A Baby on the Way

by Salonen, Debra

  Now, all Casey had to do was convince a panel of people that the right thing to do was just say no—to turkeys.

  Unfortunately, she’d awoken in a fog after a restless night. Probably because the tea she’d brewed for herself that morning had produced a quick, intense rush of nausea when she’d brought the cup to her lips.

  “Shake a leg, Casey T. We don’t want to be late.”

  Red had offered to pick her up, for which she was grateful.

  She picked up her briefcase and purse. “Coming. How do you feel this morning?”

  “Crappy. Those pills make everything taste like dog doo.”

  “How do you know what dog doo tastes like?”

  Laughing, he opened the truck door for her. “You got a point. Are you nervous?”

  “Yes.”

  “Did I hear tell that Nathan is coming?”

  “Yes. He’s riding down with the barra—I mean, one of the lawyers who is handling the case. Her name is Gwyneth.”

  He nodded, but didn’t say anything. Which was good, because she really didn’t want to think about Nathan or Gwyneth or anything outside the parameters of her arguments. At the Sunday night strategy meeting, she and Sarah had divided up the discussion topics among the faithful: air quality, water pollution, traffic, disease and decimation of property values. Casey’s job would be to summarize the points that each of the speakers made to drive home their impassioned plea.

  God, I hope I can do this without throwing up.

  She didn’t feel well. A part of her still asked the “Am I? Or aren’t I?” question. She’d picked up a pregnancy test but hadn’t used it because she was sure the disappointment would have been too crushing on top of what was certain to be a grim decision today.

  Plus, she couldn’t say what this would mean to her and Nathan. Six months ago, they’d have danced a happy dance and toasted with bubbly water. Now, they lived in two separate homes four hours apart. And although she hadn’t come right out and told Nathan her decision, Casey knew in her heart, she couldn’t live in the city again—baby or no baby.

  She was a country girl. She loved the animals, the space, the smells, the quiet. And she felt guilty about her feelings. She’d married Nathan under false pretenses, although not intentionally. While living with her aunt, Casey had devoted herself to becoming a woman of the city. Partly to make Meg happy and partly to get back at her father, who had sent her away from the life she loved.

  Coming home had brought back those feelings she’d buried, and the truth was very clear—she was no longer the wife Nathan thought he’d married.

  “MUST YOU DO THAT?” Gwyneth snarled at the driver of the car in front of them. “Don’t they teach you people how to drive out here in the boonies?”

  Nathan looked around. Modesto was hardly a small town. They’d just turned on Highway 99 South and Gwyneth had already changed lanes four times. He looked in the backseat where Philip Kim, the junior partner who had moved into Gwyneth’s place after Eric got sick, was sitting. Nathan had been impressed by the young man from the day they were introduced. A critical thinker whose mother was Japanese and father Korean, Philip’s only shortcoming was his habit of thinking out loud. He never stopped talking. Oddly, Gwyneth’s driving had turned him to stone. Nathan wasn’t even sure the guy had blinked in ten miles.

  “We’re only thirty minutes away,” Nathan told him.

  Phil wiped a bead of sweat from his upper lip. “Good.”

  “Do you know where the courthouse is?” Gwyneth asked.

  “Yes.”

  “Is Casey expecting you?”

  “Yes. You and Philip can go home and I’ll ride back with her.”

  “Even if I beat the pants off the NOTT people?”

  There was a giddiness to her tone that made Nathan uncomfortable. From what Eric had told him, chances were good that Gwyneth would win, but Casey wasn’t a pushover. When she felt strongly about a subject, she was known to bend a few rules to make her position known. They hadn’t discussed the case directly, but he’d overheard her explaining the issue to Bethany while they were standing in line at the theme park.

  “Turkeys are cool birds. Their meat is nutritious and they’re easy to raise, as long as you don’t expect them to think.” She’d laughed in that singsong happy tone that made him smile. “But you can’t raise turkeys without dealing with the by-products. Turkey poop is great fertilizer, but there’s a process required to break it down. That process stinks. When the wind is right, you can smell it for miles and miles. And the runoff from holding ponds is toxic to fish and crawdads and frogs. Have you and your sister ever gone fishing for crawdads? We’ll have to do that when you visit next weekend.”

  Nathan had never fished for crawdads, either. His father had always promised to take him fishing, but they had never seemed to find time. There hadn’t been time for a lot of things.

  “Damn you!” Gwyneth exclaimed, stomping on the brakes.

  Nathan put his hand out to brace himself. “We’re not in that big a hurry, Gwyn.”

  “I know, but driving is my passion. I just hate it when a few retards spoil it for the rest of us.”

  He glanced in the back seat. Philip was staring at his hands—the politically correct response, of course, but Nathan was certain he spotted a hint of a smile. Or a grimace.

  “This is our exit,” he said. Thank goodness.

  “APPARENTLY A FEW of the citizens speaking today misunderstood the directive we as a board put forth at our last meeting. We were making an effort to bring the language in the planning document in line with similar documents, nothing more. Actual approval for the plan will come after due process and recommendations set forth by the planning department.”

  Western-suit Guy was talking into the microphone, his gaze zeroing in on Casey every few minutes. She tried flashing him the smile that always worked with her male teachers but his frown only deepened. Maybe he’s gay.

  The silliness of the thought—that because some man wasn’t won over by her girlish charms automatically brought his sexual proclivity into question—made her giggle.

  Jimmy leaned in and whispered, “Making friends wherever you go, hey?”

  “Whatever.”

  His laugh was somehow comforting. They weren’t exactly friends yet, but she hoped they might be one day, once his and Sarah’s relationship solidified. Surely that would happen after the baby was born, she thought, adding a little wishful prayer.

  Casey clicked her pen and doodled in the margin of her agenda while sneaking peeks across the aisle where her husband sat with Gwyneth and an associate whose name Casey had forgotten. Peter, Paul, Patrick? Something with a P, she was sure of it.

  Her father, who was sitting beside her, cleared his throat. “Are you listening?” he whispered tersely.

  “Yes.”

  No. She was staring at her husband like a groupie. Her mind was all over the place. What’s wrong with me?

  “We’ll open the public comment portion of this meeting. Those of you who planned to talk have already signed the agenda, I trust,” the sweet-faced commissioner who had smiled when Casey took her fellow board member to task said.

  Casey nodded, even though the question hadn’t been asked to her specifically. Sarah had been in charge of getting all the volunteers lined up and on the schedule.

  She looked around Jimmy to check with her.

  Sarah’s normally pale skin was a rosy hue that resembled a flush from too much exertion. “Sarah? Are you okay?”

  She winced slightly and tried to smile. “The Braxton-Hicks contractions are really bad today.”

  Casey looked at Jimmy. Maybe these weren’t the small, preliminary contractions she’d read about. When was their due date again? A clammy feeling in her hands made her wipe them on her good skirt.

  The pregnancy question fled her mind when Gwyneth stood up and made her way to the center aisle. Granted she was wearing spike heels, but did she have to rest her hand on Casey’s husband’s shou
lder as she edged past him?

  Model-thin, black suit with a skirt short enough to draw everyone’s attention to her artfully sculpted legs. Straight back, chin high. Hair in an elegant twist that made her look like a force to be reckoned with.

  “Gentlemen and ladies of the board, thank you for granting this hearing. My name is Gwyneth Jacobi. My law firm represents the turkey growers, GroWell Agriculture. I have a short PowerPoint program that I’d like to run for you.” She turned to look over her shoulder at Philip—Philip!—who had moved to some AV equipment near where the planners were sitting.

  Casey softly groaned and slunk down in her seat. Red’s eyes narrowed and the furrow in his brow seemed to fold inward another inch or two, but he didn’t say anything.

  Casey watched the slides with a combination of awe and mortification. If you believed Gwyneth, raising turkeys was the cleanest, most environmentally friendly occupation in the world. “Yes, there are by-products and a certain amount of waste, but GroWell recognizes its responsibility to the world at large and to its neighbors. The bottom line is GroWell is coming to your county with a viable agricultural product that it plans to raise on land that is zoned agricultural. Who could possibly find fault in this?”

  Her intonation made it sound as though only narrow-minded zealots would question such a great plan. And the look she exchanged with the cowboy-suit commissioner—the man hadn’t taken his eyes off her the whole time she was speaking—said he agreed completely.

  Casey groaned. How did Gwyneth know to target that particular supervisor? Had Nathan mentioned Casey’s blunder to her? The idea made her queasy.

  Red turned in his seat—to give his back to Gwyneth and rally the troops. “Okay, now, she’s a city gal with no attachment to the land. All of that falderal was easy for her to say because she doesn’t have to smell the dang stink. Now, let’s give our side.”

  Our side? Our side sounded like a bunch of whiners. Our side didn’t have one supportable argument other than the fact nobody wanted the birds around.

  But that didn’t mean they wouldn’t try.

  She consulted the list Sarah had produced and pointed at an eighty-year old woman in Wranglers, boots and a tucked-in shirt. “Maude, you’re first. Give ’em heck.”

  The white-haired woman leaned over and squeezed Casey’s shoulder. “We call it hell where I’m from—just like what it’s going to be around here if those flapping birds go in.”

  Naturally, Maude’s whisper was loud enough to be heard in the next meeting room over. Casey gave her a thumbs-up, then looked at Sarah. She was going to raise the question about putting Maude first, but the look on Sarah’s face made her swallow her words. Something was wrong. Very wrong.

  She elbowed Jimmy who was focused on Maude’s impassioned speech. He elbowed her back.

  “You folks got no right to force me and my mister out of the house we’ve lived in for forty-seven years. He’s not well now. The body is willing but the mind gets confused a lot these days. If you take away what little he can connect with—the trees he planted when our littlest was born, the tractor he still tinkers with on his good days, all the things that we built up together, you’re going to be signing his death warrant.

  “I got nothing against turkeys—’cept they’re the dumbest animals God saw fit to put on the Earth, but our place is just eight miles from this here farm. On a still night, I could hear old man Booth yellin’ at the missus. I don’t need no fancy slides to tell me the stink is going to travel just as far and as fast.”

  Casey was pleasantly pleased by the digs Maude had gotten in, but she doubted the old woman’s plea would connect with the male members of the committee. But her main concern at the moment was Sarah.

  “Jimmy, your wife is in pain. Could be labor.”

  The words seemed to jolt him into action. He turned to Sarah and they discussed her condition in low whispers. Finally he looked at his watch then turned to Casey. “The pains are coming real regular. Five minutes apart. Maybe I’d better take her to the hospital.”

  She rolled her eyes. “Ya think?” She reached around him and gave Sarah’s arm a quick squeeze. “I’ll text Jimmy’s cell as soon as we know something.”

  The couple slipped out the side door just as Maude was finishing up. Casey applauded—until cowboy-suit guy reprimanded her. “This is not a high school debate. Members of the audience will please refrain from emotional outbursts.”

  Casey’s cheeks ignited, and she was unlucky enough to spot Gwyneth’s smirk. Crum. She called her next speaker. Joe Morisi. Her big gun. The sixtysomething farmer could buy and sell everyone on the board, but he was also a kind, very soft-spoken fellow with a shy manner that really didn’t leave much of an impact on their opinions when he was done.

  And so it went until her list was depleted and it was Casey’s turn. She took her legal pad and approached the podium. A slim wand stuck out of the wooden stand. She set her notes in the allotted space and adjusted the microphone to her height.

  She cleared her throat.

  “Thank you for affording this opportunity to the residents of the county to make their feelings known. Unlike the paid representative who spoke on behalf of the turkey growers, I was born in this county and spent my formative years here. I floated down the creek on my homemade raft. I picked wildflowers to place on our table every Easter. I have only the most delightful memories of an idyllic childhood. Then I went away to school back East. I lived in a city. I learned a different side of life and felt attuned to it, but in coming back home to help my father with this campaign to save a way of life, I realized just how much of a country girl I am at heart.”

  She realized that her husband was hearing this for the first time and she felt bad about that, but she followed her instincts. “As all of the speakers who went before me have said, we’re not here to ask you to rule against turkeys or agriculture. We’re simply asking you to take into consideration the bigger picture. Cities are expanding at unprecedented rates. Landowners are selling out to developers for unprecedented profits. The farmers who spoke to you today are a dying breed. They honor the land, they live in harmony with their neighbors and they do their best to give back to their community. The multinational company that is geared to ram a million turkeys down our throats doesn’t care about any of that. They care about making a profit.”

  Cowboy-suit guy, who had rocked back in his chair with arms crossed defiantly, snorted.

  She zeroed in on him. “Making a profit is the American way. I don’t have anything against that—unless you’re hurting other people in the process. Can GroWell promise that their high-tech barns won’t give off a stench so horrific it won’t drive Maude and Taylor off their ranch? No. Can they promise to contain the runoff from their holding ponds and not pollute the surrounding vernal pond beds? No. They assure us that they will be good neighbors, but we all know the code of a good neighbor is to do unto others as you would have them do unto you. So, as soon as the CEO of GroWell builds a house beside one of his industrialize-size hatcheries, I’ll back off.”

  Nathan had never been more proud of his wife. She spoke with passion, with logic and with heart. And one thing she said triggered an immediate reaction in his head. Vernal ponds. Where there are vernal ponds, there might be endangered species.

  Kirby might have been able to help her cause. Now, there was a good chance Casey and her group were out of luck. The decision rested on the shoulders of the planning commissioners.

  Fortunately, they didn’t drag out the wait too long. Before the guy that Casey had pissed off could open his mouth, one of the women on the board said, “Thank you all for coming today. This strong turnout tells me we are not dealing with an open-and-shut case. I, for one, want more information before I approve or disapprove the petitioners’ request for a conditional-use permit.”

  “Oh, come on, Sandy,” the man in the gray suit said. “A little dog and pony show doesn’t mean this company shouldn’t be allowed to build on the land they bough
t and paid for. This is ridiculous.”

  Sandy turned to him with a fury that told Nathan she really disliked the man and probably never agreed with anything he said. “I make a motion to postpone for one week the application regarding—” She consulted her paperwork then rattled off the parcel number.

  The majority of the board members agreed, but later, when Nathan overheard Sandy address Casey privately, she said, “Bring us some meat, Casey. Give us some solid proof why we should require a full EIR. Help us help you.”

  Solid proof. The kind Kirby might have. But what would that mean to his future? He just heard his wife publicly espouse the benefits of living in the country. He knew Casey. She wasn’t just making a case for her side. She was home—until that home was no longer a viable option. And Nathan, who flourished on exhaust fumes and coffee shops on every corner, had to decide which cause he supported—hers or his own.

  CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

  JAMES RILEY MILLS was born shortly after one that same afternoon. Casey and Red had been pacing in the hospital waiting room, while Nathan worked on his laptop in a coffee shop across the street, where, unbelievably, they had a WiFi hookup.

  She retrieved him once they got the okay to see Sarah.

  “We’re going to call him Riley,” an exhausted-but-beautiful Sarah said, reclining in her hospital bed. Her hair was loose and the flowery gown she had on was one Casey her given her at a recent baby shower. Her eyes glittered with triumph and love. Mostly love.

  “Isn’t he the most incredible thing you’ve ever seen?” Jimmy asked from the overstuffed rocker beside the bed, where he was holding the tiny bundle of blanket-swathed child.

  Casey leaned over his shoulder. Her fingers were actually shaking when she touched the soft pink cheek. The baby turned automatically toward her fingers, his lips opening and closing like a little fish. “Absolutely. He has your eyes, Sarah. And Jimmy’s nose. And my lips.”