Happy Birthday: A Novel

“Destiny seems to have decided otherwise,” Jim said as he stood up, and went to sit in the chair at his own desk, only a few feet from Mike’s. He was the paper’s leading art critic, and like Mike, he had a number of gallery show critiques to write. He often invited Mike to go to openings of art shows with him, and whenever he could, Mike took Jim along when he went to check out a new restaurant to review. He was sorry he hadn’t taken Jim with him the first time he went to April in New York. If he had, none of this would have happened. “I think you ought to give this some very serious thought,” Jim said carefully. “This could turn out to be the best thing that ever happened to you. There’s nothing more miraculous in life than having a child.”

“Whose side are you on?” Mike asked, looking irritated as he tried to concentrate on his computer screen again and ignore everything that Jim had said.

“I’m on your side,” Jim said quietly. “Maybe this happened for a reason,” he said cryptically. “God moves in mysterious ways,” he added smugly as Mike almost snarled in response.

“This has nothing to do with God. It has to do with two very drunk supposed adults, who had way too much wine and got into a hell of a mess of their own making,” Mike said, willing to take responsibility for the mistake and the dubious behavior, but not the child.

“Don’t be so sure,” Jim said, and then concentrated on his own computer screen, and for the rest of the afternoon, neither of them said another word.* * *

April didn’t hear from Mike for the next three weeks, and didn’t expect to. She told Ellen that it wouldn’t surprise her at all if she never heard from him again. He so much didn’t want the baby that his solution to the problem might be complete denial, of her and the child. She was startled in fact when the week before Christmas he called her on her cell phone. It was midmorning, and she was getting ready for the lunch crowd. They were booked solid straight through the holidays for the next four weeks. She had even decided to keep the restaurant open on Christmas Day and New Year’s, for their regulars, who wanted a place to go.

“April?” He sounded somber and tense when she answered.

“Hi. How’ve you been, Mike?” She tried to keep it light. He sounded so unhappy.

“I’ve been fine.” He sounded busy. “I’m sorry to call you with news like this. But I was just turning in a story, and all hell is breaking loose here. I thought you’d want to know. It’ll be on the news in a few minutes, and I wanted to give you a heads-up. There’s a hostage situation going on at the network where your mother works. They think it’s been taken over by half a dozen men. No one seems to know yet how it happened, or who they are. The screens have gone blank over there, and your mother was on air when they did.” She did a morning show several times a week, and an evening show. April glanced at her watch as he said it, and realized that he was right. She was right in the middle of the morning show.

“Is she okay? Did something happen to her?” April sounded panicked, and he felt sorry for her. He had realized during his dinner with her how close she and her family were, even if it was hard for him to understand.

“I don’t know. The screens just went blank. I think they’re holding two floors, and the building is full of SWAT teams on other floors. They haven’t moved in on the hostage-takers yet. And they’ve managed to keep it off the news for the last half-hour, but the story’s about to break. I didn’t want you to see it on TV.” He sounded sympathetic and worried about her.

“Thanks, Mike,” she said, fighting back tears. “What am I going to do? Do you think I can go over there?”

“They won’t let you near it. Stay put. I’ll call you if I hear anything. Turn on your TV. I think the story’s coming on now.”

“Thank you,” she whispered, and hung up, panicked by what was happening to her mother. She turned on the TV in the kitchen immediately, and the report was alarming. Six armed gunmen had taken over the network building an hour before. It was hard to believe they could pull it off, but they had. Once they took their first hostages, they kept gathering more, on two floors of the building. The report said that they were heavily armed with machine guns and automatic weapons, were of unknown nationality and origin and could have been from the Middle East or even American terrorists, and they had sealed two floors of the building. All the hostages were being held on those floors and no one had dared to try to free them yet for fear that the hostages would be killed. The broadcaster mentioned which floors were being held, and April realized instantly that one of them was the floor where her mother did her show. Her show had gone dark right after the introduction, as had several others. There were a number of studios on those two floors.