He wasn’t sure what to do.
With Annie napping in her bucket seat on the kitchen counter, he started making breakfast. Most meal preps started with a search for the kitchen knives from wherever Chelsea had hidden them. Today he checked the cabinet where they kept the pots, the high cabinet over the fridge, and the coat closet, where he located the butcher block of knives in the back with a scarf wrapped around the handles. The knife hunt was always a pain in the neck, but he indulged her on it.
He chopped chives and ham to put in the scrambled eggs, and took bagels out of the freezer. His boss, Mark, wouldn’t be too happy if he ducked out at the last minute. Shit. Well, it was worth a phone call to Mark’s cell today, just to see how hard it would be to send someone else. He glanced at the clock and realized the call could wait. Nobody liked to do business before eight on a Saturday morning.
If he had to go, he needed some plan to keep Annie and Chelsea safe. Maybe Chelsea would agree not to drive the car while he was gone. He could hide the keys to her Subaru.
Yeah, but what if there was an emergency? His wife was a grown woman; he had to trust her with the car keys.
He just had to make sure everything was in order for her. He would clean the house today—thoroughly—and get everything under control so that Chelsea could focus on taking care of Annie while he was gone.
He scraped a block of cheddar against the grater. Yeah, take out your frustrations on a brick of cheese.
Major frustrations . . . and a fair share of anger that he kept tamped down way below the surface.
Leo considered himself to be a flexible guy. He could roll with the punches, but never in a million years had he expected this. To see his wife drained of life and enthusiasm. That she could become such a zombie that he wasn’t sure if he could trust her with their baby. . . . That was sick.
With everything prepped for the scramble, he decided to flake a while and give Chelsea some more time to sleep. He switched on the television and paced over to the windows. A fine snow was falling, but it didn’t look like anything that would stick. Across the fence, Louise Pickler’s yard looked pristine—a bed of smooth white snow with a shiny melted glaze. Their neighbor was still at her winter place in South Carolina.
By contrast their backyard was a haphazard pattern of snow mounds and trampled areas where he had walked Annie around in the snow last weekend. A happy mess, framed by the fence that he and Chelsea had put in themselves. The memory of her boundless energy for the project made him smile. His beautiful wife had gotten right in there, mixing cement and fixing posts. In her baseball cap and overalls, she was a holy terror with a nail gun.
That was the sort of enthusiasm she brought to everything, before the baby.
He missed his wife.
His breath clouded the window and he turned away, looking at the clock and the foods chopped and ready to go. Suddenly, he didn’t have the energy to pull it all together.
Besides, the whole world looked better after a nap. He’d crack this nut later.
He placed a receiving blanket over the sleeping Annabee. Stretching out on the couch, he pulled a fleece throw to his chin and closed his eyes.
Chapter 9
Leo’s voice, so animated and full of love, pulled her from sleep. It wasn’t a bad way to wake up. Her breasts were thick and sore as she stretched toward the clock.
After ten thirty?
Leo must have given Annie a bottle so that Chelsea could sleep in.
“Don’t be a wiggle worm.” Leo’s voice came from the nursery next door. “If we get this diaper on, you get to eat.” Leo actually seemed to enjoy changing Annie’s diaper.
The floor was cold on her bare feet, prompting Chelsea to move faster. She put on a robe and fished through the cluttered closet floor for her slippers as her husband cajoled the baby. He was pleased that her diaper rash was better, and he touted the fact that they’d been using “good old-fashioned Vaseline.”
With all the books she had studied before the baby was born, all the tips on baby care, she had never thought she’d be too alienated to use the information. But whenever he was here, Leo was the one caring for Annie. Leo did the shopping. Leo did the cooking. If Chelsea didn’t produce milk, she could physically bow out of the family triangle. She could be free.
Well, almost. Guilt would follow her like a gray shadow.
Her lips puckered as she struggled to hold back a crying jag. She took a deep breath and pulled the brush through her dark hair. Despite last night’s sleep, there were violet circles under her eyes and her face was puffy. This was not a good look for her; depression was sucking her soul away.
Brushing her hair back, Chelsea wondered if her mother had gone through this. If only she could ask her.
“Let’s go wake up the mamasita,” Leo told Annie.
“She’s up,” Chelsea called.
“Hey, sleepyhead. I’m getting Annie changed so that I can take her for a walk in the park when she finishes eating. I figure you could use some downtime.”
“Sounds good.”
“Don’t worry,” he told the baby. “We’ll bundle you up. I’ll zip you into that little pink puffy thing that makes you look like a Christmas goose.”
She envied the easy conversation Leo had with the baby. He connected with her. He loved her.
“Don’t you worry about Mommy,” he said. “She gets to see you all the time, but I only get Annabee weekends and nights.”
You would think he was talking to a real person.
Well, Annabelle was real. Just not close to possessing conversation skills yet.
She met them in the hall, where Leo held Annabelle so that she faced out, her little eyes shining as she stared at Chelsea. In Leo’s arms, she looked cute and innocent.
“The milk truck has arrived,” Chelsea said, reaching for her.
“I’ll carry her down,” Leo offered, turning toward the stairs. “If you want, I can scramble some eggs while you’re feeding her. I’ve got it all ready to go. You hungry?”
“Famished.”
In her usual spot on the couch, Chelsea pulled the baby to her breast. Annie latched on and seemed to snuggle against her.
The emotion that tugged at Chelsea was bittersweet. She didn’t mind feeding the baby knowing she’d be taken away for the rest of the morning. Was that normal? Staring down into Annabelle’s serious blue eyes, Chelsea knew she had strayed from normal three months ago.
Leo chatted as he cooked. The weather. Annabelle’s new Yoda smile. His upcoming trip. He was so darned happy; Chelsea hated to be the spoiler in his day.
“Hey, it’s day eight, right?” He had been keeping track of her time on the Nebula. “How are you feeling? Notice any changes?”
“I do. They’re not the happy pills I’d like them to be, but I’m thinking more clearly, and things don’t seem to be as dark and overwhelming as they were a week ago.”
“That’s great!” Leo stabbed the spatula in the air as if it were a trophy. “You’re doing great, Chels, and I know it will keep getting better and better.”
Chelsea hoped he was right. She was worried about being on her own with Annie this coming week—a first for them.
When Annabelle finished nursing, Leo produced a plate of steaming eggs, a buttered English muffin, and orange wedges.
“Thanks.” Chelsea didn’t know what she would do without him. Leo was the only thing that kept her going.
“You’re welcome.” He checked the kitchen drawers, the hook by the stove . . . the drawers of the rolltop desk.
“What are you looking for?” she asked, holding a forkful of eggs in the air.
“Your car keys.” He rolled open the desktop and whistled at the mound of bills. “Hon? These look like they’re getting out of control,” he said gently.
Her chest tightened. “I know.”
“Are we behind on our bills?”
“It’s all insurance stuff and doctors’ bills. It’s all their mistakes. They still haven’t a
dded Annabelle to our policy, so all her bills keep bouncing back.”
“I see that.” He leafed through the bills.
All this week, she hadn’t made a single call to Sounder. “I’ve been waiting until I feel better, and you know, I think I can face it now. I’ll get on it today.”
“Do you want some help sorting this out?”
She put the plate on the coffee table. She would love help, but this was her job. She was supposed to take care of the bills so Leo could focus on work. Clients and commissions. “I can do it. I’ll call them today, during their Saturday hours. I just think they secretly try not to pay, thinking that they’re going to wear you down. I bet a lot of people just give up trying to get through on the line and pay the damned bills.”
“Could be,” he said absently. “But we need to get this stuff resolved. Some of these bills are two months overdue. We don’t want to screw up our credit.”
“You’re right. I’ll call Sounder today.”
“Thanks, honey. And if you need a hand with it, I’m game. I’ve got the afternoon to set you up for the next week. I’m going to clean the house and stock up on groceries. You’ll be good to go for the week.”
After Leo carried Annie out the door, Chelsea went straight to the shower. The hot stream of water was her only waking escape, and she sighed as she stepped in and faced the faucet. Often she sat on the floor and cried, letting the hot water wash away her tears. But today, she didn’t need to collapse on the floor.
Was that a sign that she was getting better? She hoped so.
Her hair was still drying when she opened her laptop. Last week, after she had come up with a mission, she had pushed herself to start researching the gas line installation. She wasn’t ready to jump into the project, but she could start some research.
As she waited for her laptop to turn on, the ugly pile of bills caught her eye. Leo would be so pleased if she made a dent in it. With a decisive frown, she clicked on the Web site for Sounder Health Care. There had to be some way to reset her password.
She tried logging in under her usual password, but it was invalid. She requested a new password and it sent her a link, but when she tried to use it, she was knocked off the site.
“Grr. This is why I hate you so much!” Fired up, she snatched the phone and called the company’s eight-hundred number.
“Thank you for calling Sounder Health Care, where your health needs are our priority,” said the man on the recorded message.
“I don’t think so.” She paced from kitchen to living room.
“Do you know you can pay a premium or settle a claim using our online service?” the recording asked.
“Actually, you can’t, because the Web site won’t let me in.” She knew she sounded like a raving lunatic, but it felt good to argue with the dummy voice.
“Your call will be handled in the order that it is received. You are currently caller number seven.”
“Lucky seven. You’d just better answer before you close shop.” On Saturdays the “helpline” was only staffed until one p.m. She wondered if Janet, her “personal rep,” would really be taking her call on a Saturday.
She sat down at the little desk and leafed through the invoices, trying to stack them in order.
One pile was for Annabelle. None of the bills from Annie’s pediatrician had been paid because Sounder claimed to have no record of her birth. Chelsea had sent them the birth certificate five times. Five maddening trips to the grocery store to use the photocopy machine.
And then there were Chelsea’s bills, rejected for a variety of reasons. Somehow she had been added to the policy as Chelsea Green—Leo’s last name—though she had always been Chelsea Maynard. The company refused to pay for the C-section surgeon, saying the procedure wasn’t preapproved, though it had been an emergency.
Chelsea nibbled on a cuticle as she waded through the bills. Eventually, the company would pay these; she knew that. The frustrating part was that she had to waste her time and energy taking them to task on every invoice.
After twenty minutes of waiting and pacing, her neck and shoulders ached and she fantasized about the scathing letter of complaint she would write to the president of Sounder.
After nearly thirty minutes, a female voice answered. “This is Janet. . . .”
My personal rep.
“How may I help you?”
“I have a mountain of medical bills that need to be straightened out because your company keeps rejecting all our claims,” Chelsea said, trying to temper her anger. “There’s so much paperwork here, I don’t even know where to start.”
“Let’s start with your name and policy number,” the woman said smoothly.
Chelsea paced impatiently as she recited reams of personal information. Insured’s name. Policy numbers and Social Security numbers. Dates of birth and employers. Address, phone, and cell. “Do we really have to go over all this, when I have a stack of claims to straighten out?”
“We need to confirm that you are who you say you are, Mrs. Green.”
“Well, for starters, I’m not Mrs. Green. My name is Chelsea Maynard.”
“Mmm. I see some documentation about a name change here.” A pause, and then Janet added, “I’m not sure who handled this before, but there’s a note from the underwriters saying that you need to supply us with a copy of the court order changing your name to Chelsea Maynard.”
“I have always been Chelsea Maynard.”
“Is that your maiden name?”
Maiden name was such an archaic term. “You people were the ones who insisted on calling me Chelsea Green, just because Green is my husband’s last name. It was your mistake and you need to fix it.”
“Where I was raised, a woman changed her name when she got married.” The Sounder representative sounded smug, judgmental. “Are you and Mr. Green legally married?”
Chelsea pressed a hand to her head, trying to keep her comments in check. Yelling at Janet would only slow down the process.
“Next claim . . .” Chelsea picked up the stack of claims for Annabelle and asked if she had been added to their policy yet.
“Annabelle’s birth certificate was scanned in, but not processed yet,” Janet said, as if she were proud to have found the information.
“What does that mean?”
“Processing takes two to four weeks.”
“Another four weeks?” Chelsea tossed Annabelle’s claims into the air. “She’ll be four months old! The kid will be out of diapers by the time you pay a cent for her!”
“That’s our procedure.” Janet’s voice was deathly calm. “We have to authenticate a document before adding a child to a policy.”
“It’s ludicrous!” Tears stung Chelsea’s eyes. “Just as insane as refusing to pay for an emergency C-section!”
“If you are referring to a claim, you need to give me the claim number.”
Through her tears, Chelsea read off the number on the printed form.
“It’s the coding that’s the problem,” Janet explained. “This procedure wasn’t coded as an emergency surgery, so we’re not contractually obliged to pay for it. Elective surgery requires thirty days approval time.”
Defeated, Chelsea collapsed on the sofa. “I was splayed open on the operating table like a filleted fish,” she said, her voice low and hollow. “My uterus was outside my body. Inside out. And I was awake and shaking and sick when I should have been welcoming my baby into the world.”
A sob rolled from her throat, and for a moment she forgot about the woman on the phone and cried for the woman who felt like she was dying while the object of her dreams, the baby she had carried inside and tried to nurture, was beyond her reach, experiencing the world away from her mother.
She cried for herself. She cried for the baby who had been taken from her womb and somehow had never reconnected with her.
Her thoughts were far distant when the voice on the phone brought her back.
“Listen to what I am saying.” Janet spok
e slowly, like a condescending first grade teacher. “The charges and procedure need to be properly coded and resubmitted.”
“Why can’t you change the code yourself? Just fix it, please.”
“I don’t have the authority to do that. Your doctor needs to sign off on it.”
“Are you fucking kidding me? The doctors don’t even sign these bills when they’re submitted electronically.”
“Let me remind you that I don’t make the rules. I am an employee of Sounder Health Care.”
“This is how the contract goes. I pay my premiums and you pay my medical expenses. You pay to take care of my baby and me when we have medical needs . . . and you can’t withhold payment.”
“We’ll be happy to pay when the coding is corrected.”
“Oh, it will be corrected. And then, then you’ll pay through the nose. You’ll be paying for my shrink, because I’m depressed and delusional.” The fury frightened Chelsea, but she couldn’t stop now. “That’s right. Your company has driven me crazy! I keep seeing my baby die a hundred different ways, and I’ve considered ending my own life. I almost crashed my car into a concrete post. How would Sounder like that? Maybe I won’t die and . . . and your company will have to pay to keep me suspended in a vegetative state. How about that? Or do you not have a code for brain-dead?”
After a pert silence, the rep continued. “I see here that you’re on Nebula for postpartum depression. How is that working?”
“It’s helping a little . . . I don’t know. Are you a doctor?”
“Ms. Maynard . . . Chelsea . . . I understand that you’re upset. You sound absolutely overwhelmed. Maybe your husband should handle these insurance matters. Can you put him on?”
“My husband has a full-time job and he’s leaving town Monday and . . . I’m trying to handle this if you would just do your job and help me.”
“I would like to help you, but I can only process what I’ve been given. You need to get your doctor to resubmit some of these invoices, and then there’s the matter of your name change.”
“I never changed my name!”
All She Ever Wanted Page 7
