I roll my eyes and shake my head. This interview has officially gone in the shitter.

“What is your favorite holiday?”

“Fart.”

“Gavin,” I warn.

“What’s your favorite animal?”

“Sheep, ‘cuz they’re stupid,” Gavin answers with a laugh.

“What’s your favorite smell?”

Oh that’s a super question to ask a four-year-old who just said his favorite holiday is passing gas.

“Smelly cat. And feet,” Gavin says with a giggle.

“What’s your favorite song?” Lisa continues.

Please don’t say “99 Problems But the Bitch Ain’t One” or I will smother Carter in his sleep for downloading that to his iPod.

“SMELLY CAT, SMELLY CAT, WHAT ARE THEY FEEDING YOU!” Gavin sings as loud as he can.

“How do you even know that song?” I ask him.

Gavin replies with a shrug.

“You like to say big people words a lot. How come?” Lisa asks.

“'Cuz I like it. 'Cuz I’m a man.”

“I’ve heard you like to talk about your wiener a lot. Why do you do that?”

‘Cuz it’s stupid. I crapped my pants.”

Gavin laughs out loud at himself.

“Excuse me? You know you aren’t supposed to say that word,” I scold.

“I can’t say the s-h-p word either. What the heck am I ‘sposed to say?” Gavin asks with a roll of his eyes.

This is what I have to deal with. Am I supposed to correct him when he spells “shit” wrong? Why the f**k hasn’t anyone printed a parenting handbook yet?

“What’s your favorite thing to do?”

“Fart in everyone’s face,” Gavin says in between giggles. “FART!”

“You sure like to say ‘fart’ a lot,” Lisa says with a laugh.

“’Cuz I like saying it forever, punk!”

I put my elbow on the table and my head in my hand. There is no point in even trying to put a stop to this train wreck.

“What do you like better, cookies or girls?” Lisa questions.

“My mommy makes yummy cookies. Girls are stupid. Except for Mommy ‘cuz she has boobs,” Gavin replies earnestly.

“Gee, thanks, sweetie,” I mumble as I lift my head and glance at Lisa to see if she looks as horrified as I feel.

“When you grow up, who do you want to marry?”

Obviously, the fact that any chance at a Pulitzer for this interview is long gone doesn’t matter one iota to this woman.

Gavin gets up on his knees on the bench seat and places a loud, wet kiss to my cheek.

“I want to marry Mommy. We’ll kiss and we’ll marry and I’ll take her on dates and we’ll be best friends forever and make lots of phone calls with each other.”

No, no, no, no. Just...no.

“Phone calls? Do you mean you’ll call your mommy a lot when you’re older?” Lisa questions.

Don’t do it. For the love of God, don’t do it.

“No, we’ll make phone calls like Mommy and Daddy do when they go into their bedroom and lock the door and yell and make weird noises,” Gavin replies.

17. Midget and Donkey Shows

“When asked if he enjoyed preschool, the precocious four-year-old asked me if I was the police. When I told him that no, I was not the police, he informed me that I should go to jail and called me a ‘dicky punk’.”

Carter laughs as he reads the magazine interview aloud. Lisa had sent me an email copy of the interview right after she finished it so I could look it over, but seeing it in print in one of my absolute favorite magazines that I have read cover to cover for years and only dreamed about one day being in makes me feel a little sick to my stomach.

“How can you laugh about this? This isn’t funny.”

“Gavin is quite obviously fond of both of his parents. When asked what his favorite thing about his father was he replied, ‘He tucks me in at night and tells me that if I eat my green beans my wiener will grow big and strong just like his,’” Carter reads with a laugh.

“I’m buying that kid a Porsche. He just told all of America that I have a big, strong penis.”

I shake my head at him and get up to dump the rest of my now cold coffee into the sink and rinse out my cup. My morning coffee, which usually brings me close to orgasm and gives me the strength to make it through the day, leaves me feeling queasy. I’ve only been able to stomach two sips of it. I'm guessing that the combination of seeing my name in print in my most beloved food magazine and listening to Carter read back to me the embarrassment of that day three weeks ago is the culprit for my upset stomach.

“Claire, this interview is awesome. She raves about how amazing you are by making your dreams come true and how absolutely delicious everything you make is. This is going to drum up so much business for the store. You should be proud,” Carter tells me. “Although, I really think we need to sit down and talk about this p**n comment. I get that you’re uncomfortable about it, but you don’t need to be with me. I like porn. I like to watch porn. I would especially like to watch p**n with you,” he states as he set the magazine down on the kitchen table, stands up, and walks over to me.

He rests his hands on the counter on either side of me, caging me in. He presses his body up against my back and places a kiss to my shoulder. I sigh, memories of the last time we stood like this in the kitchen flooding my mind. Even having my mother walk in on us doesn’t diminish the hotness that is kitchen sex.

“What’s really going on in that head of yours?” Carter asks as he rests his chin on my shoulder and we stare out of the little window above the sink. I watch Gavin in the front yard, sitting on the walkway right in front of the porch drawing with sidewalk chalk. “I can tell something has been on your mind, so what gives?”

Just tell him. Tell him that all of a sudden after Liz and Jim’s wedding, all you can think about is donning a white dress, standing in front of everyone you know, and committing the rest of your life to this man.

“Ever since the wedding you’ve been on edge. Don’t worry, I have no intention of dragging you to the altar if that’s what you’re worried about,” Carter says with a laugh.

I close my eyes and let my head fall forward. I should have never made those little comments all these months about how I'm not sure about the whole idea of marriage. How the hell am I supposed to know I’d change my mind?

“It’s nothing, really,” I reassure him, turning in his arms and putting on a happy face I don’t really feel. I place my hands on his cheeks and pull his face to mine, kissing him with all of the love I feel bubbling in side of me. Carter moans softly and wraps his arms around me, holding me tight.

The front door opens and closes, and we end the kiss that's sure to heat up if we don’t stop. No matter what we have going on in our minds, no matter what kind of struggles we are dealing with, nothing can change the spark between us or how much we want and need each other. That is one thing I'm absolutely positive of. Right now, that is the only thing I am sure of.

“I love you,” I tell him, staring into his gorgeous blue eyes and trying to push my worries to the back of my mind. “I’m just out of sorts. Liz has been crazy busy since she got back from her honeymoon. We haven’t had a lot of time to talk and I miss her. And I just haven’t been feeling well.”

Carter puts his hand to my forehead as Gavin comes running into the room.

“You do look a little flushed. Are you coming down with something?” he asks, pressing the back of his hand to one of my cheeks.

“I’m sure it’s nothing. Just stress,” I reassure him.

“Hey, Dad, guess what my favorite word is?” Gavin asks as he stands next to us, bouncing back and forth excitedly from one foot to the other.

“I don’t know, what’s your favorite word?” Carter asks as we separate from our embrace, and I go back to rinsing out my coffee cup and the other couple of dishes in the sink.

“Nutjob. Nutjob is my favorite word.”

“Of course it is,” Carter states with a sigh as he lifts Gavin into his arms and starts walking across the kitchen, no doubt to once again explain to him the difference between little people words and big people words. I know it’s wrong to staple something to someone’s head, but I am two seconds away from writing this rule down on a piece of paper and smacking it to Gavin’s head with the black Swingline that's on our computer desk. And just that quickly, I feel like crying for even thinking about doing that to my son. I'm obviously having issues.

“I’ll give Jim a call and see if they have any plans tonight. I think you just need a night out to take your mind off of everything,” Carter tells me as I watch him walk out of the room giving Gavin a few tickles and blowing a zerbert on his cheek.

He’s probably right. I just need a night out with friends, particularly my best friend. Liz and I haven’t had any alone time since she’s been home. She has told me more than once to just say the word and she’ll drop everything so we can sit down and talk, but I feel bad about imposing on her. She's a newlywed with her own business to worry about. I don’t want to bring her down with my insecurities. If I don’t talk to someone, though, I'm going to explode. I can feel it.

Or maybe throw up. I suddenly have an image in my mind of a person literally being blown to bits with blood and gore and body parts splattering against a wall. With my hand to my mouth I race to the bathroom to throw up the small amount of coffee I consumed.

~

“Seriously, Claire? How is it that we’ve been friends all these months and I didn’t know that you’ve never been to one?” Jenny asks with a shocked expression on her face.

“What are we discussing here, ladies? Donkey shows? Midget and donkey shows? Ping pong shooting vaginas in Tijuana?” Drew asks as he gets back from the bathroom and takes his seat at the table.

Carter calls everyone earlier in the day and demands they clear their schedules for a night out. It really isn’t too hard to convince anyone to do this, but I still appreciate the fact that he's organized it for me and knows how much I need it. We are just finishing up dinner at Lorenzo’s, our favorite local pizza place that's famous for not only good food but cheap draft beers. My stomach still isn’t feeling one hundred percent better after that morning so while everyone around me enjoys their drafts, I stick to 7 Up in the hopes of settling things down.

“Claire has never been to a sex toy shop,” Jenny informs him.

“Wait, I’m confused. Liz owns a sex toy shop, and it’s right next door to Claire’s,” Drew tells her, turning his attention on me. “Dude, you’ve never walked over to the shop that’s connected to yours? That’s a little weird.”

“Of course I’ve been to Liz’s store. I’ve just never been to any other store. And I don’t really think her store counts since it’s not like it’s full of sex toys right out in front,” I explain.

“True. My store is like a mullet. Business in the front, party in the back,” Liz states.

“Or like anal,” Drew says with a laugh.

Everyone stares at him.

“What? It’s totally like anal. Business in the front, party in the back. Hello? Why is that not funny?”

Jenny pats his arm for comfort and we all resume our discussion.

“If you guys will remember, I never even owned a vibrator until Liz conned me into doing one of her at-home parties,” I remind them.

“Ahhhh yes, the infamous dinner where we talked about your va**na and sex toys all night long,” Jim says with a laugh.

That night still goes down in history as one of the most mortifying nights of my life. It had been the night after I saw Carter again for the first time since our one-night-stand. I walked into Liz and Jim’s house, talking nonsense about my va**na and how I’d never had an orgasm with another human being when I turned around and saw Carter and Drew sitting on the couch listening to every word. Jim met them earlier in the day and unbeknownst to Liz or I, invited them over for dinner. The rest of the night had been spent discussing how many sex toys I received at the party earlier that evening and the fact I only had sex one and a half times in my life.

“Anyway,” I say with a glare to Jim, bringing the conversation back around. “No, I’ve never been inside a real, live sex toy store.”

Drew pushes his chair back and stands up, placing his hands on his hips.

“Grab your keys, folks. We’re going to pop Claire’s toy store cherry!”

Everyone pays their bills and Liz announces to the guys that the girls need some alone time. The men all pile into Drew’s car and Jenny and I get into Liz’s car to head to the Adult Mart a few towns over.

“Okay, spill it bitch. What’s going on with you?” Liz asks as she pulls out of the parking lot and follows Drew’s car.

That’s all it takes for the dam to break. I immediately start crying.

God dammit, what the f**k is wrong with me?

Jenny leans forward from the back seat and hands me a kleenex. I take it and blow my nose, taking deep breaths to calm myself down.

“I don’t think Carter wants to marry me,” I say between sniffles.

“Whoa, wait a minute. Did he say that to you? I will kick his f**king ass,” Liz threatens as she turns on her blinker and gets onto the ramp for the highway.

“No! No, he didn’t say those exact words. It’s just little things that have happened the past few weeks,” I tell her.