She wants me to insist that she come along anyway, Rita realizes. She’s thinking that if I were a good friend, I’d tell her that my sons won’t mind and she should join us, rather than let her be alone on a day that’s so painful for her.
Suddenly, the silence in the elevator seems strained.
Don’t start making excuses for yourself, Rita tells herself sternly. Don’t let her make you feel guilty.
The elevator has reached its destination. Stepping out into the carpeted twenty-eighth-floor corridor, Rita says, for lack of anything else, “Here we are.”
“Yes, here we are.” Nancy’s voice is chipper, but Rita can’t seem to ignore the shadow in her dark eyes.
“Oh, Mrs. Cordell! I didn’t even recognize you!”
“Hello, Abe. Hi, Jerry.” Derry stops pushing her grocery-filled metal cart to speak to the two elderly men playing checkers in the sunshine in front of the building. The Yankees game blasts from a battery-operated radio at their feet.
“Gorgeous day, isn’t it?” Jerry says.
Derry looks up at the blue sky and bright yellow sun perched above their building. “Definitely a gorgeous day,” she agrees wholeheartedly. “And it’s about time. I thought spring was never going to come.”
“Feels like we skipped spring, if you ask me. This feels like summer.” Jerry lifts his Yankees cap to wipe a trickle of sweat from his silver temple. “If this keeps up, we’ll all be complaining about the heat before summer really does come in June.”
“Especially you, Mrs. Cordell,” Abe says with a meaningful glance at her stomach. “I see that congratulations are in order.”
“Thank you.” She knows she must be beaming brighter than the May sun. This is the first weekend she’s been able to shed her jacket and parade around for all the world to see.
“When are you due?” Jerry wants to know.
With her fingertips curled to conceal their savagely chewed nails, Derry pats the rounded belly protruding beneath her sleeveless maternity blouse.
“Late September or early October,” she says, just as Rose told her to.
“Shouldn’t we wait another few minutes?” Peyton protests when Nancy announces that it’s time to get the presentation started. “I talked to Allison last night. She said she was coming.”
“Maybe she changed her mind,” Rita suggests, seated on a folding chair facing the women gathered on the velvet couch and love seat.
The new furniture was recently bestowed by Eric, Wanda’s wealthy married suburban lover. He also paid a contractor to convert the alcove off Wanda’s bedroom into a nursery, and furnished it with an Ethan Allen crib and changing table.
Wanda proudly led the group on a tour of the apartment, including the lovely terrace with a dazzling view, before settling them in the living room.
It amazes Peyton how candid she is about being a so-called kept woman. She likes Wanda, but can’t help wondering how she can live like this, let alone bring into the world a child whose father is openly married to another woman.
But then, it isn’t up to her to judge.
With a shiver, she pushes aside an image of that red leather Bible sitting in her drawer back home.
She’s told nobody about it, not Gil last week at dinner, not Allison, not even the police.
Oddly, the only person she’s been remotely tempted to confide in is Tom.
Tom Reilly, the man with whom she’s shared two coffees, lunch, and some soul-searing kisses. To her relief, her first impression of him was dead-on; he’s turned out to be charismatic and easy to talk to.
Peyton could easily allow herself to fall in love with him, if she let her guard down.
So she won’t let her guard down.
And she certainly won’t go confiding in him about the Bible she found in her desk drawer. He knows she had a prowler; she prefers to leave it at that. He’s so concerned that every time they part company, he insists on walking her to her door and making sure her apartment is empty.
At first, she thought he might be an opportunistic cad hoping she’d invite him in, but now she believes he’s really just a gentleman, and a concerned friend.
A concerned friend who has no idea that she’s carrying a child, or that she’s apparently being stalked by a shadowy religious fanatic who disapproves of her choice.
The pertinent passages were from the Book of Wisdom. They were painstakingly highlighted in yellow marker, pages paper-clipped and marked with yellow Post-it notes so she’d be sure to find them. She felt ill from the moment she read the first line, from chapter 3, verse 16: the progeny of an unlawful bed will disappear . . .
Unlawful bed? There was no bed, Peyton wanted to scream at the faceless intruder. There was a steel table, and a test tube and a syringe.
How dare somebody judge her?
How dare somebody invade her private space?
How dare somebody scare the hell out of her?
Yes. She’s scared. When she isn’t angry at the violation, she’s downright terrified. Terrified that whoever it was might find a way past the changed locks and window bars, this time with a more ominous purpose.
But who? Who would want to hurt her? Only a handful of people know about her condition. Could this possibly be somebody in her trusted circle of confidantes? Somebody who keeps up a normal facade yet harbors a secret religious extremism?
Or is it a neighbor, or somebody at the office, a passing acquaintance who guessed that she’s pregnant, knows she’s single . . . and saw fit to pass judgment?
None of it makes sense. She resents having to endure her days looking over her shoulder, and her nights lying awake listening for intruders.
Maybe she should tell somebody. The police, or even just Tom, or Allison.
Allison.
Peyton looks at her watch. Allison is now almost an hour late for the meeting.
This isn’t like her, she thinks, as worry for her friend begins to edge out anxiety over her own situation. She knows Allison well enough to realize that she’s responsible about appointments.
Or does she know Allison at all? How well does she know anybody, really?
Linden is still parked in front of the television set watching the Yankees game when Derry emerges from putting the groceries away in the kitchen. She crosses the room and ceremoniously sets a bowl of ice cream in front of her husband.
“What’s this?” He looks up in surprise.
“Chunky Monkey. I bought it at the store just now. It was on sale,” she adds, before he can tell her they can’t afford premium-brand ice cream.
“What’s the occasion?”
“No occasion. I just thought you deserved a treat, and I know it’s your favorite.”
“Yeah,” he says, grabbing the bowl and digging in. “Thanks.”
“You’re welcome.” Deciding to sit with him for a while, she arches her back, bends her knees, and gingerly lowers herself until she makes contact with the chair.
“What the hell are you doing, Derry?”
“I’m practicing. This is how I’ll have to remember to sit as I get bigger. It’s going to be pretty uncomfortable.”
Linden says nothing, just lifts another spoonful of ice cream to his mouth and stares at the television set.
Derry fights the urge to ask him, once again, when they can call his mother in Florida and tell her their news. He keeps putting her off, saying his mother is half deaf and too old to be thrilled about a first grandchild at this stage, anyway.
Having met her mother-in-law a few times and realizing she was never the most maternal person in the world, she knows he’s probably right. He’s probably trying to shield Derry from a disappointing response, knowing that her own family’s reaction was less enthusiastic than she had hoped.
In the fiercely Catholic Cavanaugh circle, babies are a dime a dozen. Derry’s oldest niece in Sacramento is expecting her second. Everybody offered congratulations, but nobody seemed particularly sympathetic to the long, hard infertility road Derry and Lin
den have traveled. And she couldn’t elaborate on the details of her nonpregnancy, so she kept the calls short and sweet.
“I saw Abe and Jerry on the street just now,” she comments, leaning back against the cushions. “They both congratulated me.”
“Yeah? That’s good.”
She struggles to keep from blurting that he’s not being very supportive.
Because the truth is, he’s being far more supportive than she ever expected. The mere fact that he’s agreed to this at all. . .
Well, she’ll be grateful to him for the rest of her life. To him, and to Rose.
“Did you tell Richie yet?”
“No. I haven’t had a chance,” he elaborates when she raises a questioning eyebrow.
“I can’t wait to tell more people. I tried calling Emily and Cara yesterday, but neither of them was home.”
“Who are—” he starts to ask, before recognition dawns. “Oh. Your friends from the restaurant.”
“Right. They’ll both be so happy for us. They know how hard it’s been.”
Not that she’s kept in touch with either of them since she lost her job. Strange how isolated you can become when you stay at home day in and out, rarely even bothering to get dressed in the morning, utterly wrapped up in nesting. Not in a bad way, necessarily. Most of the time, she doesn’t need anybody other than Linden.
But he isn’t exactly fulfilling all her emotional needs these days—and vice versa, to be fair.
Wishing things could be different, but not sure how to make that happen, Derry sits stiffly beside her husband. Her back is beginning to ache from the awkward posture.
It’s more difficult than one might expect to keep both feet on the floor. Normally, she’s prone to curling up with her feet tucked under her, or sprawling with her legs draped over the arm of the sofa.
But she has to get used to carrying herself differently, even when she and Linden are home alone. That way, she won’t slip up in public.
“Aren’t you going to take that thing off ?” he asks, glancing over a few minutes later, when the game goes into a car commercial. “It’s so freaking hot in here.”
“The A.C. is on.”
“It’s still hot. You must be dying.”
Derry scowls. “No, I’m not going to take it off. If I were pregnant, I wouldn’t be able to take it off the second I felt uncomfortable.”
“Yeah, well, in case you forgot, you’re not pregnant.”
Ignoring the cruel phrasing, Derry points out, “I have to wear this all the time. What if somebody pops in unexpectedly and sees me without it?”
Linden casts a skeptical glance at the triple row of locks on the door. “Nobody can pop in unexpectedly without buzzing first.”
“You never know.”
“Sure you do. I know. Nobody’s popping in here unless we let them in. I think you’re safe,” he says with a trace of sarcasm.
Derry props an elbow on her belly and chews a fingernail in frustration.
Linden couldn’t possibly understand. No man can.
This is her chance to experience, on some level, the miracle that can never be a reality for her. No, she can’t carry a baby in her womb, but she can wear maternity clothes and notice strangers’ glowing smiles as she waddles about her daily business. And in September, or perhaps October, she’ll have a baby in her arms, just like a real mother.
Rose promised. And this time, nothing can go wrong. This time, Derry isn’t just counting on the donor—the donor is counting on her.
According to Rose, the thirteen-year-old girl from a strict, ultrareligious family was date-raped after she snuck out to go to a party. She’s hiding the pregnancy from her parents, knowing they’ll disown her if they ever find out.
“How can she hide a pregnancy for nine months?” Derry asked Rose.
“It happens all the time,” was the woman’s disconcerting response. “Especially with kids her age and size. They just wear baggy clothes and nobody has a clue.”
“But . . . isn’t that wrong? How can you go along with something like this?” And how can I?
How can she go through with faking a pregnancy and a home delivery so that the girl’s baby can be passed off as hers? Rose told her and Linden that nobody would ever find out. There would be no adoption, no financial paperwork whatsoever, and the birth certificate would be legitimate.
“But . . . how can that be?” Derry asked incredulously, unable to accept that the plan could be as simple as it seemed.
“It happens every day, all over this country,” Rose told her. “Women give birth at home all the time. Do you think none of those babies have birth certificates?”
But . . . it’s wrong.
“Of course it’s wrong, Derry, technically. But it would be more wrong to let this distraught young girl give birth in an alley somewhere and put the baby into a garbage can. I’ve seen it happen over and over again in cases just like this one. That’s why whenever a girl in her predicament comes to me for help, I help. I do what I have to do. We all do what we have to do. This isn’t a game. There are no rules. We’re saving babies’ lives.”
Rose’s passionate discourse made it sound like Derry would be heroic to take on this challenge.
She must have said more or less the same thing to Linden when Derry asked her to explain the situation to him. She knew that if Linden heard it from her, there was a good chance he’d tell her she was out of her mind and would have nothing to do with this bizarre charade, despite the appeal of not having to pay a dime for a baby.
Derry wasn’t in the apartment when Rose spoke to her husband. She couldn’t bear to be. She knew that their marriage would be over if her husband dashed her fragile hopes just when they were on the verge of making their dreams come true.
So she left Linden and Rose alone with her parental fate in their hands. She went to the playground down the block and she sat on a swing in the rain, praying the whole time that her husband would somehow come through for her.
After all, it wouldn’t cost him anything. And it wasn’t as if he had never done anything morally ambiguous in his life. Hadn’t he wired the apartment for illegal cable? Hadn’t he rolled back the odometer on his old car so that he could sell it for more money?
But this is different, Derry told herself. This is huge.
Still, it helped to know that Linden wasn’t above cheating, under the right circumstances. Especially when he had financial motivation.
To this day, Derry has no idea what Rose said in the apartment that afternoon, only that Linden later commented that the woman could talk a cow into volunteering for the slaughterhouse.
That, Derry told him with a shudder, was not a welcome comparison.
“I don’t think Allison would change her mind about coming without calling to let us know,” Julie comments, as Peyton’s apprehension escalates by the minute.
Where on earth is Allison?
“It’s Mother’s Day,” Nancy points out. “Maybe she’s busy with her kids. She has two older ones, doesn’t she?”
“Yeah, but she said they didn’t have any special plans this afternoon,” Wanda says. “They spend Sundays with their father.”
“But it’s Mother’s Day.”
Wanda snorts. “Have you ever met Allison’s ex-husband?”
“I take it you have,” Rita says.
“No, but he’s a bastard. She’s told me enough about him. Whatever, she said she really wanted to be here today because her due date is so close, and she needs to hear all about cardinal movement and delivery empowerment. There’s a full moon this weekend and she’s afraid she’ll deliver early.”
“A full moon?” Peyton can’t help echoing. “What does that have to do with anything?”
“Rita says full moons can trigger labor.”
Peyton shoots a skeptical glance at the midwife.
To her surprise, Rita shrugs. “There’s actually some documentation of that.”
“Well, then, she probably went into la
bor.” Emanating impatience, Tisha checks her watch. “Can’t we just start without her?”
The lone newcomer at today’s meeting, Tisha is an outspoken nineteen-year-old who reeks of cigarettes and looks closer to thirty—apparently thanks to hard-living high school years. Her pregnancy, unlike the others’, is unplanned.
Given the fact that she’s fully made up in this heat and exhibiting her swollen belly between a snug cropped top and low-slung shorts, Peyton can’t help comparing her to one of those self-absorbed Hollywood starlet types you see flaunting their bellies in magazines.
Especially after listening to her complain about one symptom after another in the first fifteen minutes after they met. Just when Peyton was on the verge of informing Tisha she really didn’t want to hear any more, and that she’d be doing herself and the baby a favor if she quit smoking, the woman apologetically said, “I’m really sorry I’m unloading on you, Parker.”
Parker? Peyton opened her mouth to correct her, but Tisha went on, her voice quavering a little, “It’s just that when you’re pregnant and single, there’s nobody to talk to, really. Nobody who understands. I feel so alone.”
A wave of empathy washed away Peyton’s irritation. “I understand. We all understand. That’s why you’re here.”
Now, feeling a vague uneasiness over Allison’s unexpected absence, she finds herself annoyed with Tisha all over again.
Before she can speak up, Wanda utters the words that are on the tip of her tongue. “Tisha, if Allison went into labor, Rita would know about it. She’s going to deliver Allison’s baby.”
“Well, maybe she missed the call,” Tisha persists.
The midwife reaches into the pocket of her slacks and pulls out a cell phone. “I carry this with me wherever I go. I’m on call twenty-four-seven, just like room service at the Waldorf Astoria.”
“You’ve stayed at the Waldorf Astoria?” Tisha asks dubiously, looking the midwife over from her unfashionably thick, overgrown gray-streaked bangs to her plain white Keds.
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