This Cake is for the Party (2 page)

Janine feels threatened by your choice to have a child. She's withdrawing from you so she doesn't feel— He trails off.

Lonely and misguided, hopeless, bitter? Flip finishes for him.

Exactly, says Sanderson. She doesn't want to feel threatened.

Wait.
My
choice to have a child?

Flip ignores me. I can see now that he is stoned. But, but, he says. Janine must feel lonely and threatened already. Otherwise she'd be here, right? Whoa. I think that's a paradox.

Did she tell you that?

No, says Flip, looking at me again. I think it was her grandmother's birthday.

I glare at Sanderson. He looks pleased with himself.

The sound of the knife cutting on stoneware stops. I go back into the kitchen to open a bottle of seltzer. My choice to have a child. Okay. What I really want is a glass of red wine. Sanderson, of course, has the whole bottle next to his chair.

Shona hands me a glass from the cupboard above the sink. You want some lemon?

I want what you're having. I look at her glass of wine on the counter. But yes. Thank you. Lemon.

Shona is getting her master's degree at the Ontario Institute for Studies in Education at the University of Toronto. She has told me stories about the kids she's working with in her practicum. For instance: There is a boy who is obsessed with chickens. He calls himself the Chicken Man. Occasionally he clucks to himself when he is drawing at his desk. When he's excited, he calls out, Chick-
EN
!

Shona has this quality. She observes the world more carefully than I do. She is slow to make decisions or judgments. She will listen to you ramble, and when you are finished, you feel like she has just told you something important about yourself. She is going to be a remarkable teacher. I hope that my son or daughter will be able to study with her.

Shona slices a lemon in half and squeezes it over my glass. Have lots, she says, it's cleansing. She rinses her hand under the tap, blots it with a dishcloth. Cloudy tendrils of lemon juice work their way into the water. I can hear the fizz of small bubbles rising and breaking the surface.

I look up. Did you know Janine couldn't come this weekend? I ask her.

Flip told me. Birthday party? Something.

I think it's strange. That she didn't call me.

Shona doesn't answer. She reaches up and pulls her ponytail apart to tighten it and I catch a whiff of lacy, pungent garlic. Her oval face with all the hair pulled back is like an olive.

I say, Sanderson says Janine got her dog because I decided to have a baby.

She was looking into the breeders before that.

Yes, but. She didn't actually get Winnie until after I told her.

And Sanderson thinks this is important.

I look into my glass and focus on the bubbles that cling to the sides.

There's never the perfect time to have kids, I say. Right? You just have to jump right in. You never feel one hundred percent.

You make a convincing case for it, Shona says.

Janine's latest project is a font that she's made entirely out of pubic hairs.

I'm still working on it, she said on the phone the last time I spoke to her. Parentheses were easy. But I need an ampersand. I haven't even done upper case yet.

I could hear a reedy whine from Winnie in the background. Then she said, I was sitting on the toilet one day and I saw a question mark on the tile by my foot. The most perfect question mark.

In your pubic hair, I said.

It's important for me to keep the letters genuine. I don't want to mess around with the natural curls.

Right. That would be missing the whole point.

No! Off! Mama's on the phone right now! Janine said. Anyway. I think it looks good. Almost Gothic, but still organic.

I wish that I could be more like Janine. She doesn't even pretend to care about anything other than herself, and we all love her anyway. I shouldn't be so surprised that she didn't call me about this weekend.

Wait a minute, Shona says in the kitchen, raising her wineglass and pointing at it with her other hand. Where's the rest of this? Is Sanderson hogging the wine?

In the living room, Flip and Sanderson have started to argue.

Sanderson leans forward in his chair in a half-lunge. His white sweatshirt has a logo with two crossed paddles on the chest, and a few spots of red wine that he won't notice until tomorrow morning.

Flip's face is tight. He says, If smokers came with their own private filtration systems, they could breathe what they exhale themselves. But we haven't invented that yet. So we stop smoking in bars.

Nobody's forcing you to breathe smoke.

Yes they are. In a bar, when there are smokers, it's everywhere.

Sanderson nods his head, leans back in the chair. Listen, he says. If I don't want to see a monster truck derby, I don't go to the arena. Get it?

You don't have to be an asshole.

You used to be a smoker too. I don't see where you get off.

Shona interrupts. Honey, leave it, you're stoned. Sanderson, pour me some wine.

Marijuana is different, Flip says.

They've been smoking in bars since the beginning of time, Sanderson mutters into his glass.

I don't like to see them fight like this. Sanderson thinks Flip needs to stop smoking dope—that it's making him dumb. Shona told me that Flip cringes when he reads Sanderson's emails because of the spelling errors. It's so important to each of them that the other appears intelligent. As though Sanderson's own intelligence is threatened when Flip appears dim-witted, or the other way around.

I get the bottle myself, since he's not making any move to do it. I pour some for Shona. Then I pour the remaining trickle into Flip's glass. Shona made dinner for us, I say, and turn to Sanderson. Say thank you.

Don't talk to me like I'm a child, he says. Then he flashes a wine-stained smile at her. Thank you, Shona.

There was a student in the fall semester. A young woman named Brianna. She's very bright, Sanderson told me. Her technique is rough, but inspired. Sanderson would call me in the afternoon, sometimes as late as five o'clock, to tell me that he was going to miss dinner. He never lied about where he was. He'd say they were going for drinks, grabbing a bite. He was helping her with her portfolio. One night he took her to Flip's bar. That's how self-assured he was. Flip told me that he saw them share a plate of calamari. That the woman fed him a ring from her fork. He said, The way she leaned across the table, Anne. I don't know.

I have always known this about Sanderson. He's one of those men who can keep his loving in separate compartments. He can love two women at once and not feel that he's betraying either of them. But when we got married, we promised that we'd tell each other about our attractions, that there wouldn't be any secret affairs. I can understand having a crush. It's lying about it that bothers me.

It's eleven o'clock when we sit down at the wobbly kitchen table to eat. The pasta should have been cooked for another five minutes. It sticks to my teeth like masking tape. But the four of us are so hungry we finish most of the noodles anyway, use up the whole pot of sauce to cover the piles on our plates. Flip mops up the last of it with a slice of garlic bread. Sanderson is quiet, possibly craving a cigarette. Shona is the only one who has wine left in her glass. I wrap my ankles and feet around the cold metal chair legs and silently will Sanderson to not open another bottle. It's cold in the cottage, even though the candles on the table make it look cozy. I could go put on some socks, but Sanderson already took my bag upstairs and I'm too lazy to go up there. My belly feels full and tight from too much pasta and bubbly water.

So, have you picked any good baby names? Flip asks me.

I heard someone in Calgary named her daughter Lexus, I answer.

I think it's exciting, Shona says. I'm living vicariously. Flip looks at her. You want one too now?

This is how it happens, Sanderson says.

Shona looks at him. What exactly do you mean, she says.

We all want meaning in our lives. We all want to feel significant. Why else would we choose to have babies? It's our mortality thing.

Flip says, You have a mortality thing happening already?

Shut up, says Sanderson.

I try saying this out loud: I just think it's time. I feel ready. I don't want to wait until I'm old to have a baby. I want to be a cool mom.

Shona says, I hate to say this, sweetie, but I don't think a mom will ever seem cool to a teenager.

What do you think is old? Flip asks.

I just feel ready right now, I say.

Sanderson pushes his chair back from the table. He says, If I'm not ready now, I'll never be ready. It's time to throw cotton to the wind. He picks up his plate and brings it to the counter, plugs the drain, and turns on the hot water tap. Did we bring dish soap?

Shona points. Underneath.

Caution, I say.

What?

Everyone is quiet for a moment. Then a round, hollow, and breathy sound comes from Flip, who is trying to hide his laugh in his wineglass. It sounds like the fossilized call of a loon. Shona rolls her eyes at him.

It's throw caution to the wind, not cotton, I say.

You know what I mean. You don't have to make fun of me, he says.

No, it makes sense. You just throw cotton to the wind. It starts blowing around, right? Because of the wind? I start laughing, knowing that I should stop if I don't want to start another fight.

Sanderson ignores me. He looks in the cupboard under the sink and finds a bottle of green dishwashing detergent. He squirts some into the sink and there is a sweet apple smell. A white foam begins to grow on the water. Flip and I make ourselves stop laughing. We all sit at the table and watch Sanderson do the work.

You're going to quit smoking when the baby comes, right? Flip asks him.

Sanderson looks pained. Yes, Flip, of course I will.

Shona gathers the rest of the plates on the table and stacks them in front of her. She places the three forks on the top plate, which is covered with splotches of red sauce like a lurid Rorschach test. I think it would be nice, she says, for our babies to grow up together. She rests her hands on her belly.

Flip stares at her. I think we should wait, he says. Until you start teaching. You'll get maternity leave when you have a job. He touches his upper lip with his thumb. We could get a dog first.

Like Janine, says Sanderson.

Janine's dog is a baby replacement, Shona says. I want the real thing.

Flip holds the edge of the table with his hand. No, no. I'm way too irresponsible.

Shona sighs when she brings the stack of plates to the sink. You're just a scaredy-cat, she says. If I got pregnant, something would click for you. You'd get another job.

I say, What's wrong with working at a bar? Bartenders are respectable people.

You know what a baby means, says Flip. The money. There are those trust funds, those babies with the little graduation caps. No. Not until my own student loans are paid.

Shona laughs. Stop it, you're killing me. Paying off our student loans!

Sanderson turns off the tap and swishes the water with his hand. There's the bumping sound of plates swimming against stainless steel. Shona is beside him at the counter. She puts an arm around his waist and leans against him. He braces himself against the counter with one hand and holds her weight. Look at Sanderson, she says to Flip. He's not a scaredy-cat. I bet he still has student loans. Don't you, Sandy?

I glance down at my stomach, the way it makes a small ball of itself when I sit. It looks flat when I'm standing, but there's a little roll when I'm sitting down. I fix my posture in the chair. My belly changes when I straighten my back, but it still rests in a small lump on top of my legs. It's not a pregnant lump, it's just a weak abdomen, too much for dinner. But I try to imagine what it would feel like. When you're carrying a baby, you must feel like you're always carrying around a little Christmas present.

I'm actually all paid up, says Sanderson. But I had scholarships, so.

Flip stands up and fills my field of vision with his long legs, his green plaid torso. Sanderson is older than I am, he says. He's much more mature.

Don't you forget it, Sanderson says. Now excuse me, all of you, but I'm old, and I need a cigarette.

Don't turn on the porch light, I tell him. You'll attract the moths.

When he goes outside, I reach over the table for what's left of Shona's wine. Flip waggles his finger.

Oh, drink it, Shona tells me. It's not going to hurt anything. If Janine were here, you'd be drunk by now anyway.

This winter, when she bought a new condo downtown, Janine sent an email: I'm throwing a housewarming party. Just for us. Come at eight, stay till late. It was the coldest night in February, steam swirling on top of Lake Ontario because the air was so much colder than the water. When I blinked, my eyelashes stuck together, frozen. We arrived with housewarming gifts: a bottle of Tanqueray Ten, a jar of vermouth-soaked olives, a shiny silver martini shaker.

Janine opened the door and there was a gush of warm air in the hallway. The entranceway was a bright lacquer red. All along her wall, a line of tea lights glowing in glass saucers. She wore a short sequined cape on top of a black dress. It fell just above the elbows. A capelet. I felt the air melt around my body, my face defrosting. Janine had sparkles brushed along her cheekbones.

You brought cocktails! she said. She took the tall bottle out of my arms.

You look gorgeous, I said. I'll have a virgin cosmo.

Virgin my ass, she said.

Great paint job, I told her.

Like it? It's the same shade as Love That Red by Revlon. I had it specially blended and shipped from this place in Oregon.

It's hot, Sanderson said.

Inside, Flip and Shona were already drinking, sitting on chrome bar stools. Shona stirred pink juice in a glass with her finger. They were talking about the ways people learn. Shona had just come from class. She said, There are three ways that we all learn: we're either auditory, visual, or kinesthetic.