Bachelor Mother (2 page)

* * *

She was fighting back tears. He was hurting with her. Funny how all the women he knew didn’t want children but could have them so easily. And Mel –

“You’re sure you want a child?” he asked.

Her eyes were brimming as she looked at him. He handed her a paper napkin off the coffee table.

“I’ve never been so sure of anything! Everything else in life has been a big decision but I’ve always known I wanted children.”

Something in her tone of voice tore at his emotions. He knew she was telling him the truth. As a little girl, Mel had been fascinated with babies. The youngest child in a large family, she’d had plenty of practice with both her sisters’ children.

She’d make someone a terrific mother.

“Do we go to a doctor or something?” Now he was awkward, not knowing what to do. He wasn’t even sure he could do it. How exactly did a guy approach this sort of problem?

“Well…” Now Mel seemed awkward. “I read up on everything, fertility clinics, artificial insemination, embryos. Bubba, it all takes time, even to get an appointment, and I don’t have that much. Four months, maybe six. I thought it would be quicker if we just took things into our own hands.”

He tried to laugh at her choice of words but found his breath was lodged in his throat. “Mel, I feel kind of strange about this.”

“Couldn’t you just pretend I was Joanie?”

“No. I don’t think I have that good an imagination.” The minute he saw the expression on her face he regretted his choice of words. “Hey, Mel, I didn’t mean it that way. I mean, Joanie is just someone I have fun with. She knows it and she feels the same way. But with you…” His words trailed off. He wasn’t really sure what he’d been about to say. When Melanie touched his shoulder, he looked up.

“You don’t have to do anything besides get me pregnant. We can go to a lawyer, make everything legal. I wouldn’t ask you for child support or try to trick you into marrying me.”

“Hey, cut it out! I know you, Mel. You wouldn’t pull any stunt like that! And we don’t need to go to any lawyer.”

“No, I’d feel better if we did. I want everything to be up front. I don’t want to cause you any more trouble than I have to.”

“What will you tell your family?” He could just picture Donnie’s reaction.

“The truth.
After
  I’ve started to show. Then I’ll be too far along for any alternate suggestions.”

“You’re really serious.”

“Yeah. There’s just no other way.”

“When did you… ah, if we do this, when did you want to…” He couldn’t seem to make himself say the words.

He noticed she was very careful not to look at him as she replied.

“I’ve been taking my temperature every morning. Saturday night would be perfect.”

“
This
  Saturday?”
Tomorrow
? 
He felt as if he were choking.

Mel stood up and began to pace restlessly around the living room. He could sense her nervousness and knew she was deeply upset. He was about to get up off the couch when she whirled on him.

“I can’t believe I asked you!” Her color was high. He knew she was embarrassed. “It’s a stupid idea, Bubba. I want you to forget this entire conversation ever happened.”

“Come on, Mel, that’s no way to approach our problem.”

“
My
  problem, not yours. I’m sorry, Bubba. I shouldn’t have gotten you mixed up in this mess. You’re a nice guy. I know you’re feeling sorry for me.”

“Hey, Mel, come on! This isn’t like you.”

“This whole
evening
  isn’t like me.” She stopped pacing abruptly and met his eyes. “I’ve got to go. Ridiculous. This has got to be the most ridiculous idea I’ve ever had in my life. So stupid.” She was muttering to herself as she stomped off down his short hall and threw open the front door.

“Mel!” He got up and ran after her.

She was walking briskly across the short expanse of lawn that separated their two houses.

“Mel, I’ll come over in the morning and we’ll talk, okay?”

“I want you to forget this entire evening ever happened!”

He watched as she slammed her screen door. Then silence descended.

He sighed.
Forget this evening? That’s as impossible as riding a thirty-foot wave with a boogie board.

* * *

Moonlight filtered through the curtains in Melanie’s bedroom making patterns across the patchwork quilt. She glanced at the luminous dial of the clock.
Almost four in the morning and I still can’t sleep.

Melanie turned over on her side and bunched the pillow under her head. Alicia had left a text on her cell, asking her what Bubba had decided. She hadn’t texted back. It seemed too personal, somehow, to tell Alicia what had happened tonight.

I wonder how most couples decide to have a child
, she thought sleepily. How wonderful if she’d simply had a loving husband who’d say, “Of course we’ll have a child right away. I want to have children just as much as you do.”

She was surprised at the tear that slipped slowly down her cheek. As confident as she’d sounded with Bubba, inside she was terrified. Who was she to bring a child into the world, a child with only a mother? Didn’t every child deserve a father?

Sometimes you don’t have a choice. Sometimes you don’t get the whole dream.

She thought of the smallest bedroom in her house, just down the hall from her master bedroom. Over the past few weeks she’d slowly transformed it. Whenever she’d been depressed over the problem facing her, she’d worked on the little room. It had become her symbol of hope.

The nursery was painted a sunny yellow. She’d put up white ruffled curtains in both windows. Large white shelves, big enough for plenty of toys, ran along two of the walls. There was a dresser she’d refinished and painted white, a mobile she’d bought on impulse that had tiny teddy bears sitting on stuffed stars and clouds. She’d even bought a grow chart with an ostrich on it.

She’d crocheted two baby afghans and bought a small crib-size patchwork quilt. She’d placed her own beloved teddy bear, all moth-eaten but carefully stitched up, in a place of honor in the middle of the top shelf.

There’s so very much I want to give you,
she thought quietly, thinking of the child she wanted.
So much I want to share.

But as badly as she wanted a child, was she doing the right thing, asking Bubba to help her? Was she asking too much in the name of friendship?

You were wrong to even ask.

She knew he lived a casual, easygoing life. Bubba’s house was always open to his friends. His weekend parties were infamous. During the summer he had a group of friends who made up two opposing volleyball teams. They played twice a week in his large backyard.

Everyone knew Bubba. Even the senior citizens on the block speculated on “when that nice young man was going to settle down.”

Melanie knew it wasn’t going to happen for a long time. Bubba liked his lifestyle. He’d made that very clear to the legions of women who dated him. He liked to pick up and go, make trips up the coast at a moment’s notice. Bubba loved to surf. His last vacation had been to Hawaii to catch some super big waves.

He’d kept almost all his friends from his childhood, including her brother Donnie. He was a congenial host, an easygoing date, a sensitive friend.

It was clear to anyone with eyes he was a totally free spirit.

She turned over one last time, thoroughly exhausted. Melanie fell asleep and dreamed of Bubba on the beach with a flock of children, teaching them to surf.

* * *

You are getting drunk.

Bubba swirled the last of the wine in his glass, then tipped it into his mouth. After Mel had left he’d gone back to the couch and tried to watch a late-night talk show.

It had been impossible. He hadn’t been able to get Mel out of his mind.

Are you crazy? What do you think you are, some kind of machine? A super stud baby maker?

He set his glass down on the coffee table, rolled over on to his stomach and groaned.

How would you ever go to bed with her? You’ve known her since she was in diapers.

Saturday night. Tomorrow. Tomorrow night Mel wanted him to throw off his clothes and jump her bones as if she were a casual date. His dates were women who wanted physical sensation, pleasure and release, and who definitely knew the score. Who wouldn’t be hurt.

Would I hurt her by doing this?
  The thought had plagued him for hours. Yet he couldn’t bear the idea of her picking up some stranger in a bar.

If there was a woman in his life he knew inside and out, it was Melanie Randell. He’d practically lived at her house and watched her grow up. He knew how much she loved children and animals, how she hated Japanese food. He was also well aware of the stubborn streak of independence that surfaced in her fights with her overprotective big brother. Donnie could be a pain in the ass.

But more important, he knew that underneath that strong-as-steel exterior was a sensitive woman who felt deeply. It had cost her a lot to come to him with her problem. He’d seen it in her face, how she’d hated asking him if he’d father a child for her. She’d been as awkward, as embarrassed, as he’d been.

So do you do it or not?

He closed his eyes as a subtle wave of dizziness washed over him.

Great planning. You should be getting a good night’s sleep, popping zinc pills and pumping iron, not getting dead drunk and lying on the couch at
– he raised his head and blearily eyed the clock on the wall –
four in the morning.

He rested his cheek against a cushion and stared at the far wall, the colors in the curtains blurring. There was no way he was going to let Mel have sex with a perfect stranger. What if she ended up with a real loony tune, someone who messed her up? Or what if the guy found out and tried to take the child away from her?

I don’t think I can do it.

He cursed Phillip fluently as he slowly rose to his feet and began to climb the steps to his bedroom.

It was a mess. Though he hired a cleaning lady to come in once a week, and was quite adept as far as cooking and dishes went, he tended to let his bedroom mushroom out of control like a nuclear blast. There were dirty clothes piled up in one corner, a stack of architecture magazines in the other. His bed was unmade.

It didn’t look inviting.

You aren’t going to be getting any sleep tonight. You might as well clean it up.

Bubba stalked into the bathroom and filled the sink with cold water. Gritting his teeth, he stuck his head underwater for as long as he could stand it. When he finally surfaced and reached for a towel, his head felt slightly clearer. This accomplished, he began to straighten his bedroom.

One look at this and she’d run out screaming. No mother would want her child to inherit messy genes.
He sighed.
Just tell her you don’t think you can do it.

When Melanie opened her eyes the next morning she wondered why she felt so disoriented, so out of sorts. Then she remembered. Bubba. Last night.

Why did I ever ask him?

I was a strange request, even of a best friend. With all her heart, Melanie wished she could have done everything in a more emotionally logical order – fallen in love, married, had a child.

But with her medical problem, there simply wasn’t time.

She lay back among the white sheets and remembered her entire evening at Bubba’s house. Obviously she’d caught him off guard. He’d thought she wanted him to tell Phillip to shape up. She found herself smiling at the thought of Bubba marching into Phillip’s law office and demanding he marry her. She doubted anything would change Phillip’s mind.

The expression on his face when she explained her predicament had been so clear. He’d waited just a second too long before he responded, then had been so very careful to choose the right words. He was such a lawyer, with such precise, unfeeling language. Phillip’s hesitation had answered her question long before he began to slowly find the correct words to let her know she didn’t have a chance in hell with him.

What could she expect from a man she’d been dating only nine months? It wasn’t as if there had ever been a promise on either side. He’d seen her at a party, asked her out. Enjoyed her company. Found her attractive.

Though they’d been exclusive, they’d never had a discussion about a real commitment. Right from the start she’d been reluctant to present her problem to Phillip.

You always knew he wasn’t going to commit. Perhaps you even went out with him for that reason.
He’d been safe. The perfect gentleman. So very careful, so aloof. She’d been able to drift along with him and postpone making any real decisions about her future.

But now she wanted – needed – a different sort of man.

She swung out of bed.
I don’t want someone who’s careful. I want someone who’s reckless enough to lay his heart on the line.

Glancing at the clock, she was surprised to find it was almost noon. She rarely slept that late, being a morning person.

Apologize to Bubba. Ask him to dinner.

She needed to distract herself from the anxiety that was steadily building inside her. So she began to methodically strip the bed. There was nothing like housework to bring a person back to earth.

A few hours later, Melanie stood back and surveyed her bedroom. Her housecleaning had been rapid, just the quickest once-over. There was a chicken cooking slowly in a Crockpot in her kitchen.

The least she could do was feed Bubba dinner.

She felt as if her entire body were exposed, a total bundle of nerves and pure raw embarrassment. Her skin seemed glaringly sensitive. Her head ached.

Melanie closed her eyes and pressed her fingers against her temples. As if in answer to her unspoken question, her phone rang.

She picked it up with shaky fingers. “Hello?” For an instant she hoped it was Bubba. Then she could tell him she’d been temporarily insane last night and hadn’t meant a word she’d said.

Alicia.