Chapter 34 Baby on the Brain
Eva
“He’s very busy,” a saleswoman remarked.
“Yeah. It’s just business. He’s not being rude,” I said. “This was his idea.”
It had to do with a real estate deal in New York.
“Dads are always too busy, you know?” She said, chipper.
I handed her a line of clothes that fit god-awful and exchanged them for a handful that could accommodate my massive boobs and wouldn’t give me awful camel toe. Everything was stretchy and pulled in places it shouldn’t.
“These are good. These aren’t,” I gestured.
She took the failures and hung them on a garment rack. “Well, should we pull some more clothes?”
“I need something more work professional,” I said. “I often dress a little down, but there are days I meet with the board or entire c-suite where I need something smart.”
“Most women use pregnancy as a time to slow down and lean into comfort. You’re one of those high-profile women?” Her tone suggested that was not a compliment.
“I don’t know about that.” I glanced at Davey outside. “But my CEO is a pain in the ass. Thankfully, I don’t think he gives a shit about my wardrobe. Still, I’d like to feel more me, ya know?”
“We have some work dresses that are a little more formal,” she agreed.
I followed her to the rows of clothes, picking out a few simple black dresses that I could pair with one of the fifty colorful cardigans I owned. I found two that worked by time Davey finally graced us with his presence.
“I’m so sorry,” he apologized earnestly. “Disaster. Chaos. But I’m back. Did you make any progress?”
“I found a few things,” I said as the perky saleswoman toted my clothes.
“Good. I’m glad. Did you get something to wear to dinner tomorrow?”
“What?” I asked.
“We’re having dinner with the family to celebrate the baby.”
“I know. Is it an induction? Do I need robes? Sacred underpants?”
He snickered. “Mum keeps it relatively formal. A dress or jacket sort of thing.”
I controlled the urge to roll my eyes. I’d hoped to get away with a sweater, leggings, and boots. Instead, I had to put on a work dress and heels. Just the thought made me want to revolt and say I didn’t want to come.
“That’s just… how it is. I’m sorry I didn’t tell you.” Davey realized I was now even less enthusiastic.
“So, are we adding those to the registry or… buying them today?” The saleswoman returned.
“Registry?” Davey asked. “No. She needs the clothes. Why would we have a registry?”
“Most people… register for gifts,” the woman said, confused. “For their showers.”
“Oh, we won’t be doing that,” Davey said. “Whatever we need, we’ll either order or get today.”
My face fell. I hadn’t expected to care. After years of planning baby showers, I realized I’d never have one.
“You will have people who want to buy you some sweet gifts,” the saleswoman said. “And if you don’t register, you will have to explain what you do and don’t want. Trust me, you will thank me later.”
I shot Davey a look, telling him to shut up.
I wasn’t about to argue, and he got himself in so much trouble over the last week that he knew better than to poke the bear.
I wanted to trust him again. I wanted to fall in love with him—just like he wanted me to—but I couldn’t get there.
Here was a man willing to do anything and buy me anything I needed or even wanted.
He’d wait on me hand and foot. He did and said stupid things, but only because he wore his heart on his sleeve and I flustered him.
He loved me. Why couldn’t I love him back?
“Sure,” I said.
She left. “I will go grab the iPad!”
Davey said, “Eva, it’s gauche.”
“Davey, I have normal friends who would like to see a registry.”
“We don’t need people to buy us things.”
“And yet, we are here trying to also buy a present for Cordelia, yeah? Wouldn’t a registry help?”
“It cannot be that hard.”
“So, you do it. Find things for your sister and the baby.” I turned the request for emotional labor on him.
“Uh… sure.” Davey disappeared to where all the baby clothes lived.
I prepared to be unimpressed with his choices.
To my surprise—and relief—the woman brought Davey the iPad so he could input our details while I continued shopping. There was some justice in the world! I grinned at her as she passed, continuing to file through lines of strollers, cribs, and car seats.
“Are you finding everything alright?” An older woman approached.
“We’re browsing, thanks. The other woman is trying to walk my boyfriend through the registry he insists we don’t need.”
“Well, you will want to order a crib. Are you what… thirty weeks along?”
Twenty,” I answered. “Twins. Two boys. Two big, healthy boys that are measuring ahead for twins.”
“Oh, I am so sorry. No wonder you all are so busy. Twins are wonderful, but also a hit to the pocketbook right out of the gate. We have a variety of price points—”
She stopped, her demeanor changed as Davey returned holding a dress fit for a toddler and a sack of fancy organic cotton burp cloths.
She went from assuming I sought bargain bin options to realizing we had money.
Davey got a completely different reception than his average-looking girlfriend. I hated it.
“No to the dress. She’s a newborn—and a tiny one at that,” I said. “Get her practical things. Your sister isn’t fussy. The cloths are a good choice.”
“She’s a girl. Aren’t you supposed to want to dress them up?”
I snickered. “Davey, she’s a girl, not a princess. Babies are basically all the same. You don’t know what Daphne plans. She may want to lean into gender neutral. I know I do. I want absolutely nothing to do with superheroes or sports shit.”
“Not even the Cubs?” Davey asked, wounded. “Or football?”
“You don’t even care about the Bears!”
“No. Premier League and our team, babe.”
“Our team?”
“We own a minors team,” Davey said. “You didn’t get this in the presentation?”
“What presentation?”
“Onboarding.”
“To the family?”
“To the company! Jesus. I paid a fucking fortune to have that video made. The last president called it ‘essential’, and they aren’t even doing it!? Damn.”
The old woman awkwardly stared in confusion.
“Well, the more you know,” I sighed. “This is not a today discussion. Today, we need a crib, car seats, and a stroller. That’s it.”
“A crib for sure. They can take a bit to arrive—they come custom, you know? The good news is a travel crib or bassinet will do for the first few months just fine.”
“Months? You don’t have anything just… in the back?” I asked.
“Eva, we don’t want some stock crib. We want something nice,” Davey insisted.
I rolled my eyes. “It’s a crib, not an heirloom hutch.”
“You can pass them on to future children when they are well made.”
“See,” Davey said.
Was he really implying I should do this all over? Was he insane?
I shook my head. “I don’t even know where to begin there. Let’s look at what they have.”
Davey and I quickly agreed on minimalist cribs to match the aesthetic of the house—all in a beautiful barely-there blue that the woman tried to talk us out of since we might someday have a girl.
I assured her a blue crib would also work for a girl.
When it came to strollers and car seats, Davey immediately glommed onto a gigantic SUV-size stroller with two car seats priced the same as an economy car.
I was too tired to debate him and figured if I hated it, I could buy something else in a few months.
We needed car seats that could handle sub-six pounders more than anything, so we bit the bullet.
Davey didn’t bat an eye at the more than ten grand we dropped even if I about fell over at the cost. It was hard to consider how little we’d gotten for so much and how he worried even less about it.
I still didn’t understand these people, their habits, and what even drove them.
Worrying I’d never fit in—or that he’d never accept the real me, we put everything in the back of his SUV and drove back to the city.
I fought tears the entire way. At the time, I couldn’t explain it, but I felt like with every tie binding me and every purchase made, I left a life behind—the one I thought I’d have.
Davey
Precious Cordelia Alma delighted everyone.
Mum had never looked happier than when holding a baby in her arms. Eva came out of her shell—smiling for the first time in seemingly ages—as she held Daphne and Cal’s daughter.
Everyone perked up, but I struggled. It wasn’t the baby.
She was wonderful. It was so much more, and I lacked words.
As we left for the evening, Eva faded into her cloud, and I fell silent.
After things felt right, they’d fallen apart.
For the last week, I’d tried everything in my arsenal to fix things, but they didn’t improve.
I tried groveling, feeding her, sex, and even buying her clothes.
Literally nothing worked. I was out of ideas and beginning to resent Eva’s mood.
Returning home, Eva said, “I’m going to bed. I am going to meet Ellie in the morning and I’m tired.”
I couldn’t hide my feelings. She read my face.
“You know, Davey, I am sick of whatever this is. I don’t owe you anything. And if you want to fuck me, you can do it, leave, and then go back to whatever video game you’re playing with your friends.”
“Way to go,” I said. “Way to ruin the evening!”
“Me? You were all happy until we met the baby. Then, we did, and you went all quiet. Are you going to be like this with our babies?”
I resisted the urge to slam the kitchen island but balled my fists.
Eva, tearful, demanded, “Are you finally getting cold feet? After all of this, you’re finally going to leave, aren’t you? Or, rather, you’re about to kick me out.”
Realizing how much I’d hurt her, I pled. “No, Eva, calm down.”
“No, you hold all the power, and this is yet one more move—”
“Oh, really! Because you deny you love me to torture me, and you are holding everything with these babies over my head! You are the one pulling one over me!”
“I don’t do that. And it’s not… I cannot do this!” Eva turned, striding towards the stairs.
She raced up so fast that she tripped, barely catching herself. I approached in a panic, and she pushed me away.
“No, Davey! No!” She continued to the bedroom where she attempted to rummage under the bed for her suitcase.
I pulled her back. “Eva, I love you. I am only trying to help. I am not getting cold feet. I… I need support, too. All I want is for you to be there for me for once.”
“Why? So you can throw all of it in my face about where I am failing?”
“Not everything is about you, Eva! Jesus fucking Christ! I’m human, too. I need love and support. I give you everything, but I cannot help but feel you aren’t invested.”
She stopped, tears streaming. She sat on the bed, rubbing her stomach. I realized it was now or never. She was finally listening.
“Dad died before there were any grandkids. I know you didn’t meet him.
And the more things we do—the closer we become—I struggle because I know he would have loved you.
He would have been the first one to rush in excited about our happy accidents.
I know he would have never put Cordelia down.
To know that Cal was in the family and they had a baby would have made him cry tears of joy, Eva.
Sometimes, all of this feels so hollow. It’s got nothing to do with you.
It’s loss. It’s grief. And it’s much more than whatever crawled up your ass this week. ”
Eva cried more. “You can be upset without always taking it out on me.”
“Eva, stop. I don’t—”
“I miss my family,” she interrupted. “I am sorry about your dad. I know what that feels like because it seems fucking pointless. They will never know our boys. They will never give a flying fuck about them.”
“Eva, that’s not true.”
“It is. Everything I knew I wanted when I had kids is dead.”
I sat in bed next to her, realizing we felt the same. Fuck.
“I’m sorry, babe. I get it,” I said. “I wish we’d just talked.”
“I thought you were just happy-go-lucky while I was starting to die inside.”
I wrapped my arm around her. “No. I’m just better at masking it, I guess.”
“You’re better at compartmentalizing.”
“Hard disagree, Eva. I can never get the full story from you, baby. Let me in. If you do, I think we’ll communicate better.”
“I tried. I tried at the doctor’s. I tried at the baby store. I keep trying and it just doesn’t work. Maybe we don’t work? We just don’t live in the same world. We don’t speak the same language, Davey.”
“I refuse to believe that. Tell me what is bothering you. I’m listening.” I rubbed her back, giving her time to breathe.
“I want my mom. I wanted to go shopping with her and pick out clothes and plan the nursery with her. I wanted my dad to help build something. I wanted to do the things my sister got to do with them. And I wanted so badly to have a shower. You can say it’s gauche or stupid, but where I come from, it’s a big fucking deal.
It’s a huge thing. And… I won’t get that.
You made it so clear. It doesn’t fit into your world.
It doesn’t meet your family’s expectations.
So, we cannot do it. Our children need to sit completely in your little world—a domain I don’t understand.
It makes me what to scream. I feel like an accessory whose wants and desires don’t matter.
That’s why when you brought up names, I had a meltdown. ”
“Shit. Eva… I didn’t think you’d care about any of that. I want you to fit in—and you do. Mum loves you. My sisters adore you. Derrick likes to joke with you, so that’s as good as it gets.”
“I mold myself to fit in. I know how to talk and act as well as I can, but it’s not the same thing when you’re having babies—when you’re trying to raise them.
I want them to have drive and to appreciate hard work.
And I want them to love and respect their grandparents—both sets—regardless of what their bank accounts say. I won’t get any of that, Davey.”
My heart broke.
I pulled her closer. “Your parents love you, Eva. They will come around.”
“I have heard nothing. They will stick by Brooke and want me to play nice. And even if they threw me a stupid shower, you’d fight me, and she’d show up and fucking ruin it.”
“I want to believe—and truly do—that they will fix things. It will never be perfect, but they love you. Why don’t you call them—”
“I’m not in a place I can emotionally do that.” Eva shook her head. “And you deserve better than this. You’re right. I should—”
I cupped her face. “No, Eva. I am sorry. I should have just told you how I felt—confided in you. We should have communicated better. But there is no one else and there’s nothing more I want than for us to just be happy—all four of us, okay? Stop going there. Stop doubting your feelings.”
“I am trying, okay.”
“Don’t leave. I’d never forgive myself if you did.” I kissed her forehead. “I love you—And these babies. Just let me love you.”