Page 100 of 10 Days to Ruin

It’s been hell trying not to laugh out loud the whole car ride here. Making it through the rest of this night without cackling might cost me a rib or two.

“C’mon,” I say, tugging Sasha’s arm to drag him up the stairs. “Aren’t you the one who’s always mad at me for being late?”

Inside, a wave of lavender hits me like a Sleepytime Tea grenade. Fake potted ferns flank a row of blue yoga mats. A bulletin board displays stock photos of beatific couples cradling potatoes in swaddles.

And there, at the front of the room, stands “Madame Giana”—a platinum blonde with thick magenta glasses and a Russian accent that sounds like Dracula with a head cold.

Gina doesn’t do anything halfway. God help us all.

The whole plan, as per usual, was her idea. When I’d told her about Sasha’s baby threat—because let’s be real, what else could you really call it?—her eyes had bugged out of her head.

“Does he think you’re an IVF test tube with legs? Is he even AWARE of what pregnancy does to the female body?” she’d crowed in fury.

“I’m guessing he hassomeidea. Do they teach female reproductive biology in mob boss school?”

Then she’d gotten that telltale wicked gleam in her eye. “They do now.”

From there, everything had come together easily. She borrowed studio space from a friend, went wig shopping, and watched a YouTube video on Method acting so she could “get into character.”

Which, apparently, looks like… this.

“Velcome, vvvelcome, toBreathe, Push, Repeat!” Gina trills, adjusting her wig. It lists violently to the left. “You are here for ze miracle of life,da?”

Sasha’s grip tightens on my waist. “This is your surprise?”

“Like it? Thought we’d practice for our bundle of joy.: I bat my eyelashes. “Gotta make sure you know how to handle labor pains, right?”

His left eye twitches. Good. Precisely the reaction I wanted.

Madame Giana claps to draw our attention. She’s added every single bracelet she owns, so any motion of her arms sounds like a snake made out of aluminum getting repeatedly Tasered.

“Ve begin vit pair bonding. First exercise:empathy bellies.”

Sasha’s already shaking his head. “No.”

“Oh, yes.” I shove a foam gut into his arms from the stack in the corner. The thing’s the size of a beach ball, but Sasha is scowling at it like it’s a live explosive. “Strap it on, Daddy-O.”

I practically skip to the mat. Sasha looks at the thing like it personally offended him.

Then—slowly, reluctantly, but inevitably—he starts to shrug it on.

I really might tear an abdominal muscle keeping my laughter in. The sight of big, bad Sasha Ozerov, dressed to the nines as always in a crisp black shirt and gray suit pants, with a prosthetic baby belly Velcroed to his torso… it’s just too much. I have to turn away so I don’t erupt.

The half-hour that follows is more of the same. Gina—excuse me,Madame Giana—coaches us through synchronized breathing that makes me feel like a beached whale.

She keeps up a running train of commentary in that hideous Transylvanian accent the whole time. “More pelvis integration, Mr. Ozerov! As if you are trying to pass a vatermelon! He-hoo! He-hoo! Breathe, breathe, breathe!”

Sasha’s glare could melt steel beams.

Does the session include “pelvic opening exercises” that wouldn’t be out of place on a porn set? Yes, it absolutely does. Does it involve “partner-assisted stretching” for my adductors and groin? Why, that’s in there, too!

But the true record scratch moment comes later. I’m sticky with sweat—more so from trying to contain my laughter than from the workout itself—when Gina puts on a dangerous smile that I know far too well.

“Last but not least,” she croons, “we assume the birthing position.”

“Oh,” I blurt, “that won’t be?—”

“Down!” she screeches. She plants her talons into my shoulder and shoves me to my butt on the yoga mat. Then she turns on Sasha. “And you, Mr. Ozerov… behind. There, there.” She jabs a nail at the space behind my back.

---