“Any day now,” Ren said. “Paola warned me that I better not freeze up when the day comes.”
“We’re actually meeting them for dinner soon,” Paul said. “So we should get going. Hopefully, she doesn’t go into labor before the food is on the table.”
The fact that neither of the women had stopped by Sarah’s opening felt like a statement; Ren caught Sarah’s hurt expression before she could hide it.
“Sorry I haven’t been free to hang out much,” Ren said gently. “Paola’s had a tough pregnancy.”
“Well, she’s in the home stretch.” Sarah upped her good cheer in the face of his kindness. “I should let you both get to the restaurant so you’ll be ready to whisk her away to a hospital if required.”
“As long as I don’t have to do the delivery,” Ren said. “That’s my nightmare. Having the baby come in the taxi.”
Sarah smiled. “You can handle anything. You once stayed up for thirty-six hours straight to finish a paper on Thomas Pynchon.”
“I’ll remind myself of that when changing diapers at 2 a.m.”
“The Crying of Baby 49,” Sarah joked.
“I think diapers are more likeGravity’s Rainbow,” Paul replied. He took a breath. “Well, I’m glad we made it. This is tremendous work, Sarah.”
She held her chin even higher. “I have suffered for my art by having solo wine parties and reading trashy paperbacks.”
Paul gave her a kiss on the cheek, then Ren gave her a light hug.
“I want to hear about all your shows,” Ren said quietly. “I mean it. You promise?”
“I promise.”
And she watched her two favorite men in the world leave together to return to their partners and their bright, hopeful lives.
She glanced at her photo entitledBathtub. In the image, she was dangling one leg over the edge of a tub, the rest of her mostly covered in mounds of frothy bubble bath except for a bit of her collarbone peeking through the foam. One confident hand with purple nail polish raised a beer can in victory. She had used a pop flash, 1970s style, like she had been caught by paparazzi. Sarah loved the image, even if Ren hadn’t.
The photo made her look exactly like she felt. Ridiculous. Messy. A little hopeful in spite of everything.
6
TORONTO OUTDOOR ART FAIR, JULY 2012
Ren textedher a week after the arrival of his new baby.
Alejandro Omar Durand De Leon. Born November 8th, 2011. Baby and mama are perfect.
The image he sent had clearly been taken by Paola: Ren sat in front of a large, curtained window looking thrilled and exhausted, his face unshaven, clutching a miniscule bundle that squinted up from an adorably fashionable blanket. Their baby had been given a small, black cap for the occasion and squinted up like an ancient Italian man about to play bocce.
She wrote him back appropriately gushing replies and he asked her how her art show had gone.
Four sales!She wrote.Paid my rent for the month and got a fisheye lens.
Congratulations. Tell me you’re kidding about the fisheye,he replied.
Just trying to get you worked up. It was a regular wide-angle, she wrote back.
He responded kindly about her talent, but she felt sad. They didn’t feel like friends anymore, and she realized in retrospect that maybe he had only been allowed to hang out with her when she had a boyfriend. Once she didn’t, Paola had drawn a line in the sand. Breaking things off with Liam had caused Sarah to lose her friendship with Ren as well.
Of coursethey picked the name Alejandro, Anya wrote when Sarah shared the name with Anya and Kristie in their group text.Couldn’t pick something with one or two syllables. Wouldn’t be Sophisticated and European.
It’s a badass name, Kristie texted. I bet Ren’s wife is impossibly hot and classy. Signed, Krishnakali.
LOLOL,Anya wrote.Everyone knows you are impossibly hot and classy, K.
