Dad chimed in and said, “That means you just volunteered us to watch your dog for three months, Jenna.”
“Sorry, Dad, I thought it was a good way to get ahead at the office.” If there’s one thing for which my parents are suckers, it’s aiding in my future success. They immediately softened.
“Where are you staying up there?” asked Dad.
“A hotel.”
“Will you be home at all during that time?” asked Mom.
“Not sure. Maybe.”
“Geri, she’ll be gone as long as she’s gone. It’s about time she took her career seriously.”
“I was just asking,” Mom said. “I don’t care. Good for you, Jenna.”
“Thanks. Sorry, I know he howls a lot, but you’ll grow to love him.”
“It’s not that we don’t love him. It’s just that he’s crazy and loud and humps our guests,” said Dad.
“Sorry, bad parenting. He’s so cute though.”
I felt bad about neglecting Sonny for three months and sticking him with my parents, but it would be too hard to travel with him. Plus, I couldn’t leave him in the car in July while I raced or trained for four to six hours a day. I also felt bad about lying to my parents, but it had to be done.
* * *
On Monday, I knew I couldn’t handle the excitement of leaving over a period of an entire week, so I planned to leave a day early. I decided have a C-section around lunch time Thursday and not see anyone again for three months. From what I could tell, this was normal procedure. Human resources would distribute the obligatory email “Jenna Rosen gave birth to John Doe this afternoon at 3:47 p.m. Mom and baby are doing fine.” Everyone would hit “reply all” and send their congratulations and hopefully that would be the end of it until my return in October, at which point I’d explain that I had to leave the kid at the fire station because it had no work ethic and was constantly crying, shitting and sleeping.
Tuesday was a big day of ignoring my work and planning my departure. I cancelled my cable, Netflix and newspaper. Danny agreed to grab my mail whenever he rode his bike by my house and said he’d send my bills my way, wherever I was.
After printing out directions to all the races I planned to attend, I ran out of procrastination methods and started searching for an online crossword puzzle that wasn’t banned by WEBSENSE. I found a first grade level puzzle and another that was extremely difficult. I got seven words on the difficult crossword, but then aced the other to boost my confidence back up.
I closed the crossword page and stared off into space. I had reached a level of boredom where I actually considered answering my overdue discovery requests. Instead, I got up and strolled into Kimberly’s office. Kimberly was in the middle of a heated email discussion with David and Ralph, an attorney in our Alabama office. Apparently, Ralph, on the brink of making partner, offered to assist David and Kimberly with their upcoming trial in Mobile. David’s response was, “TABLE’S FULL!”
Ralph, who was born and bred in Mobile typed, “Fine, let the New York Jew and woman from Chicago go to trial against the attorney whose great-grandfather fought alongside the judge’s great-grandfather during the Civil War.”
David was unfazed. He typed, “I went to law school in Georgia and I can put on a drawl and mix it up with any southerner.”
This was partially true. While David did attend law school at the University of Georgia, his fake accent was atrocious and he could not “mix it up” in any social situation, let alone amongst men reminiscing about their granddaddys’ roles in the “war against northern aggression.”
Ralph responded, “Suit yourself.”
Kimberly typed to Ralph, “You can have my spot at the table.”
Ralph responded, “Thanks. I’m good.”
They stopped typing and I took a seat across from Kimberly in her office. We shot the shit for over an hour, then I returned to my desk, talked to a few friends on the phone and called it a day.
On Wednesday, I couldn’t face a full day at the office even though I knew I wouldn’t do anything. So, I rode the sixty mile group ride in the hills of San Antonio before strolling into work at 11:30 a.m. No one even questioned me; it was as though it was expected that I would come and go at my leisure at this late stage of pregnancy.
Thursday! I woke up at three in the morning after having a dream that I became a professional bicycle racer, and to celebrate, had a party where I served chips and dip on my law diploma. The dream was so exciting I couldn’t get back to sleep. Instead, I began packing so that when I left the office to give birth, I could drive north immediately. Sonny stayed glued to my side, as he does whenever I pack. He associates my suitcases with abandonment. When I left for work, I assured him that I’d be back, but he refused to budge, even when I fed him and opened his doggy door. I slithered out the door so he couldn’t follow me and I heard him crying and howling until I pulled out of the driveway. Poor little guy. I wish he understood English so I could tell him he would just be at Camp Rosen for a little bit.
After checking email, cycling news, and my bank statement, I lifted my ban on avoiding work to respond to a scathing letter from an opposing counsel. The tone of my letter was calm and rational, addressing each of his points in an easygoing manner that accentuated the fact that the tone of his letter was that of a raving lunatic. Once that was finished, the plan was to surf the Internet for the remaining seven hours of the day.
By 10:00 a.m., I was already thinking of leaving early. However, David swung by my office and asked me to go to lunch with Kimberly and him. I said yes, because I didn’t want to subject Kimberly to a solo hour with David. I really am a good person.
By lunch, I was so excited about my impending departure that I didn’t mind eating at Jackson’s. Jackson’s was on Harbour Island, directly on the water. It was a large place with several bars and great indoor and outdoor seating. The restaurant was able to thrive in spite of charging exorbitantly high prices for less than mediocre food because it was right on the water and had a spectacular view. Of course, David was the only person who went there and insisted on sitting indoors. Today, this didn’t bother me. My escape was near so I was on cloud nine as I walked towards my twelve dollar greasy club sandwich with David Greene.
We sat down and David ordered his first of many Diet Cokes. He’s a chain Diet Coke drinker and has an irrational fear that the waiter is conspiring to bring him Coke instead of Diet Coke, or for dessert, regular instead of decaf. This fear can only be placated by David grilling the waiter every time he comes to the table with a refill. “Are you sure?” “Who puts the taps on?” “How do you know that glass is mine?” “Did you make the coffee?” “Did you see who put it in the pot with the orange handle?”
We sat in a window seat and David kept staring at the table on the other side of the window, just outside. It was awkward; Kimberly and I pretended not to notice. Eventually, I said, “You know David, that’s not a one-way mirror, she can see you staring at her.” David responded, “She? I was trying to figure out if that was a girl or a boy from the second we sat down.”
I looked over. She was thin, had short hair, a sleeve of tattoos on both arms and was wearing a wife-beater tank top, cargo pants and boots. Thankfully, she was texting on her phone and not paying attention to us.
I said, “It’s a girl David, please don’t ask her to confirm.” This was a real concern of mine.
David replied, “I won’t.”
He said this as though blatantly staring at her for the past ten minutes and talking loudly enough so that she could possibly hear him through the glass wasn’t just as rude as inquiring directly about her gender. Fortunately she was looking at the water and not at us.
David couldn’t let it go. He said, “Do you think she’s, you know, well, you know, bi?”
“Bisexual?” I asked.
“Yeah,” David said.
“You mean if I had to speculate as to her sexual orientation just by looking at her and assigning a stereotype?” I asked.
“Yes,” David replied without hesitation or an inkling that he had veered far from political correctness. He was staring at me, waiting for an answer.
“Then I’d guess lesbian.”
“That’s what I meant,” David said. “I just, you know, wanted to be politically correct.”
I smiled at the irony and his ignorance. “I don’t think bisexual is P.C. for lesbian, David.”
“Sure it is,” he replied, like I was an idiot for not knowing the proper nomenclature initiated by my own generation. Jesus. I was excited about racing my bike for three months, but getting away from David for three months would be almost as exhilarating.
Kimberly was in the same situation, sans the impending three month vacation. She was noticeably more somber with this the awkward conversation. Next, we talked about David’s children, subrogation and my pregnancy. On any other day, these topics would result in a Jenna-shaped hole through the wall, but today, I contributed. I complimented David on his ability to produce such a great artist and dancer, engaged in a discussion about subrogation waivers and held in my lunch as David explained the many positions to have sex with a pregnant woman. The hour seemed to fly by as if it were only two, instead of the usual four-to-one-hour ratio I experienced in David’s presence. I wasn’t even upset when David failed to pick up the check despite earning nine times my salary, inviting me to lunch, selecting the restaurant, picking the seats and dictating the conversation.
After lunch, we headed back to the parking garage. Jackson’s was attached to a hotel and there was a big circular driveway in front of the hotel you have to walk past to get to the garage. We walked under the awning parallel to the valet stand in order to stay out of the sun. As I calculated that I only had to drive back downtown with David, about four minutes, before taking off for three months, I heard, “Watch out!” I turned and saw an SUV traveling in the wrong direction, headed directly for me.
The crash happened instantaneously, but in slow motion. The car was braking, but not fast enough. I had no time to turn to get out of the way. To protect my cycling legs I pointed my stomach toward the SUV, so the Empathy Belly would take the brunt of the impact. I was knocked flat, three feet behind where I was standing. My back hurt from the fall, but otherwise I was unharmed.
Kimberly and David ran over with a look of sympathy mixed with disgust. I was confused by their reaction until I remembered that I had just thrust my fetus into an oncoming vehicle. I looked down at my stomach. It was leaking. Two lead balls, added to tack fourteen pounds onto the already ridiculously heavy belly, were rolling slowly next to me.
“Call an ambulance!” David screamed.
“I’m okay,” I said and stood up, trying to figure out how to flee the scene.
“Your water broke,” said David
My “water” was all over my stomach rather than flowing from my nether region. Kimberly, who instantly deduced that I was not with child, hovered over me and began stammering to try and cover for me.
I stood up, turned away from David and said, “David, I’d really be more comfortable with Kimberly and the doctors.”
“I’ll turn away,” David replied, “but I don’t feel comfortable leaving until the ambulance arrives.” As he said this, he checked his watch. David never took more than one hour for lunch and he didn’t want my near-death experience to interfere with his billable hours.
The innards of the Empathy Bbelly continued to ooze out as we waited. David was turned the other way tapping on his BlackBerry. As the ambulance approached, sirens blaring, a crowd began congregating. I practically sprinted into the ambulance to get away from them.
For a minute, I was afraid that David might insist on accompanying me to the hospital, but he was already walking off towards his car. I don’t know why I was even worried, as there was no way David was going to go to the hospital with me instead of billing clients.
On the way to the hospital, which was a mile away on Davis Island, an EMT looked at me for the first time and said, “You’re not pregnant.”
Obviously he graduated at the top of his class. “Yeah,” I said. “This is a big misunderstanding. If I could just hop out.”
The EMT ignored me and started inspecting my head. By the time he determined there’d been no head trauma, we were at Tampa General and I was being unloaded. The EMT called for a psych consult and I knew I had to get out of there before I was admitted. If I were admitted, my carefully executed plan would be in shambles, I’d have exorbitant medical bills and be wearing a straightjacket. I was already dreading the bills and paperwork related to my one-mile ambulance drive.
I decided to fake a seizure. I have a friend named Roy who is an epileptic and I’d seen him seize a number of times. I started shaking, then fell off the stretcher onto the floor. As the orderly pushing the stretcher took off to get help, I ran in the other direction.
I exited Tampa General and ran towards the bathroom at the nearby tennis courts. I often stopped there when I had to pee while riding on Davis Island. In the bathroom, I called Danny on my cell phone and asked him to pick me up. The phone had some Empathy Belly water on it, but it still worked.
As I sat there, Sarah called and said, “I just heard what happened.”
My pulse sky rocketed and I said, “Are you going to tell David? I don’t think he noticed that I wasn’t pregnant.”
Sarah said, “No, I’m not going to tell him. Jenna, I don’t know why you faked a pregnancy, but everyone thinks you just went into labor. Use this time off as a maternity leave and get the mental help you need. Who knows, in a few months when you’re sane and Tony is out of jail, maybe we’ll hear wedding bells. Then you can have a real baby and you won’t have to pretend.”
She was so far off the mark I had to suppress a big laugh. “Thanks, Sarah. Give my best to Tony and I’ll let you know when I’ve worked through my issues.” We hung up, and I felt relief wash over me.
Ten minutes later, there was a knock on the ladies room door, “Jenna, are you in there?”
“Who is it?” I asked.
“Danny.”
“What’s the safe word?”