26. Anna
ANNA
The masseur arrives at seven.
I hear the doorbell. I've been up since five.
I make coffee. I move around the kitchen quietly while he's on the table. The house has a different feeling this morning.
There's a person growing inside me and I'm the only one who knows.
I've been thinking that sentence since three a.m. and it still doesn't feel real.
When it's done he showers. I can hear the water running upstairs.
I put down my coffee and go to the downstairs bathroom and throw up quietly with the door locked and the fan on. I run the cold water. Press a wet cloth against the back of my neck. Look at myself in the mirror until my face is something I can work with.
I go back to the kitchen.
I stop at the bottom of the stairs.
I go up to my room instead. Close the door. Sit on the edge of the bed.
I find the number for an OB on Delia's recommendation list — she made me a list of doctors when I moved in, which at the time seemed excessive. I call. I make an appointment. Ten days from now. The receptionist is cheerful. I am not.
I hang up.
I sit there for a moment with the phone in my hand.
It's real now. It was real before but now it's in someone's calendar.
I put the phone in my pocket and go back downstairs.
Nina puts a plate in front of him without a word and puts her hand on his shoulder for exactly one second before she goes back to the stove. I watch her do it. Six years she's been with him. That's her version of a speech.
He sits across from me.
"You should eat," he says.
"I'm not hungry."
I keep thinking about all the mornings ahead of this one — mornings in this kitchen without him across from me. Zeke at my feet. Nina at the stove. The city through the glass doing what it always does.
Six months of mornings.
I pretend to drink the coffee.
After breakfast he wants to take the bike out.
I already knew he would. I've been ready for it.
"No," I say.
"Anna—"
"Your contract. No motorcycles. You know that."
"How do you know that?"
"Delia told me to keep an eye on you."
"One ride."
"No. I'm putting my foot down."
I hold out my hand.
He looks at me. Puts the keys in my palm.
There's someone between us who doesn't have a name yet. I think about that every time I touch him today.
We pack together.
I made a list. I've been adding to it for weeks — things that came to me at odd moments. The charger he always forgets. The book on Sidney Poitier he put down and would never find again. The inside zipper on his carry-on that's been broken for two years.
I fix the zipper with tape from the kitchen drawer. It'll hold for a week, maybe two.
"You should download some movies for the plane," I say.
"I'll watch your season of Private Paradise."
I roll his shirts the way that takes up less space. I put the shoes in bags. I check the list on my phone one more time.
"I think that's everything," I say.
He's watching me.
"You have a list?"
"I have a list."
"That's the cutest thing I've ever heard. You have a list of what I need to take."
"Yeah. I've been working on it for a while. As things came to me."
"Come here."
"No, you're making fun of me."
"I'm not."
He holds me. His arms around me in the middle of the bedroom with the open suitcase on the floor and the city outside the window.
This is the father of my child. He doesn't know it yet. I press my face against his shirt and let myself have that for one second.
"Thanks," he says into my hair.
I step back and look at the bag.
I don't look at him.
"That's everything," I say.
He makes sure to stay close all day. I can feel him doing it deliberately — taking my hand, sitting near me, not talking about Morocco or the film or Rebecca. Just being here.
I love him for it.
It makes everything harder.
Nina keeps finding reasons to be in whatever room we're in. She's upset too, in her way. She tells him everything she has to do while he's gone. The list goes on longer than necessary.
"I'm going to miss you too, Nina," he says.
At some point in the afternoon Nina finds me in the kitchen alone. She looks at me the way she looks at things she's already figured out.
"You okay?" she says.
"I'm fine."
She looks at me a moment longer.
"You want some tea?"
"Sure," I say.
She makes it without another word. Sets it in front of me. Puts her hand on my shoulder the same way she put her hand on his this morning.
I don't say anything.
Neither does she.
We sit on the couch. It's supposed to be relaxing. My leg won't stop shaking.
In the afternoon we eat lunch on the terrace. I put my feet in his lap. He leaves his hand there. We watch the light change over LA until it goes gold. Neither of us talks much.
He thinks about saying something. I can tell. I can always tell with him now.
He doesn't say it.
I don't say mine either.
We watch the city until it's time to go.
I drive him.
The Mercedes with the top down so the suitcase fits in the back seat. The city at night moving past on both sides.
There's traffic even at night in LA.
I hold the wheel with both hands. Eyes on the road. I know he's watching me.
"You nervous?" he says.
"No."
"Anna."
"I'm fine. I just—" I stop. Start again. "I hate airports."
"LAX sucks."
I change lanes.
He's trying to read me. I can feel it. He sees that I'm upset, and he thinks it's about him leaving. He's right. He's also not right.
He reaches over and puts his hand on mine on the wheel.
I let him.
I almost say it right there on the freeway with the lights moving past us and his hand on mine.
I don't.
Departures is chaos. Carts and cabs and families and the particular controlled panic of people who are either very late or terrified of being late.
He gets his bags.
He turns around.
I don't say any of the things I planned to say.
He pulls me in.
I come. Both arms around him, my face against his neck. I let myself hold on the way I've been not letting myself hold on all day.
"It will go by like nothing," he says.
"It won't."
"I'll miss you."
"I'll miss you more."
The airport moves around us. Carts. Announcements. Someone's kid crying somewhere nearby.
I hold on.
I pull back just enough to look at him.
He kisses me. Long. His hand on my face.
Tell him. Tell him right now. You're standing right here.
A voice beside us. "You need to move the vehicle."
We both look over.
A LAX police officer. He looks at Luke.
Looks again.
"Luke Wolfe?"
"Hey," Luke says.
He stares for a second. Then remembers himself. "Sir, she needs to move the vehicle."
"This sucks," Luke says.
"No it doesn't. It's the best thing that ever happened to you."
The officer looks between us.
"Don't kiss her like that," he says.
"Like what?" Luke says.
"Go," I say.
"Anna—"
"Go, Luke."
He hands his bags to a porter.
He looks at me one more time.
I stand on the curb with my arms crossed. Holding myself together. The city behind me enormous and loud and completely indifferent.
"Six months," he says.
"Six months," I say.
He goes.
He doesn't look back.
I watch until I can't see him anymore.
Then I get in the car.
I sit there for a long time before I start the engine.
My hand goes to my stomach.
I start the engine.
I merge into traffic.
I drive home alone.
The house is quiet. Nina gone. Zeke meets me at the door.
I don't turn on any lights.
I go upstairs. Past my room. To his.
I get into his bed. His pillow. His smell still in the sheets.
Zeke jumps up beside me without being asked.
I lie there in the dark with my hand on my stomach and the city outside the window and the particular silence of a house that had someone in it this morning and doesn't anymore.
My phone lights up on the nightstand.
A missed call. Luke.
A voicemail.
I play it.
"Anna…"