Ryder

Before she can utter a word, the waitress returns with Nicole’s chopped salad and my burger. We say thank you, then I eye the lettuce, tomatoes, and carrots in Nicole’s dish with suspicion. “You sure about the burger thing?” I lift the top bun on mine. “Eat me. I taste soooo good,” I say in a cartoon character voice.

She laughs and shakes her head. “Thank you for the offer. But I’m cutting back on food that talks.”

“Tell me everything I ever wanted to know about sperm banks. But wait. First, can we just agree that the word sperm is up there with moist, pucker, and slacks?”

“It so is. We should call it cupcakes instead of sperm,” she says, and I’m glad we’re keeping it as light as we can, because this is such a serious topic. I meant it when I said never in a million years did I expect her to hit me up for some of my swimmers. I figured she had a crazy column in mind, too, or that she’d also been slapped with a new assignment from Cal—we’ve heard from a sexual researcher in Indonesia about five newly discovered sexual positions. Can you test them out and report back on their pleasure potential, please?

But this? She’s given me a bona fide, certified case of complete flabbergastedness.

I’ve no intention of becoming a dad, considering I don’t have a wife nor do I want one, since wives—in my experience—have a habit of spreading their legs when you’re not home.

Mine did at least.

With several men.

Yeah, that’s Maggie for you. The sweet little pastry chef had quite a secret life.

The woman who stood next to me in a church and took a vow before God and all our friends and family to be faithful wasn’t loyal at all. To top it off, she was unfaithful in spectacular fashion. That’s how she did everything. With panache. With exclamation marks. When Maggie made a decision, she was all-in. She didn’t just cheat. She cheated seven times. With seven men.

But she was sorry. She was so very sorry. She didn’t realize she had a problem. She didn’t know she was addicted. Would I please stand by her while she sought treatment for sex addiction? Because she wanted nothing more than to conquer her addictive behavior, change, and remain my wife.

As if that was ever going to happen.

Look, I’m sympathetic to addiction. I have a cousin who has battled the demons of alcoholism. I get that addiction is a beast, and it can wrap a person in its clutches. I understand the painful toll it can inflict on a family.

But as a man, I couldn’t bring myself to look beyond what Maggie did to us. She admitted everything one evening in our living room after I’d just finished a report for a client.

“Honey, I need to tell you something.”

She kneeled beside my chair, clasped my hand, and then spewed forth her confession like vomit as she came clean and begged for forgiveness.

I was shocked. I was hurt, and I was, frankly, disgusted. “Whatever forgiveness you seek, you’ll need to find it with God. It’s not coming from your soon-to-be ex-husband,” I told her, and then I kicked her out.

Two years of marriage, nine months of engagement, three months of courtship. That’s 1095 days of my life flushed down the drain.

All of them a lie.

In retrospect, the signs of her extracurricular activities were there all along. Too much time on her phone, too many unexplained hours away, too many distracted moments. I’d chosen to look the other way because I’d loved her. But it’s amazing how quickly you can fall out of love with someone when they smash the vows of marriage and fidelity, stomping on them with steel-toed boots.

It didn’t take long to get over her. The ending of our marriage was like a crash course in how to un-love someone. I don’t have any feelings left for her except perhaps . . . mild pity. I’m also so damn grateful she chose to cheat early on—before we had kids.

But Nicole’s not asking to have kids with me. Her proposition is a horse of an entirely different color. It’s also one I understand to some degree. My brother Devon and his partner couldn’t have kids the old-fashioned way. They chose to adopt, and my niece Simone is the cutest creature alive.

And so, as I lift the burger, I give Nicole my best Salt-N-Pepa imitation, singing, “Let’s talk about cupcakes, baby.”

“I thought you’d never ask.” She holds up her fork to punctuate her statement. “Turns out I’ve become an expert in sperm. Or cupcakes, as some say,” she says with a smile. I wink back. “And the reality is this—there are probably many amazing donors with wonderful traits. But no matter how much testing and interviewing and screening they do, I’d still be getting a sample from a complete stranger. And on top of that, the more I think about it, the more I’d like to know who the”—she pauses as if she’s rerouting words—“the donor is for my baby.”

As I bite into the burger, I note that she didn’t say father. There’s deliberateness to her word choice, and I suppose that’s understandable. I love Simone in a way that makes my heart feel as if it’s squeezing in my chest, but I also love that she’s my brother’s kid. Not mine. I’m not ready to have one of my own.

“That makes a lot of sense. You want a better idea of what you’re getting into. You want to take some of the guessing out of the equation,” I say, as I pick off the onions since I forgot to ask the waitress to hold them.

“Yes. I do,” Nicole says, taking a drink of her water. “And, please forgive me for being so clinical, but you really have everything I’d want in a donor.”

A burst of pride spreads through me. “Yeah? Tell me what that is. Besides a distaste for onions and an astonishingly good backhand at Ping-Pong.”

Her nose crinkles slightly as she smiles, drawing my attention to the small spray of freckles there, like a little constellation. “Those are absolutely at the top of my list,” she says, then she picks up her fork and takes a bite of her salad.

I eye her bowl. “Nicole. You miss the meat, don’t you?”

She laughs loudly. “Oh yeah, I do miss the meat. And yes, I walked right into that one. But that right there is one reason. You’re easygoing. You’re charming. You’re kind. You’re funny. You’re smart. You’re ridiculously handsome.”

“Oh really? Ridiculously?”

“Insanely good-looking.”

“Do continue.”

“You’re amazingly gorgeous. You’re out-of-this-world beautiful.”

I’m not often called beautiful. It’s a word reserved more for women or works of art. Oddly enough, I don’t mind it. Maybe because it came with a litany of praise, or perhaps it’s the way she says each word with a particular flare. Whatever the reason, I can’t help but give some back to her when I say, “And your child will have a beautiful mother.”

“And that,” she says, gesturing to me. “That right there. You’re just . . .” She lets her voice trail off. “You’re good, Ryder. You’re good.”

I raise an eyebrow skeptically. “Is that like nice? As in he’s a nice guy? Because nice guys finish last.” I’m sure Maggie thought I was a nice guy. A perfectly nice fellow she could cheat on.

Nicole shakes her head. “I didn’t say nice. I said good because you’re one of the good ones.”

I don’t see myself that way. I also don’t see myself as donor material. Given how my business nosedived post-divorce, it’s hard to see myself as anything but the man with the ultimate black mark on his record.

Ryder Lockhart, Manhattan’s so-called love doctor. He could help any man score any woman for life.

Except himself.

Hiring me as a dating coach nowadays is akin to hiring a junk-food-scarfing personal trainer to trim down. You just didn’t do it. “I don’t know about that, but I appreciate the thought.”

“You are a good guy,” she says, emphatically. “You have a good heart. I understand this isn’t a small request. But I hope you’ll consider it because I know I’ll be a good mother, and I want to give my child the best genes possible. I think that’s you.”

Nicole is showering me with praise. I’m not entirely sure how to receive it, especially since this is a new side I’m seeing of her. She’s always been the cool chick, the bright and bold co-worker. Quick with a quip, but thoughtful and caring, too. I’m reminded of a day last year when Maggie blindsided me with a phone call at work, one of her attempts to win me back. The call didn’t last long, but it unnerved me, got under my skin. I didn’t get into the details with anyone, but Nicole sensed I wasn’t having the best day, so she nudged me with her elbow after my show and said, “Guess what? Two-for-one beers at the Lucky Spot tonight. On me.”

A simple solution, but it had done the trick.

“How does it work?” I ask. “The whole donation process.”

She stabs a carrot slice, chews, and swallows. “Well, there’s this thing guys do when they’re horny. It’s called”—she glances furtively from side to side—“jacking off.”

“I’m well aware of how the protein shake is made. What I mean is, are we talking about one of those little rooms you go into?” I ask, since what man doesn’t have an image of a jerk-off chamber? “With magazines or porn or whatnot?”

“Yes, they schedule the donors for forty-minute sessions in them.”

“I’m more efficient than that, but that’s good to know.” I take another bite and chew. I set down the burger. “So, a nurse or orderly would escort me to a special room, and then I’d need to drop my drawers and whack off. Into a cup, right?”

“A plastic sample cup. With a top,” she says, and I’m kind of amazed that she’s answering every question like a champ. No blushing, no stammering.

“What do they provide for entertainment? Laptops? Computers? Or is it old school with Playboy?”

“They provide pornographic material in printed form as well as video on a TV screen.”

“Awesome. So I just choke the chicken in a room with a ton of other dudes going at it in their own rooms, too. Hand a cup to the nurse. She seals up the goods. Then, what’s next?”

“They do tests on your swimmers.”

“They’ll pass. Then you come in, maybe the same day, maybe a few days later?”

“Same day. We’d have to time everything to my cycle and when I’m ovulating.”

“Fine, so they undress you, prop you up on an exam table, and stick a turkey baster into you?”

“You paint a lovely picture of the process.”

I hold up a hand, waving her off. “Wait. I’m not done. You’re in nothing but a hospital gown. The doc tells you to put your cute little feet in stirrups, and they stick that baster up inside what I am sure is an absolutely gorgeous and heavenly home,” I say, because if she can compliment my tadpoles, I can say something nice about the paradise between her legs. She mouths a thank you. “After the boys make the upstream trip, they send you home.” I mime patting her on the rear and then sending her out the door.

“I think you’ve got the basic idea.”

“And after that?”

“That’s all,” she says. “That’s all I’d want you to do. I don’t expect or want any involvement. I’d have all the paperwork drawn up in advance saying there are no legal rights, responsibilities, or expectations of parenting, and no financial commitments required.”

I’m almost ashamed to admit it, but that’s the clincher for me—the lack of involvement. If I’m ever going to raise a child, I’m damn well going to do it right. The whole nine yards, two parents, just like my mom and dad raised my brother, my sister, and me.

Nicole isn’t asking me to sign up for daddy duty, though. She doesn’t want me to help with diaper detail or midnight feedings.

She’s a friend asking for the help she needs so she can then do those things on her own.

And helping a friend seems like something I should consider.

Fine, she’s asking for a hell of a lot more than a dude to put together an IKEA TV stand, and those things are beyond Da Vinci Code-level cryptic. I’d like to see Robert Langdon decipher some IKEA assembly instructions. Good luck with that, Harvard symbologist.

I like Nicole. I respect the dickens out of this woman. I want to take her request as seriously as she’s asking it. “Can I have a few days to think about it?”

“Of course. Take all the time you need,” she says, then glances at an imaginary watch on her wrist. “It’s only my biological clock ticking.”

I laugh, and she adds, “I’m just teasing. And if the answer is no, I’ll still be your Ping-Pong partner.”

“We’ll always have Ping-Pong.” I pick up my burger and take another bite.

She digs back into her salad then stops. “I almost forgot you had something you wanted to ask me, too.”

I laugh and slouch back in the booth, giving her the lowdown on Cal’s assignment. Admittedly, it sounds like such a simple favor by contrast, but I still need to ask. “I was hoping you’d be willing to take a trapeze lesson with me. As well as go on a few other dates. For the column, that is,” I say, because I don’t want her to think I’m hitting on her. “I would be grateful if you could help me out.”

Nicole is the perfect woman for this project. She has no interest in the part of me that causes pain—my heart, that damn organ I’ve locked up in a steel cage.

“I’m asking you for DNA, and you’re asking me to go on ten test dates?” she says, laughing. “The answer, obviously, is yes.”