The Space Between Us

Which was bright. Too bright. I flung a hand up against the glare and blinked fast, but tears still burned in my eyes, so I had to rub them again. My vision blurred and cleared.

“Rough night?” Vic asked from his place at the stove, where he was cooking what I assumed to be eggs, since that was what he had every morning. “You look like shit.”

“Feel like it.” I slumped in one of the hard wooden kitchen chairs and put my head in my hands. The ends of my hair tickled my nose until I pushed them back, and I looked up to see him laughing at me. “Fuck you, Vic.”

He turned back to the skillet. “Want some eggs? I’m making toast for Elaine. You can have some.”

He shoveled scrambled eggs onto a couple plates and added toast as it sprang up from the toaster, then put both on the table and took a seat across from me. He’d forgotten forks, which was typical Vic, so I got up to grab them. It was my turn not to look at him.

He didn’t ask me any questions, and I offered no answers. We ate in companionable silence broken only by the ticking of the wall clock and an occasional burst of excited laughter from the rec room downstairs. Vic finished and took his plate to the dishwasher, then spread the extra toast with a thin layer of butter. He added a can of ginger ale and a straw to the plate, but I stopped him before he could leave the kitchen.

“You go ahead. I’ll take it to her.”

He looked again at the clock. Though he has a couple of good guys working for him, he still does a lot of the mechanic work himself. He likes to be open for people who need to get in before work, and he likes to leave early to spend time with his wife and kids before bedtime. Vic is an awesome husband and dad.

“Thanks.” He grabbed his jacket and shouted a goodbye down to the rec room, waited the few minutes while his kids pounded up the stairs to grab him around the knees and burrow against him. He tousled their hair, squeezed and kissed them, then pried loose their clinging fingers and sent them back down to rot their brains with animated mayhem.

For me, Vic had no kiss, no hug. We got over all that a long time ago. It didn’t affect how we were now, didn’t make it awkward or anything like that. It wasn’t a secret from Elaine. But we never spoke of it, and anyone who didn’t know would never have guessed that Vic and I had once sort of been lovers.

In their bedroom the shades were drawn, but Elaine had turned on the nightstand lamp. The base of it was shaped like a ballerina, her head obscured by the shade, which was patterned with toe shoes. It was a really ugly lamp, but I guess Elaine loved it.

“Brought you some toast.”

She let out a sigh. “Thanks, hon.”

I sat on the side of the bed and gingerly handed her the plate, which she balanced on her belly, just beginning to mound. She looked pale, her eyes shadowed and her hair lank. I was pretty sure I looked the same, if not worse, and I didn’t have a sea monkey in my belly to blame.

She nibbled a bite of toast. “Kids watching TV?”

“Yes.”

“Vic off to work?”

I nodded. Elaine grimaced, and I handed her the ginger ale with the straw. She sipped at it and sighed again.

“Pregnancy,” she said, “sucks.”

“I believe it. I’ve seen you through it two and a quarter times, remember?”

She sipped again, her throat working, and looked at the toast but didn’t take another bite. “I know it’ll pass in a few weeks. Or a month. And then I’ll have a few months of being able to eat whatever I want.”

“And then you have that labor to look forward to,” I said without even cracking a grin. “Bet you can’t wait for that.”

Elaine managed a small smile. “At this point, maybe the kid’ll just slide out.”

“I think that doesn’t happen at least until kid number four, if not five or six.” I smoothed the comforter between my thigh and the edge of hers.

“Bite your tongue.” She looked aghast, but since I knew she’d already said if they were going for three they’d have to commit to trying for four, the look had to mostly be fake.

Elaine was planning to have this kid the way she’d had Max and Simone, at home. Here in this bed, as a matter of fact. Without drugs. She was going to have a doula and a midwife, the same ones who’d delivered the other kids, and she’d already started putting together all the supplies she needed for her birth plan.

Personally, I thought she was nuts. Give me the sterile green walls of a hospital room, a masked doctor with a needle, and a full-on epidural the moment the first contraction hit.

“So, why do you look like shit?” Elaine said around a bite of toast. Some color was coming back into her cheeks. She might actually keep it down.

“Someone’s kids woke me up too fucking early.” I pinched the bridge of my nose. “Have a headache. Want more sleep. You need more reasons?”

“I guess that’s enough. Sorry about the kids. I’m sure Vic sent them down. I’d have told them to play in their rooms.”

I laughed at that and we shared a look. “Ri-i-i-ight.”

She laughed, too, but as if it pained her. “What time do you have to go in to work?”

“Not until three.”

“You can nap before then. I’m taking them to playgroup around lunchtime. You’ll have the house to yourself.”

“Ahh, sweet freedom.” I tapped my chin with a finger. “Should I run around naked first? Or drink milk right from the carton? Or both?”

I was glad to make Elaine laugh, especially if it kept her from feeling sick to her stomach. If my feelings for Vic had always been and would always be complicated, I had no issues about my love for Elaine. She was the older sister I’d never had—the sort I tried to be, though I figured I’d never get the hang of it the way she did.

“Did you put your list by the phone?” she asked with another sip of ginger ale, another bite of toast. The first piece was almost gone and she was looking even better. “I’m going to the store later.”

“I can go if you want. Run out before work.”

“Could you?” She appeared relieved. “I hate to drag the kids with me.”

“I know you do.” She always came home with junk cereal and sugary snacks when she took Max and Simone with her, and though I was a fan of Marshmallow Mateys myself, I liked it much better when my financial contributions to the household budget came home in the form of food that didn’t add to the bulges I worked hard to get rid of. “I’ll go. No problem.”

Elaine reached for my hand, surprising me. “I’m so grateful you’re with us, Tesla. You know that, right?”

There are a lot of women who wouldn’t have opened their homes to some girl their husband had finger-banged on a grimy couch, much less treated her the way Elaine has always treated me. If anyone was grateful, it was I. Without Vic and Elaine, I might’ve been on the street. No, not might’ve. Definitely would have.

Still, I shrugged off her compliment because I recognized the sheen of tears in her eyes. Elaine was superemotional, more so when she was pregnant. I didn’t want to start the day with tears. I was feeling a little too fragile myself.

“Slave labor,” I told her. “Live-in babysitter. Toilet scrubber. What’s not to love?”

She squeezed my fingers, knowing me too well to be offended. “Well. We do love you, Tesla Martin. Don’t forget it.”

I couldn’t forget it and wouldn’t have wanted to. I untangled my fingers from her grip and held out my hand for the plate. “Done?”

She sighed heavily and nodded. “Can you check on the kids for me? I’m going to get up and get in the shower.”

“No problem.”

My phone was beeping with a missed text message by the time I got back downstairs and made sure the bratlings hadn’t destroyed anything too badly. It was simple, two words: Call me.

I thumbed in the number as I kicked dirty laundry into a pile. “Cap. What’s up?”