Not again

We were in my BMW 5 series. Ashley was wearing a henley T-shirt that was missing its bottom half. It was sparkling white and wouldn’t have been long enough to cover my six-year-old’s belly. Even though I’d seen her stomach countless times before, it was all I could look at. It was tanned and smooth; freckle-less and hairless. It was the stomach of a young person in her prime that exercised and ate well. It was flat like you see on Instagram.

My mom left me the BMW and $250,000 in her Last Will and Testament. She died from a brain aneurysm two years ago. She had the hemorrhagic stroke a mere forty-five minutes after I told her I wanted to be a painter. Back then, as a newly divorced man, I felt much more attractive in the 5 series than I did in my Honda CR-V, which I immediately sold for cash. I don’t know if I caused her aneurysm, but a part of me wants to believe I did because it would make me a more interesting artist.

 I quit my job when that $250,000 landed in my savings account and told everyone that I would spend my time painting. Lara (my ex) was the only person who didn’t respond with shock. The others said things like: You paint? What are you going to paint? I didn’t even know you could paint. But Laura told me something wonderful I wish she would have said when we were married. She said, “What you do in your free time is none of my business.”

I spent $115,000 in those first fourteen months, and I tried to paint the best I could but produced nothing that I was proud enough to share. I only had four finished pieces; the rest sat incomplete in the second bedroom of my townhouse. Going in there was like going into a room full of dying plants. With no inspiration in front of me, I did what men do and searched for it in a woman. How I ended up with one ten years younger than me, I don’t know. 

I gathered my things in the car and was about to open the door when Ashely took my hand and pulled it toward her chest. My knuckles rubbed against her breasts, and I got aroused. But we couldn’t have sex in the car; that’s a young man’s game. Soon, I understood why she was getting tender.

She said, “I’m getting off birth control.”

“Why would you do that?”

“I want a baby with you.” 

I looked at her stomach again, wondering how it could ever stretch to the necessary size. Why she brought up having a baby ten minutes before the start of the new Avengers movie was lost on me. 

“Babe,” I said, “I don’t think we should talk about this now.” 

“Honey, there’s nothing to talk about. It’s my body. I’m quitting birth control.” 

I can’t say that I enjoyed the Avengers movie that day.

***

The best part about being a parent is the pride you feel as you watch your child become more independent - that and when you’re with them but don’t have to play with them. I was at the park, waiting for Lara to come and get Taylor for the transfer. It’s hard to be a parent when you have a cell phone in your pocket. I never thought that a social media post would be more important than watching my daughter grow up, but I’ve missed too many moments while on my phone to argue against it. 

I was sitting on a slatted wooden bench, watching her play. Of course, I wasn’t really watching her or thinking about her. I was on Instagram, scrolling through the people that followed Ashley. I don’t think I’m the jealous type, but I wonder what the data from my behavior on these apps would show.  

I heard a girl’s scream and looked up. I wasn’t sure it was Taylor, but I couldn’t spot her anywhere and became worried that it was her, that someone had taken her. Panicked, I started looking inside of every slide and tunnel. 

An easy way to see if my daughter was in the park would have been to shout her name; this was not an option because I was too ashamed. I imagined all the parents staring and shaking their heads, and that was enough to stop me from doing it.

On the other end of the park, I found her in an orange tunnel. Kids were chasing each other in and out of it, but she was sitting alone in the middle picking her nails. As soon as I found her, I became aware that I was annoyed with Taylor. Instead of feeling relieved that she was ok, I was pissed she scared me and that she was in a pouty mood. 

I shouted her name twice before she finally crawled out. I didn’t want to ask her why she was sitting there alone because something like that could make a kid feel weird, so I asked her how she was doing. She answered, “Where’s mom?” 

When Lara arrived, she could tell that Taylor was in a bad mood and when I told Lara I didn’t know why she gave me a look of pity. I could read my ex much better than I could read my daughter. It was irritating not to know what Taylor was thinking, like your phone dying when you need it for directions. 

Lara got Taylor into her car seat as I grabbed her overnight bag out of my car. By the time I got back, Taylor was all set, and Lara was standing near the open trunk with her arms crossed. She told me, “Taylor said she was upset because you were on your phone the whole time at the park.”

 I apologized to Taylor and got her to smirk a little bit, which would have made me feel ok if it hadn’t been followed by Lara telling me I had to attend a parent-teacher conference. My disdain towards parenting chores like that didn’t matter since Laura had a “work thing” and couldn’t go. What this meant was that I would have to spend more time with Taylor. I tried to convince myself this was a good thing, but all I could think about was how I never had any time to paint. 

***

In my experience, once you move in with someone, you stop hooking up with them as much. Until, eventually, you rarely hook up at all. Ashely and I didn’t live together, which meant that I got laid whenever we hung out. 

Only this time, when she came over, she didn’t look like herself. Her skin was the worst I’d ever seen it, and she seemed unusually stressed. I tried to get a feel for what was going on by kissing her and squeezing her butt. She immediately stopped me.

“Honey, I’m on my period.” 

I wanted to say, “Ah-ha! I knew it!” But instead, I said, “Ok, that’s fine.”

Then, she asked something very peculiar, “How about we have sex in fourteen days?” 

It sounded like a good plan. I said, “Ok.”

“Really?” 

“Yea, babe.”

She looked happy, smiling in the kitchen like she’d opened a present. Then, after a few moments, she turned away.

“Sorry, I’m breaking out.” She said.

She went on to tell me how it’s common to break out when you stop birth control. I told her not to worry about it and that she was still beautiful while I walked to the sofa.

When I sat down, she asked if I really wanted to have sex in fourteen days. I said, “Yea, babe. Why not? What’s so special about fourteen days?” 

“I’m ovulating in fourteen days.” 

She had found a way to pull me into the baby conversation.

“Babe, I don’t think now’s the time to talk about….” 

“Fine. No sex.” She said.

“What?” 

“If we can’t have a baby, what’s the point of sex?” 

“For pleasure,” I said. 

She let out one of those loud monosyllabic laughs, which made me feel fraudulent. 

The rest of that night, we argued about having a baby. It went on and on, and neither of us budged. I told her my fear of not having time to paint, and she told me her fear of not feeling like a woman (in her opinion, motherhood was the mark of a real woman). At one point, I was so desperate to end the conversation I changed the topic to marriage and told her we needed to get married before we had a baby. I didn’t even want to get married. 

“We could have a baby and get married after.” She said, “Or during. I could have a pregnant wedding. Could you imagine?” 

I couldn’t, and I told her as much. The arguing continued until 10:30 pm when Ashley fell asleep.

I was so wound up that I jerked off in the bathroom. There was no pleasure in it. I hoped Ashley felt better after sex with me than I did. Afterward, I walked back to the bed in the dark and laid down. Ashley was still sleeping, probably dreaming about her baby. 

***

Taylor talked my ear off in the car on the way to the parent-teacher conference. I was on a three or four-day streak of no painting, which made me feel horrible, and I paid little attention to anything my daughter was saying until she asked, “Where do babies come from?”

I told her that babies come from a mommy’s belly, and then she asked how babies got into a mommy’s belly. I told her that she should ask mommy. With each question, I grew more impatient. The one that catapulted me into annoyance was, “Can I have a brother or sister?” 

My daughter had never met Ashely, and yet it was like Ashely was communicating through her. I couldn’t take it. 

“Taylor,” I shouted, “Let’s be quiet, ok? Ask that one to mommy too.” 

I was relieved when we got to the parking lot moments later. 

“We’re here,” I said. 

But Taylor just looked down at the floor, pouting. I cheered her up by asking if she could help me find a parking spot. Her whole mood changed, and she was happy again because she was helping.

“There’s one,” She said, “there’s another!”

It was all fun and games until she accidentally knocked her drink out of the cupholder while pointing. Her face went blank. I could smell the liquid sinking into my 5 series’ seats. It was wet everywhere, and I had nothing to clean it with.

“Shit,” I shouted, “You shouldn't have brought orange juice.”

Taylor didn’t exist in the minutes that followed when I parked and cleaned up the spill with my socks. She was completely silent, and I was focused on my car seat. We only started talking again when we got inside the school building, and I asked where we were going. Although I could tell she was upset, I didn’t say sorry. 

Teachers have interesting jobs. They’re like babysitters who have a real strict agenda, and the good ones make sure the schedule is educational. Taylor’s teacher, Mr. Dillon, dressed in a way that made him look like he cared about education, and I found making eye contact with him uncomfortable. 

We sat in a circle in blue plastic chairs with chrome legs. The back of mine was so weak that when I leaned back, it bent in half. Mr. Dillon sat across from us and told me how well Taylor was doing. I tried to remember some of the specifics to quote them to Lara.

The one thing that I didn’t like that Mr. Dillon said - the thing that I wouldn’t be sharing with Lara - was that Taylor had a profanity problem. Mr. Dillon told me she used curse words when things didn’t go her way. I asked him which ones, and he looked at Taylor. 

“I don’t feel comfortable saying them.” He said. Then, he grabbed a pencil and a piece of paper and began writing. 

I looked at Taylor and shrugged my shoulders. She shrugged hers too and swung her feet back and forth underneath her. She was cute, but l found myself angry at Mr. Dillon for sharing this information with me. I didn’t like to hear about the bad things. They took too much time. 

When Mr. Dillon slid me the paper, I saw it was a list of curse words:

dammit

son of a bitch

shit

***

I liked to think that I needed inspiration to paint. I had this sense for a long time that focusing on experiencing life would be enough to make me great. I didn’t realize that step one of being a painter was to paint. 

I was in my second bedroom with an easel and a blank 16” x 20” in front of me. My wooden painting pallet was prepped and sitting on a stool to my right. The empty white canvas was frightening, and I couldn’t look at it directly for too long. I didn’t know what to paint.

I welcomed the interruption of my buzzing phone. It was Ashely; she wanted to come over. It was supposed to be a workday for me, the goal was to finish a painting, but I hadn’t seen her in several days. I pitted painting and Ashley against each other and let them battle. Painting never stood a chance. 

Ashley arrived wearing that same white henley t-shirt. It was impossibly sexy. Watching the curves of her stomach as she walked made me horny. Her hip bones were like the edges of beautifully round hills. I had never done it before, but I thought of licking the insides of her belly button; I wouldn’t have cared if my tongue picked up lint. 

She was all for it, and we attached on the sofa. Soon I was kissing her stomach in a frenzy of passion. It was wet and sloppy, and I couldn’t stop. When she began to take off her henley, I told her, “Leave it on.” 

We dry humped and kissed like drunken teenagers until she demanded, “Let’s do it.” 

She reached into my boxers, but I pulled away, “I don’t have a condom.”  

She put her hand back in, “It’s fine. Let’s do it.” 

“I don’t know,” I said, and we kept kissing. 

“Nothing’s going to happen the first time.” She told me, then nibbled at my lip. 

After that, within the minute, we were having sex on my sofa. 

When I wasn’t watching the jiggle of her breasts, I’d close my eyes and picture us having sex in a NYC studio loft surrounded by my paintings. They were bold and colorful, without any hesitancy or pretense. 

After sex, Ashley laid on the floor with a throw blanket over her, hugging her legs to her chest and rocking side to side. I didn’t say anything because I didn’t want to ruin the moment. 

Later that night, I became angry that I didn’t paint like I said I would. I blamed it on time.  

***

Two weeks later, when I was paying my credit card bills, I thought hard about what my savings account meant to me. I realized I only have fifteen months or so left before the money ran out. When I initially quit my job, I imagined by this time I’d already be on a path to profitability for my creations, but this was not my reality. 

In addition to my finances, my relationship with Ashley was making me pessimistic. She was constantly talking about how she wanted to have a baby. She showed me pictures of pregnant girls on Instagram, “Aren’t they beautiful?” 

I felt the implication was that she thought the unprotected sex we had might lead to her pregnancy. It upset me because she’d told me that it never happened the first time. Her pro-pregnancy onslaught had gotten to be so much that I began to distance myself.

The advantage of not having her over at night was that the mornings were free. I woke up one morning with plans to paint and went through my routine of making coffee and getting my station set up. 

As I poured my coffee, my phone buzzed. I would have ignored it if it had been Ashley, but I always picked up for Lara. She was hysterical as she told me that Mr. Dillon called and said that Taylor was still cursing. She was pissed that Taylor was saying “shit” in the classroom and was furious that I’d left that piece of information out of the recap I’d given her. The call lasted ten minutes, and it should have thrown me off my plan to paint, but I felt something inside telling me I needed to put my brush to the canvas. I couldn’t ignore it.

In the second bedroom, I stared for a couple of minutes at the empty white canvas in front of me. I wasn’t afraid; my inspiration had finally come. I set my coffee cup down and picked up the pallet. Just then, there was banging at my door. 

It was Ashely, and she had a pregnancy test box in her hand. 

“Honey, I missed my period.” She said, “I got a test. We have to find out.”

She set down her things and skipped to the bathroom with the pregnancy test. I looked down the hallway at the light that spilled onto the hardwood floor from my second bedroom. If there was any beauty in the morning, I could no longer see it. All I thought of was the empty white space ahead of me. I was terrified.