Mommy Man by Jerry Mahoney

a relief to see that Kristen’s previous surrogacy had also been for a gay couple. I’d always wondered how our surrogate would cope with explaining the gayby in her belly. She’d constantly be answering questions, defending herself to homophobic family members and clergypeople. Having our kid meant opting into the world of homophobia Drew and I took for granted. As she wrote in her application, though, her previous pregnancy was a breeze. Everyone supported her, even her church. She welcomed the prospect of creating another gay family.
    Best of all, Kristen’s lady parts were at the top of their game. Her uterus was easier to get into than the University of Phoenix. All of her children had been conceived without much effort, carried full term, and delivered healthy. Her surrogate twins were born at thirty-seven weeks, impressive for a multiple birth. She was the perfect baby incubator.
    She was the Womb of Steel.
    Maxwell set up an appointment for us to meet Kristin on February 1. It was the five-year anniversary of the day Drew and I first met. It was kismet. We were building the perfect fairy tale to tell our future kid. We read Kristen’s application about ten thousand times, memorized every bit of trivia. We would have killed on Kristen Lander Jeopardy.
    “This was Kristen’s course of study in college before dropping out.”
    “What is sign language?”
    “This is the only medical condition Kristen checked ‘Yes’ to.”
    “What is hemorrhoids? Teehee!”
    Maxwell asked us if we’d selected an egg donor yet.
    “No.”
    “Oh.” He sounded concerned. “You should do that before you meet with the surrogate.”
    “We were told we’d have plenty of time to do that after we met the surrogate.”
    “Oh no,” he said. “Who told you that?”
    “S’mantha.”
    “Who? Nobody by that name works here.”

7
    The Wounded Bird
    I ’d never given much thought to what my ideal woman would be. It had always been kind of a moot point. As I sat down at my computer to search the Rainbow Extensions egg donor database, I was confronted with a page full of check boxes. Hair color, eye color, height, weight, hobbies. All I had to do was map out Ms. Right and hit “Enter.” I wouldn’t even have to worry if she was out of my league. I could click on any picture and be confident that the stranger I was looking at would willingly entwine her DNA with mine. It was a straight guy’s fantasy—and my worst nightmare.
    Drew wanted nothing to do with it, so I offered to weed through the contenders and compile a short list. I hovered over my mouse. She should probably be tall, just to balance out my Smurf-like stature, should I be the sperm donor. She should be smart, happy, and fun. Her essay questions should be free of obvious grammatical and spelling errors. (No child of mine was going to inherit a disrespect for the language!) And I figured she should be at least kind of somewhat moderately physically appealing.
    Of course, I had no idea what that meant. I’d spent my entire adolescence wondering what made women attractive, why certain ones made the cover of Vogue while others ladled Salisbury steak onto my Styrofoam lunch tray at school. The worst question one of my guy friends could ask me growing up was, “You think she’s hot?” I knew the wrong answer would be tantamount to confessing, “No, but you are.” But as hard as I tried, I couldn’t tell what separated Chrissy from Janet—or, hell, even from Mrs. Roper. Betty versus Veronica, Ginger versus Mary Ann, Nancy Reagan versus Barbara Bush. I just didn’t have a horse in the race, and it was so hard to pretend otherwise. It was such a relief when Julia Roberts came packaged with the title “Pretty Woman.” It was like having the teacher’s edition to the “You think she’s hot?” textbook. “I’ll tell you who’s hot!” I could say with confidence. “That chick who played Tinkerbell in Hook !” High five!
    It’s not that I don’t appreciate