“Hey,” I say. “I mean that. You get that right? That I couldn’t have done it without you?”
He looks back toward me. “Yes.”
“What’s wrong?”
“What? Nothing’s wrong. We’re at the Academy Awards, and you have a fairly decent shot at winning. What can possibly be wrong?”
“I feel like you think I haven’t appreciated you.”
“I didn’t say anything like that.” His eyes return to the window.
“But Ifeelthat way.”
“How did we just take this turn?” he asks. “I told you a minute ago that you could have done all of this on your own—you are thatgood—and now I feel like we’re about to fight about something I don’t understand.”
“I just got the sense that you were tired of all this, that I haven’t appreciated you enough.”
“You got that sense from me telling you that you deserve this?”
I chew my (perfectly lipsticked) lip, narrow my eyes, and feel like I walked into a trap.
“I’m just suddenly realizing that this was a bit of a chore for you.”
“It has not been a chore for me, OK? I’ve done everything you’ve asked of me, and I’ve done it with a smile. More than that. I’ve been genuinely enthusiastic. I’ve gone to industry parties and put my ego aside when I have to say I’m working in TV. Do you know how some of these assholes look at me? Poor little Ben Livingston: we thought he had something special, but I guess not.” He squeezes the bridge of his nose. “I’ve sucked up your dad living in our guesthouse for almost a year, I’ve grown used to you urging me to therapy to deal with my own ‘daddy issues,’ though I’m working stuff out in my own way. I’ve done it all, Tate. All of it. Not complaining, not taking anything away from you. But please don’t tell me that I can’t be a little exhausted.”
“I don’t even know what to say to all of that,” I snap. Because I don’t. Because I had no idea that any of this lived inside of him, not when I thought that we were so transparent with each other that his insides could be seen from the outside, at least to me.
“There’s nothing to say to it,” he says plainly. “I want to celebrate tonight and make this special, and I don’t mean this rudely, but you are stressed and hormonal, and can we not make a mountain out of a molehill right now?”
“So now I’m being too emotional?” Iambeing too emotional. I can feel my floodgates open, the tide of hormonally fueled hysteria washing in. This tide is exactly what I need when I’m in front of the camera; it serves me less well with Ben. My cheeks flush, my heart races, white noise fills my ears so I can’t even talk myself down if I wanted to.
“Please,” he says. “Can we drop it?”
“I’m sorry that I’m up for an Oscar when you’re not, when both of us always assumed that it would be you,” I say, and it is immediately too cruel, too dismissive. I am drowning under my emotional tsunami, and I regret it at once.
He blinks and stares out the window.
“Shit,” I say. “Shit, shit. I didn’t mean that. I’m sorry.” I rest my palm on his leg. “I just ... shit. I didn’t realize all of this was going on with you. I wish you’d told me.”
“There’s nothing to tell,” he says. “Besides, you have your own stuff.”
“My stuff is your stuff,” I say.What’s mine is yours and yours is mine, and we are braided together, remember?
The limo glides to a stop.
“OK,” he says.
“We’re OK?”
“Sure.” He kisses me, just as our chauffeur opens the back door and the roar of the waiting crowd ushers itself into our private bubble.
“Hey,” I say, reaching for his hand.
But he’s already stepping out to the pavement, squinting his eyes against the glare of the bright sun. He turns to help me ease my pregnant body out of the limo, and I breathe it all in: the adoration, the success, the Academy Awards that are terrifying and exhilarating and everything I thought they would be when I was standing in front of my mirror with Piper on my bed, when my mom was still alive, and my dad was still drinking, and Ben wasn’t even a speck in my imagination.
Everything has shifted, it’s true.
Then the baby kicks again, hard this time, and I reach again for Ben’s hand and find it, and he steadies me as I glide, as gracefully as one can when labor is imminent, out to the carpet.
