People Pleaser

She stared at the marble floors, etched with skid marks of squeaky wheels and the occasional blade of grass giving the otherwise cold and bleak floors a pop of colour. She sighed. Tapped her foot anxiously. Looked at her chipped nail polish in disdain. 

She wasn't ready to have a baby. 

Blurred words of a quickly escalating argument seeped out of the delivery room, suddenly bursting into the otherwise eerily quiet corridor outside.

"What the hell, Cathy!"

"I said get out!"

The adolescent boy, probably no older than a high school sophomore, stumbled out of the room in a huff. He took a seat two chairs to her right, pulled his phone out of his pocket and mumbled something under his breath. 

"So, how's she doing?" she asked, still staring at the floor and resisting the urge to bite her nails. 

He looked up for a second, glancing at her. 

"Are you talking to me?" 

She propped herself up in the chair and turned towards him. 

"Yeah, I'm Jill - my husband Andrew's in the room with your girlfriend, I suppose."

It took a moment for him to register this information. 

"Oh, so you're the people that the church hooked us up with." 

"Yeah."

"Cool."

A moment of silence passed, and she sensed the gears in his brain trying to voice his next thought.

"I'm Noah. In case you didn't know."

"I didn't."

"Well, now you know. So, why aren't you in the room with your husband?"

She laughed lightly at that and leaned back in her chair a little, contemplating what to say.

"Well, I've never been much of a person that can console someone. A sarcastic quip, sure. A moronic liner to ease the mood, I'm your gal, but when it actually comes down to reassuring someone, like an adolescent girl in labour, no. Andrew's always been better at that kind of thing, I suppose."

He checked his phone for the time and slumped a little in his seat too. 

"I get that. I don't think I was really helping by asking when she thought it would slide out - I mean, I guess I could've worded it better too, but I kind of have a history test tomorrow that I haven't started studying for."

Jill chuckled at that.

"Yeah, what's your test on?"

"World war two."

"That's a bit of a broad topic. Might have to pull an all-nighter."

"You're telling me."

An audible cry of pain came from the delivery room. With a shared glance, the pair knew that that was their cue to leave.

"Let's go by the vending machines," Noah said, already walking briskly to the one at the end of the hall, "I want some Lays".

Jill lingered her glance with the doors separating her and her next eighteen years of commitment, before realizing that Noah had already reached the vending machine and was now seeming to reassess his options. 

While he continued to decide, with quite a concerned face at that, Jill couldn't help but wonder how he was feeling about the situation at hand.

"So, I've narrowed it down to Lays' Classic or their Dill Pickle chips. Mind to weigh in?"

"Well, they do call it 'classic' for a reason."

"You know what... I've decided it's a rhetorical question. Dill pickle it is."

"Glad to help."

He punched in its sequence and slipped the coins in the slot.

The bag moved forward then stopped at the very edge.

"Are you kidding? I haven't eaten since like 4." Noah whined, proceeding to kick the machine incessantly.

Jill awkwardly leaned back against the opposing wall to the scene, not knowing how to respond to the temper tantrum the seemingly young adult was undergoing.

"Hey, just wondering... how old are you?"

"Fifteen," he said, sighing as he retreated from the machine.

"Wow, that's young."

"Yeah, says the married woman."

"Touché."

Noah leaned against the wall alongside her and ripped open the bag of chips, obnoxiously chewing with his mouth open. Jill felt nauseous.

"So, how are you dealing with all of this... pregnant girlfriend, looming history test, and all." 

He gave a nervous chuckle and dusted away the crumbs that clung to his face.

"Well, I got a job. Part-time since I still go to school but money's money. I thought she was going to keep it... for us."

Jill remained silent waiting for his next words. He seemed to have a difficult time talking about it.

"I don't know... Cathy was having second thoughts and was thinking about adoption," Noah gestured to her, "I wanted to be supportive of her since she would've been the one staying home with the baby and it's not like I make much anyway, but... that kid's mine."

He looked at Jill awkwardly, "Well at least in terms of genes and stuff."

Jill didn't know what to say. That the baby would be well in her care? That she would love it like it were her own? She couldn't guarantee that. She also never thought that she would be a terrible mother. Although her thinking of motherhood never went too far, the only thought regarding it was that she didn't want it, despite the attempts that she had to undergone to be pregnant for Andrew's sake.

Jill pierced the solemn silence.

"Andrew... he's been wanting a kid for a while now. And since I can't give him that..." she trailed off taking a deep breath, "Well, anyway, I want that for him. You should've seen the look on his face when he got the call that we were going to get a baby. I've never seen him that happy." She chuckled and Noah gave a small smile. 

The silence lingered, but both paid no mind, marinating in their thoughts. Jill could tell that he was going to ask her the question that she had been dreading, from Andrew, from Cathy, and now from him. 

"You're not taking my baby just because of Andrew, right? Do you want this too?"

Jill bit her lip, not knowing how to answer the direct question. That proved to be answer enough for Noah.

"Are you kidding me? You're so pathetic you can't stand up to your husband and say you don't want this? This isn't some gift you can return. It's a commitment." Noah was so enraged he was practically yelling, storming off back to the other end of the hall. He crumpled his bag of chips and threw it against the wall, inches away from Jill's face.

"Noah, wait!"

"What!" he screamed back at her, facing her with his arms slack in disbelief, almost laughing. "You've been dreading getting my baby and I've been dreading losing her," his voice was shaking and his eyes were beginning to water. What could she say? He was right. She hadn't even known the sex of the baby. "Why do you think I'm not in there with Cathy... I can't look at her without thinking of how happy she is to give our baby away. And I hate her for that."

A silent tear slipped down Jill's face. 

"You don't know how bad I want to want to have your baby," she whispered, defeated after months of lying to her husband to avoid his disappointment. 

Suddenly, Andrew burst from the delivery room, smiling wide at the odd pair, oblivious to their state of sorrow, "She's coming! Get in here!" He slipped back through the doors.

They looked at each other, not sure what to make of the situation after all that had been said. Cathy's pained cries sorted their priorities.

"How far along are you? Did we miss it?" Noah said as he rammed through the doors, panicked and rushing to Cathy's side. Jill stuck by Andrew's side, both reaching to hold each other's hands tight in anticipation.

"We're about to be parents." Andrew murmured in awe. Jill faintly smiled.

Cathy gave out one last guttural scream, her face flushed and covered in sweat. Now, a different cry could be heard.

Andrew laughed lightly, immediately removing his hand from Jill's and going beside the nurse who was taking the newborn to be cleaned up. He tried not to interrupt the task but it was clear that he couldn't wait to hold her.

On the other side of the room, Noah was petting Cathy's hair and whispering reassurances into her ear as she was succumbing to exhaustion, her eyes droopy and her breaths long. 

Jill was cold, with a fixed blank stare. 

It took everything in her body not to run out, away from expectations and responsibility. She felt Noah's gaze on her and awoke from her trance. His eyes were filled with sorrow as he knew what was about to come. Papers that would separate him and his child.

Papers that he would have to sign. Papers that she would have to sign.

And all too quickly they came. 

Filled with remorse, they signed, their true feelings pushed under the rug. 

Two people from different walks of life, practically strangers, were now trapped in their mutual, deep-held contrition, bonding them forever. The only thing they could do was plaster a smile, nod, and play the part.