Oh, Baby!

by Judy Baer

  “You were right, Molly. God’s timing is different than ours but He’s working for us all the time.”

  God’s timing. He’s working fast on the doula center, that’s for sure. I’d notified a few doulas of the potential opportunity at Bradshaw and it had taken off like wildfire. The board had agreed to provide a room, rent free, for three months so we could test the idea. Doula Central was going to happen whether I was involved or not. There were enough volunteers eager to help get the place up and running, work on the doula directory and promote the concept so that, had I wanted, I could have sat in the background eating bonbons.

  Instead, I sat on the couch half listening to Hugh, Lissy and Tony babble about all the good news in their lives. My brother is going to be a husband; my best friend, a wife; and Tony, an uncle. And me? If I look at the trend, I’m going to be a lonesome old maid with a pig, a dog and a hundred children that aren’t my own.

  “This is such amazing news!” Lissy burbled. “Molly, have you got any food in the refrigerator? We need to have a party.”

  “There are almonds, peanut butter, celery, mayonnaise, bread and cheddar cheese. Help yourself, make a cake.”

  Lissy ignored my snide comment and pulled a bucket of ice cream out of the freezer. “So much has happened that I can hardly take it all in!”

  “There’s more,” Tony said, “if you’d quit chattering so I can get a word in edgewise.”

  Lissy stopped dishing ice cream; Hugh closed his mouth and I watched Tony expectantly.

  “I’m going back to college.”

  Of all the things he could have said, that was the last I’d expected.

  “Why?” Hugh asked. “You’ve got a great job, a new promotion and everything a fellow works to achieve.”

  Tony sat down at the kitchen table and thrummed his fingers on the top. “I’m not quitting my job. Not now, at least.”

  “What brought this on?” I asked suspiciously.

  “Remember that bet we made and the date I went on?”

  “The woman in the library stacks?”

  “She’s a college professor. She talked me into taking a night class on Shakespeare. I might take an English literature class, too. Since I’m charge nurse now, I have a defined schedule and I know I can fit it in.”

  “With a little help from the professor?” Lissy inquired slyly.

  “She’s a friend,” Tony corrected her but looked far too happy about it for that status to last long.

  “What about Wanda? You’re going to break her heart.”

  “I don’t think so. She’s interested in someone else.” Tony looked smug. Too smug.

  “It must be someone outside the hospital,” Lissy commented. “Everyone there is wise to Wanda.”

  “I introduced her to someone, and she took to him like a duck to water.”

  “Where’d you find this lucky guy?” I asked. It takes a lot of manliness and diplomacy to handle Wanda.

  “At the Cassidy bash.”

  “One of our relatives?” Hugh blurted. “But who…”

  “Your brother Liam asked me if I was interested in selling my bike. I’d been thinking of upgrading to something with a little more power so I told him he was welcome to look at it and shoot me an offer. He met me at the hospital after work yesterday to check it out and…”

  “… Wanda spied him and claimed him for her own,” Lissy finished the sentence.

  “She thinks his red hair is cute.” Tony rubbed his hands together with naughty glee. “She really fell for him and has decided to put all her energy in Liam’s direction. Apparently, I’m off her list entirely. She feels I’m ‘elusive and distant.’”

  Hugh and I stared at each other, wide smiles spreading across our faces. Liam and Wanda? This was better than any prank either of us could have thought to play on our brother. Besides, it might do Liam some good to meet a woman who is tough-minded like my mother and his sisters, someone who won’t give up on him too easily.

  Serves him right, too. He’s been relentless in teasing Hugh about that tree incident. Liam needs something else to think about.

  Heh, heh, heh.

  Chapter Twenty-Nine

  The silence has been deafening from the Reynolds camp.

  I understand, but I still unrealistically harbor a faint hope that Noah might be permitted to call me. Tomorrow is his birthday, after all. I’d like nothing better than to watch him open his packages—especially the ant farm.

  Maybe I’ll just pull the covers over my head and go back to sleep.

  I might have, too, if Hildy and Geranium hadn’t been standing in the doorway of the bedroom staring at me.

  “Quit looking at me,” I mumbled. “Go away. I enjoy being depressed.”

  They didn’t budge.

  I threw a pillow over my head but Hildy jumped onto the bed and nosed it away.

  “Can’t anyone leave me alone?”

  Not only was I being tormented by my dog and my pig, Lissy, Tony and several of my siblings had called to check up on me. None of them bought in to the message I’d left on my answering machine.

  “Hi, this is Molly. I’m unavailable right now. I’ve heard rumors that Doula Day has Oscar potential and I’m out buying a dress. Don’t call me, I’ll call you.”

  I should have just said “leave me alone” since subtleties are rarely acknowledged in my family.

  I need time to work through the roller coaster of emotions that have flooded my system lately. Doula Day, though not Oscar material, pleased everyone involved. Everyone but Clay, that is. It only deepened the chasm between us, as has Doula Central, which blossomed in front of Clay’s eyes with him having no graceful way to stop it. The first women and doulas would be matched soon.

  Hugh, Lissy and Tony are a little too euphoric for me most of the time, and the rest of the family is just plain annoying.

  “Okay, Molly,” I told myself. “Quit pouting and get up. Clay and Noah are history. Deal with it.”

  I rolled out of bed, and my feet hit the floor just as the telephone rang. I almost let the answering machine pick up, but impulsively I reached for the receiver. “Hello, I’m fine, thanks,” I said, hoping to beat whoever it was to the punch. “I’m busy right now but…”

  “Molly?” a small voice said. “It’s me, Noah.”

  “Hi, Noah. I didn’t expect it to be you.”

  “You sound weird,” he said bluntly.

  “Thanks. You aren’t the first to say that. What can I do for you?”

  “Are you coming to my birthday party?”

  “I don’t think so, buddy, I…”

  “Daddy said your invitation came back ’cause we had your address wrong on the envelope and he thought it was probably too late now but—” he took a deep breath “—you can come, can’t you?”

  That’s clever, I thought. Clay likely wrote the wrong address on the envelope in order to keep me away. That’s illegal. Maybe I could report him for tampering with the U.S. Mail.

  “Thanks, sweetie, but…”

  “Please?”

  Hard-hearted as I wanted to be, I couldn’t resist the tremulous voice on the other end of the line. It isn’t Noah’s fault his father is impossible.

  He caught my hesitation. “It’s at our house tomorrow. It starts at two o’clock. Dad says ‘be there or be square.’”

  Now I wonder where he’d heard that. Surely his father wasn’t quoting me—or was he?

  It took me all morning to look appropriately casual for my first meeting with Clay since the board had gone over his head to make the Doula Center happen. By the time I’d settled on black pants, white shirt and a cinnamon-colored jacket that echoed the color of my hair, it was nearly one o’clock. I studied myself in the mirror, pirouetting, looking for obvious defects. None visible. Apparently the only holes and snags were in my heart.

  I picked out Clay’s home the moment I turned onto his street. Two-story, traditional, classy, expensive and pristine. The yard looked like an ad for a garden
shop. His constrained black Mercedes was parked in the driveway. Only a small blue ball and a yellow plastic bat abandoned on the lawn hinted that a child resided within. I hoped that sushi wasn’t on Noah’s birthday menu.

  There were several cars already parked along the street, Mercedeses, BMWs, one Porsche and a Jaguar. And here I am, a VW kind of girl.

  If it weren’t for the memory of Noah’s small voice on the phone yesterday, I might not have walked up the sidewalk and rung the bell. I clutched Noah’s gift, a set of face and body paints to use in the bathtub and a crazy Dr. Seuss–type hat I’d knitted with him in mind. I wasn’t quite sure if I’d chosen the paints more for Noah’s own enjoyment or the idea that it might drive his meticulous father crazy.

  Lord, what’s gotten into me? Forgive me for being petty, and give me grace for this occasion.

  Then the door flung open and Noah erupted out of the house and flung himself at my legs. “You came! You came!”

  “I couldn’t miss your birthday, now, could I? Not a special guy like you.” My heart warmed at the small, delighted face. The difficult decision had been the right decision after all.

  Only then did I notice an older gentleman standing in the doorway behind Noah. He was a round, pleasant man with a faint air of Santa Claus about him. “You must be Molly. Noah’s talked about you nonstop. The rest of his guests are getting a complex. Please come in.”

  I warmed to the man immediately; his affable charm was irresistible.

  Noah took my hand to lead me toward the festivities, but the older gentleman put his hand on my arm. “Sometimes storm clouds hide the sun,” he said cryptically. Then he winked and walked away.

  Maybe Clay’s family was as loony as mine after all.

  The kitchen and attached family room were full of people, mostly grown-ups. Noah pointed through the patio doors to the outside where the play yard sat in all its glory. “My dad got it for me.”

  “Excellent.”

  He crooked his finger so that I would lean down to let him whisper in my ear. “Come to my room later to see my ant farm. It’s not a puppy, but maybe next year.”

  Ah, yes, hope deferred.

  The older gentleman appeared again at my side, this time with a crystal goblet full of strawberry punch.

  “My grandson seems to be hiding somewhere. Don’t worry, he’ll come around. This is always a difficult day for him.”

  Grandson?

  “Excuse me, but I’m afraid I don’t know your name even though you seem to know mine.” I stuck out my hand. “Nice to meet you…”

  “Everett. Everett Bradshaw.” He twinkled at me genially. “And you are the famous Molly Cassidy, the doula who put Bradshaw Medical on the map.”

  “Dr. Bradshaw!” I felt my throat constrict. “The Dr. Bradshaw?”

  “One of the many.” He chuckled. “My family is swarming with them, actually.” He crooked his finger much like Noah had and beckoned me deeper into the room. “There’s someone here who is anxious to see you.”

  I followed him feeling numb, like Alice must have felt when she stumbled into Wonderland.

  I drew to a halt when I saw who it was who’d been waiting for me to arrive.

  “Mattie? What are you doing here?”

  The delightful woman from the nursing home, Hildy’s favorite and mine, was ensconced in a richly padded leather recliner. She had an afghan over her legs and her hands folded serenely in her lap. “Hello, Molly, so good to see you. I don’t suppose you brought Hildy with you?”

  All I could do was dumbly shake my head.

  “I didn’t realize for a long time that you knew my great-nephew Clay,” Mattie continued. “Noah kept talking about this wonderful ‘Molly’ but I didn’t make the connection until recently.”

  Nephew? Clay? Mattie B. Olson. Mattie Bradshaw Olson!

  This was the aunt that Noah went to visit? The aunt who’d taught Clay how to shop?

  “I had no idea.”

  “My great-nephew is too closemouthed for his own good. He wasn’t always that way, of course, but after Katherine…”

  I must have looked like a blank slate because Mattie frowned. “You do know about Katherine, don’t you?”

  At that moment Emily Hancock walked into my line of vision. She was carrying her baby in her arms.

  “I don’t think she knows, Mattie. You know how Clay is. He clams up just about the time he should be talking.”

  Mattie gave a snort of disapproval. “Where is that boy’s head? He’s got to quit living his life in fear and old memories.” She waved a hand in my direction. “Tell the poor girl what we’re talking about.”

  “Emily,” I began, “why…”

  “Charles has been friends with both Clay and Everett as long as any of us can remember. Everett is responsible for bringing my husband onto the board.”

  No wonder she dared to talk back to Clay when no one else did.

  “There’s a lot more to Clay’s story than he admits. It’s time he began to talk about his past, Molly. You’ve been a victim of it without even realizing it.”

  A victim of what?

  “Clay’s wife, Katherine, died in childbirth when Noah was born.”

  I closed my eyes as a wave of sorrow flooded through me. Overprotective of his patients, fanatical about protocol, no distractions during delivery, the birthing room is no place for a crowd.

  So Clay’s motivation isn’t to ruin me. It is to prevent what happened to him from ever happening again. Everett had said that today was always a difficult day for Clay. Not only is it his son’s birthday, it marks the greatest loss of his life.

  Mattie patted the seat of the chair next to hers. “Sit down before you fall down, dear.”

  I did as I was told.

  Emily continued to fill me in on the mystery that was Clay.

  “He wasn’t the attending physician, of course. And Katherine’s death was due to an aneurysm which none of them knew about. It wasn’t connected to the pregnancy and could have happened at any time, but because it happened just after delivery…”

  “They are forever connected in his mind,” Mattie concluded.

  Poor, poor Clay. My heart ached for him. And for Noah. “I had no idea.”

  “Of course you didn’t. Clay never speaks of it.” Mattie’s eyes grew sad. “But he lives his life trying to make up for her unexpected death. He blames himself for not seeing what was happening to her. He thinks that if he hadn’t gotten swept up in the activity in the birthing room, he might have noticed something that might have saved her.”

  “But how could he?”

  “He couldn’t, of course. He knows very well that aneurysms can happen without warning. That still doesn’t prevent him from attempting to control everything during every birth he is a part of. He’s leading with his heart on these issues, Molly, not his logical mind.”

  Chapter Thirty

  “This is the first ‘real’ party that Noah has ever had,” Emily said. “Clay has always insisted that Noah’s birthday be celebrated in a restaurant.”

  “Nothing too cozy or homey,” Mattie added sadly. “It needed to be somewhere that kept the memories at bay.”

  “I had no idea.”

  “We’re a family of Christians,” Mattie said. “It’s been hard to see Clay struggle with his faith. I’d like to thank you, Molly, for showing him that faith and adversity can cohabit.”

  “I don’t understand.”

  “After Katherine died, Clay decided… Maybe you’d better have him tell you.”

  I turned to see what Mattie was looking at. Clay filled the doorway looking tired but not unhappy. He strode across the floor and took my hand. “I’m glad you came. I told Noah I didn’t think you would.”

  “It’s hard to keep a good woman down.”

  “You are definitely a good woman, Molly.”

  He tipped his head toward a door on the far side of the room. “Come.”

  I trailed him into his study, which is dark and woody, w
ith a fireplace flanked by leather wing-backed chairs. The shelves were filled with books, the spines marching in a perfect row. Clay didn’t take chances with anything, even his bookshelves.

  He pointed toward a chair. “Sit.”

  “Is this a business meeting?”

  “You could call it that.” He opened his hands and splayed his fingers in a gesture of acquiescence. “Now you know the truth about me. You deserve honesty. I’ve resisted you at every turn without ever allowing you to know why. You took the brunt of my frustration. It wasn’t fair, Molly, and I’m sorry.”

  His voice faltered. “It’s been a difficult few years for me, but you, with your energy and perseverance, made me see that life is not just about trying to ‘fix’ the past but also about improving the future. I’ll tell you whatever you need to know about me. I want you to understand where I’ve come from. You warrant that much. Ask me anything.”

  The great Dr. Clay Bradshaw Reynolds was giving me carte blanche into his life and only one question came to my mind.

  “Did you keep your promise? About the faith thing, I mean.”

  He shook his head as if utterly baffled. “You are something else, Molly. I’m not sure what, but definitely something else.”

  “It’s important to me, Clay.”

  “Let’s just say God and I are in discussion. I’m beginning to see things that I couldn’t have six months ago. Then I didn’t think it did me any good to believe. Katherine was gone. I had a child without a mother and the profession I loved now only reminded me of what I’d lost.”

  He shifted in his chair. “At least, that’s what I thought until you came along.”

  “I don’t understand.”

  “I’ve never experienced an opponent quite like you before, Molly. Stubborn and opinionated as I can be about my position on birthing-room protocol, you’re even more so. I set out to change how births are done at Bradshaw, not knowing what a persistent foe I’d find in you. Frankly, I was as difficult as I could be in the hospital because I wanted to scare you off.”