But she didn't laugh back. She just sat there with that serious expression she usually reserves for parent-teacher conferences and conversations about our credit-card debt. That's when it hit me. She wasn't joking.
This wasn't some weird attempt at humor. My wife, the mother of my three children, the woman who complained when I left dishes in the sink overnight, was seriously telling me she wanted to get knocked up by her boss. "Melissa," I said slowly, like I was talking to one of our kids after they'd done something spectacularly stupid. "Please tell me you're kidding."
She shook her head, and I felt something cold settle in my stomach. You know that feeling when you're on a roller coaster and you hit the big drop? That moment when your brain catches up to what's happening and realizes you're completely screwed? Yeah, that.
"His wife can't have children," she continued, like this was a perfectly normal conversation. "They've been trying for years. Vivien's had three miscarriages, and the doctors say it's not safe for her to keep trying. Charles asked me last week if I'd consider it, and I've been thinking about it ever since."
Charles. She called him Charles, not Mr. Whitmore. When had that started? And more importantly, when had my wife started having private conversations with her boss about his reproductive plans?
"Melissa, no." The words came out sharper than I intended, but hell, she had just told me she wanted to carry another man's child. I think a little sharpness was warranted. "This isn't some small favor. This isn't like watching their dog while they go on vacation."
"This will destroy us." She rolled her eyes. Actually rolled her eyes like I was being dramatic. "Grant, it's not like I'm having an affair."
"It's a medical procedure. I'm helping them have a family." "You're helping yourself have a closer relationship with your boss," I shot back because, let's be real here, Melissa had always been a little too eager to please authority figures, a little too concerned with what people thought of her. In high school, she was the girl who stayed after class to wash the chalkboards.
In college, she was the one organizing study groups for professors who probably didn't even know her name. And now, at 32, she was offering to carry her boss's baby because she thought it would make her indispensable. "That's not what this is about," she said. But her voice had that defensive edge that told me I'd hit the nail on the head.
"Charles and Vivien are good people. They deserve to have a family." "What about our family?" I asked, gesturing around our living room with its mismatched furniture and crayon marks on the walls. "What about our kids? What about us?"