Belonging (15 page)

She knew exactly what kind of home she wanted these babies, her children, to have: this paradise. They could tumble on the lawn and build sand castles on the beach. They could ride their tricycles down the drive without fear of traffic. They would sleep in rooms as familiar to them as their own bodies, they would find their way through the house on a dark night without stumbling into unfamiliar doors. Perhaps there would be ponies; there was enough land. Certainly there would be dogs and cats, and she and her children would grow their own cherry tomatoes, and berries they could pick. They would have separate, private bedrooms, with shelves of toys and books, and there would be a playroom, too, for the rainy days.

A red pickup truck rumbled down the drive. Joanna hurried to the front door.

“Ms. Jones? Doug Snow.”

“Hello. Come in.”

Joanna held the door open, and as the carpenter entered, she looked him over. He was just her height and slender in a compact, intense way. He looked a bit like a cowboy in a plaid flannel shirt, jeans, work boots, but he had a beard and a long mustache that
gave him more of a folksinger air. When he took off his cap, she saw how his short, shaggy blond hair was mixed with white and gray, like his beard, and as they stood talking, she studied the lines on his face and judged him to be somewhere in his forties. He wasn’t exactly handsome—his dark blue eyes were too small and deeply set, his nose too large and crooked—but he had a definite presence.

She felt it as she walked through the house with him, describing what she wanted to have done. He listened carefully, asking occasional questions, and she had the sense that he was serious about his work.

“Why are there glass panes at the top of all these doors?” Joanna asked.

“Those are called lights, and there are two theories about them: first, that with all the fires burning in the various rooms, it was a way to check on how a fire was doing without opening the door, or to spot a fire that might have broken out of the fireplace and caught on the rug and so on. The other theory is more fun: it was a way to keep courting couples from having too much privacy.”

“Really!” Joanna was amused.

“Oh, you’d be surprised at how prudish the old-timers were. There’s even a law on the Commonwealth of Massachusetts books prohibiting a husband from kissing his wife on a Sunday.”

“Things have certainly changed, thank God,” Joanna observed.

“This is a nice touch,” Doug pointed out, running his hand over the dark wood handrail as it spiraled and curved around into an open pedestal at the base of the stairs. “It’s called a volute. It’s also here—” He traced the scrolling wooden trim decorating the base of each step along the bottom of the staircase. “A definite Greek Revival touch; from the Ionic and Corinthian capitals that topped their columns.”

Joanna ran her fingers over the design. “Elegant.”

“One of nature’s best designs, as a matter of fact,” Doug said. “It will be a pleasure to refinish it.”

Privately Joanna felt reassured: this carpenter really was familiar with old houses and their architectural details; she could trust him.

“Someone’s painted over the wallpaper here,” Doug observed, running his hand over the wall ascending from the first floor to the second, pointing out spots where the wallpaper bubbled and bulged. “It’ll have to be stripped.”

“You can do that?”

“Sure.” Peeling back a section already loose, he murmured, “Several layers here. Who knows how many.” Smiling, he looked at Joanna. “These old houses hold lots of secrets.”

It took perhaps an hour to go through the house, and they agreed on a general working estimate to be adjusted as the renovations progressed, and a date on which he’d begin—he had some other work to finish up—then they shook hands and he left.

Joanna shut the front door and simply stood a moment in the front hall. So much had to be done. Still, the basic house was solid, fine, and richly burnished by the years. Children had been raised here. For a moment she imagined another woman descending the stairs, Mrs. Farthingale, lifting her long skirts with one hand, carefully holding on to the banister with the other, protecting the child she carried.

There had once been graciousness and beauty here, and there would be again, Joanna would see to that. She was ready to spend enormous amounts of time and energy and money on the restoration of this house.

Now she was tired. It was just after six o’clock and still light out, but the quality of the light had changed. The sky was a pale, icy blue, and although Joanna had closed the French doors earlier, the house still felt cool. She didn’t turn on the heat; she couldn’t stay here tonight. Regretfully she left her house, locking the door behind her, and, taking her overnight bag from the Jeep, walked down the road to the Latherns’.

Eight

The next morning, Joanna summoned her courage and went to the doctor’s appointment she’d scheduled. Although Gardner Adams was new to the island, he’d already developed a reputation for insight and sensitivity. Tory, Bob Hoover, and the Latherns had all spoken highly of him, and so here she was, in the waiting room of his office at the Nantucket Cottage Hospital.

The concept of a family physician had never been part of Joanna’s life. She had been an unusually healthy child, which was fortunate, because any sickness on her part was inconvenient for her mother and annoying to her father’s girlfriends. The treatment for any illness had been a day in bed, with aspirin and 7UP if necessary. Her mother’s theory was that whatever it was, it would eventually pass, so there was no point in encouraging malingering with little treats like breakfast in bed. This was one thing on which her parents actually agreed. Her father believed that doctors were helpful only in cases of emergency and disaster—and for voluntary cosmetic surgery, of course; otherwise the body would take care of itself. And luckily Joanna’s body had.

Her only childhood medical memory was of standing in line in some high school gymnasium waiting to take from a small white paper cup her dose of polio booster. When she was nineteen, she went to her university’s health clinic for her first gynecological exam—and her first prescription of birth control pills. When she met Carter, she saw a doctor to have a diaphragm fitted. And that was pretty much it until the doctor in New York told her she was pregnant.

So she wasn’t used to strangers analyzing her body; or rather she was used to their scrutiny, their judgment about the way her body looked, but this kind of judgment was new and unsettling. When the doctor in New York had told her she was old for a first pregnancy, she’d almost apologized.

Now she sat with a clipboard in her hand, filling out a long and complicated form about her medical history. She had no problem with the questions about any previous conditions she might have, but the section on her parents’ health stopped her cold.

Had her father or mother had a history of diabetes or heart disease or high blood pressure? She didn’t know. And she could not ask. Her father had died first, of a heart
attack at seventy. He had been jogging with his current girlfriend, a young woman of twenty-nine named Twana, who had been the one to call Joanna, the one to arrange the cremation and dispensation of ashes, the one who wept at the lonely—Twana called it “intimate”—service. Had he had heart problems before? Twana had been living with him for a long time—six months—and didn’t mention any. Joanna’s mother had died a less abrupt and much more difficult death of cirrhosis of the liver but, vain to the last, hadn’t called her daughter to tell her until the very end. She hadn’t wanted Joanna to see her looking so unpleasant. By the time word reached Joanna and she’d rearranged her schedule and flown down to Sarasota, her mother was in a coma. Clearly Erica had died of drinking too much. There was no space for that on the form.

She had no brothers or sisters. She didn’t even have any cousins. All at once Joanna was overwhelmed with the realization of her solitary state in the world and of the consequences of this for her children. If they showed signs of some illness, there would be no way to trace it back through their genetic line—but worse than that, Joanna thought, these children would have no grandparents. No aunts or uncles or cousins. Her parents were dead and she had no access to Carter’s. No one else would be especially entranced by her children, or especially pleased even to see them arrive on this earth. She was flooded with sorrow. Resting her elbows on her clipboard, she buried her face in her hands, pressing them against her face to hold back tears.

“Ms. Jones?” She looked up to see a nurse standing in the doorway, a clipboard in her hand.

Joanna nodded, then rose and followed her. She was weighed, then ushered into an examination room. The nurse’s name was Cindy, according to the tag on her breast pocket, and Joanna couldn’t help but reflect how it suited this woman, who was around Joanna’s age, but plump and rosy, all smiles and floral perfume. They chatted easily together as Cindy instructed Joanna on the use of the paper cup for the urine sample and took Joanna’s blood pressure and then gently drew some blood. Then she left Joanna to change into a paper gown and wait, perched on the high examination table, for the doctor. As she waited, she felt the beginnings of anxiety percolate within her. All this—the high table, the technical instruments, the folder waiting on the counter—was new to her, and mysterious.

But when Gardner Adams entered, Joanna was startled out of her anxiety into a new flurry of emotions. He was so young! The Latherns had told her he was young, but
she thought that meant he was her age, in his forties. This man was somewhere in his early thirties. And he was intensely attractive: tall, lanky, long-boned, slender, with curly brown hair and dazzling green-yellow eyes. She could feel her nipples tense and the hair on her arms rise in an immediate, instinctive, sexual response. Horrified, she clutched her paper gown at the neckline and changed her posture, sagging at the shoulders, sinking down into her pelvis, pushing her pregnant belly out before her in defense.

“Joanna Jones? Gardner Adams.” Standing just in front of her, he held out his hand. “How are you?”

“I’m waiting for you to tell me,” Joanna quipped, shaking his hand. It was warm, firm, large, and his handshake was brisk and definite. No-nonsense, confident. “I’ll bet everyone says that,” she added.

He smiled and nodded. “Quite a few.” Crossing the small room, he picked up her chart, and as he scanned it, Joanna studied him. He looked like a runner, with his high-top Reeboks and long, supple, all-of-a-piece movements. He smelled of antiseptic and mint. He radiated good health, and his long hands and the back of his neck were rosy and clean. But one of the buttons on his shirt collar had come undone, and the collar pointed up at his chin in a crisp white triangle. He seemed unaware of this. When he turned to look at her, his gaze was steady, intelligent, and calm.

“Let’s take a look. Could you lie back on the table?”

The New York gynecologist had been in his sixties, portly, bald, and weary. Because his examination had been made with bored, automatic movements, Joanna had disconnected her mind from her body, numbing her senses as much as possible. She’d thought of the next FH show. She’d effectively removed herself from any emotional response.

But as Gardner Adams moved his hands over the mound of her belly, pausing here and there to palpate with his gentle fingers, Joanna was completely anchored in the room. Gardner Adams was interested in her pregnancy, and a variety of expressions played over his face as he explored her, seeming to listen with his fingertips, murmuring to himself, and nodding with satisfaction.

“Good,” he said, his face inches away from her belly. “Good. You’re doing well.”

His touch was so gentle, so courteous, that the knowledge came to Joanna that her body was important, at once fragile and powerful. Remarkable. Worthy of respect. Tears welled into her eyes and a hot flush of blood swept over her face and neck and chest, and
for a few radiant moments she felt the responsibility and privilege of being a woman carrying babies in her body.

“Twins,” he said, straightening up. “You’ll be busy.”

“Is everything okay?”

“Fine.” He folded his stethoscope. “I’ll let you get dressed, then I’ll be back to see if you have any questions.”

He left the room. Joanna rose, pulled on her clothes, and sat in a chair by the desk.

He returned, pulled a chair around to face her, and opened her folder. From behind him the sun filtered in through the venetian blinds, causing a kind of angelic aura around his body.

“Looking at your chart, I’d put your due date in late October. A Halloween baby. You’re about fourteen weeks along right now.” He paused. “Your blood pressure is a little high. Nothing to alarm you, but something to be aware of. I’d like you to cut out salt completely. Be sure you take some nice long slow walks every day. Every day. And take naps. You don’t smoke, do you? Or drink?”

“No.”

“Good. Because we don’t want to elevate your blood pressure any more than it is. You’re clear on that?”

She nodded.

“Good. That’s very important.” He stared at her steadily for a moment, as if to impress the warning on her. “Do you have any questions? Any concerns?”

“Well … only that I’ve gotten so big so soon.”

“This is common with twins,” he assured her. “Nothing to worry about, and there’s not much you can do about it. Don’t try to diet. You need nourishment for these babies. Watch what you eat—stay away from fats and, as I said, salt. Eat lots of fish and fresh fruit and vegetables. That should be easy for you at this time of year. Anything else?”

She’d been meeting his eyes, fascinated by how calm he was, how determined and serious. Looking down as she searched her thoughts for any other questions, she noticed that his socks didn’t match. One was a navy and white argyle; the other plain gray. She bit her lip, holding back a sudden fit of giggles.

“I’m a bit of an emotional powder keg,” she confessed. “Tears, laughter, anger … I never know what’s going to hit me for no reason at all.”

“That’s to be expected with pregnancy. It might calm down over the next few months.” He smiled. “Then again, it might not. You’ve got a lot to be emotional about, lots of physiological changes taking place in your body.”