Eliza Starts a Rumor(55)
Alison counted four, but agreed with him, as the truth would make it an even boy-girl ratio and probably stress him out even more. His daughter was lucky to have such a caring dad. Alison knew that not having a father had directed the course of her life in many ways. Her mother had drilled it into her to never depend on a man. “A man is not a financial plan,” she would chant. She ended every Cinderella story with her own kicker: “And the moral of the story is—buy your own shoes!”
“I never knew my dad,” Alison found herself admitting to Jack, quite uncharacteristically. “Jana is so lucky to have you,” she added, turning the attention back to him.
“I never knew mine either,” he responded, taking it. “He had a heart attack when I was four. I look just like him though, which makes me feel good. You know, walking through life, trying to do right by him.”
Alison thought about the difference between losing a father and having one that didn’t want you. She hated to think of Zachary having those thoughts.
The kids got together and posed for a selfie, all pursing their lips or sticking out their tongues, grabbing back Jack’s attention.
“Watch this.” He texted Jana:
Having fun?
They watched as she looked at her phone and put it back in her pocket.
“Remember how we had selective hearing with our parents? This generation has selective texting. She won’t answer me for hours, if at all. And if she does she’ll say, ‘Sorry, just saw this.’ The only way to get her to respond quickly is to just write her name. Jana. It totally freaks her out, as if she has been caught doing something wrong but has no idea what it is. I save that for special occasions, when I really need her to respond.”
The whole exchange frightened Alison. She was not looking forward to Zach’s teenage years. She patted Jack’s hand in sympathy. “Don’t worry. They look like nice kids.”
It was good to hear someone else’s perspective. He rested his hand on hers. “Thanks.”
It felt so nice to touch her that he didn’t let go for the rest of the ride. He wanted to kiss her, but he knew he had to first tell her the truth. The close quarters of a moving horse-and-buggy ride seemed like the wrong setting to do so.
Alison felt the intimacy as well. Even with her baby on her lap, the scene seemed ripe for a kiss. The feeling of her hand in his left her wanting more. She couldn’t remember ever waiting so long for a first kiss. It felt weirdly purposeful and certainly added to her desire.
After exiting the carriage, Alison transferred Zach to his stroller, and as the name suggested, they strolled. They checked out the craft area where Alison bought a funky bird feeder (that’s literally what it was called) and Jackie bought a cute change purse for Jana that said “Taco Money” on it.
“It’s her favorite food group!” he said, thrilled to have found something she would love.
They sat down for lunch on the porch of a café where they ate Cobb salads and shared an order of truffle fries and a bottle of Sauvignon Blanc. They never stopped talking.
“Do you like it here?” he asked.
“I do. I’ve never been happier. Though, this may be the first time in my life that I’ve stopped long enough to consider whether I’m happy or not.”
“Then how would you even know?”
“I know. I’m not thinking about my next appointment, or my depo tomorrow, or my trial next week. I’m just here. My mind is here. Maybe I’m thinking about throwing in a load of laundry when the baby naps, but that’s it.”
“And you’re not bored?”
“I’m not. When I was in the city the other day, I definitely enjoyed the whole buzz of it, but I felt good when I got home. I feel more present and contented here.”
She talked about being a latchkey kid in Queens, and he about his childhood upstate. They bonded over their strong single mothers and their liberal arts educations, his Hamilton, hers Wesleyan. They both gave so much credit to their moms for their success in life. Jackie spoke with pride of his mother starting a small business to support them after his father passed, and Alison beamed when speaking about her mother’s job at the UN. It turned out that both of their moms had passed away within months of each other, and they opened up about the awful and permanent feeling of being motherless.
He, of course, thought of Jana and of his wife, as he often did when such a conversation came up. But to his surprise he found himself talking about it. He revealed the details of Ann’s death very matter-of-factly, without taking in the words that were coming out of his mouth.
“Everything was going fine, just as we had learned in Lamaze class. It was crazy and painful and intense and long, but as we expected. Ann was determined and strong, and she pushed Jana out in, maybe, six pushes. She held her for a few seconds and then said she was having trouble breathing, that she felt a tightness in her chest. They handed me the baby. I looked down at Jana’s beautiful little face in my arms; looked up at my wife, and she was gone. Just like that. She’d had a pulmonary embolism. A blood clot in her lungs.” His tone changed. “It’s the number one cause of death in childbirth. They don’t mention it in Lamaze. I had no idea.”
He paused a second or two for Alison to recover, and let her say, “I’m so sorry for all of you.”
He thanked her, and falsely added, “It was a long time ago,” as if he still didn’t feel like it had happened just yesterday. He changed the subject, asking Alison if she had bought a Halloween costume for the baby (she had, a peapod) and went right into his Halloween-with-a-teenage-daughter fears.