by Sidney Bell
She gazes back at him serenely. “You’re the one who was disgusted by my ten bucks. Sack up, buddy.”
“Shit.” He tosses the unopened bag of popcorn on the counter. “Fine. Whatever. But I’m gonna win. So I don’t want to see any tears when that happens.”
She makes a noncommittal humming noise and crams more popcorn in her face. She bares her teeth, and he can only imagine what Vogue would think if they saw her now. But in the next breath, he’s entirely grateful that no one else gets to see this, the rough, shameless edges that other people wouldn’t appreciate. This is for him and Cal and PJ only. She’s theirs.
He finds himself crossing the room to wrap her in his arms. She growls when she nearly loses the bag of popcorn, but seems content to let him hold her once she gets a hand free so she can keep eating. He chuckles and buries his face in her hair. She smells like strawberries and butter and she’s so round and soft against him and he can hear PJ in the other room shouting at his toys and he knows Cal’s upstairs comparing flights from seventeen different airlines to get the best deal as a way of avoiding dealing with the choice he’s facing. They’re all his.
After a minute, Anya asks, “You okay, baby?”
He clears his throat. “Just happy.”
She tips her head against his shoulder. “Yeah,” she says softly. “Yeah, me too.” Then she lifts her face and yells, “CAL!”
Pretty much directly into Zac’s ear. “Fuck.” He darts away. It’s possible she gets a distant yell of acknowledgment, but Zac wouldn’t know because he’s deaf now.
“I was gonna ask you something.” She licks her fingers. “The album’s done now, right? Like, all done?”
“Do you not remember the celebration party?”
She points a sticky finger at her belly. “I’m pretty sure I’m the only one who remembers the celebration party.”
She’s definitely right. Everyone was trashed except for her and Cal, who woke up that morning with the cold from hell and spent most of the party sleeping off cough medicine. Zac finally found him snoring in the back of the VIP section, unbothered by the bass shaking the club down to its foundations. Zac nobly refrained from drawing a dick on his face. Something he promptly told Anya because he wanted credit for it.
“Good point.” Zac takes a bite of carrot. “That was a good party, though.”
She heaves a long-suffering sigh. “I’m asking about your part of the marketing duties. Interviews are over? Photographs taken?”
He thinks about it, trying to remember if there’s something still on the docket.
The thing is, the marketing for this one is weird, because the album itself is weird. Concept albums are always a little tricky to market, because individual songs don’t always lend themselves easily to radio-friendly singles, and This Is Not the End is no different.
They had to ask for an extension from the label, which they got without much hassle, but then they barely needed the extra time because Cal turned into a demon in the studio. He wrote two new songs over the course of five days, barely sleeping, barely eating, wandering around in a fog with ink from a cheap pen smeared all over his fingertips, his hair wild, his eyes bloodshot, all in the service of shaping a better ending to the story he was trying to tell for almost a year. He then revised all the other songs with the new ending in mind.
It’s the best stuff Cal’s ever written, and Zac can feel it in his guitar, in his voice, in his own head, the way the notes wrap around inside him, bleak and hopeful in turns, and made more powerful by the contrast. The critics seem to agree so far. The first reviews are starting to tumble in, and they’re glowing.
Anya’s looking at him expectantly, and Zac has to take a moment to remember her question about whether the marketing is done. “Oh. Shit. I don’t know. Probably? Mostly? Why?”
“Well, when this infant comes out, it’s going to need feeding. And I’d like to do my job without losing as much ground as I did when PJ came. It’d be really awesome if you guys could arrange to take your paternity leave one right after the other so that I can get back to work without killing myself thinking of our baby in the hands of strangers.”
“Marina isn’t a stranger,” Zac says. “We don’t buy vacations to Aruba as Christmas presents for strangers. PJ ignores her regularly. He doesn’t do that with just anyone.”
He’s not joking—PJ is every inch his father’s son, which means he’s a stubborn, reckless, rebellious little shit most of the time. Loving and lovable and cuter than a terror has any right to be, sure, but also a regular pain in the ass. Anya and Zac generally share taskmaster duties, trading off on who’s going to stand watch over PJ while he’s in time-out, taking turns resisting those big crocodile tears because their pangs of feeling cruel are less important than teaching him not to play on the stairs. But even with a nanny to help share the load, a child PJ’s age is exhausting, and more battles are forfeited than is probably wise.
Cal’s not much help, unfortunately. He’s still uneasy disciplining PJ; he never manages to look anything but daunted when he has to put the kid in time-out. He usually falls back on logic, which is useless with a toddler. Once Zac caught him trying to explain the concept of a social contract to PJ, who listened with huge, bewildered eyes while gnawing on the head of the doll he’d stuffed in his mouth, and everything about the moment left Zac laughing so hard he almost pissed himself.
However, because he does it so rarely, on the occasions when Cal does raise his voice, PJ snaps to like a private in basic training confronted with the world’s most vicious drill sergeant. Just the other day, for example, they were all at Anya’s OB-GYN appointment for a sonogram when PJ took off through the parking lot. Zac was helping Anya into the car and neither of them were in a good position to grab him. PJ gleefully ignored their panicked orders that he stop, only to instantly freeze and burst into terrified tears when Cal barked his name.
Cal’s anger is a handy ace in the pocket that Zac and Anya are careful not to overuse, lest it lose its power before PJ reaches adolescence.
“You know,” Zac says now, “I always thought I’d be one of those bohemian parents who lets their child make their own decisions and, like, listens to their thoughts and shit, and talks to him about all the different world religions before allowing him to choose the one that most speaks to him.”
“You’re dumb.”
“I really am. Maybe when he’s older. Like, twenty.”
“Anyway. Your schedule will be clear in a couple of months?”
“Yeah, no, sure. We can front-load everything we need to, get everything done before you go into labor so that we can be here as long as the baby needs us.”
“Larry’s going to want you to tour.”
Zac shrugs. “He’ll have to deal with it. Paternity leave is my right as a worker in the grand state of California.” He pauses. “Isn’t it? Don’t we have that?”
She shrugs. “I figured you’d just tell him to fuck off.”
“That too.” Zac smiles. Then he raises his head to yell, “I swear to God, man, if you don’t get down here, I’m coming up after you.” Even as Cal yells something unintelligible back, Zac lowers his voice to tell Anya, “He’s never going to do it.”
“He will. You underestimate how much he’s changed.”
Zac frowns. “Nuh-uh. You underestimate how much he’s changed. He won’t cave.”
She gives him a strange look. “That’s not what’s happening here.”
“They’re pressuring him.”
“Yes, they are, but that’s not relevant.”
“It sort of is. Since he doesn’t want to go. And he’s looking at tickets anyway.”
She gives him a pitying look. “Oh, you’re so cute when you’re saying boneheaded things.”
“He doesn’t want to go and they want him to and he’s not going to cave. He’s looking at tickets because he
feels guilty, but he’s not going to buy them because he’s not going to cave. You’re babysitting so I can watch Dancing with the Stars.”
“He wants to go,” Anya tells him scornfully. “He loves them, he misses the shit out of them, he wants to spend Christmas in Nebraska so bad he can taste it.”
“Then why hasn’t he bought the tickets yet?”
“Because he’s scared of having to tell them about us.” She licks butter delicately from one finger, then stares forlornly down into the empty popcorn bag. She makes a sad noise. Zac scowls at her. Good. She should be sad. She’s wrong about everything that’s ever happened in life.
“He’s not scared. He’s happy.”
“You can be happy and scared at the same time,” she tells the empty bag. “That happens all the time actually, because the more you have to be happy about, the more scared you are to ruin it. I can relate to that. You can’t?”
“You have too many feelings. You people with all your stupid mixed-up feelings.”
She rolls her eyes and goes to throw the bag in the trash. “He’s finally getting them back. June fucking called him the other day. He’s afraid that taking us to Nebraska with him will make them kick him out again. But he has changed, and he does feel more confident, and that’s why he’ll overcome the fear and take us out there for Christmas after all. And that’s why he’ll stand up to them if they have a problem with all of us. He’ll feel shitty about it, but he’ll do it.”
Zac crosses his arms. “I guess we’ll see, won’t we?”
“I guess we will. And when you’re babysitting for me on Monday, you’ll be thinking nothing but nice thoughts about how smart I am.”
He scoffs. “Yeah, okay.”
“Now make that other bag of popcorn. I need it. Put it in. In. Now.”
“Your popcorn talk is a lot like your sex talk,” he says, and when she whirls on him, he tears out of the kitchen at full speed, because the only thing he’s got up on her right now when it comes to survival is the fact that he can outrun her.
* * *
Cal finally comes downstairs when Zac and Anya are halfway through the episode of American Horror Story they began while waiting for him. It’s a show that they all started together but which Cal has long since given up on. Turns out his love of cheesy ’80s horror doesn’t mean he has the stomach for more edgy psychological horror. Zac and Anya usually summarize the episodes they watch once they’re all in bed with the light off, catching him up, because he’s genuinely interested in most of the plots—he simply can’t watch it.
Zac doesn’t mind the recaps. He loves finding these unexpected little quirks in Cal, even after all these years of friendship. Also, it’s kind of fun to reenact the episodes. Zac doesn’t care what anyone says, his sadistic nun performance is both believable and nuanced.
They turn it off as soon as he appears, and with instant unspoken agreement, they scoot apart to make room for him in between them. PJ’s a half-awake weight in Zac’s lap, a sippy cup of juice clutched tight in his hands, his head heavy against Zac’s chest. Cal leans over and kisses him on the forehead, smoothing wispy curls out of the way first. Then Cal slumps back into the cushions and sighs.
Zac says, “So? Did you do it?”
“Anxious about it, huh?” Anya asks him, peering around Cal as best she can since she can’t lean forward so easily anymore. “Can’t bear the tension? Is it because you know I’m right?”
“You’ve never been more wrong in your life, woman.”
Cal eyes each of them in turn. “What did you two do?”
“Nothing,” Zac protests.
“Not a thing,” Anya says at the same time.
“Did you bet?” Cal sounds exasperated. “Jesus. You have got to knock that off. My decisions are not a game for you two to play with.”
“If they were, I’d be winning,” Anya says under her breath.
“Hold up, lady, that’s not true. Which one of us said that Cal wouldn’t want to go anywhere for our honeymoon?” He puts on a high-pitched voice, one that has Cal lifting an offended eyebrow. “‘I just want us to be together. I don’t care where we are. We should save the money for PJ’s college fund.’”
“Which one of us nailed that he’d want to sleep apart before the wedding?” Anya says.
Yeah, in retrospect, Zac doesn’t know what he was thinking on that one. Cal’s a fucking eighty-year-old schoolmarm on the inside. “Okay, but I’m the one who called the massive freak-out about knocking you up. Boom. Lawyered. King me.” Zac lifts his chin, and Anya rolls her eyes, apparently wise enough to know that she’s been bested.
“Which one of us is sitting right here, listening to this?” Cal says, although he seems mostly resigned. Cheerfully resigned, though. He looks less tense than he did coming down the stairs, which is kind of the point. “But by all means, continue to make my choices a source of amusement and competition for yourselves.”
Anya’s better at looking innocent, but Zac has an adorable child in his arms and isn’t afraid to use him. “Look at PJ all sleepy,” he says, and Cal’s expression softens even as he shakes his head at Zac’s methods. Doesn’t matter. Cal can know what Zac’s doing all day long—won’t keep it from working.
It’s quiet for a moment as Cal steals a sip of Anya’s herbal tea, one big hand cupping PJ’s foot in its yellow Big Bird sock, and then Zac and Anya blurt in unison, “So did you buy the tickets or not?”
Cal’s eyebrow wings up, and he pointedly takes another long sip of tea, punishing them both. Zac pokes him in the side until he caves and says, “I did.”
“Yes!” Anya hisses under her breath, because no amount of rubbing it in is worth getting a sleepy toddler all riled up right before bedtime. She stabs a finger in Zac’s direction. “Eat it!”
Zac huffs a breath, glaring at Cal. “Really? You had to do this to me?”
“Yes, I did it to you, all to make you suffer.” Cal glances heavenward as if asking for help from a higher power.
“Don’t you dare try to renege either,” Anya tells Zac.
Zac gives her a dirty look. “I’m offended. You’re offensive. I would never. Never.”
Cal sighs. “I think I’m crazy. This is a terrible idea. They’re not going to understand. I want to go, I really do, but this is asking for trouble, isn’t it?”
“There’s no easy way out,” Zac says, because he’s a smart, wise person, regardless of what Anya says. “If you want them in your life, though, you can’t do it halfway. You suck at lying, and the stress of hiding it is going to make you want to relapse.”
“They’ll either take us as we are, or they won’t.” Anya leans over as best she can, making a soft grunting noise as she shifts her belly around. She presses her cheek against Cal’s shoulder. “But even if they won’t, it doesn’t make what we have any less real. You’ll still have us.”
“I know.” He smiles down at her. He takes her hand, kisses the back of her wrist. “I do know. Now. I was happy before my mother called me and started all this. I can be happy without them again. I just want them to understand. I want to believe they’re the kind of people who will try to understand. It’s not a test...except that it is. It’s not one I’m giving them, but it’s a test all the same, and I want them to pass it.”
“I hope they will,” Anya says.
“They will,” Zac says. There’s no doubt in his mind. “We have grandchildren to throw at them. One of them is adorable when he isn’t being a tantrum-throwing little s-h-i-t, and the other one they’ll be able to see from scratch. They’ll think it’s weird, and they’ll probably get all hung up on whether Cal’s the biological dude for PJ or the squirt—”
“Stop calling her squirt, for the love of all that is holy—” Anya moans.
“—the squirt, who is a he, a he-squirt, because we’re going to name him Harvey so that we can get the whole t
hing in the family—”
Cal laughs. “That’s what PJ stands for? You named him after PJ Harvey?”
“Who’d you think we named him after?” Zac asks.
“I don’t know. I figured it was a family name. That the J stood for Junior.”
“What are we, normals? We’re rock stars. These children are lucky they’re not being named after vegetables.”
“It’s a girl,” Anya interrupts. “We can name her Harvey if you want to, though.”
“Deal,” Zac says. “Anyway—”
“Hold on,” Cal interjects. “Really? A little girl named Harvey?”
“Anyway!” Zac repeats loudly, because he still hasn’t made his point and besides, any girl named Harvey is going to be a badass, legendary punk rock musician and he’ll have none of Cal’s weird, old-fashioned protests about it. He’ll only trigger Anya’s speech about how dumb it is to attach the shape of one’s genitals to the arbitrary mouth-noises used to identify human beings. It’s one of her better speeches, if Zac is honest—there’s a reason Zac has no qualms about his son being legally named Polly Jean—but now is not the time. “Anyway, the Keller grandparents will no doubt ask which of the kids has Cal’s particular set of genes, because they won’t get it at first, and you’ll have to put your big boy panties on, Cal, and not tell them so they can’t get all squirrelly about it.”
“PJ’s mine every bit as much as Harvey is,” Cal says defiantly, to nobody in particular, and Zac leans over and bites his earlobe as a reward.
“So we’ll go. We’ll let them have grandparent feelings.” Zac pulls back, leaving Cal all flustered from getting nibbled on. “And we’ll make them come with us to do stuff with the kids so they can see how not-weird it all is.”
“The zoo,” Anya suggests.
“Not in December in Nebraska,” Cal tells her apologetically.
“Ooh, the museum!” Zac says.
“Better,” Cal says.
“And then they’ll realize that a marriage is less about how many people are in it and more about how happy you are.” Zac nods. It’s the best plan he’s ever come up with, in his humble opinion.
