He looks at me so long that I squirm, and he presses lightly on my stomach. “Let me look. You’re amazing, Alice.” His thumb touches my belly ring.
His lashes lift and he studies my face again. “What’s wrong?”
“I’m . . . I . . . I need to know what you’re thinking.” My own thoughts are scattered—firing off rapidly all over the place. The look in his eyes, the feel of him solid against me, the scrape of his voice, husky.
“I didn’t think I’d be here. Have this . . . you. How did this actually happen? And . . . and . . . how beautiful you are. Mostly the last one.”
I prop myself up on one elbow, yanking at my tank, which snags on my earring.
“Yow!” I clap a hand to my ear.
Suddenly exuberant, moving fast, he detangles the snag, tosses my top somewhere, kisses my ear, which tickles. I’m exposed, open to the cool air, to him, and he’s still dressed. I start giggling, part nerves, part excitement, part a jumble of things I have no experience with and no name for.
Reaching forward, I catch my finger in the waistband of his jeans, the back of my hand skimming the skin just above.
I put my other hand on his shoulder to steady myself.
We’re both shaking.
“Lights out? I vote no.” Another dip of his thumb into my belly button, then a teasing nudge, before he gets to his feet.
“Yes. Please.”
“As you wish, then. Stay there.”
Tim snaps the light off, but not before swearing, evidence he burned his thumb on the heated metal. Then rustling sounds of him closing the tent flap, then hunting around for the box of condoms. I sweep my hand out, locate them before he does, wing them at him. “Suit up.”
He chokes and starts laughing. “Suit up? Wha-at? So this is a professional sporting event?”
Now I’m too impatient even to be embarrassed. I laugh too.
“Forget I said that—just—hurry, okay?”
“Jesus, you’re bossy. Hang on.”
Sound of a zipper, Tim kicking away his jeans, more rustling.
“All right, I’m coming back. No ninja moves now either.”
“Hurry,” I say again as he falls down beside me, laughing so hard, I start laughing again too. Lips on my bare shoulder, then finding one breast, hand cupped beneath, bringing me closer—but only for an instant.
I hear myself make a sound in the back of my throat, unmistakable frustration.
“Hurry, huh? What’s your rush?”
“We want what we want when I want it,” I whisper.
“Ah, so you want something, Alice? A glass of water, maybe?”
His index finger glides down from my chin, down the center line of my body.
“Grape-Nuts?” His breath stirs the hair curled around my ear. His mouth shifts down again.
I jerk against him, feeling too fast too good.
“What is it you need? Ask me.”
“Being—able to—breathe—would be good.”
“Overrated.” His mouth travels back to mine. “Close your eyes. Just feel, okay?”
Twenty minutes, hours, weeks later, I drop my head to the pillow. “Wow.”
“I’ll say.” Tim touches his nose to mine. “The real thing, Alice? Don’t lie. I know anyway.” He sounds slightly triumphant, but that’s okay.
“I . . .” I take a deep breath, then can’t do more than exhale, overwhelmed. “That was . . .”
The real thing.
Wow.
TIM
Alice falls silent, and I am too. The hair at her temples, damp, sticks to her hot cheeks. Totally light-headed even though she was the one who . . . I’m almost afraid to exhale, shatter the spell, afraid even now that she’ll stand up and walk away and I’ll . . . I don’t know what I’d do.
What she does is laugh, almost without making a sound, because she’s totally winded. Her bare stomach shakes against mine—and for a bad second I’m afraid she’s crying, which would suck. But no, laughing. She lifts one long graceful arm, drapes it, boneless, over my waist. When she moves, it’s only to get closer.
I try to shift my hips away, give her room, time to recover, but my body is having none of that shit.
Neither is Alice.
Thank God.
ALICE
I’m pressing on both his shoulders, one knee against his thigh so he’ll move onto his back and then Tim’s grinning up at me, just as I realize my cheeks are hurting because I’m smiling so much, so hard.
“Tim?” My fingers trail over his chest, then the muscles of his legs, the developing lines of his abs, moving back to cup his jaw and kiss him speechless again.
“Mmmf.”
“Want to cross off another ‘I’ve never’?”
His hands are frozen in the air by my sides, hovering as though he can’t decide what to do next. “Yeah. This one.” An arm goes up to cover his eyes. Under my hands, tension ratchets up in his muscles. “I lo—”
“—ve you.”
“Alice! You didn’t let me finish saying it. And that was my first time.”
“Mine too. Sorry. You needed to know. Or I had to tell you. Tim, I—”
“Love you,” he says. “Let me say it. Geez.”
“Okay. If you—insist.”
“I absolutely do. This is me, insisting.”
He flips us and braces himself over me, on his elbows.
“I love you, Alice.”
“Prove it.”
“If you insist.”
TIM
Making love. I’ve cringed every time Hester used those words. So off and awkward and unrelated to what actually goes on between two bodies. You make breakfast, you make time, you make the team. Love? Not so much. But I get it now. Like making fire. Not rubbing two sticks together to pull something out of thin air. More like finally being able, knowing enough, to warm your hands at something you built, stick by stick.
Chapter Thirty-eight
ALICE
I’m whistling in the kitchen as I pour cereal for my brothers and Duff’s herd of nerds, Ricky McArthur, Jacob Cohen, Max Oliviera—the leftovers from last night’s sleepover.
Harry’s grouchy because they kept him awake most of the night. I was awake most of the night too, but I am definitely not grouchy. Joel, who came in bearing a huge box of donuts, a police cliché, smirks at me.
“What?”
“I dunno, Al. There are practically bluebirds and fluffy chicks fluttering around your head. Just enjoying the view.”
“Chicks don’t fly. Not even chickens fly,” George says through a mouthful of Gorilla Munch. “You’re silly, Joel.”
“I’m serious. It’s nice to see you so cheery. You look much less feral.”
“Shut up, Joel.” But I say it mildly, pouring myself coffee, and managing to ignore a barrage of fart jokes from Duff and company, Patsy’s outraged screech because Harry’s grabbed her sippy cup and is holding it just out of her reach, and George’s lengthy explanation of the difference between feral and just plain wild.
“Rainbows, unicorns, kittens,” Joel continues, chuckling even more. “Awww, Al.”
TIM
I’m with Hester at Breakfast Ahoy. The far table on the left is full of swim team guys from Hodges, who I only dimly recognize. They’re all carbo-loading like maniacs, shoving one another, laying stupid bets, arguing about who picks up the tab, dissing each other’s form and time and attitude at the last meet, hitting on the waitress, doing stupid shit. My team from four years ago—I’d have been right there with them. Now they’re like some tribe I’m observing from far, far away.
From everything, really. Any thoughts I have are back in the tent with Alice, breathing her in, watching her face. We never looked away from each other unless we had to close our eyes for a little.
“Uh . . . What?”
No idea how long Hester’s been talking.
“. . . why I didn’t bring Cal along. Figured it would be easier to focus. Geez, Tim.” Snap of fingers in my fa
ce. God, that’s annoying. “You’re not high, are you?”
“Nope. Focus on what?”
Hester scrabbles around in this tie-dyed backpack she brought, pulls out a sheaf of papers, shoves them toward me. “This is the consent form for termination of your paternal rights—it’s called relinquishment. All you have to do is sign right here.” She taps the line with an X, then drops the pen on the paper in front of me.
The pen’s dark brown, glossy, with copper trim and copper lettering stamped on it. I don’t need to look any closer to know how it reads: WINSLOW S. MASON, BRANCH MANAGER, STONY BAY BUILDING AND LOAN, STONY BAY, CT.
“You met with my pop.” No emotion in my voice at all. None in me anywhere, really. Guess I should be surprised, but I’m not. Big picture. “When?”
“Two days ago,” she says without hesitation. “He came by in the evening and talked to me and Waldo. I figured you’d told him to come, take over, move things along faster.”
My coma-calm recedes. “Did he order you around, Hes? Intimidate you?”
“No! He was friendly, really sure what to do.” She gives a little laugh. “Not like you and me, without a single firm opinion between us. Besides, you know Grand—his advice is a little murky. Everything sounds like a Japanese koan.” She smiles up at me and I find myself looking back, not sure what to do with my face. Pop, fuck, whatever. He does what he does. This is almost over. That’s what counts, right?
“This is all I have to do?” I click the pen, flip over the paper, and scribble a few circles to get the ink flowing.
“Yes. He had it all drawn up. All you need to do is sign it, then your father gets it presented to a judge, and once we find adoptive parents, we submit more paperwork and they approve it all as a ‘good cause’ termination. But you need to go first, because you aren’t on the birth certificate and it has to be obvious to the court that you’re surrendering all rights permanently.”
I’ve flipped the papers over. A waitress blows through the swinging door from the kitchen and it flaps a little, making a crackling noise like something going up in flames.
Click the pen closed. Open again. Closed. Scratch my neck.
Relinquishing.
Surrendering.
All of this over, all of it.
All of it?
My head hurts like a mother, and suddenly I’m spent. Exhausted.
The nights of no sleeping, the diapers of doom, the freak-out moments when I’m afraid he’s stopped breathing or that the car on the side street will keep going and T-bone mine directly into the baby’s side. Having to take the kid with me everywhere like a squirmy twelve-pound ball and chain.
The sweaty fingers clutching my shirt. The cries I can’t interpret.
Even the ones I can, when he stops in the middle of wailing and just stares at me—like he’s saying, That’s right, here’s what I was looking for. The way that one smile made him look like a completely different kid. Not just a baby. Like mine.
Once again, don’t tune in to Hester till she’s halfway through whatever she’s saying.
“. . . your father’s going to come by my house to pick it up so he can be sure to file it first thing in the morning. After that’s official, your job is basically done.”
“So this is my resignation notice? Or am I being fired?”
She laughs. “I never thought you’d show up for it the way you have. You’ve been . . . great. We do this, and then we have some interviews with prospective parents, choose, and get back to normal life. Chapter closed.” She flips her dark hair back from her face.
We aren’t ordering Chinese takeout here. “We don’t agree on anything, Hester. How are we going to pick his new parents together?”
Hester sighs. “In this case, we both have the same goal. And Waldo and your father will be there to mediate. Along with the adoption counselor, I guess. But your signing off is just a technicality, your father said. If the birth father does nothing, he automatically loses all rights when the adoption goes through. So you don’t even have to be involved, if you don’t want to.”
This again. “I wish everyone would stop acting like my being ‘involved’ was some sort of choice. I mean, I—he’s—I . . .” I push back my chair. “I need some air.” Bump into the doorjamb, like I’m loaded, head out on the Breakfast Ahoy deck. The air’s so thick with bacon grease and maple syrup that you could put it on a plate. There are seagulls diving and plunging around the Dumpster and the faint breeze from the river is sending up nothing but sludgy air. Brace my hands on the rail, but it’s still like I’m falling.
Get it over with.
All of it.
Slide back into my seat. Hester’s texting.
“Do you have any pictures of Cal on there?” I ask abruptly.
Her eyebrows lift. “No,” she says carefully. “Do you have any on your phone?”
Nope, as a matter of fact. But I’m not much for taking pictures. Still, there’s some point I’m making here, and I’m too slurry-headed to figure out exactly what it is. It has something to do with Cal’s impersonal sleeping arrangement at Hester’s house, something to do with the scratchy sock monkey with the chokeable beady eyes she gave him, something to do with how she scrubs up with antibacterial gel before she takes him from me and after she hands him back, like she’s going to operate immediately. Like I have cooties. Or Cal does. Something about this new thing he does where he opens and closes his hands when I come close, like he just can’t wait to grab on to me. How he yells “Bah!” when no one has paid attention to him for a while. Something to do with “chapter closed,” like he’s some old textbook from sophomore year that I never have to look at again.
But I can’t figure out what shape that kaleidoscope is supposed to click into.
Hester looks down at my hands. “What are you doing?”
I’ve taken the pen apart without even knowing I was doing it, and it’s on the table in front of me—the push button, the clip, the thrust tube, the ink cartridge, the spring, the ballpoint itself, all scattered in separate pieces like I’ve dissected the thing for science class.
“Now how are you going to sign this?” She’s half laughing, but exasperated, rooting in the diaper bag again.
“I’m not.”
“Here’s one.” She waves another bank pen triumphantly. Then her hand freezes. “What?”
“Look . . . look, can’t we do the open thing, adoption-wise? The one where the parents send you updates and pictures and shit? I mean, why not, that way we can just, you know, check up on him, whatever. Make sure it all works out?”
“No. I don’t want that. Let’s just let him go. Completely.”
“No,” I say.
What?
“What?”
“No.” A little voice in my head is screaming at me to shut up, waving me away from my next words like they’re a pileup on Route 95. “I’m not doing it. I—”
Nearly every time words I can’t stop have changed my life, it’s been because I was being an immature, insufferable ass. Not this time. “He’s mine, Hester. I’m not letting him go.”
“You can’t be serious.”
“I can be.” I swallow. “I am.”
Do I mean that?
Yes.
I bend over the table, holding on to the edge, breathing like I’ve been sucker-punched. Like Alice.
Jesus, Alice. What’s she going to think if I—
“Tim?” Hester’s voice floats in my head, distant. “What’s going on?”
Okay, deep breaths. In. Out.
If I take Cal, if I have Cal, that’s it for being seventeen. I will have to man up, be there, put myself second, take care of business, day care and school and, hell, I don’t even know . . . for years and years and years. Till I’m, like, old. Thirty-six or more. God.
“Tim. Think. That’s crazy. You’re in no position to take on a baby. You’re living above a garage.”
Of all the reasons why I’m in no position to deal with a baby, this has gott
a be one of the less important.
“Your point?” I snap, lungs suddenly functional. “You’re the one who’s always calling me to come get him, or take him for the night because you just can’t deal.”
“And I admit it. I don’t want this. Him. Besides, sounds like you kind of resent me for all this responsibility,” Hester bites out, “so I wonder why you’d want more of it.”
She waves her hands. Our waitress mistakes this for a signal to pour more coffee. Hester waits until the cup is full and the waitress has retreated.
“You can’t be serious about this. Calvin isn’t even four months old! How are you going to take care of an infant? You’re a high school dropout.”
“I did not drop out. I got kicked out.” Like it’s so much better. “I don’t know how I’ll take care of him. I guess the same way I’ve been trying to since you showed up on my doorstep.”
The waitress returns and sets down Hester’s wheat toast and my scrambled eggs and home fries. Hester continues to stare incredulously at me before finally continuing. “You’re crazy, Tim. Selfish. Cal could go to a family, a real family, with—parents who love each other and . . . and things . . . and security and good schools and . . . everything that matters. And you think he’d be better off with his seventeen-year-old dad who lives above a garage.”
“Will you quit it with the frickin’ garage? Don’t try to make it out like I’m some blue-collar townie boy who got you pregnant, as if that even matters. But we were both at prep school when we did the deed, don’t forget.”
She glares. “I haven’t forgotten a thing. What I’m saying is that Cal shouldn’t suffer because he was a stupid mistake. I have plans.”
“You planned every bit of this. I didn’t plan a thing.”
“Exactly,” she says, pointing her butter knife at me. “Which doesn’t give me much confidence in your ability to be a father. Not to mention the whole ‘you’re an alcoholic’ thing.”
“Recovering. Recovering alcoholic, Hester. And I already am a father.”
I have, for once, no appetite, and watching Hester butter her toast pisses me off. She puts butter on one corner, takes a bite, puts it on another spot, takes another bite. Who eats like that? It’s like she can’t commit to an entire piece of toast. The waitress, who evidently finds angry, recovering alcoholic teenage fathers of illegitimate babies who live above garages a turn-on, squeezes my shoulder as she refills my coffee cup.