Mixed Blessings (44 page)

The social workers had checked Beth and Charlie out, and they'd even spoken to Annie, and they were satisfied that the boy would have a good home. He wasn't a baby, of course, and this could be difficult, they would have to expect a period of adjustment.

"We know all that," Charlie had said gently. He knew all of it, how desperately he had tried, how he had cooked and cleaned for them, and begged them to love him. And how they had always taken him back, eventually, and how it felt to be back in the iron bed on the lumpy mattress in the cold drafty dormitories he was so afraid of.

A door opened and two nuns stepped out, Charlie could hear their beads, but when he looked up they had gentle faces, and as their Dominican robes swung, he saw the small child just behind them. He was a thin, pale little boy in corduroy pants, an old navy blue sweater and faded sneakers. He had bright red hair, and he looked at each of them with quiet terror. All morning he had hidden in his room, terrified they wouldn't come. He already knew that people never did what they promised. The nuns had told him that the Winwoods were comming that day, but he didn't believe them. And he knew they were taking him somewhere, but he wasn't sure where, or for how long he was staying.

"The Winwoods are here for you," the taller of the two nuns said quietly, as Bernie nodded. They had actually come for him. He still couldn't believe it.

He looked questioningly at all three of them, as though he didn't quite believe his eyes, as Charlie walked slowly toward him.

"Hi, Bernie," Annie said softly, and he wheezed. He had been having asthma attacks for days before and he was scared to death they would change their minds if they knew it.

Charlie watched him with tears in his eyes, and then he held out his arms, and the boy came slowly to him. "We're taking you home with us . . to stay forever and ever. I want to be your dad . . . and this is your mom now . . . and Annie is your sister."

"Like a real family? Forever?" The child looked at him with wide eyes filled with suspicion. They had told him as much, but at four, he hadn't totally understood it, nor did he believe them. He was just hoping they'd come and take him out again That was all he wanted.

"That's right," Charlie said calmly, feeling his heart flutter within him. He remembered so well what it was like, except that they had never said that to him. They had just told him he was coming to stay for a while, and then they would bring him back. They never made any commitment.

"I don't have a family. I'm an orphan."

"Not anymore, Bernie." They were ready to make a total commitment to him, and the nuns all said he was a wonderful boy, very bright and good-natured and loving. He had been given up at birth, and placed in several foster homes, but no one had adopted him because of his asthma. It was just too much of a headache to cope with.

"Could I bring my bear?" Bernie asked cautiously, glancing at Annie again. She was looking at him and smiling.

"Sure. You could bring all your things," Charlie said softly.

"We have good toys at our house," Annie vouched for them, and the little red-headed boy inched slowly toward Charlie. It was as though he was drawn to him, as though he sensed that they had a lot in common and he would be safe here.

"I'd like to go with you," he said, looking up at the man who so wanted to be his father.

"Thank you," Charlie said, as he took him gently in his arms, wanting to tell him that he loved him, but he just held him there as Bernie clung to him, and then in the softest voice of all, Bernie whispered the one word Charlie had always longed for.

"Daddy," he said, his face buried in Charlie's chest, as Charlie closed his eyes and smiled through his tears, and Beth and Annie watched them.

Pilar and Brad spent their anniversary quietly that year. They knew they had a lot to be thankful for, and a lot to think about.

Christian was a gorgeous baby. He was seven months old by then, and a total joy to them. They adored him.

Pilar had hired a baby-sitter and gone back to work after four months, but she was still only working mornings, and she loved showing up with Christian in a stroller at the courthouse.

Brad showed him off to everyone, and people had finally stopped asking where the other twin was.

It had been a long, hard haul and it had taken a lot out of them. Brad always said he was glad they'd done it, but he wouldn't do it again.

And Pilar teased him that she missed Dr. Ward's dirty movies. They had sent her a note when the twins were born, and told her that their baby had died, and she had written them a very nice letter. Pilar always remembered what she'd said to them, that there were no guarantees to anything, and that sometimes fertility as well as infertility could be a mixed blessing. It had been for them, but in the past few months, the scale had been heavily weighted on the good side. Christian was a source of constant joy to them, and Pilar was grateful every moment that she had decided to have a family before she no longer had the choice to do that.

Her mother had been out to see the baby by then, and she was crazy about him too. It had been the first good visit she and her mother ever had, and they both enjoyed it.

Nancy was pregnant again, and hoping for a little girl this time.

Eventually, Pilar had told her about her infertility treatments, and she couldn't believe what they'd gone through. It had taken so much strength and courage and perseverance.

"And a little craziness. It becomes a kind of obsession, like staying at the roulette table until you lose everything or win a fortune."

"Looks to me like you won," Nancy had said to her, but they both knew what it had cost her, and her grief over losing Grace. She had never really been able to enjoy Christian at first without thinking of her.

It was only now, with the gift of time, that she could truly enjoy him.

"Sometimes I feel like I missed his first few months," she had told Brad more than once. "I was in such a haze of misery I don't remember anything." She had packed up the other baby's things, and taken the little girl toys out of the room.

She'd put everything away in a big box marked "Grace," and Brad had put it in the attic, because she didn't want to give it away, didn't want to forget, wasn't ready to let go when she did it.

But by the time their anniversary came, she felt like herself again, and she looked it.

"Well, life certainly hasn't been dull this year." She smiled.

Last year they had known they were having twins, and she'd been pregnant.

"At least you're not pregnant this year," he said, but she still hadn't wanted to go out. She liked staying home with him, and she'd been exhausted for the past few weeks after a difficult case she'd been preparing. He accused her of getting soft when she admitted how tired she was. "Used to be you'd tear me apart in court and then want to go dancing."

"What can I tell you?" She shrugged with a grin. "I'm two thousand years old."

"What would that make me?" he mused and she laughed.

She was forty-five, and he was sixty-four, but he still didn't look it, and he was busier than ever. She felt as though she had aged a lifetime in that year, but he insisted she didn't look it. It was only lately that she was dragging, but she put it down to the fact that she was still nursing Christian, and working. She had waited so long to
 
have this child that she wanted to savor every moment with him.

Two weeks after their anniversary though, she was still tired, and she had taken on three new cases. One was a difficult adoption case, which interested her, the others involved a lawsuit at a restaurant, and a major squabble over some expensive real estate in Montecito. All three cases were interesting and varied, and the people were extremely demanding.

She talked to Brad about all three of them late one night, and he was concerned about her. She looked wrung out, and in the middle of their conversation she went to nurse the baby.

"Don't you think you're wearing yourself out?" he asked as he came into the nursery and sat down. "Maybe you should stop nursing him, or cut back at work or something." It was rare for Pilar to look so tired.

"I'm using the nursing as birth control." She smiled, since it wasn't entirely true. She loved nursing him, and he was thriving. "I'd rather give up work than this," she said honestly as he watched her.

There was a wonderful bond between mother and son that always touched him.

"Maybe you should give up work again, until he's a little older."

But she shook her head. "I can't do that, Brad. It wouldn't be fair to my partners. I've been sitting on my behind for over a year, and now I'm only working mornings." But she was taking files home, and doing work on a number of other cases.

"Well, you look like you're working overtime. Maybe you should go see the doctor."

And finally, in July she did, and told him her symptoms. She reminded him of how old Christian was, and that she was still nursing. There was no question of a pregnancy, unfortunately, since she and Brad had agreed not to do any more heroics, and Dr. Ward had told her that after forty-five it was almost impossible that she'd get pregnant.

She'd never had a period again since his birth anyway, which they said was because she was nursing. She wondered sometimes if she'd just slip right from this into menopause, which seemed a little odd, but stranger things happened.

The doctor ran a few simple tests on her, and called her at the office to tell her that she was anemic, probably still from her delivery. He prescribed some iron pills for her, which made Christian complain about her milk, so she stopped taking them and forgot it. He had found nothing more serious, and she felt better in another week, until they went to watch the regatta, and standing beside Brad, she looked up at him with an odd expression, and then fainted.

He was horrified, and she went back to the doctor again, they did more tests, and this time when she got the results, she was shocked into silence. She had never thought it possible, never even dared to dream of having another child, but she was pregnant. The doctor had called her with the news just before she left her office at lunchtime to go home and feed Christian, and he told her that now she would have to stop nursing. He also warned her of the risk of miscarriage at her age, and all the other dangers and pitfalls she knew only too well; Down syndrome, chromosomal defects, a stillbirth, the veritable minefield she had to run at her age in order to produce a healthy baby.

And in the end, it was all the luck of the draw . . . fate . . . and whether or not you were destined to have this baby.

She stood in the courtroom watching him, as he rapped his gavel to recess for lunch. He was hearing a criminal case and the defendant was led away by the bailiff. Brad was surprised to see her when he looked up, she was standing at the far end of his courtroom.

"You may approach the bench," he said resoundingly as the courtroom cleared, and she walked slowly toward him. It reminded her of their days together in court so long ago. She had met him nineteen years before, and they had come so far together, and shared so much, tragedies and ecstasies, and precious moments.

"What do you have to say for yourself?" he said sternly, as he looked down at her, and she smiled at him, feeling suddenly young again, and that life was very funny.

"You look cute in your robe," she said, looking very undignified, and he smiled in answer.

"Want to come visit me in my chambers?" he said, looking very wicked as she laughed.

"I might. But I've got something to tell you first." He just wasn't going to believe it.

"What is this? A confession? Or a statement?"

"Possibly both . . . and sort of a joke . . . and maybe a shock . . and in the end a blessing. . ."

"Oh, God. You cracked up the car, and you're trying to tell me it was an old wreck anyway and we needed a new one.

"No, but that's very creative. I'll remember that the next time I need it."

She was suddenly beaming as he watched her, never suspecting for a moment what she would tell him.

"What have you done?" he asked firmly, suddenly wanting to reach down and kiss her. Everyone else was gone, and they were all alone in his courtroom. 

"I'm not exactly sure it's what Joe done . . . I think you helped."

He frowned as he looked at her, confused by what she'd said.

"I think you've been watching dirty movies again and you didn't tell me." She wagged a finger at him.

He laughed out loud as he looked down at her. "What does that mean?"

"It means, Your Honor . . . that without heroics, or hormones, or anyone's help but yours . . . I'm pregnant."

"You're what?" He looked stunned as he stared at her.

"You heard me."

He came down off the bench and walked down to her, looking at her with a smile, not even sure what he felt or why, or whether or not he wanted to go through it again, and yet in an odd way he was happy.

"I thought we weren't going to do this again," he said, looking tenderly at her.

"So did I. Looks like someone else figured it differently."

"Is that what you want?" he asked gently, he didn't want her to go through it again if she didn't want to.

She looked at him long and hard, she had thought about it a lot on the way to meet him in his courtroom. "I guess like everything else in life, as Dr. Ward said . . . it's kind of a mixed blessing . . . but yes . . . I want to.......She closed her eyes and he kissed her then, and he held her for a long time, thinking that he had always wanted to do that to her, in his courtroom. It had taken nineteen years, but he had finally done it.

The end.

Doubleday

ISBN: 0385306644

Copyright 1992