Odd Mom Out

“I don’t want more children.”

“—and is now flooding you with cocktails of neurochemicals because he fits your ancestral wish list.”

“Bullshit.”

“It’s in her book.”

“I don’t care.”

“You’re biology driven, Ta, whether or not you want to admit it.”

“Good, because I won’t admit it, and even if it were true, why now? In ten years I must have met someone that my brain would have recognized as a good reproductive partner. Why didn’t I notice until now?”

“Because you’ve had a mommy brain.”

“You’re supposed to be helping, Tiana, not making things worse.”

“You wanted answers. I’m giving you answers, and you’ll get even more in chapter five of Dr. Brizendine’s book. Motherhood changes a woman’s brain. It’s nature’s way of ensuring the survival of young. First you’re flooded with chemicals during pregnancy, and then after birth you’re flooded with more dopamine and oxytocin to help bond with the baby. For years you were hopelessly in love with Eva—”

“I still am.”

“Yes, but she’s older now, nearly ten, and she’s more independent”—she talks louder, overriding me when I try to interrupt—“and yes, you’re still very attached to her, but you probably aren’t producing quite as much oxytocin as you once were, leaving you more open for sexual attraction and reproduction.”

I’m just about to protest that I’m not interested in having another baby, that the last thing I want or need is to add to my family, when another little voice inside me whispers, Oh yeah?

The Oh yeah? stops me. Cold.

“What was the name of that book again?” I ask her after a slight pause.

“The Female Brain.”

“So I’m not crazy.”

Tiana starts laughing. “I never said that. But research is showing that hormones shape us and influence us whether we like it or not, and it’s been happening inside our brains from before we were born.”

After hanging up, I click on to the Internet and look up the book. The cover photo is white and depicts a bundled ball of phone cord with a little phone jack plug at the end.

Hardwired to fall in love?

Hardwired to procreate?

Hardwired to need a man?

No freaking way.

Monday afternoon, Eva comes home with a packet of papers that includes a notice about the first field trip of the year, the fourth-grade class’s November trip to the Pacific Science Center to see the new, highly touted anatomy exhibit and an invitation to a mothers-only event, a Creative Memories Night. I’ve heard of Creative Memories, because in New York I handled a very small ad design for a rival, Memory Delights, and I did tremendous market research before tackling the ad.

I hand the invitation back to Eva. “It’s just a scrapbooking party,” I say.

“Who is giving it?” she asks, peering at the invite and then exclaiming, “Oh! Diane Hale. Ben’s mom.”

“Do I know the Hales?”

“You should. Ben’s only like the second most popular kid in fourth grade. Behind Jemma, of course. Which makes him the most popular boy, which means this is a really really cool thing.”

“Eva, you fill my heart with absolute terror.”

“Mom, this is big.”

“It’s a scrapbooking party.” I make a cutting motion with my hand. “I’ve got to make things with construction paper.”

“And you’re so artistic.”

“If you weren’t my daughter, I wouldn’t like you.”

Eva just laughs and plops down on the couch with her binder and homework. “But you need me, Mom. You need someone to keep you grounded in reality.”

I shoot her a look of disbelief. “You’re representing reality?”

“Mom, I’m just trying to help you.” She gives me a long-suffering look. “You do need help, you know.”

Not this again. No more “make Mom over” plans. “Why? What’s wrong with me?”

“Just forget it. You’re getting upset,” she answers, picking up her pencil.

“I’m not upset.”

“Well, you will be. You always get upset when I tell you these things.”

“What things?”

Eva sighs and touches the sharp pencil tip to the pad of her finger. “That it’s not normal to be alone. That you need to get married, and I need a dad.” Her shoulders lift and fall as she catches my expression. “See? Now you’re mad.”

Whose child is this? How can she be so blasted conservative? What 1950s happy homemaker drug was plopped into her baby food? “I’m not mad.”

She rolls her eyes. “Yeah. Whatever.”

“I’m not, and I’m trying very hard to be the mom you want me to be, but sometimes your expectations are a little unrealistic. Not every mom—not even the moms that stay home—makes Toll House cookies every afternoon. And not every mom—not even moms like Taylor Young—devote every moment to domestic activity.”

Eva just hunches over her open notebook, working away. She doesn’t even bother to look at me.

“Eva, I’m more normal than you think.”

“Mmm-hmm.”

“Cutting my hair and marrying me off wouldn’t change who I am, nor will it turn me into a committee-loving parent-meeting-attending mom. It’s just not my thing.”

She finally looks up. “So you’re not going to go?”

“To the scrapbooking party?” My brow creases. “No.”

“And the field trip?”

I look at her pinched expression for a long moment. She’s the most exhausting child I’ve ever met. “Yes,” I say, sighing. “Yes, I’ll sign up to go. I’d love to go.”

Her gaze meets mine and holds.

“I can’t wait to go,” I add. “It’s going to be fun.”

“Okay, Mom. That’s enough.”

Checking my smile, I head to the studio to get back to work.

The next day, I send in the parent sign-up form for the field trip and forget about it, which isn’t difficult with my long, demanding workdays and Eva’s unusual behavior.

Eva’s always been a big reader, and I’m used to seeing her curled up with a book, used to her taking notes. But this week, she’s practically locked herself in her room, and whenever I catch her unawares, she’s reading and note taking and using a highlighter.

At first I thought it was a paper she was writing for class, but when I ask her Friday morning about what she was reading, she answers with a vague, “It’s just something I’m interested in.”

I finish her lunch, close the paper lunch bag by folding the top over. “It’s not a book report?”

She looks up at me and smiles. “No.”

I put her sack lunch by her backpack. “So what is it for?”

“To help me learn.”

“Learn what?”

Eva shrugs, closes the book, and slides the notebook on top, concealing the cover. “How to do things better,” she answers even as the phone rings.

I want to continue the conversation, but Eva’s heading to her room as I pick up the phone. It’s Taylor Young. She’s calling to see if I could cover for another mom who was to work in the class today but now has a conflict.

“I’m sorry, Taylor, but I can’t,” I answer, glancing at my watch, thinking I’ve got to get Eva out the door before she misses her bus. “Fridays are really difficult, and today I’ve got client meetings—”

“It’d only be for an hour and a half.”

“I’m sorry, I just can’t.”

There’s a moment of silence, and then Taylor says very flatly, “I’ve already called everyone else. You were my last resort. But fine. I’ll do it. I always end up doing it anyway.”

She hangs up, a loud, decisive click in my ear, and although I feel bad, I don’t feel bad enough to change my plans. I’ve a job. It’s not a choice. This is how I pay my bills and keep a roof over our heads.

My first client meeting that

morning runs late and threatens to slide into the lunch hour that I’ve reserved for my second client meeting, which can’t happen, as this lunch is a “kiss the customer’s butt” meeting, one of those I’ve got to do every now and then when we’ve either screwed up or the client just feels sensitive and needy.

In this case, the client’s very sensitive and needy, and it doesn’t help that she—the director of sales for a local four-star boutique hotel—is six and a half months pregnant.

But I get through both meetings, survive the emotionally charged lunch, promise my hotel client the sun and the stars and the moon, and rush back to the studio to update my team—who are putting in a full day of work today despite it being Friday—so they know what we’ve got to do and when.

We’re still in a meeting in the studio when Eva returns home from school. She sticks her head around the door, waves hello to everyone, and tells me she’s got to talk to me ASAP.

“Go ahead,” Robert says, gesturing me away. “It could be an emergency, one of those ‘I’m becoming a woman’ things.”

Chris makes a disgusted sound. “Please. She’s a child.”

“A nine-year-old going on nineteen,” Robert flashes.

He’s got a point, I think, heading for the house.

I find Eva sitting cross-legged in one of the chairs at the dining room table. “I don’t have any homework,” she says, munching on string cheese and a fistful of Goldfish crackers. “It’s Friday.”

“So what are you doing?”