“Thank you for being with me.”
“Is there anything I can do?” But I knew there wasn’t. Bitty did it all when her babies had to come. In the case of birth, it’s all up to the mother.
We moved forward and jerked back for maybe two hours like that in the back of that bus through the streets of Ventura, past the neat homes and small lawns, seeing everything through big, smeared windows and the smell of diesel and the sound of grinding gears making us raise our voices whenever we wanted to talk and the rumbling of the motor underneath our seats. At the top of Foothill we looked out over the city, the sun a dimming orange glow on the horizon. It was almost dark. The streetlights had come on.
“Clara,” I said again. “Do you still like Christopher Feeney?”
“Oh, Annie.”
“Because you shouldn’t.”
“You’re sweet, Annie.”
“He should be so lucky to have you.”
“You can’t help how you feel about someone.”
“Stop feeling anything about him. He’s not good for you.”
“I can’t decide if I want to tell him. When, eventually, he sees the baby.” She opened her mouth and exhaled with a deep sound. Luckily the motor drowned it out.
Jeez! I thought. Why did I bring up Christopher Feeney?
Just outside the hospital, a young mother with long dark hair stepped up onto the bus. She had her baby tied around the front of her with a cloth, like a kangaroo. She saw Clara right away and sat down next to us.
We both looked at the mother longingly. She probably had a husband and was going home to him now.
“Hello,” she said to Clara.
“Hi,” Clara said. I looked over at her. A shimmer of sweat covered her neck and face. Her legs were still spread apart in the most unladylike position, but Clara wasn’t the least bit self-conscious.
“You’re due then?” the mother said. The baby was sound asleep right up against her chest. Clara nodded.
“Are you… can you feel it coming already?”
“I’m having Braxton Hicks.”
“Wow, you just missed the hospital stop. Do you want me to… The driver would probably stop for you. I could just tell him you’re…” This lady surprised me. She was so demure and shy looking. The last thing I would have guessed she’d do would be tell a bus driver to stop and go back.
“No, no. I’m doing fine,” Clara protested. “Did you have a boy or a girl?”
“A girl,” the mother said, looking extremely proud of herself. “Marissa.”
“Congratulations,” Clara said. “She’s beautiful.”
“Yeah, way to go,” I said. I held my thumb up.
“Did you give birth at this hospital?” Clara asked.
“No, we were in Port Hueneme. At the naval hospital there.”
Oh, so she’s a Navy wife, I thought. Lucky her. With a Navy husband, who loves her and can provide for her. And probably a really cute dog. Maybe a Daschund. I like those.
“How was it?” Clara said right away. And I thought, what is a bashful lady like that going to say about the birth of her daughter? She’s gonna say, “fine.”
“I don’t remember much,” the bashful lady said. “I was in labor, like you are. It seemed like the baby was going to be born. Then they gave me Twilight Sleep. When I woke up my little girl was already born!” She seemed pleased with that.
It surprised me. I wanted to know everything about what it was like, but what was there to ask? They had erased her baby’s birth from her mind for her whole life. Anyway, it wasn’t exactly casual conversation, what really goes on during the birth of a baby. It’s another one of those secrets that everybody knows about, but nobody talks about.
I looked at the mother’s pretty face. She had thick lips with dark red lipstick. I could see the slight trace of a bruise on her cheek under the pancake makeup. Maybe she walked into a door in the middle of the night when the baby needed a bottle and she was on the way to the kitchen.
“How old is your baby?” I finally asked. It was a pretty safe question.
“Three months,” she said, stroking her baby’s head.
Wow, three months, I thought. If we could just get through this birth. If I could just see Clara signing the birth certificate. If the baby would just come out healthy and not die, like Mother’s did. If only we were at three months already.
“You’ll be going to the hospital soon, won’t you?” she said to Clara, as she gathered her bag and stood up. She looked worried, and I wasn’t sure what was going on.
Clara said, “I don’t want to go to the hospital. At least not yet.” So we waved. Have a nice life, I beamed at Baby Marissa, with your own Mom and Dad. Instead of going out the back door, Shy Mama walked up to the front of the bus and said something to Santiago. He looked in the rear-view mirror and our eyes met. Then she got off the bus at the top of Foothill with a bunch of other passengers, probably on their way to dinner. Suddenly, I was hungry.
“Clara, you want something to eat?” I asked.
But she had gone somewhere, inside herself, far away. Even though she was right next to me, it was as if I was a piece of furniture she could see out of the corner of her eye; she knew I was there and I had my function, but that was it. We rode together in silence. At the next stop, the bus driver put on the brake and walked to the back, straight to Clara. By this time, Clara was normal again, smiling.
“How are you two doing back here?” he said cheerfully, but I could see concern in his eyes. He was checking us out, trying to decide something. I felt the same way: confusion, urgency, and yet the need to act normal, like there’s nothing out of the ordinary.
“We are doing great!” Clara smiled at him confidently.
“You just let me know,” he said, and returned to the driver’s seat.
“Thanks, Santiago,” I said heartily. And then a question occurred to me. Is it possible to die at birth?
I could sense the tiniest feeling in my stomach that had nothing to do with eating. I didn’t want the feeling to grow at all. In Clara’s presence I had been safe, but now I could see she needed me to be her eyes and ears. It was something I began to realize. I had been counting on her to tell me when we should get off the bus. I didn’t know what she had in mind. Did she think that having the baby on the bus would be okay? Suddenly I felt like I needed to protect her. How could she think straight with those contractions going on all the time? Maybe we should go in. Just in case. The bus was on the way back to the street in front of the hospital. I didn’t know what to do. In our case, the hospital was a dangerous place. They could steal the baby. They knew what they were doing and they had it all worked out.
“Clara,” I said. “Do you think we should go in now? The hospital is coming up. It’s the next stop.” It was as if she could barely hear me. Like we were on opposite sides of the same pasture that extended across the horizon with mountains in the background. When she heard me, she heard me from far away. Just then she cried out, like she had been startled out of a scary dream. I panicked and pulled the line that told the bus driver to get off at the next stop. Santiago scanned the mirror. I was so glad that I could motion for him to come. He slowed immediately, but it seemed like forever before the bus stopped. Right outside the hospital, Santiago put the brake and the flashers on and jumped down off his seat. Then he ran to the back. He was a big man, clomping down the skinny aisle, pushing his girth through the few passengers who were left in their seats.
“Here,” he said, grabbing ahold of Clara. They struggled down the steps. At the sidewalk, she held Santiago around the neck and leaned onto him heavily, staring at no one, her body relaxed against him as another contraction came and went.
“I’ll go get someone,” I offered. Now I was afraid. My heart was beating in my throat as I ran through the double glass doors at the entrance to the hospital. At the reception desk, a nurse looked up at me. She had a wide face and a stern look. She reminded me of that famous photo of Florence Nightinga
le, a smart woman and a brave nurse I admired from history. In the photo, she stared right at you like she never learned to blink.
“It’s my sister,” I said, trying to keep my voice calm. “I think she’s having her baby now.” By this time Santiago had brought her in, draped over his shoulder. Someone came out with a wheelchair and tried to sit Clara down in the chair. But Clara wanted to stand. Santiago shook her hand and waved at me and ran back to his bus like there was a barking bloodhound at those big feet.
“Thank you, Santiago!” I called after him. Then I remembered what Clara had told me about registering with the Sisters of Saint Isabella.
“I’ll have to register her,” the nurse said, as if reading my mind.
“I can do that for her,” I offered. “She’s right in the middle of labor, I think.” I looked over at Clara. She was holding onto the back of the wheelchair for support. Her eyes were all glazed over. Nightingale’s expression didn’t change. In all the pictures taken in the 1800’s, people were not reminded to smile.
“I’ll need her signature,” she said.
“I can sign for her.” I cleared my throat, trying to sound official. “I’m her sister.”
“No, she’ll have to sign for herself.”
“What for?”
“To admit her. It’s the procedure.”
“Oh,” I said. “What if she was unconscious when she was admitted? How would you get her signature?”
“She’s not unconscious.”
“Right.” So then she asked who would be responsible for the costs of Clara’s stay, and so then I had to admit she had been living at the Mission with the Sisters. Nightingale picked up the phone and dialed a number by heart.
“I have a young mother here who is checking in. She could be in labor already.” A pause as she listened.
“What’s the name?” the nurse asked me directly, holding the phone to her ear.
“Clara Kathleen Shea,” I said feeling an odd sense of pride as I heard my sister’s name out loud in the air.
“Clara Shea,” Nightingale said into the phone. “Is she one of yours?” She nodded and wrote something down on the pad, and hung up. I watched her carefully as she filled out an empty form.
“What are you staring at?” Nightingale said without looking up.
You. I thought silently. No one could be trusted. I recognized the same skepticism I felt when I thought Aaron Solomon might have been a mass murderer.
“What’s her birthday?” The nurse asked.
“February 2nd,” I said.
“What year?”
I had to ask Clara, so I walked over to her by the wheelchair.
“I don’t want to be here, Annie. I was doing just fine on the bus. Why did you bring me in?” When she said that, I felt a rushing sensation inside me, like a surge of water splashing over the rocks at a waterfall. I was in the middle of the ocean and the waves were breaking over my head in huge swells. I had to make sure I got enough air. Maybe I made the wrong decision on the bus. Now that we were here at the hospital, they could put her to sleep just like that. I had to make sure they didn’t tie her down. I had to swim or else we would both drown.
“Mother always went to the hospital,” I said. It was the last thought I had before I pulled the line on the bus to stop. Maybe there was a good reason that Mother felt better in the hospital.
“Mother is married, Annie. They didn’t want her babies.”
Chapter 33
the hospital
Dear Saint Clare, Your namesake is going to become a mother any minute now. This is an emergency and I’m officially casting myself at your feet. I need some help here, but I think Jesus and Mary might have gone on vacation.
“I’ll look out for you, Clara, I promise. Tell them you don’t want the drug.” Just then another contraction grabbed a hold of her and she fell down onto her knees. I knelt down next to her.
“Right now, they just need the year of your birth so they can register you,” I said. Clara got up off her knees. She exhaled.
“1946. I’m almost 18.” That was her signal to me. I had to be a strong swimmer for both of us.
Nightingale brought the form out to Clara, but I insisted on reading it first. It had Clara’s name, birth date, doctor’s initials, and the Mission’s address. Under “Parent/Guardian” it said, “The Sisters of Saint Isabella.” There was nothing on the paper that said “I give up my baby for adoption.”
“She’s keeping her baby,” I said to the nurse, as she handed the paper to Clara to sign. “So she won’t sign this if it says anything about adoption.” The nurse looked at me, and a thought crossed her face. But it was a thought, and thoughts are silent.
“If you just sign the paper,” the nurse said directly to Clara, “we can bring you in and take care of you.”
“It doesn’t say anything about giving up your baby for adoption,” I told Clara. “I read it carefully; I think it’s safe to sign. Maybe you should write that in.” So Clara wrote, “I am keeping my baby. I don’t want to put it up for adoption.” She underlined that and signed the paper.
Nightingale went back to her desk. She came back with a thin band in plastic that she fastened around Clara’s wrist. I remembered that from when Mother came home from the hospital. Usually when the baby came home in Mother’s arms, the baby had a bracelet, too, made out of beads that spelled “Baby Girl Shea.” I guess the hospital gets really busy so people forget their names or something. However, it was a small thing that had the effect of comforting me a little. At least Clara’s name would not be lost here. And when the baby came, I would have to make sure they put the same name on the baby’s arm.
Another nurse grabbed hold of the wheelchair. She smiled at Clara, and for some reason Clara sat down. Then she started pushing Clara down the hall.
“You can wait out here,” the nurse said to me. “I’ll take her now.”
“I want her with me,” Clara managed to say, straining her head around and up to the nurse behind her.
“They won’t let anyone in the labor room,” the nurse said.
“I know that,” Clara said. “I don’t care. I want her with me.”
“She can come along while we get you prepped,” the nurse said. We went into a small room, and the nurse told Clara to take off her clothes and put on a yellow gown with ties at the back. Then the nurse went out of the room. It was the same kind of gown that Mutter Man was wearing when he fell over and crashed his pole at this very hospital, when we were all here to see Bee Bee. I helped Clara take her clothes off. When her huge stomach was bare it seemed to fill up the small space we were in. I had to touch it. It was so firm. I tried to imagine where the baby was, but it just seemed like a beach ball to me. I was simply amazed at how much human flesh can stretch.
When I leaned over to pick up Clara’s pants, I caught a glimpse of her hair, down there, underneath her baby belly. Even though Clara was a brunette, down there, her hair was a dark red. It was weird. For the first time in my life, I felt proud of my red hair.
The nurse came back in the room. She seemed sweet in comparison to Nightingale. She helped Clara get up on the high padded table and eased her onto her back. On either side of the table at the end, two small metal things shaped like a basket on a stick seemed to be standing watch.
“Is this where she’s having the baby?” I asked.
“No, we’re just going to examine her and prep her for the labor room.”
“Are you our nurse?” I asked.
“Well, I am your nurse for the next few minutes, at least,” she answered. “We’re changing shifts and it’s time for me to go home.” So I named this nurse Nice Nurse, since she was so sweet and I wouldn’t be required to remember her name.
“Move your body down to the end of the bed and put your feet in the stirrups, honey,” she said with gentleness in her voice.
Stirrups! What an odd name for something that has to do with a baby being born.
As soon as the doctor came i
n, there was a flurry of activity. Clara was moved onto a bed with wheels and taken to the labor room.
Everything had been going so quickly when we were on the bus, and all of a sudden, it seemed to slow right down. Clara was hurting; I could overhear her in the labor room. I was standing outside the door. Anyone in the whole hospital could hear her; I was sure of it.
“I don’t want Twilight Sleep!” she yelled from a deep voice that I never heard before. Then she was quiet. A minute went by. I looked through the rubber crack in the door. All I could see were the backs of the white jackets worn by the attendants. Even though I couldn’t see her, I knew Clara was in here, lying on her back, her legs spread apart, her feet up in the air. They were moving over her. Then I heard her again.
“Get your hands off me!” she yelled. I heard more scurrying and straining. The doctors and nurses always spoke to each other quietly, and so from my vantage point, Clara, in contrast, seemed out of control.
Why can’t she just ask them nicely? I heard myself thinking. She sounded like she was crazy, even to me.
I felt sick to my stomach. It was my fault for bringing her here. I should have taken her out when Nice Nurse began to soap up her red hair.
“Hair is not sterile,” Nice Nurse had said. “Don’t worry, it’s just the usual procedure.” I could see the shaver over there and we both knew what she was planning to do. It seemed like the most humiliating thing that anyone could do to Clara at this moment. I kept seeing Bitty licking the heads of her kittens, with her leg way over her head. I couldn’t imagine how shaving might figure in to that. I also knew from having shaved off my own hairs when they first surprised me by growing in down there that shaved hairs are hard and prickly and itchy when they grow back. In spite of this, neither of us stopped the nurse from shaving Clara.
The worst thing was, suddenly I couldn’t muster the courage to do anything other than what they wanted, and I wasn’t sure it was good for Clara. Once I gave in to signing Clara in, once Clara gave in to being pushed in the wheelchair, once I didn’t say anything when they shaved her, it became more and more difficult to assert myself on her behalf.
A Theory of Expanded Love Page 25
