“I wouldn’t,” I say, which comes out a little louder than I’d like.
“You probably don’t know him as well as I do,” Andy points out. “Speaking of shock, would it shock you if I told you I needed a ride to Megan’s? Or that you’re late to pick up Jase from practice? And I could use some money for Starbucks.”
“No. That wouldn’t shock me at all.”
“Alice. We all love you. If this guy doesn’t, he’s a rhino-skinned, horse-faced baboon-butt.”
“Tim again?”
“Duff and Harry,” Andy says, smiling full-on, braces shining. “I have multiple sources.”
TIM
Holy crap. Literally. On the short car ride back from the garage, despite the fact that you’d think there’d be nothing left in that tiny-ass body, Cal’s managed to fill his diaper and the entire back of his shirt and part of his hat! How is this even possible?
I’m squatting in front of him as he stretches out on a blanket on the living room floor. I knew things were bad when I ejected him from the car seat, but . . . He looks back at me anxiously, little tears crystalized on his eyelashes.
“Don’t worry. I’m on this. We’ll handle it,” I say in a manly, deeper-than-my-own-voice way, when in fact I’m not sure there are enough wipes to handle this. In all of Target. In all the Targets in all the world.
He keeps staring at my face. So sorry, Dad. I seem to have lost control here.
“No big deal, Cal. These things happen,” I tell him, although I’m not sure they do. His hat?! Maybe my genes really did completely screw him over. All this can’t have come from a body so small. There are only two thin wipes left. And no paper towels or anything like that.
The shower is the only answer. His clothes are already off, in a hellish pile on the floor that I’ll have to deal with later, so I shuck my own off quickly, kicking my loafers across the room, and carry him into the shower stall. He goes rigid with shock at the blast of water.
Please don’t scream again, Cal.
“’S fine. It’s a shower. Us guys like ’em. Give it a chance.”
He’s clinging to my chest like a spider monkey. A messy redheaded spider monkey. I rub down his back under the water. His face crumples—yikes, the water is a little hot. I turn it down to nearly cold. Cal looks even more freaked out.
I scrub up and down his back with the soap again, then lift him up so we’re face-to-face. “You’re fine, Cal. It’s all good,” I say firmly. His round blue eyes stare into mine. He bobs his head forward, puts his mouth on my nose . . .
Begins to suck on it.
I can’t help it, I start laughing. He keeps sucking away.
“You’re not going to get what you need from my nose, kid,” I tell him.
Probably not from the rest of me either. But here in the cold-as-hell shower, him slippery as a bar of Ivory soap, and both of us barely recovered from the diaper of doom, I’m happy. For the moment anyway, I can be what this baby needs.
Or at least my nose can.
Ten minutes later, I’m knocking on the Garretts’ screen door with my big secret in one arm.
“MOMMMMMY. Tim’s brought us a baby. Can we keep him?”
Mrs. Garrett’s washing dishes at the sink. She turns around, looks at me, Cal, back at me. “Oh . . . wow.”
“George, this is Cal.” I bend down to George’s level. “He’s, uh, mine. So you can’t keep him.”
Neither can I.
“Geez,” says George. “He’s got a lot of fur.”
I laugh. It’s true. Even damp, Cal’s fluff of red hair sticks up like a rooster comb.
Mrs. Garrett has come over, kneeling next to me. “Oh my,” she says, even more softly.
I can’t tell what she’s thinking, so I say, “Oops. Sorry, Mrs. G. You did say I’d make a good dad. My timing got a little screwed up. Alice home?”
She stands. “She went to pick up Jase. I’m sure there’s quite a story here, Tim. Why don’t you let me hold your baby, get yourself something to eat, and tell me about it.”
I run through the story between bites as I engage in a feeding frenzy of epic proportions. No old pizza here. I eat three turkey sandwiches, two containers of lemon Greek yogurt, a bag of pretzels, and guzzle practically a gallon of chocolate milk.
Explaining Hester’s part in the whole thing? Awkward. Especially with George (and soon Harry and Patsy too) sitting right there, round-eyed.
“So . . . I went to this party, last winter; there was this girl—I didn’t know her very well—and, um, she got an extra prize in her goody bag, but I didn’t hear until a few days ago that this prize was, uh, handed out.”
Mrs. Garrett nods in comprehension.
“That must have been some party.” George sighs. “All I ever get to take home is a bunch of gum and Super Balls and squirt guns and stuff.”
“Tim might have been happy with that, George,” Mrs. Garrett says.
She cradles Cal expertly over the small bump of her own stomach and reaches out to ruffle my hair. “You know you could have come straight to us. This is a lot to handle on your own.”
“He’s pretty teeny,” George says. “I could handle him. He could sleep in my bed. I bet he pees too. Then I’d for sure have a baby brother, in case the new baby is another dopey girl.”
“Hon!” Patsy commands, and stretches her arms up to me, elbowing my knee insistently, making it known she’s my real baby. And no dopey girl.
I pick her up, put my face in her hair and without warning my eyes sear like they’ve taken a hit of Tabasco. Fuck, no.
Mrs. Garrett sighs. “He’s a lovely baby, which of course you know. Looks healthy too.”
I nod without looking up.
“But your plate was already full. I’m sorry, Tim.”
“’S okay,” I say hastily, since sympathy is making it harder to ditch the dampness in my eyes. “I can handle full plates. Just power through ’em. You know that—I eat here all the time.”
When I glance up, Mrs. Garrett looks unfooled by my bullshit.
“This girl,” she asks carefully. “What’s she like?”
“Is she hot?” asks Harry.
“Harry!”
“What?! Joel asks that all the time. So does Duff.”
Mrs. Garrett rolls her eyes. “Duff too, now?” Joel has always been a walking hormone, but Duff’s only eleven.
Patsy is stroking my arm lovingly, sighing “Hon” periodically.
“I don’t even know what she’s like. She’s very, uh, clean. Got straight A’s in the classes we were in together. Always did the extra credit work too. She writes her baby-care notes in outline form.”
“Doesn’t sound hot,” Harry mutters.
“Harry, be still. Eat something.” Mrs. Garrett reaches into the fruit bowl, hands him an apple. “So . . . you’ll be getting to know her at the same time you get to know your son.”
“Yup. Like I say, my timing has always su—” I glance at George and Patsy. “Stunk.”
Mrs. Garrett’s eyes are sad, but her voice is brisk and practical. “I bet you need supplies—clothes and things. Joel’s Animal House bachelor pad doesn’t come equipped with baby gear. We have lots. Let’s go look in the basement.”
Downstairs, Mrs. Garrett is opening up big plastic bins marked BOY and GIRL and GEAR and making little stacks of stuff. Because none of the kids have followed us down here, wanting to stay upstairs and make faces at Cal, I can say what I couldn’t before.
“I don’t need much. She gave me a ton of crap. It’s all temporary anyway; Hester’s plan is to get him adopted quickly.” By this morning would have been perfect.
She pauses in the act of folding some fluffy blue blanket, face neutral, and then starts folding it again, without looking at me. “How do you feel about that?”
“I got nothin’, Mrs. G.” Then I flinch, remembering the last time I used that phrase.
She reaches out for a second and rubs my cheek with the back of her hand. Doesn’t say a t
hing. Then she hands me a stack of blankets, little undershirts folded on top. One of the blankets has DUFFY sewn onto it in wobbly red yarn letters.
“Won’t you need this shit yourself? Stuff, I mean.”
“I’m not going to wash your mouth out with soap, Tim. I’ve heard the word. Used it, even. Recently. And, not for another six months or so. By that time your Cal will be bigger, or he’ll be gone. Take it for now.”
“But, the thing is, for now?” I add. “Don’t know my ass from my elbow here.” I explain about the in-the-hat thing. And the green thing.
She laughs. “Normal. As long as you have a handle on which is Cal’s elbow, you’ll be fine. None of us knows what to do, to start, Tim. You and the baby will figure it out together.”
I trudge upstairs with a ton of things—including a baby gym, whatever the fuck that is (Oh good, I’ve noticed that my abs lack definition, Dad) and a windup stuffed bear that plays “Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star,” and a stack of what looks like fuzzy long underwear.
When I get to the top, there, standing in the kitchen, is Alice, still in her yellow bikini and cover-up, hair ruffled, face flushed, eyes boring into mine. With Jase and Sam right next to her. And my kid in her arms.
Shit? Meet Fan.
Chapter Twenty-five
ALICE
Tim peers at me around a huge pile of baby supplies, then drops it all at his feet, cocks his head at me, complete with smirk. “I see you’ve met Calvin. Guess the cat’s out of the bag that I’m no virgin.”
“Tim—” Samantha starts.
“What’s a virgin?” Harry asks loudly.
“Something about a forest,” George whisper-yells back.
“This”—I joggle the baby, and Mom, who’s come up the stairs behind Tim, makes a concerned sound—“is no joke. This could only happen to you!”
“Technically,” he drawls, sloping back against the wall, “it could happen to any guy with a working—”
“What the hell is wrong with you? You’re seventeen years old!”
Tim pats the pocket of his shirt, looks down at his feet. “Eighteen in December. You’re fuckin’ nineteen, in case you’ve forgotten. Not nearly old enough to be my mom, babe, so you can ditch that line of bullshit right now. Besides, you didn’t mind—”
The kitchen is dead quiet.
Jase was bending over to unlace his Converse, and his fingers go motionless.
Sam has her hand to her mouth.
Even the baby looks stunned.
Then Harry says cheerfully, “Tim swore. Twice. The bad ones.”
Tim looks over at George, who’s watching us with a scared expression, nearly in tears. Tim brushes his hand over his face, lets out a short, shaky laugh. “Uh. Sorry, guys.”
I cradle the baby’s head in my hand, look from him to Tim, back again. “Even though I saw . . . I knew . . . it had to be . . . Unbelievable.”
“And yet true. Exactly why are you so ballistic? It doesn’t eff up your life. You don’t have to babysit. That one’s on me, babe.”
“How about you reserve the ‘babe’ for your actual baby? And, newsflash, it’s not called babysitting when it’s your own child.”
Jase and Samantha are exchanging glances like crazy. Jase clears his throat. “Guys . . .”
“George, Harry,” Mom cuts in, gathering up Patsy, who kicks her feet ferociously, twisting and reaching out for Tim. “Let’s go get some of your stuffed animals to lend the baby. Something soft you don’t play with anymore.”
The boys trail toward the stairs. “He can’t have Happy,” George says belligerently.
“Who is that girl? Apparently not your dealer. That’s one whopper of a secret you’ve been keeping for nine months. Not to mention—”
“I didn’t know! I just found out, like, days ago. I didn’t know,” Tim repeats. “I don’t even remember doing her. Like, total blank.”
“Jesus,” Jase mutters.
“Is that supposed to make it better? You ruined her life, but that’s all good, babe, it was in a blackout? That’s your get-out-of-jail-free card?” The baby starts to fuss and I rest him against my shoulder, rub his back, sway from side to side automatically. Baby on board, activate Garrett instincts.
“Let me have him,” Samantha suggests, when the whimpering continues.
“Nah, he’s probably hungry. Again,” Tim mutters. “My job. Hand him over.” He reaches for the baby, lifting him out of my arms, setting his palm against the soft folds at the back of the baby’s neck. “I’ll come back for that stuff later.” He heads for the screen door, kicks it open with his bare foot, and lets it slam behind him.
Jase gives a long, low whistle under his breath.
Samantha bends to scoop up the clothes and blankets. “Wow,” she says. “His parents must— I can’t even imagine.”
Yup. The Boy Most Likely To has really outdone himself this time. If the Masons kicked him out of the house for job stuff, what now? Get him deported?
“It is honestly like the guy makes a profession of messing up. As if he wakes up and the first thing he does, before he even showers—if he even showers—is write a punch list of all the many creative and moronic ways he can be more of a disaster.”
I’m yanking open the screen door as I speak, and when Jase puts his hand on my shoulder, saying, “Al, this is not your fight,” I just yank away.
“Let me talk to him,” Samantha says, almost, but not quite, blocking my path. “He—”
“No way. You’ll both be too nice.”
“What now?” Tim says when I catch up to him at the threshold of the apartment, which he’s pushing open with his elbow. “A little busy here, Alice. Hands full and all that.”
“In.” I shove the door open, set my hand on his back, and follow him. The room now has an open diaper bag, a bouncy seat, a few bottles soaking in the sink, and a Moses basket, in addition to the usual piles of dirty clothes and Grape-Nuts–encrusted bowls.
Tim looks back at me, straightening his spine like hit me. Waiting for it, like all the ugly things I want to say are already out there, hanging in the air like toxic smoke. I press my lips together as if that will keep the words sealed up.
He brushes past me, taking up more space than he needs to, cracks open a formula can, sloshes a bottle full to the top and puts it in the microwave, whistling under his breath. Cal’s head bobs up and down over his shoulder, round blue eyes staring at me.
“How is it that all you do is screw up?”
He caps the bottle, shakes it, collapses back down on the couch, kicking his legs out onto the scarred coffee table, resting the baby’s head on his thigh. “Sometimes I screw around. Clearly.”
“Don’t you dare do that.” The baby sneezes and formula sprays. Tim cleans his little face with the bottom of his T-shirt. “Don’t pull your la-la-la, everything’s funny if you look at it the right way act.”
“What else am I supposed to do?” he asks, suddenly heated.
“Gosh, I don’t know, Tim. What’s your plan?”
“I don’t have a fucking plan, Alice. It’s been less than a week.”
“You’re going to have to do better than that. I can’t fix this for you.”
“Sorry—did I forget when I even asked you to?”
I’m pacing. Cal sneezes again, this time gushing Tim’s face.
“Could be—sounds like you have a talent for forgetting key moments in your—”
“What’s with the sneezing?” he interrupts, wiping his face. “D’you think he’s sick?”
“No, I think you have him too flat. You’ve got to prop up his head more.”
Tim edges his knee up a little.
“Like this.” I take his arm and move it so Cal’s resting in the crook of his elbow. “And tilt the bottle like this or he gets too much air.”
“You’re good at this.” His voice is resigned.
“I would be, wouldn’t I?” I step back. The baby wriggles, and one hand smacks Tim in the eye. He raise
s his hand to cup it and Calvin—Calvin, right?—evidently thinks Tim is letting go of him, because he does that startle-reflex motion, neck stiffening, hands flying out to his sides, eyes wide and shocked.
“Let me have him,” I say, practically dragging him out of Tim’s arms.
His face has gone whiter. “What the hell was that? Why’d he do that? Was that, like, a fit or something? Did I hurt him?”
I’m pulling a blanket from the side of the couch, a red one with scary sock monkey heads all over it, turning it, folding the bottom, one arm down, fold, the other arm up, wrap around. Basic baby burrito. A life skill, by now.
“You wrap him like this,” I say wearily. “Makes him feel safe. And, for God’s sake, wash your hands.”
I survey the apartment. “When was the last time you did laundry? I’ll bring you over two baskets—one for him and one for you and—do you have a pad of paper? I’ll make a list. You can probably get everything at Target, but—”
Tim’s studying me. “I hate this,” he says quietly.
“Too bad,” I say shortly. “He’s all yours. Congratulations.”
He does look all Tim’s. The red hair, the stormy eyes, bluer than Tim’s, the long string-bean skinny body. I don’t see much of that girl in him, but he’s a baby, still a blank canvas. Besides, I barely looked at her.
“Not him,” Tim says. “This. I don’t want this.”
“Sorry, stud. You don’t wrap it before you tap it”—air quotes—“this is what you get.”
He winces, opens his mouth as if to argue, then says quietly, “I don’t need baby tips from you, Alice.” He swallows and then looks at me squarely. “That’s not what I want. With us.”
“Us?” I say, and sigh. “There isn’t an us. There’s a you and a me.”
“And baby makes three?” he suggests.
“You’re hilarious. I’ll take your laundry back for now and throw it in with ours, but I’ll be damned if I’m folding it for you.”
“Cut it out. I’m not one of your brothers. No way are you washing my boxers.”
I continue as if he hadn’t spoken. “Have you worked out a schedule with this—”