Alvin's Farm Book 5: An Innate Sense of Recognition

by Anna Scott Graham

  Over the next seven days Chelsea Schumacher felt her new last name full stop. If she thought the sex they’d had as a married couple was intense, it was nothing when compared to the lovemaking between new parents.

  Or a pregnant married couple; neither Chelsea nor Andy thought of themselves as parents. But they were pregnant, confirmed on Wednesday by a urine test at Dr. Hanover’s office. To that woman’s surprise as much as the Schumachers, it did seem that Chelsea was with child.

  Blood tests would offer more proof, but a transvaginal ultrasound was performed in Albany on Thursday, Dr. Hanover concerned about an ectopic pregnancy. That was discounted as a tiny speck of life clung to the side of Chelsea’s uterus; the technician noted the embryo looked around five weeks’ gestation. Dr. Hanover stood on Chelsea’s left, attending this appointment not just from a physician’s interest. She had been monitoring Chelsea since she was a teenager; a baby for this woman hadn’t been at all possible, but on the screen stood tangible evidence to the contrary.

  As Chelsea and Andy wept, both still in shock, the technician focused on the screen. “Dr. Hanover, you see that right there?”

  “Yeah. Can you get a view from the side?”

  Chelsea and Andy paid no attention, absorbed in each other. Christmas was only days away, a most incredible and unbelievable gift would this be.

  The experts pondered the monitor, the doctor wiping away a few tears. She never cried over these sorts of findings, but in this instance, she couldn’t help it.

  Andy noticed first. “What? Is there a problem?”

  Dr. Hanover shook her head, then spoke a few words that made Sheriff Schumacher nearly fall to the floor.

  Chelsea didn’t want to tell anyone and Andy agreed, but by Saturday the twenty-third, both could barely contain the news. They spent all morning in bed, Chelsea feeling the effects of new parenthood floating all around them.

  The tender way Andy touched her was part of it, and they spoke of what seemed to make sense. That since they knew, loving each other had changed.

  It was softer, but deeper too, some ethereal manner Chelsea hadn’t imagined possible. Previously forceful, passionate sex was enjoyed. After they were married it changed, more permanent and lasting in nature. Still heady, but also with a larger trust of hearts having committed for life.

  Now that procreation had been added, Chelsea couldn’t wait to ask her mother. That sort of sexual banter Chelsea would permit, but they weren’t going to tell anyone until the New Year. Still, she wanted to ask Jenny if making love while pregnant had been different with either Alvin or Sam. Chelsea wasn’t blind; her parents, even with Jenny’s poor health, were still an ardent duo.

  From what she knew about Alvin and Jenny, that also held true. Chelsea’s mother may have slept around plenty in the late 1960s and early ‘70s, but Alvin had captured something within Jenny Cope. Chelsea rarely thought of her mom as Jenny Cope, but she hadn’t married Alvin, then had miscarried Sam’s baby before they were wed. Chelsea assumed she knew all about her parents’ pasts.

  Her mind flitted from one subject to another, previously not that way. Tanner popped into her head; he had learned about Jan and Tim from tidbits leaking. While Tim McGillis was a complete asshole, Jan Watson Cassel had only been a scheming drunk, securing a fifty thousand dollar divorce payoff so Scott could marry Alana right before Susannah was born. Chelsea knew the family’s wealth was substantial, as that chunk of change had come without question over ten years ago. Her parents had paid well over half a million bucks for her San Francisco house, but Chelsea would never have imagined the actual bulk. She was having a hard enough time accepting her own news.

  “Andy, does it feel different?” she asked, not wishing to lose that thought.

  “What Chelse?”

  “This,” she giggled. He lay atop her, seemed so deeply within her. Had her mother felt this way, as if a man she loved would never leave or be taken, then Chelsea began to cry.

  “Honey, what is it?”

  “I feel like I’ll always have you. Then I wonder if Mom thought that and Alvin died anyways.”

  Chelsea began to sob and Andy pulled out, lying beside her. “Baby, I don’t know. But Chelse, and this might sound funny, but after we got married it changed, and now, oh my God, now…”

  “Yeah,” she murmured, wiping her face with the sheet. “Now it’s like completely different.”

  “It is,” he smiled, kissing her neck. “But good Chelse, so good!”

  They returned to where bodies met intimately, and Chelsea cried as if he was getting her pregnant all over again. She was five weeks pregnant, which sounded as if she was also moving to Mars. In less than seven months… “Andy, you okay?”

  “Chelse, is this real?”

  She giggled. “Touch my boobs and I’ll tell you.”

  He stared at her. She hadn’t wished for his mouth or hands anywhere near her bosom.

  “Go ahead,” she teased.

  “No.”

  She set his palm just under her left breast. Then she moved his fingers along the curve, toward the blush of skin where a pointy edge waited. “Andy, please,” she whispered.

  Even though he’d just come, a husband did as a wife asked. But only for seconds, as Chelsea flinched as soon as his fingertips landed on that aching point of flesh.

  Then she began to cry, a multitude within her head and heart. And in her uterus too. Chelsea couldn’t stop thinking of what lay just under her skin.

  On Christmas Eve they were subdued, but it was forced. By evening’s end, if Jenny asked more than the state of the weather, Chelsea assumed she would tell her mother every single detail.

  That night had been festive, the party held at Sam’s, Will and Bethany too exhausted to host it. Louise was in better form, but new parenthood was wearing on the couple, and Rachel was spending the night at their place, an extra pair of hands. Vanessa had offered, but at the last minute her plane was delayed, snow on the East Coast closing airports. She would be there in a few days, which didn’t bother the depleted new parents in the least.

  Eric and Dana had gone to town with Travis and Tanner, David already upstairs asleep in Chelsea’s old room. His apartment in Kelso wasn’t much more than a way station and where he bunked at Mount St. Helens was the same. Since the middle of December, he owned that third floor room and on Christmas Eve he went to bed at nine o’clock.

  That left Chelsea and Andy and her parents as by a quarter after nine David’s loud drones floated down two flights of stairs. All laughed that regardless of the bed, David rested best in Arkendale. For all his gadding about, he was like his siblings, suited more for home.

  Chelsea let her husband and father clear what dishes remained, Rachel, Dana, and Eric having attended to most of the clutter. All the cousins had lent a hand, but a few cups sat on the table. Mother and daughter didn’t move, but Jenny seemed better, had eaten a large slice of Rae’s Christmas pound cake, which wasn’t chocolate but still contained special ingredients. At that late hour for a farmer’s wife, Jenny was nearly off her feet.

  The women sat at the kitchen table as they had for years, but Chelsea felt time existed in a strange bubble, one she had never thought would include her. Her mother and Bethany had more in common, talking about breastfeeding and which diapers were preferable, Rachel in on those conversations with her nanny-like status at Will’s house. She wasn’t expecting that to last, especially once Bethany’s mother arrived, but for now it was Rachel’s passion. Then Chelsea began to cry, couldn’t stop.

  “Baby, what is it?” Jenny’s voice was slowed from her pain relief and the late hour.

  “Oh God Andy, I can’t wait!”

  “Wait for what?” Sam asked, a dishcloth in hand.

  Chelsea felt some small unconscious memory being tapped, her mother slightly broken, her father tending to the housework. If she had known this was how Sam and Jenny had started living together, she wouldn’t have been surprised, but those minor details hadn’t be
en shared, or ones carrying larger implications.

  “Andy, I, I…”

  “Go ahead,” he said, kneeling at her side. “Honey, it’ll be okay.”

  “What?” Jenny asked in a stoned giggle.

  “Mom, Dad, Andy and I, we’re gonna…”

  She burst into tears, setting her head on the table, long blonde hair spilling around her face, a tenor wary but thrilled. Being admitted to Mills or buying her San Francisco house didn’t compare, nor sitting in fabulous seats in SBC Park or watching Will pitch another shutout. Not even the memories of her parents bringing home new babies was this good.

  Maybe her father returning from the hospital, her mother draped all over Sam, who sported no injuries for how mangled the Honda had been, only a few small cuts on his face. Chelsea had seen pictures of that accident, also knew how her dad had kicked at the dangling door, then walked away, an event nearly as miraculous as what she held within her.

  “Chelse, what is it? Honey, you can tell us.” Jenny’s tone was that soft, lazy drawl her family had heard more often than not over the last few weeks.

  “I’m pregnant,” Chelsea said, finally looking up. “Andy and I are having…”

  “You’re what?” Sam shouted, at his daughter’s side as soon as she spoke those words.

  “Twins,” Andy finished, blinking away tears. “We’re having a baby and it’s twins!”

  That David never stirred would later be a story for the ages. Siblings teased that maybe he’d had a piece of Aunt Rae’s Christmas pound cake, as the wailing between one pregnant woman and another very high carried on for over twenty minutes. The two men involved weren’t quite as emotional, but still red eyes weren’t only for Jenny that night. All four adults looked as if a few spliffs had been enjoyed.

  Chelsea wasn’t just pregnant; two embryos had been seen by Dr. Hanover and the technician in Albany, twins growing in Chelsea’s previously quiet womb. On the sofa, mother and daughter sat next to each other, Sam against his wife, Andy across in the rocker. For the new couple it still seemed unreal, but for the one older it was more of accepting miracles, even if so much else seemed dismal and aching. What Chelsea and Andy didn’t know was why Jenny had gotten so stoned that night; not to do with physical pain but the deeper ache of a mother’s heart. That afternoon Jenny had seen what Sam had realized since before Chelsea got married; Dana had been sexually assaulted.

  They didn’t know when or by whom; Jenny could only fathom what Sam did, that their son wasn’t much different than his father, an apple not falling far from the tree. What Sam had said to Tommie the first time he met Jenny, on Easter Sunday 1975; Sam hadn’t been in love with her then, only noting an attraction to a woman visibly upset. Eric’s adoration of Dana was much the same.

  Chelsea and Andy’s news took the sting out of it; for the first time in ages Sam’s heart was comforted. Jenny’s illness, Eric and Rachel coming home, Tanner in and out of trouble, then Dana, but at that moment Sam felt a lasting serenity like when he had finally made love to Jenny, also as when David was born. Again Sam knew a deep peace while cradling his ailing wife, for in her arms sat their eldest child, who was going to be a mother.

  Then Sam looked at Andy, a man in flux. He loved Sam’s daughter, but children had never been a consideration. From the get-go Andy had known Chelsea was infertile, yet with that specter not only removed, but doubled, a lawman’s hard edge was stripped. Perhaps in uniform he would again resemble who Sam was most familiar when thinking of Andy Schumacher; Grant’s nephew, Eric’s son, Chelsea’s husband, and now two babies’ father. Sam laughed. No angst could touch this, none at all.

  “When are you due again?” Jenny’s voice was still slow, but a relieved thrill punctuated her words.

  “Supposed to be August, but more likely July, maybe the end of June, depending on how long they go.” Chelsea sniffled. “Dr. Hanover has me set up to see a high risk specialist in Albany in the middle of January, and unless I can take them to thirty-six weeks, I’ll probably deliver there too.”

  “If there’s complications, we’ll go to Eugene or Portland, they have really good neonatal ICU’s,” Andy said. “But hopefully…”

  “It’ll be fine,” Jenny murmured. “They’ll be just fine.”

  Sam’s hands were placed along Chelsea’s sides. “Honey, you feel that?” Jenny said to their daughter.

  “Uh-huh,” Chelsea still teary.

  “Your daddy came back to me, barely a scratch on him. There is a God Chelse, and while he can be a tough SOB, he’s also got the softest hands. These babies are gonna be just fine.”

  Sam blinked back a few tears, surprised he had any left to shed. He had wept while holding his daughter as Andy held Jenny, learning no one else knew. The couple had wanted to wait until the end of January to tell anyone. That was still the plan; with his dad’s heart condition, Andy wanted to keep it that way. Maybe not as long as hearing the heartbeats, of which there would be two. Not only was Chelsea pregnant, but there were two of them.

  Jenny continued mumbling that Alvin and Grant would keep their eyes on these babies and so would Uncles Robert and Cliff. Then of course the Grandparents Baxter, and Chelsea lost it all over again. “Oh Mom, Dad, if one of them’s a girl…”

  “You hoping for a mix?” Sam asked.

  Andy nodded. “That’d be pretty nice.”

  “Yeah, I mean, I may never get pregnant again. Oh Jesus, this’s just too damn weird!”

  Chelsea sat up, then stared at her mother, finally finding Sam’s eyes. “Daddy, Mom, I never and I mean never thought this could happen!”

  Jenny caressed her child’s face. “Honey, it’s gonna be okay. You have to hold onto that. I know summer’s a long ways away, but it will be okay.”

  Sam nodded. He had worried about David right up until that boy was in his arms, had done the same with Rachel and Eric. All the kids were fine, then Sam coughed.

  “Daddy, you all right?”

  “Yeah Chelse, just something stuck in my throat.”

  Andy stood, going to the kitchen. Jenny grasped Sam’s hand, giving it a knowing squeeze.

  For a moment Dana’s sullied history poked at Sam. As he drank the water Andy handed him, Sam washed her away.

  For Christmas, there was no sorrow, only this tremendous gift for Sam’s baby girl. No matter if she was nearly his height, and he stood, setting the glass on the coffee table. Gripping Chelsea’s hands, he pulled her up, then embraced her. She wasn’t his anymore, but within her were his grandchildren. Even with Louise’s colic, Sam was again ready to hold babies as much of a treasure as when Chelsea herself had been tiny.

  Sam wiped her face, kissed her cheeks, then gave her to Andy, who had been waiting. Then Chelsea burst out again, cradled against her husband’s chest. Sam reclaimed his space on the sofa, opening his arms to Jenny, who set herself in a similar location.

  Those two couples spent the last hours of Christmas Eve in bliss and appreciation. Chelsea and Andy fell asleep first, Jenny and Sam not far behind.

  Jenny lay on her right side, feeling no pain. She had heard Eric and Dana’s hushed but happy return; Dana had sounded inebriated, coping as Joni had, as Jane had, maybe Jess too. Jenny never knew how her sister Jess had endured, but that she had committed suicide before Tommie located Jane all those years ago told Jenny that however it had been, it wasn’t enough.

  There weren’t many ways to survive sexual abuse and stay on one’s feet, but Jenny only smoked pot because of multiple sclerosis. That was why, but as soon as Sam confirmed what Jenny had seen, a few more tokes had been allowed, just to ease that news into her head. Now better information balanced what Jenny had missed since Eric first brought his girlfriend home.

  And now Jenny understood Sam’s change of heart, as well as Chelsea’s ill health. Both were secrets, and Chelsea’s news would stay that way until February. She wanted to tell the family on Jenny’s birthday. Dana’s news might be concealed well past that date, maybe until summer, when sh
e and Eric came home, living in Arkendale full time.

  Jenny’s mind was still fuzzy, but growing clearer with every call of her name. Sam’s voice was better for her than pot, but that night she hadn’t been able to resist. Probably best that she was high to hear Chelsea’s news. If Jenny had been sober, she might have raised the dead.

  Even David would have heard her whoops and shouts, but instead she was sedate, or at least not hysterical. Weepy, but these were the best sorts of tears, and it beat in her head, as when she had lost Alvin but learned of Will. Alvin had assured her Will wouldn’t be lost, and equally Jenny felt certain Chelsea’s babies had the same guarantee. She knew Sam wouldn’t be that quick to believe, nor Andy, but when she saw Chelsea again, Jenny would tell her this previously unknown bit of history. That on the first evening Alvin was gone, he had come back in a dream and told Jenny the baby would be fine, and that eventually Sam would give her a child.

  Might Alvin return that night, leaving a piece of encouragement in Jenny’s slightly foggy mind? She didn’t think so, but she could tell Chelsea about one last gift Alvin had placed into her hands, first making sure Sam would be there to care for her, to love her. Alvin had known that before he died. After he was gone, he told her the rest.

  Jenny let that be, distracted by Sam’s intentions of a more intimate nature. She let him make a very sweet love to her, the sort they had employed when conceiving their own children, the sort he offered when home from the hospital. Once Sam had been discharged, making Eric hadn’t taken any time at all.

  Chapter 11