“Well, I’m not there yet,” he said, but I leaned in to kiss him anyway. Mayor or not, I was totally smitten. Those little seeds of attraction and affection were growing into some foreign flower, an exotic plant that felt a lot like love.
And I wasn’t scared. Standing there on the high wire of my life, I wasn’t scared of my feelings for this man I hardly knew.
And maybe that should concern me, but I simply couldn’t work up the energy.
The slam of the oven door and the crash of a roasting pan hitting the counter snapped me away from Carter.
“Mom, you okay?” I asked, but the second I got a look at my mother’s face, I knew what was coming.
“I’m fine,” my mother snapped. “But you need to get your head examined.”
“Uh-oh,” Phillip muttered.
“Mom,” I begged. “Please, don’t—”
“Am I supposed to sit idly by while you pretend you’re not having a baby? While you run around acting like you have no responsibilities to anyone but yourself?”
“I’m not pretending anything,” I said, forcing myself to keep my cool and not rise to this old and tired bait. “I’m living my life and enjoying myself—”
“And how much are you going to be enjoying yourself when you’re raising a baby all by yourself, you’re exhausted and stressed out, and this man is nowhere to be seen?”
“You don’t know that’s going to happen.”
“Oh, please, Zoe. You never could be realistic. You’re going to be a single mother. Now is not the time—”
“Then when?” I cried, my cool bolting away from me. “Look at you, Mom—you’re sixty years old and you’ve never had a relationship.”
“I have you—”
I took a deep breath and realized that Phillip and Ben had grabbed their coats and were headed to the door.
“No,” I cried, heartbroken to see my holiday falling to pieces. “Don’t leave.”
“I’ll call you later,” Phillip said. “You get this hashed out with your mom. Get it dealt with for good.”
Ben and Carter exchanged manly nods and then my friends were gone.
“Look at what you’ve done, Mom! You chased them away.”
“Well, I’m sorry about that. I am, but honestly, honey, I can’t watch you get hurt like this.”
“I’m not hurt!” I cried. “I’m happy. I’m so happy.”
“You’re going to have a baby,” my mother said, as if it were a death sentence, and I wondered, not for the first time, how hard it had been for Penny to be a single mother at twenty-three.
Much harder than what I was about to face, being thirty-seven and ready for a family. Eager for one.
“Ms. Madison,” Carter said, and Penny turned her furious eyes on him. “I know you don’t know me, and I understand that the way Zoe and I got together would concern any mother—”
“Don’t try and smooth talk me,” Penny said. “You’re slick, but I can see right through you. She’s broke, you know. Teaching dance classes without insurance. No savings.”
“I just got funding for the academy—”
“Right, a new dance school and a new baby. You can guess who will be looking after this child.”
“I want to help. I’m sure Phillip does, too,” Carter said.
“Sure,” Penny practically snarled. “Where are you going to be in five months, when she’s fat and has cracked nipples and can’t stop crying?”
“Please, God, just kill me now,” I whispered, but Carter reached over and took my hand.
“I know she’s having a baby,” he said. “I’m excited for her. For me, and for whatever part I have in her life at that time. It doesn’t put me off, or scare me.”
“Well it should,” Penny snapped. “You should both be scared.”
“No!” I cried. “I should be happy. I should be thrilled. I’m having a baby, not serving jail time or enduring hardship. I’m bringing joy into my life.”
“Well,” Penny said, pursing her lips. “It seems to me your constant search for joy is what got you into this mess.”
Oh. Oh wow. Had mom just called me a joy-seeking slut? I glanced over at Carter, who was staring back at me.
“I’m inspired by your constant search for joy,” he whispered.
Sweet man. Whatever happened with him, I would not regret it. Not for a minute.
“Mom,” I breathed, “you’ve failed to realize that I am all grown-up. I’m a thirty-seven-year-old woman. And I’m sorry you had me before you were ready. I’m sorry that life was so hard on you, but this was a decision I made.”
“A decision after a mistake. An accident. I know all about it, sweetheart. I’ve been there.”
Something snapped in my head and anger flooded me, filling my hands and my feet, coursing through my veins and siphoning through my lungs. I realized that by keeping my baby’s conception a secret, I was damning my daughter to the same relationship with Penny I’d had to live with. The same strange prison of love and resentment.