She is waiting in my bathroom with the first aid kid opened and her supplies laid out on the counter. No cake in sight. She gestures toward the sink. “Wash your hand first. I’ll do the rest.”
An even worse feeling sinks into the pit of my stomach. Maybe Mr. Hooper is right. I blurt, “Do you only live next door to me because you think I need someone to take care of me?”
“No.” Her expression is closed off. “I live next door to you because I need someone to kill spiders for me.”
“You could find another man to kill spiders for you,” I suggest while washing my hand. The pain feels good. It matches the pain in my head and in my chest.
Liv sighs then hands me a towel. “And you could find another woman to take care of you, so believe me, I know I’m not necessary in your life.”
Holy shit. Mr. Hooper is right about one thing at least. “They only want me for sex and to spend money on them. I can do those things. They do not want to take care of me.”
“I know,” she says through gritted teeth. “That’s why I hate them.”
She has never verbally admitted she hates the women I date. I guessed, but this is the first time she is saying the words.
“Liv,” I say as I sit on the toilet and hold my hand out to her. “I am an adult. I do not need to be taken care of.”
Her lips form a smirk, but she still does not look happy. “Oh, yeah? Then bandage your hand yourself.”
“I cannot. It is a two-handed job. I only have one good hand.”
She pulls her lips in between her teeth, and her shoulders shake. She is trying not to laugh.
That makes me feel a little happier. I love making Liv laugh.
She is not laughing anymore as she dabs ointment all over my scraped hand. “Ollie, I’ve been thinking…”
I already know what this is about. I have been thinking about it, too. It might be my last chance. If this does not work, then I will let her go. Exactly as Mom thinks I should.
“If you are concerned about me being any good at it, I can promise you, I am.”
Her nose scrunches in confusion. “Bandaging?”
“No. Sex,” I clarify. “I am very skilled at it. I have had much practice.”
“Please don’t say those things to me, Ollie,” she whispers as she wraps gauze around my hand. It sounds like she is going to cry.
“I’m sorry,” I apologize quickly. The last thing I want is to make Liv cry. “If you are worried about getting pregnant before Thanksgiving, I have done some research. Neither of us have been tested for fertility, but barring any issues with the pipes, there are some techniques that sound very promising.”
She laughs, but there are still tears in her voice. “You’ve been researching, huh?”
“I have.” If I can just get a little control back over this situation, I will feel much better. “You want a baby, and I just so happen to have a very skilled baby maker. Give me a chance, Liv. If I do not get you pregnant by Thanksgiving, then I will be the one to confess to my family. You can get artificially inseminated like you are considering anyway. I will even go with you. For…moral support.”
That is a much better option than her finding a man to marry and having a baby with him. If that happens, she will not have time for me anymore.
She is still crouched on the floor in front of me between my legs. She puts her hands on my knees and glances at the tile beneath us.
A million images of other things I would like her to do in this position fly through my mind, but I shake them off. I need to focus now more than ever, and I have been off my game all week.
“Do you even want a baby?” Liv whispers, still staring at the ground. “Because this wouldn’t just be my baby, Ollie. It would be yours, too.”
I am prepared for this question. “I would love to have a baby with you, Liv. I will be a very good father. I have researched that topic, too.”
She shakes her head but does not look at me, which is a good thing. It is honestly easier for me to think clearly this way. “Are you a father already? If you have such a skilled baby maker and all…”
I am not prepared for this question. If I had fathered a child, I would have told her. She would likely be the first person I would tell. “I have not made a baby with any of the women I have engaged in sex with, no. I am always very careful, and I make sure they are, too.”
“Oh,” she whispers, nodding her head at the ground. “Okay. That’s…good to know.”
I am not willing to follow all of Mr. Hooper’s advice, but testing one of his theories may be a good idea. I am already in this unplanned experiment anyway. “I will not have sex with anyone else while we are trying to make a baby. I will also spend all of my time and money on you.”
She sniffles, then laughs and rises to her feet. She crosses her arms over her chest and still doesn’t look at me. She stares at the wall. “That might not be enough, Ollie.”
5
Olivia
I used to dream about the day Oliver Leonardo Cucinelli promised me all that.
In middle school, I practiced writing his name as my own over and over. Oliver and Olivia Cucinelli. Our names sounded so cute together. So meant to be. We became friends in fourth grade when I moved to Pittsburgh because we share the same birthday. Our classmates sang to both of us, but I was a new student. The teacher didn’t have a special birthday pencil, sticker, and paper crown for me.
Ollie gave me his. Our names are close enough, so he scratched out the V and R. He put in an extra L then got mad at himself. I didn’t want him to be mad on his birthday, especially not when he was being so nice to the new girl by giving me all his special birthday gifts. So, I accepted the sticker and pencil but told him to keep the crown. And that’s how Ollie was born. He seemed to like the new nickname much better than a pencil anyway.
Everyone called him that until we graduated high school. He decided it was time to mature into an actual Oliver in college, but he never gets mad when I still call him Ollie.
It’s like our little secret now.
I really prefer that over the new one.
He puts his hands on my shoulders. “What might not be enough?”
Oliver responds well to data not to tears.
“I’m almost done with my period, so there will only be a five-day window twice within the two-month timeframe we have to work with. We’ll be cutting it very close by Thanksgiving. Even if we follow all your very promising techniques, the most fertile time in a woman’s cycle only allows for a thirty percent chance of pregnancy.”
“Thirty percent is better than zero percent,” he murmurs. “I find those numbers highly suspect anyway. The human race is far too numerous for those statistics to be accurate.”
I laugh through my tears. Ollie folds me into his arms, pulling my head to rest against his chest. His muscles go from taut to lax beneath me.
He strokes my hair and whispers, “What have we got to lose, Liv?”
“Oh, I don’t know…” I bury my face against his chest and inhale his comforting scent. He smells like clean. That’s the only way to describe it. No cologne, no overpowering man soaps. Just…clean. Pure. And oh, so Ollie. “We could lose our friendship, your mother’s respect, the ability to date for a few months. I’m sure there’s more. I just can’t think of it right now.”