Twilight Child (26 page)

 “I really
have to go, Molly.” To emphasize the point, she looked at her watch. “The woman
I've got taking care of the baby can't speak English.”

 “So there's
nothing I can say or do?” Molly asked.

 “I'm sorry.”

 “That's not
much help.”

 Frances
lifted her eyes, and Molly met her glance directly. For a long moment, they
held this stare across the table.

 “I guess we
have different priorities,” Frances said quietly. “I know you think I'm an
unfeeling bitch, but I can't help that.”

 “Charlie
does. I'm not sure. I like to think that you're just obeying Peter's wishes.
That doesn't help us, but in a funny way it does take the onus off our
grandchild's mother.”

 Frances stood
up. It was useless to continue the conversation. Besides, she was getting
another cramped feeling in her uterus and had begun to get anxious about the
baby.

 “So I'll see
you in court,” Molly said, rising. Her dress was creased and a strained look
gave her an air of desperation and confusion. So different from their first
meeting when Chuck had brought Frances to his home. Molly had seemed so
formidable then, crisp, self-assured, wise and knowing. It was not that old
Molly that she saw now, and their confrontation had only widened the distance
between them. It's over, she told herself. Yesterday is dead.

 “It's a free
country,” Frances said, with a haughtiness she had not intended.

 They moved
through the crowds to the street. Frances walked ahead. But once outside, she
stopped and waited for Molly to catch up. No sense leaving this meeting with
spitefulness, she thought, reaching out her hand. Molly looked at it,
hesitating, then took it and shook it vigorously.

 “You can't
imagine how terrible it will be in court,” Molly said ominously. “For both of
us.”

 She pulled
her hand out of Molly's grasp. “It wasn't my idea.”

 Molly did not
respond. Frances stood awkwardly facing her for a moment, disoriented.

 “I hope
Charlie is okay,” she said. At that moment a cloud passed over the sun, and it
grew suddenly cold. She shivered. “It has gotten much colder.”

 “Yes, it
has,” Molly replied. She looked at Frances, a slightly bemused expression on
her face. “You're right about one thing. I don't understand any of it.”

 “I know,”
Frances said as she turned away and began to stride toward the car. As she
walked, a cramp gripped her, and she stopped. A flutter of pain continued for a
few moments, then subsided. Peripherally, she saw Molly puzzling over her
action. But when the pain had gone, she walked purposefully to the car.

 By the time
she arrived home, she was genuinely concerned over the periodic cramping she
was experiencing, filling her with anxious thoughts and fears for the child she
was nurturing. Had the confrontation shocked her yet unformed baby? If so, she
knew she could never forgive herself for exposing it to such danger. What did
she expect? Through her growing panic, she was certain that she had handled her
ex-mother-in-law with skill and determination. Unfortunately, it appeared that
she would be paying a heavy price for her supposed strength. But such logic soon
disintegrated into an ugly and illogical suspicion that perhaps Molly had
brought her there to abort her baby with psychic pain.

 The offensive
thought lingered, along with anxieties about Baby Mark, who turned out to be
just fine. She found him dozing off in Maria's arms. An empty bottle stood on
the table beside her.

 “He hungry
niño
,”
Maria said.

 As Frances
went upstairs, the painful flutter began again with what seemed like more
intensity. In the bathroom, she checked to see if she was staining. Relieved
that she was not, she called the doctor, who instructed her to get into bed and
stay there. It wasn't, she knew, quite that simple. She had to arrange for Tray
to be picked up, for Baby Mark's next feeding, for dinner, for Maria to stay
on. It's all falling apart, she thought bitterly. All because I didn't follow
my instincts, because I did not put my immediate family first.

 Thankfully,
she got one of her neighbors to pick up Tray and did persuade Maria to stay
later than usual to feed the baby and prepare dinner, which would consist of a
frozen meat-loaf dish thrown into the microwave oven, the intricacies of which
she had to painstakingly describe to Maria.

 She
deliberately did not call Peter at the office to inform him of her condition.
No sense worrying him, she thought, dreading what she had to tell him. She
tried to nap, but painful thoughts and Molly's morbid pleas kept interfering.

 Peter arrived
at his usual time. She heard Maria answering his questions in pidgin English,
then his panicked two-at-a-time steps as he bounded up the stairs.

 “What is it?”
he said coming into the room. He hadn't taken off his coat.

 “Just a
little pain. Nothing serious. The doctor said I should stay in bed.”

 Bending over,
he kissed her on the forehead.

 “Are you
sure?”

 “I feel
better already,” she said tentatively, although the painful flutters continued
to plague her. “I'll be fine,” she said bravely. “The doctor said it happens
sometimes.”

 “It didn't
happen before,” he looked down at her and rubbed his chin. “Did it happen with
Tray?”

 She shook her
head.

 “I hope it's
not too much for you, darling. It's not easy having them one after another.
Damn.” He turned away, hiding his anger with himself.

 “Don't be
silly, Peter,” she said, reaching out and touching his sleeve. “It's just as
much my fault. I just overdid things today.”

 “Well, you've
got to stop that.” He turned to face her, offering a smile and smoothing her
forehead with his hand. She grabbed his wrist and brought it down to her lips.
“What the devil did you do today, Frances?”

 Gripping his
wrist, she applied some inadvertent pressure. Her guilty secret was not sitting
well at all. In fact, it was bubbling inside of her, aching to be revealed.

 “I saw Molly
today.”

 “You what?”

 She restrained
him by putting her hand over his lips and looking him straight in the eye and
quickly explaining what she had done in the most succinct way she could,
watching his expression run the gamut from annoyance to anger to indignation.

 “I know,” she
said finally. “I was a fool.”

 “And look at
the state it got you into.”

 “I was wrong.
I'm sorry. I feel terrible about it. I should not have done it, although I felt
I did handle it very well.”

 “She had no
right to put you in that position,” Peter snapped. Then he lowered his voice.
“You should have told me, darling.”

 “I know.” She
felt like a rebuked child.

 “We could
have checked with the lawyer. Who knows how much it has compromised the case?
Besides putting you in this state.”

 “I was very
foolish. I admit it. Worse, I didn't tell you what I was going to do. Somehow I
got it into my head that she was going to tell me that she was prepared to drop
the case.”

 “People can
be very mean when they want something badly enough, Frances. You should have
shared it with me.”

 “It's spilt
milk, Peter.”

 Peter stood
up and circled the room. Then he came back to the bed.

 “Bet she laid
a guilt trip on you.”

 “That she
did. But I coped with it very well.”

 “Except for
this.” He gestured toward the bed with an open palm.

 “I don't
think you can blame this on her. It might have happened anyway.”

 “I doubt it.
She created needless stress.”

 “Still—”

 “If you
hadn't gone, it might not have happened.”

 “Well, we'll
never know,” she said testily.

 “I wonder if
her lawyer put her up to it,” he mused.

 “I doubt it.”

 “Why would
you doubt it?”

 “I'm not
sure.” She felt a brief flutter and a sense of rising tension. Something more
had to be said, she decided. “She said that Charlie was contemplating suicide,
that she found him sitting in the den with a loaded gun on his lap.”

 “Damn,” Peter
muttered. “How rotten of her.” She could see his face flush with white-hot
anger, a rare occurrence. “How could she have done such a terrible thing? And I
suppose she told you that the only thing she could think of to shake him out of
this was for us to make a deal on Tray?”

 “Something
like that.”

 “How
cunning.”

 “I think
you're being too hard on her, Peter. I understand her concern. I really do. She
was desperate. Charlie is probably very depressed. I didn't quite expect it to
go that way.”

 “Well then,
what did you expect?”

 His
aggressive manner shocked her, and she frowned.

 “I'm sorry,”
he said quickly. “I'm just so aggravated. Seeing you like this.” He paused and
looked at her for a moment, trying to gather some control. “Did you tell her
you were pregnant?” She shook her head vehemently.

 “Of course
not.”

 “Well, thank
God for that. It would have blown Peck's strategy.”

 “I'm not that
stupid, Peter.” She felt a sudden surge of resentment. Peter turned away, still
fighting his anger. When he showed her his face again, he was calmer.

 “It was just
something you shouldn't have done,” he muttered.

 “I know that
now,” Frances said.

 “We could
have avoided this. She threw this at you deliberately. That's what she did. She
would love to see you in this state.”

 “What state?
I'm not in any state. I told you the doctor just said to stay in bed.”

 “If that
woman causes you to miscarry . . .”

 “I'll be
fine.” Even to her, the words sounded far away, like the bleat of a lost lamb.

 He sat down
on the bed and took her in his arms.

 “Why are they
doing this to us? Why can't they leave us alone? Tray is fine and happy.
Everything was going beautifully.”

 Frances burrowed
her nose into his neck.

 He held her
and said nothing for a long time. It was comforting to be in his protective
arms. He had saved her, she thought, given her a new life. He was her rock.

 “I'm so
sorry, Peter,” she whispered.

 “It's not
your fault, darling. Not your fault at all. You wanted to do the right thing,
that's all. It just wasn't right in the final analysis.”

 The words
were reassuring, but they did not eliminate her anxiety.

 She stayed in
bed for a week. During that time, Peter took off from work, performed the
household chores and the driving, supervised Maria, fed the dog, and generally
pampered her. Because of the language barrier, he expressed fear of leaving
Maria in charge despite Frances's protestations.

 “She is
perfectly capable,” Frances told him. She was definitely not comfortable with
his sacrifice, although she knew it was sincere.

 “You and the
kids are my number one priority.”

 “But this
could go on for months.”

 “So be it.”

 Thankfully,
it didn't. The pain receded, then disappeared completely, and the doctor
allowed her to get out of bed and test the water.

 “I'm fine
now,” she assured Peter, who, nevertheless, put in a couple of half-days at the
office until she insisted that it was not necessary.

 “Now you've
got to promise. No more capers on your own.”

 “I promise.”
She crossed her heart and pecked him on the lips.

 Soon she was
back at her regular pace. The rest, she discovered, had done her good. Her
doctor agreed. He examined her and found her sound.

 “It was just
one of those things,” he said. “Everything's perfectly normal as far as I can
see.”

 “Maybe it was
my imagination.”

 “It pays to
be cautious, anyhow. Don't overdo.”

 “It's not
like it's the first one, doctor,” she said with mock indignation.

 “Sometimes
when one pregnancy follows hard on the heels of another, these little blips
occur.”

 “Well,
they're scary just the same.”

 The
reassurance sparked her optimism, and she tucked her anxieties away in the back
of her mind.

 There were
reminders, of course. Despite the two-year separation, Tray would sometimes
wonder aloud about Grampa and Gramma Waters.

 “You think
Grampa will still get me the sailboat?” It was a question he asked, not often,
but enough to be noticed. Usually it was when Peter was not within earshot.

 “Of course he
will,” she would answer casually, quickly changing the subject, wondering what
else was going through the child's mind. Somehow she felt her answers to that
question and others never really satisfied him. He had asked numerous other
questions when she had said good night to him after the confrontation with
Charlie at the school.

 “He just
wanted to stop by and say hello,” Frances told him, hoping that her
noncommittal answers would deflect his attention.

 “But it was
right in the middle of school. The teacher was angry.”

 “I suppose he
saw that old wagon and wanted to give it to you. That's all.”

 “Why couldn't
he just bring it here?”