Promises to Keep (20 page)

 

Jack was unplanned. Callie wasn’t even sure she wanted another child, so scared was she that she wouldn’t have enough love in her for two, but Reece wanted a boy. Her father wanted a boy, and there was still a part of her trying to please her daddy. She knew that at some point the likelihood was that she would have another baby, and she couldn’t help but think that if it was to happen, it would make everyone happier if it was a boy.

Still, this time she didn’t know. She felt very tired and only realized her period hadn’t arrived after seven weeks. The pregnancy wasn’t as easy and she felt enormous. She put on sixty pounds, hauling her body around, resenting it all the while.

When he finally arrived, Jack was colicky. In the mornings he would be fine, but by midafternoon he would be screaming, for no reason whatsoever.

Callie was trying to look after Eliza, only two herself, while trying to rock Jack—the only thing that seemed to quiet him was being rocked, or pushed in a buggy, for hours, and hours, and hours.

She tried everything. Gave up dairy in case he was lactose intolerant and unable to handle any dairy he was ingesting through her breast milk. Then gave him formula. Soy formula. Goat’s milk formula. Predigested formula. Nothing stopped the screaming.

Days would go by when Callie spent hours walking around like a zombie, wondering what the hell she was thinking in having another baby, and wishing she could turn the clock back to what was before—just the three of them.

The guilt was enormous. Looking at Jack she felt nothing like the overwhelming and all-consuming love she had had for Eliza from the first second. Looking at Jack, she felt . . . hate would have been too strong a word for it, but
dislike
, certainly. Which she couldn’t admit to anyone.

At three and a half months, everything changed. Honor showed up, unexpectedly, with a great big suitcase and a truckload of patience. She scooped up Jack and shooed Callie out of the room.

She decided to start Jack on solids, which Callie’s pediatrician had said not to do until he was six months old, telling her that babies’ digestive systems aren’t properly formed and they can’t handle the solids before then.

“Well that’s just not true,” Honor sang, rocking Jack in her arms. “You and your sister both started on baby rice at three months. Everyone did. And you both slept right through the night after that. We’re going to try it.”

Callie was too tired to argue with her.

Honor spooned a little baby rice mixed with formula into Jack’s eager mouth that evening and he slept until two a.m., in the little cot next to Honor’s bed in the spare room. (“I won’t hear of it,” Honor protested, when Callie weakly said that Jack ought to be in with her. “You need to sleep, and I need to spend time with my grandson.” Callie had the first proper night’s sleep in three months. In the morning, for the first time, she started to think that perhaps there was a light at the end of the tunnel after all.)

Honor gave him a bottle when he woke that night, and within a week he was off the two a.m. feeding and sleeping through the night. He also, miraculously, turned into a happy little boy, and one day, as he looked at Callie and smiled with delight, her heart opened up, and from that moment on she loved him just as much as she loved Eliza.

And he adored her. Oh how he adored her. Even now, at six years old, he is so different from how Eliza was at this age. She was independent, strong willed, stubborn. Refused to be kissed or cuddled by Callie unless she was in the mood, but Jack?

Jack snuggles with her all the time. He flings his arms around her legs and squeezes tightly, looking up at her adoringly.

At night, when she goes to kiss them goodnight, Eliza gives her a perfunctory peck, occasionally requesting a proper snuggle, but Jack shifts over in his little twin bed to make room for her, and when she lies next to him he reaches an arm around her neck, pulling her close and stroking her cheek, unmitigated adoration and bliss in his eyes.

 

“Eliza?” Callie calls, pulling on a robe and stuffing her feet into slippers, wincing at the headache that seems to be constantly present these days. “What’s going on with your brother?”

“Nothing,” Eliza yells from her bedroom, appearing briefly in the doorway in skin-tight leggings, a T-shirt with a peace sign and a long, ratty pink scarf wrapped around her neck. “It wasn’t me, it was him.”

“Eliza, you’re older, okay? It’s up to you to set the example. Just be nice. Please.”

And as Eliza huffs and puffs, Callie goes downstairs to make breakfast.

“Why can’t Daddy ever stay and have breakfast with us?” Eliza asks when Callie places a plate of scrambled eggs in front of her.

“He’s working,” Jack says, in irritation.

“He’s always working.” Eliza is grumpy, and Callie turns her back so Eliza doesn’t see her expression, because she agrees with Eliza: sometimes it would be really nice if he left for work a little later, or came home a little earlier. Just spent a bit more time with the children.

“He’s always here at the weekends,” she says brightly, “and he spends lots of time with you then.” Which is true.

“But I want him here on school days,” Eliza whines, “and I want Googie too. Why can’t we wake her up in the mornings?”

“Because Googie won’t be a very happy Googie if she doesn’t get enough sleep,” Callie warns, to which Eliza has no response, so silence ensues as she quickly finishes her eggs, then pushes her chair back to go and sit at the computer in the kitchen and play Club Penguin.

Jack comes up behind her, rapt, as a cartoon penguin surfs the screen, and Callie stacks the dishwasher and wipes down the table.

“Come on, guys,” she says, checking her watch. “Five minutes till the bus. Brush teeth. Eliza? Brush hair. Shoes and coats on. Let’s roll.”

When she gets home, Callie takes an Imitrex, then goes back upstairs to try to sleep off the headache. It is true that often the headache gets better as the day progresses, but right now she needs to lie down.

 

Honor sits down gently on the bed, sliding a cup of hot camomile tea onto Callie’s bedside table.

“How are you feeling, honey?” she says when Callie opens her eyes.

“I’m okay,” Callie lies.

“You’re going to the doctor today?”

“Yes.”

“Your regular doctor?”

There is a pause. “No. Mark.” Her oncologist.

The blood drains out of Honor’s face as she places a hand on her heart to still it.

“What? It’s . . .” She can hardly speak, a wave of nausea coming over her.

“No, it’s not.” Callie attempts a smile. “Reece insisted on calling Mark yesterday because my scan is due next month, and Mark said he’d rather see me himself. I don’t think it’s anything to worry about, Mom, and I’m more comfortable with Mark anyway. I barely even know my internist, and I know Mark will refer me to the best neurologists, or whoever I need to see.”

“Okay.” Honor exhales loudly. “I just . . . I just got scared.”

“Don’t worry, Mom. I’m not. Even Mark said it could be any number of things.”

“Like migraine? Or perimenopause?”

Callie smiles. “Yes. Exactly.”

 

But that isn’t really how Callie feels.

Just as she knew the minute she was pregnant with Eliza, she has a knot in her stomach, a feeling of dread, a certainty that something is very wrong, and she has been trying to bury her head in the sand, hoping that tomorrow morning she will wake up and everything will be fine.

Tomorrow morning keeps coming, and each morning she wakes up and it is not fine, and she is so scared she can’t even think about it; every time she does think about it she finds herself unable to breathe.

She doesn’t even know why she is so scared. When she was diagnosed with breast cancer she never had a flutter of fear. She knew she would be fine. This is not the same thing. Not that there were any symptoms with breast cancer the first time around, and she has no idea what this is, whether it is cancer, or whether it is something else, but whatever it is, she is pretty certain it is serious.

Which is why she has refused to go to the doctor. She doesn’t want to know. She refuses to accept that there may be anything wrong with her, because, as she has said before, bad things do not happen to Callie Perry, and if, perchance, they do, they will still end well.

Look at the cancer. It brought her and Reece closer than she could have ever imagined possible. For four years she had been immersed in her children, had not forgotten about her husband, but he had no longer been her priority in the way he was pre-children. The diagnosis made her open her eyes and pull her husband close again.

Reece didn’t changed his travel schedule, but he came home from the office a little earlier, left the house a little later, was at most, not all, of the appointments with the oncology team at Poundford Hospital.

They took the time to be together again, just the two of them. Reece even surprised her with a second honeymoon after she was declared cancer-free, or, at least, showing no evidence of the disease.

They went to Paris. Of course. They stayed in a little hotel behind Sacre-Coeur, where they lay in bed all morning eating buttery croissants and huge bowls of café au lait, and spent the afternoons touring the museums, the Tuileries, a trip out to the Chateau de Vaux le Vicomte. And late-night dinners in candlelit bistros, falling in love with each other all over again over a sparkling Burgundy and a pear tarte tatin that was heaven-sent.

Life, despite having been so complicated that past year, suddenly seemed so simple again. Reece loved Callie. Callie loved Reece. They both loved their children. And life was good. Better than good. Wonderful.

 

Thinking back to those days almost feels like a distant dream, and Callie can’t even imagine, or remember, what it is to feel that good, that optimistic. She just wants the pain to go away.

Honor leaves her daughter and goes down to the kitchen. She will drive Callie to the hospital, for Callie is no longer allowed to drive until they can get rid of the headache and find out what is wrong with her, and she leans her hands on the kitchen counter and drops her head.

She is scared in a way she too has not been before. But she cannot be scared. She has to be strong for her daughter. But is she the only one who has noticed how Callie’s appetite has dropped? How Callie is pretending to eat, but only takes one or two bites before announcing she had a huge snack just an hour ago and she’s practically full to the brim.

Is she the only one to have noticed the worrying shadows under Callie’s eyes, her palor, her skin?

Please God, she closes her eyes and prays. Please let it be nothing. Please let Callie be fine. She knows this probably isn’t quite right. That it might be better to pray for the strength or the fortitude to get through whatever it is that He decides is going on, but she can’t quite bring herself to do that.

Praying is something she is not wont to do that often, for while she believes in the Universal Spirit, in a guiding force, in protective angels that watch over us, she has spent many years questioning the God of her Catholic upbringing, and the only other time she turned to Him for help was almost five years ago.

When Callie was first diagnosed.

 

 

R
eece checks his watch and swears under his breath.

“Shit, I have to go. Al? Can you take over?” His creative partner nods, and Reece grabs his jacket and waves a group good-bye as he leaves the meeting room.

“I’ll be back later,” he shouts to his assistant. “Doctor’s appointment.”

His assistant stands up. “You have a four p.m. with—”

“I know, I know.” He pauses by the door. “Don’t worry. I’ll be back by then. But now I’m late.”

He is always late, which he tries very hard not to be, but life is so busy, and he gets so distracted, and there is always somewhere he needs to be.

Today, he thinks he doesn’t necessarily need to be with Callie for this doctor’s appointment. He is sure that this will just end up being a consultation, and that Callie will be sent home with a list of other specialists she will have to see, but Callie has clearly not been feeling well, and when she turned to him last night and said, “I need you to come with me,” he heard.

He runs up Fifty-second Street and speed walks across Lexington to the garage, waiting only a few minutes for the guys to pull his Audi out, gleaming black, brand new.

He folds his body inside and guns the engine, loving this car just as much today as when he had the casual thought that he might like an Audi S5, and spent the next few hours in his office with the door closed, salivating over pictures on the Internet.

The traffic in midtown is terrible, but there is nothing he can do now. He should have left twenty minutes earlier, and it can’t be helped. He rings home to tell Callie he’ll meet her at the hospital and that he may be ten minutes late.

Honor picks up the phone.

“Honor? It’s me. The traffic’s horrific, so it’s going to take me longer than I thought. Can you drive Callie? I’ll meet you at Mark’s as soon as I can.”

“Of course,” Honor says. She knew this would happen, as it so often does. It has become a standing joke that they have to bring two cars to every social occasion, for Reece will always show up half an hour late.

She feels a surge of irritation, because this isn’t a social occasion but something important, and then she suppresses it. She loves her son-in-law. Loved him the minute she met him and saw how he looked at her daughter; more important, she has learned to accept him, with all his foibles and idiosyncrasies.

“We’ll see you there. Have you eaten?”

“No,” he says and smiles, as he heads onto the West Side Highway.

“Want me to bring you something?” she asks.

“I’d love you to bring me something!” He is enthusiastic. “What are my choices?”