I felt a little bad about leaving you with Lisbon and Jane on such bad terms at the end of the last chapter. So, I already wrote another chapter.
Chapter 7 probably won't be up before next weekend.
Thanks for reading and reviewing!
Heaving a deep sigh, Teresa puts her elbows on the windowsill and places her head in her hands to watch the incipient rain turn the world outside into a wet, desolate mess. It's not the weather though that is responsible for her bad mood on this early Tuesday evening. Her apartment is silent and she is alone. No matter how often she tells herself that this is exactly what she wanted, it doesn't feel more right to be here on her own.
Five days passed since her fight with Patrick. It's the fifth evening in a row that she is alone with her racing thoughts. She tried to enjoy her alone time and did all the things she didn't when he was with her, like taking long baths or crying uncontrollably while watching some trivial chick flicks. Nothing was really enjoyable though and she now reached the point to know that she can't go on like this much longer. If she is completely honest with herself, she has to admit that she misses Patrick terribly. She misses his smile. She even misses his lectures about the nutritious value of vegetables, that's how bad it is. She definitely wants him back in her life.
If she could just walk up to him, kiss him and tell him she wants to be with him, things would be easier. But she's not ready yet for a serious commitment like this. The issues she still has to work out are too tangled to be resolved within five days. She came to the conclusion though that she wants to try and she knows she needs him to guide her through this.
Two days ago a plan began to form in her mind, a solution for their discrepancies. It will be a huge step for her, but it's a compromise that will allow him to play a more significant role and give her the chance to slowly get used to the idea of building a life together with him. Now she only has to find a way to talk to him. Real talking instead of the polite small talk he seems to prefer since their argument.
She knows that he still cares, because, even though he wasn't inside her apartment after the fight, he still provides her with dinner. Now he puts it in the fridge at work, in a container with her name on it, and reminds her to take it home when she leaves for the day. Apparently he doesn't trust her to prepare a somewhat healthy dinner herself, but he trusts her enough to believe she eats the food he gives her. And she does eat it, even the vegetables. That's the least she can do for him.
Whenever she thanked him for dinner in the last days, she tried to get him to talk to her about more than food, but every time he was evasive and she understood that she must have hurt him even more than she initially thought. Today, when she left work, she got scared that he gave up on her. He was already gone when she exited her office and there was no box with her name on it in the fridge, no symbol to let her know that there is still hope for them. Then, when she arrived at her car, she found a note under her windshield wiper with the words:
'I didn't feel like cooking. Try not to eat too many disgusting things tonight. P.'
So she resisted the urge to grab a burger on her way home and is now in her kitchen, snipping carrots and zucchinis and sugar peas and wondering what Patrick is doing in this very moment.
While peeling potatoes, she thinks of the only time in the last five days when he shed his polite, but distant behavior. He accompanied her to an ultrasound appointment and their baby was very active that day, making it hard for the doctor to measure it or even to get a clear picture. They both marveled at their little miracle on the screen, commenting on each move and sharing laughter when their kid seemed to wave at them.
Later in the car, when he drove her home, they continued talking about the baby and when they reached her house he placed his head on her stomach and tenderly wished his kid good night. The intimacy of this gesture was unexpected after several days of not touching her at all, but not unwelcome. Looking down at him, she felt the urge to bury her hand in his hair and stroke the soft curls, but she bit her lip to suppress the idea.
Maybe she should have given in. Maybe that would have been a start to heal the cracks in their relationship. Instead of touching him, she asked him to join her for dinner, but, without even given her an excuse, he declined. When she watched him drive away, feeling totally numb, she wondered what it would take to make him forgive her.
Now, two days later, she isn't one step closer to an answer. Tonight, she picked up the phone several times to call him, but then she got cold feet before he even answered. She already apologized to him. Three times. He seemed to accept it, but his stoic behavior stayed the same and discouraged her to initiate a talk about their problems.
Sighing deeply she stands up from her chair to get a pot for the vegetables, but an unfamiliar twitching in her underbelly causes her to sit down again. She needs a moment to realize that it is her baby who evokes the strange feeling inside of her. For a couple of weeks already she occasionally felt a vague flutter or experienced bubbling motions, but this is different.
Teresa places both hands on her stomach and softly strokes it, hoping to inspire her baby to repeat the sensation. A minute passes, then two more. Finally, she feels a slight, tickling movement - not quite a kick, but definitely a poke - under her right palm. And then another one.
Her baby is moving and it's the most incredible feeling in the world. She sits there in awe, waiting for another contact and is full of sheer joy when her baby decides to play with her a while longer. Pulling up her shirt, she checks if the activities inside her belly show on the outside. She is stunned when she actually makes out a faint ripple in the spot where she feels the next poke.
It's an overwhelming event, a big milestone in her pregnancy, and she catches herself wishing that someone would experience this amazing moment with her. No, not someone. The only person who'd be as much touched by this as she is. Maybe her baby isn't just poking her for fun, but to give her an excuse to call Patrick. Before she can change her mind, she reaches for the phone.
"What happened?" He asks anxiously, apparently assuming she would only call him in a crisis.
"The baby is fine." She quickly reassures him, before he can envision too many horror scenarios. "In fact, the baby is great. And very active."
"Active?"
"Yes, it just pokes my hand as we speak."
"You can feel the baby move? Wow." He states in this tender, loving voice of his that he usually reserves for talking to their baby inside her belly.
"Yeah, wow. It's such an amazing feeling. You know, I was afraid I might not even notice the baby moving until much later. I had no idea it would be that intense and it just makes the pregnancy so much more real."
"Scary, huh?"
"A little, but it's also wonderful. I just..." She sobs, not able to continue due to the tears that suddenly and involuntarily begin to form in her eyes.
"Are you crying? Teresa, are you okay?" She is relieved to discover that he not only worries about the baby, but also about her.
"I just wish you had been here when it first happened." She blurts out, before her cowardice can get the better of her as so often. Her words are probably closer to admitting that he means a lot to her than anything she ever told him before.
He is silent for a moment, as if to consider how to react to her confession. "I would have liked that."
"I'm so sorry for ruining everything." She tells him, still overwhelmed with emotions.
"I know that you're sorry. Please stop crying. I can deal with you yelling at me, but I feel really helpless when you cry. Especially since I'm not with you and can feed you with chocolate to comfort you." He is teasing her? That's the last thing she expected. It stuns her into silence, but at least it helps to stop the stream of tears.
"Teresa? Did you call to talk about us?" He asks very gently. "I know I wasn't exactly amiable the last days, but I'm ready to have this talk now."
This is her cue and she decides to take the offer. Talking about it on the phone might also be easier than being face to face with him. "I hate how things have been the last five days. I feel really miserable. Can you please give me a chance to make this right?"
"Sure, I'm willing to have peace negotiations with you." The tone of his voice tells her that he is smiling and she is encouraged enough by the mental image of his friendly face to go on.
"Okay, first of all, I want you to know that I'm thankful how much you care for me. Also, it's really sweet that you cook for me all the time. But can we make a deal that you also let me cook dinner once in a while? Or we can cook together, maybe. I'm only pregnant, not invalid, and I don't want you to do all the work alone."
"So you plan to resume our dinner routine?"
"I do. On the proposed terms. Otherwise I'll refuse to eat any more greens." She threatens jokingly.
"Accepted. You're a tough negotiating partner, my dear."
Hearing him talk to her like that, in his normal, teasing manner, makes her lips curve into a smile and increases her self-confidence. "Now on to more important matters. You asked me what I want, and I've been thinking about that a lot. I definitely don't want you to be absent when amazing things like today happen."
"But I guess you still don't want me to live with you either." He interrupts her.
"Patience, I'll get there. I realized that, when the baby is born, I don't want you to be one of those fathers who only picks up his kid every other weekend. So, I actually considered the idea of moving in together with you and..."
"I can be with you in half an hour, let me just pack some stuff." He exclaims excitedly.
"Patrick!" She calls before he can hang up on her. "Really, I'm flattered how excited you are about sharing my tiny apartment with me, but will you please hear me out? That's not easy for me."
"Fine, I'm listening."
"Okay, I don't think my apartment is big enough for two adults and a baby."
"I don't think my house is a good idea. I mean..."
"No, that's not what I meant." She hurries to add. "I think we should look for a bigger apartment."
"You do?" He asks, apparently as incredulous as she was when she first realized that she was warming up to the idea of living with him.
"Yes. One with enough space so that we can both have our own room and one room for the baby and maybe a guest room in case my brothers or someone from your family comes to visit."
"Like an apartment-sharing community for parents?" His voice indicates that he's not very thrilled about the idea.
"Kind of. For starters. That way we can get used to living together and maybe after a while, if things go well, we can... ehm..." Her voice trails off, unsure how to continue her sentence without making a total fool of herself.
"We can what?" He inquires, his teasing tone leaving no doubt that he knows exactly what she means.
"Look, as you pointed out yourself, I have some major commitment issues and I'm just scared that things between us won't work out." She tells him after regaining her composure. "I'll need more time to sort this out, but I really want to try to change. This new living arrangement, that I suggest, is a first step into this direction. I just need you to be patient for a while."
"I can be patient. I shouldn't have pushed you the other day, but I wanted you to acknowledge that my feelings for you won't go away if you only pretend long enough that they don't exist." Wow. She should have known that he'd be as blunt as always, even during a talk like this one.
"You did nothing wrong, your words finally got me thinking and... " She inhales deeply, wondering if she'll ever be able to voice her feelings frankly. "I need you to know that I intend to eventually arrive on the same page with you."
"You mean the page when we won't need separate rooms anymore?" He translates and his cheeky voice causes her to roll her eyes. "Hey, no need to roll your eyes. I just wanted to make sure my patience will be rewarded in the end."
"It will." She tells him, wondering why she blushes even though she's only talking with him on the phone, and quickly brings the conversation round to a less awkward topic. "Now, do you want to look for this new apartment with me or not?"
"I want to. You plan to make up your mind before our kid goes to college, right?"
"Yes, I'm actually aiming for the foreseeable future."
"Good. Do you want me to arrange something for our apartment hunt?"
"No, I know a realtor. I'll call her tomorrow to check if they have any apartments for rent at the moment. I'm sure she can recommend someone else if they don't have anything suitable for us."
"Tomorrow already? You're really serious about this."
"I am." She confirms, without any hesitation "Ouch."
"What?" He asks in a very worried voice.
"The baby. This was definitely more a kick than a poke." She proudly strokes her stomach.
"Little Patrick already practices to become a world-class soccer player some day. Good kid, we'll live in luxury when we retire."
"Girls can play soccer, too."
"They can. But I think we'll have a boy."
"Did you see something during that ultrasound that I missed?" She asks, mildly irritated.
"No, he moved too fast. It's only a hunch, but you know my hunches are pretty accurate most of the time." She is pretty sure he is grinning smugly on the other end of the line.
"If it is a boy, and I'm not saying that I even remotely believe that you're able to predict a baby's sex, you wouldn't really want to name him Patrick, right?"
"Why not? It's a nice strong, masculine name." He defends his given name.
"Probably, but it's your name. I'd end up calling our son Junior or Paddy to distinguish between him and you and I don't like that. I'm willing to accept Patrick as the middle name."
"Deal. What was your fathers name?"
"Gerald."
They are both silent, trying to figure out if this name would suit their baby.
"Nah." They finally both exclaim at the same time and break out laughing afterwards.
"What about your father?" She asks, eager to learn more about his family. They hardly ever talked about his parents before.
"Patrick."
"Are you serious? So that would make our son Patrick the third? I'm glad I already objected."
"The fourth, actually. My grandfather's name was Patrick as well."
"The Janes aren't very inventive, are they?" She teases him.
"I have to agree with you. Especially since my sister's name is Patricia, same as two of my aunts and my grandmother."
She wonders if naming his son after himself and his ancestors is important to him. "Are you okay with breaking the tradition? If not, I could deal with Patrick as the first name, you know."
"No, Patrick as a middle name is good enough. We'll find something better as the first name. If I'm wrong, which is very unlikely, how would you name our daughter?"
"I'd like to give her my mother's name, Katherine, as the middle name." She stifles the familiar, after all the years subtle, feeling of grief, but is surprised when it still lingers in her voice.
"I like the name Katherine." He tells her softly. "We can always use it as the first name if we can't think of anything else."
"I guess." She agrees, touched by his empathy. "You know what? We made pretty much progress today. We decided to get an apartment together and agreed on the middle name of our baby. And, most impressive of all, I'm not freaking out yet at the very thought of getting an apartment with you."
He laughs. "Teresa?"
"Mmh?"
"I like talking to you very much. Really talking, I mean." He reveals, sounding dead serious all of a sudden.
"Me too. The last days were a nightmare." She can't think of anything else to add, but she also doesn't want to hang up yet. In fact, she really wants to see him.
"Hey, do you want to come over for dinner? I got a little distracted, so it's not ready yet. But the roast chicken is almost done, I only need to finish with the vegetables and make mashed potatoes. And maybe the baby will kick again while you're here and you can feel it." She stammers, adding the last sentence in case a warm meal and her company aren't incentive enough.
"Chicken, really?" She can tell that the thought of her eating chicken makes him grin.
"Yeah, I discovered two days ago that the poultry crisis is over. Another milestone you missed."
"Okay, I'll be with you as soon as possible. Do you want me to pick up some chocolate cake on the way for dessert?"
"Do you even have to ask? Can you please pick up some blueberries, too? I've been craving those all day."
"You crave fruits? I'm shocked." His laugh is contagious. "Okay, see you in a bit."
"Patrick?"
"Yes?"
"Do you own pajamas?"
He chuckles. "What kind of question is that?"
"Since I only ever saw you in suits or naked, a reasonable one."
"I have some of those, yes. Why?"
"Maybe you can bring one, so you don't have to drive home in the dark in this horrible weather. I can't promise that my couch is as comfortable as the one at work, but it's extendible."
"Extendible, really? Not much use for that in your tiny living room, is there?"
She feels the urge to playfully hit his arm, but that will have to wait until he's with her. "Oh, shut up. And hurry. I really need those blueberries."
And his company, she thinks, as she hangs up with a smile on her face.