Chapter 4 Liz
Liz gave her thirty-day notice to her landlord and started packing her things as she waited for Preston to bring up the pregnancy again.
It was agonizing, a true test of her willpower, but Liz was determined not to ask Preston for his thoughts before he was ready.
Two weeks after their initial conversation, and a week before Liz was set to climb that next rung of adulthood—cohabitation—she still hadn’t found out what those terms were.
She was about to learn that the conditions for discovery involved six vodka tonics.
But before Liz began debating how many hair-depilation devices and sweatshirts were too many to cram into a U-Haul, Preston invited her to go with him to his coworker Sameer’s birthday party.
It was at a dive bar in Koreatown, the kind of place that was so uncool it was cool.
Preston had texted Liz to remind her about the party, as if it weren’t implanted in her memory with the force of a thousand Sharpies.
Liz comforted herself that even though Preston had yet to bring up the elephant in the womb, at least their plans weren’t being canceled.
They were still a couple, and they were still on steady ground. Right? Maybe?
As she tripped over herself trying to figure out what to wear to the party, Liz questioned whether steady ground really existed for anyone.
Her therapist, an impossibly rational Gen X PsyD named Jayne, always reminded Liz that by validating a feeling, she perpetuated it.
Feelings are not facts, she said. They often are the mind’s most creative fiction.
The day before, Jayne had urged Liz to envision an alternative default setting.
What if, instead of ending, Jayne had said, a relationship lasted?
Well, yeah. That would be great. Only Liz had never known that to happen.
Liz was well versed in all varieties of rejection.
The swipe right that wasn’t reciprocated.
The unsubtle Do you want me to call an Uber for you?
while she was still half naked in a guy’s bed like food simmering in the pan even though the stove had been turned off.
The glaring inactivity of her phone. (Who knew you could feel the calls and texts you weren’t receiving?) The pat lines delivered unceremoniously: I’m not looking for anything serious.
I feel like something’s missing. I met someone else.
I’m getting back together with my ex, but do you wanna fuck?
Liz threw on a black sweater, gave it a cursory mirror check, then tore it off and looked at the other options splayed over her bed.
If Preston ghosted her forever or rekindled things with his ex-girlfriend, an impossibly toned, bi-curious Pilates instructor named Jessica with fake, perfect hair and real, perfect tits, would Liz really be surprised?
She pulled on another sweater—this one navy blue—and hoped for the best.
When she walked into the bar that didn’t have a sign outside and was filled with kitsch inside, Liz was relieved to see that she wasn’t too off the mark.
Some of Sameer’s friends were dressed casually, although it was the kind of casual that involved $400 Dunks, while others had come straight from work and were still wearing suits.
Liz thought that her jeans and sweater split the difference satisfactorily.
But then she watched Sameer’s wife Pia lope away from the bar to greet someone in a miniskirt, a tattered rock-band T-shirt, and four-inch stilettos.
The vibe was I just threw this on and I look like I stepped out of the pages of Vogue.
Liz had to work a messy bun for at least an hour to achieve the right kind of undone effect and couldn’t believe how naturally things—namely looks, men, and luck—came to some people.
“You made it.” Preston smiled.
“Hey, of course!” Liz hugged him and worried that she had come across as desperately overeager instead of merely (and appropriately) enthusiastic.
The night passed in a blur of inside jokes and industry banter.
Liz tried to nod and laugh at the right times and smiled extra hard when Preston threw his arm around her shoulders and told Sameer and Pia that they were moving in together.
Finally, guests started to filter out, which was a relief, because Liz’s feet were killing her.
She followed Preston to the valet stand, noticing that he was slurring his words a little, which made sense since he’d been slamming back vodka tonics all night.
Liz didn’t want to point out that Preston was plastered in case she seemed judgmental, so she just offered, “Do you want me to drive? I Ubered here because I wasn’t sure about the parking situation. ”
Preston turned. “Great!” He was unbothered, jolly, and drunk as he paid for the valet and got into the passenger seat of his BMW. Liz slid behind the wheel and adjusted the seat settings.
“I guess you’re my designated driver now,” Preston said. “That’s a perk!”
Liz flicked on the turn signal and pulled into traffic, wondering if this was when and how they were going to talk about The Pregnancy.
Liz rooted her hands at five and nine and tried to tone down her chest palpitations; it was like a flock of birds had made a nest there and were flapping their wings to the beat of a Tiesto song.
“Yeah, no need to Uber for a while.” Then she snuck a glance at Preston to make sure he wasn’t passed out against the passenger-side window.
He wasn’t necessarily alert, but he was awake, so Liz asked, “Should we talk about it? Not now, if you don’t want to…
but sometime? It’s a big thing and it wasn’t something we were expecting. ”
“But you’re expecting,” Preston said. “Wait! That was my first dad joke.” He smiled at her, and Liz felt completely and totally…
in love? Or maybe it was the hormones coursing through her body.
She asked herself if she should push for a real conversation, then shoved this thought from her mind.
Obviously, they were on the same page! So what if Preston was drunk?
Didn’t alcohol lower inhibitions, basically making it a truth serum?
Preston was making dad jokes! He was smiling!
He was going to be a dad. Their little band was going to stay together.
Liz and Preston were going to be parents.
A few days later, Liz replayed this moment as she soaked in the bathtub, cramming her limbs uncomfortably so she could fit inside.
As the water turned tepid, Liz found herself obsessing over the idea that on the same night she had prepared the elaborate dinner and sprung the pregnancy news on him, Preston had likely been planning to end things.
Liz had no evidence of this, but a good detective didn’t need any to posit a theory.
Liz arched her back and let the bathwater cascade over her torso, careful not to spill water onto the mint-green floor tiles of the apartment she’d soon be vacating.
If the results from her ten-week appointment that afternoon showed that the pregnancy wasn’t viable, no one would be the wiser.
They’d just think Liz had let herself go and slacked off on the strict exercise regimen that allowed her to eat most major food groups and still hold steady at an acceptable size six (four in J.Crew, but everyone knew that didn’t count).
Liz forced herself to get out of the tub.
She stretched her legs, which ached from being constricted too long, then stepped through the maze of boxes and inspected herself in the full-length mirror.
She was suffering hormonal breakouts that had focused their attention on her chin, so she was sporting a goatee of pimples.
She had immediately developed a dark line of fur, a stripe stretching across her navel, which made her feel like a skunk.
And while her belly area was protruding, especially at night after a full day of eating, other areas of her body were too.
Unless the baby was also growing in Liz’s ass, it was safe to say that pregnancy was hurling its insults upon her, not its kindnesses.
Half an hour later, Preston met her at the doctor’s office, rushing into the waiting room ten minutes late.
“Did I miss anything?” Preston asked, a bit breathless.
Liz had the unkind thought that her very fit boyfriend wasn’t out of breath but rather putting it on for effect to make up for not being on time.
“Just my weigh-in,” Liz answered. “So, no. Nothing at all. Not a pound.”
Preston sensed her discomfort and rubbed Liz’s back. “Babe, don’t worry. You look great.” Liz smiled. “You aren’t fat, you’re pregnant,” he added.
But after Liz gave what felt like an arm’s worth of blood and she and Preston were led into a generic exam room, Dr. Rosenblatt, an experienced but stone-faced man in his sixties who had a good rating online and accepted Liz’s health insurance, also took note of her “accelerated weight gain.” Dr. Rosenblatt warned Liz that rapid weight gain could put her into the high-risk category for pregnancy.
Liz wanted to protest that they hadn’t even ruled out chromosomal abnormalities and they were already talking about how much she was eating, but she nodded and kept quiet.
While gesturing for Liz to insert her feet into the cold metal stirrups, Dr. Rosenblatt cautioned her against giving in to every craving.
“Right now, your baby is the size of a kumquat,” he said, inspecting her cervix.
“Or a mini cocktail sausage!” Preston announced.
Dr. Rosenblatt looked at him quizzically.
“There’s an alternative week-by-week comparison guide,” Liz explained.
“It’s more fun than fruits and vegetables,” Preston said.