Chapter 14: Less Human Than a Bookcase

[pascal_curious]

 

 

The only noise around the Beaker dinner table was the sound of silverware on china. It was a seemingly pleasant family scene like any you might see on a 1950’s TV sitcom. The son, Nervous, was absorbed in inhaling his potatoes while his father, Loki, picked through his piece of salmon, inspecting it for any tiny bones that might have evaded detection during the cooking process. The ever diligent wife and mother, Circe, pushed her green beans around on her plate, deep in thought about what she should prepare for the next evening’s meal.

 

Or not.

 

Circe glanced at her adopted son. He was shoveling mass quantities of potatoes into his gaping mouth, detritus flying everywhere. Adopted, she thought. Not really hers. She desperately wanted a child that was truly hers; hers and Loki’s. Loki, her husband, she mused. The love of her life. It was only natural to want to have a child with the one you loved, wasn’t it?
 

 

Circe wished she had someone she could confide in. She couldn’t talk to Nervous about anything, dim as he was.   In any case, Nervous was angry with her. He was only interested in telling her that she shouldn’t have Vidcund Curious over to visit so often. People were talking, he had said, and he had been very clear about what they were saying. She sighed as she thought of Vidcund.  Vidcund has always been a comfort to her, but it wouldn’t seem right to discuss with Vidcund her desire to have a child with Loki; especially when she knew that Vidcund still harbored feelings for her. She derived some sort of pleasure out of the idea that Vidcund still wanted her. It just made it difficult for her to be friends with him.

 

Circe knew she couldn’t bring up the subject with Loki. She knew what that would lead to.

 

Circe looked down at the beans on her plate. They were more gray than green. She had overcooked them again.

 

All around her, Circe was reminded of what a wonderful life she had with Loki. She had a husband that she loved fiercely. It didn’t matter to her that that love manifested itself in moments of either mad passion or unbridled rage. (That made it more exciting.) Add to that a career that was blossoming, a beautiful home filled with lovely things, 2 gorgeous cars, piles of money in the bank, and her adopted son. (Adopted, she thought again derisively.) She had everything a woman could want. Well, almost everything.

 

If she could just have that one thing, she thought, her life would be perfect.

 

Perfect.

 

“I want to have a baby,” she suddenly blurted.

 

Loki dropped his fork and it clattered onto his plate. Nervous choked on the piece of salmon he had been about to swallow.

 

“Are you okay?” she asked Nervous.

 

“Bone,” he sputtered as he pointed to his throat.

 

“Damn it, Circe,” Loki growled as he picked up his fork. “We have been through this a hundred times. Why do you have to keep bringing it up? I thought we came to a decision last time?”

 

Circe could feel her blood pressure rising already. Nervous shifted uneasily in his chair.

 

“We never come to a decision, Loki Beaker. You come to a decision and to Hell with what I want,” raged Circe. “You said before we got married that you wanted to have children!”

 

“Yes I did. And we have one.” Loki gestured toward Nervous with his fork.

 

“Nervous was seven years old when we got him. Don’t you understand that I want a baby? I want a child that is ours, a union of our genetic material, a life born of our love for each other. I thought you, of all people, would understand that. Think how blessed our child would be. He would be intelligent and have everything you and I didn’t have growing up. We can give a child so much!”

 

Nervous got up and scraped his unfinished dinner in to the disposal. He hated it when they had this discussion. It made him feel as though he was
just something they had picked up at the Mega-Mart, like a cheap bookcase or a bit of dust collecting bri-a-brac. It was a wonder he was able to remember that he was indeed human. He decided it was best to get away before it got worse.

 

“What a bunch of sentimental crap,” Loki responded.

 

“It’s not sentimental crap,” Circe shouted. “It is important to me. It has always been important to me, but for some reason you don’t seem give a damn about what is important to me!”

 

“I don’t give a damn?” he asked with disbelief. “Who is the one who put you through medical school? Who is the one who bought this house and the car you drive? Who buys the food you manage to ruin every evening for dinner?” Loki pointed at Nervous who was sneaking across the kitchen toward the living room. “Who is the one who agreed to adopt him just because you felt sorry for him. Dammit, everything I do is for you, Circe.”

 

Exasperated, Loki got up from the dinner table and turned his back on her. He walked toward the living room where Nervous was doing his best to be invisible.
 

 

“Don’t turn your back on me!” Circe shouted as she followed him out of the kitchen. 

 

“I‘m only being practical, Circe,” Loki said, exerting the extra force of will it required to remain calm and have a reasonable discussion. “What about your career? Do you think you will be able to pick up right where you left off after taking a few years off to raise a baby? What about your dream to become a doctor? Are you going to give up on that?”

 

 

Ah, phase one of the argument, she thought.  It was just as she had predicted. This was an easy enough argument to counter.

 

“I can still work and be a mother, Loki. This isn’t the 1950’s.”

 

“The fact remains that we can’t afford to give up your income,” Loki persisted. “Even if you decide to still work you will still want time off to be with an infant. Even if it is only a year we will have to give up a lot of things. We will have to sell one of the cars, maybe dip into our retirement. Do you have any idea how much it costs to raise a child and then put him through college? How do you plan on paying for that?”

 

Phase two; word for word exactly the same argument he had made last time. This time she was prepared.

 

Nervous cleared his throat. As usual, no one seemed to notice him or his lack of a college education

“That’s a load of BS and you know it!” Circe bellowed. “You know that we can live very comfortably on your salary alone. You are the one who doesn’t what to have to give up any of his stuff. That is all that is important to you; image and stuff”

 

Loki gave up on being calm and reasonable. 

 

“This discussion is over!” he yelled as he stormed into his work room.

 

Hah, she thought. It was his favorite coup de grâce. Storm out of the room, ensuring that you have the last word and thus win the argument. 

 

“That’s it, Loki!” she yelled after him. “Storm off to your secret laboratory so you can come up with some more cruel experiments to try on the only child we do have! Admit it, you bastard, you didn’t want a son when we got Nervous. You didn’t give a damn about him. You just wanted a guinea pig!”

 

Circe threw her hands in the air in defeat and skulked off to the kitchen to clean up the dinner dishes. She knew the worst was yet to come. Loki would ignore her for a few days and spend nights in his Lab. Even once he started talking to her again, he would refuse to make love to her for a few weeks, convinced that she would sabotage her birth control to get what she wanted. She slumped into a dining chair and held her head in her hands, not sure if she had the energy to cry.

 

Nervous, who had been watching over the back of the sofa, got up to slink to his bedroom in the basement. He stopped half way there and thought for a moment. 

 

“You could always ask him to stop,” he said impassively.

 

Circe looked at him, her eyes rimmed with tears.

 

“Oh, God,” she sobbed and she buried her face in her hands.

 

 

Nervous turned his back on his adoptive mother and left the room, knowing she had no idea what he was talking about.

Comments

[pascal-curious.livejournal.com]

Of course you can add me!

I was hoping I got that across about Circe and Nervous. I had a lot of trouble trying to make this chapter get the point across that I wanted to.