Finding Center (14 page)

Aly

“Good morning, Alyona. You look fantastic. How are you feeling?”

“It’s funny because everyone’s asking me that question these days, but I’m so used to hearing it from you. I’m always tempted to tell them the truth, even though I know they’re asking about morning sickness.”

“What’s the truth?”

“Anxious all the time, not sleeping well.”

“Tell me more about your anxiety.”

“It’s my normal anxiety but I’m having a hard time separating it from excitement.”

“Do you think others’ expectations are creeping into your own feelings? Muddying the waters, so to speak?”

“Sure. Everyone expects me to be excited all the time, every day, with no moments to admit I have no idea what I’m doing.”

“Maybe that’s where the anxiety’s coming from.”

“Maybe.”

“So how are you?”

“Okay.”

“Okay.”

“Zed’s been busy lately.”

“Doing what?”

“I don’t know.”

“How do you know he’s busy?”

“Errands late at night. Not coming to the gym with me some mornings, but I don’t think he’s going right to school.”

“Have you asked him?”

“No.”

“Why not?”

“Because he’ll tell me when he’s ready to tell me.”

“You’re remarkably calm.”

“If I told one of my friends, they’d say that he’s cheating on me.”

“And you don’t think he is.”

“I know he isn’t. That wouldn’t even occur to Zed as something he could do. It’s just...it’s unlike him to be secretive. I’m normally the one who spaces out and goes to a different place. But lately he’s been doing it.”

“I think you should ask him.”

“I’ll wait.”

“Okay. Is Zed still pushing the marriage question?”

“We talked about it yesterday, actually. He said that it was putting into real words all the unspoken promises we make each other. But he said that we could take our time, that he didn’t want to rush anything I didn’t want to do.”

“And you’ve held your ground.”

“So far.”

“And how’s ballet going?”

“I’m dancing terribly. It takes me the whole company class to find a rhythm for rehearsal. It didn’t used to be like that. I know why Jonathan pulled me now, but that doesn’t make it any easier.”

“Do you think you’re being hard on yourself?”

“Am I ever not?”

“I imagine that if you were dancing as terribly as you think you are, Jonathan would pull you from the last ballet you’re in.”

“You’re giving him a lot of credit, but thank you.”

“I give people credit. That’s what I do, Alyona.”

“Well. Thank you.”

“And I think you do too. You’re giving Zed the benefit of the doubt.”

“I know. But it’s Zed.”

“It is.”

Zed

The next week, I get a text message from Cara, Aly’s mother, saying that Aly went to their house after therapy and had fallen asleep there. I text Cara back and tell her not to wake Aly, that I’d come over and do it. I can skip ballet for this. She barely slept at all last night, waking from night terrors I thought had faded with the threat of miscarriage. Now I’m blaming the stress of losing roles to Madison and her wild anxiety around the company. If she’s sleeping, then she and the baby need to sleep.

I arrive a little after seven, my schoolbag weighed down with assignments to grade and lessons to plan. The side door to her parents’ house is open and I slide into the mudroom, dumping my bags and resetting the alarm in the same movement. My body aches and I just want to curl up next to Aly and go to sleep but I should probably try and get her home. The kitchen light is on, Cara and Will sitting at the island on bar stools, talking quietly over glasses of wine.

Cara stands, smiling at me. She’s all dark hair and curves. Anyone who saw her and Aly together would know that Aly was adopted. She kisses my cheek and says, “Hello, Zed. How are you?”

“Tired,” I admit a little cheekily. “I work at this school that just grinds us to the bone.”

Will snorts and lifts his wine. “Cheers to that principal. That’s the way to fix education.”

Cara rolls her eyes at both of us. “Enough, you two. Zed, have you had dinner? Oh, sorry, you probably want to go up and see her.”

“She’ll wake up the instant I open that door,” I say, yawning. “Much better if I go up only when I intend on waking her up.”

“Oh just stay here tonight. Why drag yourself all the way back down to Georgetown to come back this way in the morning,” Cara scolds.

I don’t argue too much. “In that case, I haven’t had dinner. I’m not picky though.”

She throws chicken parmesan in the microwave for me and gestures for me to take a seat. “I can’t believe she sleeps poorly. She used to sleep anywhere.”

I shake my head. It’s a fine line. Aly’s so intensely private I don’t know how much I can share. “Her doctors said it was normal in a pregnancy.”

“Insomnia’s not uncommon,” Cara says thoughtfully. She opens, and then closes her mouth. She glances sideways at Will and then down into her wine.

I crack open a can of soda. “What’s up, Cara?”

“I guess, Will and I were wondering how much this pregnancy was like her first,” Cara asks softly, unable to look up at me. “I know you two were afraid of miscarriage—and God only knows I had my share of them. That’s what drove us to adopt. But, I didn’t know about either pregnancy until there was a crisis. You were there for both.”

It’s not what I’m expecting. There was a lot different about the last pregnancy. We had both just turned twenty. We had our whole careers in front of us. We spent a lot of time in bed just talking about what to do—whether either of us thought abortion was a viable choice for us—and less time thinking about what would happen nine months down the road.

I say carefully, “It’s hard for me to tell. I didn’t know better back then. When I asked her how she was feeling, she’d tell me fine, and I just believed her at face value, because I didn’t want to know differently. It’s different now. That was six years ago. Does that make sense?”

“Yes,” Cara says, her voice a little reluctant and tired. “I’m sorry. I guess, I didn’t really think about that. Is she—no, I’ll ask her that.”

It’s a little victory when Aly’s family stops grilling me for information they should be asking her. That she wants them to ask her.

Instead, Will says, “How are you doing, Zed?”

No one has asked me that so far. Not Dan, not Aly, not Cara. No one.

I give him a wan smile. “I’m tired because when she doesn’t sleep, I don’t sleep. I wish there was an easier way for her. Anxious because...”

I let the sentence drift off into the space filling the kitchen. I was once told that learning to create space in the world is as important as learning to love the space you occupy in that world. I really believe that now, in that kitchen.

There are a lot of things about being a dad, and a boyfriend or a partner that make me anxious. There’s just no way, no matter how I break down the math, our salaries support raising a child within DC and sending the kid to a good school. Aly’s career is inevitably shorter than mine, and if she doesn’t work, we’re fucked financially. I’m anxious because I grew up in a shitty family. There was plenty of love, sure, but not the kind that I needed or wanted, so how do I know how to raise a kid? I’m still trying to figure out what I need as an anchor. Some days are harder to be Aly’s anchor than other days. Now I’ll have to do it for another person too.

I say without thinking, “I hate her nightmares. They are always bad. Now they’re terrible because they’re about the accident or that she’s miscarrying. And Jonathan demoting her at the company’s really throwing her through a loop right now.”

Cara gets up and walks to the sink. She runs the water but doesn’t wash anything. She just stands there, listening to the water run. I stay still because I don’t know what else to do.

“You’re deflecting,” Cara says finally. “Don’t deny it. Alyona’s my daughter. I know deflecting when I see it. How
are
you?”

“Anxious,” I say finally. “Terrified. Worried I’ll trip on this damn leg and drop the baby. Worried I’ll be a crappy parent because I didn’t know good parents.”

“Zed,” Will says gently. “You are a natural caretaker. Anyone who’s ever seen you teach or with Alyona will tell you that. It comes easy to you.”

Cara says, “The way ballet came easy to both of you. The way that you came easy to her.”

She’s using past tense and it makes me laugh a little. “No, not really. Nothing about us is easy. We work at it every day. Trust me.”

“That probably shouldn’t make me feel better,” says Cara, finally turning around and wiping tears from her eyes. “But it does.”

I walk over to her at the sink and wrap my arms around her. Cara was the kindest woman I had ever met when I was a teen. For all her intensity, and for all that she and Aly clashed, I love her for her kindness, for her firm desire to meet everyone on level ground, and her continuing efforts to see things from our perspective, even if sometimes that’s impossible.

Cara’s arms tighten around me. “You don’t have to stay down here with us old people. Take the dinner up to her. I don’t care if you eat in bed. Maybe she’ll eat something too.”

I take the chicken parm out of microwave and grab two forks from the drawer. “I’ll be lucky if she touches this but it’s worth the try. See you in the morning?”

“You’re welcome to ride with me, Zed. No sense in taking a cab to the Metro if we’re going to the same place,” Will offers as I sling my bag over my shoulder and pick up the plate again, heading for the stairs.

“Thanks, that’d be great,” I tell him with a genuine smile.

Aly’s old room is at the end of the hall. The door’s shut and I carefully open it, sliding in as to not let in much light at all. It doesn’t matter. Even though the light doesn’t touch her, she rolls over in bed, her legs sliding against the sheets. I shut the door behind me and say, “Hey, it’s me.”

“Hi,” her voice is immediately clear, but soft. “What time is it?”

“Late.” I sit on the edge of the bed, putting the plate on the little bookcase against the wall. I drop my bag on the floor. I have more work than I can afford to put off but I don’t care right now. I want her. I don’t even bother to take off my prosthesis. That puts too many steps between me and her. I can charge it tomorrow, even if that means I do school on crutches.

I can’t see her in the dark, but her mouth finds mine and she kisses me, gently and softly. “I should have called you. Sorry.”

“Your mom texted me. It’s fine. So therapy was rough today?”

She sits up on her knees. “Yeah. A little bit. If you thought I shouldn’t dance for the baby’s sake, you’d tell me, wouldn’t you?”

“Yes. Of course.” I prop myself on my elbows. “You’re allowed to dance. And trust me, you’re way, way happier when you’re dancing.”

“What if I’m having problems eating?” Her voice is so small. She can sound so fragile for someone so strong.

I run my hand down her shoulder, resisting the urge to touch her collarbone or her ribs. I’d know if she was losing weight, but it’s harder to know how much she should be gaining. “Is food hard right now?”

“Very.”

“I’ll try to be better about helping,” I say honestly, even though I don’t know what that means. “Aly. I’m not going to let you fall back down that into hole. I promise.”

“Okay,” she whispers. “Thank you.”

“Anytime. It’s why you keep me around,” I say, finally reaching for her. She’s warm to touch, her skin soft and smooth. She’s wearing just a T-shirt, the way she likes to sleep, and my fingers skim over bare flesh, over the curves that didn’t exist before, her only slight baby bump, the fullness of her breasts. It’s not that this is going anywhere in particular—Aly has a strict rule about no sex in her parents’ houses—but more like relearning each other, reassuring each other that we’re okay.

“That’s why?” she teases me.

I grin into the darkness. “I mean. I guess one of the reasons.”

She pulls my shirt over my head, and sheds hers too, and then promptly shivers. I pull up the blankets around her and roll her over, leaning down and kissing her, running my tongue inside her mouth. She makes a small noise, arching up against me, hips driving into hips, her stomach brushing against mine. We’re all miracles, each and every one of us, making more miracles, by accident or on purpose.

Aly’s hands skate over my chest and I nip at her earlobe. Aly sighs, running her foot down my left leg, from flesh to metal. I drop my head and groan. Her smile against my skin is victorious and bright. It’s a while before she pulls away from me and sits up, hair disheveled, gloriously naked, and reaches over me for the now cool dinner. I turn on the bedside lamp and we split it—Aly avoiding the cheese—and talking about our days, never getting dressed. It’s casual and wonderful and one of the things I love about Aly. She can be so incredibly self-conscious sometimes, and then other times, she’s so easily at home in her skin.

“Tomorrow will be better?” She looks at me for affirmation, her hair long and pale gold, falling over her breasts, her eyes dark and blue in the low light.

“Tomorrow will be better.” Even if I knew it was a lie, I’d tell her this every day if she wanted me to. If she needed me to.

She kisses me, taking the plate from my hands and putting it back onto the bedside table. Straddling my lap, she takes both my hands and places them on her slightly rounded stomach. I take a deep breath. The sobering effect is instantaneous. She covers my hands with hers, her head bowed so our foreheads brush against each other and her hair hangs like a curtain, guarding her secrets and her thoughts even from me.

“We’re going to be okay, right?” she asks me. “The two of us. At this parenting business.”

“Yeah,” I have to tell her. “We’re going to be okay. And even when we fuck up, it’s going to be okay.”

“How do you know?” It’s the question of the hour.

“Because our parents fucked up pretty bad at points,” I say, thinking of Cara and Will downstairs. “And we still love them.”

“Do you love your parents?” she asks, her head rearing up.

“Yeah. I do.” And it’s not a lie. It’s not something I’m telling Aly as part of my duties to keep her together. I do love my parents. I can’t live with them, and I need a solid amount of space between us at any given moment. But that doesn’t mean I don’t love them. It doesn’t mean that I don’t think they’re forgivable for the mistakes they made.

“It’s a little bigger than a lime,” Aly says shyly, our hands still over her stomach.

“It’s weird, you know, how they measure babies. Why not just use numbers?”

She laughs and says, “I think they’re trying to use common objects so it’s easier to imagine. The poppy seed, grapes, kumquats, limes.”

I really wish I could think of something profound to say, but all I can say is, “I have no idea what a kumquat is but I think it’s really funny that someone used that word as a unit of measurement for a baby.”

Aly’s laughter is infectious and I grin, rocking with her. Her hair’s everywhere and I could drown in this happiness. I whisper, “They should have a guy version of measurement. This baby’s the size of a spark plug or something.”

She snorts and sweeps her hair out of her face. She’s beautiful. She takes my breath away. I’m staring at her so intently I barely hear her say, “Zed. You think you’d know how big a spark plug is?”

I sit up and object, “I grew up in farm country, you know.”

“Sneaking away to put on spandex and join the ballet class!” she reminds me.

I shrug. “Yeah, but you can’t measure a baby in musical notes.”

“Your baby is an eighth note,” she says, giggling. “That’s kind of brilliant.”

“It doesn’t even make sense,” I whisper.

“And a fucking kumquat does?”

She curses so infrequently that I just gape at her for a long moment, and then we burst into laughter. Every time one of us manages to slow down and catch our breath, the other one laughs harder and the cycle starts again. After a long day, laughing with the person I love most in the world feels like dancing in the rain.