by Piper Denna
I indulged myself, staring at the ceiling and smiling, while they banged around in the kitchen. No waiting all day for them to arrive. Life was good. I was so hungry I was nauseous by the time I hit the kitchen. Smoke from overheated grease on the griddle filled the air, smelling ghastly.
I took a seat and faced my opponent, a short stack of pancakes I suddenly doubted I’d be able to subdue into digestion. Emily watched expectantly, as did Cam. I hefted the syrup bottle with a shaking hand and smothered the enemy, hoping to drown out the smell. Wielding my knife and fork, I cut my edible enemy into tiny pieces. Thankfully, Cam and Emily had tucked in to their own food, and didn’t see me take my first bite. I swallowed three times before the food went down, and then I felt it immediately coming back up.
“Um. I…” I started for the bathroom, “forgot something,” I called back over my shoulder.
Kneeling in front of the stool and retching repeatedly, I heard Cam calling, “… put and eat… right back, Em.” He knocked softly but I couldn’t answer, so he entered anyway. He held my hair back until I was finished, then I collapsed against his legs.
“Ali, what’s wrong with you?”
“I don’t know,” I admitted. “I was so hungry. I think I was too hungry, that’s all. And then the smell, oh my God.”
He handed me down a wet washcloth.
“Haven’t you been eating? Have you just been sleeping all the time?”
“Cam, I swear, I had a tuna sandwich just before I went to sleep yesterday.”
“Well, I had a little surprise, and now I’m glad. I took a week of vacation time. I’m gonna be here to make sure you’re eating right.”
“God. Some impression I make, huh? I thought I’d be all made up and lovely when you got here.” I started crying, for no good reason. “Instead, I’m fast asleep with sheet wrinkles on my face, my hair a wreck, spoiled tuna breath. Then you end up holding my head while I puke, in the middle of your breakfast. This is on its way to being the least romantic weekend ever.”
“Maybe you should see a doctor, huh? It could be an ulcer or something.”
“Cam, no. I just get low blood sugar sometimes. I guess I need to pay better attention to it. Please don’t worry.”
We rejoined Emily and I took slow sips of OJ.
“Ali, don’t you like the pancakes we made you?” she asked with a trembling lower lip.
Cam soothed, “Ali’s got a little upset stomach this morning, Em.”
“Mommy told me she threw up her breakfast every single day when I was in her tummy.”
Cam’s fork dropped with a clatter to the floor. “Yeah. She did,” Cam remembered, casting a starstruck look at me.
“Oh. Well, I just have a little stomach bug. I’ll be fine later on.” I pasted on a smile I didn’t feel.
*
On the way to the horse pasture, Emily let us both know she wanted a baby sister.
“Emily, I’m not having a baby, honey. My kids are big. Bigger than you. Maybe you should talk to your mom about a baby sister, huh? She has a husband, right?”
“Whatever,” she giggled.
Cam pulled me inside the tack shed again while she rode, and kissed my again-brushed mouth softly, before he said, “I think you’re pregnant.”
“You can think all you want, but IUD’s are very effective birth control.”
“Not a hundred percent, though?”
“No, but…”
“Okay then. Do you, like ever have a period? When’s the last time?”
“Geez, Cam. That’s kinda nosy.”
His impatient look told me we wouldn’t be making out anymore until I’d given him all my personal info. “I don’t know. It’s not real regular since I’ve had the IUD. I mean, the last few years, it’s hardly there. I’m getting older, you know…”
“Jesus, Ali. You’re thirty-three, not fifty-three. Do you think it could be Bill’s?”
“Bill’s what?”
He raised his brows at me as if I was a complete ditz.
“Oh, God. ‘It’ is nonexistent. Your imagination. There’s a system when you have an IUD. Each month after your period, you check to see if the string is still there, which means the thing is still seated. I’m a diligent checker.”
“Okay,” he asked patiently, “so when was the last period?”
I scratched my head and thought. Emily and Butter passed by and started another loop. “I had a period… let’s see… I know!” I smiled, ecstatic that I remembered. “When I figured out Bill’s affair with Brianna. That’s why I was going down, see.”
Cam’s lip curled, probably at the mental picture of me performing fellatio on Bill. “Ali, that’s over two months ago. None since then?”
“Oh. Um, no. But like I said, it’s not real regular.” I didn’t believe my own words, in my shrinking voice. Shit, shit, shit. How could I be knocked up when I was asking Bill to get a vasectomy? My eyes filled with tears again, and then Cam was kissing me, holding me against him like he’d never let me go.
He smiled when his lips left mine, and his dimples almost made me smile back. “I know this isn’t what you’d want,” he told me. “But…” then he kissed me again. “Well, we’ll go get a test later. Then we’ll know, okay?”
“Yeah, I’m sure it’ll be negative.” I wished I was sure.
*
Will and Andy were swinging Emily back and forth in the hammock, laughing at her squeals. I stood in my bathroom at the farmhouse watching the kitchen timer count down minutes to the moment of truth.
Cam and I had gone to ostensibly buy groceries, but then I’d snuck off to the pharmacy for a pregnancy test. We’d picked up Will and Andy from Kerri’s on the way home. Andy made a snide comment about whether CJ was going to be there every weekend now, or what? So Will whacked the back of Andy’s head.
Emily ingratiated herself with both boys by acting impressed with how strong and tall they were, and begged them to help her with her batting for Little League. I had to smile at her innate female ability to flatter and flirt, just as smooth as her dad’s.
Cam was in the kitchen putting away groceries. I’d decided I couldn’t possibly wait ‘til the next morning to take the test. I figured if I was pregnant enough to be getting so violently ill, I’d be pregnant enough to test positive. Cam knew what I was doing, but he didn’t say a word. Just whistled and put stuff in cupboards.
The timer beeped. I covered my eyes, then called myself a coward. I looked.
“Shit! Oh SHIT!” I screamed. “Oh Holy mother of God! Shit!”
All three kids went silent.
“Mom?” Will called, “You okay?”
“Um. It’s a bug. A really big bug. A positively huge bug! Cam!”
He found me sitting on the closed stool, with my head between my knees, drawing deep breaths. “Shit. Oh shit. How could this happen?”
“I wish I could refresh your memory right now,” he murmured against the top of my head. “Oh, Ali. I love you so much.”
Being unhappy about it made me feel even more lousy. Guilt, because he was thrilled and I wasn’t, made me feel nauseous again. Then there was the guilt over starting a new family when I wanted to make sure my kids didn’t suffer through the pain of their dad doing that. Shame over begrudging Bill what I had done myself. Shame over being impregnated by another man before I’d even filed divorce papers. Fear of what my mother would say. Resentment for the unwelcome, unborn child. Shame for that.
I cried big, painful, wretched tears. I didn’t want another baby. My boys were big and able to make their own breakfast. They put their clothes in the hamper. They were potty trained. They were going to hate me. I cried more.
“Cam. I need to be sick again.” If only I could throw up all the rotten feelings, I thought between heaves. If only my mind could vomit.
Poor Cam knelt there and held me while I retched and sobbed over carrying his child.
When I’d finally cried myself out, I was exhausted. Cam tucked me in my bed,
kissed my forehead, twisted closed the blinds, and left me there to nap. I went to sleep feeling like the World’s Biggest Jerk.
*
Fwack! The sounds of ball meeting flesh, then Will yelling while Andy and Emily laughed, roused me. I opened the blinds and watched a very poorly matched game of Dodgeball in progress. It was Cam against all three kids, and whenever he hit Will or Andy, he’d lay them flat and they’d all laugh. The guy had an arm and, just as I remembered from junior high school, the boys found getting knocked flat by a flying missile to be hilarious. More pain, more fun.
I watched in sheer amazement as my younger son purposely took a hit to shield a girl.
It wouldn’t be all fun and games blending families. But from my place in that window, I let optimism carry me. Cam was good at this. He could relate to the boys, and maybe, just maybe, we wouldn’t be the first blended family in the world to all die from the sheer effort of getting along.
*
“Geez, you guys! Three against one, and I still haven’t seen you hit him once!” I stepped out in my sneakers, and took them all by surprise.
Andy recovered first. “Come on, Mom! It’s Mr. Incredible against the world! The sidewalk’s the center line.”
Cam purposely threw the ball slow enough for me to catch. I tricked him with a fake-out throw, and then threw a fast one right at his chest. It was an easy target. The ball made contact before he caught it, and the kids cheered.
“Ha! Our mom used to be a softball pitcher!” Andy yelled to Cam.
Cam smiled, preparing to launch back.
“Come on,” I taunted. “Show me what ya got, come on, come on!”
I saw him hesitate; he was afraid of hurting me or the baby. I ran up to the sidewalk, daring him to throw. He decided to be cute and match my charge, racing toward me and tagging me with the ball. I tried to wrestle the ball from him, stooping so low as to kick the back of his knee so he lost his balance and fell down.
“Take the ball,” I ordered the boys while tickling Cam’s ribs. A most unmanly thing I’d discovered one day when we were fooling around—Cam was ticklish as the day was long. They wrested the ball from him and whooped and hollered.
“I didn’t know it was Tackle Dodgeball,” Cam laughed. “But since it is, I guess you’ll be getting tackled too.” He rolled us over, pinned me and sat on my legs, then started tickling. I resisted laughing as long as I could.
“Tickle Dodgeball,” Emily laughed. She joined her dad in tickling me. “I’m glad you feel better, Ali,” she chirped, then chased after the boys.
“Me, too,” Cam said quietly, growing solemn. “We can talk about it later. If you really don’t want…”
“Don’t even say it,” I answered. I pulled his confused face down and kissed him.
“Yuck! They’re kissing,” Andy announced from across the lawn. “Geez, Mom! Not in front of the kid.” He covered Emily’s eyes while Cam and I laughed.
As Cam helped me up, I heard Will mutter to Andy, “That’s pretty freakin’ creepy to watch, ain’t it?” Not surprisingly, Andy agreed.
*
We spent Saturday biking the canyon again, and the boys and I took Cam and Emily up the steep hike to Hanging Lake. Emily lucked out and got carried on Cam’s shoulders. Will and Andy raced each other and Cam off and on. I found myself out of breath and struggling to keep up.
Cam had been so sweet that morning, bringing me juice in bed before anyone else was awake. Emily slept with me again, and she lay snoozing peacefully while he kissed me good morning and asked in a whisper whether or not I felt sick. I hadn’t yet, and the juice helped prevent it.
The boys were taking to Cam. The day was a success. Everyone had a great time, but I couldn’t help resenting that I was already feeling the effects of an unplanned pregnancy. Two months in, and it was already slowing me down. I’d better get that book finished because, once the baby came along, I wouldn’t have time to write. Life as I knew it would come to a screaming, wailing halt.
*
With the boys snoring soundly in the other room, and Emily breathing deep, slow breaths, I tiptoed out to the couch. Cam was waiting for me and followed me without a word out to the hammock. We made out silently for several minutes and I felt myself getting wild horny.
“God, I want you so bad. We’ve gotta get rid of all these kids. Soon,” I whispered. “Maybe we should sneak out to the tack shed.”
“You sure you’re ready?” My hard nipple under his hand assured me that I was. “What about this thing with the baby?”
“What about it?” Annoyance at the reminder buzzed through my arousal, leaving frayed shreds. “Everybody has sex when they’re pregnant. Don’t tell me you won’t do it ‘til after the birth.”
“I just think you should get checked out. I mean, is that thing still in there or what? Can it hurt the baby?”
“Shit. I don’t know. I checked for the string and can’t find it. Maybe I expelled it.”
“Wouldn’t you notice it? What if it just turned sideways in there, and pulled the string up?” he worried.
I sighed. He had a good point. Uterine perforation was one possible complication. If the thing wasn’t in right, it might pose some threat to the baby.
“It cramped a lot when they put it in. I doubt I’d pass it without noticing. I guess I’d better find a doctor who doesn’t know who I am and get checked out.” First the pregnancy slowed me down, and now it interfered with sex. I was not pleased.
“How long do you think you’ll be able to keep it quiet, anyway? Sooner or later everybody will figure out that you have a baby around the same time your divorce is final.”
“I know.” And I couldn’t help crying then, thinking the revenge I was so happy to take, back in April, was coming back to bite me in the ass.
All Fore Revenge
Chapter 21
Kerri and her kids showed up bright and early Sunday morning, waking us all from a sound sleep. Cam and I went scurrying inside from the hammock and made like we’d already been awake, while the boys and Emily scrambled to dress.
Kerri pushed past the wave of kids going out the door to come in and announced, “I picked up a paper for ya. Might wanna check out the front page.”
“Oh no. What now?” I grumbled, unfolding the thing on the table.
Just below the fold was the giant headline, “HAVE YOU SEEN THIS WOMAN?” Below were the words, “If not, you must have been out of the country!” Below, photos of me—With Cam in the AP photo on the bike and being fed chocolate, kissing Bill and receiving the ring, leaving Bill with my load of luggage and my “fuck you very much” look, and in my back-cover photo from Love on the Back Nine.
I sat down and put my head between my knees while Kerri recapped the high and low points of the story for me. Cam stood reading silently to himself. The article pointed out that about three weeks before the big show in Charleston, I was in Prescott, Arizona claiming to be married for five years to CJ. At press time, my book was up to number 111 on Amazon. Bill was quoted as having “no comment” on the photo of his wife with the chocolate-wielding hunk, stating only that the kids and I were recovering in peace from the public break up.
While I fought the wave of nausea, Cam tapped my shoulder and handed me orange juice.
Kerri looked on with her brows raised.
“Kerr, please don’t tell anybody yet, but I’ve got a bun in the oven.”
“How long?” she asked, eyes wide.
“Two, two and a half months? I need to see a doctor about getting that useless IUD removed. Can you recommend somebody?”
She hugged me then and, for Cam’s sake, I suppressed tears.
“Cool! You always wanted more kids!” she cried, rubbing her hands together.
Cam looked like he’d been sucker-punched.
She got serious and asked, “Oh, wait. It’s not Bill’s?” Her eyes darted in alarm from me to Cam. At the shake of my head, she resumed her happy plans. “I get to be auntie again. I’ll cr
ochet an afghan. I’ve been practicing, you know. This one will be just as wide at the top as it is at the bottom. Oh, cool!” On a notepad, she scribbled the name of her OB-Gyn. “I’ll call there in the morning and get you an emergency visit worked in, okay? Wow, even with an IUD, huh? Somebody must have been very determined in there.”
“She’s been sick a lot. Not just in the morning,” Cam worried. When I put my head down again, his hand rubbed my shoulder.
“Probably means it’s a girl. I had terrible morning sickness with both of the girls.”
“A girl would be best,” I said. Maybe a daughter with Cam’s dimples…
“No it wouldn’t,” Cam said. “I want a son, to carry on my name.”
“Screw your name, mister. Let the salt family worry about it,” I teased.
“That’s not even the same Moreton. There’s no ‘e,’” he laughed.
The kids were yelling about saddling the horse, so he went outside.
“You’re not happy, are you?” Kerri looked at me, concerned, while I sipped juice.
“I’m trying, Kerr. Cam’s so excited. I just didn’t plan on it. My kids are big, and it’s so much work starting over. My body finally got back to normal after all this time. And it’s embarrassing! Everyone will know what I was doing while I was still married to Bill. How can I condemn him when I got knocked up? At least he doesn’t have illegitimates running around. God. I’m trying to be positive, really. It’ll just take some time.”
“Ali. You’re not the first woman to have an unplanned pregnancy outside of marriage, for God’s sake. Remember when you wanted lots of kids? You’re only thirty-three.”
“I know. But it was so hard. I changed my mind.”
“Honey, Bill was never there to help, and your kids are really close in age. And you were so young.”
I sighed and got up to start making breakfast. “I know. It’s just a shock. We’ve only known for two days. It’ll grow on me.” God knew, I’d be growing for sure.
