It Takes One to Raise One
Do you know what you find when you climb near the top of the spire on the top of The Empire State Building?
Fresh air. A brisk wind. And an extreme amount of bird shit.
Do you know what you don't find?
Children. Well, at least you usually don't find them up there. Today, on the other hand…
No, I hadn't brought Bethany up here. Admittedly, if she found out that I'd climbed up here and hadn't brought her, I'd end up hearing about it for weeks. And if Dave found out that I'd climbed up here at all, I'd hear about it from him for even longer…
But fuck it, I needed somewhere to think and if the top of The Empire State Building worked for a gigantic hairy ape, then it would work for me too. Okay, that doesn't really make any sense. Do I already have pregnancy brain?
Oh yeah. If that last line was confusing you, I'll just go ahead and say it. I was pregnant. Preggers. Knocked up. Bun in my cute little oven. About to spawn. One of Dave's baby batter bombs had finally exploded in the right place… Or the wrong place. Depends on your perspective… However you wanted to say it, there was a tiny little life growing inside of me. And I didn't have the slightest fucking clue what to do about it.
The doctor from California had called to tell me that my heartburn was exactly what whole bunch of you had thought. Basically, my digestive system was really unhappy with all the new hormones that were coursing through it. I mean, it had barely gotten used to puberty and strawberry cream churros dipped into peanut buttery and jelly soda. Seriously. You can get them at Disneyland and they are friggin amazing. I've got to figure out a way to get them shipped into New York. Well, by them I mean the soda and the churros. Disney doesn't sell puberty…
Although it's a funny thought when you get right down to it…
Anyway, I was sixteen and pregnant. Never again could I sit back and mock those girls on reality TV. Which I suppose hadn't been all that nice when I'd been doing it but damn it, I'd thought that something like this couldn't happen to me. I was smart. I was careful. I was amazing.
I was going to be a mother. Not a second mother like I'd been to Bethany but a from the start, birthing, breast feeding, diaper changing mother.
Fuck! No, not fuck. No more fucking. Fucking was what had got me into this problem in the first place. Not that I wanted to call my baby a problem… The little squirt didn't deserve that….
I'm guessing that you've figured out by now why I'd needed to find a quiet place to think. I was totally and completely freaking out.
The doctor had called shortly after we'd gotten home. He'd been somewhat scared to tell me, possibly because I'd still been holding onto my machine gun while he'd examined me. But I guess being able to tell me over the phone was a little bit safer. The conversation had gone something like this.
Him: Miss Hit-Girl, I got back your tests. You're pregnant.
Me: Are you sure?
Him: Yes. Are congratulations in order?
Me: I don't know.
Then I'd hung up the phone. And just kind of sat there for a while. Dave and Bethany were both still asleep. The trip had taken a lot out of all of us. I wrote them a note saying that I had to run some errands and that I'd be back later and then quietly slipped out of the safe house. Then I'd wandered around New York until finally I'd ended up here, hanging from a rope over a thousand feet from the ground in a place made famous by a huge ape. An ape that I was going to start looking like when I got all big and pregnant. A tear tried to slide down my cheek but I wiped it away. I was NOT going to cry about this baby.
Shit.
I looked down and realized that I was being an idiot. Responsible mothers to be did not suspend their asses this far above that much concrete. Really, a responsible person wouldn't do most of the things that I did as a matter of course. But I'd figure all of that out later. Right now, it was time to go home and tell Dave. And not in any cute or funny way. I'd seriously screwed with his head when I'd done that whole fake pregnancy thing a while back and he deserved a proper conversation this time.
Oh my god I hope he doesn't assume I'm kidding….
Once I'd gotten back down the building, I grabbed a regular churro from a street vendor and called Miranda while I walked toward home.
"Hey, can you watch Beth? Dave and I need to have a little talk?"
"Is everything okay?" asked Miranda.
"I don't know." I repled. That seemed to be my go to answer right now.
"You're pregnant, aren't you?"
I tried not to spit churro on the people around me. I only partially succeeded. "Umm…." I replied. Shit, my conversations were getting wittier and wittier.
"Admit it!" she pushed.
"I can't." I replied. "I have to talk to Dave first."
"You mean you might…"
"I mean I have to talk to him first before I talk to anyone else. He deserves that. So shut the hell up and agree to watch the kid, alright?"
Miranda laughed a bit at that. "I'll come by and pick her up."
"Pretend it's your idea. Tell Dave you want to spend the day with her."
"I know the drill."
I finalized the plans with Miranda and then wandered around a bit more until she'd called and let me know that she had Bethany. Then I returned to my home.
Dave was sitting on the couch applying an ointment to an impressive number of bruises. He looked up when I came in, smiled, and then went back to his business. That boy had been pummeled enough times that he knew what he needed to do to get better. Part of me wanted to do that whole wander around the room all nervous like but I'd walked off most of that while waiting for the coast to be clear.
I sat down on the chair across from him and then looked at him carefully. He was tall. He was strong, both emotionally and physically. He was brave. He was going to be a great dad. I was probably going to be a basket case but he was going to be a great dad and so we would all be okay. I carefully modulated my voice to make sure that while I sounded happy, there was absolutely no humor in what I said to him. "I'm pregnant."
Dave's hand squeezed on the ointment tube and it squirted all over him. He didn't notice. "It's not a joke this time, is it?" he more said to me more than asked me.
"Definitely not. I promised I'd never do that again. I am truly pregnant. The doctor from California called earlier. Apparently it's what was causing all that indigestion."
"I thought women got morning sickness." Said Dave absently.
"Apparently I get afternoon sickness…. Maybe because my hours are so strange." I replied.
Dave looked at me with hope in his eyes. "Are we happy?" he asked.
"We're terrified." I replied. "And confused. And excited. And worried. And a fuck ton of other emotions. But I'm pretty sure that happy is in there too. That is, if you're happy too?" I said, trying to hide the fear in my voice. We'd talked about this a few times before but those had all been theoretical. This was real.
"Of course I am!" Dave said. He stood up, picked me up, and whirled me in a circle. Gently though, I could tell the difference. Then he sat me down and finally noticed all the ointment on his shirt. "I'm guessing this will be a funny story we can tell the little sprog someday." he said and grabbed a towel to clean up. When he put the towel down, I saw his gaze catch all the guns on the wall. "What about…" he gestured toward them.
"What about me being Hit-Girl?" I asked. "I'm not giving up being me but for now, all of the dangerous stuff will have to stop. Once the baby is here, well, I don't know. I suppose we'll figure that out when we get there."
Dave smiled. "That's just about the most adult answer you've ever given to a question. I'll be right back, okay?" I nodded and he went over into the bedroom for a few minutes. He came back with something in his hands and then he got down on one knee in front of me.
"Are you?" I asked, not able to get out any other words.
He nodded and held out the ring box that was in his hand. "This isn't because of the baby. And I'm hoping the fact that I already had the ring will prove that. I was going to propose in California until your little trip to crazytown before the reunion kind of spoiled the moment. I promised then that I would wait and propose at a more romantic time. Maybe this isn't it but I can't imagine going another minute without telling you how much I love you. Without telling you how much I want to spend the rest of my life with you. I don't care if that life is going to only be ten more seconds or a hundred years. All I do care about is sharing that life with you. I love you and I have to propose to you right now. I can't wait any longer because you are the best thing that has ever happened to me." Dave paused for a moment and opened the box. A delicate golden ring with a perfect little diamond winked at me. Hit-Girl. Will you please marry me?"
I smiled. And nodded. Actually, I nodded a lot because I couldn't get my voice to work and I didn't want him to somehow think I was saying no. Because I was saying yes. Definitely yes. A few tears slid down my cheeks but I just ignored them because they were happy tears and nothing to be ashamed of at all. I held out my hand and it shook a little as he slid the ring onto my finger. It was a perfect fit. Finally, I found my voice and managed to officially say the word. "Yes. Yes I'll marry you, Dave. And knowing that you were planning to propose before you found out I was pregnant makes this the most romantic moment that I could have possibly imagined. I didn't need a fancy restaurant and an orchestra. Or a quiet stroll on the beach with just the two of us. I just needed you. Needed us. Together. Now start kissing me, stupid. Before I start crying like a loon."
Dave picked me up and carried me into the bedroom where he made love to me. Gently but in a way that I knew he'd never let me go. Then we just lay together without needing to talk. Finally, my stomach decided to rumble and remind us both that I was hungry. We laughed and enjoyed a bit of naked picnic in the living room since Miranda hadn't brought home Bethany yet. We talked about how she might react to the double news of my pregnancy and Dave and I being engaged. Neither one of us was really sure how she would take it. Would she feel happy? Jealous? Like she was being replaced? It was a problem and one that we'd have to face soon.
