The Year We Turned Forty (19 page)

Last time, after Lucas was born, she'd been convinced she needed to keep him on a strict schedule, refusing to let even Morgan and Madison's busy activities dictate his nap or bedtime, often watching their softball games from the car as he slept. She was religious in her approach to when he slept and ate, while also trying to squeeze in the right amount of
time
—whether tummy or story.

But now, if Lucas refused to sleep, she'd scoop him from his crib and let him be awake, his large green eyes drinking in
his surroundings. If he wailed in anger until she picked him up, she'd give in. If the girls wanted to hold him or feed him, she didn't hover over them in case they lost their grip. She just let life happen, as it should. And she'd worked harder this time to create a bond between the twins and their new baby brother. Just that morning, she'd asked the girls to feed him and watched as they both tried in their own way to get him to eat his strained peas. She'd felt so much more like a family this time than she had before. When Grant was able to get home for dinner and they all sat around the table together, the twins talking about their science-fair projects—Madison was calculating the density of fruits and vegetables and Morgan was doing a data analysis of the most popular animals—turns out kittens beat out puppies two to one!—while Lucas mashed his food, she could almost pretend Grant had fathered all three of them.

She leaned back on her wrists as she waited for Gabriela at the park, letting the sun dance across her face as she soaked in all these moments, willing them to replace the ones she'd like to forget.

“Jessie?”

Jessie snapped her head around at the sound of a familiar voice. She sat forward and pulled Lucas into her lap as she looked up, putting her hand over her eyes to see Peter standing above her.

“What are you doing here? Is Cathy with you?” She looked around, feeling a pit in her stomach. It was the first time she'd been alone with Peter since the day she'd told him she was pregnant. Jessie hugged Lucas against her chest and he squirmed. But she pressed him closer anyway.

“No, she's at work,” Peter said without elaborating. “May I?” Peter pointed to the grass beside her.

“Actually, I was just about to leave.” Jessie started to rise from the blanket.

“Jessica—”

“Please don't call me that.” Not even Grant used her given name. And something about Peter saying it made her skin crawl—at least this time. Before, he'd mistakenly called her that and then it had morphed into an inside joke that for the life of her she couldn't remember why she'd ever thought was funny.

“Okay,
Jessie
.” He put his hands up as if showing her he wasn't holding anything. “Listen, can I please talk to you?”

“Did you follow me here?”

“No . . . well . . . sort of,” he stammered.

“What do you mean
sort of
?” Jessie started tossing squishy blocks and rattles into her diaper bag while perching Lucas on her hip.

“Just hold on a sec. I know how this looks, but I'm not stalking you. We need to talk and I couldn't think of another way to get you alone,” Peter began, wedging his hands into the pockets of his khakis. “I haven't been able to get Lucas out of my mind since we ran into you.”

All the sound around her quickly faded as if she'd shoved earplugs into her ears. She could see Peter's lips moving, but she couldn't hear him.

“Are you listening to me?”

Jessie scrambled for something to say, for the words that would make him retract his statement. When he'd refused to have anything to do with her pregnancy, she'd quickly settled into the idea. It would have been too complicated for him to be in Lucas' life. And she'd never told anyone, but when she used to rock Lucas to sleep while alone in her empty house, the twins with Grant for the weekend, she would thank her lucky stars
that he was gone. His presence would have only reminded her of that night.

“What do you mean you can't get him off your mind? Where did he fit into your brain during the nine months I was pregnant? For the six months since he was born?”
And what about the ten years after that?

“I don't know. There was something about seeing him, the way Cathy held him. Like, maybe we could work it all out somehow.” He sighed loudly. “Maybe that's a crazy thought. But I
felt
something. And now I can't pretend I didn't.”

“You could barely bring yourself to look up from your damn BlackBerry!” Jessie's voice rose and two speed walkers looked over as they passed.

“I know,” he said sheepishly. “I'm sorry, I think I was in shock. But I did. Look at him, I mean. He has my eyes.” Peter started to peer around Jessie's shoulder at Lucas' face, but she turned to block his view.

“So what are you saying?” Jessie could see her vein throbbing through her wrist.

“I don't know, exactly. Maybe I could spend a little time with him here and there?”

“Here and there?” Jessie snapped. “What, you want to take him to his Mommy and Me tumbling class? I'm sure that won't raise any eyebrows.”

“No. Not like that. No one could know,” Peter said, ignoring her dig. “Obviously, we'd need to keep this from Cathy and Grant. For now.”

“What do you mean,
for now
?” Jessie said, shifting Lucas to her other hip and slinging her bag over her shoulder, panic rising inside of her.

“I mean, I think we should consider that one day we may
need to tell them the truth. Now that I've seen him, I don't think I can live with myself, knowing I have a son out there who doesn't even know who I am.”

Jessie felt bile rushing up to her throat. All along, she'd banked on the fact that Peter would be the same uncaring jerk he'd been last time. But now that she'd made different choices, Peter seemed to be following suit. She felt a burst of rage. Why couldn't the universe just let her be content? Had her one mistake been so awful that she would forever be denied happiness? She had hated herself for years after what happened, and now she realized that the karma gods might be hating her too.

“No,” she spit out.

“No what?” Peter looked at her incredulously

“I said
no
. Like you mentioned, you have a wife. And you also have a son, named Sean. You need to go back to
that
life,” Jessie said as she started walking away.

“I have rights,” Peter called after her, but she refused to stop, putting one foot in front of the other, nearly colliding with Gabriela as she turned the corner to where her minivan was parked, her breathing coming in short, desperate spurts.

“Are you okay?” Gabriela eyed Jessie as she tried to catch her breath.

“I'm fine,” Jessie said as she took in the gauze and bandage on Gabriela's arm, remembering that she'd just come from the doctor, that today was the day she'd had the blood test that would determine if she was pregnant. “There was a swarm of bees over by our blanket and they kept following us wherever we moved.” The lie fell off Jessie's tongue effortlessly. “Can we just have lunch at my place?”

“Of course.” Gabriela stretched out her arms to hold Lucas.

Jessie handed him over and searched the park until she saw
Peter walking in the opposite direction, his shoulders hunched. Changing her own outcome had altered Peter's as well, and now, possibly Lucas'. She bit her lip hard, suddenly desperately regretting being back here, angry with Blair for leading them to believe they'd all get their happy endings by returning. Or had she just assumed that a second chance would automatically be a better one?

Peter had said he
had rights
, and she'd heard something in the undertone of his voice, that he was making her a promise. That he wasn't going anywhere. Until this moment, she'd had zero plans to return to her old life. But now, when she considered which was the better option—losing Grant but keeping Lucas, or losing Lucas but keeping Grant—she honestly didn't know what to think. But she was painfully aware that she had less than six months to figure it out.

“Let's ride together, then I'll bring you back,” Jessie said to Gabriela as she popped the van's side doors open. “Sorry it's such a mess—just push the Cheerios and whatever else is on the seat to the floor before you slide in.”

“I can't wait until there are mystery things ground into my car's seats,” Gabriela said, smiling.

“Do you think you're pregnant?” Jessie asked as she buckled Lucas in.

“You know, I hate to say it out loud, but I do. I really feel different this time,” Gabriela said, putting her hand over her stomach. “Plus, I got acupuncture before the implantation and our doctor said the embryo was grade-A quality, so . . .” Her voice trailed off.

“Oh, Gabs, that's such great news!” Jessie slid into her seat and reached over the armrest to hug her. “I knew with both of my pregnancies before I took the home tests. I think it's like a
mother's intuition or something.” Jessie forced herself to bury the image of her sobbing hysterically in the Starbucks bathroom after she peed on four tests, the pink lines confirming what her body had already confessed to her the week before.

“I have tons of the symptoms. Breast tenderness, tightness in my abdomen, exhaustion.” She looked sideways at Jessie. “I've become an obsessive Googler.”

“Thank God for Google,” Jessie said.

“I'm so happy it had already been invented. Not sure I could go through this without it.”

“When do you officially find out?”

“They're going to call me by tomorrow at the latest. And in the meantime, I'm
not
going to buy a home pregnancy test. So don't allow me to stop at CVS and get one, even if I beg you! I'm just going to find out the good old-fashioned way and then we can celebrate.”

“Yay!” Jessie cheered as they started driving toward her house.

Gabriela's phone started vibrating in her lap and Jessie looked at her expectantly. “Is that them?”

Gabriela shook her head and frowned. “It's my editor.”

“Lucas, do not have a meltdown. Auntie Gabriela needs to take a very important call,” Jessie said over her shoulder.

“Hello?”

Jessie listened for several minutes as Gabriela offered a lot of
hmm
s and
okay
s, unable to piece together what the conversation was about. “I did get my itinerary, thanks,” Gabriela said right before she hung up.

“What was that all about?” Jessie asked.

“I have to go to New York City tomorrow morning.”

“Lucky! I love it there this time of year!”

“I don't think this trip will be about pleasure,” Gabriela said.
“I'm behind on my deadline and Sheila is not happy. At least Claire is going with me as moral support.”

Jessie stuck out her lower lip. “I wish I could go.”

“It's not too late if you want to come.”

“No, I can't. Grant's work schedule is crazy this week. But that doesn't mean I'm not insanely jealous of your girls' trip.”

“He seems really tired.”

“I know you saw him doze at your reading. I'm sorry.” Jessie shook her head. “This project he's been working on is kicking his ass. If it makes you feel any better, he falls asleep on me quite often too.”

“Oh, I wasn't offended! Those things bore me to tears too,” she teased. “Is everything okay with you guys?”

“It's fine. I'm fine.” Jessie smiled.

“Jess, I know that you really want to make things work with Grant this time,” Gabriela began.

“I'm
making
things work this time. It's different,” Jessie insisted, and told Gabriela about her recent talk with Grant. And how after, she'd set up a sitter and asked him out on a date. As she pulled on her jeans and placed huge dabs of concealer below her eyes to hide the signs of the sleepless nights from Lucas' teething, she thought about how she fell in love with Grant so swiftly. They'd met when he'd come to pick up her post-college roommate, Michelle, for a date, the chemistry between them instant as they'd listened to the hum of the blow-dryer, speculating how long it was going to take her to get ready. It hadn't worked out with Michelle, who'd quickly moved on with a personal trainer, and she happily gave Jessie her blessing when Grant had called to ask her out, joking that he hoped she air dried her hair.

She had made a reservation at one of their favorite
restaurants in Marina del Rey, and as they watched the sunset, Jessie remembered the talk they'd had in their alternate life, the night she'd asked him about his job, how the stress had practically melted from his face as he explained, and then how he'd made love to her after. So this time, she vowed to keep the communication lines open, asking Grant about his latest project. He'd talked through some problems he was having with a beautiful old building in Long Beach that was being converted into a steakhouse. And Jessie filled him in on how Claire's mom was doing and about how Gabriela was still trying to get pregnant. And as he'd wrapped his arm around her as the sun fell into the ocean, her exhaustion had disappeared.

“Enough about me.” Jessie changed the subject as she braked at a stoplight. “How far behind are you on your manuscript?”

“Yes, I've barely written a fourth of the book.” Gabriela paused and looked out the window. “In fact, you owe me some feedback, girl. What do you think of it so far?”

Jessie swallowed. She had read the pages Gabriela gave her and had been avoiding giving her a critique. There hadn't been anything specifically wrong with them and she liked the storyline and characters so far, but the chapters weren't anything like the last time she'd written the same book. It was as if something was missing, the pages lacking Gabriela's trademark charm and magic. Jessie had always been able to give her honest opinion, but now she worried it would be too much for Gabriela to take. And now that Jessie's destiny was changing drastically for the worse because of the things she had done differently, she worried what this might mean for Gabriela and her career.