Heads or Tails (12 page)

As quickly as I could, I used a soapy wash cloth to wipe her body, certain that I was missing crucial folds and creases in my haste. I winced at her screams, which increased in volume and intensity as I washed her thick black hair, which still amazed me in its utter un-Margot-ness.

“Okay, baby girl, almost done.”

Fog had covered the neighborhood, as it often did at that hour. As a result, the windows threw nothing but gloomy shadows into the kitchen. I did my best to rinse her, knowing that I was likely leaving a film of soap on various body parts. But I just had to be done. My body ached as if I’d joined Jesse at every tri training I’d missed. I draped a towel across my chest like a shawl put on backwards and slowly lifted Gretchen up, feeling insecure about my balance. I was right about the residual soap because my fingers lost their purchase and she slipped back down into the water, startling her and splashing more water on me, the fruit and the floor.

“Sorry, sorry,” I said, my body trembling. I turned my heel, slipped and nearly dropped her again, this time onto the tile floor.

“FUCK!”

Just then, I heard Jesse come in the front door. I hung my head, hoping he hadn’t heard me shout an obscenity at the baby. Well, not at her, but still. This is what I feared about parenthood: my flaws, my incompetence exposed to the very people I was supposed to be my best self with. Whether Jesse had heard or not, he didn’t let on when he appeared in the kitchen doorway. I always loved how he looked after workouts — rugged, natural. Eyeing him herself, the baby’s crying declined by degrees like an auditory staircase.

“Hey,” he said, taking in the scene. He grabbed a handful of paper towels and began mopping up the counter and the floor.

“Thanks,” I said, grateful that I didn’t have to ask for his help. “How was training?”

“Not great. I was pretty tired.”

“Can you hold her for a second?”

He paused his cleaning and regarded me, then exhaled. “Yeah, sure.”

I changed out of my soaked t-shirt and emerged from the bedroom to find Jesse bouncing Gretchen on his knee at the kitchen table. She was still wrapped in the towel with her shoulders exposed. He was pretending to walk Gavin Newsom up and down her legs while saying, “Doo de doo. Doo de doo.”

“Hold her for one more minute?” I asked. “Sarah says I should be feeding her rice cereal now.”

“Sure,” he said, continuing to dance Gavin along the baby’s thigh. In the last few days, he’d begun helping more than when she’d first arrived. He’d picked her up out of the Pack ’n Play, comforting her after she started to cry while I was in the shower. He’d even changed a few diapers — the last two without me even having to ask him.

In the kitchen, I asked more about the day’s training, though I had trouble concentrating on the details while also measuring out the proper proportions of what would be Gretchen’s first solid food.

“Does this look right?” I tilted the bowl so Jesse could see.

“You’re asking the wrong guy.”

An image of Abe whisked across my mind as I shuffled through the utensil drawer searching for the smallest spoon we had. I used it to scoop a little cereal and, kneeling down in front of Jesse, brought it to the baby’s lips, which were currently occupied with Gavin Newsom’s head. I gently moved the toy away.

“Hide it,” I whispered to Jesse out of the corner of my mouth while working to distract the baby with the new food.

Instead of using her lips to bring the cereal into her mouth, she blew a raspberry, showering bits of rice cereal and saliva onto my face and Jesse’s legs.

“Oh, great,” I said, wondering why Sarah hadn’t warned me about how messy infants were.

I tried again. This time, Gretchen actively spit the food all over herself.

“So much for that bath you just gave her.”

It was my sentiment exactly. Normally, I loved when Jesse expressed the precise thought I was having. Each time was to me like a tick in the “Reasons We’re Supposed to Be Together” column. But right then, I was just tired and the comment irritated me.

Trying to keep my cool, I spooned out more cereal and held it up, wondering if I should go through that whole ridiculous airplane scenario I’d seen some parents do. But before I could even bring the spoon to her face, Gretchen kicked her legs in preemptive protest, knocking the bowl out of my hand and onto the floor, face down.

“Goddamnit!” I yelled, inflamed by the piling on of my own mistakes.

“Can we try this another time, please?” Jesse said.

“Jesus, yes. Why are
you
so annoyed?” As soon as I’d said it, I wished I hadn’t.

“I’m
annoyed
because you didn’t ask me about bringing this baby here. I’m annoyed because I hardly slept last night — or many nights in the last week. I’m annoyed because if you miss many more tri trainings, you’re flat-out not going to be any shape to do this race with me. I’m annoyed because we haven’t watched our shows or really even seen each other in over a week. I just…miss you.”

This, too, was what I feared about parenting — being, for the first time, at cross purposes with Jesse, particularly when we needed each other more than ever. His mention of shows reminded me that I could use the TV as a distraction for Gretchen while I cleaned up the kitchen. I carried her into the living room. Jesse followed us.

“Why isn’t Sesame Street on on the fucking weekends?” I growled, thumbing the remote aggressively. My legs felt weak and I had a sudden urge to sit down.

“I love that you’re so devoted to your friends,” he said, his tone softening. “But there must be limits. We’re not set up for this. We don’t have the gear, we don’t have unlimited money to pay for a nanny.”

I remained silent. It was all true. Outside, someone laid on a car horn and it all just made my hair hurt.

“We agreed. It was a core principle of our marriage — we didn’t want kids.”

“She’s
not
our kid.”

“That’s my point.”

I hooked Gretchen underneath my right arm. She was face down and kicked her arms and legs as if she was air swimming. As usual when we bickered, I wondered if Jesse thought of Marigold and how he’d never have found himself in a preposterous situation like this if she were still alive. “There are no other options right now,” I whispered.

“How do you know? What has Jean said? Have you talked to Margot?”

I shook my head. “I want them both totally focused on getting Margot better. Pestering them will only delay that.”

“You haven’t even heard from them? Jesus, Hill. This is like a big deal. At the very least, we need some sort of, I don’t know, timeline or something.”

“You’re right. I’ll call her. I’m calling her right now.” I crossed the room and picked up the phone, waving it at him to prove my intention. Wordlessly, I pointed to Gretchen, then to Jesse, then to myself and to the bedroom, signaling that I needed him to watch her so I could devote my attention to the call.

Gretchen had been with us nearly a week. I wanted to hear that Margot was better, that this adventure would soon end, that I could reclaim my life, my work, my routine, my husband’s good graces. Transform this situation into a long ago memory. I sat on the edge of our bed, on Jesse’s side. I dialed slowly, in a way, I suppose, to prolong the illusion, to continue to fool myself into believing life would soon return to normal. Somehow, deep down, I sensed that it wouldn’t. In the moment between my dialing and the first ring, I hooked my left index finger around the drawer knob on Jesse’s nightstand and quietly slid it open. Marigold’s photo was face up in its dusty silver frame, a change from the last time I’d looked, when it had been face down.

Just when I thought the call was headed to voicemail, Jean answered. She sounded withered and old, and I slumped backwards onto the bed, suddenly more fatigued than I’d been in the entire last week.

“She’s —. It’s a process, Hilly,” she said. “The doctor explained that it’s a tricky concoction of hormones, brain chemistry, not to mention repressed emotions and memories.”

Tears spilled out of the corners of my eyes and I palmed my forehead with my free hand. I wanted to just roll over, to bring my knees to my chest, my prayer hands under my cheek and fall into a deep sleep. “It’s been almost a week, Jean.”

“How is my baby granddaughter?”

I recognized the topic-shifting technique I’d executed myself with my own mother earlier. Trying to hide my frustration, I recounted the days with Gretchen. The new favorite toy, her emerging teeth, her near mastery of sitting up without toppling over, her new ability to hold a bottle herself.

“Sounds like she’s thriving. On behalf of Margot, thank you.”

I thought of the bath time debacle and wondered whether she was really thriving under what still felt like my own extreme inadequacy. But though someone else would likely parent more effortlessly than I could, I knew I was all the baby had then. I had to continue to give it my best. After all, Jean had parented me when I’d needed it.

Seeing Marigold’s picture while hearing Jean’s voice reminded me of the time Jean travelled to California for my bachelorette party. It wasn’t the typical drunken night out, but instead a simple weekend in San Francisco with my closest girlfriends. We hiked in the Presidio, crafted our own gourmet ice cream tour of the city and enjoyed spa treatments at the Huntington Hotel. Being of a different generation, Jean didn’t come for every outing but joined us for a few excursions, including lunch at the deYoung Museum after viewing the Quilts of Gee’s Bend exhibit. It just seemed right to include Jean in the weekend — I wasn’t the only one of our friends who loved her, and Margot didn’t mind. Jean even stayed in town one night longer than everyone, even Margot, who’d darted back to Manhattan to close a big deal that wound up on the front page of the
Wall Street Journal
the next week.

That last night with just the two of us, Jean requested “a real, authentic California burrito” so I brought her to a Mexican dive in the Mission that Sarah had introduced me to. We munched on chips and guacamole and sipped imported Mexican beers as we waited for our meals.

“So now that all the bachelorette hoopla is over, why don’t you tell me how you’re really feeling about getting married,” Jean said.

I screwed my face into a what-are-you-talking-about expression.

“C’mon, Hilly. I know you better than that. Something’s gnawing at you.” Since we announced our engagement, Jean had taken an interest in my marriage, as opposed to my wedding, which was my own mother’s primary focus. “It’s a big step. How are you really feeling?”

“Fine! I feel fine! Excited!” As the words spewed from me, even I knew that my faux enthusiasm was pathetically transparent.

“Hilllllllyyyy.”

I thought of Jesse, whom I adored. And I thought of Marigold, sitting there so ageless and glowing in the framed photo he now kept inside rather than on top of his nightstand. I hadn’t asked him to move it — I never would have — but still I was relieved when she stopped looming over us so overtly from the bedside table. Yet I feared that perhaps Jesse resented feeling compelled to move his treasured photo. Meanwhile, unknowingly, my mother had ordered marigolds for our late summer wedding centerpieces. Though I took little interest in most of the girly details of the affair, I was awash in relief that I’d thought to ask about the floral arrangements. My mom wasn’t happy about losing the deposit for the marigolds, but it was one of the few wedding details I insisted on.

“Really, everything is good, especially with Jesse,” I said, more sincerely this time. We loved being a team and we were eager to make it official. “But,” I confessed, “I do wonder if he’ll ever get over Marigold.”

Jean nodded, as if she expected this very admission. “That poor girl is, sadly, not here. But you are. It’s you who Jesse loves now. Be
you
.”

I couldn’t help but think of my sister Julia, my closest blood relative whom I never even met. “I don’t know. I’ve already spent my entire life playing the runner-up, the consolation prize,” I said, breaking a chip and sticking one half in salsa and the other in guacamole. “I get overwhelmed sometimes, wondering if I can ever measure up to what he could have had with her.”

“Of course, he must have loved her very much. But don’t fairytale it,” she said, creating her own verb. She pointed a tortilla chip at me. “Nothing’s ever perfect. Even a platinum memory tarnishes.”

I nodded and took a long swig of my beer. The bitterness was a welcome jolt to my system.

“Holding on is natural, given the tragic circumstances,” Jean continued. “But look at it this way: Jesse’s heartbreak over Marigold shows that he is capable of deep love. And by marrying Jesse, you’re not replacing her. You can enhance his life without replacing her. Jesse knows that — or else he wouldn’t have proposed.”

Just then, a muscular waiter with salsa stains on his waist apron brought two red plastic baskets leaden with burritos the size of footballs, which were surrounded by even more chips. Jean put her napkin in her lap, ready to dig in.

“Now, if you ever want to talk about this — now or even after the wedding,” she said, “you let me know. But for now, just listen to me: life will never be the same for Jesse since Marigold’s death. But that doesn’t mean it can’t be better.”

Looking back, it’s hard to believe that I’d almost been too afraid, too insecure to commit to what had proved to be the most fulfilling relationship of my life. But thanks to Jean’s sound reasoning, her pep talk that night, I leapt, despite the risks.

On the phone with her after her granddaughter’s botched bath, I didn’t know what to say. I didn’t know how, through my exhaustion, to express my willingness to help, but also the bounds of my abilities. “Jean, I —,” I stumbled. “This is really…”

As always, she seemed to hear what I wasn’t able to express. “It’s going to be awhile, Hilly.”

“I can’t think with all this noise!”

Jesse slammed his legal pad down so hard that the baby leapt an inch in her bouncy seat.

She regarded him not so much with fear but with something more like curiosity or, if I was really reading into it, apology.