173 Days
Rhea opened her front door and watched Danny walk up fifty-two steps with a tote bag full of Italian ingredients.
Since she had spent so many nights at his house, he’d insisted on traveling west for her.
She did not argue, mostly because she hoped being on her turf would give her the strength to confess her inner turmoil.
That way, if he stormed out, she could at least sob into her own mattress; driving home in thick traffic after Danny shattered her heart would be too much to bear.
The romantic plan for the evening was to make a pizza, then go to the Ferris wheel on the Santa Monica Pier. After learning that Rhea had not only never been on the Santa Monica Ferris wheel but had never been on any Ferris wheel, Danny became determined to change that.
Like camping, riding a Ferris wheel was an activity Rhea never knew she had always wanted to try.
She pushed aside her fear of heights and relished the image of her and Danny eating cotton candy while soaring above the ocean on a giant wheel: the American dream, a symbol of happy childhoods and loving families; the ideal location to inquire how Danny felt about being a father.
As they began mixing pizza dough, Rhea offered the perfect lubricant for shoving the idea of parenting onto Danny: a picture of Tiny’s newborn son, Wolfie. She held up her phone, and Danny gave the appropriate response to a newborn he did not care about:
“Aw, wow, look at that little guy.”
Tiny had given birth three weeks earlier.
Her doctor had put her on bed rest for the final stretch of her pregnancy, so she was not able to have a baby shower.
Zoe and Ada threatened to bring a baby shower to her bedside, but when Tiny told them, dead seriously, she would have her security team escort them off the property, they relented.
Tiny had been relieved; no part of her wanted a baby shower.
She could not imagine smiling for photos in a flower crown while being eaten alive from the inside.
Rhea had been equally relieved; she could not imagine prancing around yet another baby shower while her heart was being eaten alive from the inside.
As much as Tiny hated being pregnant and referred to Wolfie as an asshole in utero, she was enamored with her son and sent pictures to the Ada-Tiny-Rhea-Zoe text chain every few hours.
Rhea often wondered why she was still on the chain.
It was now solely used for pictures of babies.
Rhea grew weary of coming up with new compliments for her friends’ kids, so she started just sending emojis—hearts, balloons, smiley faces, whatever the occasion required—and this seemed to satisfy her friend group’s thirst for validation.
They tried tossing the pizza dough up in the air, like real Italians, but it kept falling on the floor, so they gave up and just shaped it with their hands.
This was the tenth time they had cooked dinner together.
If Rhea had known how much fun cooking could be, she would’ve started years ago.
She pulled out the chef’s knife Danny had bought her and began chopping garlic.
“Is Danny short for Daniel?” she asked.
“No, it’s short for Dandelion.” The gravelly timbre of his voice elevated his corny humor, making it sound wonderfully dry and clever.
Rhea laughed accordingly. “It just dawned on me that you could have some unusual name I’ve never heard of.”
“Nope, I’m just Daniel. But please don’t call me that. It’s my dad’s name.”
“Really? You’re Daniel Beckett, Jr.?”
“Have I mentioned my dad is a narcissist?”
“I can’t believe you’ve secretly been a junior this whole time.”
Rhea was trying to imagine how she would feel if her name were Sarah Darby, Jr., when her cellphone rang.
She saw Ada’s name and her heart skipped.
Ada was two weeks past her due date, and everyone was on edge.
Rhea answered, and the sound of Marcus’s voice made her knees soften; one never wanted to hear the wrong voice on the other end of the phone.
“Hey, we need a favor—” Marcus said.
“Of course, anything.”
“We’re at Trinity, and the baby’s heart rate is low. They wanna do a C-section, but the kids are home with our nanny and—”
“I’ll go to your house right now.”
“Oh, thank you so much. We might have to stay the night here, we’re not sure how long this is gonna take—”
“I’ll stay with them. I’ll take off work tomorrow.”
Danny was eyeing Rhea with concern.
“Can I talk to Ada?”
She felt tears welling, and Danny squeezed her hand.
“She’s with the doctor, I’ll see if she can call you before they take her…wherever they’re taking her.”
She heard Marcus sniffle. Ada Achebe took her birth plan very seriously and had thus far never strayed from it.
Her first two children were born on time, at home, with the same weather-beaten doula and no complications.
Ada’s life always went according to plan, and everyone in her circle was woefully unprepared for this turn of events.
“She’s going to be okay; they do this all the time.” Rhea’s comforting words were meant for herself as much as Marcus.
“Yeah…she just really didn’t want to do a C-section.”
“I know…but when it’s over, she’ll be healthy, the baby will be healthy, and everything will be fine.”
Rhea tried to stop tears from falling, but the idea of Ada not being fine had entered her mind, and she could not get it out.
Although they did not talk as much as they used to, and Ada’s life seemed a touch too full for Rhea at the moment, Ada was still the closest thing she had to a family.
She imagined indestructible Ada in a gown, on a gurney, scared and listening to a doctor explain the danger her precious baby was in.
Rhea wanted to drive to Trinity and rescue her; instead, she would rescue her children.
—
Danny drove them through the canyon toward Ada’s neighborhood. When he offered to come, Rhea almost said no, but she could not imagine coping with her Ada anxiety without her human Xanax.
He held her hand and tried to lighten the mood. “She’s gonna be okay. Two of my sisters had C-sections; it’s not ideal, but they were totally fine.”
“Yeah, I know, she’s tough, she’s gonna be fine.”
“And we’re still getting on that Ferris wheel, Darby. I’m taking you tomorrow, even if we have to bring the kids with us.”
He brought her hand to his lips and kissed it firmly; she realized it was shaking. She had to focus on something other than Ada in peril. She knew sending her friend fearful thoughts was not going to help. She tried to send Ada some positive vibes by recalling joyful memories from their teen years.
Chichi inherited that loud, wild laugh from her mother.
In high school, Ada had the most wonderful habit of laughing so hard she would lose control of her bladder.
Rhea and Tiny used to make it their mission to make Ada pee her pants.
If Ada’s pants were left dry, they did not consider it an evening well spent.
Rhea, Zoe, and Tiny were in Ada’s room, well past their bedtime, playing truth or dare, and Tiny said, “I dare all of us to streak to the stop sign.”
Tiny had become obsessed with the idea of streaking, an activity that seemed to be reserved for boys, but Tiny wanted in. She pointed out the window to the stop sign at the end of the street. Protestive groans rippled through the group.
“Rules are rules,” Tiny said.
They climbed out of Ada’s window and hid in a bush. As they stripped down, they started giggling. By the time they were naked, they were in hysterics, trying to keep their laughter down so they did not wake Ada’s parents.
“Tiny, I can’t do it—the streetlights are too bright,” Rhea said, which sent peals of laughter through the group.
“You have to.”
“I’m never gonna forgive you for this. If someone sees us, I’ll sue you,” Zoe said.
“Guys, I think I’m having a heart attack,” Ada said through hyperventilating breaths.
This made them all hunch over, laughing while tears spilled.
“Please, Tiny? Any other dare—I’ll do it,” Rhea begged.
“Nope, this is happening. Suck it. The fuck. Up.”
They held hands, counted down from three, and ran out into the street. Their hysterics made it challenging to run. At least one of them had to keep slowing the group down for laughter, but they did not drop hands, and Tiny forced them to continue.
“Guys, wait—I have to stop—” Ada said.
“No! We’re so close!”
“I’m peeing! I’m peeing!” Ada screamed as pee ran down her legs.
This unhinged the group. They roared with laughter; even Ada was guffawing.
“I have to go back!” Ada said, leaving a trail of urine behind her.
“No! Keep going.”
They touched the stop sign and sprinted back to Ada’s house.
When they got back to their hiding place, the laughter was finally dying down, and Ada said, “Well…at least I didn’t pee my pants.”
Rhea smiled at this memory and imagined sending it telepathically to Ada, along with a cascade of love.
When Rhea and Danny arrived at the Achebe-Miller house, the exhausted nanny looked at them as if they were allied forces come to liberate her.
Chichi ran to Rhea and demanded a joke. Rhea and Danny had looked up several kids’ jokes on the way over and repeated them, to Chichi’s delight.
Ekele watched his nanny grab her purse and speed-walk to the door.
“Where’s Mommy?” he asked.
Rhea tried to explain that his mommy would be home soon but was not able to get three words out before Ekele started wailing. His nanny left a nanny-shaped hole in the wall as she fled from the property and ran to her car. Rhea picked Ekele up, which made him scream harder.
She tried to soothe him; she gently bounced him until he yelled, “Stop bouncing me!”
She tried to calmly explain that everything was going to be all right until he yelled, “Stop talking!”