Another Man's Baby (13 page)

“Well, wait until you become a father. Those civilians were right; you don’t understand until it comes right in your face.”

“Did you tell your son not to join?”

“How the hell was I going to do that? He respects me. He’d think I was the biggest hypocrite in the world to go out and tell other kids to join and then tell him not to. But to tell you the truth, I keep hoping my wife will go off, tell him no damn way. He broke up with his girlfriend. I don’t know if he thinks that will win her back or what. I just know that he wants to go and there ain’t a damn thing I can do about it. I’m serious, I’m not signing back up.”

“Neither am I,” Eric admitted. “Damn,” he added, taking a long swallow. “It must really be hard on you being a recruiting officer.”

Eric waited in vain for an answer while Leon Ross looked past him, his eyes dead and haunted. “I should call my wife,” Eric said at last, not making a move to reach for his cell. “She’s probably worried about me.” Still he didn’t call, knowing that his phone was off and Gabi couldn’t contact him. He closed his eyes and swallowed.

“
Have faith.”

In what?
Eric wondered. The voice was coming more frequently. He’d put off counseling but if the voice continued he’d go just to find out the meaning of the voice. The base had a counselor but it was the last place Eric would go for mental help. When he left the corps it would be with honors, not as a mental case.

“Want to dance?”

Eric’s eyes traveled up the lean brown feminine body standing before him. “Sure, why not?” he said, putting his glass on the table and moving to take the woman in his arms.

An hour of dancing passed more quickly than Eric could have ever imagined. He was on his second drink with his dance companion, his fourth for the evening, two over his usual limit. He was feeling no pain and no guilt that he was making his wife worry.

“I love a man in uniform.”

Eric smiled. He’d heard that line a thousand times. His usual response was, ‘So does my wife.’ Not tonight, though. Tonight, he didn’t want to mention Gabi or acknowledge the fact that she was sitting home worrying about him. He was tired of her worrying about him. He was her husband, not her son. His eyelids closed and he swore he could see her sitting on the sofa in front of the television, not concentrating on the picture, but thinking of him. He didn’t want to see the pity in her eyes tonight. He wanted to forget that he couldn’t be a man for her, that he couldn’t give her a baby.

“Thanks,” Eric said at last. “I’m glad that I wore my uniform.”

“What’s your rank?”

“General,” Eric lied.

“Really?”

“Really.” Eric smiled at the woman. “Have you ever been with a general?”

“No, but I’m always ready to try new things.”

“I bet you are,” he said, smiling into her black eyes, looking at her chocolate brown skin and neatly weaved hair. 

He held out his hand to her. “Come on, let’s dance some more.” When she laid her head on his shoulder he thought of Gabi and the fact that she would smell the woman’s scent on his body, on his clothes. So what? he thought. So what? He’d had a hell of a day.

“Lieutenant, are you ready to go?”

Eric looked toward the sergeant. “I’m having a good time,” he replied lazily.

The sergeant glanced down at his watch. “My wife is probably worried about me, sir. She can’t sleep until I get home.”

The message was loud and clear. Eric and the sergeant had talked about their wives. His dancing for over an hour apparently had the sergeant worried and rightfully so. Eric was more than tempted, he was ready. And if he had his own car he might have followed through on it. He smiled in the sergeant’s general direction, wondering what would happen if he stayed away all night.

“Lieutenant?”

“I thought you were a general,” the woman spoke, laughing.

Eric hunched his shoulder and grinned at her.

“It doesn’t matter. I’ve never done a lieutenant either.”

“Mercy,” Eric said and smiled, walking away. “Maybe next time.”

             
ANOTHER
MAN
’S BABY
             
229

Chapter
Eleven

For three hours, Gabi had sat in front of the television not watching the programs, repeating over and over to herself that she would not call Eric. He was a big boy. He knew she was worried about him. She was trying her best to give him space to work it out on his own. Between finding out he was sterile and not being able to maintain an erection the last few times they’d made love, things were not good. Talking only seemed to make it worse, so she didn’t talk, not about anything important anyway.

The click of the lock blasted through the quiet house like a bullet. Instead of the tension draining out of her body, more settled around Gabi’s shoulders. She wanted to run to Eric, examine him, and make sure he hadn’t been hurt. Not tonight, she thought. She’d wait until he came to her.

“Gabi, why aren’t you in bed?” Eric asked, coming to the doorway of the living room.

The slurred speech made her head jerk up. “Did you drive home like that?” she asked before she could stop the words.

“No, Sergeant Ross drove me. I’ll need you to drive me in tomorrow. My car’s at the office.”

Eric stood there staring at her, a look on his face that struck at the core of her heart. She was losing him and he was doing it deliberately. Saving a marriage took more than one person; it took two. Gabi no longer knew which way to go. If she talked he got angry; if she didn’t, she got angry.

“You hungry?” she asked instead. “Did you eat?”

“No, I didn’t eat. You got something on the stove?”

“I have a plate for you in the fridge. I can warm it up for you.”

“Thanks.”

So polite, she thought, the two of them could be room- mates. She passed him on her way to the kitchen and caught the scent of perfume, stopped and looked at him, frowning at the lipstick on his shirt. She shook her head and headed toward the kitchen. Not tonight, she thought. Tonight she wasn’t in the mood. Tonight she would warm his dinner and pretend that he wasn’t reeking of alcohol and another woman’s perfume.

***

“Eric, I made an appointment for a physical for you. You have Saturday off, so Friday you need to fast. No drinking after work because they’re going to draw blood.”

“How do you know what the doctor is going to order?”

“It’s a physical. It’s not hard to figure out. Why are you being so suspicious?”

“I just don’t know what reason you have for going behind my back and making an appointment for a physical.”

Gabi couldn’t keep the sigh from escaping. “Look, it’s no big deal. My insurance requires it for both of us.”

“Then this is for insurance purposes?”

She glared at him. “I want to make sure you’re healthy. They’re doing me a favor, blood tests, X-rays, EKG, the works.”

“What, no test for STDs?”

Gabi stood up and looked down at him. “Should they test you for STDs?” She grabbed her keys from the hook and walked out the door without saying goodbye. Her body was shaking with the effort to maintain control.

***

Gabi fumed the entire way to work. Nothing was going as it should. She’d talked with Ongela and had been advised to wait it out, to give Eric more time. She would give Eric all the time he needed but she wished he’d give her just a little help, just behave as though he liked her. She was beginning to question it. She wondered what she’d done to make him stop liking her.

Opening the door of the clinic, Gabi paused. This used to be her home away from home. She’d always loved working here but now even the office felt stifling. Her relationship with her co-workers was deteriorating almost as rapidly as her marriage. Trying to remain sane at home and at work was becoming a for real juggling act. Gabi stopped as she saw Traci heading for her. She took a deep breath, wondering what was coming now.

“Gabi, where were you last night?”

What an odd question. Gabi looked at Tracie and witnessed a flicker of something pass across the woman’s face. She didn’t know what was up but her skin crawled. “Why?” she asked instead of answering the question.

“I saw Eric last night in a club in
Joliet
. At first I thought it was you dancing with him.” Tracie hunched her shoulder. “But after an hour or so I could tell it wasn’t you.”

Gabi’s spine stiffened as she ordered her body to obey her commands. She was not going to break down and she was not going to let Tracie think she didn’t know Eric had been out dancing with another woman.

“Eric went out for a few drinks with the sergeant he’s working with. He told me he had a good time dancing and had a few too many drinks. He didn’t mention seeing you there, though.”

“I guess he was a little too preoccupied.”

“Probably,” Gabi answered, not taking the bait. “I’m sure he didn’t intend to be rude. Next time you run into him you should speak, he’d love it. I am surprised that it took you an hour to notice the woman he was dancing with wasn’t me.”

Gabi reached for the next chart, smiled, and called the patient into the room. She was grateful she didn’t have to give shots at the moment. She was feeling much too volatile to stick anyone with a needle.

Tracie was supposed to be her friend. And what she’d done Gabi didn’t consider friendly. It was a dig, pure and simple. But there was not a damn thing she could do about it, and she refused to wear her feelings on her sleeves. She thought of Tracie telling her she could tell she and Eric were fighting because Gabi had not been oozing with stories about him.

Gabi took the patient’s blood pressure and replaced the cuff, her mind still on Tracie’s comment. She would have to make sure their lunchtime conversations contained  dewy-eyed comments as she lied about something wonderful Eric had done. She had no choice but to lie as he’d done nothing wonderful in months, not since finding he was sterile.

***

Gabi stuffed the laundry into the washing machine, determined not to bring Eric’s shirt to her nose, determined not to try and place the scent. She closed her eyes and felt the knife jabbing away at her. She couldn’t believe Eric was cheating on her. Cheating was one of the two things she wouldn’t tolerate. They’d talked about this before they were married.

Eric knew that she wouldn’t stand for a man putting his hands on her and that she wouldn’t stand for her husband cheating. She’d told him that. She’d grown up with  cheating and spousal abuse in most of the foster homes she’d been placed in. She wasn’t going to take either.

As much as she loved Eric, she’d been telling him the truth when she told him that she would leave him. Tit for tat, baby, she thought to herself.

Gabi couldn’t help it. She brought the shirt to her nose, the perfume stinging. She wasn’t crying, she told herself. “I’m just having an allergic reaction,” she said softly as the tears fell from her eyes and streamed down her cheeks.

***

“Girl, your husband’s a good dancer.”

“Isn’t he, though?” Gabi grinned at Jamilla, wondering where she’d seen Eric dancing. She was grateful she had her hand wrapped around her Coke. She sucked the icy drink through the straw and into her mouth, fighting the urge to fling the liquid on her co-worker.

“Yeah, he danced with me once last night but then this hoochie got him and wouldn’t let him go.”

“Can’t say as I’d blame her,” Gabi answered and took a bite of her sandwich.

“I was going to ask him to give me a ride home but he left before I got a chance.”

“Too bad. Were you there with Tracie?” Gabi asked, ignoring the shards of glass piercing her soul, or her blood that had to be running down her arms and her legs.

Gabi looked at the floor expecting to see a puddle of her blood, but there was nothing.

Where’s your ‘have faith’ now?
she silently asked the voice in her head
. Seems when I can use you telling me that, you aren’t here. Why? Is it because my husband is screwing around on me and there is nothing you can say? Well, let me tell you this: Having faith ain’t gonna cut it. If he’s screwing around, his ass is out.

For the rest of her shift Gabi avoided Tracie’s looks of pity and Jamilla’s smirk. She wanted to kill Eric for humiliating her like this. Sure, he was hurting, but so was she. But she wasn’t running out to clubs getting smashed, or dancing. She was sitting home worrying about her husband and wondering how to fix their marriage.

The sound of babies crying in the waiting room renewed the pain Gabi was carrying. She’d begged off working with the pediatrician but that didn’t prevent her from seeing or hearing all of the babies coming in for their checkups.

Her stomach lurched when Tracie walked toward her. There was a determined look in Tracie’s eyes, the same look they all had when they had to tell a patient bad news. “What’s the matter?” Gabi asked before Tracie could open her mouth.

“Come into the back with me. I need to tell you something.”

“Sure.” The voice that came from Gabi’s mouth did not sound like her at all. It sounded like someone who had stuffed their mouth full of rocks. Tracie turned, giving her a inquisitive look, no doubt wondering why Gabi wasn’t following behind her. Her feet wouldn’t move, that’s why.

Gabi gave a weak smile and ordered her brain to send the proper command to her feet. She followed Tracie into the kitchen, surprised when Tracie kept walking out the back door of the clinic and into the parking lot. The numbness became all encompassing. This was serious.

“Let’s walk across the lot to Dominick’s.”

“But…”

“It’s okay, we won’t be gone that long.”

“Tracie, you’re being so mysterious. Just spit it out, tell me what’s wrong.” Gabi stopped walking, wanting to get this over with.

“Jamilla is angry with you.”

“You mean that little confrontation we had about Mr. Rivers? I apologized.”

“She was angry with you long before that. She’s jealous of you and she’s out to hurt you. I just wanted to warn you to watch your back.”

“What can she do to me?” Gabi stood in the middle of the parking lot knowing exactly what it was Jamilla could do to her.

“She’s going after Eric. It’s no secret that the two of you are having problems. I’ve seen him without you several times now in the same club in
Joliet
, and so has Jamilla.”

As they walked into the store, Gabi decided to forget the pretense of coming there to shop and leaned against a wall. “Are they…  She took in a breath. “Do you think she’s sleeping with him?”

“You would know that better than me.” Tracie blushed and looked down. “I’m just telling you so you can put a stop to it.”

“Eric wouldn’t cheat on me.”

Silence.

“He wouldn’t.” Gabi swallowed. “I don’t even know why I asked you if they were sleeping together. I don’t think even Jamilla would go that far, we’re friends.”

“With friends like that you don’t need enemies.”

“Tracie, the entire time Eric was gone, Jamilla was a good friend to me. She kept me from being so lonely. I owe her.”

“You owe her nothing. She wanted someone to party with, and you were alone and lonely. She wasn’t hanging with you for you, but for herself. Now that Eric’s returned she’s jealous.”

“Of what?”

“Of what you had.”

Gabi blinked. Tracie had said
had
. A soft groan slipped out of her. She didn’t have enough friends to lose any. And if she admitted to the truth, she wasn’t feeling confident enough about her marriage to do nothing. The thought of making amends with Jamilla came to her. Maybe if she did something to let the woman know there were no hard feelings, maybe Jamilla would play in someone else’s back yard.