Inside Out (17 page)

Her dreams at the hospital were vivid and accusing. Garrett was always there, he was always in love with her, and Tracey was always pushing him away. Whenever she awakened, her dreams were still in her head, and the anxiety and grief overwhelmed her.

Later, she envisioned Garrett sitting there next to her bed. He would cradle his head in his hands as he sat in the chair beside her bed. One time he cried for Tracey and called her his love. It got to where she always saw him there. Sometimes he would tell her things, silly, inane things. Sometimes, she felt so happy she cried. Those times, this vision would crawl into bed with her and hold her and she would hold onto him so tight that sometimes he disappeared. She asked her vision sometimes if her baby would be okay. He would always tell her that their baby would be fine. He would kiss her sometimes, and Tracey could feel that he still loved her. Never mind that Rett didn't, wherever he was. Tracey knew that this apparition did.

Later, she saw him as a satellite, an orbiting guardian angel, when the doctor told Mama the baby's vitals were fine. Her loved ones ignored her satellite as they filed out but he came to her when they were gone and he held her tight. He promised her that their baby would be happy and healthy; he promised her a house; he promised Tracey understanding for every stupid thing she did; he promised to always love her.

* * *

Tracey remembered very little about the first two days in the hospital. Everything clouded together and she couldn't tell reality from dream. Her first vivid memory was of waking up feeling the baby kick. Tracey held her tummy trying to quiet her as she took in the room filled with flowers. The flowers were from her mother and father, she knew. But her first instinct was to think they were from Rett. She divested herself of that particular wish right away. There was no way he would send her anything even if he knew where she was.

“I'm ashamed to even bring these in.” Though gentle, Monica's voice startled Tracey when she swept into the room. Moni carried a coffee mug filled with a soft lilac and saffron colored flower arrangement.

“Oh, come on in, girl,” Tracey replied, grinning, or trying to grin. Her throat was dry and her face felt as if she had been wearing a mud mask too long. She searched for a glass of water. Always anticipating another's needs, Moni tipped a cool stream of water from a pitcher into a glass. She handed it to Tracey and helped her sit up. Sitting up was no easy feat with the heavy baby girl curled up inside her.

Moni sat in the chair beside the bed. “How ya feeling?”

“Oh, as if I've been in the hospital for three months and I'm not sure why.”

“You don't remember?”

“Nope, the last thing I remember was going to the mall with Mama.”

“Well, you were at the mall with your mom and your pressure went up and you fainted. The paramedics were called. That was the day before yesterday.”

“The day before yesterday only?”

“Yep.”

“Are you sure my baby is all right?” Tracey clutched her belly. They had told her Nathalie was fine, and the baby seemed active and healthy, but what did Tracey know?

“Yes, she's fine. At least as long as you don't keep stressing yourself out. But if you want your doctor, she's around here somewhere. I can get her.”

“No, not yet. Where's Mama? I'm surprised she's not here having a fit.”

“Oh, Tracey, honey baby, you're up. How are you feeling? Oh, God, you scared me half to death!” her mother said softly, rushing into the room.

“Speak of the devil,” Tracey quipped dryly. Her mother came right over and let down the side rail on her bed and sat down next to her, holding her hand.

“Not the best ever, but I'm okay.”

A nurse came then to take her blood pressure and draw some blood. She also examined Tracey's belly.

* * *

“We need to talk to her.” Sharp and authoritative, Carolyn's voice commanded the doctor's attention. Tracey had been conscious for a day with perfectly good vitals. It was time.

“I understand you need to talk to her, but as you well know, her condition is delicate right now. We don't want her to experience a lot of stress,” Dr. Singh stated plainly.

“But you said she was stabilized.” Rett's brow furrowed.

“She has stabilized,” Dr. Singh allowed. “Her blood pressure and all the vitals look good, but she's dilated more than she should be. We don't want her going into labor early.”

“I love her, I would never want to jeopardize her and the baby, but there are some things we have to settle.”

The doctor seemed to contemplate their words and finally nodded reluctantly.

“Tracey,” Carolyn called in a voice that feigned calm and civility as she swept into the room. Her mother was a bit dramatic. Her voice was never calm, civil, or smooth. She didn't look at her and Tracey felt the way she did when she was eight and drove the car into the pool.

Then Garrett Atkins stepped into the room with the doctor right behind him. Tracey's heart monitor went haywire. Her doctor freaked out, which of course made things worse. It was actually almost comical later. Out of the corner of her eye, Tracey saw Rett leave the room. She had to get a grip on herself. “I'm fine. I'm fine. I was just a little surprised. That's all.” She tried to take deep breaths and calm herself. Her monitor slowed its beeping and she insisted to her doctor that she was fine.

“He can come back.”

The damn doctor looked at her mother, not Tracey.

“Stay.” Carolyn told the doctor. And she did.

Mama went out into the hall then, and was followed back by a more timid Garrett Atkins than Tracey had ever seen before.

The heart monitor sped up a little, but Tracey was steady. The doctor assured herself that Tracy was fine before she left the room.

“We have to talk,” her mother said.

The pit of Tracey's stomach felt as though it were on a plane descending too fast. “About what?”

“About you.”

“What about me?”

“Let's hear what you have to say, and don't you dare lie to me. You've already done enough of that.”

“I don't know if I can explain,” Tracey choked out, feeling the pregnant tears begin to well up inside her. “I just wanted to avoid any problems. I didn't want you or Daddy to be angry with me. I just… I wanted…” And she couldn't get the rest out because she was overtaken by the kind of sobs one always saw in the death scene of a movie, only her feelings were real. What was even more mortifying was the fact that Garrett was holding her and trying to calm her down. And what was even more ridiculous was that he was telling her that stress was bad for the baby. Her mother was looking at him as if he were crazy.

“Tracey, I don't know what to say about this. I just don't know what to say. I thought I raised you better. And—just a question—how long were you intending to keep this from your daddy and me? You had to know we'd find out when she was born. It's the kind of thing you can tell just from looking at a child. What were you going to do when she looked just like him?”

“You think she'll look like me?” Rett asked. It seemed like a ridiculous question to ask at the time. Why the hell did he sound so happy?

“All the babies in our family come out looking like their daddies,” Carolyn replied off-handedly.

“My baby girl, Nathalie,” he said in awe. He pressed his hand to Tracey's inflated stomach. Garrett smiled, stroking her stomach as if he had been doing it all along, as if it were the most natural thing in the world. “Angie will be glad to know she's going to have a little niece to corrupt.”

Carolyn turned her attention back to him. “The baby's already big as a house, as you can see.”
Thanks, Mama
. “They may have to do a Caesarean. But I hope that's not necessary.”

“That's the way my sister and I were delivered,” he said, nodding his head. “We were both nearly ten pounds.”

If Tracey were white, she was certain she would have gone pale. She already knew the baby was big, but the very idea!

“Listen, Garrett,” Carolyn spoke with a gentle voice. Tracey recognized contrition in it. “You'll have to forgive me for what I said in the waiting room that day.”

“What did you say?” Tracey asked.

She didn't pay Tracey any mind.

“I believed that you had abandoned Tracey and the baby. When I saw you I thought…”

“I understand,” he said. He
always
understood. “You didn't expect it to be the other way around. Listen, I was in love with Tracey.”
Was
in love with her? “I would never have done anything to hurt her. Then again, I didn't think she would ever do something like this. I guess she knew that the only way to keep me from this baby was for me not to know it existed.”

“But you said you knew she was pregnant. You asked her to have the baby.”

“Yeah, well, I knew she was pregnant, but Tracey led me to believe that she was going to abort the baby. I had no idea she was going to carry her to term.”

That was not altogether true. Tracey never actually said she was going to abort the baby.

Her mother's eyes found her. Her chin had dropped and her mouth was open. Tracey closed her eyes; she couldn't stand much more of this. Her head began to hurt and, as if she felt it, too, Nathalie started to move within her. Garrett's hands were still pressed to her abdomen so he felt the movement, too. Tracey felt him kneel down beside her. She heard his laughter, heard the amazement that made his voice crack as he yelled, “She's moving! She really is moving in there! She really is in there!”

If they were any other couple Tracey would have shared this joy with him, but they were not any other couple and there would be no sharing between them.

He turned to her mother, whom he barely knew, and beckoned her. “Come feel her move.” And her mother came, the both of them touching Tracey, but not touching her at all. She opened her eyes to see them smiling at each other, kneeling there in an intimate moment that still managed to make Tracey feel like an outsider.

She did what she could to stop the tears burning in her eyes from falling.

* * *

“Baby!” Travis McAlpine came into the room bearing even more flowers. “If I hadn't been halfway around the world, I would have been back sooner.”

Garrett jumped up then. Tracey's mother stood as well.

Then Tracey's father uttered a very, very rare and unrepeatable curse.

“Go ahead, tell your daddy what you've done,” her mother said, waving her soft hand with its long, pink-tipped nails in the air. Tracey stroked her belly, thinking of what the world had in store for her baby.

“Tracey?” His deep, stern, preacher-man voice started her to trembling. Her daddy was not going to like this.

She didn't say anything right away. She only looked toward the window, watching the fan her mother had brought chop up the world beyond it.

“Tracey, I am not going to keep asking you this. You've had enough surprises for us this year already. I'm not going to pull your teeth to hear another one.”

Tracey swallowed and opened her mouth, willing the words to just come out. They didn't, and she wished it could be easier. She wished for once she could speak out clearly, assertively. “Well…”

Her mother crossed her arms in front of her, waiting for the precise moment when her father understood what Tracey was about to say so she could jump in and either help demolish or help save her daughter. Tracey wasn't sure which.

Tracey watched her father, but he wasn't paying her any attention. For the first time since he'd come in, he was noticing Garrett. And staring daggers into him.

“I don't guess you're going to have to tell him after all.” Her mother gave Garrett a firm, supportive pat on the back before going to stand beside her husband. Tracey absolutely thought of her mother as a traitor then.

Garrett stood, still watching her father, who was always intimidating. But Garrett didn't seem intimidated. Garrett seemed furious. “You bastard, you didn't tell me. You didn't tell me she was pregnant. You didn't say a word. You fu—”

“Watch it,” Carolyn warned.

“Did you know he came to see me, Carolyn?”

“She didn't know, and if you insult one more person in my family, you are going to have problems.”

“Yessir,” Garrett nodded. Sarcastically, he added, “When you're done, remember to tell your wife what you've done. I've already told her what Tracey's done. Like father like—”

“I don't need to explain a damn thing to anybody!” Travis roared at him.

“Oh really?” Garrett turned to Carolyn. “Ask him about it.”

From the look on her face, she would do just that, but not there, not then, not in front of them.

“Before you start throwing stones,” Travis bit out, “let's look at you and what you've done. To start, my wife tells me that you begged Tracey to have the baby so you could raise it.”

“I did.”

“Well, why did you take no for an answer? It was your child.”

“I didn't.”

“You did. You let Tracey just tell you ‘no' and you were through with it.”

“I didn't. Tracey led me to believe that she was going to abort the baby.”

“She led you to believe? And you accepted that?”

“I had no choice.”

“So you accepted it. A legal ‘prodigy' couldn't think of a way to stop her from doing it? You didn't check on her to see if she'd done it. You never checked to find out if she really went through with it because deep down you were kind of hoping she would, weren't you?”

“No, sir.”

“Oh, I think so. I think since you had already broken up with her, had already decided that she wasn't going to come around to your way of thinking, had already decided that she was going to burden your plans for the future, you wanted her to get rid of that baby. You wanted an excuse not to ever see Tracey again!”