The motherhood mandate, p.14
The Motherhood Mandate, page 14
Seriously? “Every single woman in my family has struggled to get pregnant, Sam!” she yelled, glaring up at him. “Did you ever wonder why there is a four-year gap between Chloe and Mackenzie and a three-year gap between Mackenzie and me? No? Well, apparently my parents had problems having kids, too!”
Sam stared at her, puzzled. “So?”
Was basic biology beyond him? Rylee thought, feeling her rage bubbling up. “So, why should I take pills every single day that mess me up, when I only have my period two or three times a year because I can’t ovulate!” she yelled at him.
“Don’t ovulate, huh?” Sam laughed, shaking his head at her. “Seems like you managed to squeeze an egg out, didn’t you?” he growled. “You should have told me you had stopped taking the Pill. I could have picked up a box of condoms and we wouldn’t be here!”
That was it. Rylee found herself sliding back into the car, perching on the very edge of the backseat as the sobs she’d been holding in finally let loose. She let the boxes of shoes fall to the muddy asphalt, not caring if she ruined his tournament shoes.
She heard Sam move around the car and pull another box from the trunk. “When you’re done, I’ll be upstairs,” he muttered in her direction. Then, he walked away, leaving her alone in the cold.
After a long time, Rylee slowly pulled herself together. She could hear traffic close by and the sounds of people out shoveling the slushy ice from in front of their garages. She rummaged around Sam’s car until she found the tissue box that she’d stashed during allergy season. She took a few minutes to compose herself, then gathered up Sam’s tennis shoes and carefully walked across the yard to let herself in.
She slowly climbed the steep stairs, feeling the strain in her lower back as she moved. She paused at the landing to slip her boots off and watched the muddy slush drip to the floor as she set them down. There was room for a small bench, she thought, and maybe a boot tray.
She slowly opened the back door, looking for Sam, before stepping into the kitchen. He was putting dishes into the cabinet near the stove. He glanced over, then went back to ignoring her.
The pungent smear of paint hung in the air. Rylee found herself breathing shallowly as the scent assaulted her, making her feel trapped in the tiny space.
She dropped the shoe boxes near the closet, quickly crossing the room to open the front windows. She took a few deep breaths of cold air as she steadied herself against the window frame.
“What are you doing?” Sam snarled, storming into the living room. “It’s thirty degrees out there!”
“Airing this place out,” she replied. She was amazed he couldn’t smell it. “Paint fumes are bad for the baby. It’s bad enough we already had some furniture delivered, so everything picks up that horrible smell.” She looked from him to the couch and back, challenging him to say something.
He only glared at her, so she walked past him and into the kitchen. She opened that window, as well, then looked at the back door. No, letting it out to the hallway would just trap the fumes.
She saw him move to the thermostat and turn off the heat. Of course, he did, she thought as he slowly walked back into the kitchen. He grabbed another box off of the floor and moved it to the counter next to the stove.
“You going to help or what?” he asked snidely.
“Sure,” she sniped back. She stepped past him and started to unpack the cups and assorted silverware. “I can’t believe you’re okay with the smell.”
“It’s just paint, Rylee,” he told her, scolding her as if she was a child. “Give it a few days and it will be fine. Besides, we don’t have to officially move in for a few weeks. All we have to do is get it ready for inspection.”
He grabbed his empty box and placed it next to the back door. Then, he looked over the appliances with a wary eye, almost as if he shared her concern about how ancient everything was. He abruptly turned around, picked up the empty boxes off the floor, and headed back outside.
She watched him go, feeling empty. The kitchen layout was strange. The small kitchen sink was up against the living room wall, with barely enough room on the counter for an equally small dish drying rack.
She stood in front of the sink and took a few steps back, almost bumping into the side of the stove where it stood up against the wall next to the small pantry. The original kitchen cabinets were across from the stove, with the refrigerator directly to the right. There was room for a two-person table in the far corner. It felt like a prison.
Rylee walked back into the living room and stood looking at the busy street below. So much traffic. It was going to be impossible to get much sleep here.
She pulled out her phone and found Kathryn’s number. She just needed to talk to someone, anyone, who might understand what she was going through.
“Hey, Rylee!” Kathryn said. “How’s moving day?”
She heard the back door creak slightly as Sam came back in. He tossed a few boxes on the counter.
“Not so good,” Rylee told her. “I don’t like this place very much, Kathryn. It’s such a dump. The carpet is old. It smells, and it’s so small! I just want to go home!”
“I’m sorry,” Kathryn replied. “But it’s not like you have to live there very long, right?”
Sam tore open one of the boxes and began to loudly shove things into the cabinets. “They must have just painted and the fumes are almost overwhelming,” Rylee found herself complaining as she glared into the kitchen.
“That’s bad for the baby, right?” Kathryn asked.
“No, Sam says it’s fine,” she whimpered.
“What?”
“Yeah, I know. He doesn’t understand what it’s like to have to climb two flights of stairs just to get to the bedroom with a baby growing inside of you!” She paused for a moment. “I gotta let you go. It’s freezing in here and I need to turn the furnace back on.”
“Okay,” Kathryn said. “Talk to you later.”
Rylee put her cell phone down on the windowsill and started across the room to the thermostat, but Sam headed her off. “Close the windows first, Rylee.”
“It’s cold in here, Sam,” she said, stating the obvious.
“That’s because you had to open up all of the windows,” he told her. “It’s winter, for chrissake!”
The baby started moving, kicking at her lower abdomen insistently. Rylee slid a protective hand over the intermittent taps, trying to calm them both down. “But it still smells in here!”
He looked down at her hand, frowning as if she was reminding him why they were stuck there. “If you’re worried about the baby, go home,” he told her. “I can finish unpacking and close things up before I leave.”
“But you drove us here,” she protested.
“So, call Kathryn back,” he shot back, grimacing. “Call your mom. Hell, call an Uber if you want to.” He turned to head back into the kitchen. “Or you can help me put things away so we can get going sooner.”
“Fine. I’ll help,” she told him. “Those back stairs are pretty steep, though. If I break an ankle, it will be your fault!”
The delivery crew arrived early, even though Rylee had specifically told the sales manager she couldn’t be there before lunch. That meant cutting her exercise class short and racing to the apartment so they didn’t force her to reschedule. Irritating, yes, but necessary because the housing inspection was coming up.
She carefully navigated the small alley and parked her car in the garage. Then, she headed to the front yard, where the crew had already started staging the small amount of furniture her tiny budget had allowed: a full-size bed frame, a dresser, a nightstand, and a bistro table with two chairs that just might fit in the kitchen. She’d carefully measured and remeasured the rooms, but there was no way to know until they brought the furniture in.
She looked over the group of men to find the foreman. One of them, a tall African-American, had a clipboard. It must be him.
She walked over, trying to find a pleasant smile for him. “Hi,” she said, “I’m Rylee Williams. You must be here to deliver my furniture.”
He nodded. “Sorry we’re a bit early, but today’s a light day.” He looked up at the sky. A tiny snowflake swirled by.
“I understand,” she reassured him. “Let me take you up.”
She led him up the steps to the porch, then opened the ancient screen door to unlock the door to their apartment. They went up the steep stairs and into the living room.
“The stairs to the bedrooms are right around the corner,” she said, pointing to the far side of the living room. She led him up the second set of stairs, holding on to the railing as she pushed herself upward.
The stairs opened up to a short hallway. “The main bedroom is to the left,” she said. They slowly walked down the hallway, the sound of their movement echoing against the antique hardwood floors.
Rylee pushed open the door, looking over the small room. One wide window, framed by two narrow windows on either side, overlooked the busy road below. The door next to the windows led to a tiny closet. The mattress and boxspring were propped up against the far wall.
“The dresser should go next to the closet,” she told him as she walked to the left side of the room. She peered into the open closet door, then firmly closed it. She’d moved about two weeks’ worth of clothes and it seemed to overwhelm the small space.
He nodded. “Small room,” he told her. “But we can make it all fit.”
She nodded back. “I’ll be in the kitchen if you need me.”
Rylee fled down the stairs as quickly as she could, feeling just a bit overwhelmed by the feeling that the apartment was slowly starting to claim her. She made her way to the kitchen and pulled her iPad out of her bag. She set it on the countertop next to the stove so she could keep an eye on the movers as she worked.
She needed to understand why Sam was so stressed out about how much money they were spending. She glanced around the living room but didn’t see a router.
Didn’t matter. She unlocked her phone and got to work setting up a mobile hotspot. Then she hunted through her emails until she found the one that gave her access to the budget he’d created with the financial advisor, pulled it up, and started looking.
The crew brought in the dresser, carefully moving through the living room. She ignored them as she scanned through the simple spreadsheet. Each tab was a separate month and she could see his budget for rent, utilities, groceries, gas for his car, and estimated insurance costs.
Rylee traced her finger along the outside of the iPad, studying the numbers. This budget didn’t make any sense. Where was he tracking the actual expenses so that they could validate their over-under? Seriously, wasn’t that Budget 101?
She rolled her eyes and started searching through the folder to find the electronic receipts. Then, she updated the January sheet with everything she could find that qualified as ‘pregnancy-related’ expenses, added a few formulas so it could auto-calculate the account balance, and added a description field so they could quickly sum up each category.
As she worked, she found receipts for all kinds of things, including his online gaming habit. In the last few weeks, he’d bought two new titles, some avatar ‘weapon enhancements,’ and paid a premium subscription fee for something called ‘Cosmic Battlegrounds’. All of that added up to over a hundred and fifty dollars.
Rylee thought about all of the complaints she’d fielded over the last few months. About how much money she was wasting while he spent money on his toys. She even found a receipt for something called a ‘motion controller’ that promised to provide the user with a more immersive experience for the low cost of three hundred dollars.
When she was done, she realized they had spent over $5,000 of the money their parents had deposited in the joint account to help them get started. No wonder Sam was freaking out.
“Where would you like the kitchen table?” one of the workers asked.
She pointed to the far corner of the kitchen. “Let’s see if it fits there,” she told him. She watched as they brought the small table in, followed by the two chairs.
It fit, but just barely. It would have to do.
She looked into the living room. Maybe her mom was right, and she should have her cleaning service stop by weekly to help out. Temporarily adding the apartment wouldn’t cost much more than what Mom was paying now and it wouldn’t need to be reported to the Court if it was tacked on to her parent’s current account.
In the meantime, they had time to rework this budget into something more reasonable. She picked up the phone and iPad and had a seat while she waited for them to bring in the bed frame. The first step was to reach out to the accounting firm her family used to ensure they had an accurate ‘poor people’ budget to work with. Then, she had to figure out a way to report only items to the Court that fell within that budget until they went their separate ways.
Chapter Eleven
Rylee sat down on the yoga room floor, a bit apprehensive. Today’s class was all about preparing for labor and so far, everything she’d read about it had terrified her.
Sam sat down beside her. He’d graduated from his usual Wimbledon Whites into a much more down-to-earth wardrobe: a dark green sweatshirt, worn jeans, and loafers. It made her feel just a bit more relaxed. Maybe he was ready to focus on the baby.
“Good morning.” The instructor, a buff, blond woman, who had probably never been pregnant before in her life, smiled as she looked over the group. “I’m Jane and I’ll be your instructor for this session.”
She paused, looking over the small group. “We’ll get started in just a few minutes,” she told them. “In the meantime, why don’t you pair up?”
There was a bit of shuffling while the guys moved to sit behind their partners. Rylee looked over to Sam. Should she move? Was he going to?
He sighed and moved behind Rylee, copying the other participants so that she was seated between his legs and able to lean up against his warmth. He leaned back on his hands, almost like he was avoiding even touching her.
As the last couple straggled in, Jane waved them to have a seat. “Today, we’re going to work on breathing,” she told them. “I know you’re thinking, ‘why do I need to work on breathing? I do that every day, right?’”
The class laughed.
“We’re going to learn three different breathing techniques today,” she told them, as she settled down on the floor in front of them. “One is for active labor. One is for transition, which can be the most painful part of labor. And the last one you’ll use is when you’re ready to push.”
One of the women raised a hand, nervously biting her lip.
Jane leaned forward to read her name tag. “Yes, Julia?” she asked.
“Should we be practicing that last one?” Julia asked. She sounded a bit panicked to Rylee. “I mean, I have six more weeks to go and don’t want to go into preterm labor!”
“Good question,” Jane responded, cocking her head with concern. “Each of these exercises are designed to help you relax and work with your body when it’s actually needed. It’s perfectly safe to practice these in advance. In fact, we encourage it!”
She looked over the group. “Let’s start this exercise with your hands on your belly,” she told them. “This will help to remind you to breathe deeply into your diaphragm. You should feel your hand move as you breathe in and your belly expands.
“Breathe in, ladies. Slowly let your breath expand beneath your hands.” Rylee shifted position, slowly breathing in as deeply as she could. “Pause for a moment. Now, slowly release that breath. Good!”
Rylee slowly let her breath out. This was similar to the breathing exercises she did for her yoga class, and she found herself moving her hands in a slow, circular motion along the sides of her belly.
“Now remember, when you are in active labor, that space you’re breathing from is where your baby is, so that’s where you need to focus your energies,” the instructor told them. “Let’s try that again, ladies. We’re going to focus on breathing in for four to six seconds. Slow and steady. Fill that tummy like it is a balloon and make sure you are breathing only as deep as is comfortable for you.”
Rylee closed her eyes and found herself relaxing back into Sam. She felt herself inhaling deeply, slowly filling her lungs with air. Exactly what she needed.
“Hold for just a moment,” Jane told them. “Now, quietly exhale through your mouth.” Rylee could hear the quiet exhalations around her and opened her mouth slightly to join them.
“This time, we’re going to count it out. I need everyone to breathe with me, even you, dads! Expand that tummy as you inhale. Relax and breathe in one, two, three, four. Pause. Now exhale, breathing out all of that tension. And again . . . ”
Behind her, Sam seemed to make a half-hearted attempt to follow the breathing exercise. She felt him take a shallow breath. His stomach barely moved behind her back.
“We do this four times in a row because this will help you focus during your contractions, which last anywhere from forty-five to sixty seconds during active labor,” Jane told them. “Once you are in transition, your contractions may last up to ninety seconds long and come about every two minutes. Breathing through them is very important as it will help your body relax and help the baby move down into the birth canal.”
Rylee squirmed a bit, trying to find a comfortable spot on the cushion. Her butt accidentally brushed up against Sam. Almost immediately, he moved away from her and she found herself leaning away from the minimal amount of support he’d been providing.
“Our next breathwork is to help you resist the urge to push before you’re completely dilated,” Jane told them. “These breaths are two short, shallow breaths.”
She demonstrated, breathing in two short breaths through her mouth, followed by two sharp pants. There was a slight whistle, almost like she was sucking air in through a straw and then panting it out in two hard exhales.
Jane smiled. “Now, it may sound like you’re hyperventilating,” she told them. “But you’re taking two purposeful and shallow breaths, followed by two purposeful breaths out. Let’s give it a try, everyone.”
