You are eight months pregnant, panting on a treadmill at the New York Sports Club on East 76th Street. Despite some difficulty breathing, there’s a smile on your face. Because you just found out. It’s a girl.
Drew wanted the baby’s sex to be a surprise. You wanted to find out with a blood test at eleven weeks. Since the pregnancy was most definitely not a surprise—two rounds of IVF—and because you want Drew to keep thinking you’re accommodating and kind, you let him have his way. But at your appointment this morning—somewhere between the unnecessary reminder that you’re forty-five years old and the insinuation that your pregnancy is but a countdown to release this miracle from your ancient womb—the OB let it slip. “Just two weeks till she’s full term.” So now you know. Jostling with you on this salt-stained treadmill is your daughter. Your best friend for life.
You’re half-watching the row of TV screens on the wall when a little girl’s face appears on two of them. A tug of familiarity and your smile is gone. You’ve seen these freckled cheeks and crooked bangs before. You scan the headline and realize you’re just remembering the photo from last summer. This is an update. A suspect is in custody.
You weren’t pregnant when Madison Relihan was kidnapped and murdered. It was a disturbing story. But you went about your life. Now, your breathing becomes so ragged you have to step off the treadmill. You sit at the shoulder press machine and place your unsteady hands on your firm belly. You manage to wait until you’re in the shower to cry.
The hall light is on when you get home and Drew is clanking dishes in the kitchen. He’s lived here for a year but it’s still surprising to find him in your space. You step into your spare and neutral living room, all clean lines and sturdy fabrics, and the air tastes thick and rotten. You spin into the bathroom and dry heave over the vessel sink.
Drew hears you gagging and comes to check on you.
“What are you cooking?” you ask.
“Baked cod,” he says.
“Open a fucking window,” you say.
He opens all four of the windows in the apartment and brings you a glass of water.
You could have said that nicely. But you also could have called him a moron for cooking fish when he knows your nausea has returned. So it’s probably a wash. Drew has a high tolerance for what Anthony referred to as your tone. Probably because Drew teaches middle school and is more accustomed to snark than most people. Still, you worry you’ll wear him down eventually, like you did Anthony. You’re trying so hard not to. Drew has only heard you yell five or six times, and you haven’t called him a single name out loud.
You want to act as grateful for Drew as you are. You’d nearly given up. You’d begun to accept that your career and travel might have to fill the space where you’d always wanted a family to be. But then the impossible happened. In your mid-forties, with a waning supply of viable eggs, you met a decent-looking, employed, single man in Manhattan who was on board with having a kid, right away, with you. This was all enough to overlook his finances. Drew is a social studies teacher with two master’s degrees and debt that’s outrageous even for a millennial, which he technically is. Fortunately, your recent promotion to Managing Director came with a big raise.