Maternity Leave (24 page)

When I woke up, a cold had settled in with a vengeance. I needed to get home, rest and get an antibiotic. As the plane taxied, I opened the overhead compartment to get a jump start on getting off the plane. The flight attendant told me to sit down and I passed out.

My first thought when I awoke was that the airlines were getting heavy handed about the “stay seated” rule. As it turned out, my seat mate was a shot-putter for the University of Tampa track team, and his eight-pound shot put hit me in the face as I opened the overhead compartment. That was gonna leave a mark.

My eye was swollen and the airline’s legal team was surrounding me. “Where’s my luggage?” I asked.

“Right here, we got everything for you and will help you take it to your car.”

I did a quick inventory and noticed everything was there except the belly. I asked about the belly, but the airline personnel said they saw nothing like it. Normally, I would stick around and raise hell until my property was found or replaced. However, I couldn’t hang out at Tampa Airport without risking running into at least a handful of attorneys from my firm. The only alternative was to blow another $500 on a new Empathy Belly, which would have to be over-nighted at the cost of an additional arm and leg. I chose this option, planning to bill it to the airlines.

The next morning, after receiving my new pregnancy belly, I put in an appearance at work even though I was exhausted and sick. Right after I came in, David swung by my office. He sipped his coffee and asked about my trip. The tone of his voice suggested I’d been in Hawaii instead of taking depositions in Mobile, Alabama.

“Good,” I said, hoping that would suffice.

Hardly. David liked to talk about the depositions of experts. He’d had several neon sign fires in the past and was eager to ask questions involving the words “fabrication,” “Hayco bushings,” “transformers” and “conduit.” I’d spent five days repressing memories of these topics and one day nursing a head injury, so I didn’t even attempt to engage him.

“I’m going to go over my notes and draft an update to the client, you’re going to have to be in suspense until then.”

“Okay. You’ll never guess what happened to me this weekend.”

I could feel a horrible story coming on, but asked what happened anyway.

“I went to the beach with my wife. She was facing the ocean and I was facing away from the ocean reading my newspaper. I was under the umbrella, listening to my iPod.”

Interesting. I’d never gone to the beach to face the parking lot and tune out the sights and sounds of the ocean. More interesting was that David had an iPod. I couldn’t imagine what he listened to.

“Anyway, my wife nudges me, so I lower my paper and look toward the showers. There was a topless woman in one of those up-the-butt-line-things taking a shower. She must have thought she was in Europe. Can you believe my wife pointed that out? I’m the luckiest guy in the world.”

“What’s an up-the-butt-line-thing? You mean a thong?” I asked.

“Yes, a thong. Anyway, I kept lowering my paper to check it out. It was the longest shower I’ve ever seen. I was in heaven.”

David made the motion of a man reading a paper, lowering it, and raising an eyebrow at something he likes. He repeated this motion ten times. As he explained, “It was so funny, I just kept lowering the paper.”

“Sounds like a good time.”

“It was. What happened to your face?”

I was starting to think I didn’t have a huge black and blue mark, raised like an egg, covering the left side of my face and that I didn’t sound completely sick and congested. He noticed one out of two. “A shot put hit me in the face on the return flight.”

“I used to shot put,” David said. “Have you ever done it?”

Not exactly the sympathy I was looking for, but I answered. “Yes, I threw it like a baseball and destroyed my shoulder. It was a great time.”

“You can’t throw it like a baseball.” David set his coffee down and showed me the proper way to throw a shot put. He used my Johnson Smith paperweight as the shot put and threw it straight up into a ceiling tile. The ceiling tile bumped up a little bit, but did not break. The best part was that his follow-through moved him just far enough forward to be hit in the head with the paperweight on its way down.

“Are you okay?” I said.

“Of course. If that ceiling tile weren’t there, it would have gone at least seventy feet.”

“Isn’t the shot put record like seventy-five feet?” I asked.

“Yes. I’m almost as good as the Olympians and I barely train and have a full time job as a named partner at a large prestigious law firm. If I wasn’t here, I’d probably be the record holder. Have you ever practiced shot-putting?”

“No, but maybe I’ll practice this weekend,” I said as convincingly as I could.

“Can you shot put pregnant?” David asked.

“Probably not too well. I’ll have to wait until after the kid pops out to learn that skill.”

“When is that?”

“A week or so.”

“Man, getting down to the wire. Have you had any hemorrhoids? My wife had them all the time.”

I thought hemorrhoids were something in your ass and didn’t know what they had to do with pregnancy, but since they sounded gross, I assumed it was par for the course with pregnancy and said, “Yes.”

“They’re just excruciating huh? My wife was in such pain.”

Gross and painful, not surprising. “Yeah, they’re no fun.”

“Are you effacing yet?” David asked next.

Hmm. No idea what that was. At least I’d heard of hemorrhoids from commercials. Effacing? What the fuck. “Yeah, a little.” I said.

“Just a little? Wow, my wife was fully effaced and two centimeters dilated for an entire month before delivering.”

Of course he was asking me how big my vagina is, he’s my boss, why wouldn’t he. “I’ll see you later.”

David left and I called Danny as I looked up hemorrhoids and effacing.

“Hey,” I said, “have you ever had a hemorrhoid?”

“Yeah why?”

“David thinks I should have hemorrhoids at this stage of my pregnancy. I was looking it up.”

“You’re lucky you don’t. It was so painful. It hurt to shit, so I avoided shitting. But eventually, you just have to go. Seriously, I thought about naming that shit when it finally came out of me.”

“Lovely. Here’s the more formal definition. ‘Swelling and inflammation of veins in the rectum and anus caused by increased straining during bowel movements by constipation or diarrhea.’”

“Is this why you called?” Danny asked.

“Yes. Oooh, fun fact. Based on their very low incidence in the developing world, where people squat for bodily functions, hemorrhoids have been attributed to the use of the unnatural ‘sitting’ toilet.’ Maybe Jason is right to shit in the backyard.”

“Bye, Jenna.”

“No wait, David also asked me if I was effacing.”

“What’s that?”

“Looking it up now, but based on my context clues, I think he was asking me if I was dilated yet. He wants to know how big I am down there.”

“You should abandon the pregnancy story and just sue him for sexual harassment.”

“Maybe. I could probably get a class action suit going with the other women here.”

“Good luck. I’ll see you later.”

I closed out the hemorrhoid and effacement research and began my treatise to the client regarding the previous week’s depositions, of which I had actually attended only three. Four minutes later, I thought about giving birth prematurely just to avoid this assignment.

The cold that started coming on while I was away got worse. I left work early, went to the doctor and got my Z-Pak, the antibiotic that always makes me feel perfect within four days. Doctors caution against using antibiotics, claiming the body builds up a resistance, causing them to become less effective when you really need them. I don’t know the exact definition of “really” sick other than potentially terminal. However, I do know I’m always ready to stop coughing and sneezing out green mucous, mouth breathing and feeling fatigued. As a result, I eagerly signed up to punch one of my antibiotics tickets.

Mom called me on my way home from the doctor. “Hi Mom.”

“You sound terrible,” she informed me.

“Yeah, I just left the doctor. I’m on my way to get antibiotics from the pharmacy.”

“Did you get yogurt?”

“No, I hate yogurt.”

“Antibiotics give you a yeast infection if you don’t eat yogurt.”

“Says who?”

“Science,” my mom replied as though she had actually answered the question.

“I’m only going to be on them a few days, I’ve never had a yeast infection, and I hate yogurt. I’m good.”

“If I get you yogurt will you eat it?”

“No, but feel free to pick me up some dinner.”

“Yeah, right.”

“I’m sick,” I said.

“Did you ride your bike today?” she asked.

“Yes, but I only spun around an hour easy.”

“Then just make an easy dinner.”

“Bye, Mom.”

“Bye, Jenna. Feel better.”

A few days later, Danny came by my house to give me a massage. I asked if he’d ever heard about the connection between yeast infections and yogurt.

“Absolutely. It’s true,” he said.

“How the hell does that work?” I asked.

“You just rub the yogurt on your hoo hoo and voila, yeast infection free.”

“You’re so full of shit. You eat the yogurt as a preventative, you don’t wipe it on your crotch as a cure.”

“I took a shot,” he said. “You gotta take a shot.”

“You almost got me,” I said sarcastically.

I didn’t want to say anything to Danny, but ironically, the discussion of yeast infections made my vagina itch. Must be the power of suggestion. I tried to focus on something else, but it was difficult unless Danny was doing one of his torture pressure points. When that happened, the pain shifted to that area for a bit, then back to my itchy crotch. It was the first time in my life I was anxious for a massage to end.

When he’d finished, I got dressed and Danny came out to remove the sheets and fold up the table. While I was writing him a check, he said, “What’s that?”

“What?”

“That stain on the sheet?”

“What stain?” I said.

“Right there, where your crotch was until just recently?”

Holy shit. There was a small off-white clump resembling cottage cheese on Danny’s blue sheet, exactly where my crotch had been during the massage. How the hell was I supposed to get out of this one? I considered telling him the massage turned me on rather than have him think I excrete yeast, but I decided to go with denial. “I don’t see anything.”

“Right fucking there.” He pointed, but didn’t touch it.

I played stupid. “Whatever, there’s nothing there, just put the sheets away.” A few seconds later I decided I needed a backup plan. I said, “If there was something there, don’t tell anyone, please.”

“Of course I won’t tell anyone. Don’t worry about it. There’s actually a medical term for it we learned in massage school.”

“Yeast infection?” I said.

“No. That’s a layman’s term,” Danny replied.

“What’s the scientific term?” I asked.

Danny looked serious for a moment and his voice took on a professorial tone as he said, “Rank pussy.” He then cracked up.

“Very funny,” I deadpanned, cracking a smile in spite of my bright red face.

After Danny left I thought about taking my pregnancy leave immediately in order to avoid facing him again for at least three months.

* * *

Sure enough, my cold was gone by Friday. I had one race weekend and one week of work left prior to my maternity leave. Great news, blunted only by the fact that it was “T” day: the day I had to meet Tony Smith. Over the past few weeks, Sarah had called me daily to arrange “the date.” She had been dropping very strong hints that my secret would not be safe if I reneged on my promise to date her son. With no illness, work trips or races, I ran out of excuses to avoid seeing Tony. I thought about being pregnant for the date since, in my experience, it’s quite the turnoff. However, such a stunt could piss Sarah off enough to squeal to David. I was stuck hoping Tony was one of the few men not transfixed by my beauty and charming habit of being overly judgmental and self-centered.

Exactly on time, my door bell rang. I opened the door and there stood Quinton. He was grinning broadly with a look of amazement. Clearly he thought the stars had aligned. Reflexively, I slammed the door shut. All of a sudden I was eager for Tony to show up and shoo Quinton away.

“Jenna?”

I opened the door again. “Sorry, Quinton, I was surprised. I’m expecting someone else.”

“Wow, this is fate. I swear to God that until I got to your address, I didn’t realize it was you.”

“What in the hell are you talking about?” I said, dreading the answer.

“I’m Sarah’s son.”

Until this moment, I thought that I had experienced all of Quinton’s bad traits during our one and only date. Not so. His catastrophic lineage had gone unmentioned over dinner at IHOP. I recovered and said, “You’re a schizophrenic and go by Tony and Quinton?”

“No, Quinton is my real name. My mom started calling me Quintony and Macaroni and other nicknames when I was growing up. Eventually she shortened it to Tony around the house.”

“Makes sense. Well, I’ll let your mom know that we already have dated and that it didn’t work out.”

“Come on, Jenna, give me another shot. You have nothing else to do tonight.”

“I can improvise,” I said.

“Come on, I owe you after the last time. Let’s go to Ruth’s Chris or Berns, and get a good steak.”

“That’s okay,” I said. “You don’t have to do that.”

“No really, my treat. I’d like to start from square one with you.”

“That’s going to be hard, but I guess we can grab dinner.”

“Thanks,” Quinton/Tony said, then added, “You know what though? I’m not really in the mood for steak. I’m really in the mood for a burrito. Want to go to Moe’s?”

“That’s quite the bait and switch.” I felt rude saying it, but he was the one who threw out the expensive steak dinner idea. I never would have suggested it. I pondered whether Moe’s was even a step up from the International House of Pancakes.