by M. E. Carter
Pushing through a door in the back, I enter what looks like a guest room and see a sliding glass door ahead of me. Through the glass, I see my wife sitting across from Santos. Immediately, my hackles rise. I put the can of Sprite down as I head toward the door. If he’s starting shit with her again, I want my hands free, so I can make good on my last threat.
Sliding the door open, they both look up at me.
“Everything okay out here, babe?”
“Fine,” Tiffany assures and reaches for me. Seeing the question in my eyes, she continues with, “Sorry. The smoke was getting to me.”
I nod once and gesture for her to move forward so I can sit behind her. Partially to be near her and partially to remind Santos that her place is with me. He’s not looking at us, but I’m not dumb enough to think he doesn’t see it.
“Babe, can I ask you a question?” Tiffany asks. I nod as I shift and get more comfortable. “How did you know I was done with this lifestyle? With the parties and stuff.”
The personal nature of her question surprises me. I’m not really sure how to answer, especially in front of present company.
“Um, I.. I don’t know,” I stutter.
She nudges me. “Come on. I promise I’m not being girly and emotional right now. I need your honest answer.”
I’m still not convinced but I don’t mind humoring her. Leaning my head back, I think about how best to answer. “Well, I guess it’s because we’d talked about being monogamous.”
“And you just trusted me?”
I cringe. This is one of those questions where I’m damned if I do and damned if I don’t. I might as well go for it. I suspect she’s trying to make a point about something so it’s best to run with it. Even if it backfires and I don’t get that reverse cowgirl later. “Well, not at first. But I guess the longer we were together and the more you proved good on your word, the more I trusted you.”
She turns to look at me. “Did you hear that, Santos?”
“I’m not sure what that has to do with me,” Santos grumbles.
What the hell kind of conversation did I walk in on?
“You and Mariana just got divorced. But that doesn’t mean your relationship is over. If you want to be a different guy, be it.”
He snorts humorlessly. “Thanks for the vote of confidence, but she doesn’t want anything to do with me.”
“That’s where you’re wrong.” Tiffany turns her entire body to face him. I don’t like losing the heat of her against me, but she’s on a roll right now. “She doesn’t want anything to do with the guy who cheated on her without a second thought. She doesn’t want anything to do with the pain that makes her feel. But if you are a different person, truly have that part of your life under control, there’s no reason you can’t get back together.”
I stare at her for a few seconds thinking about how amazing it is that not only does she not blame Santos for the shitty way he talks to her sometimes but is sitting here actually trying to help him. And then he ruins it by bursting out laughing.
“Are you kidding me right now?” he asks angrily, obviously missing her point. “Tiffany, we went to a huge conference where we did the most intense therapy you can do. And that wasn’t enough. I promised complete and total transparency and to never, ever fall off the wagon again. That wasn’t enough. It’s over and done with. She made that clear.”
“I don’t believe that,” she argues firmly.
“How? How can you not believe that? She said no. She went to court and finalized the divorce.”
“Because my cousin remarried her cheating husband.”
Santos freezes with his glass halfway to his mouth. Pretty sure I have the same stunned expression on my face. For as well as I know my wife, I guess I missed a few details.
“Really?” A twinge of hope crosses Santos’s face.
She nods. “Really. They were divorced for two years before he finally pulled his head out of his ass. He went through another year of therapy, proved he was a different man, a better man, and they got back together. They’ve been happily re-married for five years.”
We watch as Santos digests the information. I can almost see the lightbulb that has finally come on. The one that shows him he does have choices. He can change his path. There’s no telling if it’ll make a different in his now defunct marriage, but isn’t the point to better yourself before you can be your best for someone else?
“I see your point,” Santos finally says, making Tiffany smile.
“Good.” She pats me on the thigh. “Now if you’ll excuse us, this baby mama is getting really, really tired all the sudden.”
My eyes widen. We agreed not to tell anyone about the baby yet somehow Santos knows? “Babe!”
“He guessed.”
Santos chuckles. “Don’t worry. I’m not telling anyone. I’ve done this before, remember? That first trimester… phew… it’s exciting and terrifying all at once.”
“And exhausting and annoying,” Tiffany tacks on. She stands up and I humor her by letting her think pulling on my hands is helping me to my feet as well.
“Hey, Rookie,” Santos calls, using the nickname I haven’t answered to in over a year. I stop and looks at him, unsure where this conversation is about to go. “Congratulations, man. I’m happy for you.” He bumps fists with me and I feel a certain relief. Relief that someone else knows the best secret I’ve ever kept and is excited for me. And relief that maybe Santos is finally seeing the error of his ways and he’s going to stop being a dick. Maybe he can earn my respect back. With that thought, I extend an olive branch I know he’ll appreciate.
“Thanks, man. I just hope I’m as good of a dad as you are.”
Placing my hand on Tiffany’s lower back, we head back into the party.
“He and I still aren’t going to be friends, ya know?”
“I know,” Tiffany replies as we push our way through the crowd. “But we can still be kind to him when he’s hurting.”
Grabbing her, I pull her to me and kiss her deeply, not caring whose around. “You know how much I love you, right?”
She nods. “I do. Now get me out of her. I need to throw up before we get it on.”
My chin drops to my chest as she turns tail and races out to the bushes.
Pregnancy is not all it’s cracked up to be. Not that I was expecting it to be a cakewalk. But I’d looked up a few websites and every one of them said morning sickness usually tapers off at about ten weeks or so.
Lies. They all tell lies.
Here I sit at twelve weeks pregnant, and not only has the nausea not gone away, I swear I throw up more now than I did a few weeks ago. Even these gross hard ginger candies my mother-in-law told me about don’t work.
Disgusted at the thought of eating another one, I toss the offending candy back in my drawer and slam it shut just as Steve jumps out of his chair, arms raised victoriously.
“Woo hoo! Nailed it! Did you see that three-pointer?” he yells, eyes still glued to the monitor. “Nailed it!”
“Yep,” I answer nonchalantly, even though I want to call him out about this catchphrase he’s been overusing lately, but I don’t. He knows basketball is my least favorite sport of them all. Especially these days when watching players run up and down on the court, back and forth on the screen, over and over and over, makes me want to toss my cookies.
He drops his arms in defeat. “You don’t sound very excited. That was an impressive shot. He had two defenders on him.”
“You know basketball isn’t my jam.”
Steve roars with laughter. “You said jam. About basketball. Your puns crack me up.”
I smirk. I wasn’t trying to be funny, I don’t even get the joke, but if it keeps him entertained, I’m not going to pretend it was a mistake. As long as he’s distracted and happy, I don’t have to tell him what’s really going on.
For a while now, I have been avoiding sharing the news of what’s happening inside my body. Not because I don’t trust Steve. I do. He�
�s a phenomenal boss. But I’m still trying to keep this pregnancy under wraps until I’m out of the “danger zone.”
At least, that’s what I keep telling myself. While that’s part of the reason, the other part is selfish. I want to find out what happens with Steve’s job first. If he gets that position in New York, then his job will come open and I want it. Badly. Sports producer in a market this size by the ripe old age of twenty-four would be a giant step closer to my long-term dream of working for ESPN. But I’m not stupid. As much as the corporate world is starting to break open that glass ceiling, we all know it’s damn near impossible to get a job when you’re pregnant. No one wants to fill a position, only to have to refill it temporarily for maternity leave. It sucks, but I work in a male-dominated industry. I know how it works.
Getting back to my search of yesterday’s late-night game scores, I feel the tell-tale signs of nausea rolling in again.
“Um, I’ll be right back.” I race out of the room, thankful that Steve doesn’t look up. He never asks where I’m headed when I leave suddenly, and I’m grateful he never seems to pay attention enough to his surroundings to realize my bathrooms breaks have tripled recently.
This is also one of the times I’m glad the sports department is stuck upstairs. It’s us and three reporters whose desks don’t fit in the newsroom. That means the ladies restroom never has anyone in it except me.
After giving myself a few minutes to unload the oh-so-filling lunch I ate of crackers, I head back to my workstation. I guess I’ll be sucking on another one of those disgusting candies after all.
Steve still doesn’t seem to notice me coming back in, too busy writing up the story about the game he was just watching. So his next comment shocks the shit out of me.
“Are you ever going to tell me you’re pregnant, or are you just waiting for me to figure it out on my own?”
Swiveling around in my chair, I cock my head at him. “I’m sorry—what?”
Looking me dead in the eye, he continues. “You heard me.”
I open my mouth to respond, then close it. Denial won’t work. I guess he pays more attention to his surroundings than I thought.
“I was hoping you wouldn’t figure it out.”
He continues doing the hunt and peck on his keyboard, not at all offended by my lack of disclosure. “This ain’t my first rodeo with morning sickness, kid.”
I purse my lips, but he waves me off. If anyone else called me “kid” I might be offended, but Steve is just inappropriate like that.
“Meg upchucked all the time when she was pregnant. Morning, afternoon, night, middle of sex.” I grimace, but he doesn’t notice. “She was miserable.”
“You realize you just told me having sex with you made her throw up.”
He pauses momentarily then shrugs. “I’m sure she’s not the first to say that about me. Anyway”—I facepalm myself—“my point is you need to throw that nasty ass candy away and get a lemon.”
Furrowing my brow, I’m trying to figure out what he’s even talking about. “A lemon? Is this some weird reference to making lemonade or something stupid like that?”
“While that would have been a good one, no. This is about how sniffing a lemon cancels out all the other smells around you and calms the tummy. In fact…” He reaches into his drawer and rummages around for a few seconds. “Ah ha! Here it is. I brought you this.”
Handing me a lemon triumphantly, I can’t help but be touched by his gesture. Not only is he not upset I didn’t tell him about the pregnancy, he brought me something to feel better anyway. I might have a stray tear or two if I wasn’t too busy sniffing my new anti-nausea medication.
“I hope this works. Thank you so much.”
“Wait. Give it back.” He reaches his hands and wiggles his fingers like it’s of the utmost importance that he takes back his gift. So I comply. I have no idea what he has up his sleeve now.
Putting the lemon on his desk, he grabs his lunch fork and stabs the shit out of the fruit making me jump. “Here.” He hands it back to me. “You get more of the scent that way.”
Sure enough, as I hold it up to my nose and breath normally, my nausea fades away.
“Ohmygod, that’s so much better.”
“Nailed it.”
“What is it with you and that catchphrase?”
He shrugs. “It fits so many parts of my life.” I roll my eyes as he continues spouting off all his positive traits. “Including the fact that I’m a wealth of pregnancy information,” he boasts, going back to his work. “You should’ve been picking my brain all along.”
“It seems that way.”
“And don’t worry. When the horrific gas that smells like something is rotting inside you comes, I have remedies for that too.”
Shaking my head, I try not to laugh. “I’m gonna pretend you didn’t just say that.”
“Pretend all you want. Eventually you’ll let one rip during a staff meeting and be pissed at yourself for not taking me up on my offer.”
“Okay, I’m gonna just keep gathering these scores…”
He shrugs as I turn back to my monitor, keeping the lemon close by. Admittedly, I feel a little stupid. Part of my job is researching. Researching scores, background information on players, patterns of play for teams. And yet I couldn’t figure out how to look up remedies for morning sickness? I’m losing my touch.
Steve spends the next hour watching the game from last night I have no interest in. I already know who won thanks to the highlight reel I scoured hours ago. It took two minutes to find what we need for tonight instead of two hours. But while basketball may be my least favorite sport, it’s his most favorite. To each his own, I suppose.
Suddenly, Steve gets quiet. A little too quiet. He’s not silent. I still hear him moving around. But his normal outbursts and clicking of the keys aren’t there.
“Tiffany,” he practically growls, immediately putting me on edge.
Spinning around a little too quickly, I take a quick sniff of my lemon. When my stomach calms down, I look up at him. He’s just staring at me, mouth open, eyes wide.
“You’re scaring me. What’s wrong?”
He shakes his head, like he can’t believe what he’s about to say. “They want to interview me.”
Just like that, my own jaw drops open. “You mean—?”
He nods. “New York wants to interview me.”
My hands fly up to cover my mouth. Now my eyes are wide as well. “Are you kidding me?”
“Nope.” He stands slowly, annunciating each word as he goes up. “I. Have. An. Interview. In. NEW YORK!”
He throws his head back and bellows his excitement, and I join him with my own cheers of excitement. Good thing we get loud up here regularly. I’m sure no one downstairs is even flinching at our outburst.
“When? When do they want to see you?” I ask excitedly.
He leans over to read off what I presume is an email. “Uh, looks like next week. Think you can come in on Sunday night, just in case my plane runs late?”
“Hell, yeah,” I say without hesitation. “This is too important. Ohmygod, Steve, you’re being interviewed in the number one market in the country!”
He flops down on his chair and looks up at the ceiling. “I can’t believe it. I thought there wasn’t a shot in hell.”
“Of course there was.” He bats away the wadded-up piece of paper I throw at him. “You’re an amazing producer in a market that has almost every professional sport right here in town. I bet they were thrilled to get your résumé.”
He blows out a breath, still shaking his head in disbelief. “You know if I get it, you need to put in for this job, right?”
I shouldn’t be surprised by his words, but I am. It’s one thing to be told you’re good at your job. It’s another thing for your boss to come out and say he wants you to be his successor.
Feeling a little weepy after all the excitement, I barely croak out, “Yes.”
“Good.” He sits up strai
ght and raps his knuckles on his desk. “Because I don’t want this department going to shit. We need strong leadership and someone who knows what the hell they’re doing. That’s you.”
“While I appreciate your vote of confidence, you know you aren’t the deciding factor, right? Even if you do get the job in New York, and I have this feeling you will, there are no guarantees the bigwigs will want to move me up.”
“Don’t sell yourself short. They know what you can do.”
“Yeah, but they don’t know I’m pregnant yet,” I admit. “You know that might put a kink in it.”
Gotta love, Steve. His face immediately looks like I’ve said the dumbest thing ever. “You’re kidding, right?”
“Oh, come on. You know full well HR won’t want to mess with maternity leave paperwork.”
He gives me the once-over with his eyes, which is weird, but knowing Steve he probably thinks there is a point to it. “Seems to me you’re going to be filling out that paperwork one way or the other.”
“Is that why you just looked me up and down like a creeper?”
“I was trying to prove that you’re going to look pregnant either way. Get it now?”
“No.”
“Hmm. I missed the mark on that one.”
I drop my head in my hands. I can only hope whoever he interviews with finds his weird sense of humor as endearing as I do.
“My point is, glass ceiling or not, you already work here. It’s not like you would start and three months later take time off. It’s not a big deal.”
My eyebrows shoot up. “It is a big deal, Steve.”
“Well, yeah. It’s a baby and all that crap. But it’s not a big deal like you think. Remember last year when that picture came out?”
I bristle. The last thing I expected was for Steve to ever talk about that horrible time again. I know my face is flaming, and I’ve gone stiff.
“Stop looking like that,” he interjects. “I’ve still never looked at it, so whatever. I don’t care what you do on your off time, although please never speak to me of your sexual escapades.”
