First Comes Baby

by Janice Kay Johnson

  “Like I told you, I want to be a father. In every sense of the word.”

  If he hadn’t signed a contract and parenting plan—well, okay, if he wasn’t Caleb—that might have scared her. If Matt had started talking like that, she would have freaked. She’d wanted the baby to be hers. Hers alone.

  How funny that now she was okay with this baby being theirs.

  Unaware of her reverie, Caleb muttered a profanity as a hulking SUV cut him off on the freeway.

  “Have you told your parents?” she asked.

  He shook his head. “I figured I’d wait until it happened.”

  She couldn’t blame him, since she’d done the same. Almost at random, Laurel said, “I’m planning dinner for six tomorrow.”

  “Cooking doesn’t nauseate you?”

  “Yeah, but I’ll survive.”

  “Why don’t I cook? You have to admit, my sweet-and-sour pork is to die for.”

  “Why aren’t you married?”

  “Huh?”

  “Do you know how many women would kill for a man who’d make that kind of offer?”

  This grin was faintly wicked. “Yeah, I’m one of a kind. Women do propose all the time. But I’m saving myself for…” He broke off.

  “For?”

  “God knows. An octogenarian wedding?”

  “You and a little white-haired lady in a nursing home?”

  “Maybe.” He growled something under his breath. “Does traffic get worse every day, or is it my imagination?”

  Contemplating the giant parking lot I-5 had become, Laurel said, “It gets worse, I think. That’s why I ride the bus.”

  His face settled into a frown. “I don’t like the idea of you having to take buses when you’re really pregnant.”

  “As opposed to only a tiny bit pregnant?”

  He ignored her flippancy. “What if you have a long wait? And the Metro buses have lousy shock absorbers.” He wasn’t done. “What if you have to stand? And you know how you get jostled getting on and off.”

  She did know, and wasn’t looking forward to it. But the idea of squeezing herself behind the wheel of a car, only to inch along the freeway, was even less appealing.

  “The bus is actually pretty relaxing. And people are nice. Somebody would give up their seat for me.”

  “Hell, let’s get off here.” He took the Forty-fifth Street exit and got in the left lane to head west, toward the Sound. “What do you feel like eating?”

  Her stomach quivered. “A piece of dry toast?”

  “In other words, don’t bother taking you to Le Gourmand?”

  She groped through her purse for the soda crackers she’d taken to carrying. “Really, really no.”

  “Ah, well, let me get some takeout and we’ll go to your place.”

  Even the smell of his Korean takeout upset her stomach. She had to crack her window, which would have helped more if the air outside hadn’t been diesel-laden. But she made it home and curled up on her couch a safe distance from Caleb while he ate. Her stomach had settled enough to accept a piece of toast, which he made for her, and some strawberries.

  He didn’t stay long, promising to be back by four tomorrow with the groceries he needed to make dinner. “You don’t have to do a thing” were his last words.

  The next afternoon, Caleb returned so vibrantly full of life and energy Laurel felt washed out in comparison. She’d been so tired all day that she’d already taken a nap. She only hoped today was an anomaly. How would she get through a day at work if all she wanted to do was crawl under her desk and snooze?

  She left him to cook while she showered and then fortified herself with a couple of crackers. She wouldn’t even have to make an announcement if she had to dash off and puke the minute Dad and Meg walked through the door.

  They arrived separately. Megan, four years younger than Laurel, was a hotshot software designer for a small firm that existed in Microsoft’s shadow in Redmond, just across Lake Washington from Seattle. She was currently working on a team designing some kind of management software that she claimed would be a big seller thanks to flexibility from a rules-based interface.

  Whatever that was. Laurel was embarrassed to have so little grasp of what her sister actually did.

  Both sisters had had dishwater-blond hair when they were toddlers—the kind that the sun bleached to silver-blond every summer. Laurel’s had stayed somewhere between blond and light brown, while Megan’s had darkened to a rich shade of mahogany. Megan was, in Laurel’s admittedly biased opinion, a beauty. She had inherited their mother’s slim build instead of Grandma Woodall’s buxom one, which Laurel considered something of a curse.

  In low-cut jeans, heels, a cropped lime-green blazer and big gold-hoop earrings, Megan strolled in, dropped a huge purse and hugged first Caleb and then Laurel.

  “You didn’t say Caleb would be here.”

  “He invited himself yesterday. And then offered to cook.”

  “What a man,” her sister said admiringly.

  Laurel laughed. “That’s what I told him.”

  “You know, if you don’t want him…” Megan gave him a saucy look.

  He grinned at her. “One Woodall sister is enough for me, thanks.”

  Laurel suspected that he saw Megan as a little sister, and for all her teasing, Meg had never given the slightest sign of a crush on Caleb. She was currently dating another computer geek, a guy who would have been handsome if he’d ever comb his hair or thought about what he was putting on in the morning. Apparently his virtuosity in HTML and a dozen other computer languages offset his stylistic lack for a girl who’d cared deeply what she put on in the morning from about her second birthday on.

  Dad arrived grumbling about traffic. “I had to go in to work today. Somebody screwed up.”

  He was an engineer at Boeing, working on a new fuel-efficient plane that was to be built in Everett. In his mid-fifties, he had to be the catch of the Boeing plant, single, nice looking if not exactly handsome and still possessing all his hair. It was the color of Megan’s, and turning silver dramatically at the temples. As far as Laurel could tell, he had never considered remarrying. She knew he dated, but not once since her mom had died when she was eleven had he introduced a woman to his daughters.

  “Smells good,” he said, shaking Caleb’s hand. “Thank God you took over the kitchen.”

  Laurel threw a magazine at him. He laughed when it fell short.

  “So what’s the news?” he asked. “Meggie told me last night that you have an announcement.”

  Caleb clanged a pan lid. “Why don’t we wait until we sit down?”

  “So you can listen? Or has she already told you?” Megan asked.

  He smiled at her. “Not saying.”

  “Pooh.”

  “Anybody want some wine?” Laurel stood. “Caleb, how far away from sitting down are we?”

  “Five minutes. In fact, you can take the salad to the table.”

  Laurel’s father opened the wine and poured, and a few minutes later they were seated. The food did smell good. So good, she was having one of her brief and usually foolish moments of genuine hunger.

  Meg leveled a look at her. “Out with it. We’re ready to toast. Assuming it’s good news?”

  “It’s good news.” Laurel met Caleb’s gaze and drew strength from the encouragement she saw in his eyes. Then she bit her lip, looked at her dad and said, “I’m pregnant.”

  There was an awful moment of silence. He stared at her, as if uncomprehending. “Pregnant?”

  “I should have told you I was going to try. But I was afraid you’d want to talk me out of it.”

  “I didn’t know you were even dating…” His dazed stare swung to the fourth person at the table. “Caleb?”

  Laurel decided to be blunt. “No, we aren’t sleeping together. Yes, Caleb’s the father. I asked him to donate sperm.”

  “You mean?” Megan looked stunned.

  “Yes. I chose to be a single mother. Instead of going to
a donor bank, I decided to ask a friend. Caleb wants to be involved in my baby’s life.”

  He spoke up then. “As I told Laurel, there’s no one I’d rather have a child with.”

  Her father half rose. “You got my daughter pregnant?”

  “Daddy!” She grabbed his arm. “He didn’t ‘get’ me pregnant. Not the way you mean. At my request, he donated sperm.”

  Her father sagged back into his seat. “Good God, Laurel! You’re twenty-eight. Have you given up on life?”

  That hurt. It would have hurt worse if Caleb hadn’t said quietly, “Seems to me she’s embracing it.”

  “But you’re writing off any possibility of falling in love and getting married.”

  She wanted to say no, but that would be a lie.

  “You didn’t believe me when I told you before. I just…I can’t imagine it, Dad.” Her voice was small, shaky. She might have fallen apart if Caleb hadn’t been there offering steady support by his mere presence. “But I want children. I want a family. And I can have that without getting married. Is that so awful?”

  He scrubbed a hand over his face. “No. No, of course not. You’ll be a hell of a mother, Laurel.”

  Tears in her eyes, Megan stood and hugged Laurel. “I should have said this first. Congratulations.”

  “Thank you,” she whispered.

  Her father lifted his wineglass. “To my first grandchild.”

  They all drank, Laurel taking the tiniest of sips before setting her glass down again.

  Caleb handed Megan the bowl of rice to begin dishing up, then the salad to George Woodall.

  He took it, but seemed unaware it was in his hand. “I don’t like the idea of you managing on your own, Laurel. Being a parent…it’s hard work.”

  “You managed on your own, after Mommy died.”

  “You girls were eleven and seven. And don’t you remember how tough that first year was? Meggie had to drop out of soccer. I just couldn’t get her to practices. You two went off to school every day in mismatched outfits, your hair barely brushed.”

  “But in the end, you were a great parent.”

  “You weren’t babies. Laurel, no matter how beat you are, there’ll be no one besides you to get up in the middle of the night, no one to give a bottle, get to day care when you’re held up…” He shook his head. “You know I’ll do what I can, but I’m a long way from retirement age. And Meggie seems to work twelve-hour days.”

  “It’s not that bad,” Laurel’s sister said. “Although… Honestly, I’m not sure I’ve ever actually held a baby. You know I never babysat.”

  Megan hadn’t liked little kids. By the time she was ten or twelve, she’d curl her lip and say, “Ew, kids.” Laurel wasn’t expecting a whole lot in the babysitting department from her sister, at least until her child was of an age to start learning to navigate the Internet.

  “I don’t expect a lot of help.” Laurel accepted the rice from her sister. “Daddy, dish up.”

  He looked down uncomprehendingly at the bowl still in his hand, then transferred some salad to his plate and handed it to Caleb. Poor Caleb, who had slaved in the kitchen and was probably starving. He always was.

  To reassure her father, Laurel talked about some of the research she’d done on maternity leave, neighborhood day-care centers and mothers’ groups.

  “I do plan to be here,” Caleb interrupted, when she was waxing eloquent about her ability to handle her job and a baby with one hand tied behind her back.

  His scowl was for her. He wasn’t jumping in to make her dad feel better, he was irked at her for leaving him out of her calculations.

  As if the two of them were alone at the table, she said, “You travel so much.”

  “I can curtail it when you need me. I have people working for me who’ll be glad to take over.”

  “But…I didn’t ask you to change your life.”

  His face darkened. “I thought I made it clear that I wasn’t going to be just a biological father. That if I signed on, it was going to be the real deal.”

  “I didn’t expect you to change diapers, either.”

  “Why not? Don’t fathers do that?” He shot a glance at George.

  “I did,” her dad agreed.

  “I’ll be here, Laurel,” Caleb repeated.

  Absurdly, her eyes were filling with tears. Pressing her lips together, she nodded, then dabbed at her eyes with her napkin.

  As touched as she was, Laurel was a bit annoyed when her father seemed to relax after this exchange, apparently reassured that Caleb intended to do his manly duty. Hadn’t he raised her and Megan to be strong, independent women who could cope with whatever life threw at them? Apparently, single parenting wasn’t one of those things.

  She tried to excuse him. He was from another generation that still had faith in traditional two-parent homes. But the world had changed. Look how many gay and lesbian couples had children, how well open adoption was working, how single mothers banded together to share their loads.

  But Laurel couldn’t shake the feeling that if Meg had made the same announcement, he wouldn’t have been so alarmed. Her father doubted her ability to handle the stress of single parenthood, not the ability of women in general or even of his daughters in particular. Despite his support, in the end he was just like everyone else. He didn’t understand why she couldn’t go back to being herself, the Laurel who hadn’t been taught how powerless she really was, who hadn’t faced death, who hadn’t spent weeks in the hospital recovering from broken bones and swelling that compressed her brain. And because she couldn’t, he assumed she was weak, that she would falter as a mom.

  Knowing he thought like that stung.

  But her father being her father, he disarmed her hurt and resentment before dinner was over. He set down his fork, looked at her and said, “Laurel, I want you to know that I didn’t mean to imply you can’t do this on your own.” His smile held regret and remembered grief. “I just wish you didn’t have to.”

  “Oh, Daddy!” Blinking back more tears—damn, she wished she didn’t cry so easily these days—Laurel stood and hugged him. With her eyes closed, the familiar scent of him in her nostrils, and his strong arms closed around her, she felt so safe.

  Straightening away from him was a wrench, just as moving out of his house the second time had been. She couldn’t be Daddy’s little girl forever, and she would forever know she wasn’t really safe.

  “Thank you,” she whispered, and went back to her place at the table.

  When he and Megan left an hour later, Caleb was at her side to wave goodbye.

  “I really appreciate you coming,” she told him, assuming he was leaving, too.

  “Hmm? Oh, no problem.”

  “Are you taking off, too?”

  “I thought I’d hang around for a while.”

  “Okay,” she said, although he hadn’t asked for permission.

  Inside, he asked, “How’s the stomach?”

  She’d remembered what the doctor said and barely nibbled. “Actually, I feel fine,” she said with surprise.

  “Good. Why don’t you sit down and I’ll get you some herbal tea?”

  That sounded nice. Grateful everyone had helped clean up, Laurel headed toward the couch, ready to relax.

  That is, until behind her Caleb continued, his tone flat. Maybe even hard. “And then, you and I need to have a talk.”

  CHAPTER FOUR

  LAUREL’S VOICE ROSE. “What do you mean, I’m trying to shut you out?”

  “That seems clear enough to me.” Caleb paced her miniature living room, three steps one way, three the other. He considered himself an easygoing guy, but tonight she’d enraged him almost as much as she had when she asked another man to father her baby. “Didn’t you just spend the last two hours trying to convince your dad how competent you are to single-handedly raise our child?”

  “I was trying to make him understand my decision!” She sat on the couch, glaring up at him, her head turning as he passed in front of h
er.

  “I thought it had become our decision.”

  “I made the decision to have a baby long before…”

  “I butted into it?” he interrupted.

  “I didn’t say that!”

  “But you meant it!”

  Her lower lip stuck out in a way that was familiar to him from the thousand maddening arguments during their PLU years. “Maybe I did.”

  Ready to yank on his hair in frustration, Caleb was struck by a sudden thought: he hadn’t seen Laurel look so stubborn, even combative, so alive, since they’d hugged goodbye at Sea-Tac Airport the summer she saw him off to Ecuador.

  His Laurel, who had felt powerless since even the choice of life and death had been taken out of her hands in that parking garage, was grabbing for control, because something mattered a whole hell of a lot to her.

  Next to that, his hurt feelings didn’t count.

  He stopped midroom and shook his head. “Listen to us. We haven’t squabbled like this in years.”

  She sniffed. “We never squabbled. We debated. And I usually won.”

  “Yet another subject open to argument.”

  She bit her lip to hide her smile. Seeing it, he couldn’t help laughing.

  “Okay, okay. This one you can win. I understand why you felt you had to convince your dad that you’re superhuman.”

  She gave a queenly inclination of her head. “Thank you.”

  Anger gone, Caleb dropped into her single easy chair and slid low, spine curved. “Just…don’t forget I’m here, Laurel. For you, any time. You know I mean that.”

  Abruptly, tears sparkled in her eyes. She swiped at them impatiently. “Darn it, Caleb! I’m trying to be mad at you!”

  “Yeah? You can quit any time.”

  “I don’t want to quit! I am competent to raise this baby alone. I swear my father relaxed the minute you stepped in.” She lowered her voice to a gruff note that failed to echo her dad’s. “‘Ah, she has a man after all. I don’t need to worry.’”

  She looked cute trying to scowl at him, her lashes still damp, her hair sagging sideways from the elegant topknot she’d earlier achieved.

  Caleb found himself smiling. “You do have a man. You don’t have to worry.”