That Baby

by Jillian Dodd

"I was just being polite and making conversation while you were trying stuff on."

  "She was crushing on you."

  "I can't help it."

  "Were you crushing back? She was pretty and she did have the kind of bombshell body I'll never have."

  His fingers trail across my chest. "I don't know, you're looking pretty bombshell to me right now."

  "I don't have curvy hips, Phillip."

  He grips my hips in his hands while I slide off his boxers.

  "Listen closely," he says. "I love you. I think you're sexy as all get out, but that's not all that makes you sexy. It's your confidence, your sense of humor, and your willingness to try anything that I love. I hope while you're pregnant you don't ever doubt my love. I want you to try to enjoy the way your body changes. And know that I think you having our baby might just be the sexiest thing ever."

  CHAPTER FOUR

  Dear Baby Mac,

  You are growing super fast right now. And your heart is beating super fast too. 150 beats a minute! (Which is about double mine.)

  You have arms and legs and you can move them. Your dad says you're waving at him when he talks to you, but I can't feel it because you are only the size of a raspberry.

  I've gained three pounds though, which seems kind of excessive for a raspberry. Although, I'm pretty sure, it's gone straight to my boobs, which are now bigger than normal and your father is obsessing over them.

  I also am craving Milk Duds and am considering buying stock in them.

  Things are super busy at work. Our plans for the new building were approved, we had a groundbreaking ceremony, and construction has officially commenced. If all goes as planned, we'll move in well before you're born.

  I'm also officially addicted to searching nursery designs on the Internet and have been compiling ideas. I'm not sure what I want it to look like yet, but I'm pretty sure it will be a bluish grey.

  And, just so you know, there are about a thousand blue-grey paint colors available, but I promise to find the perfect shade.

  Your grandmother is very excited about you. She and your grandpa have been staying here a lot. It's been sort of challenging, if I'm being honest.

  Your dad and Danny have been enjoying her cooking. And, I'll admit, it is nice sometimes to come home to a warm, home-cooked meal.

  It's been sweet of her to cook for us.

  It was also sweet when she put all my wedding gifts away.

  And it was even sweeter today when she reorganized all my kitchen cabinets.

  But . . .

  It's sort of pissing me off.

  It shouldn't be, because she's doing it to be nice.

  But it is.

  February 24th

  Take out a hit.

  Phillip is lying across the couch, watching football.

  I stand directly in front of the TV, arms crossed and foot tapping in irritation.

  "What?" he asks, trying to look around me.

  "Don't what me," I say. "It's not funny."

  "What's not funny?"

  Phillip looks confused. I really thought he'd smile. "You moved the gnome to freak me out."

  "The gnome? No, I didn't."

  "Phillip, do you promise--swear--you didn't move it?"

  "I swear. What is your obsession with this gnome?"

  "He's moving of his own accord, Phillip. You're the man of this house. Doesn't that concern you?"

  "Can you move over just a little?" Phillip asks, still trying to see the game.

  I grab the remote and threaten to turn it off.

  Phillip leaps off the couch then pins me to the chaise. "You're being a bad girl."

  "Phillip! Stop thinking about sex. I mean, don't stop thinking about sex, just don't think about it right this second. I need you to come upstairs and deal with this."

  He laughs. "Deal with the gnome? What do you want me to do with it? Shall I bring in a gnome from a rival school? Take out a hit on it?"

  "You're not taking this seriously," I pout.

  He gets off me and pulls me up. "Fine. Show me the gnome."

  I tiptoe upstairs and point toward the living room where the gnome has now taken up residence on the back of the sofa table.

  "How did he get there?"

  "I have no idea."

  "This is silly."

  "I know!"

  "Let's wrap him up tight and put him back in the hutch," Phillip says, going out to the garage. He gets a ball of twine and wraps the gnome's legs with it. "There, he won't be able to walk now."

  "You think he's walking?"

  He rolls his eyes at me. "You think he's walking, that's all that matters."

  "But, he has a mono leg. I think he hops, so I don't think the string will stop him, Phillip."

  "Fine," he says, anxious to get back to the game. "I'll tie him into the hutch."

  He opens the top drawer and ties string around my heavy cutlery tray then lays the gnome down face up and ties those strings around his legs.

  "He's not going anywhere, now," Phillip says, shutting the drawer and heading back downstairs.

  CHAPTER FIVE

  Dear Baby Mac,

  Your dad is obsessed with reading my pregnancy books. And not in a good way.

  He's starting to read all the horror stories. Ectopic pregnancies. Blighted ovums. Miscarriages.

  Please, promise that you won't do that to me.

  I know it's only been 10 weeks and you're only the size of a prune, but I can't wait to meet you.

  Your dad is convinced you're a girl.

  Later in the pregnancy we can find out what sex you are, but I don't think I want to know so, hopefully, you're okay with a gender-neutral nursery.

  Although, just in case, I bought a really adorable dress with a pale pink tutu and a butterfly applique. Oh, and matching pink sparkly booties that my mom would have gone crazy over.

  But, shhh . . . Don't tell Daddy.

  And guess what?

  Next week you're getting your first picture taken!

  We're having an ultrasound. And I'm nervously excited!

  So be good, be there, have a nice strong heartbeat, and show off your itty bitty self!

  March 12th

  Get my hopes up.

  "I'm so nervous," I tell Phillip as we enter the doctor's office.

  "I'm excited," he says. "This is going to be so incredible. We're going to see our baby for the first time."

  "I know. I'm so excited too, but I'm scared. Afraid to get my hopes up. Especially after you were talking about all the different types of miscarriages. With the blighted ovum one, you can feel pregnant, even start to show, but there's no baby. Just an empty sac. That would be so sad. And what about the other one you read about, where they couldn't find a heartbeat. I don't know what I'll do if that happens, Phillip."

  He grabs my hand and squeezes it. "Everything is going to be just fine. I'm sure of it."

  I nod. "You're right. It will be fine," I say, but I'm still a nervous wreck. It's weird. I know I'm pregnant. I know my body is changing, but sometimes I don't feel pregnant. Which makes me question if everything is okay.

  "Do you care if I record the ultrasound?" he asks me. "Danny said we should even though they will print us out a picture."

  "Yeah, I think we should."

  "Did you drink enough water?"

  "My teeth are floating."

  Phillip laughs and it helps break the tension. "That ought to be good enough then."

  We get set up in the ultrasound room, me on the table with my shirt pulled up and Phillip sitting next to me, his phone ready to record.

  Our ultrasound tech comes in and squeezes gel on my stomach and rubs the wand across it. Grayness moves across the screen in front of us. She frowns at the screen.

  I squeeze Phillip's hand tighter, worried there's no baby to find.

  But then she slides the wand to the other side of my abdomen and says, "There we go."

  On the screen in front of us is a little black oval and inside of i
t, at the bottom, is--"Is that it? Is that our baby?"

  "Yes, it is. See there, that's the baby's head," she says, directing us with the pointer on the screen. "And there are the facial bones. You can see the cord coming out of the belly, here, and there's its bottom. How far along are you?"

  "Eleven weeks."

  "It's moving," Phillip says, sounding a little worried.

  I want to look at him, but my eyes are glued to the screen.

  "It is very active," she says. "The last baby I had was quiet and napping, this one is bouncing all over the place."

  "Look at his little arms move. And his legs kicking. It's amazing."

  "The baby is moving a lot. Is that normal?" Phillip asks.

  "It's completely normal. Let's see if the baby will hold still long enough for me to get some measurements." She makes a few clicks then says. "Your baby is measuring at eleven weeks and two days, so it's size is as expected. Your due date should be accurate."

  "Look at the baby! It's going crazy. Is it because I'm nervous?"

  "No," she says. "Your baby's putting on a show for you. Oh, look, there's its hand. It just waved at you. Hello, Baby."

  "Ohmigawd! Hi," I say.

  "Hello, Baby Mac," Phillip says. I turn to look at him. There's joy written all over his face and he's practically vibrating, he's so excited. He pulls my hand to his lips and kisses it.

  "Can you believe that's our baby?" he says to me.

  "I can't believe I can't feel the baby moving. It's all over the place."

  "Well, the baby's not very big yet," the tech says. "In a few more weeks, you'll feel all of this. At first like a flutter, then later you'll feel hard kicks and elbows to the ribs. Look at him showing off. That was a somersault."

  "Did you see that?" Phillip says. "The baby just opened its mouth."

  "And swallowed," the tech says.

  "That's amazing. This is all so breathtaking."

  "Let's hear the baby's heartbeat."

  The room fills with the kind of sound you would expect to hear in a submarine. An odd sonar-like whooshing sound.

  "That's your baby's heartbeat," the tech says.

  "That's crazy. I can't even believe this. I'm sorry, it's just such--" I get choked up.

  "A beautiful sound, isn't it?" she says. "I never get tired of hearing it."

  "The heartbeat seems fast," Phillip says.

  "It is. About one hundred and sixty beats per minute. Your baby has a nice strong and normal heartbeat. Everything looks great."

  Phillip puts his lips across my knuckles again, only this time he keeps his head down. When he finally looks up at me, his eyes are glistening with tears. "This is really happening."

  Seeing Phillip get emotional causes tears to flood my face.

  I nod at him. "We're really doing this. We're really having a baby."

  We walk hand-in-hand to the car, not saying much. I think we're still both in awe.

  "I could have stayed all day and watched that. Have you ever seen anything so amazing?" he asks me.

  "I haven't. Could you believe how much it was moving? It was crazy."

  We go get lunch, but neither of us eats much. We're too busy watching the ultrasound video over and over.

  Later that evening, Phillip strolls in from work as I'm getting ready to run over to see the progress on Lori's kitchen. His tie is slightly loosened and he looks delectable.

  "Hey," he says, putting one hand on my ass and kissing my neck. "Where you going in such a hurry?"

  "I was just running over to see the kitchen progress before you got home."

  "My parents won't be here until late tonight. They have a benefit dinner."

  "Yeah, I saw your mom was all dressed up. She looked really pretty."

  "Did you show her the ultrasound video?"

  "No, I wanted to wait for you," I tell him, giving him a kiss and running out the door. "I'll be right back."

  When I'm standing in Lori's kitchen looking at a newly framed wall, I realize that I just missed out on an opportunity. "Lori, does Danny have a sexual tell?"

  "What do you mean?"

  "Like in poker, a tell is how you can tell what kind of hand they have."

  "I don't know. I never thought of it. What does Phillip do?"

  I walk up to her, put one hand on her ass, and pretend to kiss her neck just as Danny breezes in.

  "Damn," he says. "Can I play too? I knew you were gonna be a good neighbor."

  Lori and I look at each other and laugh. Danny struts across the kitchen, pulls Lori's waist in tight to his, but gives her just a sweet kiss on the cheek.

  "Oh my god!" She bursts out laughing. Danny looks confused, but Lori points at me and screeches, "That was just it!"

  "What was what?" he asks.

  "Nothing," she says to him.

  "Well, on that note," I say. "I better leave you two alone."

  "Good idea," she says, not even bothering to walk me to the door.

  When they're finished with whatever they were doing, they come over for dinner. Since Phillip's mom isn't here, we eat delivery pizza at the kitchen island.

  Phillip and Danny both stand and eat. Something she would not approve of.

  And that makes me happy in a sadistic way.

  "So, Mac," Danny says, "did you know our wives started hooking up behind our backs? I mean, the least they could do is let us watch if we can't play along."

  Phillip squints at me as I'm setting down a plate of brownies.

  Lori giggles in a way that makes her look guilty.

  "What are you talking about?" Phillip asks.

  "I walked in tonight and your wife's hand was on Lori's ass and she was kissing her neck. It was pretty hot, I'll admit. Been a while since the days of two girls kissing."

  "We weren't kissing, Danny," I say.

  Danny waves his hand at me and goes, "Whatever."

  "Did you do that in college?" Lori asks him. "Like two girls at once? A threesome?"

  Phillip and I remove all expression from our faces. I'm pretty sure this is not something Lori wants to hear about right now.

  I say to her, "Of course not." Then I turn to Phillip. "I wasn't kissing Lori. I was demonstrating your sexual tell."

  "My sexual tell?"

  "Yeah, what you do when you want sex. You grab my ass and kiss right here on my neck. And Danny pulls Lori's hips in tight to his, but then he just gives her a sweet little kiss on the cheek."

  "I do do that," Danny laughs. "Lori has one too, though. She rubs her hand up under my shirt."

  "So, we had the ultrasound today," Phillip says with a beaming smile.

  "Really?" Lori says. "Why didn't you tell us?"

  "JJ was nervous," Phillip says. "We wanted to be sure everything was okay."

  "And?" Danny asks.

  "We have a video," Phillip says proudly.

  CHAPTER SIX

  Dear Baby Mac,

  Congratulations, you are real!

  And we have the proof on video! The ultrasound tech said you were showing off for us and I think she was right. You were moving all over, kicking and punching, and you even stopped to wave at us! It was seriously the most amazing thing I've ever seen.

  You have a really big head, but the tech said that's normal right now, that your brain is super important because it's helping you grow and develop!

  And although I couldn't see it, the baby book says that--as of this week--you have hair! And I'm dying to know if it will be blonde like mine, or brown like your daddy's. Your dad has amazing brown eyes with golden flecks. I have blue eyes, but when I was little I wished I had pretty brown ones like his.

  I've known him since I was born. Crazy, huh? There are photos of my mom holding him when she was pregnant with me.

  Considering how fully formed you appeared, it's hard to believe you're still so small--although we're moving up to the bigger fruits.

  You are now the size of a lime.

  Sorry, I just let out a little sigh.

 
; Mommy may have, on very rare occasions, liked to do something called a tequila shooter. It's a tasty adult beverage that you have with salt and lime.

  Mommy misses it.

  And caffeine, and soda, and alcohol, and--oh my gosh--what I wouldn't do for a beer. It's not fair that Daddy still gets to drink them when Mommy is pregnant. Oh, and I didn't want you to feel bad if you are a boy, so I bought you a cute blue onesie with a baseball on it today. And little booties that are striped. When I showed your daddy, he said they reminded him of something called Naughty Dream Week.

  Speaking of that, Daddy just took his shirt off and is getting in bed. I should probably go, uh, rock him to sleep or something.

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  Dear Baby Mac,

  Daddy says you're the size of a plum.

  And now I'm hungry.

  Oh, and thanks for easing up on the hangover thing. I'm starting to feel more normal. Although, I can't button my skinny jeans even though I've been jogging almost every day.

  Right now, I want to go to the movie theater, so I can put Milk Duds on top of some warm, buttery popcorn.

  And, you know, maybe see a movie.

  March 22nd

  Contractions

  Phillip wakes me up by rubbing my face.

  "Morning," I sigh. "Are you leaving for work now?"

  When I sit up, he hands me a cup of hot chocolate. "We got some ice last night and it's kinda slick, so I was thinking you could either ride to work with me or just work from home."

  "Can't you work from home today too?"

  "Normally, I would, but we have clients in town so I have to be there. Dad was supposed to drive down this morning, but they got snow up North and he's not going to make it. And since it's predicted for them to get more, he's going to stay up there this week."

  "Oh, boy! A week with the house to ourselves. What ever will we do?"

  He kisses my forehead. "How about tonight we have a romantic dinner in front of the fire?"

  "Naked? I ask, but then I look down at my bloated looking stomach and say, "Or not."

  Phillip puts his hand on top of my teeny bump. "Naked sounds perfect. Are you going back to sleep?"