Won't Go Slowly

Part 9

"He what?" Danielle uttered in disbelief, her eyes widening as she very slowly set the glass of wine in her hand back down on the coffee table, and you just nodded.

"Oh yeah," you said, taking a sip of your own wine.
Danielle's eyes were searching all over the place, like she was trying to comprehend this information. "That's –"
"Insane?" you finished, "Oh, I know."

Danielle was still looking at you, not saying anything, and you sighed, leaning back against the couch. "Like, he never, ever thinks before he speaks," you continued, "Like, who the hell just hears someone wants to have a baby and then just goes, 'well, here, have some of my sperm!'"

You were being ridiculous in your intimidation, you knew that, but it felt kind of good to laugh at the whole ridiculousness of the situation.
"He said it like that?" Danielle asked.

"No, no, of course not," you said.
"Well, what did he say exactly?"

"He..." you started, recalling the conversation, "he asked if I considered asking someone I knew."
"Did you?" Danielle asked.

"No," you said immediately. That wasn't how it was supposed to work, quite honestly. You'd done your homework, you'd gone to the clinics, and this was how it was supposed to happen. You were supposed to select one of these case numbers, one of these fine gentlemen who had already decided to donate their sperm, who'd already done it in fact, and it was all just waiting for you.

"I'm not just asking someone for their sperm," you said, quite definitely. Could you even imagine just going up to your co-worker one day and being like, hey Bob, can I have some of your sperm? Yeah, no.

"Right, of course not," Danielle agreed. You were pulling your hair back, sinking back further into the couch when your phone rang. You leaned forward, looking at the name on the screen.

"Speak of the devil," you murmured, bringing it to your ear to answer it. Before you could even get a "hello" out though, all you could hear was pounding music, and you remember that Tyler was supposed to be at a concert tonight. At first you thought he'd pocket dialed you, but you could definately hear him murmuring something into the phone, though you had absolutely no hope of making it out.

"Tyler!" you yelled. You could hear him continue to say something vaguely, but it was just the tone of his voice overshadowed by pounding music. "Tyler, I can't hear you!"

It continued for a minute more, and then he hung up, you assumed, and the line went silent.
"What was that?" Danielle asked, and you just shrugged. "Have you talked to him since...?"

You shook your head 'no', but it hadn't even been 24 hours.
"Well, what happened after?" she asked.

"We just wanted a movie," you said, as you had, ordering dinner and turning on Netflix, and then he'd taken the dogs home.

Now, though, you were doing pretty much the same thing, watching Netflix with Danielle and catching up on your show. It wasn't under the second episode was about halfway through that your phone rang again. Tyler.

"Hello?" you answered tentatively this time, but it was pretty quiet, actually. And you could hear what sounded like wind, or something.

"Hey," he said, and you could tell right away, just from the sound of his voice that he'd been drinking.
"Tyler, where are you?"

"Walking home," he answered, "Where are you?"
"I'm at home," you said. You looked quickly at Danielle and gave her a signal to let her know you'd be back in a moment and could keep the show going.

"Can you come over?"
"I'm - Danielle's here," you said.

"Oh," he said, and then asked, "are you guys talking about me?"
"No," you said convincingly. Because you had been, but you weren't anymore.