What I Thought I Knew: A Memoir by Alice Eve Cohen Read Free Book Online

concerns about overpopula—” The rest of the story is obscured by static.
    “I hope our baby isn’t the six-billionth,” I say, contemplating the terrible possibility of giving birth in the next few weeks, considering my options.
    “Yeah, I’m with you.” Michael sighs, surfing stations. He turns off the radio. We drive in silence for a while. I watch scenery fly by. The trees in Massachusetts are beginning to turn color.
    “I’m performing at that conference in Cleveland this week.”
    “When do you leave?”
    “Tomorrow morning.”
    “Tomorrow!”
    “I know, the timing is terrible.”
    “Yeah.”
    I look out the window and mope. We drive a bunch of miles.
    “Michael ...”
    “What?”
    “You’re going to have to do something besides touring.”
    “What are you talking about?”
    “If we have a baby, you can’t be on the road so much.”
    “That’s how I earn a living.”
    “I know, but I get the feeling you expect me to stay home and take care of the baby full time while you keep touring. Is that what you’re thinking?”
    “Thinking? I’m not thinking. I’m reacting. I’m dealing with the fact that you’re very pregnant and very confused about it. So I’m sorry I haven’t been planning a career change in the last two weeks, I’ve had other things on my mind.”
    “I can’t raise a baby alone, with you on tour all the time.”
    “What do you suggest I do instead?”
    “I don’t know. Something closer to home.”
    “Okay. No more touring, ever,” he says in his most sarcastic voice.
    We drive for miles in silence. The green blur of trees is punctuated with flashes of red.
    “I’ll just get an office job and sit in a chair until I die.”
    “—I’m not saying you have to get an office job.”
    “Of course you want me to get an office job. It’ll be really good for our family. Hey, my father worked at an office job he hated for forty years, and then he died. No reason I can’t do that too. It’ll be great—”
    “You don’t have to get an office job.”
    “No, of course not. Because you know exactly what job would be right for me.”
    “Stop it.”
    I turn on the radio and surf channels. All I can find is a religious station.
    “—President Clinton twice vetoed the bill, but Republicans on the Hill are preparing for a new fight and plan to reintroduce Partial Birth Abortion Ban legislation in Congress next month. Republican presidential candidate George W. Bush is proving himself a great friend to the Christian Right because of his outspoken support for the bill and his unwavering antiabortion—”
    “Ugh.” I turn off the radio. “I hope abortion isn’t illegal by Tuesday, or it’s the coat hanger for me,” I say, in an attempt at gallows humor.
    Michael doesn’t say anything. I shouldn’t have said anything about the abortion, certainly not a joke. We drive in silence. I imagine myself at home with a baby—a single mother in practice, if not marital status—Michael on the road, calling home now and then.
    “You say you really want this baby. But you can’t just say that and then go all over the country all the time.”
    “I’ll never leave our apartment again.”
    “You want complete freedom to go wherever you want, whenever you want, and that’s been great up till now. You don’t want to grow up, it’s who you are, I’ve always loved that about you. But it makes me wonder if you’ve really thought about what it means to be a father, and if you really want this, because you can’t have complete freedom and take care of a baby.”
    Michael starts to speed up. “I’m trying to support my family!”
    “I know that. If you could just find something that doesn’t take you away from us so much of—”
    “Like what? I have no idea what else to do!” His foot presses heavily on the pedal. “Tell me! Tell me! What? Obviously you know. Tell me what I have to do!”
    “I don’t know!”
    Michael is driving really fast, aggressively passing cars on