A Pact For Life (24 page)

The three toothbrush comment pushed Diana's thoughts in an entirely new direction. “This condo isn't going to work for the three of us. We should start looking at houses.”

“You want to leave here?”

“It's not big enough for a child. We need a yard for her to play in and a neighborhood full of other kids she can be friends with. She won't get that here.”

“We can start looking tomorrow.” Cale lazily replied as his eyes started to feel heavy. The up and down strumming he had been doing to Diana's thigh stopped, and his hand slid onto the sheets.

“Cale, we also should start thinking about...” She wanted to say marriage, but couldn't. “Girl's names.”

“I'll leave that up to you if you want to name her.”

Both had given it plenty of thought, but they never shared their baby names with each other. Cale wanted something unique – Quorie, Cleopatra, that sort of thing. Diana meanwhile wanted a traditional name for their daughter. Something regal that seemed to bring out a British accent when spoken like Catherine or Sophie.

“What do you think of Sophie?” Diana asked.

There was no response from Cale, he had fallen asleep. Little by little, Cale was growing tame.

PROTECTION

The sun was just rising, and so was Diana. It wasn't her alarm that awoke her though, but rather a physical sensation stemming from her stomach. It was a jostling she never felt before, yet knew exactly what it was. Her daughter was kicking.

She looked over at a smiling, sleeping Cale, and excitedly called out, “Hey...hey Cale.”

“Whaaaaa...” Was the closest way to describe his response in English.

“You have to feel this. She's kicking.”

She grabbed his hand and placed it on her stomach. It took Cale a moment to register what he was feeling. Once it clicked however, Cale was wide awake.

“Holy shit! How does it feel?”

“I've never felt anything like this before. It's like a gentle patter inside. Like bubbles bursting.”

With one hand on her stomach, Diana got up, walked to the bathroom, and turned on the shower while Cale went to the kitchen to prepare breakfast.

Shortly thereafter, a pancake smell from the kitchen slowly made its way into the bathroom and forced Diana to cut her shower short. She was a victim to her cravings as this aroma led to a desire for strawberry topped pancakes which progressed into strawberry topped pancakes with chocolate chips.

Before going to the kitchen, she proceeded to get dressed. It was a rushed job as the smell caused her to miss a button on her exceedingly tight, black blouse. The blouse was actually too tight, so she took it off, and went to the bedroom to find something of a better fit. Each item she held up in front of her looked too small for her current size and she knew one of the bigger pregnancy milestones Diana was dreading had finally come. She needed maternity clothes.

In the back of the closet next to the floor to ceiling shoe rack was a black maternity dress her mother had bought in preparation for this day. She slipped it over her head and it felt like she was wrapped in loose fitting bed sheets. It was hardly flattering for a beautiful woman, let alone a menacing lawyer. She vowed later that day she would go out and find better maternity clothes. 'Better' being the term to describe anything she could wear that didn't make her despise her reflection.

“Ah!” Diana cried out as an intense kick scared her. She looked down at her stomach and said, “Well you definitely have my strength.”

Her daughter answered in the form of calmness.

Diana glanced in the mirror one last time before going to the kitchen. The pancake smell was all consuming now, and she was powerless to refuse its call. She did wonder however if there was any peanut butter she could add to the meal.

It was one of those bright, sunny days that follows a night of intense snow. The yards and trees glistened, the sidewalks scraped and strewn with de-icing pebbles, and the roads a slushy mess of knee-high, muddy snow left behind by the snow plows.

Parallel parked outside the Cherry Creek Grill was a red Porsche SUV covered in the remnants of whatever the car in front sprayed up. The doors opened and out stepped Diana and Andrew on their first lunch as friends rather than lawyer and client.

Diana never told Cale about the lunch. It was no use to worry him over nothing.

The Cherry Creek Grill was your typical high end steakhouse. The servers wore white collared shirts and black ties, the lighting was dim enough to mask the aged features of the rich clientele, and the value of the wine selection was equal to the GDP of a small, third world country.

Inside the restaurant, they were seated in a back corner booth that looked specifically made for a couple. Their server, a middle aged, obviously gay man came over and asked for their drink orders.

Andrew looked up, smiled, and asked, “Can I get a decaf coffee and a water without a lemon please?”

They couldn't tell by the dim lighting, but the server blushed and said, “Certainly,” before turning to Diana.

Her flabber was gasted from Andrew's order. It was the same thing she was going to get, including the non-lemon exemption. She didn't want him to think she was ordering the same thing, so she said, “Can I get a Sprite?”

When the server left, Andrew leaned forward in the booth and said, “Thanks again for coming to lunch. What're the odds we both finally have the same day off?”

Since neither of them were statisticians nor autistic, this question was simply rhetorical, but if you really want the answer...

Per month, the odds of a renowned cardiologist and a prestigious lawyer both having the same day off were one out of every fifteen days. If you include holidays and the occasional sick day, this increases to one day out of ten.
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“It's nice to finally have lunch with someone intelligent,” Diana stupidly said. “I mean, I usually have lunch with my assistant and we mostly talk about women stuff. You know, hair and clothes.”

“What about your boyfriend? Jamie said he was an artist or something?”

The last thing Diana wanted to talk about with Andrew was Cale. She wished he had brought up hair or clothes. At least then it wouldn't have felt so awkward. “Ahhhh, Cale. He's... umm, yes, he's an artist, but he hasn't done much lately. He's actually changed a lot these past few weeks. Like he's bottling up all the wild energy he used to have, and...”

Too much information. She shuffled a bit and franticly thought of something to save herself when something brushed against her butt. She reached behind her and felt a paper, pulled it out, and discovered a New York Times' crossword puzzle. “Hah, look at what was jammed into the seat. It's last Sunday's crossword.”

“Oh, I love crosswords.”

“Me too!” Diana shouted and immediately thought it made her look like a fool.

“Well, if it's alright with you, would you like to work on it until our food comes?”

Diana smiled and laid the paper down on the table so they both could see it. Andrew got out a pen and said, “Here, go ahead and turn it toward you, I'll come over to your side.”

Diana slid over as Andrew joined her side of the booth. As he sat down, his cologne washed over her, and she felt like melting out of the booth and onto the floor. Cale never wore cologne, and now she realized what she had been missing.

Sitting on the same side in a booth was one of those things that friends don't do, and both realized it right away, but Andrew had already done the deed. To leave now would only bring that embarrassment out in the open.

Andrew's method for doing crosswords was identical to how Diana and her Father solved them. It was a flat out race to see who could get the most right.

After the initial rush of answers, Diana turned her attention away from the crossword and onto the baby kicking. It had been two days since the last, first, and only time the baby had kicked. She tried not to worry over it, but every hour that went by without a kick meant every hour she wondered why.

While they struggled with rest of puzzle, Andrew asked, “Oh, by the way. What would you like to eat? Their spinach enchiladas are pretty good, but you could really say that about everything on their lunch menu.”

There was a conflict whether she should order something flattering, a caesar salad, or something true to her pregnant impulse, a heavily garlicked filet mignon with a melted cheese baked potato. She looked over the menu as her stomach screamed for the filet mignon. Calmly, she said, “I think I'll get a caesar salad.”

“Interesting, I thought the pregnancy would cause some weird cravings.”

Diana grew red as she lied, “I guess that hasn't happened to me yet.”

The gay server smiled at Andrew as he walked from the kitchen all the way to their table. Without the menu in front of him, Andrew began to order, “Can I please get a swordfish steak, medium, and a cup of vegetable soup.” The server nodded enthusiastically and Andrew continued, “And she'll have a caesar salad, and...I'm sorry Diana, do you want caesar dressing?”

“Umm, sure. That's fine.”

Any feminist leanings Diana had were too confused to tell her how to react at someone ordering her food. Sure, it was old school chivalrous, but then again, it was patronizing. She liked it, but didn't.

The server left and the two returned to their crossword. Although it was really just Andrew who returned. Diana was stuck in mental limbo. Was she falling for Andrew? Why hadn't the baby kicked? What was Cale doing? Was she happy with the tame Cale? Why hadn't the baby kicked? Why did Andrew seem so perfect? Why hadn't the baby kicked?

In his once warehouse studio apartment that was now just his warehouse studio, Cale had rows and rows of house listings arranged on the floor. He tried to organize them by price, size, and location, but nothing stuck. He didn't even know which listings to keep and which to toss. How big was too big? Too expensive? What makes a house wrong?

Next to the rows of paper were some copper wire, wood planks, and steel geometric shapes - the raw material for his latest commission of abstract nothingness. Between the house listings, and the pseudo sculpting, Cale wanted to choose death.

What if this was the rest of his life? Bullshit creations and husband-father stuff? The husband-father stuff had its share of moments that he was looking forward to
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, and things that were tough at first like cooking and cleaning first had grown easier.

As for the bullshit creations, there were no perks and it never became easier. Actually, it was the opposite. Every new piece of garbage that he tied to his name was worse than the last.

He knew that his life was over. Not literally per se, but the freedom he once had was as good as gone. Any decision with his life would now need to be taken with Diana and the baby in mind.

This loss of life wouldn't be so bad if he still had his art. His real art, not the bullshit that he was forced to do to make money. Cale was now the equivalent of a former sci-fi star relegated to pictures and autographs at conventions.