Then Came You - Jennifer Weiner [108]
She gave me a sympathetic smile. “Why don’t you take a break?” I looked down at myself. I was still in the same green top and blue skirt I’d worn to the meeting on Wall Street that morning, and I hadn’t showered before I’d put them on. I went to my bedroom and shucked off my clothing. I’ll take a shower, I told myself. I’ll call Darren, see if he’s tracked India down. I’ll call Tommy, ask if he wants to come visit, and Trey . . . and then, before I knew it, I was facedown on my bed. When I opened my eyes again it was ten o’clock at night.
I scrambled into the shower, then into a pair of sweatpants one of my brothers had left behind and an old T-shirt of my father’s. Annie was on the living-room couch, the baby asleep in her arms, the television tuned to an episode of Real Housewives. She turned around, looking guilty, and turned the TV off when she saw me.
“Tia’s having her dinner. I nursed her,” she said.
“Rory, not Tia, right?”
Annie looked too worried to smile at my attempt at a joke. “I hope that’s okay. I probably should have asked you first...”
“No, no, it’s fine.”
“... but you were sleeping, and it just seemed silly to pump it and then feed it to her, so I just...”
“Really, it’s okay.”
“She’s an angel,” said Annie, gazing fondly at the baby. I looked to see if Rory had undergone some sort of transformation during my nap, but she was the same, wrinkly and red and bald and disagreeable-looking, even in a very sweet white-and-pink one-piece outfit with a matching hat. “Here.” Annie lifted the baby, holding her out to me. Before I could think about it, I shook my head. I braced myself for rolled eyes or laughter, or, worse, disgust, but Annie just said, “I remember when I had Frank Junior. I felt like I was babysitting. I think I spent the entire first year of his life waiting for his real parents to come get him.”
At her mention of her son, I realized I had no idea what she’d done with her children. “They’re staying with my parents,” she told me. “My folks know what’s going on, and I’m fine to stay for a few days.”
I took a seat on the couch beside her. “Did you always know you wanted kids?”
Annie looked thoughtful. “I guess I always knew I’d have them. But that’s not exactly the same thing, is it?” I shook my head as she continued. “That was just what everyone I knew did. My mother, my aunts, my cousins . . . everyone had babies, and most of them ended up raising a baby or two that wasn’t even their own.” She looked at me. “Did you always know you wanted to go to college?”
I considered before answering. “I guess it’s the same thing. It’s what everyone I knew did.”
She nodded. “It’s not so bad, though, is it? I mean, you had fun in college, right?”
Because it was late, because I was still foggy from my nap, because, in the past weeks, my life had changed so radically that I barely recognized it anymore, I told her the truth. “Not so much. Not really. I’m not even sure I know how to have fun.”
Annie looked at me, startled. “Really? Huh. I always thought . . . I mean, if you had money . . .” Her voice trailed off.
“Money can’t buy you social skills. Or friends.”
“True.” She sat quietly, maybe thinking that, in some respects, she was richer than I’d ever be. Rory started to stir, stretching and waving her fists in the air. “Want to hold her?” Annie asked. She handed over the baby, and this time, I took her. Rory opened her tiny, toothless mouth and yawned before settling herself against me. “Cute,” I said, and meant it.