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“Thank you.”
“Excellent.” He laughed—ho, ho, ho, Madison thought, just like an actor doing a really bad interpretation of Santa—and leaned in close. “Suppose we have a drink and discuss things?”
Discuss what? she wanted to say. How you can figure out a way to get me into bed? But Mrs. Whitney had not raised a stupid daughter so Madison smiled brightly, just as she’d been doing ever since MicroTech had taken over FutureBorn and said oh, that would be lovely, but she had a previous engagement.
The phony smile of her very married employer turned positively feral.
“Now, Madison, it isn’t wise to say ‘no’ all the time.”
It isn’t wise to court a sexual harassment lawsuit, either, Madison thought, but she knew what he didn’t, that their uneasy alliance would soon be over.
It was enough to make another smile easy to produce.
“Some other time, Mr. Shields. As I say, I have a date.”
She felt his eyes on her as she walked away.
Twenty minutes later, she slid into a booth at a quiet bar on Lexington Avenue. Two things were waiting for her: a cold Cosmopolitan cocktail and her old college roommate, Barbara Dawson.
Madison sighed, lifted the drink and took a long, long sip.
“Bless you for ordering ahead. I really needed that.”
“I live to serve,” Barb said lightly. She smiled, and jerked her chin toward the TV screen above the bar. “I caught the show. Still hiding behind those tortoiseshells, huh?”
Madison grinned. “They make me look intellectual.”
“You mean, they make you look untouchable.”
“If only,” Madison said, and took another sip of her drink.
“Don’t tell me. The lecher’s still leching?”
“Uh-huh. Did you know you were my date for tonight?”
“Why, Maddie,” Barb purred, batting her lashes, “I never knew you felt that way.”
“Hey, there’s an idea. Maybe that’ll be my next excuse.” Madison shook her head. “He’s impossible but then, he’s a man.”
“Have you ever considered it’s time you stopped thinking every guy out there is a cheating, conniving jerk like your once-upon-a-time fiancé?”
“No,” Madison said firmly, “because they are. And that includes my own father, who only stopped being unfaithful to my mother because he died. Men are all the same. It’s a fact of life.”
“Wrong.”
“Right. There are no good guys, Barb. Well, except for yours, but Hank’s the last one on the planet.”
“Maddie…”
“Did you read the latest alumni newsletter?”
Barb looked glum. She knew where this was going. “No.”
“Remember Sue Hutton? Graduated a year after us? Divorced. Sally Weinberg? Divorced. Beverly Giovanni? Divorced. Beryl Edmunds? Div—”
“Okay, okay. I get the message, but that doesn’t mean—”
“Yes. It does.” Madison gulped down the last of her drink and looked around for the waiter. “I am not getting married, Barb. Not ever!”
“No husband? No family? No kids?”
Madison hesitated. “No husband doesn’t mean no kids. Actually—actually, I do want kids. Very much.” She paused again. “But I don’t want a husband to get in the way.”
Barb raised an eyebrow. “And you’re going to manage this how?”
Okay, Madison thought, now was the time.
“Artificial insemination,” she said, and if her heart hadn’t been beating so hard at this first public admission of what she was about to do, she’d have laughed at the look on Barb’s face. “Surprised you, huh?”
“You could say that.”
“Well, I know a lot about A.I. It’s safe, it’s reliable—and it means a woman needs a syringe of semen, not the man who provided it.”
Something dropped to the floor. Madison looked up. The waiter, a young guy of maybe twenty, was standing next to their table. Either his jaw or his order pad had just hit the ground.
It was just what Madison needed to ease the tension.
“Another Cosmopolitan for me,” she said sweetly, “another glass of Chablis for my friend…and if I dinged your ego, I apologize.”
Barb groaned and put her head in her hands. “Nice,” she said, once the waiter had scurried off.
Madison tried a quick smile. “Sometimes, the truth hurts.”
“Speaking of which…I’m going to be blunt here, okay?”
“We’re friends. Go for it.”
“Well, have you thought this through? I mean, have you really considered why you want a kid? Could it be to sort of relive your own childhood? Erase your mom’s mistakes? Oh, hell,” she said, as Madison’s smile vanished. “Maddie, I didn’t mean—”
“No. It’s okay. You said you were going to be blunt. So will I.” Madison leaned forward. “My mother depended on the men she married for everything. I never wanted to be like that. I was intent on making my own way in life. On not having to rely on anyone, ever. Doing well in school mattered. So did getting a degree, and an M.B.A., and making it up the corpo
rate ladder.”
“Honey. You don’t have to ex—”
Madison reached over the table and caught Barb’s hand.
“I was sure I’d never want marriage or children, any of that stuff.” She paused; her voice grew soft. “Then, one day I looked around and realized I had it all. The undergrad degree. The
M.B.A. The great job. The Manhattan apartment… Except, something was missing. Something I couldn’t identify.”
“See? I’m right, Maddie. A guy to love and—”
“A child.” Madison flashed a quick smile that didn’t do a thing to rid her eyes of a sudden suspicious-looking dampness. “There’s a thousand dollar Picasso print on the wall next to my desk. My P.A. has one of those school photos of her little girl next to her desk and you know what? It hit me one morning that her photo was a lot more important than my Picasso.”
“Okay. I shouldn’t have said—”
“And then, a couple of months ago, a girl who once interned for me dropped by. She had a belly the size of a beachball, her back hurt, she had to pee every five minutes—and even I could tell that she’d never been happier in her life.”
Madison let go of Barbara’s hand and sat back as the waiter served their fresh drinks. When he was gone, she picked up her glass.
“Right about then,” she said, trying to sound lighthearted and failing, “I realized I’m going to be thirty soon. That sound you hear is my biological clock ticking.”
“Thirty’s nothing.”
“Not true. My mother had an early menopause. For all I know, it’s hereditary.” “I still say there’s a man out there meant for you.” “Not if my mother’s bad taste in men is also hereditary. Go on, give me that look, but who knows? She was married three times, always to rich, gorgeous, world-class bastards. If she hadn’t been in that accident, she’d probably be on husband number four.”
“What about kids needing two parents?” Barb said stubbornly.
“Did you have two parents?”
“Well, no, but—”
“One loving parent is better than two who screw things up. And, yes, I know A.I. might not be the answer for everyone, but it is for me.”
“You really are serious,” Barb said, after a second.
“Yes.” Madison gave a shaky smile. “I want a child so much…I ache, just thinking about it. The whole thing, you know? The good and the not so good. A tiny life kicking inside me. My baby in my arms. Diapers and two a.m. feedings, the first day of kindergarten, visits from the tooth fairy and in a few years, arguments about curfews…”
“Okay. I’m convinced. You actually might do this.”
Madison took a breath. “I am going to do it,” she said quietly. “I’ve already made the arrangements.”
Barb widened her eyes. “What?”
“I’ve seen my OB-GYN, I’ve been charting my periods—and I went through the donor files at FutureBorn and picked out a guy who seems perfect.”
“Meaning?”
“He’s in his thirties, he has a Ph.D., he’s in excellent health, he likes opera and poetry and—”
“What’s he look like?”
“Average height and build, light brown hair, hazel eyes.”
“I mean, what’s he look like?”
“Oh, you don’t get to see photos. It’s all very anonymous. Well, unless the donor wants his sperm kept for his own future use, of course, but when a woman purchases sperm—”
“Purchases,” Barb said, with a lift of her eyebrows.
Madison shrugged. This part of the conversation was easier. Talking about the emotions driving her was tough; the technicalities were a snap.
“It’s not a romance novel,” she said dryly. “The purpose is to have a baby, not a relationship.”
“And you’re going to do this…when?”
“Monday. And if things go well—”
“Monday? So soon?”
“There’s no point in waiting. Yes. Monday, two o’clock. If all goes well, nine months from now, I’ll be a mother.” Madison hesitated. “Will you wish me luck?”
Barb looked at her for a long moment. Then she sighed, picked up her glass and held it out.
“Of course. I wish you all the luck in the world. You know that. I just hope—”
“I’ll be fine.”
The friends touched glasses. They smiled at each other, the kind of smile women share when they love each other but disagree about something truly important. Then Barb cleared her throat.
“So,” she said briskly, “since Monday’s the big day, how about we celebrate tonight?”
“Aren’t you meeting Hank?”
“Actually I thought we’d both meet Hank. His boss just bought a place on Sixtieth off Fifth, and he’s throwing a big party.”
Madison batted her lashes. “A party in the city in June?” she said in her very best East Coast boarding school voice. “How unfashionable.”
“Come on, don’t say no. It’ll be fun.”
“And maybe, just maybe, I’ll be swept off my feet by some Prince Charming.” Madison laughed at Barb’s blush. “You are so transparent, Barbara!”
“Heck, this is only Friday. Your date with a test tube isn’t until Monday.”
“Very amusing.”
“Come on, Maddie. If your mind’s made up about this test tube thing—”
“It’s not called ‘this test tube thing,’ it’s called—”
“I know what it’s called.”
Madison sighed. “It’s been a long day. And I’m not dressed for—”
“The party’s only a couple of blocks from your place. We can stop by first so you can change. Please?”
“Sometimes, I forget what you’re like when you get an idea.”
