DOUBLE KNOT

by Gretchen Archer

  “Then, Mother?” How long was this story?

  “I told her to wait at the elevator and I’d see about the suitcases,” Mother said, “but that was a lie. I really wanted to check on my pot ro—”

  Mother stopped mid-roast. Or, rather, Bianca stopped her mid-roast. We’d been discussing how this nightmare transpired and who was going in for just about two minutes when from the other side of the door, Bianca began working up a shriek. I clocked her. After forty-five seconds she hit the top and began squealing her way down.

  “What is she saying?” Fantasy asked.

  “It sounds like she’s saying giddy up.” Mother cocked an ear. “Giddy up! Giddy up!”

  “Oh, holy crap.” I stared at my watch. “Her contractions are two minutes apart and they’re lasting a minute. She’s going to have that baby.”

  “There’s a helicopter.”

  I looked at Mother, trying to figure out what a helicopter had to do with anything.

  “She got here in a helicopter,” Mother said.

  “Let’s get her back to the helicopter.” Fantasy liked the idea.

  “And let her have her baby in a helicopter?” I looked at my watch again. “I don’t think you two get it. Her contractions are right on top of each other. She’s having this baby. I don’t think we can move her an inch.”

  “Well, you’d know,” Mother said.

  There was way too much going on for me to know exactly what Mother was talking about. I’d know because I’m pregnant? Because I had a baby eighteen years, two months, and six days ago? Because I’d taken a ten-minute first aid and CPR course a million years ago in Officer Basic Course Training?

  “Remember Effie Conklin?” Mother asked. “You delivered her baby.”

  Fantasy poked my arm.

  “Gotcha! Go for it, Dr. Davis.”

  I couldn’t wait to see Fantasy in a Burger King uniform.

  Bianca, from the other side of the door, said, “Chugga, chugga, chugga, CHUGGAAAAAA!”

  “Oh, boy,” Mother said. “You better get in there.”

  I put my hand on the doorknob, squared my shoulders, looked them both in the eye, and told them they were going to be sorry.

  I cracked the door. “Bianca?”

  “DAVID!”

  * * *

  Mother ran her legs off gathering childbirthing this and that—ice cubes, pool towels, boiling water. (“Why are you boiling water, Mother?” “Well, because.” “Mother, we don’t need boiling water unless someone wants pasta.” “We’re having pot roast, Davis.”) And she fed me information through the crack in the door. No Hair had DeLuna secured on the sunporch. Fantasy was on one of our V2 phones with George Town Municipal Airport waiting for news on Bradley and Baylor and at the same time, running all over Probability looking for a doctor. That left Mother to assist the midwife.

  And by midwife, I mean me.

  “Mother, go to my room—”

  “WOULD YOU LOWER YOUR VOICE, DAVID? I CAN NOT HEAR MYSELF DYING!”

  Bianca’s white pill box hat had slipped from the top of her head and was clapped over her left ear. I don’t know how she could hear me whispering to Mother.

  “IF YOU’RE GOING TO TALK TO ANYONE IT HAD BETTER BE MY HUUUUUUUSSSSBAAAAAND!”

  Then Bianca did a full-on back bend in the bed, soundtrack Poltergeist.

  I spoke through the crack. “Mother, where’s your portable phone?”

  “In my pocketbook.”

  “Bring it to me.” You bet I’d get her huuuuuusssbaaaand on the phone. “And dig through my clothes for something I can change her into.”

  Mother shuffled off. When she returned I had to get Bianca out of her ten miles of chiffon dress so I could get her into my maternity sleepshirt. It took four contractions to get her out of the white cape and into the t-shirt because I had to stop for her to yell, “GLUGGA! GLUGGA! GLUUUUGGA!” and “SWROUP! SWROUP! SWROOOOUP!” I worked fast before another one hit, shaking out the t-shirt and pulling it over her head, and when I did, I knew this would be my last day on earth after all. Printed across the front in big purple letters were the words I ATE THE WORM.

  Then the miracle of childbirth was put on hold while I enjoyed the miracle of communication with a human not on Probability. I flipped open Mother’s old phone, dialed Richard Sanders’s number, and I almost fell to the floor when he answered.

  I paced back and forth at the foot of the bed with Mother’s impossible phone. The first thing I intended to do if I ever got off this ship was buy her a new one and donate the old one to a history museum.

  “I’d have never left if I had any idea she would go into labor, Davis.”

  “I know, Mr. Sanders. I’m sure she knows that too.”

  “RICHARD, I AM LEAVING YOU! DO YOU HEAR ME? I WANT A DIVORCE! AND DRUGS! DAVID, GET ME NARCOTICS!”

  “Bianca?” I pulled the phone away from my head. “You need to calm down. For Ondine’s sake.”

  “What happened?” Mr. Sanders asked. “The last person I talked to before I left was Dr. Durrance. She assured me at the rate Bianca was going there might not be a baby in a month.”

  “Because she’s been so sedentary, Mr. Sanders. I guess the minute she got out of bed and started moving she went into labor.”

  “KOOVA! KOOVA! KOOOOOOVVVVVA!”

  I needed out of the room to talk to Mr. Sanders, to ask what he knew about her blood pressure, her gestational diabetes, and the apparent loss of all her mental faculties, but Bianca wouldn’t let me out of her sight.

  When we’d talked for two minutes, Mr. Sanders assuring me he’d get here as fast as God and Gulfstream would let him, but considering the fact he was still in China, it wouldn’t be anytime soon. Then he asked to speak to his wife.

  “Bianca?”

  “WHAAAAAT?”

  I turned my head for one minute, then looked back to find Bianca backwards, facing the headboard, riding the bed like a pony, spread eagle with one foot off one side of the bed, one foot off the other. I cocked my head one way, then the other, trying to figure out how she’d assumed that pose.

  “Mr. Sanders wants to speak to you.”

  Blond hair flew. “YOU TELL HIM TO KISS MY ASS! PARUNKK! PARUNKK! PARUUUUUNK!”

  Oh, someone save me.

  “Mr. Sanders,” I said, “she can’t talk right now.”

  “I heard.”

  He asked to speak to No Hair, so I stuck my head out the door and watched for Mother to waddle down the hall. Anything to keep from watching Bianca buck on the bed. No Mother. I held the phone behind me and yelled, “Mother!”

  “I’m coming!”

  She peeked in the door. “Heavens to Betsy. What in the world is she doing?”

  “GUANTAAA! GUANTAAA! GUAAAANNNNNTAAA!”

  Mother shuffled off with the phone just as Fantasy rounded the corner in a dead heat. She bent over, head hanging, hands to knees with the news. “There isn’t a doctor on this boat. Not one.”

  “ZUZZZA! ZUZZZA! ZUUUUZZZZZA!”

  “God almighty.” Fantasy raised up, got a peek at Bianca, then crossed herself. We watched Bianca’s head spin for a minute, I crossed myself too, I’m not even Catholic.

  “Have you gone down there yet?” Fantasy whispered.

  “What?”

  “You know.”

  “No, I don’t know.”

  “Have you looked?” she asked.

  “At what?”

  “You know.”

  “No, Fantasy, I don’t know.”

  “Yes, you do.”

  What? No! “NO!” I smacked her. “Sick!”

  “You have to take a peek, Davis.”

  “Oh, hell no, I don’t!”

  Mother turned the corner at a full gallop.
“We have a problem.”

  Exactly what we needed.

  “I gave Big Guy No Hair my portable phone.” Mother was patting her chest and panting. “And the next thing I knew, So and So was in my pocketbook. She got the gun. Davis, she’s going to kill that little weasel crayman.”

  “Mother, listen to me.” I grabbed her forearms. “Go to the kitchen, close the door, and stay there until one of us tells you it’s clear to come out. Do you understand?”

  She understood. I turned around to find Bianca on her back, her head hanging off the foot of the bed. We looked at each other upside down. “David.” She wasn’t screaming. In fact, I could barely hear her. “Please don’t leave me.”

  “I won’t, Bianca.”

  TWENTY-SIX

  No Hair had secured DeLuna to a sun chair and the chair to the iron bistro table, the same table we sat around two (years) days ago when our V2s went down. DeLuna’s hands were cuffed behind the chair, his feet strapped to the frame. He wasn’t going anywhere, and if he did it would be over the deck railing with a chair and a table to splat on the deck below. He was bound, gagged, and out of the way until Jess, just up from a nap, stared at the butt of the Hi-Point 9mm peeking out of Mother’s pocketbook too long. No Hair stepped out of the salon to talk to Mr. Sanders, leaving Jess staring at Mother’s pocketbook so long she came up with a bright idea. And now she had her bright idea pressed against her husband’s left temple.

  Bianca was in the middle of the bed on all fours, soundtrack, The Blair Witch Project.

  I looked at the second hand on my watch, knowing another contraction would hit her in twenty seconds, long enough for me to step out on Mother’s balcony and access the situation on the sun deck. I slid open the doors, keeping one foot in the bedroom with Bianca, the other firmly planted on the deck. A welcome gust of Caribbean breeze blew through me and hit Bianca in the face.

  “Oh, thank you, David.”

  Words I’d never heard pass the woman’s lips.

  The next words from her lips were, “MY LOINS HAVE IGNITED! IGNITED! I’M ON FIRE! HIT ME WITH A HOSE, DAVID! PUT OUT THE FIRE! THE FIRE!”

  “Bianca?” I waited for the storm to subside before I spoke. “You need to rest between contractions. And please try to pipe down.” Because you have no idea what’s going on right outside this door, one of your outbursts might trigger more bloodshed, and you’re totally out of trunks.

  I stuck my head out the door.

  “Young lady, you don’t want to do this.”

  No Hair was negotiating with Jessica.

  “I do. I want to so hard.”

  I couldn’t see or hear DeLuna.

  “Have you ever shot a gun?” No Hair asked her.

  “No.”

  “It’s messy, Jessica. It’s ugly,” No Hair told her. “You’ll be covered in his blood.”

  Jess looked down at her rhinestone anchor.

  “Let me have the gun.” No Hair extended an open palm. “Give it to me.”

  My heart jumped in my throat when Jess turned to answer No Hair and the gun went with her, the death end flailing in No Hair’s general vicinity.

  “JESS!” I drew her attention and the gun away.

  “So, Davis?” I could see the sun glinting off the gun. A flash of it hit me in the eyes. “I’m going to kill him!”

  “JOOOOBAA! JOOOOBAA! JOOOOOBAAAAAA!”

  Someone help me.

  “Jess?” Fantasy stepped onto the sun deck from my stateroom. Now we had her surrounded. “Let’s rest a minute. Close our eyes and think about it. Maybe sit down, relax, and talk about it.”

  I smelled a lullaby on the way.

  “HEEYA HEEYA HEEYA HEEYA!”

  (Squatting. She was up on her haunches. I cut my eyes to see Bianca squatting in the middle of the bed, rocking on her feet, side to side, chanting to the childbirth spirits.)

  Nothing was working. No Hair couldn’t talk the gun away from her and Fantasy couldn’t put her to sleep.

  It was up to me.

  “JESS! 2008! The financial crisis! What happened in 2008?” I shouted over “HEEYA HEEYA,” the wind, and the deck.

  Her dark hair whipped around her head, the 9mm finding everyone when she used her gun hand to push it out of her face. Fantasy gasped and No Hair dove out of the line of fire.

  “The collapse!” Jess waved the gun through the air. “The bailout!”

  And with that, Jess’s anger was temporarily redirected.

  “WHY?” I asked, The Exorcist playing out behind me.

  “Banks didn’t support transparency for hedge funds! Mortgage bankers didn’t obtain financial statements! Subprime loans were out of control!” No Hair took a tentative step toward Jess. “Mark to market accounting rules weren’t followed! And there was no regulation of credit default swaps!” No Hair and Fantasy closed in on her as Jessica got the last of the Banking Collapse of 2008 off her chest. “Anti-predatory state laws were overridden!” Jessica DeLuna, dark hair flying, wearing a rhinestone anchor and one silver shoe, wielding a gun, screaming at the top of her lungs for all of the Caribbean to hear, unleashed the financial devastation anger she’d held for years.

  “But what was the real problem, Jess? Whose fault was it? What went wrong?”

  I don’t remember moving, but I was all the way out of Mother’s room at the edge of the balcony. “Where was the failure, Jess?”

  “Leadership!” Jess waved the gun through the air to make her point. “Total and complete lack of leadership!”

  “POOOKALOO! POOOKALOO! POOOOKALOOOOO!”

  “You’re the leader, Jess! You have to lead! Put that gun down and take back your bank!”

  “My bank! My bank! My bank!”

  Just then, Max DeLuna weighed in. He couldn’t have managed words, and if he did say something through the gag she understood, I didn’t hear it. He must have sneered—at her, at the idea. It was just a flash, but the end result destroyed our collective attempts at defusing the situation, and the barrel of the gun was making an impression on Max DeLuna again. Right between his eyes.

  “You bastard,” she said.

  Now that I heard.

  “Jess!”

  She wouldn’t look at me.

  “If you shoot him—” I gave every word the time and attention it deserved, “—he won’t go to prison for what he’s done. You will.”

  In the end, it wasn’t the prospect of her life over just for the satisfaction of ending his, or the idea of returning to Hawaii and taking her rightful place at her father’s bank that loosened Jessica’s grip on the gun. It was Anderson Cooper. My cat launched through the air like a missile to catch Jess’s soaring hair. Jess screamed, Anderson screamed, and the gun hit the deck to skid and spin to a stop at Fantasy’s feet.

  The reading chair on Mother’s balcony caught me when I stumbled back. My head was thick with the close call, my heart hammering, and it was with glazed eyes I watched No Hair and Fantasy scramble to lock everything and everyone down.

  “Davis?”

  Then I began hallucinating.

  “Davis, honey?”

  It was my husband.

  * * *

  I thought she might be singing a Christmas carol.

  The lyrics to Bianca’s song sounded like, “On Dasher, on Dancer!”

  She was actually belting out the word Ondine, opera style, hitting a very impressive range.

  We were as far from Bianca’s birth plan as could be imagined in any of her wildest dreams or my worst nightmares and there was no going back. Bianca was bringing her baby into the world aboard Probability.

  After the kiss to surpass all other kisses in the history of kisses, Bradley Cole, my husband, the father of my twins, told Bianca he liked her t-shirt on his way to Mother’s p
owder room, where he rolled up his blue oxford sleeves and scrubbed.

  My legs were too weak to hold me up, so I sat on the bed beside Bianca and found her hand. She asked me why I was crying—I didn’t know I was—her breath ragged, her blond hair plastered to her face, her icy green eyes seeking mine. After her next contraction, during which she fractured all the bones in my hand, she told me to stop crying, because she might reconsider my employment at some point in the future.

  “What, Bianca?”

  She started to repeat it, but said, “UUUUGAAAKK! UUUGAAAAKK! UUUUGAAAAAAKKKK!” instead.

  Bradley lifted a chair over our heads, placed it at the foot of the bed, grabbed Bianca by the ankles and pulled.

  She let out a woof.

  “Let’s do this, Bianca.”

  At the door, Baylor, a head taller than the rest of the spectators seeing way more of Bianca than they wanted to, said, “Dude.” Then introduced himself to Arlinda.

  (Really? Right now?)

  Bradly asked for volunteers from the audience. “Caroline? Fantasy?”

  Mother and Fantasy climbed on the bed with us. Each took a Bianca knee.

  I held my breath until Bradley came up for air. “She’s crowning. This baby’s coming. Help her, Davis. Get behind her.” His incredible blue eyes met mine.

  Which was when Bianca started singing Christmas carols.

  I held my breath, Bianca belted out opera, until my husband made the announcement.

  “It’s a…boy?”

  Bianca fell back and collapsed into my arms. I pushed her hair from her face.

  “It’s a boy,” he said. Mother helped Bradley wrap the beautiful little life in a Probability towel. “Bianca, you have a baby boy.”

  Richard and Bianca Sanders named their son David.

  * * *

  Emmeline. My daughter’s name was Emmeline.

  Having said goodbye to her when she was an hour old at the UAB Women and Infants Center in Birmingham, Alabama, I said hello to her again eighteen years, two months, and thirteen days later at my childhood home in Pine Apple, Alabama. It was forever, holding on for dear life, lest the connection that had escaped us once slip away again, before either of us spoke. And when we did, they weren’t exactly words. It would be four hours later when Emi and I finally stepped out of my high-school bedroom. We let Mother in and out with cookies, the Starbucks, and random pieces of life to share with Emi. “This—” she landed a stack of photographs of my ex-ex-husband Eddie Crawford on Emi’s lap, “—is who would’ve raised you.”