9. GETTING PREGNANT

CELESTE AND I WORKED HARD AT GETTING her pregnant as soon as possible. She stopped drinking. We made our own sex props—a Lucky Hole wall along with her trolley of goodies—and we kept an eye on her fertility schedule. We both wanted to do it the old-fashioned way. I sold my apartment and was happy to throw a down payment on Mother’s kitchen table, where I’d taken many a scolding.

I ate ice cream cones out of Celeste’s cunt until I thought I’d die. We worked out a system whereby she whisked the wall away just as I was about to come and she jumped on top of me, taking my sperm and lying on her back with her legs in the air.

It didn’t even take us long. Daddy was so proud of me. Ha, you should have seen that bitch Ava’s face when Daddy threw a party for me at work! It was worth eating all the ice cream cones in the world. This was before the MDoggHotBody campaign went pear-shaped. Then, I was king of the world!

Celeste, pregnant, was cantankerous. She grew huge, monstrous. And, inexplicably, her appetite for sex grew equally as large. She binge-watched porn in between phoning me with her latest ache or pain or to tell me what kind of ice cream to bring home for dessert. At least she wasn’t drinking. I hated the porn. At first I tried to pretend it was interesting, but it revolted me—all that skin and hair and genitals and groaning.

I tried to convince her that porn wasn’t good for the baby. She needed to mix it up, watch some nature or shit like that or the baby would be a crazed serial killer sex addict. She just laughed at me. She treated pregnancy like a terminal illness, calling in massage therapists, a hair stylist, and even a make-up artist for god’s sake! She said she was too tired to even lift a finger, but she lifted more than one when it came to food. She heavy-lifted all day! And when Bax was yanked from out of her, she was perplexed and furious as to why the weight didn’t just drop off. So Mummy and Daddy sent her to a spa for three months. Three months! She left me with a newborn and went off to find her former figure.

When Bax was born, I was terrified. Baxter Hunter Williamson the Fifth Barkley, a ridiculous name for a tiny baby The nurse tried to hand him to me, but I shrank back and shook my head. “No,” I said, “I can’t.” What if I broke him? I couldn’t hold him, worried that my fear and rage would overwhelm me and I’d snap the child in two, then four, then six, just to spare him the horror of this world.

Eventually Daddy made me tell him what was going on. I cried and told him that I was afraid I would hurt the baby, that he was too small. I couldn’t tell him my real fear, that my hands would betray me and I’d kill him. But Daddy said he understood and maybe he actually did because he took Bax and held him, all swaddled and tiny, then told me to cup my arms under his arms, not to take the baby but just to hold Daddy holding Bax. And it worked. When Bax made it into my arms, my whole life changed. I straightened up and held my boy close, and I swear that surge of love and protection was like nothing I have ever felt before or since. I’d never let anything harm that precious boy. Nothing. Ever. And I didn’t want anybody else to hold him. When we took Bax home, I pushed the nanny away and let her do the cursory cleaning. I was so afraid that Celeste would take Bax away from me when she came back from the spa, but I didn’t have to worry because she wasn’t interested in Bax at all, treating him at best like one of her FluffSqueaks.

Granted, Celeste looked all svelte and smooth. She had dropped the weight, but she’d gained an entourage. Night after night, day after day, we were lumbered with her newfound friends, Christine and Lila. Christine was Celeste’s art therapist in the clinic, and Lila was a nutritionist although she looked anorexic to me. I remembered how Daddy had warned me about Celeste’s penchant for bringing losers back from rehab, and I sighed. I found I could summon nothing but hatred for my wife.

You can’t hate her. She’s Bax’s mother. She’s your wife. She’s part of the deal. Shit man, she IS the deal.

In the next breath: I hate her and feel like my head’s about to explode, she’s so noisy and so messy. She’s such a slob.

Lila and Christine didn’t help. I heard them talking about me on the connecting audio, and it didn’t take long for me to realize that Celeste was drinking again. How could I go back to work if she was drinking again?

I wondered, while I was bathing Bax and listening to them, if the three of them were sexually involved. I tidied up the towels while Bax gurgled and splashed, and I thought about that message on Celeste’s portable flash comm:

Can’t wait to smell your sweetness and lick your skin!

Celeste loved lesbian porn. Then there was the way the three of them were always hugging and kissing and touching each other. I asked her about the message, but she got angry and demanded to know what I was doing looking at her comm. I told her it lit up in front of me; it wasn’t like I was spying on her or anything.

What would I do if Celeste told me she was having an affair? Probably nothing. My chest closed in tighter, and my ears buzzed with a ringing sound.

I heard Lila. “Our credit cards are totally maxed out. What a blow, being let go from the spa.”

She’d lost her job? Christine too? Why hadn’t Celeste told me? I had forgotten about the lives of consumers, the ones spending all the money I urged them to. If you asked me, the Blowflies were lucky, what with all that welfare living.

I told myself I too had to stop buying things for Bax. My credit cards were also maxed out, and Daddy had no idea.

The buzzing in my ears became a high-pitched scream. I gathered up my solid, fragrant little boy.

“Bax my boy, what would I do without you? You get it, don’t you? Mama thinks I coddle you too much, but you’re my boy. I never thought I’d feel like this, never. This kind of love, it’s nearly too much. I would do anything for you, my boy, anything.”

Downstairs Christine was putting the food on the dining room table.

“Is Sharps being better around Bax?” I heard Christine ask.

Better? What the heck did she mean? I leaned in to listen.

“No, he’s utterly neurotic. It’s quite ridiculous. I’ve got no idea how he’ll go back to work,” Celeste said.

“It’s so destructive for Bax,” Christine protested, and her voice rose. “He can sense it you know. A dichotomy between parents about baby regimens are one of the biggest causes of dysfunctional adults in later years.”

WTF?

“I know, sweetie,” I heard Celeste sigh. “But what can I do? I’ve talked myself blue in the face. So now I just live with it.”

Live with what? What was she talking about?

“It’s not fair on Bax,” Christine insisted. “You owe him more. I see the consequences of this with my clients daily.”

The consequences of what?

I heard Celeste sigh again. “I’ve got no say in anything. Listen to this one: Bax isn’t allowed to have a blanket at night, in case he strangles himself. There he is, poor little guy, stiff as a plank in two pairs of thick pajamas, hardly able to move.”

“Why would he strangle himself?” Christine was outraged. “Has that ever happened? I’ve never heard of it.”

“It’s possible in tiny babies, but what are the odds? But Sharps loves his boy—you can’t tell him anything. I didn’t tell you, but a couple of weeks ago, he woke up and thought Bax had been stolen in the night. He was hysterical. I tell you, there’s no reasoning with him.”

How could she tell them about that? I was aghast and my armpits puddled with oily cold sweat. I pulled off my T-shirt and wiped my pits dry. I can’t believe she told them that! How could she? I’d had a nightmare.

I picked up Bax and carried him into the bedroom to get a fresh T-shirt.

I thought about my alcoholic father, his rages, the constant threat of violence and the ever-present tension in the family. Big hard man. Big hard drunk with a fist like iron. “Be a man, boy,” he’d yell at me for no reason, breaking the silence like shattering glass. Or, “Grow a pair, will ya?”

All I wanted was for Bax to know that he was completely loved. I wanted him to remember his childhood as perfect, with everything shiny and in its place and with me doing things with and for him. I never knew I was capable of feeling so much love for one person. What did she know, that bitch, Christine? I clenched my fists. My scalp was crawling, and I wanted to put my fist through the wall.

I picked up my son and took him into his bedroom, and we sat down on the floor to play with his toys. I’d had a special carpet installed, pale blue with no loose fibres to clog his little lungs. His wallpaper was serene, marshmallow clouds on blue skies, sunshine, happy faces of smiling sunflowers.

But I could still hear them downstairs.

Celeste continued to trash talk me. “Sharps is so totally paranoid that something will happen to his boy that he can’t leave him alone. He made me get rid of my FluffSqueaks, every single one of them!”

I hadn’t made her get rid of them. I had wanted to, yes, because I didn’t want Bax inhaling their neon plastic fur, but they hadn’t gone far. They were in the basement, rushing around and bumping into each other, squeaking like a nest of angry little birds and making it nearly impossible for me to do the laundry. I tried to kick the shit out of them, but the little bastards were too quick for me and they seemed to love what they thought was a game.

Lila changed the subject. “I read about a Blowfly family,” she said, “trying to integrate into city life, but they got caught and sent to the farms.”

Blowflies integrating? I sat up straighter, horrified. I hadn’t seen anything on the news about it. I’d follow up later. The Blowflies weren’t allowed to encroach on our sanctity. They were scum, filth.

“Come on Bax,” I said, “it’s bedtime, my boy. Time for you to go to sleep.”

But Bax wouldn’t go down. I carried him downstairs to make a bottle, and I looked over at the three women. They were sprawled on the sofa, caressing each other, massaging one another’s backs, hands, legs.

I made Bax’s bottle and said a loud goodnight to the writhing orgy of limbs. “Goodnight ladies, if I don’t see you leave.” Having reminded them whose house it was, I turned to go upstairs when I remembered something. “Wait, it’s garbage day tomorrow. Celeste, hang onto Bax for me.”

To my happiness, Bax protested at leaving my arms and Celeste distracted him with a singing toy. “Sweetie,” she said to me, “it’s only eight at night. You’ve got time.”

“What time do the garbage collectors come?” Christine asked.

“Oh, about twelve hours from now,” Celeste said, “but Sharps is obsessed with the garbage.”

“Am not,” I said, slipping on my shoes and a coat. “I just like to be organized, not like some people I know.” I smiled, three quarters wattage.

“There’s organized and there’s obsessed,” Celeste called out, but I ignored her.

I closed the front door and I heard her discussing my so-called garbage obsession, and my chest ballooned with rage. I stood in the snowy night, listening to my wife gossip about me. I kicked at the light atmospheric Yuletide fluff and wished I was in a rage room.

“The more stressed he is, the more he cleans and organizes,” I heard Celeste say.

I told myself that I didn’t care what they thought. It wasn’t like any of them had lives I wanted. I went back in and I finally got Bax to sleep while Celeste saw Christine and Lila out. I gathered up Celeste’s mug of orange juice and vodka and poured the remains down the sink. I straightened up the sofa cushions and picked up the toys on the floor.

Finally. Peace and quiet.

“We need to have a chat,” Celeste said, and my heart dropped.

She was kicking me out. She’d had enough. I felt bad for the things I’d felt and said about her. I couldn’t lose this. I crushed a tiny fluffy rabbit in my hands, twisting its neck tighter and tighter, filled with panic. I’d taken things for granted. I’d sat in judgement of her and forgotten who was in control, who held the power. It wasn’t me; it was Celeste. And there I was, thinking my biggest problems were Ava and my neighbour Strawberry Merv whose Christmas lights outshone mine. Celeste and I called him Strawberry Merv because he had a large strawberry-shaped birthmark covering half of his face. His real name was Mervin Hobbs, and he was clearly the least of my problems. My world was about to implode, and I had to apologize and convince Celeste that I’d try harder. I opened my mouth to speak, but she interrupted me.

“We need to have another baby!” Celeste beamed at me. “Baxie needs a little brother or sister. But I’m not getting fat and gross again. This time we’ll go for surrogacy. And Christine’s more then willing to do it for us. Daddy will pay her.”

“Another baby? Christine?” I blurted out, my body slick with sweat at my narrow escape. I was dizzy with relief but equally stunned by what she had just told me.

“If she can’t, then Lila said she will. We might try with both of them. That’s what we wanted, right? A nice big family? Mummy and Daddy will be so excited, you’ll see!”

The noosehold around my neck loosened. I wasn’t being fired by my wife. We were still a team. I put my head in my hands and began to cry.

“Oh, sweetie,” Celeste said. “Come here. Come let mama make you feel better. It’s all good, baby, it’s all good.”

Reprieve. But work was still looming, I only had two weeks left of my pat leave. And was I going to have to have sex with Lila or Christine? No, of course not, they’d just need my sperm. I had to stop over-complicating things so much, stop worrying and overthinking.