“No, I’m happy to wait,” he said.
They drove in silence for a while. “Still no calls on the baby furniture?” Will asked about five miles down the road.
“Nope.” Becca shook her head. “Other than to say it was back-ordered. I haven’t heard from them since.”
“I’ll give them a call tomorrow.”
“Thanks.”
Until they knew when the furniture was coming, Becca was still using her office as an office. No point impinging on Will’s space until she had to.
Another ten miles whizzed by. Becca could smell Will’s aftershave. It made her look forward to that night, when the lights were out. When they’d said their good-nights and he reached for her across their big silent bed.
“We should probably look into signing up for those childbirth classes the doctor mentioned,” Will said.
Becca nodded. “I’ll call tomorrow.”
THE BABY’S FURNITURE finally arrived, three weeks late, on the last Thursday in June. Becca, just home from the day care when the delivery company had called to say they’d be there within the hour, had phoned the high school for help moving her office furniture out of the nursery. Within fifteen minutes she’d had ten boys from Save the Youth on her doorstep. She ordered pizza for all of them.
By the time Will got back from the state Higher Education Administration luncheon he’d been attending in Phoenix, the work was done. His home had a nursery.
“The furniture looks great, just like we envisioned,” he told Becca, standing beside her in the doorway of the room. “But the walls sure look bare, don’t they?”
“I was thinking the same thing,” she said. “What do you think—wallpaper, paint or just some colorful balloon appliqués? Fabric ones,” she added. “Maybe with sequins.”
“I’ll bet we could hire some of the kids who’ve been working on The Hero sets to come over and paint.”
Becca nodded. “And then put up some appliqués?”
“Sure.” Glancing around, Will shrugged. “Are they something we can just go buy?”
“Probably.” Becca walked farther into the room.
“But what I’d really like to do is make them,” she admitted, a little embarrassed. Busy with her civic and charitable duties, she’d never really been the homemaking type. An occasional afghan was all she ever managed.
Will’s face was relaxed; he seemed pleased by her suggestion. “Will you have the time?” he asked. “I sure don’t want you overextending yourself.”
Warmed by his concern, Becca smiled. “I have a feeling that by the end of the summer I’m going to have more time to sit and sew than I know what to do with.”
ALMOST AS IF BY DESIGN, they both turned away from the nursery and moved down the hall, through the formal living room, to Will’s office on the other side of the house. Will left long enough to exchange his suit for some gym shorts and a T-shirt, and with little disagreement, he moved furniture around until they were both satisfied. They each had a personal workspace, enough privacy for phone conversations taking place at the same time, and the room still looked coolly elegant.
While Becca rearranged her files, Will sat down at his desk, intending to get through the day’s mail. And found himself watching Becca, instead. There were still some things he could predict. The way she kept her pens lined up in a desk drawer, instead of in a holder on top of the desk. Her preference for index cards, rather than notebooks.
He knew that she preferred baths to showers, that Cheerios was her favorite cereal. That the only chocolate she liked was Hershey’s milk chocolate. None of that fancy stuff for Becca. He knew lots of little things about her.
He just didn’t know what she wanted out of life.
“How much thought have you given in, say, the past ten years, to my goals in life?” His words dropped into the silence that had fallen.
“What?” Becca looked up, perplexed.
Will repeated the question, his tone not accusatory, just curious.
“Well,” she said, frowning. “I guess not much.” She looked over at him, her eyes filled with apology.
“I guess, when I think about it, I’m not really even sure what they are, other than to do well with Montford—and to have a baby, of course.”
“Things anyone in town could tell you,” he replied, still not with accusation. But with sadness.