Chapter 5
It was hard to tell whether Carol or Therese was dreading it more. Therese feared the unknown, having rarely spent more than ten minutes at a time with Harge. Carol’s anxiety stemmed from the opposite. She’d had enough terrible meals with Harge (including the most recent one, when he revealed his new wife) that she had endless ideas of how this could go wrong.
She gave Therese an out, told her she didn’t need to go. It was just a brunch. Therese could spend part of the day with Abby and Rose, or the Martinellis. They could reconnect later, after Carol brought Rindy from Harge’s.
Therese turned her down, and Carol was shamefully relieved. She didn’t want Therese stuck in this potential firing squad, but she wanted to face it alone even less.
The Saturday night before Easter saw them both awake too long, nerves chasing away sleep. Carol had only been sleeping a few hours when the phone jolted her awake, and goddamn it, why did they have a phone in here anyway?
It was loud and insistent. Next to Carol, Therese mumbled something and reached for the alarm clock.
“It can’t be time already,” she said on a drowsy groan, sounding very much as she had the morning Carol practically dragged her into the dentist’s office to get her wisdom teeth pulled.
“It’s the phone,” Carol said, voice heavy with sleep as she grabbed the offending object. “Hello?”
“Carol?”
She’d had at least three nightmares involving Harge in the last week, so hearing his voice now wasn’t welcome. “Harge? Do you know what time it is?” Carol didn’t. It was too much effort to lean over and check Therese’s nightstand.
“Two-thirty,” he said. “Ten minutes.”
“What?” Carol rubbed her eyes.
“Sorry, that wasn’t…two-thirty.”
He shouldn’t be awake, and he sounded odd. Carol sat up. “What’s going on? Is Rindy alright?” Her heart stuttered, though she thought that if something were wrong, something like that, he’d tell her immediately.
“She’s fine. Ten minutes,” he repeated, a little muffled this time.
“Ten minutes what?” She could hear him speaking to someone else. “Harge.”
She said it sharply enough to regain his attention. “Contractions are ten minutes apart.”
Carol blinked. “What?”
“Lilah’s in labor.”
Fully awake now, Carol ran through the scraps of knowledge she had on this pregnancy. “You said late April,” she told him, what he’d told her at dinner two weeks ago.
“I did.”
“It’s April 1st,” Carol stated, caught between concern, and thoughts that he might be drunk and pulling a joke on her.
“Yes, Carol, I know the time, and the date, thank you.”
His irritation was clear, familiar. As was the fear underneath it. “Okay. Alright. Are you sure it’s labor?” She’d had cramps and false starts with Rindy for days beforehand.
“Our bedsheets would indicate that it is.”
Carol was glad he couldn’t see the face she had to be making. That’s what she got for asking. “Okay,” she said again. “Well, if the baby wants out now, then it’s probably fine to come out.”
“Probably,” he repeated. “Thank you.”
She detected something genuine in his sarcasm. He was not a bumbling, panicked father, at least he hadn’t been with Rindy. He was nervous, then and now, but not useless. There were worse men for the rodent woman to go through this with. “Are you going to the hospital?”
“We’ll be out the door in five minutes,” he said, and Carol sensed that he wasn’t really saying it to her. “Look, it’s late. The housekeeper’s here, and she could wait with Rindy until the nanny shows up, but—”
“I will take her.”
“Thank you,” he said, and Carol could hear real relief.
The call ended quickly after that. Carol replaced the receiver, then squinted as Therese turned on the bedside lamp.
“What’s going on?” Therese asked.
Carol took a breath. “Well, the good news is, brunch is cancelled.”
It started raining as they waited for Harge, thunder and lightning threatening to wake up everyone else lucky enough to be asleep at this hour. They waited in the lobby in pajamas and robes, Carol squinting into the rain and darkness in search of Harge’s car.
The moment she recognized it, she went outside, jacket over her robe. There was an awning over the building’s entrance, saving her from the worst of what was quickly becoming a downpour. Harge came to her carrying an umbrella in one hand and Rindy held aloft by his other arm. Rindy’s face was tucked into Harge’s shirt, and Carol knew instantly she’d been crying.
“Hey,” Carol said. “Oh, sweetheart, how are you?”
“Hi, Mommy.” Rindy’s greeting was quiet and muffled. She kept clinging to Harge.
“Sweetheart,” he said. “I have to get your bag, okay? Can you go with Mommy?”
Rindy did not like this idea, it was clear, but she nodded, let Harge put her down. Her sneakers, surely put on in haste, made tiny splashes on the pavement. Carol immediately pulled Rindy against her side.
Without Rindy’s weight, Harge was much faster getting to the car. He wasn’t running, but there was a jog in his step that reminded Carol unexpectedly of another Easter morning, brighter and sunnier and long before Rindy.
They were seeing her family, not his, for once, and Carol’s sister was fighting with the front door as they rolled up the drive. She was very pregnant then, with a toddler demanding her attention, and her arms laden down with bags. Carol’s brother-in-law was, typically, nowhere in sight. Harge had bounded up the drive to help Elaine—his first meeting with Carol’s sister—all charm and smiles. Carol barely had time to open the passenger door before he’d rushed back --satisfied Elaine had her balance and that one of the servants would help—and held Carol’s door for her.
She’d loved him in that moment, quite a bit, even as she laughed and told him not to try so hard. She hadn’t known then, not at all, what would come after. She would bet quite a lot that he hadn’t either.
She watched him now as he stood by the passenger door for someone else, watched him talk to Lilah. Carol couldn’t see her well, the view mostly blocked by Harge, but she did not look happy. Carol got a slightly better look when Harge moved to grab Rindy’s things from the back, saw the effort put into breathing. It brought a pang of sympathy, of remembered pain, low in Carol’s belly. She gave Rindy a little squeeze where the girl leaned against her.
Harge returned with Rindy’s bag. He’d barely handed it to Carol before Rindy was hugging him again.
“Shhh, hey,” he said, voice as low and soothing as he could make it while having to talk over the rain. “Everything’s fine, remember? Lilah’s fine.”
“Baby too?” Rindy asked.
“Absolutely. And you get to have fun with Mommy until baby gets here.”
They exchanged a few more words, which Carol felt oddly guilty about hearing. She focused on the rain hitting the awning until she sensed Harge had comforted Rindy as well as he could.
“Sweetheart,” she said, gaining the attention of both of them. “Rindy, why don’t you go in where it’s warm? Therese is there, waiting for you, see?” She pointed to the glass doors, where Therese was visible in her robe and slippers.
Rindy went, after assuring Harge that she loved him, and Mouse, and the baby. He promised the feeling was mutual, and Carol stood with Harge, watching Rindy make the short trip into the building, Therese opening the door for her.
Without Rindy, Carol heard Harge exhale, even over the rain. He held his umbrella, unnecessary for the moment, with white knuckles. He handed her the bag.
“She’s anxious,” he said, a warning, or an apology.
“Just her?”
He glared without heat, followed Carol’s gaze to where it had returned to the car. “Lilah’s fine.”
She hadn’t been talking about Lilah, but let it go. “Labor got her that angry already?” she asked. She could see enough of Lilah’s expression to be concerned, and slightly amused.
“No, that was my father.”
“Harge…” Carol wasn’t sure if it was pity or a reprimand.
“Long story. We weren’t supposed to see them until tomorrow,” he stopped, rubbed at his temple. “tonight, now. But they showed up earlier, and it’s them she’s pissed at, not the labor.”
“Yeah, that would do it. She’s not going to have it in your car, is she? Or in front of my building?”
“No, she’s not, but thank you for your concern.”
Harge began telling her, just slightly too fast, about Rindy. When she’d gone to bed, when she’d woken up, the Easter egg hunt they were meant to have that she would mis now, her probable disappointment.
“We had her basket hidden,” he continued, “but now—”
“Harge. Harge, it’s fine. We made her a basket ourselves. She’ll be fine. We’ll take care of her.”
“I know.”
Carol was taken aback, wondered just what else was going through his mind that he’d say that so easily. She didn’t press. “Everything will be fine,” she said, what he’d told Rindy. “Everyone will be fine. Airds come from tough stock.” John and Jennifer and their stubborn refusal to die had to mean something for this baby, early or not.
Harge gave her a look she couldn’t read, then smiled. “Thanks. I’ll call.”
“Good. Don’t speed,” she said as an afterthought.
“I never speed.”
“Unless there’s a woman in labor in your car. Don’t speed.” He’d pushed it a little with Rindy, she remembered, and that was in broad daylight, on dry roads.
Harge rolled his eyes, but gave an awkward wave of acknowledgement. Then he turned and made the return jog to his car. Carol watched him close and stash the umbrella, headed back inside when the driver’s-side door shut. She could imagine what he’d be doing, saying, his hand on Lilah’s belly as he checked on her, assured himself that nothing drastic had changed in the few minutes he’d left.
It was what he’d done with Carol, anyway, with Rindy, and Carol hadn’t the right or desire to see him do it again, like this. She carried Rindy’s bag in with her, heard Harge pulling away.
Therese and Rindy had already taken the elevator by the time Carol got to the lobby. Carol walked fast to reach them when the elevator reached their floor, though her movements weren’t as quick as Harge’s had been. It was heartbreaking, stepping back into the haven of their apartment.
Rindy’s tears were flowing stronger and faster without Harge. Therese had gotten her to remove her shoes and jacket, or done it for her, but now Rindy was still, standing in the middle of the living room and sobbing. Therese was crouched down with her, but clearly out of her depth.
Shedding her jacket quickly, and Rindy’s backpack, Carol went to them, a lump jamming her throat as she listened to Rindy’s harsh, panicky cries. Therese looked slightly terrified, and Carol couldn’t blame her.
“Oh, sweetheart.” Carol drew Rindy into a hug, feeling that tiny back shudder under her hands. “It’s okay, Rindy, you’re okay.”
“What about Mouse?”
“Lilah’s okay too, my love.” Carol didn’t think she could use Rindy’s pet name for the woman in Harge’s car. Not without rolling her eyes anyway.
“But she hurts!”
It was a frustrated exclamation, almost a wail. Carol pulled back enough to look at Rindy, run her hands up and down pajama-covered arms. “What did Daddy tell you about how Lilah would have the baby?”
Jesus, she hoped it was something. He seemed to be leaving things to the last minute lately, and she wasn’t prepared to have this conversation with their seven-year-old at three in the morning. Or ever, ideally, but Harge had taken that option off the table.
“Mommies go to the hospital to help babies get born,” Rindy recited, like something she’d heard many times.
Carol smiled, as much in relief for herself as in comfort for Rindy. “That’s right. And sometimes it hurts a little bit to start with,” she said, wildly downplaying, “but that’s okay. The mommy gets her baby in the end, and everything’s okay.”
“Sometimes.” Rindy wiped her nose with her arm.
Carol frowned. “Sometimes?”
“Lizzie says babies are weird, and sometimes weird stuff happens.”
Carol shared a look with Therese, a steadying moment to keep her face clear. Steve’s mother had been a nurse, and Lizzie sometimes knew far too much because of that. Or just enough to be irritating as hell. “Lizzie doesn’t know everything, Rindy, I promise.”
“She says they get stuck up there sometimes, and you have to pull on their head with giant pliers to get them out.”
Carol sincerely did not want to know what Rindy’s understanding of the phrase “up there” was. “Lizzie doesn’t know everything,” Carol repeated.
“She says sometimes their heads get yanked off with the pliers.”
“She’s wrong, honey,” Carol said, taking a firmer stance.
“She says sometimes they come out ass-backwards and it messes everything up.”
That one sounded distinctly like Angie, not Steve’s dead mother. They’d need to talk the next time they were together. “It’s going to be fine, Rindy. Lilah and the baby will be fine.”
Rindy let out a loud sniffle. “Daddy will take care of them?”
“Yes,” Carol said instantly. Rindy didn’t need to know that Harge would be pacing and smoking the whole time, that this was completely out of his control. “Daddy will take care of them.”
Rindy calmed a bit, for a moment. Then there was a crash of thunder, and she practically jumped out of her skin. “Mommy!”
Carol hugged her again, nonsense sounds instinctively spilling forth. Rindy wasn’t especially afraid of storms, not typically. But this wasn’t a typical night. “It’s okay, darling, it’s just noise, it can’t hurt you.”
“But it’s loud!” Rindy protested, a tired whine. “And scary.”
“I know. I know, honey. Lots of things are scary tonight, aren’t they?”
Rindy nodded miserably. “Lizzie says babies don’t want to come out sometimes. What if Mouse’s baby is scared of the noise and doesn’t want to come out?”
“Oh, Rindy. The baby has Lilah, and Daddy, and their big sister waiting for them. I’m sure it wants to come.”
“But what if it doesn’t?” Rindy pressed, exhaustion and fear obvious.
Carol had spent the last two weeks preparing for brunch. Stilted small talk and pointed looks. Her biggest worry was trying to keep her disgust and discomfort from Rindy. She wasn’t prepared for this, felt herself repeating the same empty platitudes.
Then Therese, silent since Carol entered the apartment, spoke up. “When I was little,” she said, quiet, careful, “and we had someone new come stay with us at our school, they were usually scared. Sometimes, we would push our beds together and grab all the blankets and pillows and make a big fort, pretend we were camping.”
Rindy stayed quiet, the tears still falling, but Therese had her attention.
“Everyone would help with the fort, and we would all huddle underneath it, and talk, and tell stories, so the new person wouldn’t feel so alone, or scared.”
“Did it work?” Rindy asked.
Therese smiled softly. “I think it did. What do you say? You want to build a fort, hide from the rain?”
“The baby isn’t here though,” Rindy said, deep in thought. “How can we make the baby feel less scared with the fort if they’re at the hospital with Lilah?”
“The baby might not be here,” Therese said without missing a beat, “but they know their big sister. I bet that if you’re happy and calm and less scared, the baby will feel that and know it’s okay to come out, even with all the silly noise.”
“Really? You think so?”
“I do. What do you think, want to try?”
Rindy wiped her arm across her nose again. “Can we, Mommy?”
“We can,” Carol said, taking some of Rindy’s tears with her fingers. “I think you’ll be able to find lots of fort supplies in the linen closet,” she said, a conspiratorial whisper that had Rindy bolting. “Get some tissues for your nose first, alright?”
It was unclear if Rindy heard her as she ran down the hall, even less so whether or not she would listen if she had.
Carol found herself staring at Therese once Rindy was out of sight, enough that Therese gave her a kind of nervous half-smile.
“I’ll help her clean it up after,” Therese said, like an apology. “I just thought, it didn’t seem like she’d be able to sleep any time soon, so—”
Carol kissed her. They were low to the ground, on Rindy’s level, and Carol’s knees protested. But she cupped Therese’s face and kissed her, soft but insistent, until she was sure Therese would stop explaining, apologizing.
There was no explanation for this woman, there couldn’t be.
Therese smiled, surprised and pleased when the kiss broke. “You’re not mad then?” she asked, teasing.
“I adore you,” Carol said, not teasing at all.
Therese’s smile widened, faltered, then faded. “Carol?”
“What?” Carol asked, concerned by the tone.
“Do they really use giant pliers on babies?”
Carol chuckled. “Forceps,” she said. “They’re forceps, and they don’t use them all the time. Only when the baby’s being stubborn.”
“So, they do get stuck up there?”
Carol stood, held out a hand for Therese. “Go supervise construction, please. I’ll have one person in this house with nightmares already, let’s not make it two.”
Furniture was moved. Sheets and pillows were collected. Therese found a flashlight in the junk drawer, more for ambiance than necessity. Rindy was much happier with a task, a feeling that she could do something to help her new sibling along. Soon, the three of them were piled underneath the fort, along with a nest of pillows.
Rindy laid down between them, calmer and more excited at the same time. She talked about her brother or sister, all the things she would teach them. Therese was the one who did most of the interaction with her on this topic, and Carol was grateful, content to hold the two of them and adjust pillows as needed.
“What would you like?” Therese asked Rindy. “A brother, or a sister?”
Rindy answered quickly, if not definitively. “Jake’s a boy, and I like Jake. Even if Lizzie doesn’t. But boys can also be yucky.”
“Yes,” Therese said, making quite the effort to keep a straight face. “They can be that.”
“Daddy says he wants a girl, because he had such good luck with me.”
“Yes,” Carol said, kissing Rindy’s hair. “Yes, he did.” He’d wanted a boy, before, but Carol always maintained that he was happier with a daughter.
“But I don’t know if I want a sister,” Rindy continued. It was obvious that she’d put much thought into this, long before Therese asked the question.
“No?” Therese prodded.
“I don’t know,” Rindy said. “I’m Daddy’s little girl,” she said with authority, and a finger pointed at her chest. “Daddy says.”
“Daddy’s right,” Carol replied, ignoring the faintly sour taste that came with those words.
“But I can’t be his little girl if he has a littler one.”
“You’ll always be his little girl,” said Therese. “Even if he has a littler one, she won’t replace you. Steve loves Angie and Peggy both, doesn’t he? And if Lizzie ends up with a baby sister someday, he’ll still love Lizzie just as much.”
“Lizzie says if Aunt Peggy or Aunt Angie have another baby, she’s moving in here,” said Rindy. “And Grandpa said that Uncle Steve and Aunt Peggy and Aunt Angie are all going to hell. And Mouse.”
“And what did Daddy say about that?”
“That Grandpa and Grandma don’t know everything, and had to be in time-out for awhile because they said mean things.”
Since John was so keen on declaring the status of everyone’s immortal souls, Carol could imagine what he’d said about her and Therese, within Rindy’s hearing. She could ask, too, but didn’t need to. “It sounds like Daddy’s right,” Carol said, that foul taste in her mouth not quite as strong. “Do you know what else?”
“What?” Rindy asked.
“Daddy will never, ever replace you. I know that for sure, okay?” She’d said as much last week when Abby posited that Harge’s new family might hold sway over the old, that Carol might benefit from it.
Rindy nodded, content for now. They talked about the baby, Easter, what they would do when Rindy woke up. Carol thought they’d moved on from Rindy’s fears about childbirth, until she heard a sleepy question voiced against her side.
“Mommy, did I hurt you?”
“What, sweetheart?”
“Like the baby hurt Mouse. Did I hurt you?”
Carol smiled at the worry there. “Only a little bit. I barely even remember the hurt.”
“Promise?”
“Promise,” Carol said, lying through her teeth.
“That’s good.” Rindy yawned. “I guess I don’t care if I get a brother or a sister. As long as they’re okay, and Mouse is okay, and they don’t get their head squeezed with the pliers.”
The answer was as remarkably grown up as it was childish. Carol and Therese smiled over it, both holding still until they were sure Rindy was asleep.
“Did it?” Therese asked after awhile, a quiet whisper as she balanced on an elbow, watching Carol, stroking gentle fingers along Rindy’s arm. “Did it hurt, with her? You never really said.”
“You never really asked.”
“I don’t like to think of you in pain, knowing I wasn’t there.”
It was such a Therese thing to do, to say, worrying so much about a hurt she didn’t cause, couldn’t possibly have helped. “It hurt terribly,” she admitted, making sure Rindy was fully asleep. “For awhile. The ride to the hospital lasted forever, even though Harge was speeding. He kept telling me to count to four.”
“What?”
“Something from the Navy. Steve and Peggy probably know about it too. Deep breath, count to four, let it out.”
“What’s that supposed to do?”
“In his case? Control the fear, keep him calm enough not to get killed by the Japs. It wasn’t entirely unhelpful with Rindy, honestly.”
Therese laughed a bit too hard, covered her mouth to stifle it.
“The hospital was better. We left Harge, he told me to count to four one more time, patted me like you would a puppy. Then they wheeled me into a room, got me an I.V., and a mask to breathe into. I was sort of floating for awhile after that, they told me when to push, and eventually they showed me this slimy, wrinkly thing that Harge later decided looked like a Rindy.”
“You were drugged?”
“Not horribly. My sister doesn't remember having any of her children. She entered the hospital, changed into a gown, and the next thing she knew she was being handed a perfectly cleaned, pretty baby, all wrapped up."
Therese looked slightly horrified. “How did she know any of them were, were hers?”
Carol’s eyebrows lifted.
“What? We mislabeled things at Frankenberg’s all the time, put things in the wrong places.”
“’We?’ If I’d known you were such a slip-shod employee, I would never have gone to your desk for help,” Carol teased, and got a glare for it. She reached over Rindy, traced Therese’s bottom lip until she smiled. “They’re all hers,” Carol promised. “They all have my dear brother-in-law’s hideous nose. Poor things.”
Therese had to hold back a laugh again, to keep from waking Rindy.
Carol listened to Therese’s stifled giggles, to the rain outside. Sudden wakeup call aside, she felt happier than she had in weeks. “I never told you about Rindy’s birth, you never told me about your fort building expertise.”
“Hmmm?”
“At the school. You never told that story about building forts for the new kids. Did someone do that for you?”
Therese frowned in thought. “Yes, but I’m afraid I wasn’t very appreciative. I was convinced it was just temporary, that my mother would come back, so I thought the whole thing was stupid. I just wanted to go back to my bed and be left alone.”
Therese smiled self-deprecatingly. Carol did not. “You never told me,” she repeated, heartbroken for the younger Therese, angry at the woman who helped create her, who should’ve been there to comfort her the way they were comforting Rindy.
“I didn’t not-tell you, not on purpose,” Therese said, still thoughtful. “I hadn’t gone back to that memory in a long time. I can’t remember when, before tonight.”
“No?”
“No. It mostly makes me remember being lonely. I haven’t felt that in a long time, so I guess my brain sort of forgot about it.” Therese shrugged.
It was a simple answer, or Therese thought it was. But it eased some of the pain in Carol’s chest. “Good,” she said, careful as she leaned over to kiss Therese. “I don’t want you to feel lonely, ever again.”
“I don’t,” Therese promised.
They lay in the quiet, with the rain outside, and Carol was struck by the fact that everything that truly mattered to her was in her arms, under this makeshift shelter.
“Now,” Therese said with a cheeky little smile. “How are we going to get Rindy and get out of here without waking her? I’m too old to sleep on the floor.”
Carol scoffed. “You’re too old?” she grumbled, sitting up amidst Therese’s quiet laughter. “Well then. The goddamned Easter Bunny is bringing you nothing this year, I’ll tell you that much.”