Postcards From Last Summer

by Roz Bailey

  PART THREE

  And Baby Makes Six

  Summer 1999

  56

  Darcy

  “Oh, look! Another one-piece snap-crotch thingy,” Darcy said, holding up the cotton garment, so tiny it seemed impossible that a human body could squeeze into it. This one was striped, in yellow, lime and emerald green, with a trainfull of little animals riding one of the stripes across what would be the baby’s belly.

  “Another set of onesies . . . from Nancy!” Lindsay said, dutifully jotting down the neighbor’s name on the gift list so that Darcy could be sure to write her a thank-you note. “And that, I think”—Lindsay kicked at a few mounds of crumpled gift wrap on the floor—“is the last of the gifts. So we’ll put the coffee on and let the guys in.” Boyfriends had been sent down the street to wait out the first part of the shower at Coney’s “because the sight of diapers and breast pumps makes single men run for the border,” Lindsay had insisted, and as the shower’s planner and host, she seemed to know best.

  “Thank you so much . . . everyone,” Darcy said sincerely. Before today she’d had no idea half of these things existed, no sense that she wouldn’t be able to survive the next six months without a breast pump from a college friend or an ear thermometer from Mrs. McCorkle’s neighbor or an Exersaucer from Elle. How could she have known that the hospital wouldn’t release her infant without a proper car seat, which the baby would promptly outgrow in six months? It was all a tad overwhelming and extremely alienating for Darcy, who couldn’t imagine that this bold, nudging ball growing inside her was going to really make its way out as a baby she loved.

  “Don’t they just warm your heart? There’s nothing like little baby clothes.” Mary Grace McCorkle sat down beside Darcy and began refolding baby garments that spilled out of gift boxes. “Of course, you’ll want to wash them all first, in a special detergent. Some baby skin can’t tolerate our harsh detergents.”

  Darcy had been planning to leave the tags on. “I was thinking that I might have to return some of the gifts that were duplicated,” she said quietly, so other guests wouldn’t hear. The breast pump looked like a Gothic torture device, and what baby would need wardrobe changes to warrant all these outfits? “You know, like, who needs twelve onesies?”

  “You will, my dear. Just wait and see.” With a laugh, Mary Grace reached over and patted Darcy’s cheek. “Babies soil their diapers and spit up so often, you’ll be amazed at how many times you’ll reach for a new outfit. Could be one every hour.”

  “Really?” A dirty diaper every hour? Was this Wonder Ball inside her really going to wreak a path of destruction on the cute Calvin Klein boxers Kevin’s mother had sent? Darcy couldn’t imagine anything that came from her body messing in its diaper every hour, but then, lately, she’d had lots of trouble imagining her future.

  In a brief flash of sanity last fall she’d realized she had only eight months left to get her bachelor’s degree sans baby, and so she’d pushed on at Hunter College through morning sickness and maternity clothes and weekly ob-gyn appointments scheduled around classes and final exams. Her June due date seemed to spark a deadline unlike any she’d faced at Bennington, and so she’d attended every class, completed every project and paper. In the spring production of Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet she was cast as the nurse, and though she brought a more youthful approach to the role than most people envisioned, she felt that it was balanced with due authority toward her young charge. That production had been a turning point for Darcy, the readings and rehearsals, opening night and maintaining energy for every performance. She was well suited for the rhythm and excitement of theater; getting paying work after the baby was another story, but for now it was exciting thinking of the possibilities as an actress.

  “Isn’t this precious?” Lindsay’s mother held up a navy velvet jumpsuit with a white collar, the Little Lord Fauntleroy outfit Darcy’s mother had sent, gift-wrapped from Saks. “Too bad your mom couldn’t be here,” Mrs. Mick said, squeezing Darcy’s arm.

  “It’s a shame,” Darcy said, though she was actually relieved her mother had called to decline the shower invitation, claiming she had a previous engagement. They’d had some explosive arguments when her mother first heard about the baby in late September. Melanie Love was angry at Darcy for screwing up her birth control pills, furious that she was planning to have the baby and keep it, disappointed that she wasn’t going to marry Kevin. “What am I supposed to do with you?” her mother had asked at one point, as if she couldn’t bear the inconvenience of having a pregnant daughter in her life. By October, Melanie Love made it clear that she had no plan to remain attached to her daughter when she put the Great Egg house up for sale and purchased a one-bedroom co-op on Madison Avenue. “I really couldn’t afford a two-bedroom,” she explained to Darcy, “and besides, it’s time for you to make your own way. Especially if you’re going to start a family.”

  Thank God for the McCorkles. Lindsay had driven her Saturn out to Great Egg, packed Darcy’s possessions inside it, and moved her into the McCorkles’ Brooklyn home, where Mrs. Mick was delighted to have not just another mouth to feed, but one who was eating for two. Hunter College, on the upper east side of Manhattan, was an easier commute from Brooklyn, and after two weeks with the McCorkles Darcy could feel the stress draining from her body. Mrs. Mick seemed so appreciative of the smallest things—picking up milk from the deli, helping with the dishes, inviting her to catch a matinee at the multiplex, and Lindsay seemed to enjoy catching up with her best friend each day when she came home from work.

  The winter months had passed quickly as Darcy focused on staying healthy, drinking skim milk, and attacking her schoolwork. Life with the McCorkles had been wonderful . . . but Darcy knew things would change once she had the baby. Mrs. McCorkle was happy to have her stay on, but living arrangements were the least of Darcy’s worries.

  Motherhood was the problem.

  With the baby due in a month, Darcy had expected to feel some sort of maternal feelings, a welcoming glow toward her infant. Unfortunately, whenever talk of diapers and baby baths and nursing came up, any mothering instinct was chased off by feelings of inexperience and inadequacy.

  How could this baby come to her if she didn’t love it?

  At first she’d thought it was just her lack of exposure to children that bugged her, so she checked out a dozen books from the library and researched contemporary mothering. She learned that breastfeeding could provide the baby with extra immunities, that baby powder could actually harm the baby’s lungs, that the cords of blinds were hazardous to toddlers . . .

  But none of these facts could make her feel any love for her baby.

  And now, with all these women gathered here to celebrate the new life coming into the world, Darcy felt like a fraud, a flimsy actress propped up to play the mommy role, only to disappoint her audience.

  Would she ever start feeling some sort of attachment for the shifting noodge in her belly?

  She was afraid not. And the idea of playing out the same flawed relationship she had with her own mother was devastating. She was jarred from her painful thoughts when Nancy, Mrs. Mick’s neighbor, took the seat beside her with a plate loaded with desserts.

  “You okay, little mommy?” Nancy asked. “You look overwhelmed.”

  “Just amazed at all these gifts,” Darcy lied. “You guys shouldn’t have gone to so much trouble.”

  Really, they shouldn’t have, because Darcy knew that cold, detached mothers like her mother, like the mother she was becoming, didn’t deserve any of this.

  57

  Lindsay

  “Behold, the Diaper Genie—magical processor of poop!” Skeeter Fogarty lifted the plastic contraption, which reminded me of a lunar space module for a mouse, and placed it on the table with a grin. The presents had been opened, the sparkling cider served, and most everyone at Darcy’s baby shower had finished eating, and the conversation paused now as Skeeter captured the guests’ attention. “I shall demon
strate. God knows, I’ve packed enough of these with my kids’ diapers. Does anyone here have a doody?”

  “I do!” His brother Johnny pressed his right hand over his chest. “I was a Boy Scout. I promised to do my duty, every day.”

  “Not that kind of doody, you bonehead.” Skeeter rolled his eyes. “We’ll have to improvise. Okay, so what else can we stuff in? Old socks? Styrofoam packing chips? Mrs. McCorkle’s Irish meatballs? Just kidding, Mrs. Mick. Okay, so you start by opening the hatch here, stuff in the baby’s poopy diaper, though in this case these packing peanuts will work just fine. Press ’em in as far as you can—really get your arm in there. Then you put this little top on, twist and . . . voila! No smelly diapers in sight!”

  People clapped and laughed.

  “But wait!” Skeeter interrupted.

  “There’s more!” Johnny added.

  “The next time you got a doody diaper, you pop it in, twist the top, and just go about your business.” He demonstrated with balled-up gift wrap, repeating three more times. “Easy as that, folks. And then, here’s my favorite part, the final product.” Skeeter opened the hatch on the bottom of the Diaper Genie and pulled out a string of white plastic bulges. “Sausage links.”

  “Only it’s not really sausage,” Johnny added. “So don’t eat it.”

  “Stanky! Who’d want to eat lumps of baby poo?”

  “You called it a sausage. Lots of people eat sausage links. I love those little half-smokes.”

  “Speak for yourself,” Skeeter said to his brother. “Personally, I like my links full size, if you know what I mean . . .”

  “Okay, guys, let’s keep it clean,” Steve McCorkle interrupted, taking the diaper machine from Skeeter and walking it over to the heap of gifts.

  “Who invited them?” I asked Ma as I stacked empty paper plates.

  “Everyone is welcome at the McCorkle house, you know that.” My mother laughed at the demonstration as she adjusted the brakes on the Rolls Royce of strollers and moved it behind the couch. “You boys are too much!”

  “I have a trick I can do, if anyone can loan me a fifty dollar bill. Anyone interested?” Skeeter announced, but people shook their heads. “Oh, come on. What have you got to lose, besides fifty bucks?”

  Watching them joke around, I felt a sore spot for Bear. Of all Steve’s friends, why was he the one who’d left town and shacked up with some girl in Hawaii? “Bear’s got an island bride,” Skeeter was saying one day in the lineup, much to my alarm. “He truly is the Great Kahouna.” When I went to Steve for verification, he just shrugged. “I don’t know. I think he would have mentioned if he got hooked up with her. Why? Did you want to send a blender or something?”

  It would be two years, this September.

  Sure, I had moved on, and I was dating a really great guy now, but I still missed Bear. Maybe because we’d been friends, too.

  “I hope you boys appreciate all the work that went into this affair.” My mother pretended to scold Skeeter as he helped himself from the buffet table. “My Irish meatballs included.”

  I grabbed an empty tray and headed into the kitchen. “At least we managed to keep them out until after all the gifts were opened,” I told Tara, who was gathered at the kitchen table with her boyfriend, John Sharkey. They sat across from Milo and Darcy, the four of them lapping up the last of the Coney’s Banana Flambé that I had made for the group.

  “I like this new tradition of having men at baby showers,” Ma said as she rinsed glasses in the kitchen sink. “In my day, it was all women, and the amount of oohs and aahs over each little pacifier that was opened was enough to put a person in sugar shock.”

  “I think that’s how showers still go in my family, Mrs. McCorkle,” Sharkey said. Tara had met attorney John Sharkey through her father almost six months ago, and much to Mr. and Mrs. Washington’s delight, one date had evolved into a steady relationship. I found Sharkey very entertaining, always regaling us with tales of people he’d helped and injustices he’d righted. An active proponent for equal rights, Sharkey had emerged over the years as a spokesman for African Americans at rallies and marches, boycotts and fundraisers. While Tara agreed with his mission in theory, she had confided to us that he sometimes made her feel guilty for not being as involved in the campaign as he was. Today he was in fine form.

  “In my family,” he went on, “men are kept away from the business of child rearing, and that’s fine by me. My sisters have had three babies in the last five years, and they wouldn’t let me within a mile of the baby showers. That’s female business.”

  “And did the dads help in the delivery room?” Tara asked.

  “You kidding me? They want nothing to do with it. My brother-in-law, Vince, he thought he’d step up and help my sister out, but one look at Mother Nature and he was out. That brother went down—all two hundred pounds of him.”

  Ma and I exchanged an amused look. “I hope I can hold it together for you, Darcy,” I said. Darcy had asked me to be her labor coach, and we’d been attending childbirth classes together—a new experience for both of us. We practiced the breathing techniques in class with a great deal of skepticism. One day Darcy even raised her hand and asked, “Can’t we all just get a whopping dose of pain meds?”

  “Just make sure you’re there,” Darcy told me now. “I’m not going to be very kind when some nurse tells me to blow tiny breaths and forget that my body is being torn in half.”

  “Can we not go there?” Wincing, Milo dropped a fork onto his empty plate. “I swear, men just aren’t built to tolerate thoughts like that.”

  “I’m with you, Milo,” Sharkey agreed. “When I’m a father, I’ll be quite content to wait outside with a box of cigars.”

  “You’re so old school,” Tara teased him.

  He pushed away from the table and untucked his tie from his shirt pocket. “You got that right. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I’m going out front to talk about manly things. Baseball and circular saws. Not to mention Brownie Beaver. My nieces will be devastated if I don’t get an autograph.” Elle was outside with her boyfriend Ricardo, who played a beaver on Woodchuck Village, a PBS show that was gaining popularity among preschool kids.

  “He’s not in costume,” Milo told him, “but look for the tall, winsome gentleman who could be Antonio Banderas’s twin.” Milo also worked with Ricardo, as Elle had brought him into the studio a few months ago to assist the set builders and he’d worked his way up to assistant set designer.

  “Ask him to sing you the one about Beaver’s teeth-brushing tips. It’s very cute,” I said.

  Sharkey headed out the screen door, adding, “I live for it.”

  “Aw, he’s a keeper,” Ma crowed. “Very polite.”

  “Thanks, Mrs. Mick,” Tara said.

  “Ma, you like every boy who comes around here.” I was careful to reserve my own comments as I removed a tray of cheese tarts from the oven and set them on the stove to cool. Zack and I had gone out with Tara and Sharkey a few times, for dinner and drinks, and I’d found the man just a little too flashy and full of himself for the judicious Tara. Everywhere we went, he tried to monopolize the conversation with stories about cases he’d taken pro bono. He insisted on ordering apple martinis for everyone, then stuck Zack and me with the bill.

  “If a man has good manners, I admit I’m a pushover,” my mother admitted.

  “He’s got my vote, Tara,” Darcy said, pushing herself up from the table. “Okay, I’m going to go out there and act maternal again. Madonna’s got nothing on me.”

  Milo followed her. “I’m going with you. Time to say my good-byes if I’m going to meet my friends on Shelter Island.”

  Steve passed them on his way in and went straight to the tray of tarts. “I love these things,” he said, grabbing one.

  “They’re for the guests!” I insisted.

  “So? I’m a guest, Gidget. Man . . . this is hot.” He juggled it over to the table and took a seat beside Tara. “Hey, T. What’s new in the world of po
litics?”

  She shrugged, a light in her dark eyes. “Same old bureaucratic bullshit.”

  “Sounds tedious. You still thinking about a career change?”

  “She already took her LSAT,” I butted in. “Columbia Law wants her in the fall.”

  “I’ve been accepted there,” Tara said, her eyes on Steve. “But it’s not like I was their number-one draft choice or anything.”

  He nodded. “So it’ll be law, like the old man.”

  “Yeah, the apple falls near the tree. I know it’s boring, but I think it’s a good match for my skills.”

  “It’s a great match.” Steve broke the tart in two and held one steaming half up to his lips. “You deserve better than what you’ve got. I mean, in the senator’s office.”

  My eyes went wide at the obvious chemistry between them. Steve was flirting, and Tara was flirting right back at him.

  “You should give me a call sometime, in the city,” he was saying. “Maybe we could hook up for lunch or something.”

  “Maybe . . .” She glanced over at the screen door, obviously thinking of Sharkey. “Did you meet my boyfriend? John Sharkey. He’s a civil rights attorney.”

  “Heard about him,” Steve said. “But who hasn’t? His face is on the evening news every time there’s an allegation that someone farted in the wrong direction.”

  “Steve!” I said.

  “All I ask for is a modicum of manners . . .” Ma shook her head. “My own children . . .”

  But Tara was laughing. “I agree, New York’s flatulence statutes are simply archaic.”

  Steve swiped another cheese tart and headed into the living room. “So call me sometime.”

  “What was that about?” I asked Tara as I dished the tarts onto a platter.

  Tara laughed. “I really don’t know.”

  “Flirtation is harmless,” Ma said, drying a bowl.

  “But you’ve got Sharkey,” I said.