Rafael Yglesias - Only Children

“Tell me he’s going to get better,” she’d say each night.

“It’s colic. It’ll go away.”

“My mother says we should let him cry,” Nina once said in a monotone.

“If we hold him, he’ll be all right,” Eric had answered. And then heard himself say, “If we let him suffer, he’ll expect nothing from the world.” The words floated up from Eric’s soul; they weren’t a creation of his brain.

“Why did this happen to us?” she sometimes asked.

“I don’t know,” he always answered.

By the sixth week, Eric feared even their stubborn will to continue to love Luke would collapse and they would crash, their marriage and their belief in life shattered.

They interviewed a few nannies, but knew, in their hearts, that no one would hold Luke for hours on end the way they did. But they did hire a cleaning woman to come twice a week and Eric knew (he had hoped otherwise) that eventually full-time child care would be necessary. Eric put all actual and potential expenses into his computer at work and looked at the last four-week take of commissions and trading in his own account. The gap between expense and income had widened. A year of this trend and they would be bankrupt.

One night, at the end of the sixth week, after Eric got the Snugli off (it had become Luke’s second skin) and succeeded in laying Luke down without startling him awake, Eric found Nina at the kitchen table, in the dark, weeping uncontrollably. It was three-forty in the morning. That day, Eric discovered he had neglected to take a four-thousand-dollar profit in options a week ago, because as the result of fatigue, he had forgotten he owned them. By the time he remembered, it was too late, the price had retreated. Eric watched Nina; she cried without pause. He was terrified by her emotional condition. Eric decided he couldn’t leave Luke alone with her. Anyway, he had become inept, even dangerous at trading.

The next morning, Eric went into Joe’s office before the market opened, and asked Joe for a leave until September and a loan to cover his expenses.

Joe had the Journal open on his desk, his bifocals at the end of his nose. Joe closed the paper when Eric finished his plea. He looked at Eric over the flat rims. “Have you considered that your son’s colic might be in your mind? Babies cry, you know. Maybe you’re being overprotective.”

“I don’t think so,” Eric said. He was used to fighting this point of view. His mother, Nina’s mother, the nannies Nina had talked to in the park, a couple of the child-care books, their pediatrician, all of them (when other suggestions had faded) had made the case that Luke’s fussing was made worse by their comforting. But Eric knew about experts — the stock market was littered with the torn scraps of their proud ideas. Consistency, riding out the run of luck against you, was the only thing that ever worked. Bulls get rich and Bears get rich and Pigs get nothing. “I’ve read that the only thing they know for sure is some babies are born with an incomplete formation of the digestive tract,” Eric told Joe, the speech tediously familiar. “In three months, they’re all right. If Luke isn’t better in another six weeks, we’ll act differently. But until then, he’s blameless. I mean, Joe, Luke can barely hold his head up. How the hell could he know to manipulate us?”

“They know!” Joe said, wagging a finger and smiling at his own wisdom. “They know how to get their hooks into their parents. They learn in the womb.”

Although Eric thought Joe’s brand of wit, with its pompous elaboration, unfunny, Eric nevertheless usually flattered Joe with a laugh. But this time, Eric stared at him. “I don’t think so, Joe. It’s just bad luck. Sure, I could blame it on Luke and run away from the responsibility. You wouldn’t do that. And you wouldn’t respect me if I did. Nina can’t handle this alone. I want to ride it out with her for the next six weeks. All these years I’ve never taken Fridays off to go to the Hamptons — I must have saved up six weeks’ worth.”

“That’s not our arrangement, Eric. You know that. I’m not your boss. This is a partnership—”

“Not exactly, Joe. Come on, be fair. You hold the seat on the exchange. I service your clients and your name is on the checks when I score for mine.”

“Neither are you a broker working for me. You get seventy-five percent commission on your clients. I give you ideas and clients and a steady income — a piece of my management free to boot. And as to not taking off Fridays, when have I taken them?”

“I know,” Eric said, bowing his head, dismayed. He had told himself not to make that point about Fridays. He rubbed his forehead and closed his eyes. He was so tired he could pass out right there — let it all go, the work, the money, the years of staying on Joe’s good side, the marriage (his once smoothly functioning, content marriage), and even Luke. Eric could just let go — fall onto the carpet and be carried off.

“This is really Nina’s responsibility,” Joe said. “I know it’s none of my business, but despite women’s lib and all that, it’s unfair of her to expect you to earn money for the family and also take on caring for your son. What you do here ”— he tapped the desk with his fingers—“ that is caring for her and your baby.”

“It’s just six weeks,” Eric said in a tired, exasperated voice that amounted to a whine. Please , oh, please. Look Joe in the face, he told himself. “After that, I’m here. There’ll be no more of the new daddy stuff.”

“Why don’t you hire a woman to help her? What about your mother, or her mother, for God’s sakes?”

“Joe, cut the crap. How about it — yes or no? It’s your choice.”

“Eric, I’m hurt by that. I don’t ask you questions as a boss. I’m trying to help. Her mother could be a great consolation to Nina now. It’s a wonderful time for mother and daughter — the birth of a grandchild. It is, anyway, if they’re Jewish.”

Eric covered his face with his hands. “Oh, God,” he said, rubbing his fingers into his tired eyes. Eric hated asking for favors because of the intimacy they allowed; they opened up the account books of your life and gave everyone the right to audit your management ability. Now Luke’s colic was due to his mixed marriage. “That’s why I need the time off,” Eric said, lowering his hands. He had rubbed his eyes so hard that Joe looked blurry. “We’re going to her parents’ summer house in Maine. They’ll be coming up and can help us.”

“Ah,” Joe said, nodding. He had talked himself into a corner with his criticisms. “Then why don’t you stay here and let them handle it?” he argued.

“Joe—”

“Visit on the weekends. Take a week—”

“I’ve been useless anyway. I’m no good like this. You don’t need me.”

“If she and the boy are away, you’ll be getting rest. Then you will be of use. Don’t ever say I don’t need you.”

“My son needs me more.” Eric’s tone was final. He challenged Joe with a stare.

Joe took off his bifocals and cleared the Journal away. He lifted the newspaper gingerly, holding its creased middle with his fingers, giving it the respect of a holy text. “How much will you need?”

“A month’s income. Seven thousand.”

“Seven? And how are you going to repay it?”

“Take it out of my commissions when I return.”

“You’re going to generate fourteen thousand in commissions in September? I don’t want you churning accounts to pay me off. That’s how you lose clients.”

“Forget about the money,” Eric said, and turned to head for the door. “I’ll get it from a bank.”