Shelter

by Gilley, Lauren

  “Of course I’ll come,” he cut off her rambling, chest swelling up with a warm, bright sensation he couldn’t put a name to. She wanted him to be there when she looked at the baby. Wow. “You sure?”

  Her eyes flicked away, as if she was afraid he’d see a spark of doubt in them, but they came back, and she nodded. “Absolutely.”

  14

  “Lot on your mind?”

  Carlos tore another flake of pine straw off the bale at his feet and spread it on the ground around him. He shrugged at the question. Salvador was on his right, and he really didn’t want to talk about his personal shit in front of him, but the guy who’d asked, Mike, was a solid dude. Almost a friend. “I guess,” Carlos said, turning his head in Mike’s direction in hopes Salvador wouldn’t hear. He didn’t like to talk about family shit, at least not normally, but when he’d awakened that morning in Sam’s bed, Sam’s widow curled up around him, a weight had settled across his shoulders that he hadn’t been able to shake. At this point, internalizing his stress was giving him indigestion. “Gotta leave early.”

  “Everything alright?” Mike asked as he distributed his own straw.

  “Yeah. My girl’s going in for an ultrasound today,” he swallowed hard at the referral to Alma as his girl. “It just kinda hit me, ya know?”

  Mike nodded.

  Salvador wasn’t so tactful. “Girl? Dude, you got someone knocked up? Shit! Is it that Jessica chick with the nice ass?”

  “No,” he snapped. “It’s not her.”

  “What’s her name?”

  “Salvador,” Mike said with a sigh. “Leave it alone.”

  “Alma.”

  “That’s a cool name.” Then the landscaper’s already big eyes nearly bugged out of his head. “Hey! Wasn’t Sam married to a chick named Alma?”

  Too late, Carlos realized that his frustration had led to the leaking of too much information. He caught Mike’s gaze and saw his coworker’s sympathy. He at least wasn’t going to judge him for taking up with his dead cousin’s wife.

  Salvador, on the other hand, looked like a teenage girl who’d just sunk her teeth into the gossip of the decade. “Bro, seriously? She’s hot! The brunette, right?” He laughed. “Man, that’s bad, hooking up with his girl like that.”

  Carlos shucked his gloves and left them where they fell – he couldn’t vacate the area fast enough.

  “Hey, where you going?” Salvador called after him as he stalked away.

  “Carlos,” that would be Mike.

  He didn’t care. Fuck it. Their foreman, Good & Green’s owner’s nephew, stood with a shoulder propped against the cab of one of the trucks, looking like the aimless, lazy kid he was. They all knew he only had the job because of who he was, not what he knew: which was jack shit. Todd, though they all called him “little dickhead” behind his back, turned at the sound of Carlos’s boots over the grass.

  “What up?” he asked. He had a flat, roofer’s pencil behind one ear for some reason and a steaming paper cup from Starbucks in one hand.

  “I need to take off.” Carlos barely managed to keep his voice cordial.

  Todd frowned. “Thought you said two-thirty?”

  “Got a call. The appointment’s been bumped up.”

  He shrugged. “Whatever. Jimmy’s gonna take one of the trucks back. You can ride with him.”

  **

  Carlos was quiet in an unhappy way, not a calm, reflective one. At least that was Alma’s estimation as they settled into chairs in the gynecologist’s office. She might have been mistaking his mood – after all, what guy would want to walk through the hall they’d come down lined with photos of naked babies nestled in people’s palms - but she knew she read him well. And he was agitated about something besides this appointment.

  “You okay?” she asked.

  “Yup.” He picked up one of the magazines off the table in front of them, then frowned after he’d flipped the pages and realized it was a publication for expectant mothers. He tossed it back down and it hit the table with a smack that drew disapproving glances from the other patients.

  The OGYN’s waiting room, unlike any other Alma had ever been in, was almost silent. In all her previous visits, she’d wondered why she was the only patient who wasn’t pregnant. Was everyone in the world having babies? Now, she was one of the pregnant masses. No one around them spoke, busy with books or cell phones. One woman was trying to pacify the baby who fussed and squirmed in its carrier and she looked fretful, afraid that its cries might disturb the ridiculous, tomb-like quiet that everyone seemed intent on maintaining.

  “How was work?” she ventured.

  He shrugged. “Work.”

  Brooding Carlos was not the man she’d wanted at her side this afternoon. Where had her charming doofus gone? She frowned. “Are you sure you’re - ”

  “Alma Morales,” a nurse called.

  Carlos stood and offered a hand to her, which she took, not wanting to look rude, and, moody or not, she was thankful for his support.

  The nurse smiled at them in a way that indicated she thought they were both the biological parents of her baby. “Right this way.”

  **

  The ultrasound technician had little cartoon cats on her scrubs and Carlos kept going back to them because if he focused on what the monitor was showing them, took a moment to absorb what the white and black blobs of static were, a lethal combination of guilt and joy twisted like a hot knife in his belly. Sam should be here to see this, he kept thinking. He should have been there to see his own child, tiny and indistinguishable as it was, up on the screen. Should have had the opportunity to see the unshed tears glittering in Alma’s eyes. It should have been Sam’s fingers that were intertwined with hers on the edge of the exam table.

  But in the same instant, he was glad the fingers were his. That it was his name on her lips when she breathed in wonder. The baby was a piece of her, and, through the blood of the man who’d been like his brother, a little piece of him too. He wasn’t so delusional – yet – that he was supplanting himself as the father. But he loved the little blip on the screen. Of all the questions he had, the baby had never been one of them. When it was born – he or she – he was going to be there, in whatever capacity Alma wanted him to be.

  “It’s hard to see,” the tech said, “but this is the head over here, and down here are the feet.” She moved the cursor so the arrow pointed to the respective head and feet of the grainy baby. Carlos might as well have been looking at an underwater sonar scan of the ocean floor for all it resembled a human child, but Alma gasped and squeezed his hand.

  “Oh, it’s so little,” she murmured. “Can you tell whether it’s a boy or a girl?”

  The tech smiled. “I’m afraid not yet. It’ll be a few more weeks until it’s developed enough to determine sex.”

  Alma’s eyes went back to the screen. “That’s okay. It won’t make a difference.”

  The experience was so surreal, the spell under which Alma had fallen so tranquil, that Carlos hadn’t had the heart to tell the doctors and nurses that he wasn’t the father. The frowns and apologies would have ruined the moment. So the tech swiveled her head in his direction, still smiling, and then glanced at Alma, giving them that inclusive, you’re-the-expectant-parents look.

  “Are you considering names?” she asked.

  It was a normal question, one all parents fielded. But Carlos felt a twinge of sadness. It wasn’t his place to name the baby, or even to suggest names.

  Alma, though, just smiled, wiggled her fingers inside of his. “I already have one picked out.”

  “Boy or girl?” the tech asked.

  “Either. It’ll be Sam either way.”

  Which was perfect. Carlos swallowed the sudden lump in his throat. It wasn’t about him or her or revenge anymore, it was about this new, tiny, as of yet gender nonspecific Sam.

  It was too late to help the first Sam. But the asshole who’d taken his life was never going to hurt new Sam.

  **r />
  On their way out of the doctor’s office, his arm snug around her waist, the warmth from his body seeping into hers and combining with the overflowing abundance of maternal love welling up in her heart, Alma couldn’t have been more content. The doctor had printed her a photo of her ultrasound and it hadn’t mattered that the baby looked like some kind of space creature, it was the most beautiful thing she’d ever gazed upon.

  Her Sam.

  Carlos’s support had been the magic key that had unlocked all the wonderful parts of the experience she might have missed had she been alone. As they stepped outside into the weak autumn sunshine, for the first time, she felt fully, wholly pregnant. And even excited about the prospect of bringing this new life into the world and getting to meet him – or her – face to face.

  That blissful epiphany was being overshadowed, however, as they perused the baby aisles of the nearest Target and she took stock of all the things her new bundle would require. And how much all of that would cost.

  “They want four hundred bucks for this damn stroller!” Carlos exclaimed.

  A fellow shopper gave them a dark look and Alma put a hand on his arm. “It’s just that brand,” she said in a soft voice, hoping he’d follow her lead. “This one’s cheaper.” Though the one-hundred-thirty dollar price tag was making her light-headed.

  “And this car seat,” he shook his head. “Bottles, wipes, toys, formula, high chairs. Shit! How can one baby need all this stuff?”

  “Don’t forget the blankets, sheets, clothes and hundreds upon thousands of diapers,” she muttered, massaging her temples. She felt more than a little guilty for bringing Carlos along in this scouting expedition. His curses weren’t sympathetic: they were the product of the pressure he was feeling. As if this were his baby he would need to provide for. After all, he’d said “both of you” that night, his hand on her stomach. “This was a bad idea.”

  They left the store empty-handed, in glum silence. They’d left her car at the Silver Plate, so they headed back in that direction. Her stomach grumbled at the first red light and he pulled into the very next fast food place, which happened to be a Wendy’s. She looped her arm through his as they walked across the parking lot in a silent thank you.

  At a window booth, over their respective burger and salad, Alma watched the creases etched between his brows. He chewed his food like it perplexed him, which she’d always found cute. But his concentrated face, as she’d always called it, wasn’t so cute this time because she knew she was the cause of it.

  She speared a cucumber slice while she debated her words. “Carlos.”

  He paused, swallowed, glanced up at her.

  “I don’t want you to feel obligated.”

  “About what?”

  Alma sighed and set her fork down. “The baby.”

  He took a sip of his drink, ate exactly three fries – she counted – chewing slowly. “I don’t,” he said at last. “It’s not like that.”

  But why wasn’t it “like that”? She believed him that he meant it when he said he loved her, but love went cold all the time. And babies broke solid couples apart. She still wasn’t even sure what they were, so how could he shoulder the financial burden of her child automatically?

  “This,” her hands went to her stomach, “is a lot to take in today. Babies are expensive and time consuming and very not sexy.”

  Carlos frowned. “I know.”

  Either he didn’t get what she was driving at, or he didn’t want to. She knew she walked a fine line between giving him options and offending him. She forced a smile that felt flimsy at best. “You know, most guys would be running for the door like their asses were on fire right about now.”

  The joke did its job; he cracked a curious grin.

  “But I know you’re not that kind of guy. You don’t run away from scary situations.”

  A dark look skittered across his face. It was only there a moment; if she’d blinked, she would have missed it, but she saw the downshift in his features. When she couldn’t put a label on the brief expression, she let it slide.

  “But,” she went on, “I don’t want you to commit to something now and then regret it later.” He blinked. “Heck, pretty sure I’d send the little peanut back if I could,” she said with a flat chuckle. But the humor obviously failed when he continued to stare at her with an intensity that was more akin to Sam than to him. It unnerved her. “Carlos,” Alma sighed, “I’m giving you an out, okay? Being with me doesn’t mean you have to step into the dad role if you’re not ready.” And honestly, I’m not sure I’m ready for you to do that either, she added in her head.

  “You remember how just last night you were talking about pushing people away?”

  “That’s not what I’m doing,” she protested. She took a deep breath and then another. “I can’t ask you to support me any more than you have. It wouldn’t feel right to ask you to pay for diapers and toys, and…” she shook her head as she looked into his big, deep brown eyes, willing him to understand. “It’s too much.”

  “Because,” he swallowed, and this time not because he was eating, “I’m not the father?”

  “Because…I’m not sure what you are,” her voice came out a bare whisper as she tried so hard to convey her confusion in a way that didn’t insult him. “We haven’t really talked about that and…” he looked so hurt – in this new, intense Sam sort of way – that she glanced away and took stock of their surrounds. “Hell of a place to have this conversation,” she muttered, dabbing at eyes she hadn’t realized were moist.

  “Alma.”

  She didn’t want to look at him with this bundle of guilt a tight knot in her stomach, but she did.

  His expression had become fierce. He’d never looked that way before in all her recollection. “Do you love me?”

  “What?”

  His lips pressed together into a hard line. “Do you love me?” he repeated, slower, as if it were the most important question he’d ever uttered.

  “That’s a loaded question,” she forced a laugh, then sobered. “But yeah, you know I do. It’s just…”

  Some of the seriousness left his expression as one corner of his mouth twitched to the side. “You just don’t know how.”

  Ashamed, she nodded.

  Carlos started to reach across the table, then looked down at the spread of food between them with disgust. He pushed his half-eater burger to the side and put his hands on the table, palms up, in what she took to be an offering gesture. “I’m in, Alma. Whatever it is we’re doing, I’m all the way in. And it’s cool if you need some time to figure things out, but I’m not going anywhere.” The small smile came back. “I already told you that.”

  “Babies are expensive,” she repeated. “I don’t want you to resent me.”

  “Not possible.”

  You always shoulda been with me instead.

  On some level, he’d been right when he’d said that.

  15

  Lots of progress could be made in two and half weeks. Alma learned how to balance her tray at work and could carry eight drinks at a time without so much as a drop sloshing over the sides. Her tips improved and Sharon’s dirty looks dwindled. Emily proved decent company, but more than anything, being around the other waitresses reminded her that she sorely missed having a go-to gal pal she could talk to about anything.

  She and Carlos split time between his place and hers. Wherever she was, she pushed the cooking and cleaning to domestic goddess levels. Martha Stewart would have been hard pressed to offer her advice.

  Carlos continued, she couldn’t help but notice, to come home from work in a pensive, withdrawn mood. A beer and a little time in front of the TV loosened him up. And by dinner, he was smiling again. Alma knew it was because of the financial stress – he had to be doing the math in his head and coming up empty. Guilt nagged at her, kept her up at night. Once, she’d rolled over in her king sized bed at the house to find him awake too, staring at her across the sheets. Neither of them had spoken
about the mental weights they carried.

  But less and less often did she tear up when she glanced at a picture of Sam. The feelings of betrayal faded and when Carlos positioned himself on top of her, it was his touch she anticipated, not Sam’s.

  They passed the days in a limbo of sorts. Equal parts happy and depressed. Somewhat hopeful. Decidedly together. Whichever direction they were headed, it was hand-in-hand.

  They talked for four days straight about Thanksgiving and it was with nervous butterflies flapping around in her belly that she straightened her dark brown cardigan over a white tank top and studied her reflection.

  “You ready?” he called from the kitchen. She’d told him to stay out of the cookies, but he sounded like he was chewing one as he spoke.

  “As I’ll ever be,” she said to herself. She had a few stray hairs that needed tucking into place with a dab of styling crème, and her lip gloss needed a fresh application. Now if she could just keep her breakfast down, she’d be all set to go.

  Alma didn’t realize that she stood and stared at herself, a stricken expression on her face, until Carlos popped his head in the bathroom.

  “You alright?” he asked, frowning in concern.

  He looked good, she noticed with approval. Dark jeans, clean white sneakers and a black button-up shirt that was fitted in all the right places, the sleeves rolled up so those tan, vein-laced forearms she loved were exposed. Smelled nice too – she recognized the scent of Davidoff Cool Water.

  “Nervous,” she admitted. “Really nervous.”

  “It’ll be fine.”

  She narrowed her eyes at his reflection in the mirror. “Liar.”

  “Yep. Now come on. Does your mom still make that sweet potato stuff I like?”

  **

  Thankfully, Carlos drove because Alma was shaking so badly she thought she might not have had the strength to press the gas and brake. As they turned onto her parents’ street, her stomach fisted up into a knot that left her nauseas and panting.

  “You’re fine,” Carlos said as the car slowed and the turn signal clicked on.