by Lynn Shurr
“I look like a pumpkin,” Nell complained.
“Oh no, you don’t,” Precious swore. “Right now, you’re only up to watermelon size, girl. By the end of November, you’ll be a prize-winning pumpkin, one of those great big ones that weigh a ton. You show more ’cause you’re short. Sharlette here, she never gains an extra ounce with her babies. Me, I’m wearing all four around my hips.”
Stevie Riley, a little rattled by all the pregnancy talk, snapped a picture of the group. “Don’t worry, I can airbrush out the bellies if you want,” she assured the women.
“No use, those baby girls will just keep asking where they was when you got married. You might as well show ’em,” Precious predicted. “Ooh! We got a big present coming.”
Despite specifying “no gifts—your presence is all we ask to celebrate our happiness” on the invitations, a small tower of boxes accumulated by Nell’s feet. One present, a pair of hand-carved wood ducks—the flamboyant male and his more sensible mate—rested in a basket filled with Spanish moss. Nell, feeling like a fat nesting hen, was relieved the carvings weren’t of swans.
Now, Calvin Armitage and Asa Dobbs, carrying a wooden chest between them, set the offering at their quarterback’s feet. As they bent over to drop the burden, dowdy Rosemarie Leleux appeared from behind their bulk.
“This gift is from Granny. She says she won’t be around to see you use them all, so it’s best to give you these now.”
Joe raised the lid of the plain box, its thick reddish-brown finish patinated with scratches and nicks and perhaps, recently wiped of cobwebs. A stack of crocheted baby blankets, twelve in all, four blue, two pink, some yellow, some green, some multicolored lay inside.
“Dear God!” Nell gasped as if the chest contained a cobra. The prediction that she and Joe would have twelve children came surging back in her mind. She recovered quickly. “The blankets are so lovely. They must have taken years to make.”
“No, only since last year this time when you and Joe Dean got hitched in Las Vegas. I never saw Granny crochet with such energy as after she heard the news.”
“Please thank her for us. We’re so sorry she wasn’t well enough to attend. And do have something to eat before you go. Nadine is a wizard in the kitchen, just like your Granny is with afghans.”
“Thank you. I know Nadine’s cooking and I know I make people uneasy, but I’ll stop for awhile.”
The homely woman with the chicken-pox scarred face gave Nell a beautiful smile. She turned her stubby body toward Calvin Armitage who took a step back, something he never did, but she grasped his hand despite this move. “Hall of Fame,” she said.
Asa Dobbs thrust his palm towards the traiteur. “It’s a boy, positively,” she told him, then turned and walked off to the feast.
“Yes, Yes!” Ace pumped the air and did his celebratory duck walk back and forth in front of Sharlette and Nell. “A son at last and you were going to make me wait to find out, devil woman!”
Calvin shuddered. “That’s what the Rev said she is.” He pointed a shaking finger at the retreating broad-hipped Rosemarie. “Some kind of voodoo priestess.”
“Mais no, she’s just a traiteur, my man,” Joe Dean explained. “She does no harm.”
“I don’t give a damn!” Asa Dobbs exclaimed. “It’s a boy!”
“Twelve, Joe. There are twelve blankets.” Nell shivered even though it was eighty degrees under the oaks.
“We only got three embryos left in the freezer, Tink. Beats me.” He grinned wickedly.
Looking shaken, Nell struggled out of her chair. “Excuse me. I need to use the bathroom—again.”
Avoiding the trailer-sized portable bathrooms complete with sinks to wash up that were towed in for the guests, Nell waddled to the house and entered the dim hallway leading to the downstairs powder room. She nearly collided with Cassie who walked a tiptoeing Deanie up and down while Tommy watched from his baby seat. Deanie let go of Cassie’s hand and toddled in a headlong rush to Nell’s leg.
“Ma,” he said happily. Pointing to his brother, he announced, “bebe,” and flopped down beside Tommy. “Boo!” He puffed the word into the baby’s face. Tommy blinked his eyes and smiled.
Both Nell and Cassie beamed. They hadn’t seen each other since the baptism and Deanie made this sudden reunion easier. “I came in to pee,” Nell confided.
“See, I told you adoption went easier, but you had to have your own.”
Nell was uncertain if Cassie joked or not. “You were right about that.”
“You know when I gave you Tommy, I felt stupid for getting myself in trouble, guilty about what happened at the bus station and very scared about the future.” Cassie gazed at Nell’s baby-filled belly.
Nell’s stomach clenched. “Cassie, honey, it’s only been two months, but we love him so. Look how Tommy’s eyes have turned Billodeaux brown, just like melted dark chocolate. Deanie loves him, too, don’t you, Deanie?”
“Bubba,” Deanie said and blew another boo into the baby’s face.
Nell went on a bit desperately, “Truly, I wasn’t sure I was pregnant when you came to us and I could tell Joe wanted to make a home for Tommy. He’d have a dozen if we could, but you know that won’t be possible.”
“For most people, Dean and the twin girls would be plenty.” Cassie picked up her son and tucked him under her chin. Their red-gold hair matched perfectly where Cassie’s natural color had grown out. Still, she seemed more likely to be the baby’s sitter than his mother in her short black skirt and snug emerald top, only a slight slackness of belly betraying what the teen had endured.
“You should be outside dancing and having a good time, Cassie. Let me find someone else to mind the babies.”
“I’d rather stay here. People say things to me like how brave and generous I am to give up my baby. I was only dumb and scared.” She held Tommy so tightly he began to cry.
“You’ll always be a part of his life, Cassie. We promised.”
Talk about scared. If Cassie chose to leave with the baby, she’d hardly be able to stop the taller girl whose figure had matured with her pregnancy. With the clang of pans in the kitchen and the blare of music from the band outside, Nell doubted if anyone would hear her call for help if it came to that.
“I got a letter from Mexico. Bijou said he’s sorry, that gambling is a sickness with him. He told me how to find him and said I could bring the kid along if I wanted. It’s cheap to live down there. He has a job training horses.”
“Cassie, please…”
“You know what Nell? I’m not that dumb and I never want to be that guilty or that scared again. I did the right thing giving you my baby.”
Joe stepped out of the shadow of the stairwell. Deanie saw him first and got to his feet from a three-point stance on the floor. The boy tottered forward. “Dada!” Joe swung his son up on his shoulders where Deanie proceeded to muss a very expensive haircut.
“I wondered how long it took for someone as tiny as you to pee, Tink. Heck, you only went an hour an ago. LeJeune Pommier says we should come cut the cakes because he isn’t sure how long the football-shaped one will stay up on the sugar tee in this heat. Some joker is vandalizing his other masterpiece by sticking plastic Mardi Gras babies in all the airbrushed grapes. You should see, two of them have little pink bows glued to their heads and someone put a daub of orange nail polish on the top of another so he looks like Tommy here. Can you believe, there are twelve in all. I tell you, the Sinners are the quickest team in the league to exploit a weakness.”
“Go to your daddy, Tommy.” Cassie held out her baby and Joe tucked him under his arm in a football carry.
“Yes, let’s all go see—after I pee,” and Nell breathed out as easily as possible with two unborn babies pressing against her diaphragm.
The sun set. The party wound down as families with small children went home. Lizzie’s kids gave the exhausted ponies good rubdowns and extra feed in the barn. The rental people arrived with their truck and its
crew deflated the castle-shaped jumper and the puffed-up radar frog. They broke the rock wall into pieces and placed it on a trailer. In the barbecue pavilion, Calvin and Ace danced with their wives to a slow nostalgic tune. Under the white tent, Nadine could be heard bossing the staff and dictating the disposition of the leftovers.
Nell watched from the balcony off her bedroom. She’d gone upstairs to rest and exchange her wedding gown for an airy white cotton dress that didn’t make her look any smaller but did feel good against the skin.
Joe, Rev and Mintay, Connor and Stevie sat at a table and chairs purloined from the wedding tent and repositioned near the bank of the bayou where they watched a yellow autumn moon rise over the tall cane on the opposite bank. The grounds of the ranch had been thoroughly sprayed for mosquitoes, but it wouldn’t be long before migrant insects across the river got their scent and forced the couples to retreat to the screened pavilion or the house. Until that time came, they enjoyed the night and the peeping of the tree frogs.
Nell went to join them. She took the chair waiting for her and swung her legs into Joe Dean’s lap. He removed her slippers and began massaging her feet. She gave an orgasmic sigh.
“If I had a cold ginger ale in my hand right now, my life would be complete.”
“Here, take what’s left of mine.” Mintay handed Nell a half-full aluminum can and sipped on her own drink from a plastic cup.
Connor nudged Stevie with an elbow as a signal he was ready to needle his friend. He poured himself more wine from a bottle they shared, put his arm around his tall blonde wife and said, “Football’s greatest lover, Joe Dean Billodeaux, reduced to rubbing a lady’s feet.”
“Let me give you some advice, mon ami, rub a woman’s feet and they will do anything for you.”
“I think I already have,” Nell said.
“And just last summer on a night like this, you told me wishing wouldn’t make things so. Since then, I’ve married you twice and given you a family of four children. These slackers are barely getting started.”
“I wouldn’t say that, my man.” The Rev smoothed his wife’s gown over the small, rounded belly its folds hid. “Lookit, only two months along and already showing. I think we havin’ twins, too.”
“You weren’t supposed to say until next month after the ultrasound, Rev,” Mintay protested.
“I can’t stand when a Cajun boy goes smug on me. No harm done, my love. I’m callin’ Connor and Riley for my twin names. Joe Dean, you think of something else for yours. One of mine is bound to be a boy and Riley will do for either, I figure.”
“No worries. Since Nell, here, won’t let me name the girls Revelationana, or T-Mintay, we’re going with Jude Emily and Ann Marie. The Ann is for Nell’s mama, Marie for her saint. Then, Jude for a saint and Emily for Nell’s unsaintly sister. You and Stevie planning on a family, Con?”
“We’ll get busy when I’m through playing. I want to be home with my family, and frankly, the thought of four kids in one year is kind of scary.”
“You got that right,” Stevie agreed.
“Hey, it took a lot of work to make these wishes come true.” Joe Dean rubbed a hand over Nell’s belly and felt one of his daughters respond to his touch with a small punch.
“Mintay would say modern science made these two. My mama would claim it was her novena. I’d say St. Jude gave me the wife I needed and my two boys. Whatever, wishes don’t come true without some serious work and perseverance. That reminds me, I hope you guys are ready for another Super Bowl because I been praying.”
Connor and the Rev groaned.
Nell, her face looking pale and fey in the moonlight, asked softly, “Do you really think there will be twelve children, Joe?”
“Mais yeah, Tink. Madame Leleux has already knit their blankets. They’ll come, this way, that way, all ways, because you and me are forever—sugar.”
THIRTY-FIVE
Nell sat on the upper gallery waiting for Joe. She’d persuaded Corazon to move the wicker loveseat from the bedroom onto the porch. The stout young woman had done so without any help from her employer. Corazon Romero was a gem as the girl’s aunt, Anita Pommier, had promised. Corazon deftly switched a tray with a toasted cheese sandwich and a cup of bland, canned chicken soup for two sleepy baby boys tucked under Nell’s arms.
Fat and plain, the possessor of thick eyebrows and a light mustache, Corazon was good-natured, industrious and devout. Nell heard her singing to Deanie as she put him down for a nap. Her sweet, sad voice seemed to say that having failed to find a husband in Mexico by the time she turned thirty, she did not expect to have children of her own. Nell had no idea what the Spanish words really meant. Yes, Corazon was a find—one that Joe Dean would have no interest in as a woman.
Silly me, Nell thought as she tucked the copy of the trice read Goodnight Moon under a pillow and took a bite of her sandwich. Her pregnant condition caused these jealous feelings. As Precious Armitage predicted, her belly had reached Great Pumpkin size while her actual stomach compressed to half its normal capacity because of all the room the twins took up. She no longer had an appetite and even insipid foods gave her heartburn.
Her obstetrician banned normal sex way back in October by saying it was best for the babies to stay inside as long as she could hold them. She’d done all she could to keep Joe happy and he had done the same for her. But by this first week in December, the only urge left was to get the birth over with soon. Three more weeks to go. Nell sighed and sipped her soup. And no sex for six weeks after that. Poor Joe. Poor Joe like hell, he could find willing women wherever he went. Her hormones raged again, double damn it!
In November, she’d been assigned to bed rest after a scary encounter with early contractions. Allowed to come downstairs for Thanksgiving, she nibbled on what small portions her stomach could hold while Nadine and her own mother fussed over her and Joe coaxed her to eat a little more. What she wanted most right now was to see Joe to drive through that gate, bound upstairs—and rub her feet. Maybe, just maybe, she would fall asleep on this balmy December day with Joe holding her exactly so, taking the weight of the babies off her insides. She hadn’t slept really well since Joe left for the game last Friday afternoon.
She should have told him not to drive to Lorena Ranch today. The Sinners won their game on Sunday, but she knew enough about football to understand three turnovers and victory by a field goal were not acceptable to Coach Marty Buck. This morning, the team would be watching endless film on their errors. Tomorrow, Joe would throw the ball over and over to their rookie wide receiver, Dawson Hunt, who had been responsible for two fumbles, until the pigskin stuck to the new guy’s hands like French Quarter Roman taffy. Then, the Rev and his gang would try to strip the ball from the kid until Dawson got it right. Maybe, the Sinners should have kept Jared Forte despite his problems with Joe. Regardless, Nell acknowledged being needy enough to ask her husband to add a six-hour round trip drive to his schedule. He intended to come home anyhow, he claimed.
Three days from home was too long to be away right now, Joe Dean figured as he sped along the highway watching for the exit to Chapelle. He had talked Nell into this pregnancy. He’d prayed and gotten twins just as he wanted. St. Jude must be a joker, though, to throw in three months without sex to make this little miracle happen, a small test of Billodeaux marital constancy. He could do this. Hell, last season, he had gone without for six months. Still, he’d never considered there might be no sex inside of marriage. He’d hang in there no matter how cute the temptresses on the road might be—and offer up his pain. If he had to drive three hours to make Nell happy after being chewed out by an irate coach, he could do that, too.
Nell heard the noise of an engine and pushed herself up awkwardly to listen. No, that wasn’t the smooth sound of Joe’s Porsche. A well-kept older model of a Ford truck with a gun rack holding two hunting rifles mounted in its cab came down the lane. Knox Polk, the retired army sergeant who had taken over the management of the ranch since Bijou’s fl
ight, sat behind the wheel. Sergeant Knox oversaw any of Joe’s nieces and nephews who wanted to earn some cash by working for him. Joe had learned the folly of giving free rein to relatives, Nell thought, almost sorry his childlike trust in kin had been destroyed.
Knox waved to Nell as he passed. He continued on to the barn. A few minutes later, she could see Knox leading Fatima toward the paddock where she could crop the grass without being too far from her stall. Fatty’s belly sagged earthward making the small mare look like a lumpy stuffed toy. She was full of L.B. ’s foal and nearing her due date, too. All in all the horse seemed to be handling the discomfort better than her owner.
Another vehicle approached the gate, its engine as loud as a Mack truck. Nell couldn’t see who was driving through the trees. Either Knox or Corazon had buzzed the noisy vehicle through to the ranch road. As soon as she saw the bright red paint with the frieze of cactus blossoms, her heart flamed into jealousy. Norma Jean Scruggs had arrived.
The driver laid on the horn belting out a bar of Deep in the Heart of Texas and brought the big rig with its matching horse trailer to a smooth stop alongside of the house. Nell tried to push up again from her nest in the cushioned wicker but couldn’t find the best grip for the maneuver. She called out for Corazon. The maid came from a side door and marched gesturing and chattering in Spanish at Norma Jean, who emerged with a clatter of high-heeled boots from her impressive motor home.
“Pardone me mucho,” Norma Jean apologized, evidently speaking the lingo.
Corazon, mollified, fluffed the white uniform she thought proper to wear and flapped her red bib apron bordered in yellow rickrack she always placed over it. Then, she graciously invited that brazen woman into Nell’s home. Knox, standing straight and tall in the barn door, shoved back his grubby white Stetson on his grizzled hair and watched with amazement and perhaps, appreciation as Norma Jean’s long legs, clad in tight denim, carried her toward the kitchen door.
