So, Tayla. She had quite nice eyes. Dark brown and a little soulful. And she was pretty well proportioned, nothing abnormal. Well, not from where Boone was sitting anyway. And, yes, he was fairly sure he was being shallow, but if this woman was having their baby it was going to get some attributes from her so he wanted to make sure he would be okay with that. Totally shallow, he told himself. What was he gonna do if she squeezed out a kid that wasn't good looking? Hand it back?
"I think it's so great that you guys have decided to go ahead with this," Tayla said, smiling widely.
At the prospect of having a baby for them or the money she was getting paid to have a baby for them? Boone mentally hit himself round the head. Jack had warned him about talk like that. But then, Jack warned him about a lot of things. Which Boone would be offended by if Jack didn't make up for it in other areas. And, yeah, Boone was a pushover.
"And this house is gorgeous," Tayla continued, looking around the living room from where she sat. She looked at Boone. "Looks like there's been a lot of blood, sweat and tears gone into it."
Boone smiled a little. "You could say that."
"Well it looks good," she said.
"Thanks."
"So, how soon are you guys wanting to do this?" she asked. "Because I'm ovulating next week is all. You don't have to do it next week but if you guys wanted to get started straight away we can do it then. If not then you've got another month or whatever to sort stuff out."
Boone looked to Jack. No point putting it off, he figured. But there was still stuff to sort out. Like the nursery for example which, right now, looking more like a junk shop. But, even if Tayla did get pregnant next week, though Jack had warned him not to expect results first time around, he'd still have nine months to do the nursery so that really wasn't a problem. But Jack wasn't looking at him. Jack was looking at the coffee table for some reason. He seemed to be thinking quite carefully. He then looked up at Tayla.
"Next week?" he asked, a little too blankly for Boone to read.
Tayla just nodded, apparently having the same trouble as Boone.
Then Jack looked at Boone. He raised his eyebrows a little. "Next week?" he asked again, though the meaning was completely different.
Boone shrugged a little. He still couldn't read what Jack was getting at, which way he was leaning. Boone was fully aware that he was a grown-up and he could make his own decisions but he liked to run them by Jack first, even if Jack wasn't aware he was doing it. But Jack was making his work very hard for him right now by looking at him with that unreadable expression.
Screw it. He turned to Tayla. "Next week's fine," he replied. "If that's okay with you?" Damn, so nearly decisive.
Tayla smiled at him. "I said it's fine by me."
Boone nodded his head a little. Right, she did say that.
"So, have you guys discussed who's gonna play daddy?" she asked. "Biologically I mean."
"We haven't really..."
"Jack," Boone stated, and suddenly realised he'd cut in. Jack turned to look at him. Yep, he was in trouble now.
"What?" Jack asked him.
Boone decided to play it cool. "What?" Jack raised his eyebrows at him. Yeah, that was never going to work really, was it?
"You said 'Jack'" he stated.
"I was trying to get your attention," Boone replied lamely. "To say 'hey, we really need to talk about that.'"
Jack shook his head a little. "Why do you assume it's gonna be me?" he asked. "You don't want to have a kid."
"I want to have a kid," Boone stated, hoping Jack could tell that he really did mean it.
"But you, what, don't wanna father it?" Jack continued.
"Jack, it's not that I don't wanna father it, it's that you do want to father it," Boone explained. "You want to be a dad, a real dad. You want it so much. I'm happy to just be there while you do that."
"Boone, I'm gonna need you to do a little more than be there," Jack stated.
Boone rolled his eyes. "I know that. I didn't mean it like that. I just think it matters to you more," he explained.
Jack looked at him for a beat, considering something. Boone was trying not to look like a nervous wreck. Not that he was a nervous wreck. No, he was a very together person, honest.
"Compromise," Jack suggested. "There's every chance we're gonna have to try this more than once. How about, I take the first try, you take the second and we go on like that?"
Boone smiled. Made sense. And it made Jack happy which Boone was always more than willing to do any way he could. "Okay, deal."
Jack smiled. "Deal."
Jack looked back to Tayla and Boone suddenly realised that he'd actually forgotten she was sat there. Maybe they shouldn't have had that discussion in front of her. Maybe she'd think badly of them for each wanting to apparently dodge the biological label. And that whole thing about having a rota to impregnate her may have been offensive in some way. But she seemed to be still smiling so Boone guessed she was okay with it.
"I guess you got a date with me next week then," Jack told her.
"You have a date with a cup," she corrected him.
Jack nodded a little. Boone hated the thought of that personally so he was glad Jack was having first shot at it. Hopefully Jack would succeed and Boone would never have to 'date a cup'. The thought of doing something like that in somewhere so clinical was the biggest turnoff Boone could imagine. It would be like doing it with your mother in the next room. Which Boone had equal problems with in his teens. Luckily he had a big house.
"I'll sort out an appointment with my doctor at the clinic and let you guys know what's what," Tayla said.
"Okay, sounds good," Jack said.
Tayla got to her feet and Jack and Boone showed her out. Jack then turned to face Boone.
"Is there a particular reason you freak out in the face of responsibility?" he asked.
"I do not." Boone found himself pouting a little, which probably wasn't helping his case much. Jack raised his eyebrows at him. "It just so happens that I used to run a business," Boone pointed out.
"Yeah," Jack conceded. "Because you were too scared to work out what you really wanted to do with your life. That's where real responsibility comes in. Working for your mother hardly counts."
"I was good at that job," Boone insisted. There weren't a huge number of things that Boone considered himself good at but CEO of that godforsaken company was one of them, no matter how much he hated it.
"I'm not saying you weren't," Jack replied levelly.
"So what's your point?" Boone asked, getting increasingly more frustrated. If Jack didn't get to the point soon he was going to have to punch him. Well, not really, because Boone didn't actually know how to punch someone. Not properly. No one had ever taught him how.
"My point is, you don't want to father this baby in case you screw it up somehow and then it would be all your fault," Jack explained. "Which it wouldn't be, by the way. The father of this baby could be anyone, it's me and you who are raising it. Together."
"If it doesn't matter then why don't you just do it?" Boone asked.
"Because you don't want to. And I want to know why."
Boone rolled his eyes. "I just told you," he explained. "Sarah lost the baby and you want another one. You got Sarah pregnant so now you can get Tayla pregnant and everyone's happy."
Jack went quiet. Boone cursed himself. He'd probably crossed a line there. He shouldn't have brought up Sarah, he should know better than that.
"Sorry," Boone said quietly. "I just wanted you to have this cos I know how much it means to you. I didn't mean for it to be such a big deal."
"It is a big deal," Jack insisted.
Boone nodded. Yeah, he guessed it was.
"I appreciate the thought, though," Jack continued. "I know you're trying to help but sometimes you miss the point. I don't care about being the father, I care about you not wanting to be the father."
"I never said I didn't want to," Boone stated. Which wasn't a lie, he never did say that. Sure, he'd much prefer for it to be Jack's baby, but he never said that. But it wasn't to do with him not wanting to be a father, not really. A little bit, sure, but not really. It was to do with the fact that he wanted a little bit of Jack to hang on to, in case anything happened to the real thing. But he wasn't about to say that to Jack. He was fairly sure he'd already been labelled as far too co-dependent as it was.
"So we're cool, right?" Jack asked. "We both get a shot at it?"
Boone nodded. "Whatever you want."
"Okay," Jack concluded. "So, you done playing with the stove or should I order some takeout?"
"I'd go with the takeout."