Free Fashionably Late by Olivia Goldsmith Page A

going to be now?” he asked, and the bitterness in his voice made her wince. “Hot wine enemas?
    Coca-Cola douches? Oh, Karen.”
    She tried to smile. “Well, the good news is, we don’t have to try anything. The bad news is, that’s because nothing will work.”
    The little vertical wrinkle he got between his eyebrows, the only noticeable age sign on his tanned and handsome face, appeared. He ran his hand through his thick salt-and-pepper hair. His eyes, such a beautiful, clear light blue, clouded over. “I’m so sorry,” he said.
    He reached across the glossy tabletop and took her hand. “I’m so sorry,” he repeated. Then he looked down at his plate and they both sat there for several moments in silence.
    While they’d been going through this process, they’d long ago made a Real Deal on it: if either Karen couldn’t conceive, or if Jeffrey’s sperm was weak, they wouldn’t try in vitro or donor insemination. Both of them agreed that it was immoral, not to mention painful and humiliating, to spend that kind of money and effort to make their own genetic product when the world was filled with unwanted babies. Now, looking at Jeffrey’s bowed head, knowing it was her fault that they couldn’t have a child, she wondered if he regretted the deal.
    “Are you still hungry?” she finally asked him.
    “Only for you,” he said. And, taking her hand, he walked her away from the table, across the gleaming, empty floor, and down the hall to their bedroom. The light in there was dim and the bedţa simple Shaker pencil-postţ was made up in her favorite Frette sheets. Jeffrey drew her to it. He stopped and wrapped his arms around her. Then he nuzzled her neck and began whispering, his voice husky.
    “Oh, baby, it will be all right. Look at the up side: no more thermometers, no more calendars, no turkey basters, no more wasted sperm samples.” He kissed her on the nape of her neck and she felt a shiver run down her back. “All my sperm for you, now,” he told her.
    His arms were so long, and they felt so good wrapped around her. He was a big man, and one of the things she had loved about him was how he managed to make her feel small. She leaned her body into his. “I love you, you know,” he told her.
    “Prove your love,” Karen said, and they fell onto the bed, hungry for one another.
    Afterward, as she lay in his arms, the beautiful sheets rucked up and wrinkled around her, she turned to look at his profile. It was perfect, and if she cast it in gold it would pass for the head of an emperor on a Roman coin. Karen ran her hand along Jeffrey’s sternum and down the thin, soft line of hair that ran from his chest over his stomach to his groin. It was so sweet. He was so sweet.
    “I was thinking of looking for my mother,” she murmured.
    He turned over, ready to go to sleep. “Didn’t you have enough of her tonight?” he asked.
    “No, I mean my real mother.”
    He was silent for a few minutes. Karen almost thought he had fallen asleep. “What for?” he said. And she heard him sigh.
    “I don’t know. I just feel like I want to.”
    He turned over again, this time on his back so he could see her. “Why open a new can of worms?” he asked. “Don’t we have enough to deal with at the moment?” He put his left arm out so she could lie against his side. She felt comforted by his warmth.
    “Jeffrey, you honestly don’t mind? About the baby, I mean.”
    He hugged her closer. “Karen, I think I gave up a long time ago.
    We’re so lucky already. Why should we have everything? It would only tempt the gods.”
    “Don’t be superstitious,” she told him, though she was herself.
    “Anyway, we can have everything. I’m going to call Sid tomorrow and get him working on an adoption. I was talking to Joyce and she said they have a very good contact in Texas.”
    Jeffrey rolled onto his side, away from her, and cradled his head in the crook of his elbow. “What are you talking about?” he asked.
    “A