Shelter Valley hadn’t been young the day Will was born. The cracks had already been in her sidewalks. As irritating as they were, he was rather fond of them.
“There’s a condo for sale near my country club,” Roger offered. He was the doctor, if Will remembered correctly. Podiatrist. Or was it pediatrician? After four beers, Will wasn’t positive.
“It’d be a long drive to work every day,” he said, offering the deck to Scott for a cut.
The youngest of the four, Scott was a radio announcer in Phoenix. He’d been divorced twice.
“But a short drive on weekends,” Scott said, grinning. “Not so far to take a lady home to bed after a night of dancing.”
Will might be feeling a little blurry about things, but he knew he wasn’t at that point yet. The point of bringing women home.
Having the guys in, drinking far more than he should, sitting in a room full of smoke and foul language—that was enough of a stretch.
But damn, he thought, looking around the table, his gaze landing on the chips piling up in front of him, this sure was fun.
“Let me know when you’re ready to file the papers,” Duane said. “I’ll save you a bundle.”
Staring at his cards, not sure if that was a six or a nine, Will’s fun screeched to a halt.
“File the papers?” he asked, trying to enunciate clearly.
“For the divorce,” Roger filled in, belching as he helped himself to his fifth beer. The man should be a fat ugly loser the way he was sucking down those beers, not an athletic successful doctor.
After the couple of seconds it took him to compute Roger’s words, Will put his beer bottle down on the table so hard beer sloshed out the top. “Who said anything about divorce?”
“You’re separated,” Scott said cynically, a man well-versed in the realities of broken relationships.
“That’s just the prelude to when she hits you up for all you’ve got.”
“Becca wouldn’t do that. We’re just taking some time to be sure the decision we made twenty years ago was the one we wanted to make.”
“Uh-huh,” all three men said together with knowing grins.
“She didn’t want me to leave.” Will heard his voice getting louder. “It was the only way for us to get a clear look.”
Though he wasn’t sure he was seeing any more clearly away from Becca than when he was sleeping right beside her. He still carried her with him everywhere he went.
“That’s what they all say,” Duane told him. “Take it from a guy who hears about it all day long.”
“Becca’s different.” Was she carrying him with her, too? He suspected she was. Did that say anything about them? He took another swallow of beer as he thought about that.
“Just take my card,” Duane said, pulling a business card out of his wallet. “Call me when she hits you with it. Because trust me, man, she will.”
“My wife cried a pool of tears after she kicked me out,” Roger said. “A month later she came after me for half of everything.”
“I held her at a quarter,” Duane reminded him.
“And thanks to you, I’m in for ten,” Roger said, throwing a couple of chips on the table.
“I’ll double you,” Will told him, recklessly throwing out chips. He needed another beer, too. To chase the one he was going to down in one gulp just as soon as he won this hand.
He’d better get used to bachelorhood. It might be all he had.
The next day, when Will stumbled out of bed some time after noon, Duane’s business card was still sitting right where he’d left it in the middle of the kitchen table.
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
“GIVE ME SOME EXERCISES to do,” Becca asked Randi the last Monday morning in August. After seeing Martha dash around at the Little League tournament on Saturday—and the energy her friend exerted when Shelter Valley knocked in the winning run— Becca knew she had to prepare herself for the years ahead. Starting immediately.
“What kind of exercises?” Randi asked, coming fully into the family room to join Becca on the floor.
“Stay-young-and-energetic ones.”
Randi laughed. “I noticed the eye cream on your bathroom counter when I went in for fresh towels,” she said. “How long you been using that stuff?”
“One day,” Becca admitted sheepishly. “You notice any difference?” She batted her eyes.
“Oh, Bec,” Randi said, laughing, “your eyes are beautiful just the way they are.”
But Becca was determined. “Still, it doesn’t hurt to get in shape. I may not be able to do anything about the aging that comes with forty-two years of living, but I can certainly control what kind of shape my body’s in.”
Grinning, Randi looked at Becca’s huge belly. “I wouldn’t be so sure of that if I were you.”
But before the morning was over, Randi had taken Becca through an entire series of safe yet effective exercises to help her, not only during the birth but the weight-loss period afterward, as well.
“You do these every morning, keep them up after the baby comes, and you’ll live to be a hundred,” Randi promised her.
Finally, a promise Becca wanted to hear. If she lived to be a hundred, her baby would be almost old before she died.
THAT NIGHT, alone in her house, Becca reached rock bottom. And nothing happened. She didn’t convulse. Or scream. She didn’t foam at the mouth or run raging through the rooms like a maniac. She sat quietly on the leather sofa in the family room, doing absolutely nothing, seeing nothing. Feeling nothing.
Nothing mattered. She was completely and utterly alone. Not just in her house, but in her heart.
Glancing at the rocker she and Will had picked out together, she knew, objectively, that seeing it there should hurt. But it was just a chair. Not moving. As lifeless as she.
“I’m okay,” she announced to the dust motes collecting on her tables. They didn’t stir. “I’m not falling apart.”
The room didn’t notice at all. Didn’t change at all.
Will was gone. They’d been separated for almost two weeks with no sign of reconciliation. She was all alone in the world.
As the time passed, Becca sat there, amazed that nothing terrible or urgent was happening. She wasn’t being carried away by men in white coats; she wasn’t dying; she wasn’t even crying. She was still sitting calmly in her family room, untouched. As was everything around her.
The bookshelf held the collection of favorites she and Will had gathered over the years—including the book with the torn black binding they’d picked up in a musty old store on a back street in London. It was a collection of world mythology.
Her sofa was clean. She and Will kept it that way. They had a bottle of leather cleaner under the sink in the kitchen. The thick tapestry rug lay with its familiar pattern, images of doves in each corner with a serpent wrapping around most of the piece. You had to really look to see the figures. But she’d looked at it so many times, she saw them immediately.
The television sat silent across the room, part of the home-theater system she’d bought Will for Christmas. It had Surround Sound, a DVD player, a VCR. His stereo components were there, too.
The plants needed dusting, though not watering, thanks to Randi.
They were going to have to get another CD rack soon. Theirs was almost full. The afghan lying along one corner of the back of the love seat had a bump on one side, where it was folded unevenly. She’d fix it.
The walls still looked pretty good, though they hadn’t been painted since the house was built. Hmm. Could be they looked so good because she’d only turned on one small lamp, on the end table beside her, when she’d come into the room.
She didn’t see any smudges in the entire wall of windows, but then, it was nighttime. Dark outside. The tiny lights in the distance, seen from her vantage point up on the mountain, would hardly cast enough illumination to show smudges.
She was glad. Smudges bothered her, and she didn’t have the energy to wash windows.
&
nbsp; Becca wondered if she was going to fall asleep sitting there. Not that she felt sleepy, but it was night. She’d feel sleepy eventually. She could always pull the afghan over her if she did.
Of course, she’d have to get up and walk over to the love seat to pick it up. Later. But that would take care of the bump where it was folded unevenly.
Just as she was feeling almost resigned to her numbness, the baby gave her a not-so-gentle nudge. Looking down, Becca watched as a small lump formed against her belly, visible even through the T-shirt she was wearing. It moved slowly across her belly and she followed its progress, both inside and out. She could feel the tiny body part move. She could see it.
“It’s okay, little one,” she murmured, almost dazed as she watched. “My mind’s still here, with all the other things in this room. I’m alert and aware. Believe it or not.”
The movement stopped.
Placing her hand over the small lump still poking out, she rubbed gently. “I’m going to be able to take care of you,” she whispered. “I’m sure of it now.”
With these words came the first twinge of feeling. Though intense, it lasted only a brief second and was gone.
The lump disappeared.
“It’s not that I didn’t have enough strength, which was what I feared,” she said quickly, still talking out loud. “I just didn’t know I had it. It hadn’t ever really been tested.”
The baby kicked, and feeling returned to Becca in a rush. Big tears welled up in her eyes, slid down her face, as her heart opened up and dark lonely holes filled with peace.
“I’m okay,” she whispered. “Whatever comes, I’m going to be okay.”
As though digesting the meaning of those momentous words, the baby was still.
“I may not be happy,” Becca admitted, half laughing through her tears as she looked down at the mound that hid her baby. “I’ll never be completely happy without your daddy.” She stopped. Sniffed. Wiped her tears. “I love him so much….”
Her voice broke. “But I’ll be okay, no matter what,” she said with a shuddering breath.
The baby pushed, and Becca felt his small touch, first inside her and then where he pushed against the hand she had lying across her belly. He was probably only responding to her warmth. Or maybe the limb had already been there. But in Becca’s heart, her baby had just reached out to hold her hand.
“I love you.” She’d never said the words to her baby. Never allowed herself to think them.
And yet, when uttered, they were as natural as the breath that had accompanied them.
“I love you so much,” she said again, unable to stop the flow that had finally broken free from the dam she’d built around her heart.
“No matter what happens, I’ll be here for you.” She knew that with complete certainty. The doubts were gone, the fears replaced by something much stronger. Something that would see her through. “If you have a need, I’ll meet it,” she promised softly, caressing her child. “I love you.”
The source of her strength. It was that simple.
Her child.
Hers and Will’s.
A miracle.
BECCA SLEPT in her bed that night. She’d put the couch bedding away and was already curled up before Randi came in from the basketball camp she’d been attending. She awoke briefly when Randi popped her head in to check on her and say good-night. And then drifted off again, holding Will’s pillow to her chest.
The bed was big.
But she slept.
PHYLLIS LANGFORD hung up the phone slowly, deliberately, taking great care to make sure it rested completely in the cradle, taking care not to make a sound. Though it wouldn’t have mattered if she’d dropped it. Or screamed. Alone in her pretty little house that Tuesday morning, she was the only one who would have heard.
Christine had been in a car accident. She was going to be okay, Will had assured her—just arriving in Shelter Valley later than she’d planned. Instead of having more than two weeks to get settled before school started, she’d have only a few days. She’d reach town shortly before classes resumed.
Even that was okay. She was going to stay with Phyllis, anyway, at least for a while. Phyllis could get the room ready for her and her sister, Tory, who was coming with her. It wasn’t as if she had a lot to do with her spare time.
Still, Phyllis couldn’t shake the feeling that something wasn’t right. Not one to give in to fits of fancy or an overactive imagination, she still couldn’t rid herself of the sense of unreality.
Christine had called Will, which was fine. Expected. But she hadn’t called Phyllis.
And that was odd. Very odd.
Shaking her head, telling herself that she needed only to wait until Christine arrived to get her answers, Phyllis grabbed her keys. Will hadn’t just talked to her about Christine. He’d asked her a telling question or two about life, as well. And about Becca.
Becca had been confiding in her all along, but this was the first conversation she’d had with Will since the couple’s separation.
He’d asked for a clinical definition of love.
She couldn’t give it to him. Real love, the kind he was searching for, was something you believed in or you didn’t. It was bigger than proof.
Phyllis headed out to her car, intent on visiting Becca—especially after Will’s questions. She’d made a couple of friends very quickly, of whom Becca was the closest. Even if the only thing she could do was keep Becca company while her normal activities were curtailed, that was better than sitting around alone. Worrying.
Dressed in an attractive, tank-style cotton maternity jumper that looked almost cool enough to withstand the 110-degree temperature, Becca invited Phyllis in with a gracious smile and more composure than Phyllis had ever seen her exhibit. She couldn’t help wondering if perhaps she was seeing the real woman lurking inside Becca Parsons, the woman who’d been pushed beyond endurance by life’s crises.
“I just made a pitcher of fruit smoothies,” Becca said. “You want one?”
“Sure.” Anything cold and icy sounded great. Pulling her sweaty sleeveless blouse away from her skin, Phyllis followed Becca back to the kitchen. What she’d give to have long beautiful legs like Becca’s. To be able to wear short shorts, instead of the knee-length, thigh-hiding things she had on.
She might be younger than Becca, but the other woman definitely had the edge.
“You start teaching in less than three weeks,” Becca said, pouring icy pink liquid from a blender into two tall glasses.
“Yeah.” Phyllis took both glasses and carried them to the table while Becca put the leftover smoothie in the freezer. “We have meetings all next week, and then, soon after that, the kids come back. That’s the part I look forward to.”
Becca joined her at the table. “We’ve got some great kids here.”
“That’s what I’ve heard.” Phyllis thought to the weeks ahead with excitement. “I can’t wait to be part of it all.”
Becca sat back in her chair, her features relaxed as she sipped her drink.
“Did you attend Montford?” Phyllis asked.
“Yeah.” Becca nodded. “Best four years of my life.”
It was an opening Phyllis couldn’t pass up. “You and Will haven’t had great years together?”
“Of course we have,” Becca said, though her brow was furrowed as she looked down at the imaginary spot she was scraping off the table with one long slim finger. “It’s just that we wanted kids so badly.” She smiled sadly. “We got married in college and started trying right away, thinking we’d have our first baby before Will started work on his dissertation. We were planning at least half a dozen, all told.”
“Wow.” A few weeks ago Phyllis would have been floored by such a goal. But after meeting enough of Shelter Valley’s citizens, seeing firsthand how they put family first and actually took the time to enjoy their lives, she wasn’t quite as shocked. Shelter Valley’s straightforward approach to happiness would have seemed naïve to her eve
n six months ago. Now she’d begun to believe in it herself. Despite her failed marriage, she’d had a good experience of family life as a child, and she understood how making family and community a focus, a priority, could create a sense of genuine contentment.
Looking around at Becca’s beautiful impeccable home, Phyllis said, “So what happened?”
“We couldn’t get pregnant.”
Becca’s words were simply stated, but her eyes portrayed many years of heartache.
“We tried everything, went through test after test, procedure after procedure, but nothing worked.”
Phyllis wiped condensation from her glass. “What was wrong?”
Becca shrugged. “They never found anything, really. Nothing that would have prevented fertilization.”
“But you and Will stayed together through it all?”
“We did,” Becca said. “He was wonderful to me, understanding, loving, putting up with me when the disappointment became unbearable.” She smiled.
“He’d take me away to exotic new places, fill my mind with exciting new treasures, keeping me so busy that I’d fall into bed in whatever hotel we were staying at and actually go to sleep.”
Trying to put herself in Becca’s shoes, to feel what her friend had felt, Phyllis frowned. “So what happened?” she asked again. “Why did you and Will separate once you were finally pregnant?” It seemed that her friends had a dream come true in their midst and should be gloriously happy. Not living in two different homes.
Unless the baby wasn’t Will’s?
“I don’t know,” Becca said, her voice wavering. “It’s all so crazy, so confusing.”
“Is the baby Will’s?”
Becca’s eyes opened wide. “Of course!”
“Then…”
“I thought I had to have an abortion.”
Phyllis couldn’t have been more taken aback if Becca had told her she’d had a sex-change operation. There’d been no mistaking the anguish in Becca’s eyes when she explained how she’d always wanted a baby.
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