Babies

“We’re friends, Jack.” she said as she worked Amour-all on the recently scrubbed-to-a-squeaky-clean wheels.

 Jack paused in rubbing wax on his vintage ‘68 Camaro, cocked his head to the side and gave her his typical crooked grin. “Something on your mind, Vicky?” he asked eying her curiously.

She hooked her short blonde hair over her ear and it promptly fell over her face again. She never should have listened to Mallory about getting it cut. Jack had told her she’d regret it. He had been right. He was right about everything. He was rather annoying that way and yet she knew that’s what she liked best about him.

“Just the same thing that’s been running through it  for  five years,” she admitted.

Jack sighed. “Vicky, you have to get over Tim. He treated you like crap. You’re so much better off without him.  Please, move on,” he pleaded.

“I have. I don’t think about him anymore and I definitely don’t miss him. You and Mallory helped with that.. you especially. I’ll always be grateful to you. You’ve been the best friend I ever had,” Vicky said, her voice quiet though with a hint of emotion.

He smiled. “That’s saying something. That honor used to go to my sister. Guess when Mallory and Garret moved to China to teach English she forfeited that spot. Did I tell you she sent me an email last night? She’s going to have a...”

“A baby. I know,” she said grimacing at the bitter reflection in the ultra-shiny hubcaps.

"Yeah," he said frowning at her.

“Wax on, wax off... sand the floor... paint the fence...what’s the last one? Side to side, is it?” she asked trying for casual and failing miserably.

“I think so,” Jack answered carefully watching her.   “I thought Mallory making me an uncle would elicit more excitement than Karate Kid instructions from Mr. Miagi.” He swiftly moved around the car, grabbed her hands pulling her up then removed the chamois cloth from her grip and dropped it.

He placed both hands on her shoulders and stared her down. “You and me will be that snot-nose brat’s Godparents. We should at least pretend we like him or her. Aren’t you happy for Mallory?”

“I would be if I wasn’t consumed with envy,” she said fighting the urge to cry.

He made a weird face. “You wanna live in China with a wimp like Garret? It ain’t all it’s cracked up to be.”

“Jack, you know I want a baby. It was the only thing Tim could have done to make up for everything else but he was too selfish to do even that.”

“And good thing. You actually want a kid with his defective genetic code? I pity any kid unfortunate enough to be his seed,” Jack growled.

“I wouldn’t have cared. I just want someone to love, a baby,” she said pressing her quivering lips together. She took a deep steadying breath then added “I’m getting so old.”

“Old?” he shouted. “If you’re old that makes me ancient.”

“It’s different for men. You can produce viable sperm until you’re a cranky old geezer,” she retorted bitterly.

“You’re just in your thirties, Babe. Women are having babies well passed that. You’ve got plenty of time.”

“I want a baby before I’m too old to care for it. Think I want to go to school conferences at retirement age?”

“So, what are you saying? You want to adopt?”

“They’ll never give a single woman a baby without a man on the horizon.”

“ Maybe you should try some online place to find husband material,” Jack suggested.

“I don’t have any intention of wasting precious time dating someone in the vague hope one day in the not so near future he might consider marrying me and possibly have a baby,” she replied.   “I looked into in-vitro fertilization. It’s so expensive, though, and they told me it could take three or four tries before it takes, if it takes. There’s no guarantees.”

“Then it’ll have to be adoption,” he said gently. He caressed her cheek with a forefinger and smiled. “You’re a great person and anyone can see you would make a wonderful mother. They let gay men adopt so why not a sweet girl like you?”

“There’s one other way.” she whispered, nervously licking her lips. She took his hands, squeezed them and looked him straight in the eyes. “We’re good friends, Jack.”

Taken aback he grinned. “What’s that got to do with the price of green tea in China?”

“You could help me.”

“How? Give you money for the in-vitro?  Help you adopt?” he asked befuddled.

“No, Jack, this is totally, completely free and no strings attached. All I want is your ... genetic code," she said carefully. She quickly continued in earnest before he could do anything other than widen his eyes in surprise. “I’ll do anything you want, Jack. I’ll pretend to be Brittany Spears in a school girl outfit, I’ll do a strip-tease, even watch porn with you, anything. And you don’t have to worry about the baby.  I won’t expect anything from you. Not money, not even acknowledgment. It’ll be totally my baby, my sole responsibility and I won’t even tell anyone who the father is. You wouldn’t have to do anything, not even take me to the hospital. I swear it. I’ll put it in writing and everything.”

He stood quite still, stony faced. He tried in vain to keep his emotions in check, but he felt his core temperature rise,  blood thunder through his veins and the rage of which he never knew himself capable bubble to the surface. He pulled his hands out of her grip and formed fists.

“What kind of man do you take me for?” he hissed through clenched teeth.

She stared at him, pleading. “The best kind. That’s why I would only ask you for this huge favor. You’re everything I would want my baby to be. You’re wonderful in every way, Jack. Kind, considerate, loving, loyal and so many other things. It would take me hours to say them all. And even those things others dislike about you, I find charming. If I could get a carbon-copy baby of you I’d be the happiest person alive.”

“You don’t know me at all,” he muttered, in credulous.

“Of course I do!”

“No, Vicky, you don’t if you think I go around spreading my seed to the corners of the world without giving notice to who I might be producing,” he retorted angrily.

“I... I never said that. I know you don’t. You’re the last person who would do that.”

“But you expect me to make a baby with you and drop out of sight,” he spat.

“Well, I just wanted to make it easy for you.”

“Easy, is it? To never see my own kid?”

Shocked to the core, she gaped open-mouthed until she found her voice.  “You mean you would want to see my baby, be a part of his life?”

“Don’t you mean OUR baby? You may be the mother, the one that carries him inside you, but he would still be half mine.”

“You want to see him or share custody?” she asked bewildered.

He made to put his hands around her neck and got to within two inches and shook them violently. “Right now I’d like to throttle you,” he snarled.

“Okay, Jack, if that’s the only way for me to have a baby, okay. We’ll share. Half is better than nothing. I’ll do anything. Please, Jack,” she said desperately.

“You keep saying that, you’ll do anything. But would you, really?” he asked suddenly drained of anger.

“Yes, absolutely anything. Just name it.”

Before she knew it, Jack grabbed her and pulled her  hard against him and kissed her like she’d never been kissed. Shock first stole over her, but that swiftly vanished. She clung to him. Demanding as the kiss was she relished every moment, wishing it never would end. As foreplay goes, WOW! That baby was as good as conceived.

But the kiss did end and breathless, thrilled and utterly confused they stared at each other. “Why didn’t I ever think of that?” he muttered in a daze.

“I don’t know. Feel kinda stupid,” she whispered, still clutching his shirt.

“One way to fix that. Marry me,” he said.

“Marry...you?  But we’re just friends...such good friends.”

“That’s all married couples are, good friends with a dash of passion. We just proved we got that.”

“But is it enough? Are you sure?” she asked bewildered.

He kissed her again tenderly at first but escalating slowly until they were quite out of breath again. He pulled back and whispered, “Yeah, I’m sure.” 

 He abruptly opened the car door and held it open for her. “Get in.”

“Where are we going?” she asked, stunned.

“China. Mallory would kill us if she didn’t get to see this in person.”

“She’ll think we’ve gone over the deep end...doing this just for a baby.”

“I’m hoping for several babies, if that’s okay. Nine months from now we won’t be sleeping much. Ready for it?”

She smiled and kissed him before slipping into his car. “We should practice that not sleeping thing.”

He grinned too and sailed across the hood Bo Duke style. “Sounds good to me, Vicky. But before the babies, let’s get hitched.”