“So, what’s the answer?” Teddy asked. “How do you get a baby without the expense and hassle of sperm donors and in vitro, if you won’t do relationships?”
“The problem is not that men aren’t willing to knock a girl up,” Kat said. “The problem is either they don’t want the responsibility and thus aren’t willing to take the chance of a girl trying to tie him down with a baby, or they do want to knock you up, but they also want you barefoot and pregnant in the kitchen, making them sandwiches and fetching them beer and slippers.”
“That’s sexist and untrue,” Autumn said.
“Sort of,” Zoe said. “I think it’s more that they want a trophy wife. They want the respectable appearance of a wife and two-point-five kids without having to give up boinking their secretary and playing golf with their idiot buddies.”
“We are a cynical bunch of biddies,” Teddy said, cackling. “This is a shitty and cynical conversation.”
“Yes, yes it is,” I agreed. “But I can’t say I don’t agree with Zoe and Kat.” I apparently have finished yet another margarita, and Laurel is pouring me more. I feel it loosening my tongue even further, but it’s my fortieth birthday and fuck it, right? “You know what we need? A billionaire.”
Teddy snorts a laugh into her glass. “A billionaire?”
“Yeah, we need a billionaire. Not one to share, we each need one.” I dip another chip into salsa. “Jesus, someone take the chips and salsa away from me. I’m pathologically incapable of not eating them if they’re in front of me, no matter how full I am.”
“Explain,” Kat said, taking me at my word and moving the chips and salsa to the other end of the table.
I dip my finger in the salt on my glass rim, lick it off my finger. “Okay, so…I’m wasted, so this may be the dumbest thing I’ve ever said. But—but! Think about it: if you give him a contract saying you’re not interested in locking him down with a baby, a billionaire is perfect. A young one, mind you, not one of those crusty old guys who made his billions the slow hard way. I’m talking the hot young ones who got rich suddenly. He wouldn’t be intimidated by the fact that we’re successful and have a shitload of our own money, right? That’s point number one—young guys are usually either gold diggers or scared of us because we’re more successful than them, and the older ones are usually boring and can’t keep up with our flabbergasting sexual prowess, and just want us to settle down and be arm candy or baby machines. I’m not looking for either, right? I want a sexy guy with a big dick and a nice body who can make conversation and doesn’t want my money and doesn’t want to settle down with me; he doesn’t have to be, like, actually a billionaire, just someone better off than me so I know he's not looking for a sugar mama. And I want said unicorn man to put a baby inside me the fun way and then get the fuck out of my life. I mean, you read these romance books, and they make it seem like hot young billionaires are a dime a dozen. Throw a stick and you hit six of ‘em. So how hard can it be? You just have to find one. They’re out there, dammit.”
We’re all laughing, and none louder than me.
“We could put an ad in the paper!” Laurel said, gesturing with her hand to place imaginary blocks of words in the air. “Beautiful successful single woman, forty, seeks attractive male billionaire to knock her up. No strings. Financial validation required. Serious inquiries only.”
“YES!” Kat shouted. “Let’s do it! Oh my god, it’s so great. You know how many men would line up to answer that ad? We could spend a calendar year on our backs getting plowed by sexy rich guys before we ever even go off birth control! Laurel, you’re a motherfucking genius!”
“That’s not exactly what I meant,” I said. “But…the idea does have merit. It wouldn’t be a scam if you’re not trying to get money out of them. It’s just a way to weed out the too old and too young.”
“And plus, you can vet their genes,” Autumn said, getting into the spirit of things. “You can select the perfect father that way—it doesn’t have to be just financial validation. You could request medical history to make sure they don’t have, like heart disease or club feet in their family.”
“Clubfeet?” Zoe turned on her sister. “What the hell is wrong with you? Jesus, woman.”
“If he’s hot, that’s all the vetting I need,” I said. “I mean, unless you’re talking someone adopted, how frequently do you have just one person in the family who’s all hot and sexy and everyone else is hit up with the ugly stick? Not often, I’d say. If he’s hot, chances are he’s got good genes.”
“It just goes to my point,” I said. “It’s a foolproof plan. Billionaires, I’m telling you. Have hot sex, get a baby, and then shoo the guy away with a signed contract saying I don’t want a dime from him.”
“What if he doesn’t want to leave his offspring just wandering around?” Zoe asked.
“Then he wouldn’t answer the ad,” Kat responded for me. “If you don’t want to leave a baby lying around somewhere, you don’t go knocking up desperate forty-year-old single women.”
“I’m not desperate,” I said, turning on her. “Are you desperate?”
“No, but I’m not the one talking about putting an ad in the newspaper so I get knocked up without risking getting into a relationship.”
“I’m not scared of getting into a relationship,” I protested, “I just don’t want one.”
“You are too scared of relationships,” Teddy said.
“No, I’m not,” I insisted, a little too vehemently. “I just want—”
“What you want is a baby,” Kat said. “You just can’t admit it.”
“Why the hell would I want a baby?” I snapped. “Responsibility. Time away from work. A whole human dependent on me. A human who is helpless and can’t eat or sleep or shit without me. I’m not ready for that! Why would I want that?”
“I don’t know,” Kat said, “why would you? You bought it up. You just suggested an ad for a billionaire to impregnate you.”
“I didn’t bring it up, Teddy did!” I pointed at Teddy.
“I did not bring this up! It was her!” Teddy in turn pointed at Laurel. “She started it with her fun fucking and adventure sex bullshit.”
Laurel rolled her eyes. “And what does the fact that I enjoy a good vigorous pounding in challenging positions have to do with you biddies suddenly wanting to be mothers? Or having a quote-unquote meaningful relationship?” She shook her head. “I just want to be fucked into oblivion, not saddled with a barfing, screaming shit-machine that never sleeps and needs me literally every ten seconds for the next eighteen years. Or a baby.”
“I mean, we all want to be fucked into oblivion,” Zoe said. “Who doesn’t? Waking up with a sore hoo-ha, walking into work bowlegged, having to think really hard to remember if you had four or five orgasms…yes please. Having to fend off the hot but dumb ass-bag who did said vigorous pounding because he thinks you suddenly want him to fuck you like that every day and wants you to call him daddy and is already shopping for a ring because he’s never had a pussy like this? Yeah, no.”