Pierce’s emotional withdrawal from her continued like the slow amputation of a limb. If their paths crossed during her frequent visits to the youth building to monitor the renovation’s progress, he might ask if she was okay, but he never seemed to look directly at her. At times, she was reduced to email to keep him updated, or simply to know if she should expect him home for dinner.
Rather than reading in bed like he used to, he stayed in the family room—supposedly working—until well after she’d fallen asleep.
On several mornings, she’d found him on the floor. She didn’t ask for an explanation, just to see if he’d offer one. So far he hadn’t.
He wasn’t cruel. He wasn’t angry. He was simply … absent. How could she reach him?
She heard Pierce’s car pull up out front and then his key turn in the front door’s lock.
“Laurie?”
Sweet baby, that’s your daddy’s voice.
“Honey? Can you come to the door?”
She hurried to him. “What is it?”
He turned, pointing to the box. “I found it on the porch. UPS.”
“If they knocked or rang the doorbell, I didn’t hear them. But I’ve been expecting this.” She ignored his puzzled look. “Will you bring it back to the nursery?”
He lifted the huge, awkward package and motioned with his chin for her to proceed. “What is it?” he asked.
“It’s for the baby.” She hoped he would follow her and entered the nursery first. “I figured if we opened it in here, we wouldn’t have to fit it through the door after it’s assembled.”
He stood in the doorway and scanned the room. She’d painted the top two-thirds of every wall the same sky hue as their bedroom, the lower sections a soft brown, like freshly tilled earth.
“I found a great wallpaper border. It’s over two feet tall, if you can believe it. It’s a continual farm scene. Barnyard, animals, a silo. If we put it where the colors meet, it’ll be great, don’t you think? There are even little grass sections we can place at random.”
He cleared his throat. “Should you have painted? I thought the fumes were bad for both of you.”
She smiled at him. “I’m well past the first trimester. Julie Matthews helped me. The windows are big, so we opened them and kept fans going. We did it this morning. It’s already dry.”
She had paint under her nails, and specks still dotted her hair. “Would you help me open the box?” Her voice shook.
His mouth tightened and he cleared his throat. He pulled a pocketknife from his front pocket. “What is it?”
“A crib.” She held her breath when his hand stilled. She had always wanted to make this memory with him—assembling their baby’s crib. “Ina Hood sent it. She used it for her own children. I’m sure it’s a cherished family heirloom, but she wanted us to have it.”
“You called her?”
“Your parents did. I think they called everybody.” She paused. “She’s happy for us, Pierce. Everybody is.”
Panic scampered across his face.
“Pierce, please? Don’t eat and leave tonight. Do this with me.”
She watched him debate.
“It’s exciting! It’s what we always dreamed together.”
Then, he looked at her as he used to, as if she were the answer to every question he had.
He lifted out the first piece of the blond, antique crib and laid it on the floor. “Guess we should put it together.”
Laurie laughed. “I guess so.”
To Laurie’s amazement, the clear fragrance of a fragile, unspoken truce hung in the nursery air.
They laughed together more than once as they worked to construct the crib without instructions. While Pierce attached the casters, Laurie ladled vegetable soup into two bowls. With cracker crumbs on their hands, they picnicked on the floor and decided to place the bed near the door. The opposite wall’s trio of tall windows obviously needed shelves on both sides and a window seat with storage underneath.
“Laurie, you’re really making this room nice.”
“Thanks. It’s important to me.”
“You’ll make a great mom.”
She looked at her beloved, threw her arms around him, and burst into tears.
With tentative, gentle hands he patted her shoulders and hair. “Shh.”
She clung to him, starved for his company, his voice, his touch. She wiped her eyes with the back of a hand and burrowed against him to whisper against his neck. “Thank you.”
“For what?”
“For sharing this with me. I feel like we’ve drifted apart lately. And we’ve hardly talked about the baby.” She felt him swallow. “Will you do something for me? For us?”
“If … if I can.”
“Will you lie down with me tonight like we used to? I’m not asking for anything else. Just, please don’t go to the couch. Let me go to sleep with you beside me.”
He kissed her temple, then the top of her head. “Sure.”
***
For the first time in many weeks, he wasn’t sneaking into bed after Laurie fell asleep. Rather, Pierce fully intended to fall asleep pressed against his sweet wife’s back.
Her tentative hand crept over her hip and twined his fingers with hers. He actually relaxed and drifted into a deep, sound sleep.
Mama sat in her chair on the tilted porch. She had clear, blue eyes and brown, wavy hair that matched his own. The sun shone down, and she smiled at him as she brushed his hair out of his eyes.
Then he saw Mama in her nightgown. The way it hung over her body, grazing the top of her small, tanned feet. How she draped her hand over the side of her bed, resting it on him when he slept on the rug. He heard her soft voice, with its quiet southern drawl, calling his name as he wrote in the dirt with a stick.
Next, he was standing with his ear pressed to the door of Mama’s room. Mama was crying on the other side. He peered through the keyhole.
Then he stood on the bus steps. “Mama’s gone.” Daddy grabbed him by the shoulders and shook him. “You hear? Your mama’s gone.”
Pierce woke before dawn, facedown on the floor. As he rose, the familiar anguish rushed over him like a tidal wave, and it nearly drowned him.
As his eyes adjusted to the darkness, he clicked off the pre-set alarm clock. Laurie slept on her side, the outline of her back defined by the light quilt she’d claimed in the night. His hand quivered, then reached for her as if drawn by an unseen force. The whisper of her name stuck in his throat.
She shifted in her sleep, rolled in his direction, and kicked off the covers. Her rounded belly strained against the nightgown she wore. She laid her arm across her stomach, cradling their baby.
Pierce closed his eyes but could block neither the new, graphic remembrance of his mother, nor the visual evidence of his child growing inside his wife. Both images seared his eyelids.
Numb, he brushed his teeth. Dressed, left, and walked to his office through the woods. Yet this time, the familiar path held no comfort.
Several times during the day, he’d almost called Laurie. Just to hear her voice. Just to know she was all right.
He’d reach for his phone, be ready to make the call, and freeze. He couldn’t think of her without thinking of the pregnancy. And every time he thought of the pregnancy, fear threatened to swallow him whole, as it had the evening she miscarried.
Last night’s reprieve, induced by her excitement over the crib, had been only that—a reprieve.
He worked late, almost until midnight. Left his office and walked back through the familiar woods. He found his wife in the kitchen, standing at the counter, eating a container of yogurt.
“You’re finally home,” she said. “I had leftovers. I can heat some up for you if you’re hungry now.”
“No, thanks,” he said, looking at her.
“What?” she asked as she licked the spoon. “Do I have food on my face?”
“No.”
They stared at each other. Terror seeped from his p
ores and almost caused his knees to buckle. He turned and walked to a dining room chair and sat. She followed and sat also.
“Pierce, what’s wrong? You’ve got to tell me. I’ve watched you turn white as a ghost. You pull away from me. I’ve lost count of how many mornings I’ve found you on the floor. I thought we’d turned a corner last night putting together the crib.”
“Stop.” He held up a hand. “I can’t talk about it.”
“Why can’t you talk to me? Or is it that you won’t talk to me? We used to talk about everything.”
He rose. “Not this!”
“What haven’t you told me?”
He banged his fist on the table.
She jumped as if he’d slapped her. “You’re scaring me, Pierce.”
“No, I’m the one who’s scared.” He slumped back into the chair, his face in his hands. “And I don’t know why.”
“Is it because of the miscarriage?”
“I was so afraid you were going to die.”
“I remember you saying that. I woke up in the hospital, and you were begging God not to let me die. Why would you think that?”
“Because of all the blood. Because you looked half dead lying there asleep from the sedative they gave you.”
She blanched.
“I’m sorry.” He took her hand. “I can’t figure this out.”
She pulled back to look him squarely in the eyes. “What are you dreaming when you leave our bed and lie down on the rug?”
“I dream about the bus ride.”
“When your father sent you to live with the Cranes.”
“Yes.”
“You were five, you were scared, and you didn’t understand what was happening. I know that. But there’s got to be more. What did he say to you?”
“He said, ‘Mama’s gone. Your mama’s gone, and you’re not staying with me.’”
“Anything else?”
“I don’t remember.”
“You don’t remember anything else he said, or you don’t remember anything else you’ve been dreaming?”
He rested his head on her shoulder. “I’m dreaming about my mother. I’m a little boy, and I see her sitting in her chair.”
“And?” She rubbed his head, her bulging belly between them. “Tell me the rest, Pierce. The fact that you don’t want to proves it’s important.”
“I’m standing at her bedroom door. I’m listening, and I hear her crying. Then I’m looking through the keyhole.”
“What do you see?”
“That’s where it always ends. I have no idea what’s on the other side. Please don’t ask me any more questions right now. I need time to figure this out.”
He heard and felt her sigh. “Only if you promise to tell me anything else you remember.”
“Okay. I will.”
***
Pierce pulled in front of his home as the last orange rays of sunset disappeared behind the trees. He shoved the car’s gear into park and slumped over the steering wheel, leaving the engine running.
Earlier that day he’d finished his sermon, then sat in his office because he hadn’t wanted to come home. Why did he feel this way?
The memories he’d shared with Laurie last week scrolled through his mind.
A chill went through him—cold, colder—until he wrapped his arms tight around his stomach and huddled in the driver’s seat. A shadow, an image, danced in his peripheral vision.
He turned his head—
And remembered his mother’s death.
The vision punched him in the chest. He barely stifled a cry of shock. Did it happen that way? Could it be true?
Oh, yes, he thought. It happened exactly that way.
Pierce covered his face with his hands. Mama, his sweet mama. How he’d loved her. She’d had the gentlest touch. The kindest smile. How could he have forgotten her death?
He would no longer be able to think around the random pieces of memory, weave through them like one might a bizarre emotional obstacle course. Having the whole picture changed the rules.
The two will become one flesh. You gave her your word. Tell Laurie what you just remembered.
The command hit Pierce like a slap. He put his head back against the seat.
No, no. He had to be mistaken. Telling Laurie this, now, would devastate her.
He waited and waited, hoped he’d come up with a justification for keeping the memory to himself. Instead, he grew certain he had no choice but to tell her.
He found Laurie in the family room.
“I’ve already eaten,” she said, the television remote in her hand.
“It’s okay. I’ll fix myself a sandwich later.”
“Pierce, I was too nervous to watch the delivery videos with Kay, even though she offered. I have to return them soon.” She paused. “A healthy birth isn’t like a miscarriage. I’m starting to get nervous about the process, too. Maybe if we watch a normal birth, we’ll both feel better.”
He loved her so much, maybe she was right.
“I’ll give it a shot.” He lowered himself to the couch. Her small smile offered encouragement as she pressed PLAY.
The introduction didn’t bother him. It just contained a lot of what most would consider good, useful information. Then a birthing scene came.
Laurie reached for his hand and squeezed. Pierce closed his eyes.
The narrator called it natural childbirth. Which meant the woman labored without pain medication. Pierce turned to face Laurie. She looked better than she had in several days, her expression hopeful, with a little pregnant glow shining through the dark circles under her eyes. He took a snapshot with his mind, to have, to save, because she had never looked more beautiful. Then he slipped his hand free of hers. He knew he was about to break her heart.
“Laurie, turn it off.”
She didn’t hear him at first.
On the screen, the baby crowned. The mother gave a long, groaning push. Another. The head and shoulders came first, then the newborn all but slid out, screaming like a banshee. The mother cried tears of joy. So did Laurie.
“What, honey? What did you say?” She wiped her eyes.
He couldn’t repeat the words. His throat had closed.
A second birth story began. This time the mother on the screen needed a C-section. Laurie concentrated on the video.
Pierce sat perfectly still beside her. Quiet, contained, staring at the floor.
Finally, she looked at him, turned down the volume. “Pierce, what’s wrong?”
“Laurie, I have to tell you something.” Despair coated his words. “About before I came to live with Mom and Dad.”
CHAPTER NINE
Hazy moonlight fluttered across his closed eyelids that night long ago.
As it had many times before, a dull cramp low in his belly woke Pierce from a fitful sleep. He blinked, grateful for faint stars rather than a pitch-black night. But then he heard a sound like a whimpering animal. He crept out of bed and over to Mama’s room.
With his ear pressed to the thin wooden door, he heard her. Crying. Panting. Groaning.
Somehow he knew he shouldn’t be there listening.
But he had to know. He had to know what was happening in there.
Mama never shut him out. Her door stayed open at night.
More often than not, he greeted the day from the braided rug by her bed. The soft cotton of her ankle-length nightgown always brushed his feet as she rose to greet the day. Then she made Daddy breakfast and coffee. Pierce knew from the smell when she’d overcooked the fried eggs.
But tonight, Mama’s door was shut. Shut and locked.
His tummy hurt. And he needed to go to the outhouse. But Mama always said to tell her before he went out there at night. He couldn’t go without letting her know.
He danced in place outside the closed door. Listening. He heard more groans and strained not to wet the thin, too-small underpants he always slept in. He couldn’t hold it much longer.
Risking a scolding—
or worse, a switch—he angled his head, squinted, and peeked through the metal keyhole.
When he did this during the day, he had discovered he could see all the way around the narrow room, across the bed, and out the window to the pig shed. He often thought that when he was bigger and had his own house, he would never put his bed on the same side of the house as a stinky pig shed. Tonight the room should have been dark, but Daddy had turned on both lamps. Something was wrong.
Mama lay on the bed, her face out of view. Across the tops of her bent knees he saw Daddy. He stood at the window, his back to Mama and the door. Maybe Daddy wouldn’t know he had looked through.
Mama’s knees shook.
Now he really had to go. If he sneaked out, Daddy might not see. He could ease the screen door shut real quiet and tiptoe across the porch on the opposite side of the house. He could be back without Daddy knowing he’d left.
Pierce turned away.
“Luther. Luther, please. Ohhh,” Mama said.
He heard her and peered back through the long slot below the rusty, round doorknob.
“Luther. Hold my hand. Luther.” She panted.
But Daddy just stood there. Feet spread. Arms crossed over his chest, hands flat against his sides. He didn’t even look back at her.
Mama screamed. Like Mrs. Taylor, their neighbor, had screamed when her husband accidentally chopped off his finger while helping Daddy in the barn.
“Mama! Mama!”
Pierce twisted the doorknob, beat on the door with his fists as tears pooled in his eyes.
“Go back to bed, Pierce. Now!” Daddy yelled. “Do it, boy!”
“Mama!”
Another groan.
With one dirty foot pressed against the door jam, Pierce pulled hard on the knob. Even as the yellow wet trickled down his other leg, he twisted the knob and tried to get to her.
“Luther!”
“Mama!” he cried through the keyhole, then pressed his cheek flat against the door to see more.
Daddy finally came to Mama. He stood between her knees at the bed’s edge.
She sat up, grabbed his forearms. “Promise me you’ll keep Pierce.” She grunted the words. She panted and gasped, her body rocked and jerked. “Promise me you’ll keep both of them! Luther!”
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