Dirty Red (Love Me With Lies)(22)

“Why would he marry a girl like you?”

At first, I think I hear him wrong. Surely not … he couldn’t have said what I think he did. He's the help — a lowly manny. But, when he looks at me expectantly, waiting for an answer, my eye begins to twitch — an embarrassing reaction. I feel heavy under my rage. Like I can lift it from my shoulders where it landed and throw it at him.

So rude! So inappropriate!

I briefly consider firing him, and then I see milk erupt from Estella’s mouth and run down the back of his shirt. I scrunch up my nose. Better him than me. I turn on my heel and charge up the stairs, as if motherhood herself is chasing me.

When I shut my bedroom door, the first thing I think about is sex. I have the urge to rip someone’s clothes off — someone being Caleb, of course. When I was seventeen, my therapist told me that I use sex to validate myself. I promptly had sex with him.

The second thing that enters my mind is the box of Virginia Slims I keep stashed in my lingerie drawer. I go there now and run my hand across the wood paneling at the back. It is still there, half full. I pull a lighter out of an arrangement of silk flowers and head for the balcony that sits off my bedroom. I have not had a cigarette since my sixth month of pregnancy, when I sneaked one after a particularly stressful night at my in-laws house. I light up while replaying Sam’s grody comments in my mind. I would have to talk to Caleb. Obviously, Sam could not continue to work for us after saying such terrible, degrading things to me.

I wonder what he meant by “a girl like you”? People had used that line on me many times in my life, but it was usually to deliver a compliment or to grease the prospects of my bright future. A girl like you can go far in the world of modeling. A girl like you can be anything she wants. A girl like you can have any guy she wants.

Sam had said it differently. There was no compliment, just … why would he marry a girl like you?

I suck on my cigarette, relishing the comfort it brings. Why did I ever give these things up? Oh yeah — because I wanted to have a damn baby. I stub out what’s left of it on the stone edging of the balcony and toss it expertly into some bushes on the ground level. Caleb cannot stand the smell of cigarette smoke; in fact, it was his one and only complaint about me when we were dating. He begged, pleaded and went on sex strike to get me to stop smoking, but in the end it took getting pregnant for me to kick the habit. I was going to have to shower if I didn’t want to get busted. I'm already in enough trouble. I strip down to my bra and panties and head toward the bathroom, when I see Sam appear in the garden with Estella. He's wheeling her in her carriage — a three thousand dollar purchase I have yet to even touch. I watch him with narrowed eyes, trailing him as he winds along the garden path, wondering if he saw me smoking. It doesn’t matter, I decide. By the end of the day, he will be gone for good.

“Your days are numbered, buddy,” I say tersely, before closing the bathroom door.

Caleb comes home after Sam is already gone, which has both foiled my plans and left me alone with the baby. I am chewing on celery, when he walks in the door carrying take-out.

He drops the bag on the kitchen counter and goes straight upstairs to check on the baby. I ignore them, and dig around in the bag to see what he’s brought me. When he comes back down, he’s holding her.

“Wha—? Why did you wake her up?”

I was hoping to spend some time with him without her butting in.

He sighs, opens the fridge. “She’s a newborn. She eats every three hours, Leah. She was awake.”

I glance at the baby monitor and remember that I turned it off to take a nap. I must have forgotten to put it back on. I wonder how long she’s been awake.

“Oh.”

I watch as he puts the cold breast milk into the bottle warmer. I can count on one hand the times I’ve fed her. So far, either Caleb or Sam has done her feedings.

“She’s six weeks old today,” I say. I’d been counting down the days until I could sleep with him again. I almost hadn’t made it to the six-week mark when he came back from his run the week before. He is at his best when he’s sweaty.

The food in the bag is making my mouth water. I start eating without him. He brought chicken masala from my favorite little place. We eat from there so often I have the calories all worked out. If I eat one full chicken breast, five mushrooms and scrape off most of the sauce, I can get away with two hundred calories. I have to force myself to stop eating. I want the last piece of chicken, but if I’m trying to lose the baby weight…

He still hasn’t looked at me.

“Thank you for dinner,” I say. “My favorite.”

He nods.

“Are you just never going to talk to me again?”

“I haven’t forgiven you.”

I sigh. “Really? I hadn’t noticed.”

His lips pinch together. I hop off my barstool and make a brave move. He raises his eyebrows as I gently take the baby from his arms and lay her across my forearm as I’ve seen Sam do.

“She burps quicker this way,” I tell him, imitating Sam’s movements. The baby plays along brilliantly, burping loudly seconds after I do the little pat-pat. I relocate her to the crook of my arm and reach for the rest of her bottle. Caleb watches it all without uttering a word.

I smile at him sweetly.

Come on, you bastard. Forgive me.