The Parting Glass (30 page)

“You’re pregnant,” Megan said without preamble. “When were you going to tell me?”

Casey looked sheepish. “I hadn’t decided.”

Megan dove for her, pulling her forward for a quick embrace. “It’s fantastic, Case. I’m so thrilled for you. Why on earth didn’t you just tell me right away?”

Casey was silent.

“Because things aren’t going well with Nick?”

“I just hate to parade how well things are going for us. I know you and Nick are still in that adjustment phase we all go through.”

“You didn’t go through it.”

“Okay, so Jon and I adjusted to each other in high school.”

“How could you let our little problems spoil telling me your news? Who cares if Nick and I are going through a rough spot or two? We’ll get past it. And that shouldn’t take away from your excitement.”

“Jon’s beside himself with joy.” Casey smiled wanly. “I’m basically just beside myself. I’ve been sick as a dog all week. How can you eat in this weather?”

“With great gusto. I’ll eat for you, too. How far along are you?”

“Not very. Two months or so.”

“Peggy didn’t have much morning sickness.”

“I hate her for that.”

The news was really starting to sink in now. Megan knew Casey and Jon had planned to have a baby and that it hadn’t happened as fast as they’d expected. Casey, who was thirty-two, had worried that she had waited too long to try. So Megan really was delighted for her sister, but she wondered exactly what the news would do to Niccolo.

She decided to contemplate that later. “Have you thought about fixing up a nursery? Do you want a boy or a girl?”

“It’s such a cliché, but I just want a healthy baby. I don’t care about anything else.”

Megan knew where that thought came from. “Phil has an autistic brother. If heredity had anything to do with Kieran’s problems, then it probably came from Phil’s side.”

“And our side is so extraordinarily healthy, huh? Exactly which Donaghue would you like this kid to take after?”

Megan burst into laughter, and Casey joined her. “Let’s hope Jon’s Hungarian genes are strong,” Megan sputtered. “This baby will need all the help it can get.

Megan didn’t tell Niccolo about Casey’s pregnancy. The perfect opportunity never seemed to arise. He was gone more than he was home, and when he
was
home, he was distracted by paperwork and telephone calls. His television appearance had generated real interest in Brick and new hopes of increased funding. He worked on grant proposals and fielded requests from locals who still demanded to be shown through the tunnel. A reporter from the
Plain Dealer
had stopped by the saloon for photographs and an interview, and even though Niccolo and Iggy had carefully explained the so-called miracles as natural good fortune, the article had stirred up more interest in the image.

Both Rooney and Josh had been around the house more than usual, too. Rooney was wandering less and growing more content with his life on Hunter Street, and Josh, who was attending summer school to earn extra credit, was home every night studying. Megan wouldn’t have had it any other way. After years of wondering where her father was, she was thrilled to have him under her watchful care. And Josh was too old to be her son, but she thought of him as one and loved watching him set his life on track.

A week after her talk with Casey, Niccolo came home from the saloon bedraggled and remote.

“I’d like to talk to you.” He flopped down on the couch to remove his work boots.

She was surprised, because talking was one of the things they didn’t do anymore. “Here? Now?”

“Have you made dinner?”

“No, I didn’t know what time—”

“We’ll go out.”

This didn’t feel like a date, or even an invitation. It felt like a command performance.

“What about Josh and Rooney?” She folded her arms, preparing for a fight. As much as she yearned to be alone with Niccolo, this was not the way she wanted to begin the evening.

“Josh can cook macaroni and cheese and slice some tomatoes.”

She knew Josh wouldn’t mind that, would, in fact, probably enjoy having the house mostly to himself so that he could turn up his stereo or call his friends without worrying about tying up the phone.

She decided not to argue. “Should I change?”

“We’re just going to Great Lakes.”

He was acting like the stereotypical Italian male and nothing like himself. She almost called him on it but decided not to. She would know soon enough what was bothering him.

She fluffed her hair and changed her shirt while he showered and dressed. They didn’t talk in the car. The Great Lakes Brewery was within easy walking distance, but he didn’t seem inclined to consider a stroll in the evening breeze. Under more cheerful circumstances she would have been delighted to go. The brew pub was about fifteen years old, but the building itself was more than a hundred, and a local legend claimed that the bullet holes in the wall had been put there by no less a man than Eliot Ness himself.

They were seated outside on the patio before he spoke. “We’ll order, then we can talk.”

She nearly rebelled, but she decided to give him this one last concession and not one thing more. The next time he told her what they were going to do, she would tell him where to put his orders.

She studied the menu and settled on the tortellini salad and a cold glass of the brewery’s Edmund Fitzgerald Porter. They were seated next to each other so that they could hear their own conversation. It was a perfect night to eat outside, and the attractive patio was crowded and noisy.

“I’ve heard tell that John D. Rockefeller had law offices just above the pub,” she said, after their server had come and gone.

“What else have you heard tell, Megan? Recently, that is.”

Now she understood what was wrong with him. “If I had my drink, I’d toast my sister.” She lifted an imaginary glass. “To Casey and Jon and the baby to come.”

“Why didn’t you tell me? Or didn’t you think I’d want to know?”

“I wasn’t trying to keep it a secret. There just wasn’t an opportunity, and I didn’t want to blurt it out.”

“Come on, Megan.”

She started to protest, but there was nothing more she could say. Maybe if a perfect opportunity had presented itself she would have told Niccolo. But she hadn’t even attempted to find one. The truth was that she hadn’t wanted to face him with news of the baby. Because she had known what would come afterward.

“I guess I was trying to forestall another argument.” She waited until their mugs had been delivered and she’d had a few sips before she went on. “I know how you feel about having a baby, and I just didn’t want to see your disappointment that they were first.”

“I don’t care who’s first. Don’t you know me better than that?”

“How’d you find out?”

“Jon stopped by the saloon. I think he was hurt when I didn’t congratulate him.”

She rested her fingertips on the back of his hand. “I’m sorry. Let’s buy some champagne and stop by their house on the way home. Casey can’t drink it, but she can watch.”

“Jon’s over the moon.”

“Casey is, too. Only
she
got sick on the trip.”

“The night before I was ordained, I had a dream about three little dark-haired boys. Stair steps, each one half a head taller than the other. They were waving goodbye to me from across a river. I very nearly called off my ordination.”

She swallowed a lump in her throat and more of her beer. It was such a lonely vision, a man being parted from a future he would never be allowed to experience. “You have obvious dreams, too, Nick. And that’s not the only one.”

“Meaning?”

“You’re still dreaming about being a priest, aren’t you?”

He didn’t deny it. “How do you know?”

“I sleep beside you, remember?”

“What, am I chanting the Gloria? Reciting the Eucharistic prayer in Latin?”

“Even I know that’s not done anymore.” She tried to soothe him. “I’m not angry, and I’m not worried. But we’re both in transition here. This isn’t the right moment to add a baby to the mix.”

“At least this is a different argument than the one that says I’m too busy and preoccupied to be a good father. That I’m more worried about ersatz miracles than about my own wife.”

Her empathy was eroding. “It’s part of the same argument. You’re not ready. I’m not ready.”

“If I thought you might be ready while we’re both still fertile, I wouldn’t even bring it up.”

The comment was so unlike him that she just stared. He had never before used their advancing ages as a reason to hurry into pregnancy. Now she wondered how long he had been worried.

“Forget I said that.” He reached for his beer, as yet untouched.

“That would be pretty tough. You did say it. And you meant it.”

“I could have said it better.”

“Let me make sure I understand. You think we’re ready, right this very minute? In fact, if we rush home without eating, we might catch the next ovulation and just in the nick of time?”

“That’s not what I said.”

“You need me to prove that I will be ready soon. That’s what you said.”

He put his head in his hands for a moment, like a man who was too weary to hold it up. After a few seconds he straightened. “I want what Casey and Jon have.”

“If you were looking for a brood mare, there were better choices.”

“None of them were you, and I was looking for Megan Donaghue.”

“You want me to tell you that I’m one hundred percent certain I’ll be ready to have a baby next week or next month, but I’m not. Every day we seem to drift further and further apart, Nick. This is the first time we’ve been alone in ages. We haven’t even…”

“Made love?” He looked increasingly exhausted. “I know.”

“You want a baby
and
an immaculate conception?”

“I thought this was going to be easy. How can two people who love each other as much as we do suddenly be so far apart?”

She was glad he realized that it wasn’t a question of not loving each other. “Let’s enjoy tonight,” she said. “Let’s talk about something, anything, besides Brick and funding and the renovations. I won’t tell you about the kitchen sink I’ve picked out if you won’t tell me about your latest grant proposal.”

“Deal.”

“Then we’ll buy champagne and visit the Kovats family. You can watch Casey turn green. Maybe it will convince you that waiting a while for a baby’s not such a bad idea.”

“A stellar evening to come.”

“Then we’ll go home and act like a newly married couple. You won’t ask Josh about messages, and I won’t ask Rooney if he remembered to take his bedtime medication. At least not more than once.”

“And I won’t fall asleep as soon as I hit the bed.”

“You’d better not, or I’ll hit
you.
”

She hadn’t told Niccolo she was hurt by his lack of attention. It was a reality that had only slowly occurred to her. She had thought herself beyond such a thing. She had never been emotionally needy, and she was a practical soul who was tolerant of the imperfections of others. Logically, she understood that Niccolo’s exhaustion and preoccupation, even his demands, were a result of needs that had little to do with her.

She was surprised that even though she understood all this, she was still hurt. And she was too bewildered at her own reaction and too ashamed of it to tell him so.

The remainder of the weekend was a truce. Niccolo pulled himself away from his work on Sunday morning to make coffee and homemade ciambella to celebrate A’s on two of Josh’s summer school exams. In the evening they convinced Rooney to take a stroll through the neighborhood and wandered toward Casey and Jon’s with the leftover cake in hand. But on Monday morning Niccolo was ready to go by six, and before he left the bedroom, he warned her he might be late for dinner, too.

“I have a breakfast meeting with someone from Catholic Charities,” he said on his way out the door. “They want me on their board.”

She turned over to glare at him. “And you’re going to say no, right?”

“Most likely.”

She didn’t like the sound of that, and her reaction must have been obvious. “The contacts would be great,” he added. “That’s the only reason I’m hesitating.”

“You could open a new branch of the United Way while you’re at it. Those contacts would be great, too.”

“You’re going to be at the saloon?”

She had told him she would be. Now that the necessary repairs had been done to the tunnel, she wanted to finish clearing the second storeroom. She didn’t know whether she would ever use it or not. She was inclined to permanently seal off the tunnels as soon as she and Niccolo could come to an agreement, but in the meantime, cleaning out the stacks of trash was something to do. She had asked Niccolo to build a small display case at the front of the saloon for memorabilia. She knew others would find some of the correspondence and newspapers and lists of supplies as interesting as she did.

She turned away from him and pulled the sheet higher. “You can find me in the bowels of the earth if you need me.”

“I’ll see you there.”

She doubted it very much.

She did see him for a few minutes at lunchtime. He stopped by the picnic table on his way out to buy more supplies. “Good meeting this morning?” she asked.

“Productive.”

“You told them no?”

“Almost. I said I’d think about it.”

“There are probably a few free minutes between midnight and 12:05 to give it some thought.”

“Megan, I’m sorry, but don’t hold dinner for me. You go ahead and eat, and I’ll grab something when I get there.”

She didn’t even ask where he would be. Somebody needed him, and he felt compelled to go. “Let me write down our address, in case you forget where we live.”

He had already turned to go. Now he turned back. She’d expected irritation, but he looked contrite. “Let’s plan a weekend away. Soon. Just you and me. Where nobody can get to us. Okay?”

She managed a smile, although she suspected this was an invitation that would never materialize. “Okay.”

“I’ll see you later.”

She shook her head as he walked away.

The afternoon was hot and muggy, and she wasn’t sorry to go back down into the tunnel, which was cooler, even if not the most pleasant of atmospheres. She hurried past the image without a glance, then turned back to study it, training her high-powered flashlight directly on it. Niccolo and the Brick kids had redone some of the plumbing that week. There had been no indication of a leak, but he’d asked her to check and see if the image had changed. It looked the same to her, eerily like the beckoning Virgin Mary. No tears today, but the image was as clear as the first day she’d seen it.