The Four Seasons

by Mary Alice Monroe

  When she’d arrived back at her own home she remained on the sidewalk, her coat collar up close around her neck and her small hands tucked tightly under her armpits. She tried to look at the Victorian with the same dispassionate eye she’d looked at the neighboring ones. Mrs. Kasparov’s list of flaws came to mind, and though it rankled, they were all too true. On the block, their house was the eyesore, the shabby one that prompted neighbors to say, “What a shame. If only they would fix it up.” It was a shadowy, melancholy house that sat on a huge double lot on the corner, hidden by overgrown pines and a forest of shaggy shrubs. Light flowed through torn shades or missing blinds, adding to the somber sense of depression.

  Looking at it now, she found it hard to remember when happiness flowed bright from these dreary windows, or when the family had lived and laughed and talked in those darkened rooms. Merry had been the last flicker of light in the old house and now that, too, had been snuffed out. The old Victorian appeared exactly as it was—a house of secrets. Suppressing a sigh, she walked up the front steps and slipped, unnoticed, into the house.

  Hours later, the house was deathly quiet, save for the melodic clanging of the five-note wind chimes outside her window. Rose sat alone in the blanketing solitude of her room while the computer whirred. She opened the side drawer to her desk and pulled out a file from far in the back where no idle eyes would find it. It was a plain manila file with only the initials D.B. on it. DannyBoy. Copies of his e-mails were inside. Not love letters—theirs wasn’t that kind of relationship. She thought of them as letters from her dearest friend. By the time the computer had booted, the words were ready to spill out of her. Laying her hands on the keys, she took a deep breath and typed.

  Dear DannyBoy,

  Tonight I feel a despair that frightens me. I feel I am nothing of value. My sister Merry at least depended on me but now she is gone. My older sisters have their own lives that do not include me. Soon they will leave, too. Even this house, which had once been my haven, feels hostile and forbidding. But no matter, because I, too, must leave. The four Seasons have been cast to the wind.

  I’m sitting here in the darkness, listening to the wind chimes outside my window and waiting for the dawn. I’m reminded of Emily Dickinson’s “slant of light,” and wonder to myself where nothing goes after death?

  Rosebud

  An e-mail came almost immediately.

  Dear Rosebud,

  Don’t you dare despair. Turn on the lights!

  I swore I wasn’t going to do this. We’ve been chatting online for a long time, though we’ve only talked privately like this for a few weeks. I think of us as friends. I hope you do, too. So I hope you won’t think I’m one of those Internet creeps when I say this, but I get the sense I better tell you now.

  I drive a truck all day through town after town. The miles roll beneath me and I have to tell you, it gets pretty lonely. One day is pretty much like the next. The roads are always crowded and some of the drivers are nuts. It’s not like the old days when the road stretched out before me.

  But lately, I know when the day is done and I park my rig that it’ll be okay because I’ll find a letter from you waiting for me. I don’t know what you mean by that “slant of light,” but I can tell you that your letters are the bright point of my day. I don’t have any wind chimes outside my cab, either, but your words are music to a lonely man.

  You think you are nothing? You are something! Real special. I feel lucky just to know you. Like I said, I’m no nutcase and I don’t mean to get too personal, so don’t worry.

  DannyBoy

  Rose put her hands to her heated cheeks and laughed out loud. She couldn’t write much, afraid that she might get maudlin and start getting really, really personal. So to ease his mind, and because she sensed he was waiting for a reply from her, she wrote again.

  Good night DannyBoy.

  I’ll sleep well, now.

  Your friend, Rosebud

  Down the hall, Jilly lay in her twin bed staring at the ceiling. So they’d known all along, she thought with chagrin. Even Merry. For years her sisters had whispered about her secret. Guess what? Jilly had a baby! Mother had explained it to them. Jilly always was the wild one, you know. You don’t want to end up like Jilly. Did they know that in all those years she never once allowed herself to think of it? Never once so much as breathed the words in her sleep? The nuns at Marian House had promised her redemption if she pretended that it had never happened, it being the scandalous, sinful cycle of conception, pregnancy and birth outside the sacrament of marriage. She’d lowered a veil over that episode of her life, a black fog of forgetfulness so impenetrable that, as the years passed, she actually fooled herself into believing none of it had ever happened.

  Occasionally, over the years, something insignificant would trigger a memory: the sight of an infant in a carriage, the smell of cafeteria food, the sound of rain on the window in the early morning. Jilly would dismiss the memory with a quick shake of her head and a willful command of her mind to think of something else. She’d cast the memory into the deepest, darkest compartment of her heart, locked it tight and thrown away the key.

  But Merry had managed to open it. Sneakily, when her guard was down, Merry had come forth with this request to search for the child. This Spring. It felt like her ghostly hand was stabbing into Jilly’s chest, wrenching out her heart and rummaging through the myriad compartments, and in doing so, releasing the memories like demons taking flight.

  How wrong Sister Benedict had been! Years of silence were obliterated in one fell swoop by the simple words of a child. Find Spring.

  Now she had to face that it had happened. She had had a baby. And tonight, she knew the memories were waiting, a powerful, relentless army of them, just beyond the ridge of her resistance. Waiting for the moment she fell asleep.

  Then the long-delayed onslaught would begin.

  7

  January 5, 1973

  JILLY WAS SEVENTEEN AND pregnant. She rode in the passenger seat of the black Cadillac Brougham, resting one hand on her gently rounded belly and looking out at the dull, monotonous scenery of Interstate 95 north to upper Wisconsin. The morning was bright and sunny, mocking the dark, brooding mood within the car.

  “Do you need to stop?” Her father kept his eyes on the road. In the past four hours he’d offered little conversation besides brief inquiries as to whether she was hungry or had to use the rest facilities. He wasn’t the talkative type on the best of occasions, and rarely carried on the usual father-daughter banter about such things as school grades, boyfriends or plans for college. The silence today, however, was punitive.

  “No,” she replied, glancing at his stern profile. She felt herself recoil and wanted to weep. “Thank you. I’m okay.” She turned away again, tightening her bladder muscles against the straining urge. She would not ask to stop again so soon after his pithy comment on how this trip was taking forever due to pit stops. She could kick herself for having that soda.

  Despite the long drive, her father maintained his usual crisp and immaculate appearance in his dark suit and pressed white shirt. Next to him she felt like a ragamuffin in a baggy dress and her mother’s old coat. The blue wool wasn’t warm enough for the January cold, but the voluminous A-line style was the only one they had that allowed for Jilly’s expanding waistline. What did it matter what she looked like or how warm it was, she told herself. She didn’t plan on going outside much in the next few months so she would make do with her mother’s hand-me-down.

  She sighed and looked again at the raw bleakness outside her window, feeling each of the miles that separated her from her home and the life she once knew in Illinois, from the carefree high school girl she once was.

  Jilly knew she’d crossed the line from child to woman ever since that evening last November when she walked into her parents’ bedroom, closed the door behind her and quietly told her parents that she was pregnant.

  Her mother had accepted the news with her usual hysteria. />
  “Oh, my God! Pregnant? Oh, my God. You must have been drinking. You were, weren’t you?” she accused, sitting up in bed and pointing. She’d been watching TV and her heavy lids, the slurred words and the telltale empty glass on her bedside table revealed she’d been drinking. “I told you she was drinking,” she’d screeched to her husband, as if it was his fault.

  “Mom, I wasn’t drinking.”

  “How could you have done this to us? I knew you’re irresponsible, you’ve always been. But I didn’t know you were immoral, too! It’s a mortal sin what you’ve done. A mortal sin! And the scandal! Your father is a judge in this city. Did you think about him? Did you think about anyone but yourself?”

  Her mother cried then, not for Jilly, but for herself. “Oh, Bill, I can’t take this. Two daughters ruined.” Then turning back to Jilly she narrowed her eyes and cried, “Your sisters’ reputations will be ruined, too. And so will mine!”

  Her father compressed his lips and didn’t say a word. His thick red brows, streaked with white, furrowed as he slowly closed his magazine and let it drop to the floor.

  Jilly turned her eyes to the ground, embarrassed and ashamed for bringing such scandal to the family. Everyone knew that “good” girls didn’t go all the way. “Good” girls did not get pregnant. Standing there at the foot of their bed, she looked in her parents’ eyes and a part of her died seeing the judgment written there: Jillian Season was not a Good Girl.

  After a short but noisy cry her mother sobered up and spent a while in the bathroom. Jilly glanced at her father to see him staring at her, an odd expression on his face, as though he couldn’t quite believe what he was hearing. How many times had they argued about her curfew in the past? He’d always told her it wasn’t that he didn’t trust her, he didn’t trust the boys she dated.

  “Well, when is the baby due?” her mother asked when she emerged from the bathroom. She had washed her face, brushed her short red-gold hair, and she appeared to have collected her composure. Jilly took heart that they’d have a real conversation instead of histrionics, but her hope wobbled as her mother crossed the room and climbed back into the bed.

  Jilly remained standing. “In early May sometime.”

  “Have you seen a doctor? Really, Jilly, how do you know you’re pregnant?”

  “I went to Planned Parenthood.”

  “Good God,” her mother exclaimed. “That place?” As far as she was concerned, Planned Parenthood’s clinic, located in a poor, dangerous part of town, was a bastion of fanatics—enemies of the Church who offered birth control and abortions to a new, immoral generation that preached free love. And now her daughter was one of them. “Bill…” she said, reaching over to clasp his hand in a dramatic gesture.

  “We’ll send her to Dr. Applebee,” he said, the voice of reason. “Then we’ll get the facts.”

  “I am pregnant. Three months pregnant. I had a blood test and there’s no mistake.”

  The calm authority in her voice, the very fact that she had found her way to Planned Parenthood, had the test done and could report to them this finding, all without their help, took them both by surprise. She could see them look at her differently, more as an adult.

  “Who is the father?” her own father asked.

  “I don’t want to say,” she replied, looking away.

  “Don’t press her just yet,” her mother intervened. “I’m sure she hasn’t gotten used to the idea. I certainly couldn’t believe it when I found out I was having you. I was married, of course,” she said, letting Jilly know that this shift of attitude by no means forgave her. “But was I surprised. Stunned, in fact. I had to give up my dancing career.”

  Jilly knew the worst was over once Mother’s dancing career was mentioned. Her mother cherished her years in the Chicago Ballet Company as the highlight of her life and she never let an opportunity go by when she couldn’t remind them of all she’d given up for her family.

  Once the idea of her pregnancy sunk in, the horror and shock subsided and the concept that they would be grandparents began to take root. Their voices grew solicitous. They painted rosier scenarios. Her parents assumed that she had a special beau, someone she was in love with and wanted to protect. She felt like dirt under their feet as she stood there listening while they calmed down and began talking about how they’d help her—and him—through this ordeal. Abortion was briefly mentioned in an academic sense, but they were Catholic. It wasn’t really an option.

  The kindness was killing her. It was easier when they were mad and yelling at her. At least then she could shut down emotionally. As it was, the guilt was paralyzing.

  “Sit down,” her mother said, patting the mattress. “It bothers me to see you swaying back there. There’s no sense you wearing yourself out, not in your condition.” She put her fingers to her breast. “I can’t believe I just said that! To my own daughter. That’s better. Now, Jilly dear, you’ll have to marry the boy, of course.”

  “Marry him? Mother, I’m—”

  “You’re young, I know. But not that young. Lots of girls get married after high school. You could live here.”

  Jilly could see her mother’s mind whirring with possibilities, not all unpleasant. Ann Season made no secret of her desire for weddings and grandchildren. She never saw much merit in sending a girl off to college, especially one as stunningly beautiful as her eldest.

  “No, I don’t think—”

  “I could redo the third floor to make it into a little apartment for you.”

  “That’s too—”

  “Oh, it’s no trouble. I’ve always meant to do something with that floor. When you were children it was your playroom, but now…” Her eyes lit up. “To think, babies again in the house.”

  “Mom, I didn’t say I was getting married.”

  “But what else can you do? It’s what a girl in your situation must do. Provided he’s a decent enough fellow. Isn’t that right, Bill?”

  He sat very still for a while, pondering not his wife’s question, but several of his own. The hour was late and his eyelids were beginning to droop. Jilly thought he looked very tired and very old. He had married late in life and was an “old” father, never the type interested in sports or goofing around with his kids. His was a reserved, quiet love that was proved in constancy and concern. All the girls felt loved, but knew the one true passion in his life was his wife, Ann. He was old-fashioned; he would take the question of marriage very seriously.

  “Do you want to marry the fellow?” he asked in a sober tone.

  She shook her head. “No, Daddy.”

  Her mother released a puff of frustrated air and sat back against the pillows.

  “Who is the father of the child?” her father asked again. His voice was quiet but she heard the force of his will in the undertone.

  “I can’t say.” She felt inexpressibly weary.

  “Of course you can. What’s his name?”

  “Is it that Connor boy?” her mother interjected. “You went out with him awhile.”

  “No.”

  “Well who?”

  Jilly looked at her hands. “I don’t want to say.”

  “You will say,” her father demanded.

  “I won’t.” Her voice was equally soft and equally firm.

  There was total silence.

  Bill Season studied his eldest daughter, his eyes narrowing in the same manner that she’d seen him scrutinize a witness on the stand in his courtroom. He took his time, letting everyone know he was weighing his decision.

  When she was young, she used to close her eyes when she heard her father talking to a client on the phone. He was so thoughtful, so persuasive. She’d be lulled by the soothing tone of his professional voice. He used that tone now, trying to convince her to tell him the name of the baby’s father.

  “Jillian, you are my eldest daughter. My firstborn. I’ll never forget the pride and joy I felt holding you in my arms the first time. I’m only interested in your welfare. As your father, it’s my
duty to protect you, and my grandchild. And remember, I am your father first, a judge second. So tell me now, who is the baby’s father?”

  It took all her determination, all her love for him, not to give in and tell the truth.

  She didn’t know who the father was.

  She knew who the father could be, but she wasn’t sure. There were two boys she had been with, one from her school, another a college man. Getting pregnant was bad enough, but how could she tell her parents that she’d been with more than one boy? They’d be devastated. Call her a tramp, a whore. They’d cast her out, disown her. But worst of all, she would hurt them more than she already had. She was more afraid to lose their love than she was of losing the baby.

  “I can’t tell you,” she replied.

  After Jilly’s adamant refusal to name the boy, all talk between them came to an abrupt stop. Her father cut her off emotionally. Her mother abandoned all dreams of babies in the attic and stepped in to make the necessary decisions. She could be quite effective when she put her mind to a task. The following morning she contacted Catholic Social Services and, with their help, selected Marian House.

  And that was where she was headed this cold January morning. Jilly leaned her head against the cool glass of the car, recalling the chilling sensation that trickled through her blood when she heard the words—Marian House: A Home for Unwed Mothers. It had the same foreign sound, the same illicit and dangerous association as a home for juvenile delinquents. Juvie Hall. Those names were whispered as a threat to naughty children. “You’d better be good or you’ll go to Juvie Hall.” Or, “If you fool around, you’ll end up in a Home for Unwed Mothers.” There wasn’t much difference between them, not in most minds. Whichever one you went to implied you’d broken some law, that you were unfit and had to be removed from society.

  As she stared out at the barren trees and the vast, isolated, snow-covered fields of northern Wisconsin, she shivered in her thin coat and wondered what Marian House would be like. There were no brochures for her to browse through or interviews granted. No one asked her opinion. Jilly was being sent.