began keeping what I fondly call The Whitney Chronicles. My best friend, Kim Easton, has overcome breast cancer, and her son Wesley has turned three. I’ve been made vice president of Innova Software, located in downtown Minneapolis, and been married for almost two years to Dr. Chase Andrews, the most incredible husband in the universe. That’s my personal bias, of course.
And Mitzi Fraiser is still the most aggravating person on this planet, but she’s my aggravating person, so I love her anyway. Most of the time…at least some of the time…in brief spurts…Hmm…I do remember having a pleasant thought about her sometime between last Christmas and New Year’s Eve. I think.
Kim stopped over after work tonight so that we could debrief each other on our day at the office. She likes to come to my house for three reasons. There is no LEGO embedded in the carpet, Ernie and Elmo are not the anchormen during the evening news, and there is always chocolate.
I’ve been sacrificing myself in the name of medical science, researching the curative uses for chocolate. It has the same health-promoting chemicals as fruits and veggies. It’s the least I can do for the good of mankind. How often did I dream Mom would tell me to eat my chocolate cake instead of my Brussels sprouts?
Oh, yes, that’s another thing I don’t understand about Mitzi. She hates chocolate. This is another indication that she is an extraterrestrial—something Kim and I have suspected all along.
“What’s up with Mitzi these days?” Kim curled her feet beneath her on my overstuffed couch, looking all of fifteen, instead of her actual thirty-three years. “She’s been acting weird lately.”
“More than usual? How can you tell?”
Kim grinned and took a piece of milk chocolate with almonds. “The magazines, for one thing. I got a copy of Pregnancy in my mailbox this morning. And the fact that she’s turned into the food police. Did you see her whip that Twinkies out of Bryan’s hand yesterday? You’d have thought he was having a toxic-waste sandwich.”
Bryan Kellund was my assistant before Mitzi was assigned to me. He’s the only person I’ve ever known who can disappear in plain sight. He fades into the background as though he’s wearing wallpaper camouflage. That’s why I’m so amazed that he found a girlfriend who’s even more inconspicuous and retiring than he. They cook tapioca pudding to spice up their dessert menu.
Bryan’s current idea of subterfuge is sneaking into the office break room and substituting decaffeinated coffee for the fully leaded stuff and then patiently watching and waiting for Harry’s and Mitzi’s energy to wane. I’ve caught him a time or two, but I never say anything about it because I’ve done it myself. Anything that makes Mitzi and Harry a little less hyperactive is fine with me.
“I’ve learned not to attempt to figure out what Mitzi is up to,” I said. “Frankly, I’m more curious about Harry.”
My boss, Harry Harrison, is a software genius and our office mascot. Okay, Harry’s not our mascot, exactly, but his hair is. Two or three years ago he discovered the curly perm and he’s resembled a Chia Pet ever since.
“I think he’s depressed,” I murmured, more to myself than to Kim.
“Harry? Don’t you think I’d recognize it if Harry were depressed?”
Kim has battled depression much of her life. She now has it under control with medication and lots of exercise to get those endorphins moving.
“Wouldn’t you be depressed if your claim to fame was being washed down the shower drain?” I persisted. “Have you looked, really looked, at Harry’s head lately?”
Understanding dawned on Kim’s pixielike features. “His thinning hair, you mean?”
“Thinning? Kim, he’s only six strands away from a comb-over.”
“Shades of Rudy Giuliani—you’re right. No wonder he skulks into the office wearing that wool felt hat that makes him look like an Indiana Jones wannabe.”
“We need to be nice to Harry. My own dad’s hair is starting to thin, and he’s very sensitive about it. Mother caught him wearing a baseball cap in the shower last week. She says he can’t stand to see the reflection of his head in the mirror.”
And that’s only one of the many weird aging games my parents play. Dad now insists he’s in male menopause. What it really is is revenge for what my mother put him through when she was “of a certain age.”
“‘…vanity of vanities! All is vanity,’” Kim intoned.
“You can say that again. Harry and Dad may be prime examples, but look at all the silly, pointless things we’ve done….”
“The grapefruit diet?”
I never did get into that. I was in love with a cabbage soup diet that produced enough gas to replace fossil fuels.
“Remember the Approved Veggie Diet? The only ‘approved’ vegetables were arugula, chicory, bok choy, kohlrabi, leeks and dandelion greens.”
We waxed nostalgic about the smoothie diet—best made with ice cream; the metabolism-revving diet—basically seasoning everything with cayenne pepper; and “EEAT”—Ecclesiastical Eaters Anonymous Training, a diet group at church that actually worked.
Kim rubbed her brow. “What does my weight matter when Wesley is etching new creases here every day? No one cares about my figure when they see the Grand Canyon on my forehead.”
“‘Can any of you by worrying add a single day to your life span?’” I quoted, knowing just how crazy she is about that naughty little buzz saw of a boy. “But back to Harry. If food is the way to a man’s heart, then good hair is the way to his ego. If Harry actually goes bald, he’ll have to start therapy.”
“Men are definitely wired differently from women,” Kim agreed. “I see it in Wesley already. He and his dad spend hours piling blocks into pyramids and knocking them down. They laugh and high-five each other like they’ve just invented football. Yet when I ask Kurt to vacuum the floor, he says ‘Didn’t I just do that last month?’ as if he detests repetition in any form.”
“Knocking things down and picking things up are two entirely different concepts. One is male, the other, female. Even Chase says so.”
Chase. Two years of marriage, and I love him more than ever. God really knew what He was doing when He put us together. It doesn’t hurt that his sandy hair is shot with gold, his eyes are an inky Crayola blue, and his physique…There’s only one way to describe it—hunky. Oh, yes, and he’s crazy about me, and a doctor besides. This morning he sent me yellow roses for no reason at all except that he loves me.
“Now you’re thinking about him,” Kim observed grumpily. “You’ve got that moonstruck look on your face again.”
“And you don’t feel that way about Kurt anymore?” I teased.
“Of course I do.” Kim’s attention drifted from me to some private thought of her own. “I wish…”
“Wish what?” I held the candy dish under her nose to refocus her with the scent of chocolate.
“Kurt and I have been talking lately—” Kim reached in and took a piece of Dove dark chocolate, fortifying herself for a heavy-duty conversation “—about having another baby.”
My stomach took a roller-coaster ride from peak to valley and up again.
“Wesley will love a baby brother or sister! That’s wonderful….”
Frankly, Wesley has become a bit of a tyrant, having control as he does of two entire households—Kim’s and mine. It wouldn’t hurt a bit to have a new baby around, someone who instinctively knows how to establish a dictatorship. It may seem absurd to think of a baby as a despot, but I can’t think of an autocrat more qualified to put Wes in his place.
My excitement evaporated when I saw the expression on Kim’s face. “Isn’t it?”
“Of course it is!” she blurted, and burst into tears.
At that moment, a flurry of activity erupted as my cats, Mr. Tibble and Scram, growling and hissing, rolled together past our feet in a single absurd kitty ball.
“Ignore them,” I advised.
“Won’t they hurt themselves doing that?” Kim snuffled.
As she spoke, Mr. Tibble tired of the game and went limp, as if his bones had liquefied. Scram tumbled halfway across the room by himself before he realized he’d been abandoned, then stood up and marched off huffily, his tail straight in the air in a gesture of disdain.
I’d insulted Mr. Tibble deeply when I introduced Scram into his peaceful kingdom, but he’d taken on the kitten with aplomb, taught him who was boss and generally made Scram a being subservient to his own royalty. Just like what Mitzi tries to do with us at work.
“So tell me about this new-baby conversation,” I urged, “and why it makes you cry.”
“If we don’t hurry up, Wesley will be grown-up. I don’t want a large age gap between him and a baby brother or sister.”
There’s not much danger of being all grown-up when one still sucks his thumb, refuses to sleep without his blankie and demands Cheerios in church, but when Kim is emotional, logic flies out the window.
“What’s stopping you?”
Kim looked pained. “Kurt is worried about my health. He’s been on the Internet trying to find out if getting pregnant with my personal history of breast cancer will increase the risk of the cancer recurring.”
“And…?”
“If the cancer returns while I’m pregnant, treatment options are limited. Chemotherapy can be given without hurting the baby, but it is not given in the first trimester, when the major organs are forming. He knows I’d never do anything to harm the baby, even it if were risky for me. Kurt is afraid of my having a recurrence. He doesn’t want me putting my own life on the line.” She rolled her eyes helplessly. “He’s been spouting information about hormones like they were football statistics.”
“Is the danger real?”
“It is definitely real in Kurt’s mind.”
“‘Accept the authority of your husband,’” I murmured. “There’s the rub.”
“That might be a thorny issue for some, but to me that means voluntary compromise and teamwork with someone I love and respect. Kurt and I have discussed it. Whatever we decide will be mutual.” She looked troubled. “But he has even stronger feelings than I. He’s convinced I would be inviting problems if I had another baby right now. He’s also afraid that being pregnant might exacerbate my depression.”
Not a minor concern, considering Kim’s history.
“He wants to have another child, but not at the expense of my health. He’s adamant about that.” Tears welled up in her eyes. “The idea of not giving birth again breaks my heart! I desperately want to have a brother or sister for Wesley.”
“Aren’t you putting the cart before the horse? Who says you won’t? Besides, is this about giving birth or about being a parent? There are other ways to…”
But she didn’t seem to hear me.
After she left, I put some lasagna into the oven, tore up lettuce for salad and still had over an hour before Chase was due to arrive home from work. I couldn’t get Kim out of my mind. How would it be like to be caught in the place in which Kim found herself? Another child, or her health. What would it serve if having another child deprived Wesley of his mother?
To distract myself, I picked up our wedding photo album. Looking at those pictures always turns me into a slobbering romantic. When Chase arrived for dinner, I met him at the door holding his slippers and a newspaper and doing my most seductive siren imitation. Unfortunately, his cousin’s dog, Winslow, had made a hash of his slippers last weekend, and to find them I’d had to dig through the garbage can. Fortunately, they didn’t smell too bad. Since we both read the paper at work, I’d also had to substitute an O magazine for the Tribune.
Clever man. He knew immediately that something was up.
“Now what have you and Kim been doing?” he asked as he put his arms around my waist and gathered me to him. “Last time you tried the newspaper-and-slippers routine on me, you’d agreed to foster a potential seeing-eye puppy without talking to me first.”
“Did you even consider that it might be because I love you and I want to show it?”
“No.” He grinned, and his dimples deepening. “I know you love me. You show it every day and in every way. Something else is going on.”
I ran my finger along the chiseled line of his jaw and was supremely thankful to have this man is in my life. Blessed. I am so blessed.
I stared into the inky blueness of his eyes and watched them grow round with surprise as I whispered, “Chase, how do you feel about having a baby?”
Chapter Two
Though I’d caught him off guard, radiant warmth spread across Chase’s features.
He took me in his arms and kissed me until I totally forgot our topic of conversation. When he finally set me away from himself, he held me at arm’s length to ask, “Do you really mean it?”
“Huh?” My lips were deliciously swollen and rosy, my cheeks were flushed, and a little mechanical monkey in a red suit was riding a bicycle around in my head where my brain had been. Over two years together, and the impossible just keeps happening—I fall more and more deeply in love. If this is the way God’s will feels, then never let me out of it.
“A baby? You’re ready?”
I tipped my head and stared at him. “It’s not as if we haven’t talked about having children before, Chase.”
“True, but I’ve never heard you say you’re ready for them, either.”
I have to admit that several things have been standing in my way—the thought of having my blissful relationship with Chase change when a little third party arrives, what I would do about my job at Innova, and the enormous responsibility of bringing a brand-new soul into the world for eternity.
There’s also that little issue of my mother. Even though she desperately wants grandchildren, she’s recently begun telling people I’m her younger sister. She says she’s not old enough to have a daughter my age. It’s problematic to have my mother stop aging while I continue to grow older. When I surpass her in age, she’ll have to start introducing me as her big sister.
Becoming a grandmother might send her over the edge. Then again, why worry? She’s been dancing pretty close to the edge for some time now.
The baby conversation feels right this time. Maybe it’s because Kim’s been harboring the same thoughts, or that Mitzi keeps leaving baby magazines and maternity clothing catalogs on my desk at work. It was Mitzi who decided I needed to get married and registered unwilling me for an evening of speed dating with Hasty-Date. She’d had high hopes that someone would take pity on me and ask me out. Hasty-Date turned into a Hasty-Dud, but I ultimately met Chase, who is Kim’s doctor and Kurt’s good friend.
I’d also humored Mitzi when she told me I had to get rid of all my out-of-date clothes and found me a personal shopper. And the time she said my hair would look great in cornrows. When Mitzi decides it’s time for something to happen, there’s no stopping her. Could I put up with Mitzi’s pride if she thought she’d convinced me to have a baby? The idea gives me cold chills. I can already imagine her volunteering to be my conception coach, carrying a megaphone and a stopwatch and cheering me on.
“How do you feel, Chase? This isn’t something you can agree to, just to make me happy. When we make this decision, we both have to be ready.”
Chase is far too indulgent with me. He lets me eat saltines and drink hot chocolate in bed and wear his new T-shirts as pajamas. He shares his toothbrush with me when we’re traveling and I’ve forgotten my own—the definitive sign of true love. The only thing he really holds the line on with me is football. I can snuggle with him, blow in his ear, rub his back or sleep on his shoulder. But I cannot turn the television off during an interception thingy, walk in front of him during a touchdown or keep asking him why they have “downs” instead of “ups.” It’s a small sacrifice on my part, I think, since I really love taking naps in his football jersey on Sunday afternoons.
“I can’t imagine anything I’d love more than having a beautiful little mini-Whitney around the house.”
“It could turn out to be a mini-Chase.”
“As long as you’re involved, he or she will be perfect.”
“Besides, there’s no way we can duplicate me. Dad says I’m one of a kind.”
“He’s correct there.”
“He also says I wasn’t spoiled as a child but that I just smelled that way.” I learned humility from Dad.
“Life will imitate art.” Chase pulled me close and cradled me in his arms. “And you, my dear, are the highest art form I know.”
As I closed my eyes and let him kiss me again, I reminded myself never to let Mitzi know that those baby magazines she left on my desk had had any effect on me whatsoever.
Tuesday, March 2
The idealistic baby fantasy lasted almost twenty-four hours. Then Kim asked us if we’d watch Wesley while they went out for dinner and discussed the “you-know-what” issue.
I know why they didn’t want Wesley along while they were trying to decide if they should have another child. Wesley—precocious, beautiful, intelligent, gifted, spoiled Wesley—is the finest form of birth control ever invented.
He marched into our house on chubby BabyGap jean-clad legs, pulling a little wheeled suitcase. He shrugged off his denim jean jacket, ruffled his pale blond curls, opened his big baby blues in an expression of vast innocence and said authoritatively, “Disney-dot-com.”
“Wes, you know Aunt Whitney doesn’t let you play on her computer,” Kim chided.
“Sorry, buddy. The dot-com era bit the dust. Didn’t you hear? According to the Wall Street Journal, it’s still in recovery mode.”
He stared at me, his lower lip wobbling tremulously, a single perfect tear forming on the center of each of his lower eyelids, giving me an opportunity to relent and stop the floodgates of misery and mayhem about to erupt.
I, like a fool, didn’t bite.
In slow motion, Wesley’s world, and even Wesley himself, crumbled. He fell to the ground, opened his mouth and let out a wail that shattered all my crystal in the dining-room buffet, scared Scram and Mr. Tibble off the couch and into the bedroom and put a slight crack in the picture tube of my television.
Okay, I’m exaggerating a little. The television was not damaged.
“What’s this about?” I yelled to Kim over the din.
“He’s in a phase. Just ignore him.”
“It would be quieter in here if my house were sitting in the middle of an airport landing strip.”
“He’s had separation anxiety lately. His supper is in his little suitcase. You know what a fussy eater he is.” Kim smiled weakly. “If we do have another baby, I don’t think we’ll indulge him or her quite so much.”
“Good idea.” I picked Wesley up by the armpits and made a wet, noisy raspberry sound on his bare belly. He quit crying out of sheer surprise, waved goodbye to his mother and demanded ice cream. So much for separation issues.
Chase walked upstairs from the basement. “Who’s being murdered up here?”
“Say hi to our houseguest.”
“Hey, buddy.” He and Wesley high-fived. “How about some smoked oysters and a little football?”
Wesley chortled and lunged out of my arms toward Chase.
And so much for the fussy-eater thing.
Tonight was different from the other times Wes has stayed with us. I kept imagining him as my own little boy, with us not for a few hours, but for a lifetime.
As the evening progressed, I tallied in my head all the wonderful—and not-so-wonderful—aspects of being a parent. Clearly there are glorious things about having a child.
1) The way a baby smells after a bath—soap, lotion, powder and that natural fragrance of sweet breath and fresh skin.
2) Baby toes.
3) Baby kisses.
4) Watching him suck his thumb as he soothes himself to sleep.
5) The kittenlike snore that reminds me of a purr and signals he’s no longer messing with my mind and is really, truly, asleep.
6) Pink, full lips relaxed in an innocent smile.
7) The comical way Wesley holds my face in his and turns it toward his own when he wants my attention.
8) Long, fine eyelashes that delicately fringe sleepy eyes.
There are, however, some not-so-blissful things about having a little one around, too.
1) The way a baby smells after depositing a large treasure in his training pants.
2) Baby toes—when they are uncovered because said baby has flushed his shoes down the toilet.
3) Baby kisses—when they are open-mouthed and that same mouth has recently been eating smoked oysters and crackers.
4) Watching him suck his thumb, biding his time, waiting for me to turn my back on him so he can wreak more havoc in my household.
5) The strange sounds children make in their sleep—the snuffles and grunts that make me leap to my feet to check on said child every few minutes.
6) Full, rosy lips screwed up into a pout.
7) The way a child can manage a vise grip on your face so tight that it feels like he might screw your head off to get your attention.
8) Long, fine lashes through which he can turn a glare into a full-scale emotional assault. With a look, Wesley can make me feel guilty for everything I’ve ever done to him, including administering vitamins, combing his hair, stopping him from putting his finger in a light socket and preventing him from pulling off my cat’s tail without anesthetic.
9) Potty training—and little boys with very bad aim.
10) Stubborn refusal to wear “big boy” pull-ups to bed. Changing bedding. Twice. In three hours…
Sometimes it’s best not to record everything in one’s journal. It makes reality too clear and, well, too much of a reality.
Chase, of course, loved every minute of the evening—me getting soaked when Wesley splashed in the bathtub; me standing on my head trying to get him to eat green peas; me setting off a crying jag by suggesting that Wesley might sleep better if his pajamas weren’t on backward.
It appears that as long as I serve smoked oysters with crackers to them as they sit on the couch watching men in ridiculous outfits try to injure each other over a bit of pigskin and a pumpful of air, everything will be fine. Maybe it’s a guy thing, but Chase came down on Wesley’s side of every issue.
About toilet training: “Little boys need the practice. Don’t worry, the floor can be washed.” By who, I wonder?
About flushing: “I’m sure Kim and Kurt have lots of other shoes he can wear.”
About pet care: “Don’t worry, Scram will grow another tail.”
“Chase, are you going to be one of those indulgent fathers who thinks everything his son does is cute?”
“It will be, won’t it?”
“What if your daughter decides it’s okay to pee on the floor, flush her shoes down the toilet, eat oysters and burp?”
He thought about it for a moment before answering. Then he glanced at me hopefully. “Then I won’t have to worry about guys flocking to our door asking her out on dates before she’s ready.”
Before she’s thirty, you mean.
