by Sadie Sumner
“Worried how?” Rufus put his raincoat on.
“Sperm, silly. Gil’s gametes. He’s not keen.”
“Gil’s just not of those men who need to procreate.” Rufus made rivulets in Puffy’s fur with his fingers.
Chloe had taken her baby home early and they stopped at her cutting table on their way out. “I wish she’d keep her area tidy. Have you spoken to her about this mess?”
“I have,” Rufus said. “Chloe’s tired, her baby hardly sleeps. And before you ask, her work is as good as ever. I don’t know how she does it.”
Monica tidied away a paper pattern. Even though they were alone, she lowered her voice. “Just between us, do you think she makes a bit much of the whole I-have-a-baby-so-I-need-special-treatment thing?” She held up Chloe’s work to inspect it.
Rufus took a step back. “Mon, you know you can’t say stuff like that, it’s not, you know, acceptable.”
Monica reached over and stroked Puffy. “My inside voice escaping, little Puffy.” She used a baby voice. “About the sperm. Perhaps I could have yours instead. You could be my B plan, Rufi.”
Rufus gaped at her as sleety rain broke through the sky and pelted the glass roof. He shook his head. “Well, aside from the fact of my sperm and someone else’s eggs, inside your body.”
Monica interrupted him. “God no. I’m not going to have it myself.”
“Really?” Rufus was surprised. “But IVF is pretty foolproof. There are plenty of new techniques. My sister got pregnant right away on it.”
“Lucky her. But it mucks with your body. I don’t think I could handle that.” They walked to the front door.
”Makes sense, in some strange way, but I’m shooting blanks darling. I thought you knew that. Mumps when I was 19. I would love a baby. I really would. But that’s not going to happen.”
Monica felt a panic rising. The deposit had taken all her savings. “What will I do?” The ache in her stomach returned.
Rufus locked the door. “You’ve got four options.”
The streetlights came on, and the downpour stopped as quickly as it had started so that the pavements shone with fresh rain.
Rufus tucked the rabbit deep inside his coat. “Beg, borrow, buy or steal. I love that wet smell of the pavements.”
“It’s called petrichor, the scent of fresh rain,” Monica said despondently.
“You know everything,” he squeezed her arm. “We’ll be a bit early, but we should get to the bar before Gil.” He looked thoughtful. “And it’s true; my sister did go a bit crazy, all those hormone injections.”
They took a cab, then got out early and walked together up West Georgia, through the early evening crowd, everyone wrapped up against the cold.
“You understand I didn’t plan this. I had no idea I’d want a baby this much. It feels almost painful,” Monica said.
“We all thought you didn’t like babies.” Rufus pulled a scarf from his bag and wound it around his neck.
“That’s the point. I don’t like other people’s babies. But now I’m pretty sure I’ll like my own. I used to have the same dream, where I’m in a room full of babies, hundreds of them, all lined up.”
“Were they crying?” Rufus pushed Puffy deeper into the sling to keep him warm.
“Yes! But I ache for a child now. You’ve no idea how powerful it is. And since Dotty died, and I started this, the dream stopped. Except.” She decided to tell him about the phantom baby vision.
“Except what?” They walked close together to hear over the noise of the city.
“I see babies. Well, the same baby actually. But here’s the weird thing. It’s just in my blind eye.” Monica straightened her eye patch.
“That sounds like Charles Something Syndrome,” Rufus said.
“What is that? How do you know this?” Monica stopped walking.
“Hold on, let me think,” Rufus said. “My aunt had it for years, constant visual hallucinations through her blind eye. Is that what you have?”
Monica could only nod.
“And you know, she never told anyone till just before she died.”
“It’s a syndrome? I thought I was going mad.”
“Oh, darling.” Rufus squeezed her arm. “I remember now. It’s called Charles Bonnet Syndrome. So, babies seem to be in your stars.”
Monica felt a flood of relief. “I think Dotty dying released the whole baby thing in me. I suddenly realized I was not going to be one of those, you know, sparkly post-fertility thrivers.”
“Oh, that is so sweet. I never picked you for someone with mommy-ache,” Rufus said.
Monica laughed out loud. “How do you even know that term?”
“I’m gay. I read Huffington Post. So you’ll use a surrogate?”
Monica felt warm inside. Talking about it was good. “Why can’t Gil be more like you?”
Rufus put up his umbrella. “He’s the best guy I know.”
Rufus did not like her being negative about Gil. “Yes, a surrogate. I’ve already started the process. I’ve even chosen our egg donor. They are looking for a surrogate in India, would you believe.” The fear that Gil would not provide the gametes flooded her again. “I wish you could be the daddy. Have you had them checked lately? Maybe they’ve recovered?”
Rufus turned to face her. “Even if they have, as much as I love kids, I don’t think I’m cut out for fatherhood.”
“But it wouldn’t be fatherhood, not in the daddy daddy way, just your sweet genes.”
”You should talk to Gil,” Rufus said.
“He’s like Teflon,” Monica replied. “Nothing gets in. Was he always like this? Back in college?”
Rufus considered the question. “Yes. No. I don’t know. Probably not so much.” He stamped his feet to warm them up. “People cope differently. Just talk to him.”
They were outside the Pacific Centre, and Monica pecked his cheek quickly. “You’re smart, the best friend a girl could have. I’m going in here.”
“Where?”
“A baby store.” Monica felt a flush of embarrassment.
“We’ll come with you, won’t we Puffy?” Rufus shook the rain from his umbrella, and together they consulted the map inside the mall entrance. Monica had walked past the designer baby store a hundred times and never noticed it. Now she stood in the middle of the store surrounded by cribs and changing tables and heated baby wipe holders. A stack of toys designed to develop hand-eye coordination covered one wall. There was every kind of soft animal. Rufus held up a stuffed rabbit for Puffy to see and Monica pressed an organic cotton quilt to her cheek and watched a woman who seemed to drift through the displays in a trance. Heavily pregnant, the woman sighed as she trailed her fingers over each item. Monica wondered if she too would be overwhelmed, taken beyond herself when her baby came.
They left the store and walked the few blocks to the bar beneath a shuttered video store on Granville. The bar was Rufus’ local and he bounded down the stairs. Monica paused outside. She avoided this part of town, with the homeless propped against shop fronts or curled around their bags. Nearby a group of young people sat huddled together with bongos and dogs. She felt their dislocation as an almost physical thing and could not understand why Rufus liked this area. She ducked in out of the rain and down the stairs. It was still early. Lurid neon splashed the empty dance floor. Monica joined Rufus at the bar and ordered a Bloody Mary.
“Never seen it this empty.” Rufus wrapped the sling over Puffy and pulled his jacket to hide him. “Mind you, I’m never here this early.” He smiled at the barman. “Two more.” He pointed to Monica’s drink. “The photos look great.”
Gil’s photography hung on the walls. Rufus had arranged it all. But Monica could see right away that as soon as the lights went down and the music came up, no one would notice the art on the walls.
Gil arrived, shaking the rain from his hair and wiping his face with his handkerchief. He glanced shyly at the photos and grimaced. “It’s dark, and there’s no one here.�
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“Oh, Mr. Negative. I know it’s not exactly a traditional opening. But you’ll see. Take me on the tour before the crowds arrive.”
Monica followed them, drink in hand, as they wandered photo to photo.
“These are great, my friend. Just wait, everyone will love them.” Rufus peered at the tiny price stickers on the side of each frame. “And cheap. God, everyone will want one at these prices.”
Gil leaned in close to inspect the grain and sharpness of an image. “I know the work is good, maybe my best yet, but something’s missing. Do you think I’ve taken the Dog thing too far? Perhaps it’s become a cliché?”
Monica threaded her arm through his. “They’re perfect, just as they are.” She’d resolved to be very nice to him, and he glanced at her and raised an eyebrow.
“How was your day?” he asked.
“Interesting,” she said, not ready to tell him about Antoinette and her parallel world.
Gil looked around the empty bar. “I should take photos of newly deserted places. You can almost see the essence people leave behind, like ectoplasm. A photograph defined by what’s not there, rather than what is.” His voice drifted off.
Monica glanced at him in surprise. She could see the idea excited him. “You should have brought your camera,” she said.
He nodded. “At this rate, I could go home, get it and come back.”
Rufus punched his arm. “Give it 20 minutes. I guarantee it will be pumping. I wish Puffy could see them. They are so stupid with their ‘no-pets’ rule.” He reached his hand into his jacket.
Gil took a big swig of his drink and shuddered. “They must have doubled the alcohol in this. Do you think, perhaps, the photos should be larger? Or maybe sepia?”
Monica excused herself and went to the washroom. When she returned, the men were deep in conversation, their heads almost touching. She came up behind them close enough to listen but still hidden in the shadows. Rufus was telling Gil that she’d already pressed the go button.
“It’s a thing with her now. A production. She has it all under control,” he said, and Gil shivered and grabbed at Rufus’s arm. “What about me? I thought you’d be on my side.”
Rufus shook himself free of Gil’s grasp. “I am on your side. Always have been. But I have everything invested in that business. I want to leave too, but not yet. If she wigs out, then we all lose.”
Monica pushed herself further back into the shadows. Her husband and her business partner wanted to leave. It made no sense.
Gil glanced around but did not see her. “You’re just like her. It’s all about business with the both of you.” He ran his hand through his hair.
Rufus shrugged. “I know why I’m still there, but what about you? And if you say money, I’m going to smack you up the side of your head.”
The smell of the bar caught in Monica’s nostrils, a whiff of old beer and urine that clung to the darkened reaches. She knew Gil would be too embarrassed to reveal the state of his bank account to his friend and how beholden he was to her.
Rufus gulped his drink. “It’s money, isn’t it? What a shitty reason to stay in a relationship.”
“I have this dream, where she comes home and everything is gone. Including me.”
“That’s cruel. Just leave, Gil. Walk out the door.” Rufus pressed his lips together. “You know she’s miserable.”
They both turned to watch as a group of men descended into the bar, shoving and laughing. Monica held herself up against the wall in a state of shock.
“Since when?” Gil tapped the side of a photo frame to straighten it.
The floor was sticky beneath Monica’s feet as she edged closer to listen over the increased noise.
“It amazes me that a man with such a well-trained eye can’t see how miserable his wife is. Anyway, all married couples are complicit in each others’ misery,” Rufus said.
Monica put her hand over her mouth. Around her, the bar felt restless, fractured as the men waited for the band to start, to provide a point of focus.
Gil raised his voice. “How would you know that? Six months, right? That’s your longest relationship.”
Rufus held the sides of his head and pulled at his hair. “Fuck Gil, years of observation. You and Monica are a brilliant case study for a desolate marriage.” The rising noise of the bar buried his voice.
A man with long red hair gripped a microphone on the raised platform they used as a stage. A pinpoint of light found him, and he became instantly animated. The men turned to watch as the band ripped suddenly into a furious country alt number that filled every crevice and space. People deserted the bar and thronged the tiny dance floor.
Monica took her chance and walked back into their view.
“Hello, my boys,” she wrinkled her nose. “It smells in here. What did I miss?” She was amazed at the levity in her voice and grateful the dim lighting obscured her face. “Where is everyone? Rufi, I thought you invited 200 of your best friends.”
“I did.” He pointed to the entrance as another group burst noisily through the door. A man in tight jeans and perfectly cropped black hair rushed down the stairs and came towards them. Rufus kissed him and took his hand.
“And who do we have here?” Gil asked.
“This is Dillon,” Rufus said. “And this is my oldest friend,” he introduced Gil, “and his lovely wife, Monica.” He used a sweet voice, and Monica scowled at him. “And, and course, my business partner.”
Gil held out his hand, but Dillon went in for the two-kiss.
“Don’t be shocked,” Rufus said to Dillon, “they’re super stylish.”
“Is that hard work?” Dillon kept up the joke. His accent was pure Quebecois.
“Not for them, they thrive on it,” Rufus grinned at Monica.
“Are you the one responsible for this god-awful band?” Dillon shouted over the music. Rufus clapped his hands.
The band took a breath between songs. “Oh thank god,” Dillon said and turned to Gil. “You do weddings, right? How do you like it?”
Gil snorted. “One day I’m sure one of them will be about genuine love. Most weekends I go down on bended knee in front of the happy couple, to find that perfect shot to convince them and everyone they know that it’s true love. They’ll look back and remember that one false moment and think it’s real.” He drank down the rest of his Bloody Mary in a single gulp.
“So, not a fan of the women in white?” Dillon responded.
Gil laughed. “I’m thinking of renaming my business Hope Over Experience Photography.”
“How’s your marriage?” he said to Gil and smiled at Monica to include her in his humor as the band dove into their next number.
“Why do you ask?” Gil had to shout.
“Oh, you know, professional curiosity.”
Gil clinked his glass with Dillon. “Never better my friend. Never better.”
Dillon laughed. “No matter how bad this music, we’re dancing,” he pulled Rufus towards the dance floor.
Monica wanted to leave immediately, go home and take a bath. Instead, Gil urged her to a shadowy table against the back wall where they sat side by side. “I think Rufus is a touch embarrassed that he has, you know, straight friends,” he said.
Monica made her voice sound normal. “In some circles, we’re a badge of honor, like, meet my favorite binary, mixed-couple friends.” Monica was amazed at how skilled they both were at playing this game.
Gil laughed, “Binary huh. I guess that is us.” He sucked on his straw. “They do an excellent Bloody Mary. I don’t think anyone noticed my photos.”
Monica could feel his disappointment. Usually, she would try to soothe his wounded ego, but now she sat very still with her hands clasped in her lap as they watched the dancing. Now, Monica thought. Tell me now. Get it over with.
Gil turned to her, “I wanted to ask. Why are you wearing that eye patch? Really?”
“Does it look bad?” His pretense crushed her.
“No,
it’s very stylish. But your glass eye looks good.”
“It is not a glass eye. It’s a prosthetic.” She felt as though he would never understand her.
Rufus waved his hands above his head to catch their attention. “Can you hold Puffy?” he was breathless from dancing. “Just for a while. I don’t want to squash him.” He took off his jacket and undid the sling. “Don’t let the management see. Or they’ll throw us all out.”
Gil took the rabbit. Its eyes glinted in the gloom and its tiny pink nose quivered. “I didn’t know you had a new partner. How long?”
Rufus shrugged, “Recently.”
“How recent?” Monica asked. He was a chronic over-sharer, and she was surprised she’d missed this development, even with the fuss of Dotty dying and the prospect of a new baby.
“Last week.” He bent and touched his nose to the rabbits.
The music slowed, and Dillon joined them.
“These are beautiful.” Dillon pointed to the photographs. “Are they all yours?”
“They are.”
Monica could see Gil was grateful for the compliment.
“Is the dog easy to photograph?”
Gil stroked the rabbit. “When he behaves, but mostly it’s a major pain to get him to stand still.”
Dillon pointed to the nearest photo of Dotty’s coffin, the frozen field, shrouded in mist.
“This one. Pure genius. I mean that. It looks almost like the dog’s waiting for the dead to rise.”
“Oh god,” Gil said happily, “you’ve no idea how I struggled with that shot. There were a dozen people around us.”
“Do you ever include people? Live people I mean, other than brides?”
“I think they ruined it for me,” he said it like a confession.
“What do you do, Dillon?” Monica asked.
“Adult student. I went back last year. Psychotherapy, focusing on narcissism.”
“Oh, you should so psychoanalyze us,” Monica said. “Especially Gil. He distrusts therapy, thinks it’s unmanly, like paying someone to unblock your drains. Don’t you, Gil?”
Gil held up his hands in surrender as her phone vibrated in her pocket. She took it out and mouthed ‘sorry’ and made her way through the crush of men and up the stairs, away from their betrayal.
