16. Chapter Sixteen
Chapter Sixteen
“Headaches and nausea are some of the minor ailments common during pregnancy.”
A Young Woman’s Guide to the Joy of Impending Motherhood
Dr. Francine Pascal Reid (1941)
M y head was still aching horribly when I woke up a mere five hours later. It made my stomach feel queasy, and I was tired. It was like I had a hangover, but there was no way I should be. Over the years, I’ve developed a fairly healthy tolerance for wine. But if I had gotten drunk, at least my hangover would have been done and over with by ten, instead of this headache lingering for the morning and into the afternoon.
The only good thing was that it was summer and I didn’t have to deal with hyper five-year-olds at school. But as bad as the morning with the kindergarten class would have been, a day working in a wine store is a hundredfold worse. Seeing the bottles of wine, talking about which red would go best with the braised rabbit, and the constant slight aroma in the store did not help me feel better.
″You’re such a horrible friend,” was how I answered my cell phone when I saw Morgan’s name on the call display late in the afternoon.
″What did I do?” she cried. I could tell she was properly horrified. Morgan, for all her mathematical intelligence, is quite gullible.
″You kept me out too late, and now I feel like a big bag of poop,” I moaned. There was no one in the store right then, so I rested my head on the counter by the cash register. There was a bunch of things I needed to be doing, but sitting with my head down seemed like a fine idea for the rest of the afternoon. “I think my head is going to explode all over these bottles of wine.”
″But you hardly drank anything!”
″I know. It’s totally not fair. What do you want anyway? Just to laugh at my utter, utter miserable-ness?”
″I would never do that to you, Casey. At least I wouldn’t do more than giggle. I wanted to see if tonight’s the night you’re going out with David.”
″If I survive that long.”
″Are you excited?” she asked coyly. “It’s been so long. Are you nervous?”
″A little—a lot,” I confessed.
Especially since I still had no idea why David didn’t kiss me back Sunday night. I mean, I had ideas, but I didn’t like thinking about them since they involved David considering me as just an unattractive, pathetically evil ex-girlfriend, or something along those lines. And I was also trying desperately to stop dwelling on it, because that just leads me into thinking about J.B. telling me he doesn’t like the thought of me kissing David. I just needed tonight to be over. Trying to prevent myself from thinking about all these different things was about to make my head explode.
″Do you really think—would you want to get back together with him? For real? What about what Brit said about it not working? And if you get together, what about the baby thing? Or would you just want to have a baby with him? And then you could marry him and not have to be alone forever. Or are you not thinking about all that, and is this some sort of catching up where you get to have sex with him?”
″I’m trying not to think about having sex with him,” I said, diving right into the important question and not dwelling on the fact that Morgan predicted me having a life alone with only a baby for company. “I think that might be jinxing it. But I am going to wear my lucky unders, and I did the whole shave this morning.”
″You need to wax. My girl is so good it’s almost painless.”
″Painless and waxing are not two words that can ever be in a sentence together. My Venus Divine does the trick nicely, and it never hurts. But back to David—I honestly don’t know what to think. It’s different than just a normal guy, because we’ve got all this history, but is that all it is? And what about the fact that I may or may not have broken his heart back then? Did he forgive me, is everything hunky-dory, or is he holding some evil bitterness inside him that’s just going to explode all over me? And what about having a baby? I was all set to give up men, and now here I am getting all worked up about one again! It would be better if this was just a normal date with a normal guy, and I could just trick him into having sex with me and get the conceiving thing over and done with. This is just too huge right now for me to deal with without my head blowing up.”
There was silence from Morgan for a moment. I didn’t intend to go off on a vent like that, but it just needed to come out and Morgan’s always a good person to vent to. “Do you think you’re maybe overanalyzing this a little too much, Casey? I mean, look at it as just dinner with an old friend.”
″But it’s not! It’s—”
″Maybe, just for now, pretend it is. That’s all—just casual, sharing some food. Don’t worry about everything else.”
″You think I’m nuts.”
″At times, yes, but I still love you lots.”
I took a deep breath and prepared to calm down. “Thanks. I needed that.”
″If I was there, I might have had to slap you.”
″That would hurt too much. Speaking of slapping—which is what I’d like to do to that good-for-nothing Anil… are you okay today?”
″I guess.” There was a catch in Morgan’s voice that made me wonder if I should have played the bad friend card and just avoided the subject altogether. “It just—it hurts. It was such a surprise, you know. I had no idea. Absolutely none.”
″He really blew you out of the water, didn’t he? And he deserves to suffer greatly for that.”
″Thanks.” Yep, she was close to crying. “Look, Case, about what Brit said last night…”
″Britney said a great many things last night.”
″About me going to that wedding with J.B.” There was a long pause. “Are you really fine with it?”
″I talked to him about it,” I told her, omitting the I’m-okay-with-it whole thing. “He said he’d check his schedule.”
“Really?” Morgan said, a little too eagerly for my liking. Morgan was in a rebound mood, and if truth be told, J.B. would be a great rebound guy.
″He’s not sure, so don’t get your hopes up yet,” I told her quickly .
″That’s fine. It’s just to make Anil jealous, you know, not that I’m interested or anything. I mean, it’s J.B. we’re talking about. It would just be nice to go with a friend.”
″Why wouldn’t you be interested in him?” I asked stupidly. “He’s a great guy—really good-looking and smart and funny and…”
Morgan laughed. “And listen to yourself. I figured out a long time ago that J.B. is off-limits. It’s me you’re talking to, not Brit, who—gotta love her—truly does believe that the world revolves around her and wouldn’t notice someone’s feelings unless they exploded all over her shoes. I am fully aware that me and J.B. —if ever anything, you know—that would be stepping on some serious toes. Your toes,” she finished, just in case I was not getting the picture.
I couldn’t help but laugh. I do love Brit and she’s been my best friend for over twenty years, but it’s nice to know sometimes that others see her faults as clearly as I do. But for Morgan to think that about J.B.… “We’re just friends,” I said lamely when I finished my giggle. “That’s it.”
″Why didn’t you ever try again?” Morgan wondered. “Cooper has to be okay with things, now that he has Emma.”
″What does that have to do with it?”
″Because Cooper was in love with you, and that’s why he didn’t want you and J.B. together. The whole living arrangement was an excuse—a pretty lame one, if you ask me.”
″Cooper was never in love with me!”
″For a smart girl, you can sure be stupid.”
″Look who’s talking!”
″Now you’re just being mean. But back to J.B.”
″You don’t know what you’re talking about with Coop. We’re friends—that’s all we’ve ever been. Just like J.B. and I. Well, maybe not, but…” I shrugged, and remembered that Morgan couldn’t see me. “He’s a good friend and I like being around him, and I really think that’s all it’s ever going to be. Besides, who knows what will happen with David, right?”
Morgan gave a little sigh. “I know what you feel about David, but don’t put all the eggs in his basket, okay? I want to see you happy. For the record, I think you and J.B. would be amazing together. And you can tell me not to invite him to go to the wedding with me, you know.”
“It’s no big deal,” I fibbed. “Besides, I’d never ask you to do that. Again. David was enough.” This, of course, reminded me of how Morgan had made the ultimate friend sacrifice and walked away years ago so I could have David .
“You know, I forgot all about that,” Morgan marveled. “If I hadn’t stepped back, there never would have been a you-and-David. There would have been a Morgan-and-David, and since I didn’t go to Europe with you and Brit, we’d still be together.” She gave a little laugh. “That’s strange to think about.”
″Strange,” I agreed. “Even stranger than you thinking Cooper was ever in love with me.”
″You should ask him someday,” Morgan laughed. “I know I’m right.”
For the rest of the day, I couldn’t quite make the thought of J.B. stay in the don’t- think-about-it box. He just kept popping out, and always when I least expected it. I’d be waiting on a customer, extolling the virtues of buying a Canadian wine, when all of a sudden I’d have an image of J.B., sitting in his boxers eating breakfast with me, or laughing at me for something, or sharing a bottle of wine over dinner. I needed to stop thinking about him. It was not even worth going there. It’s not—it couldn’t happen. It wouldn’t happen. It couldn’t, so why was I wasting my mental energy thinking about him?
To get my mind off J.B., I tried to focus on seeing David later tonight and wondered what he needed to tell me. I’ll get back together with David, and Morgan will meet someone, and J.B… I don’t know what I want for J.B., but I’m not thinking about him anymore today. David. I need to focus on David.
By the time I got home from the store around six-thirty, my headache had faded to a manageable level. A quick shower helped, and I got dressed, hurrying because I only had a few minutes. Despite all the talking David and I had to do, I couldn’t help but hope for a little action tonight, so on went my pink lace bra and thong under my black pants that make my bum look svelte. Just so you know, David fell outside the one-month-dating-before-I-sleep-with-him rule, since technically I have known him since I was nineteen.
I added my white blouse with the ruffles to the outfit. Then I took off my shirt since ruffles and dinner never go together well for me. Maybe I should wear my Capri pants, but I wanted to wear my ankle boots, so I kept on the pants. I rifled through my closet, remembering the days it was filled with the latest fashions. Those were the days when my credit cards were also filled to the brim. I’m glad I got the debt under control, but some days I really do miss the shopping .
I finally settled on a white blouse with three-quarter sleeves and my new black vest. Even though I’d be able to pass for one of the waiters at the restaurant, I had no time for any other last-minute changes. I took the two minutes until David was expected to try and tame my curls. The shower made them frizzy. I finally wet my hands and ran them through my hair as the doorbell rang upstairs. I gave myself a nervous grin in the mirror.
″Wish me luck, Sebastian-cat,” I told him, giving his head a scratch. He was watching me from the comfort of my pillow. “You’ll be the only one who wishes it.”