Reid
He had known his answer was going to be yes no matter what she asked of him.
But he could never have anticipated the request.
Maya had gone quiet. She lifted her head.
"I do want something from you,” she said.
"Yes."
She almost smiled at that. It wasn't quite a smile. It was the ghost of one, tired at the edges.
"You don't know what it is."
"Doesn't matter."
"It might."
"It won't."
He watched her, waiting. She took a breath—the kind of breath you take before you go underwater—and she said it.
"I want a baby."
Reid didn't move.
"I want your baby," Maya said. "I want you to—" She stopped. She pressed her lips together and started again. "I want you to get me pregnant."
His ears were ringing. Reid became aware that he was still looking at her. He became aware that he had not blinked in some time.
He opened his mouth.
He closed it.
Yes was already there, already sitting behind his teeth—yes, yes, whatever you need, yes—and it was the only thing that was true.
"Maya," he said.
"I know how it sounds."
"I don't—"
A baby.
His baby.
Their baby.
He had to close his eyes for a second because the want of it went through him so fast it was almost violent.
"Yes," he said.
It came out rougher than he meant it to.
Her eyes widened.
"Reid—"
"Yes. Whatever you—yes. Of course yes."
"You don't have to—"
"Maya." He leaned forward without meaning to. He made himself stop. He didn’t want to crowd her. "Of course. Of course yes. I would—there is nothing you could ask me for that the answer is not yes. I told you that. I meant it."
He had a thousand questions.
Where would she live. Would he be a father or just…a donor? Did she want to use a clinic or was this—did she want him to—
His face went hot.
There were more important considerations.
"Would I—" His voice caught. He started again. "Would I be in their life?”
Maya's eyes closed, briefly.
"Reid."
"I'm not—I'm not asking for a promise. I'm asking what you're imagining. When you—when you pictured it, was I—"
"Yes," she said.
She was giving him more than she had given him in a week. She was giving him more than he had earned, possibly more than he would ever earn. She was telling him that in whatever future she was imagining, he was in it—not as her husband but a part of her life. Present. A face his child would know.
He pressed the heel of his hand briefly against his eye.
"Okay," he said. And he knew he had no right to make the demand that was burning in him.
"Okay."
"Okay. I have—one thing."
“What is it?” she asked.
"It's a condition." He said because it was. "It’s non-negotiable.”
"Reid."
"I'm going to provide for you. Both of you."
She opened her mouth.
“Whatever happens between us, whatever you decide, I am going to provide for you. You and the baby. Whether you're living here in this house or if you sell it and you're living three states away and I only get see the child every other month—”
His voice cracked then. He kept going.
"I will still be providing. That is not up for discussion. The rest—the rest is whatever you want. But this—" He swallowed. "I'm telling you. I’m not asking."
For a second he thought he'd overstepped. For a second he thought she was going to stand up and walk out of the room and he would never see her again, and he had offered her a thousand yeses and then drawn one line and that was going to be what broke it—
"Okay," she said.
He blinked.
"Okay?"
"Okay, Reid."
"You're—"
"I'm not going to fight you on that one," she said. Her voice was uneven.
"Okay."
They sat there.
He was going to have a child.
With his wife.
He put his hand over his mouth. He felt terror and gratitude and grief and a stupid, stubborn, animal joy. He tried not to let any of it onto his face.
He was going to be worthy of this.
He was going to spend the rest of his life being worthy of it.
The front door closed behind Maya.
His brain seemed unable to process what had just happened. His wife had asked him for a baby.
The clock in the hallway ticked.
I want your baby.
He couldn’t sit still. He had to move.
He had thought someday. They had both thought someday. He hadn’t wanted to rush her.
And then he had put handcuffs on her, and someday had died along with everything else.
I want you to get me pregnant.
He walked without any destination in mind, barely registering the streets he passed or the people around him.
He’d stopped walking. When had he stopped walking? A woman with a stroller went around him with a faintly irritated glance. There was a vision of Maya in his head and she was—she was—
She was pregnant.
His breath went.
He took a deep breath and started walking again.
And underneath it all was the other thing. The mechanical fact of it. The how.
His face was hot.
He was a grown man and he was walking down a public street with his face hot like a teenager because his wife—his wife, his Maya—had sat across a table from him and asked him to… impregnate her.
He thought about being inside her. He thought about her hand on the back of his neck. He thought about the way she—
He walked into a tree.
He rocked back a step, and stood there on the sidewalk.
"Jesus," he said.
He put his hand against the trunk to steady himself. Reid pressed his forehead against the bark.
He was going to be a father.
Maybe. If it worked, if her body did what she was asking it to do, and his body did what he was asking it to do, and if whatever fragile biology they were about to attempt cooperated.
He had shut all of that down when he shut the door on her.
And now she was handing this part of it back to him.
She was asking him for a child without asking him to be her husband. He would respect that.
He touched his cheekbone, carefully. There was going to be a bruise tomorrow.
He started walking again.
He was going to be the kind of father that a child of Maya's deserved.
I want your baby, she had said.
Your baby.
He looked at his wedding ring, and he thought, okay.
Okay.
Let's go.