What's a Pregnant Lady Like You Doing in a Place Like This?

2-27-2009

Is no place safe from pregnant women? Mr. Crud and I step into a basement cum barroom last Saturday. Our first party in months. Partly we sometimes have a hard time relating to folks who haven’t been briefed on our year of heartache. Mostly we are lazy. And in love with Battlestar Galactica and can’t imagine a finer evening than curling up on the couch and watching Lee Adama and Starbuck shoot each other simmering glances while saving humanity from the Cylons. But this special Saturday we decide to venture out into the world of band parties to catch my ex-Gollipopp bandmates do their thing.

One of Mr. Crud’s pals who he hasn’t seen in a few months steps up to our conversational plate.

“What’s new?” Mr. Crud asks.

“I’m going to be a dad in a few months,” Old Pal says and pivots to show his very pregnant wife standing behind him, chatting with friends.

“Hey, that’s great,” Mr. Crud says. We exchange glances. To bring it up or not to bring it up, that is the perpetual question. Is their a tactful way to say “Wow, I’m so happy for you. Kt here was pregnant too. Twice in fact! Twice in one year in fact!!! But you know, it didn’t work out.”

Nope. No tactful way in a basement lit by Christmas lights.

“So, what week are you in?” Mr. Crud asks, making me proud with his pregnancy conversational prowess.

“31. So about 9 weeks left,” he says.

“It’s about 40 weeks,” I say to Mr. Crud, wanting to demonstrate my own knowledge on the topic of human gestational periods.

I do the math. Old Pal’s wife is due a week after I would have (should have) had Dewey. In an alternate universe of perfectly replicating genes, Old Pal and Mr. Crud would have lots to discuss and a mutual back-slapping party of a time ahead of them. Instead, we fish for words as Mr. Crud and I continue to exchange “should we mention it?” looks.

No. We shouldn’t. No father of an about-to-pop pregnant lady wants to hear of a worst-case scenario come to life. He wants to be happy and to be reassured that he didn’t really need to sleep that much anyway.

I decide to excuse myself for a cigarette far far away from the pregnant. The first band starts. A 3-piece with—wouldn’t you know it—a pregnant lady taking lead vocals. Shouldn’t you people be at home gorging on ice cream and nesting or some shit like that? Can a girl even go to a band party without having to look in the mirror and see her failed uterus?

I turn to leave as another friend of Mr. Crud’s steps inside. The last time we saw her I was pregnant and about to have my second ultrasound of doom. She, on the other hand, had a gorgeous 8-month-old daughter whose smiling face made me hopeful that maybe this time things were okay. (Darn babies and their hope-inspiring faces.)

“So where’s the baby?” Mr. Crud asks after we’ve exchanged the requisite how’s it going-s with his friend.

“We have a system,” she says. “I get to party for the first hour while he sits in the van and watches her sleep. Then it’s his turn. And by the end of his hour, we’re usually ready to head home.”

“Ooo, good one,” I say.

I know that Mr. Crud and I will never be motivated to enact such a plan once we (hopefully) have a critter of our own. Plus I’m too prone to forgetting to look at my watch unless I’m having a bad time.

My ex-mates’ band starts up. Old Pal is the third member of the band. Mr. Crud pulls me to the front of the milling crowd where I, who have crossed over into the sleepy drunk zone, find a seat. A few feet away from me Old Pal’s wife records him on a small camcorder. A permanent wide smile settles on her face as her eyes flicker back and forth between Old Pal and the camera’s screen. I imagine myself as her, watching Mr. Crud bang the skins at what would probably be his final rock show before our theoretical baby comes. She smiles like she has a secret. You know, like a baby growing inside of her that is made of the two of them, a being founded in love and kisses and cells dividing at the right time. My eyes keep finding her and wondering if that will ever be me. Should we have tried again last month? Is it time? The longer we wait, the more I get used to sweaty yoga practices and Friday martinis and the fear that hums in the background of every discussion of maybe getting back into the TTC game.

I have secrets too. They just don’t make me smile knowingly.