by Tawni O'Dell
She gets up reluctantly and walks toward me, making certain not to look at Shannon. I have a towel draped over Shannon’s legs. I put one over the placenta, too.
“Sit on the bed. Put this towel on your lap and hold her there,” I instruct her.
She does what she’s told.
She takes the baby and peers into her face.
“She is wrinkly and ugly. Why is she so skinny? I thought babies were supposed to be pudgy. Kenny was pudgy when he came home from the hospital. And he was a nice color, too. And he smelled good.”
“She’s going to look that way, too,” I tell her.
The baby begins to cry.
“She’s crying. She hates you,” Kenny says gleefully to his sister.
“Shut up,” Fanci snaps at him. “Why’s she crying?”
“We want her to cry. It’s good for her lungs. It’s what she’s supposed to do.”
“What’s her name?” Kenny asks.
“Babies aren’t born with names, stupid,” Fanci responds, a little of her old cockiness returning. “Someone has to name them.”
“Can we name her?”
“It’s not up to us,” I explain.
“Can she see? Can she see us?” Kenny leans over her and waves. “Hi, little baby.”
She continues crying, and he looks up at me.
“She wants her mom,” he states knowingly.
“Okay. I have a few other things to clean up. Why don’t you two go into the other room and I’ll be with you in a couple minutes.”
I take the baby and swaddle her in a pillowcase. I don’t have any baby blankets and a towel seems too rough.
I rock her in my arms and coo at her. She starts to calm down.
“She’s going to be hungry,” I say to Shannon.
“There’s formula and bottles in my car,” she replies dully.
I hold out the baby to her.
“I don’t want to hold her.”
“Come on,” I urge her.
Maybe if she holds her, she’ll keep her, I think to myself. Maybe she’s never held one of her children. Maybe that’s been the problem.
She won’t even look at her.
“I said, I don’t want to hold her.”
“She’s beautiful.”
“Of course, she’s beautiful. I always make beautiful babies. Lucky for me.”
“Can I get you anything?”
“I’ve got Tylenol with Codeine in my bag for the after contractions. And I could use a glass of water.”
“Why don’t you let me call a doctor?”
“Why? I’m fine.”
“You don’t know that for sure.”
The memory of Mom dying in her bed fills my head. A complication of childbirth. The angels taking her to live with Jesus. I nestle the baby tighter against my chest and remember holding Shannon the same way. I remember the terror I felt looking at Mom’s dead, staring eyes. I tried to ignore them. I kept talking to her. I sat beside her and kept touching her cold arm. Long after I knew it was hopeless, I kept pretending. Long after I knew in my heart I would never feel safe again, I kept living.
I always believed Shannon was immune to all of it. She was too little. She couldn’t possibly have known what was going on. She couldn’t have felt what I felt. She never knew Mom. She never knew love. She couldn’t miss what she never had.
I never stopped to think that the not-having part could be worse than anything else.
“Don’t worry about me,” she says, staring out the window yet reading my thoughts. “I’m not going to die like Mom. I’m not a wimp.”
Chapter Twenty-Nine
CLAY IS WAITING FOR ME outside the J&P Building when I arrive.
I’m in a pretty good mood all things considered. I left mother and daughter sleeping soundly. I pulled a drawer out of my dresser, emptied it, and made a makeshift crib for the baby.
Shannon still didn’t have any interest in holding her or feeding her but she promised me she’d take care of her if she woke up while I was gone. She said the baby needed to be in good shape for when she sold her. It was the only moment during the couple hours after the birth where I felt a twinge of dread.
Fanci agreed to stay and watch over them for a nominal fee. I made her call and clear it with her dad, who wasn’t home. I told her to keep all the doors locked and not to open them for anyone and if a bald guy with a big black mustache showed up to call 911 first, then me.
Kenny listened solemnly to my instructions and informed me they’d be fine as long as Fanci had her stick.
Seeing Clay, I’m flooded with memories of him as an infant. He was a good baby. He hardly ever cried. He had the most intense gaze. Whenever I’d talk to him, he’d furrow his silky little brow and clench and unclench his tiny fists while he studied every part of my face.
I thought he was trying to commit it to memory and I’d assure him that I’d always be around. I wouldn’t ever leave him. He wouldn’t ever have to try and remember me.
I’m feeling so good I can almost even be optimistic about our meeting with Cam Jack. Maybe something positive can come from finally having the truth out in the open. I don’t have anything to fear. This is my boy. He will understand.
“I still don’t get this. Why all the secrecy? Why are we seeing Cam Jack in the first place?” he asks me again as we’re walking up the shadowy, silent, plush staircase.
Despite my mood, I’m still not brimming with enough confidence to tell him the truth, although I know I should and I know I’m going to regret not doing it.
“What’s it about? Do you know him?”
“Not exactly.”
Cam’s office door is wide open tonight.
From the moment we crest the staircase, we can see him at the end of the corridor, sitting behind his massive desk, talking on the phone.
We pause in the doorway and he waves us in.
“I don’t get it,” he says into the phone. “The poster says, ‘How can there be too many children? That’s like saying there’s too many flowers.’ What the hell is that supposed to mean?”
He listens for a moment.
“There sure as hell can be too many flowers. There can be too many kids, too. People in general. You ever been to India?”
He listens again, nodding.
“No. I haven’t either but I’ve seen pictures.”
More listening.
“Well, it’s not my concern, Bill. Not my concern at all. Just thought I’d give you some feedback long as I had you on the horn. You take care now.”
He hangs up and smiles at us.
“Friend of mine,” he explains. “Running for Congress. Has these pro-lifers supporting him. Some of the slogans they come up with.”
He shakes his head, then gets up from his desk. He’s in a pair of navy suit pants, a white shirt with the sleeves rolled up to his elbows, and a gold power tie loose around his neck. He walks toward Clay to shake his hand.
“So here he is. One of Laurel County’s finest.”
I hold my breath. I don’t know what I expect to happen when they make physical contact, if I expect Clay to burst into flames or for a cartoon anvil to fall on Cam’s head.
Nothing happens. I let out my breath.
“It’s a pleasure to meet you, Mr. Jack,” Clay says innocently.
The genuine smile on his face and the sincerity in his voice make me hate myself more than I ever thought possible.
I was so caught up thinking about my own discomfort, my own shame, my own fear, I didn’t think about Clay at all.
He’s unprepared. I’ve set him up for the biggest shock of his life and he’s going to experience it in front of a total stranger who’s also his dad.
“Mr. Jack?” Cam asks and shoots me a questioning glance. “There’s no need to be so formal. You can call me Cam.”
“Well, thank you.”
Clay looks pleased with himself.
I want to die.
“This is really a lucky coincidence for me
that it turns out my mom knows you,” he continues. “I just came up with the idea a couple days ago about contacting you in the hopes that you’d help find a job for one of your former miners, Dusty Spangler. He was one of the Jolly Mount Five. He has a wife and three young children and has had a hard time getting back on his feet since the accident. He doesn’t want to go back into the mines, which is understandable under the circumstances, but he knows so much about the mining profession and he’s a hard worker and a quick learner. I thought maybe you could find a position for him elsewhere in your company.”
Cam gives him his full undivided attention, watching him with a kind of disbelieving curiosity, almost as if he suspected someone was going to appear with a video camera at the end of Clay’s speech and announce it was all a practical joke and they’d be showing the tape at the next board meeting for a good laugh.
“Sure, sure. Why not? Here.”
He shuffles through some papers on his desk and hands Clay a notepad and a pen.
“Write down his name and phone number. I’ll see what I can do.”
He glances at me while Clay’s busy writing.
“You didn’t tell him, did you?”
“I couldn’t do it,” I reply, almost in a whisper.
“Well, then.”
Cam motions for Clay to take a seat after he takes the pad of paper back from him. He positions his bulk on the corner of his desk.
“There’s no easy way to say this so I’m just going to say it: You’re my son.”
Clay smiles and leans forward like he missed the punch line of a joke.
“You’re my son,” Cam goes on obliviously. “Your mom and I…well, it was a long time ago.”
“What did you say?” Clay asks.
“I’ve said it twice already. You’re my son.”
“I don’t understand. I’m your son?”
He points at himself and looks at me, then back at Cam.
“And you’ve always known?”
“Unless your mom was lying and someone else knocked her up. She was young. I gave her the benefit of the doubt.”
Clay stands up.
“You got my mom pregnant when she was a teenager, and you didn’t take any responsibility for it?”
“No one twisted her arm. It was mutual consent.”
“You didn’t take any responsibility for it?” he repeats.
“Under the circumstances, we decided to be discreet.”
“We never decided anything. You decided everything,” I interject. “I was seventeen.”
Clay takes a step toward Cam. I think he might hit him. Or worse. He’s also armed.
Cam doesn’t sense any of the tension. He gets up from the corner of his desk and walks over to his liquor cabinet.
“That all happened a long time ago,” he says while he pours himself a drink. “It’s water under the bridge. No use dwelling on it now. You can dwell on it later if you want. Right now I have a business proposition for you.”
He looks over at Clay.
“You a drinking man?”
“No,” I answer for him.
“Yes,” he says.
He pours Clay a drink, too, and takes it to him.
I don’t get offered one.
“I don’t know what you’ve heard about my health,” he says as he moves behind his desk and takes a seat, “but the bottom line is, it’s not so good. I need a kidney transplant.”
He glances expectantly back and forth between Clay and me as if we’re supposed to know something we don’t.
“Which means I need a kidney,” he continues. “I’d be willing to pay you quite a bit. Six figures.”
“Are you crazy?” I gasp. “Are you out of your mind?”
He ignores me and speaks directly to Clay.
“What do you say? You only need one kidney.”
“There’s no way,” I cry. “You think you can totally disown a child, deny he’s even yours, then invite him over for a drink one night out of the blue and offer to buy a body part?”
“I have to think about it,” Clay says.
“What?” I practically shriek. “There’s nothing to think about.”
Clay looks at me coldly.
“He was talking to me, Mom. Not you.”
“Good man.” Cam sits back in his big leather chair. “You think about it. I had to think about it, too. I realize I’m putting myself on the line here. Your mom wanted to keep our relationship secret forever and that was to my advantage. Now that you know we’re related you can try and get an inheritance out of me and frankly, you can do whatever you want after I’m dead. Good luck fighting Rae Ann and her family.”
He holds his drink in both hands against his belly.
“The only other problem is it wasn’t exactly something I wanted the general public to know about either, if you get my meaning. I thought about it long and hard. Do I want people around here to know I got myself a bastard son? That I knocked up the teenaged daughter of one of my miners? I really struggled with it. You know, the moral ramifications and all. Finally, I came to my senses. I said to myself, Hell, Cam, that was over twenty years ago. Times have changed. Plus you got more money than you know what to do with. You’re as close to a king as these people’ll ever see. Why would you give a good goddamn what they think? So that’s where I stand on it now. You can tell whoever you want because, frankly, I don’t care what people around here think of me.”
He moves forward in his chair suddenly and throws back his drink in one gulp. He sets the empty glass down on the desk like a challenge.
Clay gets up from his seat.
“Well, you don’t have to worry about me saying anything because, frankly, I do care what people around here think of me.”
He puts his untouched drink down on the other side of the desk.
“And, frankly, I don’t want any of them to know I’m related to you.”
I FOLLOW HIM outside. He’s walking, but I have to run to stay with him. He won’t look at me or talk to me as we head down the street.
He stops suddenly and I end up a couple steps past him before I can correct my own momentum.
“You had no right,” he shouts at me.
His voice is angry, but his face is screwed up like he’s about to cry.
“You had no right not to tell me. You knew my whole life who my father was and he was right here in the same town and you never told me. How could you do that?”
“I was protecting you,” I try to explain.
“It wasn’t up to you.”
“I’m your mother. It’s my job to protect you.”
“Not from my own father.”
“Yes, sometimes it is.”
“No. No. No.” He shakes his head as he chants. “Never. No one has the right to keep that information from a child. I don’t care what kind of reasons you come up with. He’s my father. Don’t you understand what that means? You’re not more important because you’re my mother.”
“Are you taking his side?”
“Listen to yourself. Sides? You’re always talking about sides. This isn’t some kind of competition. Is that what it is to you? Even now? He hurt your ego by dumping you so you decided I’d never know who my dad is.”
“No. That’s not how it happened.”
I grab his arm but he shakes me off.
“He dumped us. Don’t you understand? Not just me. Us. He didn’t want to have anything to do with you. I didn’t care about myself. But he didn’t want you. I hated him for that.”
He keeps shaking his head.
“You didn’t give him a chance to even meet me.”
“He didn’t want to meet you. He told me if I ever tried to see him…”
I stop myself from explaining further. I don’t want to hurt him more in order to try and make my actions seem more justified.
“It was up to me to find out what kind of man he was. It wasn’t up to you to decide I should never find out,” he tells me, then takes a few steps away from me.
“I thought I knew you. Now I have to look at you in a completely different way.”
“Don’t say that.”
“I don’t know who you are. You’re not strong. A strong woman would have told her son who his father is. That takes strength and courage. You’re a coward.”
The tears finally burst free. They stream down his face.
“I always thought you were so tough. Look at my mom. She doesn’t need anybody. She doesn’t even need a man. Even though I wished you needed a man. Even though I prayed about it and had dreams about it. Even though I would have done anything to have a dad even if he was just a stepdad. I would’ve even settled for a steady boyfriend I could have called Uncle Somebody.”
“Clay, I’m sorry.”
“You’re not strong at all. How could you do it? Did he pay you?”
I slap him.
It’s the loudest sound I’ve ever heard in my life. Louder than gunfire. Louder than a mine siren. Louder than the silence in our house as I lay awake waiting for my dad to come home from the bar.
I’ve never hit my son.
He turns and runs. It’s not the first time I’ve seen him do it. I’ve seen him run off to play with his friends, run to catch the school bus, run after a pop fly, but the sight has never made me sick with grief before. He was always running toward something, not away from me.
Chapter Thirty
EVERY LIGHT IS ON in my house. I can see it from the road blazing behind the drooping fringe of the willow trees.
Shannon’s car is gone.
The front door opens before I even park my car and Kenny and Fanci come rushing onto the porch with Gimp following arthritically behind them.
“The man with the mustache came here just like you said,” Kenny shouts at me.
I rush over to them. I kneel down and touch Kenny all over to make sure he’s whole.
Fanci’s dark suspicious eyes ringed in silver don’t look receptive to the idea of being touched so I settle for giving her arm a quick squeeze.
“Are you okay?” I ask them.
“Yeah,” Kenny says.
“I would’ve called you, but they took the phones and hid them,” Fanci adds.
“Who’s they?”
“Your sister and the man with the mustache.”
