Total pages in book: 97
Estimated words: 92136 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 461(@200wpm)___ 369(@250wpm)___ 307(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 92136 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 461(@200wpm)___ 369(@250wpm)___ 307(@300wpm)
“Sort of. Where on earth are you?”
“I’m at home.”
“Well, what’s all that noise? Is your television on? Can you turn it off? I’m having trouble hearing you.”
“It’s not my television. It’s a baby, and I can’t turn it off. Sorry, I wish I could.”
She was silent a moment. “Did you say a baby? What’s a baby doing at your apartment? Whose baby?”
I took a deep breath. “It’s my baby, Mom.”
More silence on my mother’s end. I imagined her taking the phone away from her ear to stare at it.
“I’m sorry, what?”
I spoke loud and clear. “I said, it’s my baby.”
“You have a baby?”
“Yes. She’s eight weeks old, and her name is Paisley.”
“Eight weeks old? I don’t understand. You’ve had a baby for eight weeks and you’re only telling me about it now? Oh my God. Oh my God, I have to sit down. I feel faint.”
Stay calm. “No, Mom. She’s eight weeks old, but I just found out about her two days ago.” I waited for a reply, but didn’t hear anything for a minute, and then there was the telltale crackle of a brown paper bag as she breathed in and out of it. “Mom? Are you okay?” More crackling. “Look, I know this is a shock. It was for me, too. I promise, I had no idea she even existed.”
The crackling paused. “How is that possible? You didn’t know you…got someone pregnant?”
“No, I didn’t.”
“I don’t understand. Was it your girlfriend or something? Why wouldn’t she tell you?”
“It wasn’t my girlfriend. I don’t have a girlfriend.”
“Who on earth was it?”
“Just someone I know.”
“Well, what’s her name, for God’s sake?”
“Rachel.”
“Rachel what?”
I winced. I really needed to find out her last name. “I don’t know.”
“Merciful Jesus, Nate! Is she a prostitute?” More crackling.
“No! Jesus, Mom. She was just a woman I knew, okay? Let’s leave it at that.”
“So where is this woman now?”
“I don’t know that, either. She left the baby with me and said she needed some time away.”
“So how do you know it’s even yours?”
Even though I knew the question was fair, and I’d had it too, it made me angry. “Because I do, all right? She’s mine, and I’m keeping her.”
She started up with the wheezing and the paper bag again, and I gave her a minute to calm down. My mother was the kind of person who could make a mountain out of a molehill, and I’d just put her at the foot of Everest.
“Mom? You there?” Paisley had accepted the pacifier and was finally quiet—for now, anyway—and the crackling noise had stopped.
“Yes. I’m here.”
“Would you like to meet Paisley? I could drive up this week. I took some time off from work.”
“Oh, dear. Oh, dear, I don’t know what to say.” Her voice was nervous and timid, like I’d asked her if she’d like to meet the Queen of England instead of her granddaughter.
“Say yes. She’s really cute, and I’ll bring her in the early part of the day, so she’s not so fussy. Evenings are when she’s at her worst.”
“You were, too,” she said, surprising me.
“I was?” We didn’t talk about the past in my family.
“Yes. You’d cry and cry, no matter what Daddy and I did to soothe you. And we tried everything—cereal in your bottle, gripe water, whiskey on your gums.”
“Whiskey? You tried to get me drunk so I’d pass out and stop crying?” I joked.
She laughed, a thing so rare I’d nearly forgotten what it sounded like. It made my throat tighten a little. “It was only a drop, I promise,” she said. “But that’s how things were back then.”
“No wonder I developed a taste for a good bottle of rye.” I looked down at Paisley and tried to imagine a parent thinking it was okay—and a great idea!—to rub booze on her gums. “But I think I’ll skip the whiskey for now. She seems to like the pacifier, and she loves to be rocked to sleep.”
“It’s been a long time since I’ve held a baby,” she said quietly. “I always thought I’d have grandchildren, but things turned out so differently than I’d planned.”
“I know, Mom. Believe me. I know.”
By the time we hung up, there was a tentative plan in place for me to drive up to Grand Rapids with Paisley next Saturday morning, depending on how my mother was feeling. I would give her a call that morning, and if she was up for a visit, we’d go.
I was tempted to call Emme and let her know how the conversation with my mother had gone, but she was probably eating dinner by now. I didn’t want to bother her. But part of me couldn’t stop thinking about inviting her over to spend the evening hanging out with me, eating spaghetti and meatballs, maybe watching a movie after we got Paisley to bed. It was torture. After a while, I swore the aroma from the sauce was drifting from her kitchen across the hall into my apartment. Paisley was fussy and wouldn’t stop. I was hungry and lonely and wondering what the fuck had happened to my charmed life when there was a knock on the door.