Chapter 38
Madison stuck her phone between her cheek and her shoulder, digging inside her purse to find her keys. “How did you survive the seventh month again?” she asked Everleigh, wincing at the stubborn pain in her hips.
Which, apparently, was normal.
Pain was normal when you were pregnant. So was heartburn. Excessive farting. Stretchmarks. Boobs that transformed into a giant map of the New York subway. Peeing every fifteen minutes. And probably half a dozen other fun things no one thought to warn you about.
Everleigh laughed. “The hard part was the beginning for me. I had a few problems later on, but I guess that not puking your heart out five times a day made me extremely tolerant for the small issues I had.”
“Yeah, Karma is a bitch I guess. The first trimester was rather smooth. Second one? Great. Number three is being a major bitch right now.”
She finally found her keys and unlocked the door, kicking it closed with the heel of her foot. “Anyway, Saturday in four weeks sounds great for the baby shower.”
“Perfect. Don’t worry about a thing, I’ll set it up.”
“Great. Just… a small thing, OK? I don’t care if there are only a few people.”
“Of course you don’t,” Everleigh said with a chuckle. “I’ll keep it small and simple, pinky swear. Don’t forget to text me Annie’s phone number and say hi to Ben for me.”
She hung up, throwing her keys in the bowl on the small table she had insisted they really needed. Ben loved his apartment all modern and looking sleek enough to be pictured in a magazine, but there was an odd satisfaction in throwing your keys after a long day at work.
“Hi, Rocco,” she said as greeting for the small dog that took her job as guardian of the house seriously. They had considered changing her name to Coco, something that sounded a little more appropriate for a female dog, but they were too used to Rocco and hadn’t been able to switch.
She noticed right away that Ben’s laptop case was on the kitchen counter - a little unusual for him. He normally set it on a chair by the dining table, because that was his favorite spot to work. The fact that he was home early was also unusual, and these two things combined made her feel a little uneasy.
She looked through the apartment and eventually found him in the nursery, sitting on the window sill they had converted into a comfy bench.
“Ben?” she asked when he didn’t seem to acknowledge her presence in the doorway.
He lifted his eyes from the large, leather book he was holding.
The uneasy feeling turned into dread.
“Honey, what’s wrong?” she asked as she stepped inside the room.
“I got a call this afternoon,” he said in a rough, tight voice. “He… ah…”
“Oh,” she said softly, understanding right away. She had been dreading this moment ever since Ben had told her his father was sick. “I’m so sorry.”
Ben’s relationship with his dad was a painful, sore point for him.
Still. It was his father. His only remaining family.
She walked to him and had to bite her lip when she saw he was holding a picture book. Probably one his mom had made from the day he was born, seeing as it was full of pictures of him.
“It’s… I don’t know how I feel,” he admitted. “I thought I wouldn’t feel anything. Or maybe relief. But that’s not… that’s just not it.”
“I don’t think you can really prepare yourself for this kind of thing,” Madison said softly, stroking his hair.
He leaned into her palm, briefly closing his eyes as if he was savoring a quiet moment of relief. “Does that make me a monster if I don’t mourn him?”
“No. No, Ben, it doesn’t. I don’t think there is anything that could ever make you something other than loyal, loving, and trustworthy.”
“I barely have pictures of him, you know,” he said with a sigh, lifting the picture book. “That’s what I was looking for. A few when I was a baby. Then the rest is mostly with mom, or my grandparents, or Chris. He was never there, and when he was, you can see so clearly that… he didn’t give a damn. I didn’t understand back then. I thought I was boring or disappointing but… he just didn’t care about anything or anyone but himself.”
She didn’t know how to answer that, and she wasn’t even sure Ben was expecting an answer, so she kept silent.
“How can you not care about your own child?” Ben closed the book, putting it down on the bench next to him before setting his eyes on her stomach. He gently cupped it, bringing his lips to it. “How can you not love them? Our baby is not even here, and he already takes up so much space in my heart and in my life.”
“Some people… some people are just wired differently and…” She hesitated, not willing to speak badly of someone who was now dead.
“You’ll tell me, right? You’ll tell me if I become like him?” he asked in a faint voice that was almost completely muffled against her stomach.
“Ben, you will never-”
“Please, Madison. What if I really turn out like him? What if I hurt our child the way he hurt me? And you? What if I ruin everything?” There was fear in his eyes, as if he truly believed that one day, he might change.
“You won’t.”
If there was one thing she was sure of… it was that.
***
He hesitated a lot.
In the end, it was Madison who told him to go.
The last thing he wanted was to leave her alone, even if just for two days. She was well into her seventh month now and even though everything seemed to be alright, he still wasn’t comfortable with the idea of being so far away from her, should anything happen.
There were surprisingly a good number of people who attended Bartholomew Ackerman’s funeral. All business relations. A few local politicians as well. He sensed their eyes on him throughout the ceremony but pointedly ignored them. Some were probably thinking about the son who didn’t bother to visit his dying father but showed up for the reading of the will.
He couldn’t care less about any of it - what they thought, the will, the money.
And even about the house. His father had tried to sell it but hadn’t found someone willing to pay the price for it. He hadn’t won, in the end.
It was sunny and warm in Oregon that day, and he was getting hot under the stiff, formal coat he was wearing as he watched his father’s coffin being lowered into the ground. Everyone had left.
He threw a handful of dirt, then headed to a different part of the cemetery. His mother’s grave was still in pristine condition. Simple, white marble. He didn’t visit it a lot but always made sure someone took care of the place for him.
“Hi, mom,” he said as he crouched down, resting a hand against the cold stone. He cleared his throat, trying to remember the last time he had talked to her grave. It had been years ago.
“Just wanted to give you a heads up. Although, you might already know. I hope he’ll leave you alone up there. I hope you’re happy, and that he won’t change that.” He took a deep breath, reading the one line underneath her name that always felt a like a punch to the gut. Loving mother.
The two words that announced to whoever would walk by that this woman passing away had made an orphan.
Him.
And even if, technically, he had only become one a few days ago… to anyone who knew him a little, it was the day his mother had died that he had lost his parents.
“I’m gonna be a dad,” he said with a small smile. “It’s a little boy. Pumpkin is still being difficult about the name, but I think I can convince her to go for Rocky Bruce Lee Wayne if I ask when she’s mid-contraction or something.
“We talked about it a lot and… we’ll come visit when he’s a little older. Maybe spend a few weeks during summer break… I don’t know. But we’ll come. I promise. I think you’ll really like Madison. She’s… the most perfect woman I have ever met. She’s gonna be an awesome mom. A little messy, though,” he amended. He cleared his throat again, his thumb softly tapping the stone. “I just wanted you to know that I’m OK. I’m happy. I’m really, really happy, mom.”
Standing up, he gave the tombstone one last look then headed to the limo that was waiting for him.
It was time to go home.