Proximity

Jane was not pregnant, but she looked as if she was. She found her sister Lisa, who was due in one week and didn’t look it, offensive. Jane’s neighbor Rachel assured Jane that she didn’t look pregnant, but Jane could tell from Rachel’s eyes that she was lying. Jane wanted to be pregnant while looking pregnant. Rachel had no children, wanted no children and did not look pregnant or definitively not-pregnant.

Lisa chatted about pregnancy to Jane over the phone. Lisa liked talking pregnancy now that she was pregnant. Listening was the least Jane could do for Lisa. Having recently relocated for the job she’d quit after discovering she was pregnant, Lisa had few people to confide in other than her husband. Besides, this was the first time in their adult lives that Jane and Lisa had been at all ‘close.’

Previously, Lisa had approached pregnancy wearing an expression not unlike that of a terrified dog. Her eyes to one side, she’d grit her teeth as if straining at a leash, and enter a discussion about pregnancy ready to leave it immediately. In past times, Jane had tried to tell Lisa, who was seven years younger, about her own desire to become pregnant. Lisa would say, ‘I’m not really a baby person,’ take the wheel of conversation and steer it sharply the other way.

Jane turned to Rachel to discuss her longing for a child. Rachel assured Jane that any woman who wanted to be a mother could nowadays. Jane protested that she, 35, was growing old. Rachel, 40, asserted that women of all ages became mothers these days, and so could Jane. Hadn’t there been a special on TV, after all, about a woman who conceived at 75—or something? What about Sarah from the Bible?

Jane and her husband were in a perpetual fight about their readiness for a baby. Jane insisted that they were ready, but he believed they were not. Jane wished there were a pregnancy-ready test she could buy at the drugstore to prove to him that they were as ready as anyone could ever be. The curtain was closing on her childbearing years. She was considering divorce.

Now, pregnant with her first child without even trying, Lisa approached the topic of pregnancy with zest and enthusiasm. During her nine months, Lisa didn’t stop barking about ‘stupid soccer moms,’ but did rethink her position on breastfeeding (now she was for it). Lisa no longer ranted that baby-changing tables made restrooms both unsightly and more unsanitary. Instead, she jotted notes in a small black book about which establishments were baby- and child-friendly, then relayed the information to Jane. She was ready anytime, Lisa said. Nursery painted, crib assembled, age-appropriate snuggle toys lined up on the changing table, clothes hung on tiny hangers in the closet. House childproof. The baby could come at any time. ‘I’m ready,’ Lisa repeated to the blank space of her sister.

As usual, Jane wrapped the phone cord around her neck and bit her lip to restrain herself from articulating her childish, jealous thoughts; or worse, wailing. She glanced down at her pregnant-looking abdomen as Lisa gabbed on about how morning sickness was worth enduring and laughed at the unending suggestions of baby names she received. Lisa, who still wore camouflage pants and combat boots, confessed she could already hear the baby cooing. Jane began to cry.

‘Are you getting a cold?’ Lisa asked. ‘I hope you’re not getting a cold, since the baby’s due in a week and you’re flying out here.’

‘No. I’m just yawning. It’s 7AM. Yawning makes me tear up.’

‘No way! It does me, too!’ Lisa said.

‘I’ve got to pee,’ Jane said. ‘I’ll have to hang up now.’

‘I know how you feel. I have to go every three minutes.

As she hung up the phone, Jane shouted, ‘Fuck!’ to the air around her.

Rachel was unmarried and more than content not being a wife or mother. She wanted to concentrate on her career as an accountant. If she was meant to be anything other than what she was right now, it would happen in due time. Rachel phoned Jane to make sure she was awake and ready to go for their usual morning walk. Rachel wanted to lose weight and Jane wanted to not appear pregnant.

Jane pulled herself upright from a fetal position to answer the phone.

‘Are you crying?’ Rachel asked.

‘I’ve been yawning,’ Jane said.

‘What are you crying about?’ Asked Rachel.
Jane explained that she felt exploited by Lisa, who was soon going to harvest her autumn baby without having ever looked pregnant, while she, Jane, appeared pregnant every day of every numberless month while wanting to be but without being. The without being was killing her, she said. She was getting older and her childbearing days were numbered. This statement conceived a pregnant pause, after which Rachel said simply, ‘Well.’ As if everything was.