Reality is an odd thing, sometimes. Sometimes, it just lurks. It stays on the edge of your peripheral vision, waiting for just the right moment to slam you upside your head with Its Louisville Slugger. You can feel Its breath. You can hear it whispering, but can’t quite make out what it’s saying.
It’s been ‘lurking’ a lot since the pregnancy began. I think it’s been lurking around my wife as well. It’s basically been refusing to really make Its presence known on any consistent level. Instead, it’s been choosing to surprise us and ambush us at moments of it’s choosing. Like the OBGYN visit when the Doc couldn’t detect the heartbeat. Reality is a Dominatrix and I am Its bitch, these days.
With all the games it’s been playing with us, it had a field day with me this week. It found something in me I didn’t even know existed. A very nasty fear that probably would have never come to light if not for the pregnancy.
My wife, all wives, let’s face it…hell, all women…are master’s at coming up with those ‘questions’ for men at the oddest and damnedest times. Like the three in the morning “Do you love me?’ You follow? My wife has run the gambit on all of them more than once. I won’t go into each and every one. Mostly because none of them compare to the one she hit me with this past week. Even Reality was caught off guard. But, the bastard knew enough to jump on it and do a river dance on my emotions for a few days.
We have only been married three years. We didn’t know each other as well as we should have when we married, and the first year was not without it’s rough patches. But we got through them. With the help of friends, family, and God. We prayed a lot. A LOT. Despite how far we come, I suppose we are still learning a lot of intimate little details about each other. There are probably things I still don’t know and the same goes for her. We have had to put a lot of faith in one another at critical times, as we were tested by life and with a watchful eye by one another. I suppose, for women and wives, it’s more important than it would be for men to know if your partner will or can meet life’s expectations. I hope I haven’t offended any women.
So, I guess that is why my wife hit me with the question she did. We were just sitting there, watching some movie or something. To be honest, I don’t even remember what we were watching anymore. From out of nowhere, she says my name. I half acknowledge her and she asks
“Will you be able to take care of the baby if I die?”
I heard her. I did. I think it was Reality that said “Huh?”
“Will you be able to take care of the baby if I die?”
Now, I turned to look at her. “What? What do you..”
“Will you be able to take care of the baby if I die?”
Here was my response.
“What? Don’t even say that. I don’t want to talk about it. That’s crazy. “
She actually let it drop.
However, Reality was not about to let it drop. You see, Reality has an edge my wife, Thank God, does not. Reality can see past my lame verbal response to what I am actually thinking and picturing in my head.
Imagine the closing scene in “Somewhere In Time”, (one of the few chic flicks I like) where Christopher Reeve and Jane Seymour meet in heaven. It’s all white, with a white mist, as they walk towards each other, smiling so slightly. Only it’s me, instead of Chris and my wife instead of Jane and I am standing still, holding the baby, this little stranger, as I watch her just fade until she is gone. I am left alone with the baby. That’s what I imagined over and over and over….
This is where Reality stops slapping Its knee and saying “Good one!” to my wife. It stands up and walks around, behind me. It raises Its Louisville Slugger and hesitates and then lowers it. “Excuse me a sec’. I have to get out the aluminum bat for this. I’m afraid I’ll break the Slugger.” Reality gets out the new bat, raises it above Its head and WHAM!
What I felt was a profound and sic kingly deep loneliness. Emptiness. I was not in a hole, I was the hole. I’m not close to my family. I would lose my stepson to his father. I’m not particularly ‘close’ with her family. She and my stepson and the baby are my family. They are my family. That quick, I would lose two-thirds of it. Gone.
Then there is the fear. I could never let the baby go. Never. Not for work, not for anything. I would never be able to let it out of my sight for even a moment. I would spend eternity with the baby in my arms, afraid if I put it down, it to would fade away from my world. WHAM!
And her words. Echoing all around me. Everywhere and in my head and heart.
“Will you be able to take care of the baby if I die?”
WHAM!
WHAM!
WHAM!
I have no answer. Only a thought. A selfish thought. “I am alone.” I look at the baby and it looks up at me as if to say ‘Yes. You are. Sorry. Wish I could help. Don’t forget to love me.” WHAM!
My legs feel like rubber. I can’t imagine anything past this scene. Nothing. Because I can’t imagine life without her and my stepson. I just can’t. No way. I don’t see one. How could I live…go on…exist..without them? How? WHAM!
I see myself in that white mist holding the baby. Only now, I am a huge, autistic oaf holding a tiny, porcelain doll, afraid to move or shift it for fear of breaking it. Afraid to set it down, because as soon as I do, it will shatter into a million pieces. WHAM!
Reality is laughing at me. It leans over and with a hot, garbage smelling breath, whispers in my face “It could happen, too, quicker than you can say Tony Orlando. Suck on that for a while, dude.”
WHAM!
WHAM!
I can’t even get angry with my wife for asking this question. She’s raised a child for ten years. A few of those years on her own. She knows I have barely even held an infant. Hell, I have never even felt one kick from the womb. She has to ask. She has to wonder and think of these things. Though I often accuse her of worrying over the dumbest things, this is not one of them.
After sitting on this for a week, the same scene playing over and over in my head, going nowhere, no answers coming to me, nadda, my stress level just rose. I started to get short and quick with co-workers and family. My wife and I were disagreeing over the dumbest things.
Yesterday it came to a head. We had a ’loud’ discussion over my inability to give her receipts. “F***!” I’m thinking, “If I can’t remember a lousy receipt how will I remember to feed a baby?!” WHAM!
After a few hours of silence, we began to settle the whole mess, when I broke down like a little pussy in tears and told her what has been eating at me for a week. I apologized for sounding so stupid over something that hasn’t even happened. She said it wasn’t stupid. I looked at her and told her she could never leave me like that. I couldn’t live without her. Ever. I would never be able to see my stepson. Ever. She promised she wouldn’t leave me. That she wasn’t going anywhere. She promised. This made me feel better, for a while.
But that stupid ass movie ending keeps playing over and over. And Reality sits next to me, smacking Its lips as it devours tub after tub of greasy, overly buttered popcorn, watching it with me. Every now and then it leans in and whispers, “Have you seen the alternate ending? Have ya’ , dude? The one where you die and she’s left alone?” It’s lips smack on Its buttered fingers. “Sorry. Don’t mean to stress you out. Why don’t you light up another cancer stick and relax. I’ll just sit riiiiight here and mind my own business.”
Like I said earlier, some days, I am just Reality’s bitch.