“It’s good,” I assure him before turning my attention back to Raven. “Look at you.” I beam, holding her at arm’s length. “You’re gorgeous.”
“I’m enormous. I got stuck in a revolving door last week. An actual revolving door. A security guard had to help me out. It was deeply humiliating and also kind of hilarious.” She looks down at the dress. “Thank you so much for all the clothes, by the way. And the books…which I have most definitely been reading.”
“Have you?”
“Well, I’ve been reading the covers. And some of the chapter titles. One of them has a pretty cute font.” She grins with the specific charm of a twenty-three-year-old who knows she’s being lovingly managed and doesn’t entirely mind. “But honestly, the prenatal vitamin guide was actually helpful. I didn’t know you weren’t supposed to take them on an empty stomach. That explains a lot of mornings.”
“Raven, please tell me you’ve been eating. What did you have for breakfast?”
She looks at her shoes. “Eggs. Fruit. Quinoa.”
“Mm-hmm. Now, the truth.”
“Flamin’ Hot Cheetos,” she mumbles.
“So you had heartburn for breakfast?”
“It’s a food that I ate in the morning. That’s breakfast by definition.”
“It’s a sodium delivery system disguised as a snack. I’m not asking you to meal prep. I’m asking you to occasionally consume something that grew in the ground, okay?”
“Potatoes grow in the ground. Chips are made of potatoes.”
“Cheetos are made from corn, Raven.”
“Still a vegetable.” She points to Saylor’s chest. “And still not helping.”
“The point is, do you want me to send you some groceries? I can arrange that,” I offer.
“What would I do with groceries?”
“Cook?” Saylor hints, seemingly amused.
Raven laughs, and the sound is bright and young and fearless, like a woman who is growing another human being and treating the experience with the casual competence of someone assembling IKEA furniture. I’ve never met anyone who wears pregnancy with less pretension. Raven doesn’t glow. She doesn’t nest. She doesn’t post bump photos with captions about sacred journeys. She just shows up, does the work, and eats Flamin’ Hot Cheetos for breakfast, and somehow that’s more reassuring than every parenting book on my shelf. She makes this look so uncomplicated, even though it’s very, very complicated.
“I promise I’ll eat real good. Don’t worry too much. I promise I’m taking care of little blob just fine.”
“I’m sorry. I’m not trying to be controlling,” I say.
“You’re not.” Then her gaze shifts. Looking over my shoulder toward the entrance, her expression changes. Not dramatically. A subtle tightening around the mouth, the way a person’s face adjusts when they spot someone they were hoping wouldn’t show. “But speaking of controlling,” Raven mutters quietly.
I turn.
Eleanor is walking through the waiting room like she owns the building, which, given the scope of her husband’s former real estate portfolio, she might. She’s in a cream-colored coatand pearl earrings and her hair is blown out to a volume that suggests she came here directly from a salon, which she probably did. Eleanor doesn’t go to appointments. She arrives places. She makes appearances.
She looks good. I hate that she looks good. She looks like a woman who has been sleeping well and consulting with an attorney who charges by the hour and winning, or at least believing she’s winning, which for Eleanor has always been the same thing.
“Raven,” I say carefully, without turning back. “Did you invite Eleanor?”
Raven’s voice gets small. “Only because I’m scared of her. She called the office and asked about the appointment and I didn’t know how to say no. And she offered to pay for it because this clinic has the 4D ultrasound machine and my insurance only covers the regular one. I’m sorry. I should have told you but I didn’t want you to not come.”
“It’s okay.”It’s not okay.But Raven is twenty-three and pregnant and shouldn’t have to navigate the minefield of Eleanor’s emotional warfare. That’s my job. “Don’t worry about it. Go do your thing. I’ll handle this.”
The nurse appears from the hallway, clipboard in hand, and calls Raven’s name. The nurse casts a look at Saylor, then back to Raven’s belly. “Dad, you’re welcome to come back too. We’ll get Mom changed and then you can join for the ultrasound.”
The word “Dad” lands in the room like a bird flying into a window. Saylor’s eyes bulge. Raven’s mouth opens. I watch the misunderstanding form and decide, in real time, to let it stand. Correcting it would require explaining the entire baroque arrangement of surrogacy and custody and fake engagements that brought us to this waiting room, and the nurse has a clipboard and a schedule and does not have time for the novel-length version.
“Go,” I tell Saylor. “Make sure Raven’s okay. We need a minute.”
