Chris and Heather had now lived together in the remodeled basement for over three months. They celebrated Christmas and New Year's together. They officially began dating the night Heather moved in and both became incredibly happy. Chris worked extra at the coffeeshop so he could afford more stuff for the baby.
Irene came into work and once again saw Chris working before his actual shift. "Do you live here now? You've been working, like, triple shifts lately."
"I have a baby on the way and I'm kind of getting into it," Chris said.
Irene pulled on her apron. "Chris? I was wondering. We've worked together for awhile now and I think we've gotten to be pretty friendly and I was wondering if you would want to go out sometime," Irene said.
"The Birth""Oh, Irene. I...I would like to but I can't. I'm dating Heather now," Chris said. "I thought I told you but I guess..."
"If you did, I don't remember," Irene said quietly. "But that's okay. Dating would probably end up ruining the friendship."
Chris chuckled nervously. "Yeah, probably. Or I would've been really horrible to you, cheated on you and then blamed the whole thing on you."
Irene blinked. "Wow! That was detailed," Irene poked Chris in the chest with her finger. "And I am not going to believe that you could do anything like that."
"Well, maybe someday," Chris smiled. "Shouldn't you be getting to work?"
Irene flipped him off and began making the coffee for one of the orders. "So when is Heather due? It seems like she's been pregnant for a year."
"Any day now. We're both really excited."
"I bet. Is it cool knowing you're about to be a father?" Irene asked.
"Honestly, I go back and forth. Some days I am ecstatic about it but others I hardly think about it," Chris said. "But I am excited about her going into labor."
"Did you know when you talk about Heather, the pregnancy or the baby your face just lights up. It's really kind of adorable."
"Hey Chris! Telephone!" another employee hollered.
Chris took the phone, "Hello? Really? I'll be there as soon as I can."
"It's time?" Irene asked.
Chris nodded. "It's time."
At the hospital, Chris ran into Heather's mom, Adelaide, and her friend, Lisa, who directed him to Heather's room on the third floor. When he got up there, Jonathan and Kim were waiting outside of her room.
"How is she?" Chris asked.
"She's doing fine. She's not fully dilated yet so the doctor is making her wait but it should only be a couple of hours," Kim said.
"A couple of hours? That's horrible!" Chris exclaimed.
"I was in labor with you for eleven hours," Kim revealed.
"Really? Well, I'm sorry. Had I known, I would've came right out of there," Chris hugged his mom and knocked on the door to Heather's room.
"Come in," she yelled.
Chris walked in and saw Heather pacing around the room. "How are you doing?" he asked nervously.
"I'm fine. I'm not dilated enough yet so I have to wait," Heather said, her voice tense and affected by the pain. Chris went over and hugged her. She hugged him back but not to the same degree.
"We're about to be parents," Chris smiled and kissed Heather's cheek. "Are you excited?"
"I'd be more excited if I didn't have an eight pound human being about to tear my vagina in two!" she said angrily.
"I'm sorry," Chris said as Heather pulled away from him.
"I just want this over with so the pain will go away and I can hold my newborn in my arms and I swear to God that I am not letting another man touch me again," Heather said.
"Well that seems kind of harsh. Plus it'll make our relationship kind of boring...and pointless," Chris said with a depressed tone in his voice.
"Chris? Will you just go find my mom?" Heather said, rolling her eyes.
"Sure," Chris snapped and left the room.
Three hours later, Heather was screaming in pain while Chris and Adelaide stood on either side of her. Outside the room, Jonathan, Kim, Lisa and Brett were sitting in a waiting room.
"Do you think everything will be all right?" Lisa asked.
"I think so. Heather never had any trouble while pregnant so I think the baby will be just fine," Jonathan said.
Everyone sat in silence for awhile until Adelaide came out of the room. Everyone stood up and waited for her to say something. "Come in and see the new baby," Adelaide smiled.
Everyone came into the room and saw Heather holding the baby and Chris sitting right beside her.
"Oh, he's so adorable," Kim said. "What are you gonna name him?"
"We have a couple names picked out but we haven't decided yet," Chris answered.
"Why doesn't everyone leave the room and we'll get the mother and baby into more comfortable quarters," the nurse said and everyone filed out.
Brett stopped and hugged Chris who was surprised at this gesture. "Congratulations, man. I'm gonna go grab a soda. Do you want anything?"
"No, man, I'm fine. I'm just gonna wait here until they get Heather moved," Chris said.
"Okay," Brett shrugged. He walked down the corridor and into a small vending area. Suddenly, he heard a woman and what he assumed was a doctor talking.
"...About three months according to the results. And as far as I can tell the fetus is doing just fine. Again, congratulations Rachelle," the doctor said.
Brett peered around the corner and saw Ms. Aulthaus headed toward him. He ducked back into the vending area and watched her pass. "Ms. Aulthaus is pregnant?"
To be continued...
I'll admit that I don't listen to as much as I used to do back in the 1990s and early 2000s. They don't make songs like that anymore. It seems like most bands or artists out there are in it for the money, not for the music. Maybe I'm wrong but I don't believe I am. Or they use their music to complain about the world (I'm talking to you, Green Day!) and I am just not on board with that. I can complain about Darfur and Afghanistan in my own way, thank you. I don't need you to song to me about it. I listened to the radio all the time in the late '90s and early 2000s because when I worked at Baker, the college installed three TVs that aired music videos all day long and I loved the songs they played. There are a lot of songs that I don't hear very often unless I just happen to catch them when my local alternative radio station plays them during the Nineties at Noon. Unfortunately they rarely play Sarah McLachlan or Shawn Colvin but when they do...well, they rarely do.
Vladimir Nabokov is in my top three favorite authors right after Michael Chabon and John Steinbeck. The first book of his I read was Lolita and since then I've read all of his short stories ("The Vane Sisters" having a profound affect on me) and finished reading Ada not that long ago. Nabokov has a unique voice that no other author has or ever will. The Original of Laura, written during the last three years of Nabokov's life, has all the markings of a great Nabokov tome however, since the novel is unfinished it leaves the reader (or at least me) greatly dissatisfied.
When Nabokov died, he specifically asked for the cards to be burned which is something his wife didn't do and, obviously, something his son, Dmitri, didn't do. Laura will either become a huge literary event or an example of adhering to an old man's dying wish. I don't know if the book should've been published, I think, had I been in Dmitri's position, I also would've published the cards. The book, from what people had gathered, is about Laura, who is married to an increasingly unattractive man named Phillipp Wild. A book about Laura has been published by one of her former lovers and it creates kind of a scandal. The book also ruminates a lot about growing older and death which leads us to the subtitle: Dying Is Fun. Death has pock-marked this story with Phillipp ranting about how his body is falling apart and he's getting closer to death. Given the time period of these writings, one could allude that in certain paragraphs Nabokov himself has possessed Wild when he goes off on a tangent about death.