My Funny Valentina (11 page)

She c
ame and pulled her chair beside his using medical jargon he’d also heard spoken a year ago, showed him what were all too familiar diagrams of anatomy with pointing arrows, adding new glossy pamphlets to the mix, with serious faced doctors and smiling wan children clutching stuffed animals in hospital beds in the photos.  She mentioned appointments and operation dates, talked of specialists and referrals.  Finally, blessedly, she stopped talking and he pushed back his chair, rose, and walked down the hall to his spare room. 

Made his way t
o Zoey.

She slept on her back in the pink
-and-white onsie Val had zipped her snugly in after bathing her in the bathroom in the new colorful plastic tub Evelyn had purchased, Stash watching them rapt from a distance until Valentina had urged him nearer. 

‘
Do...do you want to rub the baby lotion on – she loves to have it put on her after I’ve warmed the bottle in the bathwater.’ 

He’d
come forward, been all thumbs at first, trying to open the slippery bottle to Valentina’s stifled giggles.  He’d followed her murmured directions of where to apply it as Zoey had cooed in delight feeling his big warm hands on her, smiling up at him, her vivid green eyes wide, cheeks flushed rosy from her bath.  The baby’s eyes were shut now as she slept, soft puffs of breath escaping her kewpie-doll lips, spidery black lashes resting on her cheeks.  Stash reached a hand down over the crib rail to stroke the glossy dark curls.  Just like his. 

‘
I didn’t do anything wrong,’ said a tearful voice from the doorway, ‘I did my best to stay healthy...while I was pregnant.  I ate all the right things, didn’t drink, went to the doctor right on schedule...’ her voice pleaded for him to believe her.

‘
I know, Val,’ he said not turning to face her, not sure he could, his gaze staying fixed on their daughter.  ‘It’s my fault, not yours.’  The admission emerged from him low and pained.

‘
What?
  Stash, no!’  Suddenly she was by his side, her hand on his arm, ‘It’s not your fault either!’

He
turned his head and looked at her, the torment in his eyes.  ‘Yes, it
is
me – Athina has the exact same condition.  They found out a year ago, when she went to the doctor because she was tired so much, felt so weak...’

Val
entina looked at him in shock then seemed to visibly pull herself together.  Made an attempt to rally – so she could comfort
him.

‘
Stash, no one really knows why these things happen,’ she said, ‘but we are fortunate with Zoey because we found out so early.  The doctors I’ve spoken to all say they believe they can fix the problem; the specialist here in Chicago says after the operation she should live a completely normal life.’

Stash just stared down at Zoey, not responding
, his hand moving to rest over her heart feeling its gentle beat beneath it.  A tear splashed down on to the baby’s cheek making the long eyelashes flutter for a moment as she slept on.

‘
No!’
came a fierce whisper beside him.  Valentina’s hand bunched into the crisp cotton material of his sleeve, pulling him out the room and shutting the door with a firm click behind them.  Shoving him against it, she glared up at him. ‘Anastasio Andreas Karas, don’t you
dare
give up on our daughter,’ her voice shook with emotion, ‘she’s going to be just fine, Stash, she is!’

‘
She’s so small,’ he whispered, pain in his voice, pain on his face, feeling pain squeezing in from all sides until he could barely breathe.

‘
But
we’re
not!’ Valentina gripped both his arms, shaking him, seeming to be willing him to believe as strongly as she did.  ‘She’s got two above average height parents that will be there every second with her, helping her make it through this, hell; between the two of us that’s an eleven-foot tall friggin
giant
supporting her!’

‘
12-foot,’ Stash automatically corrected.

‘
You always were good with numbers and such,’ Valentina said softly. ‘Look, Stash, I’m not going to stand for you blaming yourself, or moaning gloom and doom over our fate,’ she stated with voice lowered now so as not to disturb their sleeping child, but still brooking no argument from him, ‘she is going to need
both
of us working together as a team to get her through this.  You in?’

‘
I’m in, Val,’ Stash smiled down at his brave, strong wife, ‘so in.’

‘
Thank you, Stash,’ Valentina said with tears painting her eyes verdigris, ‘thank you, thank you.’  Her body seemed to collapse against him after hearing his firm words of support, and Stash pulled her into his arms.  Placed her head against his chest providing a soft place for her to fall.  A warm refuge from the cold.   

‘
You know, Val, you’re right, Zoey is probably going to grow up
freakishly
tall with the two of us for parents,’ Stash whispered a joke into the soft coppery waves of her hair to lighten the mood.  ‘I mean like captain of the NBA team, tall.’

‘
Poor thing,’ Val whispered back, and he could feel the grin spreading on her face through his shirtfront, ‘possibly 12 feet tall with all that curly hair of yours and my big feet – she’s never going to get a date!’

Stash
kept his laughter low so as not to wake Zoey and held her mother even closer, ‘Funny, Valentina.’

~8~

‘
HELLO, MANA MOU
, I have a little present for you out here,’ Stash said, standing on the front stoop of the small wood frame home he’d grown up in, a wide grin on his face.  He turned and lifted Zoey from Valentina’s arms behind him, placing her in the arms of her only living grandparent for the first time.

‘
Anastasio...what?  How? 
Who?
’  His mother’s face was a picture of puzzlement, staring at Zoey.  Then delight, joy, astonishment all comingled in one magical memorable moment. 

‘
Her name is Zoey,
mana mou
,’ Stash said, his voice deepened by emotion, ‘Zoey Francesca Karas.  My daughter.’

‘
Oh, Anastasio,’ his mother lowered the hood of the baby’s coat with a shaking hand, ran it over her black curls as the baby looked on wide-eyed at first, seeming to read the obvious love shining out of her grandmother’s dark eyes. 

Hearing the commotion, seven
black-haired women rushed out to the porch, eight voices soon exclaiming over Zoey in a torrent of Greek, the baby hoisted high in the air to admire, her curls repeatedly stroked, bright lipstick soon staining both her chubby cheeks from so many kisses. 

‘
If only your dear papa could have seen her,’ his mother wept, ‘we go inside now; we drink a toast to the baby,’ she said through her tears, ‘come Anastasio...’

‘
Come on in, Val,’ he turned and motioned for Valentina to join them, but she hung back, hands nervously kept in the pockets of her coat.  Clearly unsure of her welcome. 

And
it appeared she had good reason to fear as sixteen dark eyes settled with frosty dislike on her.  Coldly examined the woman who had
dared
to leave their brother, their son –
their King!
  The woman who had apparently hidden his own child from him.  There were ugly grumblings whispered in Greek, bitter condemnations that made Stash step forward and take charge.

‘
Enough!
  Valentina is still my wife and the mother of my child and she will be respected as such,’ he rapped out in rapid Greek.  ‘She brought Zoey into this world and for that I am eternally grateful.  If she is not welcome here than neither am I – or our daughter.’ 

His statement
was met by grudging silence.  Then his mother turned to Valentina, her lips resembling the shape of a smile, ‘please, come inside out of the cold.’ 

It was a start.

They spent the next hour in the living room that had paintings of scenes from a small idyllic hometown in Greece hung on the walls, seated on plastic-covered furniture, the baby still being passed amongst her many aunts until her eyelids drooped and she was placed in a crib in the bedroom between her two young cousins.  Stash then gathered his sisters and mother around him, and with Valentina watching from a chair across from the crowded couch, hands clasped tight in her lap, he stood and told them in clear precise terms about Zoey’s condition. 

‘
Oh, no!
  Not her too, not the baby...’ A gasp of horror came involuntarily from Athina. 

Stash
came and sat beside her, put his arm around Athina, telling her, telling them all, that he and Val expected nothing but success from the upcoming operation and wanted nothing but their support and prayers.  They all promised as one, to give them both just what he asked for.  

~~~

‘Valentina, wake up.’ A hand shook her shoulder and Valentina woke at once, sitting up straight on the chair in Zoey’s hospital room where she’d nodded off.

‘
Zoey?
’ her voice held traces of anxiety.

‘
Zoey, is just fine,’ her mother-in-law, who bent down in front of her, hastened to reassure her, ‘but you should go home, Valentina, you have slept at the hospital every night since her operation.  Rest now.  You will do her no good when you take her home tomorrow if you are sick yourself.’

‘
But I can’t leave her here alone,’ Valentina protested, looking over at the painfully small hospital bed where Zoey slept with monitors beeping and heart wrenching tubes protruding from her every oracle it seemed, ‘Stash got called earlier to a construction project to take care of an emergency only he could handle.  If I go home, she’ll be all by herself.’

‘
You go,
I
stay,’ Stash’s mother’s command was firm.  ‘I will watch over my granddaughter myself; make sure she is all right tonight.’

Val
entina’s eyes filled with grateful tears gazing at the small woman who had put away her mournful black clothes to wear bright colors every day on her visits to the hospital to boost their spirits.  Making sure, she and Stash slept on chairs pushed together in the room, bringing them covered platters of delicious homemade Greek food, even when they’d protested they weren’t hungry then ended up devouring everything on their plates.   

Val
entina felt humbled by her mother-in-law’s heretofore-unseen strength.  Felt ashamed she’d ever looked with distaste at a poochy stomach and saggy bosom that had proven to be a comforting haven when she’d been cradled close against them as she’d wept during the long fearful hours while the operation took place.  Stash had looked on; maintaining his own white- knuckled grip on his chair in the waiting room until they’d heard the joyful words from the scrub-wearing, smiling doctor, ‘the operation appears to have been a complete success.  Zoey will be just fine.’

‘
Thank you...
mana mou
,’ Valentina whispered now.

Her mother-in-law smiled at her,
sat beside her in the chair next to hers and squeezed her shoulders in a warm embrace.  ‘You know, Valentina, when you called that day for Anastasio at my house a year ago, he was so confused.  So upset,’ she shook her head sadly, ‘I know he wanted so badly to go home to you then, but Athina, his sister, she was so sick and we all needed him too.  That was not fair of us – so wrong – to keep a husband from his wife.’

Valentina remembered the call
she’d made to Stash at his mother’s house that next day – after Valentine’s Day – after the scene in the kitchen at their home.  Recalled her tearful plea to him. 

J
ust come home, Stash! Please.

‘
I
can’t
come, Valentina,’ Stash had replied, his voice sounding unbearably strained, ‘it’s Athina, she’s –’

S
he’d hung up the phone before he could finish his sentence, had packed her bags and left.  He’d made his choice, she’d thought then, and it clearly hadn’t been her.  But still she’d waited for him to call her back.  To come look for her.  Not quite believing that he never had.

‘
You go home now, Valentina,’ Anastasio’s mother said with a decisive nod. ‘You take good care of your husband!  Make him a nice meal.  He needs his wife.  He has missed you for a
very
long time.’

~~~

Stash opened the door to the apartment hearing the clock on the
hallway wall just finishing chiming out eight times.  ‘Bloody eight p.m.’, he muttered, fatigue settling over him nudging down his shoulders a notch.  That meant it had been eight long hours on the site in the frigid Chicago weather. He’d left the hospital right before noon, right after receiving a call from his anxious construction manager telling him there’d been an accident at the Culbertson site. 

N
one of the crew had been hurt, thank God, but they’d lost an expensive crane that had toppled over on a snowbank.  They’d managed to get it upright again once he’d gotten there, but it had taking down some needed scaffolding that would have to be reassembled, adding extra time to the project’s projected completion date.  And that was the last thing he needed now – when all his time, all his attention needed to be focused at the hospital instead.  With his daughter.