She managed to keep the patter of conversation somehow, and that night she was grateful that Ollie had to stay late at the office, working on a presentation for a new client. A very big one. But what did it matter now how big his clients were? In Sarah's mind, her life was over.
She was asleep when he got home that night, and managed somehow to get through breakfast the next morning. He asked her what was bothering her, and she told him she had a splitting headache.
“Did you find out about those tests yet? Ill bet you really are anemic.” He looked suddenly worried, and instead of loving him for it, she hated him as she thought of what he had planted inside her.
“Not yet. They haven't called.” She turned away to put the plates in the dishwasher so he wouldn't see the lie in her eyes, and a few minutes later he was gone, and the children had been picked up by their car pools. And an hour later she was at the gynecologist's office, planning for her abortion, but the doctor threw her a curve, and asked her how Ollie felt about what she was doing. “I … he … uh …” She couldn't lie to the man. He knew her too well, and in addition to that, she liked him. She looked directly at him with a strange light in her eye, and silently dared him to defy her. “I haven't told him.”
“About the abortion or the baby?” He looked startled. He had always thought that they had a very happy marriage, the kind in which two people confide easily and openly in each other.
“Neither one. And I'm not going to.” His face set as he listened to her and he slowly shook his head in disapproval.
“I think you're making a mistake, Sarah. He has a right to know. It's his child too.” And then he had an uncomfortable thought. Perhaps there were things about them he didn't know. Anything was possible. “It is … isn't it?”
She smiled in answer. “Of course it is. I just don't want to have it.” She told him all the reasons why and he made no comment, but when she was through, he repeated again that he thought she should discuss it with her husband. He urged her to think about it, and after she had he would make the appointment for her, but not before.
“You're still a very young woman. You're certainly not too old to have this baby.”
“I want my freedom. In eleven years, my son will be in college, and my daughter two years later. If I have this baby, I'll be tied down for another twenty years. I'm not ready to make that kind of commitment.” It sounded incredibly selfish, even to her ears, but she couldn't help it. That was how she felt. And no one was going to change that.
“Is that what Oliver feels too?” She didn't answer for a long moment. She didn't want to tell him that Ollie had always wanted more children.
“I haven't discussed it with him,”
“Well, I think you should. Call me in a few days, Sarah. You have time to make the decision and still do things safely.”
“Time isn't going to change anything.” She felt defiant and angry and let down as she left his office. He was the one who was supposed to solve the problem for her and now he wasn't.
She went home and cried, and when Oliver came home at eleven o'clock that night, she was in bed, feigning another headache. The children were long since asleep, and she had left the TV on in the bedroom, droning at her as she waited for him to come home, but still sure she wouldn't tell him.
“How'd it go today? You look tired.” She looked up at him sadly as he walked into the bedroom.
“It went okay,” he said as he sat down on the edge of the bed and smiled at her and loosened his tie. The blond hair looked tousled by the wind, and he was tired, but he still looked unbearably handsome. How could he look like that? Life was so simple for him. All he had to do was go to an office every day and deal with real people in a real world. He got to have all the fun, while she spent every waking hour with women and children. There were things about life that weren't fair, and in her eyes, that was one of them. There were times when she wished she were a man, when she wished she had lived her life differently, when she wished she had gotten a job years before, instead of doing what she'd done. But this was so easy. She had taken the easy way out. She had had two kids, moved to the suburbs, and given up her dreams. And now she was having another baby … but she wasn't, she told herself rapidly … she was having an abortion. “What's wrong, Sarrie?” He looked worried as he bent to kiss her. He knew her too well, and he could see the anguish in her eyes, the anguish not born of guilt for what she wanted to do, but of anger at what had happened.
“Nothing. I'm tired too.”
“The kids give you a hard time today?”
“No … they were fine.”
“So what's wrong?” he persisted.
“Nothing,” she lied.
“Bullshit.” He took off his jacket, opened his shirt, and moved closer to her on the bed. “Don't try and kid me. You're worried sick about something.” And then a sudden wave of terror hit him. It had happened to a guy he knew at the office six months before. They discovered that his wife had cancer and four months later she was dead, leaving him devastated and alone with three children. Oliver knew he couldn't have lived through it if he lost Sarah. He had loved her for too long. She was everything to him. “Did the tests come back? Is there something I should know?”
For an instant she thought of what the doctor had said … You should tell him, Sarah … he has a right to know … it's his baby too … But I don't want to! something inside her screamed. “The tests were fine.” And then, forced by the honesty they had always shared, she let herself be pressed into telling him something she knew she'd regret later. “More or less.”
The pain of worry sliced through him like a knife as he gently took her hand in his own. “What does that mean?” He could barely speak and he never took his eyes from hers. “What did they tell you?”
She realized instantly what he thought and knew she couldn't cause him any more worry. She didn't want any more of his children, but she loved him. “It's nothing like that. Don't look so scared.” She leaned over to kiss him, and as he held her she could feel him tremble.
“Then what is it?”
She spoke in a whisper, from an abyss of despair, then slowly raised her eyes to his again, still wanting not to tell him. “I'm pregnant.”
For an instant, neither of them moved as her words sank in, and his whole body seemed to go slack from the tension that had seized him when she started speaking. “Oh my God … why in hell didn't you tell me?” He sat back and grinned and then his smile faded as he read the look in her eyes. She looked as though she would have preferred having cancer.
“I didn't know until yesterday. Stupid, I guess. It must have happened in Jamaica.”
He couldn't repress a grin and for an instant she wanted to hit him. “I'll be damned. I never even thought of that. I guess it's been a while, my memory is rusty.” His voice and eyes were gentle, but she pulled her hand from his and lay back against the pillows, as though to get as far away from him as she could. It was all his fault.
“I'm having an abortion.”
“Oh? When did you decide that?”
“Within about thirty seconds of hearing the news. Ollie, I can't do this.”
“Is something wrong?”
She shook her head slowly, suddenly knowing what a bitter fight it was going to be between them, but she wasn't willing to lose this time. She was not going to have this baby. “I'm too old. And it isn't even fair to the children.”
“That's crap, and you know it. They'd probably be thrilled if we told them.”
“Well, we're not going to. It's going to be all over in a few days.”
“Is that right?” He got up and started to pace the room. “Simple as that, is it? What is it with you? Every time you get pregnant, we have to go through this fucking insanity about abortion.”
“It's not insanity. It is my sanity. I don't want another baby. You go to the office every day, you have your own life. I'm stuck out here playing car pool and PTA mom, and I'm not going to re-up for another twenty years. “I've done ten, and the way I see it, I'm halfway through, and you're not going to change that.”