Shopping for a Billionaire’s Baby

by Julia Kent

  “I’ll protect you,” I tell Chuckles, tentatively petting his side. He lets me, the purring growing stronger. “We’ll be okay. No costumes for you.”

  If cats can smile, he does.

  “Shannon?” Declan’s deep voice outside the door makes us both turn, Chuckles abandoning me in a hot minute for his true love.

  “Hi,” I muster, my feeble tone more a function of processing Chuckles’ reaction to me than my own sickness.

  “You need anything? Water? Homemade electrolyte water? I brought some in the car.”

  “You did?”

  “I know it’s the only thing that really helps your stomach.”

  Tears fill the back of my throat, cutting off my breathing through my mouth, the joy of his touching pre-planning making me feel vulnerable. “Come in,” I tell him, unable to say anything more, too overwhelmed.

  The doorknob clicks and he opens it, eyes going soft with compassion as he sees me on the ground, my head on the toilet, Chuckles now covering his trouser cuffs with cat hair and love.

  “Oh, honey.”

  “It’s not that bad.”

  “My stomach lurched when Marie brought up the baby shower, too.”

  “Oh.” I move aside and prop myself up against the wall, gesturing to the toilet. “Do you need to throw up?”

  Instead of laughing, he bends down and squeezes himself into the small space between me and the bathtub, getting a lapful of Chuckles for his efforts. The back of his hand is a kiss against my hot cheek. “I’m so sorry.”

  “For having a mom like mine? I know. You’ve said it a thousand times.”

  “No, no. I’m so sorry you have to go through this.” He gestures at the toilet. “All this pain and trouble is on you–and only you–to have my baby.”

  “Our baby. It’s not a purely sacrificial thing. I get something out of it, too.”

  “But you have to do all the work. I just got to have fun making the baby.” He waggles his eyebrows and squeezes my hand. Chuckles makes a huffing sound of dismissal.

  “Eve’s curse and all that. Adam did have to give up a rib to make women.” I poke him there. He makes a sound close to a giggle. It would be adorable if I didn’t instantly have a wave of hot-cold rush over my body, warning me I’m not quite out of the woods yet. Nothing is less sexy than puking in front of your husband. I know this because of a bad sea bass dinner once in New York. Don’t ask.

  “No comparison. I’ll take quick torso surgery over what you’re facing for the next twenty-eight weeks.”

  I give him a wan smile. “It really is unfair, isn’t it? And yet you can’t fight biology.”

  “No.” He tucks a long piece of my hair behind my ear. “You can’t.” His soft smile is so sweet, so loving, our eyes locked in an ever-deepening connection I feel in my belly, my spine, my fingertips and toes. The longer we stare, the more it rises up, a wordless bond that has a grounded feeling to it, radiating love and yet with discomfort at the edges, lurking, because nothing else in the world feels like this.

  I’ve learned to hold back the frantic impulse to avert my eyes and to let myself fall into him. He always catches me, even when I cry from the beauty of it. Even when I long for more, in the moment, feeling the eternity of possibility and the inevitable finality of this, too. Love may last forever, but bodies do not, a reality I’m coming to grips with in a very real way these last few months.

  Especially when I realize he’s falling into me, too.

  And our baby? Our baby is right there, witness to it all, a new presence we invite into the sanctity of our love.

  “How do you do this to me, Shannon?” he says, his warm grip on my hand so soothing. “How do you reach inside me and find new places I don’t have on my internal map?”

  “You do it to me, too, Declan. You’re the expert.”

  “I’m an amateur compared to you.”

  I rest my head against his shoulder, breathing slowly, my body unprepared for the adrenaline rush of the moment. A slow, steady warmth fills me as Dec uses one hand to grip mine, the other petting Chuckles.

  My free hand moves to cup my belly, tears rolling down my face, dotting the tops of breasts that will soon feed the life I’m growing inside me.

  “I’m pretty sure we’re both beginners compared to this one,” I whisper.

  His eyes move to my hand. Declan makes a sound of love, deep and emotional, then covers my hand with his own, heavy and thankful.

  He presses a kiss against my cheek, and then:

  Bam! Bam! Bam!

  “Shannon? It’s Mom.” Does she do that with a sledgehammer?

  “No kidding,” Dec mutters.

  “Are you okay? Morning sickness is a real bitch, honey. I had it for thirty weeks with Carol.”

  Declan leaps to his feet. “I’ve got this, Marie,” he says as I reel. Thirty weeks? Thirty weeks? That can’t be right. There is no way I can last eighteen more weeks like this.

  “Declan?” She sounds shocked. “Are you in there, too?”

  “No, Mom, I’ve developed remarkable ventriloquist skills,” I snap.

  “You’re very good at it, honey! You should go on America’s Got Talent and do that! You could be a pro.”

  Declan’s eyes hit the ceiling.

  “Go away, Marie,” he says.

  “Ha ha! Shannon, you sound just like him!” Is she clapping?

  “Thirty weeks?” I whisper.

  “Ignore her.” He hugs me. “You’re at twelve weeks. I’m sure you’ll be like Carol.”

  “One more week?” I ask, letting myself hope.

  “Can you make it?”

  “I can’t do eighteen more. I just can’t.” The words instantly fill me with guilt. “I mean, I will. If I have no choice.”

  “The midwife said she could prescribe medication. Maybe it’s time to go that route?”

  My miserable headshake isn’t the first one. We’ve had this conversation before. “If I get to thirteen weeks without relief, I’ll consider it. I’m functional. Just sick all the time.”

  “Your quality of life matters, too.”

  “If that were true, we wouldn’t be hiding in a bathroom from my mother.”

  “Marie?” says a deep voice from the other side of the door. “I assume you have another bathroom in this house. The one down here has a conversation going on inside it, and unless it’s a multi-stall, I have no desire to join an orgy in a private home.”

  “Is that my dad?” Declan chokes out.

  “Sounds like it. Except for the joke at the end. James doesn’t.... joke.”

  “He does if he has enough alcohol in him.”

  I start to stand.

  “What are you doing?” Dec asks, as I hear Mom give James directions to the upstairs bathroom.

  “I’m getting up,” I tell him. “We have to face them.”

  Declan grabs my father’s copy of 1,001 Bathroom Jokes and starts reading. “No. No, we don’t. This bath mat is surprisingly comfortable. Better than that old recliner in the living room.”

  “We can’t hide in the bathroom forever!” I chide.

  “Says who? We make up our own rules. My life is my own,” he deadpans. “Besides, I need to catch up on my dumb-blonde jokes.”

  “Because you married one?”

  “You’re anything but dumb, Shannon.” He squints. “And not very blonde.” Chuckles looks up.

  I sigh. “Mom must have invited your dad over for dinner. I wonder why he’s so late.”

  “Because your mother invited him over for dinner.”

  “Huh?”

  “Dad’s here for dessert and drinks. Mostly drinks.”

  “He’s never shown up before.”

  Declan drops the book. “You’re right. Which means there’s a reason why he’s decided to show up.”

  “Is it because of the baby?”

  “That’s the only new aspect to this situation.”

  “He can see us anytime he wants. Why come all the way out to Mendon?
”

  “You really don’t understand men, do you?”

  “Explain.”

  “Dad is here to show off.”

  “Show off what?”

  “His status as the alpha grandfather. He’s claiming his role in the hierarchy.”

  “You are joking.”

  “Not joking.”

  “This is a thing?”

  “With him, yes.”

  “Are you sure?”

  “No. But it’s my educated guess.”

  “Educated? How? You’ve never given him a grandchild before.”

  “I haven’t. But I’ve seen him do this in other areas. Coaches, Boy Scout leaders, house masters...”

  “That’s toxic masculinity, right there.”

  “Dad would call it ‘good business’.”

  “Do you think it is?”

  A melancholy twitch pulls his mouth up on one side. “No. But that’s my dad.”

  “He’s about as different from my dad as you can get.”

  “We have two pendulums that swing in wildly different directions as role models for how to be a father.”

  “You’ve been thinking about that a lot, haven’t you?”

  “You’re thinking about motherhood, right?”

  “Constantly. I just never thought about you doing it, too. In your own way.”

  “Why wouldn’t I?”

  “You don’t talk about it.”

  “That’s because it scares the shit out of me.”

  “It does? Being a dad scares you?” A disconcerting twinge shoots up my spine.

  “Absolutely. Look at who I grew up with. I don’t want to be the same kind of father to our kids.”

  “Look at my mother! You think I want to be like her?” I crack.

  We shudder in mutual sympathy.

  “Looks like we have to make it up as we go along,” he says, nodding his head slowly. “Like everything else in life.”

  “Our business. Our relationship. All of it–we invent it, don’t we? Events and feelings unfold and we make snap decisions every day, shaping our world,” I say.

  “Right. We’ll have to do the same with this baby.” His hand is so warm on my belly. “You’re getting bigger.”

  “I am?” My waistbands have all gone super tight, but I don’t feel ready for maternity clothes. Buttons are an issue, but Carol told me about these waistband extenders that give you an extra inch or two, so you don’t have to actually put the button through the buttonhole. I don’t feel pregnant–I feel fat. The nausea and exhaustion are the only signs I’m pregnant, but I know in the next few weeks that will all change, too.

  “I can feel it. This stretch of skin,” he says, rubbing sensually. “It’s harder. Firmer. As your womb grows, the placenta’s almost done, and the baby is almost the size of a lime.”

  What a surprise. “You know that?”

  “I’ve been reading some pregnancy books.”

  “Dec.” I melt, touching his cheek. “I had no idea.”

  “It’s what a good future father does, right?” He gives a humble shrug. If Grace were still his assistant, I’d be on to him. Declan McCormick doesn’t randomly go around reading pregnancy and childbirth books. Even as an expectant father.

  But there is no Grace now, so he must have done it on his own.

  I lean against him, too tired for a kiss, too bereft to pull away. “I love you.”

  “I love you, too, Shannon.”

  We stare at the back of the door. “We have to go out there, don’t we?” I finally say.

  “Yes.”

  “I thought we could make up our own rules?”

  “I left the car keys on your parents’ buffet table.”

  “Oh, Dec.”

  “Never said I was perfect.”

  I take his hand as he offers it to me, helping me up. My eyes go deep into his, making me relax.

  “No. You’re not. Thank God.”

  * * *

  Declan

  * * *

  “DOWN DOGGIE!” Tyler screams, as we exit the bathroom to find our nephew standing on a dining room chair, screaming at a cotton ball with legs and a wagging tail.

  “Chuffy! Chuffy!” Marie says, picking up the little four-pound puppy. “Tyler, honey, he was being friendly.”

  “Don’t want dog friends!” Tyler snaps, glaring at Marie.

  Chuckles came out of the bathroom on our heels, but at the sight of the puppy, his back arches, fur standing up. In a street fight, Chuckles could take Chuffy out with one well-timed claw scratch.

  And Marie knows it.

  “There you two are! James is here. He came for drinks and dessert, and he said he has important news to talk about with the family. We have wine and cake out here.”

  “That better not be entheogenic wine,” I mutter.

  “What?”

  “Nothing.”

  Shannon elbows me. “Play nice.”

  “My father is here with your mother, both in the same room. That’s impossible.”

  “Then fake it.”

  I plaster on a smile.

  “You look like Christian Bale in American Psycho.”

  “Then my outsides match my insides.”

  At the table we find Carol and Jeffrey digging into big pieces of lemon cake, Jason pouring Dad a few fingers of something amber, Tyler standing on the chair, watching Chuffy like a security guard looking for shoplifters among a group of teens, and Marie buzzing about as hostess.

  “James! What’s your news?” Jason asks, cracking open the top of Pandora’s box and peeking in.

  “I’ve secured a spot at Milton for the baby.”

  “What?” I just blink at him.

  “Of course, you could have done it, but I know how busy you are with your new little company.”

  From any other mouth, that would be a benign sentence, but my father managed to slip three different emotional hand grenades into it. If brevity is the soul of wit, it’s also the death of ego when James McCormick starts lobbing condescending one-liners.

  “I’m an alum, Dad. It’s a given.” Grenade tossed back. I’m an alum. Not my father.

  “You’re so consumed as you get your company off the ground. I’m sure it never occurred to you, and these institutions do have timelines. Plus, money talks.” A smirk tossed Marie’s way goes right over her head, but Jason notices.

  Jason always notices.

  “Alums don’t have to give notice, Dad. There’s a completely different set of standards for us. Besides, times have changed. Admission isn’t a guarantee anymore.” Shannon squeezes my hand questioningly. What are you doing? that hard pressure asks.

  I don’t know, I squeeze back. But I’ll be damned if I’ll let him win.

  “At any rate, it’s set. Your son has a spot in the Milton class.”

  “If we decide to send him or her there,” Shannon interrupts, “that is reassuring.”

  “If,” Dad chuckles. “Aren’t you cute? Of course you’ll send him there.”

  “Why do you assume the baby is a he?” Jason asks casually, starting a new beer. His eyes catch mine. Wordlessly, he reaches into a small bucket and hands me a wet one, popping the top in a gesture that isn’t kindness.

  It’s mercy.

  “I suppose it’s human nature,” Dad says grandly.

  “You’re human?” I mutter. An elbow in the ribs from my wife is what I get in return.

  “I have three sons. So to me, babies are boys.”

  “Isn’t that funny? We have three girls so I’ve gotten used to thinking of them as girls until born,” Jason responds, leaning against the dining table, giving Dad an evaluative look.

  “We’ll see who is right,” Dad declares, holding up a now-empty glass.

  Marie pours him more of something from a bottle. I can’t see the label. “All I care is that the baby is healthy,” she says. It’s a rare person who can make Marie one of the more reasonable people in a room, but Dad manages it handily.

  “How a
re you feeling?” he asks Shannon, the shift to compassion likely calibrated to the time frame for the alcohol hitting his bloodstream. But his eyes are kind as she answers, and I let my guard down just enough to want to believe that he cares.

  “Still sick, but hopeful it’s ending soon.” I slip my arm around her waist and find the ratio is off. You spend long enough touching someone on a daily basis and their body becomes a terrain you know with closed eyes, the way they feel a series of physical expectations that are met so consistently, they become ritual. As the baby grows inside her, Shannon’s body is starting to change. My fingers don’t quite rest along her hip where they used to. The span of ribcage I normally brush my thumb against isn’t quite there. Amazement shoots through me, brushing aside the petty irritation of my father’s oneupmanship like a broom sweeping out debris.

  The baby is reconfiguring her body.

  Just as it will soon restructure our entire life.

  Tyler squeezes past me, eyes on the cake and the dog, jumping wildly between the two, clearly sizing up the risk versus benefit of going to the table and getting a treat. The pull of the cake is stronger than the push of the dog, which makes sense for an eight-year-old boy with a sweet tooth.

  Dad answers Shannon with a smile, then turns to Jason and makes small talk, the cadence of their conversation less stilted than I would expect. Just like that, my father is there, mixing with my wife’s family, and I realize we’ve done it.

  We’ve blended these families by mixing their blood inside Shannon’s body, producing a newly minted person who will forever be a forging of two disparate worlds. Marrying Shannon accomplished some of that, yes, but Dad wouldn’t be here if it weren’t for the baby. Marie, by her own admission, has invited him countless times before. And sure, he’s only here to establish dominance, but he’s here. And now Jason is talking about cryptocurrencies and Dad is telling him they’re the twenty-first-century equivalent of the tulip madness of seventeenth-century Holland, while Tyler goes to town on lemon cake, and it’s all because of this.

  My hand moves to Shannon’s belly, proprietary, protective.

  This.

  “So,” Jeffrey says sharply from my side, suddenly there, making me look down with a surprised glare I quickly wash off my face. “I have a question.”