“Well, I never thought of that.” She seems interested.

  “Mom, times are changing. You need to get with the program.” I grab an apple from the bowl by the sink and take a bite.

  I’ll leave her to think about that for a while.

  I raise my eyebrows at her and then walk away.

  Dad sits next to Jonathan. “What, boy?” He shouts.

  Jonathan gives me a look.

  I roll my eyes.

  I take a Prenatal vitamin.

  Doctor’s orders.

  11

  Dinner

  So this is the day that I have been dreading the most.

  It’s March.

  I am 6 months pregnant.

  My newly found sister-in-law slash Devil #2 is coming over for dinner.

  I’m just hoping that everything she says doesn’t end in a giggle or a “you know what I mean?”

  Jonathan is happy and a little nervous, I can tell. Mother has been busy all day in the kitchen making Cornish Game hens, and a Lemon Meringue Pie. She has never been much of a cook, but since living at my house she has recorded every episode of Rachel Ray.

  So hopefully the force is with her.

  Father has been watching television all day.

  I actually found him this morning laying back in the reclining section of our couch in his underwear.

  And by underwear, I don’t mean boxers that could double as a bathing suit. I mean tightey-whiteys that shows all of your junk, underwear.

  I screamed.

  Then covered my mouth and walked out of the room. I don’t think he even heard me.

  I fetched my mother as promptly as possible and told her that she needed to “tend to her husband”.

  She did.

  Last week’s talk about taking more initiative in her marriage has really gone to my mom’s head.

  Now it’s 5PM and Diane arrives in less than an hour. Her husband is coming as well.

  Hopefully I don’t find him attractive because I am going through this weird pregnancy-horny phase lately.

  Like this morning I jumped on Jonathan and made him do me from behind. Twice!

  He wasn’t complaining, but I was keeping him from his regular routine.

  “Are you just using me for sex, Miss Hawkins?” He asked

  “Yes I am. Problem?”

  “None whatsoever. Just don’t make me late for work.” He hates being late.

  I felt a little awkward doing it “doggy style”.

  My belly is starting to show and in that position, I feel like the baby is low to the ground and away from any penis obstructions. Last thing I need is my beautiful baby being corrupted by the fact that a penis poked her/him in the head while still in the womb

  I’m not exactly sure how that anatomy works, but I have seen pictures, and it seems plausible to me.

  Jonathan got me dressed for tonight. A loose black dress with a gold necklace and knee-high boots. I sort of look like a pregnant bohemian stripper.

  If that makes any sense.

  My hair is just pulled back in a low ponytail. I was not in the mood to use any sort of hot metal to curl or primp myself. I would have probably hurt someone.

  I am chugging Cranberry juice.

  Ugh.

  I am so boring.

  I am sitting at the dining room table which I helped mother set. After ten minutes of work I told her I was exhausted and had to sit down.

  Yes this was a lie, but it got me out of work. So what?

  Jonathan is dressed in a very dapper and sexy outfit this evening. Although he makes me drool anyways, tonight it is particularly hard for me to keep my hands off of him. Again: pregnant horniness.

  The doorbell rings.

  Jonathan heads over.

  I stand.

  Resentfully.

  He opens the door and there stands the blonde goddess and her shorter and hairless counterpart.

  “Hi everyone! This is my husband, James,” Diane says as she sways into the room.

  “What?” My father yells from the other room.

  “David, get up off of the couch and say hello! Where are your manners?” My mother intervenes. Embarrassed I can tell. She tucks her hair behind her ears. A true “Gwen” sign of nervousness.

  Mother shakes both of their hands and takes the wine Diane brought.

  James, her husband, seems quiet. And, luckily for everyone in the room, I am not the slightest bit attracted to him.

  He is a short man with a squinty face. He has flushed cheeks and impeccable clothing.

  Diane, too.

  She has an Armani sweater on and Christian Louboutin shoes. I know because Cindy recently taught me about the red-bottomed shoes.

  I asked her if all the women wearing red-bottomed shoes were in some sort of cult. She just gave me the typical raise of the eyebrows, which basically means yes in Cindy language.

  I remember seeing Molly (yes, New York Molly) wearing those same shoes a few times.

  Guess I’m just not that cool.

  Diane is polite. Fake, yes, but she has manners.

  I, on the other hand am the unruly child at the dinner table.

  We are all sitting. Jonathan is across from me. He keeps looking over at me, checking in.

  I’m scarfing down my chicken and realize that I am doing so with my hands. Everyone else is eating with their forks.

  “Sorry, I’m pregnant.” I wipe my mouth with my napkin and pick up my fork. My mother looks appalled.

  I have grease on my face and pepper in my teeth. But I don’t care. I could eat a Rhino I am so hungry.

  Diane is sipping her red wine.

  Bitch.

  I want wine.

  But the demon baby inside of me can’t handle alcohol, so I am sipping Cranberry juice out of a wine glass.

  The conversation around the dinner table is as follows:

  Dad starts in: “Can you pass the bread, love?” He signals to Diane to pass him the rolls that lay in the middle of the beautifully set table.

  Diane grabs the basket and hands it over.

  “No, the rolls!” Dad yells at her.

  “David, those are the rolls.” My mother pats his arm.

  “I know what rolls are, Gwyneth. Don’t patronize me!” He yells at my mother.

  I am smiling at this point because this is the most entertainment I’ve had since the Parks and Recreation episode where Andy (Chris Pratt’s character) rubbed Ron Swanson’s bunion while running his shoe-shine business.

  Jonathan butts in. “Here dad, I will get them.” Jonathan grabs the asparagus, guessing at what my dad’s needs are, and passes them down.

  “Thank you, son,” David, the alcoholic, insane person at the table says.

  He then begins to light up a cigar.

  “Where did you get that, David? You daughter is pregnant!” Mother apologizes to the table.

  I can see James, smiling as he wipes his mouth clean.

  Diane chugs her wine.

  This is perfect.

  “Darling I remember you smoking a puff or two while pregnant. Don’t give me grief!” My father scolds my mother, which really embarrasses her. But also shuts her up. So here dad is, smoking at the table.

  I’m sipping on my Cranberry juice with greasy chicken fingers, and Diane has already finished off half of the bottle of Zinfandel.

  Jonathan diverts the attention away from my crazy father.

  “So James, what is it that you do exactly?”

  “I work in finance. I run a hedge fund,” James replies. I can’t quite put my finger on it, but I feel like I have seen James before. Somewhere in the city maybe? New York is huge, and there are all types of men in suits running around. But, for some reason his face sticks out to me.

  I cock my head to the side. “Have we met before?” I ask James.

  He quickly looks at his wife as if this is a trick question. Everyone looks over at him for a response.

  “No, I don’t think so, why?” James responds as he takes a sip of his wine. He even bites into a piece of roasted potato. But I can feel his heart rate increase from here.

  I look down at his hands.

  He is wearing a ring. A very certain type of ring.

  And then it dawns on me.

  When I first moved into the city a few years ago, I went out to a strip club with a bunch of my friends.

  When I say “a bunch” I mean three.

  Exactly three.

  That’s how many friends I had.

  Three.

  Anyway, my friend Jason who went to NYU got pretty intoxicated and started climbing up on the stage and touching the girls (which of course isn’t allowed).

  A man came up behind him and threw him off of the stage and told us all to get out.

  It was a nice strip club. One of those kinds where “high-end” clients come to play. One thing I remember and will never forget, is when we all got outside, this same man punched Jason in the face. Just for good measure.

  We all laughed at him because the man left a huge imprint of a ring-sized eagle on his face.

  It faded a day later.

  But we even colored it in with sharpie when we got Jason back to the apartment and he passed out on our couch.

  I will never forget that little eagle.

  And, you guessed it!

  It is the same one that James wears now.

  “Oh, never mind. I think I am thinking of someone else,” I say.

  But I chug my Cranberry juice and decide to stay silent the rest of the meal because I really know who Jason is.

  Hedge fund?

  My ass!

  You own a strip club, dude. A very profitable strip club.

  This night is turning out to be more of a success than I thought it would.

  Great stories to tell Cindy.

  Great stories.

  We finish the meal with the Lemon Meringue Pie.

  Jonathan and Diane hug and say that they “must do this again”.

  But I can tell that they are not our kind of people.

  And Jonathan didn’t really hit it off with either of them.

  As the door shuts, Jonathan just kisses my head and whispers, “Glad that’s over.”

  I have never loved him more than I do right now.

  “Does that mean I can get back into my Spiderman pajamas!?” I ask as he starts to clear the table.

  “Babe, you can even get into your Ninja Turtle onesie.”

  We laugh.

  I decide to help him clear the table.

  “Do you want to know a secret?” I whisper to him as I grab the cutlery.

  “Only if it doesn’t involve inappropriate things regarding your parents,” Jonathan says with a serious expression.

  “No.” I lean in and whisper, “James own Centerfolds downtown.”

  Jonathan stands up a little straighter. “Like the…”

  “Yep!” I cut him off, very pleased with myself.

  I mean, you can’t make this shit up.

  “How do you know? Actually never mind, I don’t really want you to answer that.”

  I lean over the table and kiss Jonathan and whisper, “I used to work there.”

  Lie.

  But just for a second he believes me.

  12

  Old People

  The time has come for mother and father to leave my house.

  I am in my third trimester, and everything is annoying, especially them.

  My father reluctantly showed up for his two court dates. And while Jonathan was able to save him some money, he inevitably lost his company and had to file for bankruptcy.

  It’s a good thing that he is going crazy, because at least he only realizes about half of what is going on.

  I decided to take over the process of selling their home in San Francisco. It was worth more than I thought it would be. And with the money they make on that, they should be able to live a fairly decent lifestyle in Glen Cove.

  But not in my house.

  I told mom I would pay for a retirement home of her choosing until their house sold.

  She started crying.

  After a couple of days she came to the realization that dad needs more help than any of us can give him. And was relieved to realize that even though they have to move out of my house, they will not be moving far.

  In fact, the retirement facility of my mother’s choosing is exactly 1.2 miles away.

  Great.

  We are in the car now headed over there to check it out and put down a deposit.

  I am expecting: old people walking around with canes, tiny, yappy dogs, and Priuses as far as the eye can see.

  Instead we pull up and my mouth drops to the floor.

  First of all it’s gated. Palm trees line the front driveway.

  There is a “fake beach” where people can sit out and relax. We see the line of them sunbathing and reading magazines as we pull in.

  A golf course surrounds the area and it’s lush and beautiful.

  Instead of Priuses, there seems to be a god-awful amount of red convertibles.

  The front office is a Mediterranean-style mansion with a waterfall out front. The receptionist is a gorgeous young blonde with huge breasts, smushed down under a suit.

  We follow her to one of the available condos.

  The path is lined with ferns, and tame Parrots and macaws sitting out on their perches. You can even pet them!

  So I did.

  One bit me.

  We arrive at the condo.

  The front door is solid mahogany with beautifully etched glass sides. The mailbox to the side of the door is wood as well and has palm trees carved on the front of it. A small Koi pond sits to the left.

  I look over at mother and raise my eyebrows.

  “Here we are,” The beautiful blonde says as she opens the door and enters the condo.

  The floors are marbled tile with large, red, authentic Indian rugs displayed over them. The kitchen has gold and white granite countertops. A bit lavish for me, but I can tell mother is impressed.

  Father looks around and starts knocking on the walls. “Sturdy I’ll say,” He comments.

  I roll my eyes.

  As if David knows anything about architecture.

  “Now the kitchen and bathrooms both have emergency response buttons. So if you fall or need help, we have a 24-hour staff ready at a moment’s notice. We also have a full menu here in the kitchen for delivery from our private restaurant, which I will show you later in the tour.”

  I grab the menu out of the cute blonde’s hands.

  “Holy shit, this is amazing. Caviar? Veal?” I look up at her.

  She replies, “Only the best!”

  We then enter the living room which is furnished with plush leather couches and a Beachwood coffee table.

  The large plasma T.V. hangs on the wall and a built-in mini bar sits next to it. I point out the bar to Dad and nudge his arm. He looks intrigued.

  The wide French doors open out onto a concrete patio which displays a low hanging hammock and three shady palm trees. There’s a built-in fire pit and a few chairs lining the patio as well.

  Impressive.

  “As you can see, there is ample light in this particular unit. And also this…” The blonde pushes a button on the wall and large, beige shutters slowly start to close. They drop down from the ceiling and hit the floor covering all of the windows.

  Now it is completely dark.

  “Perfect for movie night!” She giggles.

  “Wow, they have really thought of everything,” I say.

  “Yes, we certainly have.”

  “How much is this unit again?” I ask, as I fiddle with my pamphlet.

  “It’s $5,000 a month including a meal plan,” She answers.

  “Oh, five thousand for two people, that’s not bad!” I say smiling at dad.

  “No, I’m sorry, that’s five-thousand per person. It covers all of your medical needs and a year membership to the golf course as well.”

  “Oh. Mom, did you know about this?”

  Mother pretends to ignore me and continues into the bedroom area.

  “Mom!” I shout.

  She stays silent.

  The bedroom is as big as the living room.

  “The bathtub has jets which you can control with this remote here.” The cute lady holds up the remote and turns on the jets for us. “It also controls the lighting.” She demonstrates the lighting as well.

  A King-sized bed sits low to the ground and above it, a large mirror. At the opposite end of the room hangs another massive T.V.

  The room is carpeted and warm.

  I want to live here!

  I shake the thought away.

  We can’t afford this!

  “Mom, we should go. I really think we need to talk about this first,” I say, quietly this time.

  “Would you mind showing us the rest of the grounds now?” Gwyneth says in her most proper asking voice.

  I roll my eyes.

  I’m in the fucking deep end.

  We finish the tour, and I have to say I am impressed.

  Father only tried one shenanigan, which was: taking off his clothes and trying to get into their pool.

  Did I mention it was Grandparents Day and all of the tiny children were visiting the resort? A couple of them even screamed and their loving and protective grandparents shielded their eyes.

  Luckily, the staff has “seen this many times before”, and didn’t make dad feel too embarrassed afterwards.

  I, however, will never recover.

  I thank the cute blonde and my mother tells her that she will “be in touch”.

  We get into the car.

  “Ten thousand a month!” I shout and look over to my mother who is looking down at her perfectly manicured nails.

  “That better come with two blow jobs a day for dad, or I’m out.” My mother looks at me appalled.

  “Dear, I know how much you get in your inheritance. I have never said anything to you about it before. But, Emily, you are spoiled! You owe us.”

  I start the car and huff.

  I try to strap on my seatbelt but I am pulling too fast and it won’t come out.

  It frustrates me more.

  UGH!

  “Fine!”

  I let go of the non-functioning piece of shit seatbelt.

  “Fine, mother, you win,” I say and this time I slowly pull the seatbelt and gently slide it around my body and click it into place.