Lilli de Jong

by Janet Benton

  And how those cries affect me! Until now, no matter how much I’ve cared for a person, with the exception of Mother in her dying hours, and despite how dreadful this sounds, I’ve found it easier to bear their suffering than my own. Not so with Charlotte. My shoulders, back, arms, and neck ache from holding her; my nipples are scabbed and sometimes bleeding; yet the most worn-out, painful part of me is my heart. It stretches so wide when she’s contented that I believe its fibers are tearing. When she suffers, it shrinks and throbs and hardens into a knot.

  Never before have I even thought of my heart as the muscle it is. Never has mine seemed to expand and contract in concert with my feelings. It hurts continually now from responding to the inconstant creature that is Charlotte.

  Anne sees that I can’t be asked to nurse a second infant.

  * * *

  I’ve written nothing yet of what happened after I was moved to the delivery room. I was shaved—which the doctor said prevents disease. She placed me on towels and bathed me with a cloth. Then she left to examine Sally, who was feeling faint, and all the others in the house.

  After some time of worsening contractions, Delphinia brought a dinner tray. I ate one bite of chicken and vomited. She sat with me till the paroxysms ceased and watched me endure several onslaughts of pain, then told me I was doing very well, because I tried not to brace against them, which only makes them fiercer.

  I passed a long night in this way, awake. In the morning, the doctor returned and washed her hands in chlorinated lime, then began to execute a process she said is used in the best maternity hospital in Philadelphia: a quick-acting cathartic, then a bath, then the rupture of the waters.

  Next I spent some long time pushing in agony. I hardly knew where I was, or with whom. Periodically Dr. Stevens pushed her hand inside me to discern how open I’d become. A problem emerged: though my os was fully dilated, the baby couldn’t pass beyond. Would I have to be brought to the hospital for surgery?

  At last the doctor thought to give me a catheter and discovered that my bladder was profoundly full, blocking the passage. All the power of my pushing had only forced my poor baby’s head against my bladder—which may help explain her alertness.

  Merely two more pushes and the baby was out. Delphinia bathed her as the doctor gave me morphine and depressed my abdomen gently to expel the afterbirth, then dosed me with quinine until my ears were ringing—the sign she’d given enough. She approached me next with a dropperful of some other draught and I protested, saying I wanted no further treatments. Already the morphine and the quinine were having peculiar effects. I had close in mind what a doctor’s overzealous dosing had done to Mother.

  “These unmarried girls lack the common sense of a lady,” Dr. Stevens said to Delphinia, as though I wasn’t in the room.

  Delphinia gave a hard stare. “With all they’ve been through, they’re anxious of being harmed.” Then she laid my baby gently onto me.

  My body trembles still from its long struggle. The doctor said I would soon forget the pain, but I haven’t forgotten. I awaken from brief rests in a sweat, heart hammering, and recall the hours of fruitless pushing till the catheter cleared the way. I was mad with agony, yet the doctor only yelled to push harder, harder.

  That struggle, it turns out, was the easier part. Now the dear person I must keep alive is outside my womb, and no need but air is filled without my effort.

  Today was typical. She nursed or dozed with my nipple in her mouth for sixteen hours of the past twenty-four; I counted. The other hours, she had to be in my arms, or she would scream.

  A moment may come when I have nothing left to offer—when it will all have been sucked out.

  My hand shakes as I write. Oh, for a few hours of sleep! Tiredness penetrates me—as if I were a rag doll, with tiredness as my stuffing.

  Fourth Month 12

  Charlotte is crying. I can hear her through two closed doors. Yet I’m determined not to respond because I’m furious, furious. I’m seated beside a claw-foot tub in the room across the hall, and Charlotte is in the bassinet, screaming for me, and I have reached the end of my patience.

  Here is what has just occurred. The recovery room is on the first story. The furnace sits beneath it, in the basement. The coalman arrived with a delivery as I was reaching to put a dozing Charlotte in the bassinet, aiming to drop myself into bed right after. And do mark, please, that this was one of the few times in her fifteen days of life when she was unwary enough that I might attempt this.

  But as I lowered her slowly through the air, the round iron cover on the side of the building slid open, and coal descended raucously through a chute into the basement.

  At the first burst of falling coal, Charlotte’s body startled from head to toe. Her face contorted into a mask of misery, and she began to wail. I pulled her to me again, and she affixed her cruel mouth to my nipple, from which she had barely dropped away. The pain shot into me as it does every time, but for once I didn’t clench my jaw and wait for it to subside. I put my finger in her mouth and detached her. I placed her in the bassinet amid the noises from below and ran out of the room.

  I’m shaking on the cold floor beside the tub, this notebook clutched to me, while she cries in our room, alone. Of course my flight brings no relief; my muscles clench to hear her. Yet I can’t tolerate her insatiable need. She sucks beyond endurance. I want only to use my chamber pot, to brush my hair and put it up with combs, to bathe, to put food into my body—and most of all to escape the state of nervous vigilance she keeps me in.

  Hear me, diary. I meant to keep her the full three weeks before the adoption agency took her. But I won’t. I can’t. Why endure nearly another week of this? I want to go home. I’ll speak with Anne and let her know. I’m ready to give Charlotte away.

  * * *

  I continued my mutiny, covering my ears against her cries, and she actually ceased her protest. I tiptoed to our room and found her sleeping and lay in my bed alongside the bassinet! The two of us slept straight through till supper, when Delphinia brought in my tray.

  Thanks to a generous food donation, the fare was ample. I devoured the roasted chicken, the bread with butter, the cobbler made with peaches from some steadfast canner’s remaining stores. Delphinia beamed to see such an appetite. And for the first time since her birth, Charlotte looked about calmly and seemed at peace.

  I suspect the poor baby has never had a decent rest till this, despite my endless trying. One might be tempted to think she’s determined not to sleep for fear of losing me.

  Yet our dearth of sleep has brought that very outcome closer. I’ve sent word to Anne and now must only last through one more night.

  Delphinia told me few girls make it to the full three weeks. “The ones who do,” she observed, “are saddest.”

  Can this be so? Am I protecting myself from the agony of losing her by parting early—as Nancy did?

  Fourth Month 13

  There is no protecting oneself from this.

  We spent another night nursing and dozing, and the adoption agent arrived in our room early today. She was a tall, frowsy woman who introduced herself as Miss Emmeline Trout. As she spoke, gaps showed in her mouth where teeth had been; apparently her wages are too low for her to afford a dentist. This was sad and discouraging to see, as was her patched and worn clothing—for her sake, and also for Charlotte’s. Because what sort of a family would adopt a child from an agency whose employee’s condition spoke so plainly of hardship? I feared it would be an impoverished one. Would my baby go hungry?

  I’d obliged myself to give Charlotte to this agency several months ago, having made an agreement through Anne. Looking at the vulnerable creature in my arms, however, I wanted better.

  Emmeline encouraged me to hand Charlotte over. “We got a family what’s eager and willing,” she said, reaching.

  But I couldn’t move my arms forward. Do it! my brain commanded, without having any effect.

  “Yer a sentimental one,” said Emmeline, bar
ing her gap-toothed smile. “No harm in you carrying the baby to the office in place of me.”

  So I clutched my living bundle close and followed Emmeline down the hall and into the office.

  On hearing of my hesitation, Anne stood from her chair and brandished the adoption papers she’d signed after I’d verbally affirmed the agreement. I’d been continuing in the way of Friends by not signing any vow of truthfulness—any contract—since claiming special truthfulness at one moment infers that our words are otherwise untrue. But as I watched Anne, the thought went through my mind that because I hadn’t signed, perhaps they couldn’t force me to comply. Anne, too, might have been thinking this.

  “Now hand the baby to her, Lilli.” Anne tightened her lips, keeping her blue eyes steady on me.

  I remained unable.

  Anne caught Emmeline’s attention and gestured toward me, and Emmeline understood; in a wink she’d slid her skinny arms under Charlotte and scooped her away. A cold spot formed on my front.

  “It’s best you go quickly,” Anne instructed her. And I’d thought Anne to be a kindred soul!

  Emmeline stepped into the hall with her bounty and headed toward the front door. Charlotte began to bawl. Anne moved out from behind her desk, seized my upper arms, and tried to push me onto the bench so I couldn’t follow.

  “We must be brave and do what’s best for the baby,” she said. “Give her the chance to overcome the disgrace of her birth.”

  But I wrenched away and ran. “Come back!” I screamed at the retreating woman. “I’m not ready! I’m entitled to the full three weeks!”

  And to think it was I who had initiated our early separation.

  Emmeline halted and turned, her face pink with discomfort, her small gray eyes pinpointing me. She held Charlotte to her threadbare bodice, but my baby leaned her head toward me and emitted a wail. I rushed at Emmeline and reversed her trick. Instantly Charlotte gripped my wrapper with her inch-long fingers, pushed her head into my chest, and kicked her feet with excitement.

  By then Anne had reached us. Her muscles were tense with disapproval. “Lilli,” she admonished. “More days won’t make this easier.”

  I could only whisper, for my chest and throat were clenched. “What if they don’t love her? What if they’re cruel?”

  At this, Anne’s aspect softened. To Emmeline she said, “You can bring a letter from the family, can’t you? Since this will put Miss de Jong at ease.”

  Emmeline’s face went blank as thoughts transpired beneath its surface. She consulted a watch from her skirt pocket. “Our office is closing in two hours. The family expects a baby today.”

  “I’m entitled to keep her longer,” I asserted. Charlotte began knocking her cheek against me, giving out her grunt-like sound that signals hunger.

  “She is entitled,” Anne told Emmeline. “But taking the full allotted time won’t help. Today’s Friday; why don’t you come back Monday with that letter. We’ll make sure she’s ready.”

  I raced to the recovery room and pushed shut the heavy door, then curled with Charlotte beneath the blankets. I satisfied her thirst and breathed purposefully to calm the thumping in my chest. Then the door opened, and Anne walked in. She sat on the bed formerly occupied by Nancy. A weariness settled over her, and her back slumped.

  “I don’t know what I should do,” I began, intending to apologize. “It may—”

  Anne straightened. “I expect you to comply with our agreement when the agent returns on Monday. And despite your being in recovery, you must go to chapel with the others on Sunday, to be reminded of what’s right. The cook can take the baby.”

  I agreed.

  Meanwhile, I have Charlotte for a few more days.

  I do hope to find assurance enough in the family’s letter and at chapel to strengthen me, for she will surely find a better life without her mother’s disgraced company.

  Fourth Month 15, First Day

  The hours at chapel have only worsened my dilemma.

  I took a seat beside Gina in a foul state of mind, only slightly improved by an early bath and a change of dress. The sight of the other girls neatened and wearing clean clothes did cheer me, however. And fortunately it was the elder Reverend Williams’s week to preach. He never smirks or jests at our expense or castigates us, as his son does.

  “Ah, but you are bright and fresh today,” he called over his lectern—though most would have viewed our group as stained and ruined. “It is well that I bring you a message of hope.”

  Hope? Every leaning head perked up to listen.

  “For just as spring comes to the land,” he intoned, “as insects and mammals awaken in the dirt, and plants begin their pilgrimage toward the sun, so each human life has its springtime. You must every one of you remember, whatever your misfortunes and missteps have been, that this is—yes, this is the springtime of your lives.”

  Delivered in the crackling voice of a gray-haired man with a hunched back and a cane, this counsel was affecting. Certainly we do have youth on our side. In the bodies around me, I sensed an easing. Perhaps all the former freshness in our hearts is not decayed by sorrow. Perhaps something new and untainted might arise!

  Reverend Williams moved his sparkling eyes from one to another of us, promising: “If you will live in service of God, then you will find happiness. Indeed, and this is my message for you today, you will find more happiness than the woman who has never strayed.”

  Breaths were taken in or released through his small crowd of listeners. He raised his arms and lowered them, as if suppressing our potential errors. His voice acquired a singer’s earnestness. “For when the sinner repents, her belief is far more fervent!” he called. “Her hunger for good has been fed by its absence. Do you think the truly repentant can sin again?” We awaited his answer. “The repentant sinner can bear only to pursue good. Only to pursue good! And she will be redeemed.”

  He paused to push unruly curls from his angular face. Beside me, Gina gave out a sigh and straightened her spine as if relieved of a weight, despite being filled to bursting with her baby. Others shifted in their seats, loosening their limbs; some wiped moistness from their eyes.

  I wished I could share in their relief. Though I had no desire to be disrespectful and even loved this man for his intentions, I found myself beset by irritation at his constructs, which struck me all at once as flawed beyond repair.

  For one, most of the young women who pass through here are not sinners, but victims; what did Nancy and Sophie, for instance, do wrong? So why should they be told to seek redemption?

  For another, what of the men who put us into our condition? Shouldn’t they be made to kneel before the Lord and spend their coming years in repentance? Who searches out their souls and makes them pay?

  And what of the families who’ve let us bear our crosses alone, the families who’ve chosen appearances over love? Surely they too ought to consider their sins.

  The reverend raised his half-bent arms and waved them about, continuing to illustrate his points. A younger man’s vigor came to his face; his voice gained force and clarity. The faces around me grew flushed with gratitude and hope, just as he wished them to. But I couldn’t join them. Instead, I mourned the weary, twisted nature of my heart. I marveled at the simplistic notions of well-meaning people that grow ever more tiresome. I wondered how Gina could accept his words, how her eyes could glow adoringly, when she’d so recently bemoaned the lies that will underpin her new life.

  And I considered the lie that will underpin my own life. The lie that Charlotte never grew in me, was never born, that all this never happened. We each have our own version of that lie. It’s the currency with which we buy our return ticket to society.

  I wanted to call out to the reverend: How can anyone here truly live in service of God, or create an honest love with any human being, with this lie forming the rotten center of our selves?

  Steeped in this alienated condition, and whether despite or because of it I didn’t know, I felt an
odd state overtake me. I began to float away from the scene at hand, as if I were a passenger on the deck of a boat that was leaving. Then it seemed as if an insistent wave pulled me overboard—and I was engulfed by a warm and luscious sea. I was insensible to the others. I breathed underwater, like a fish. A buzzing sound entered my head, and I felt this: unbounded happiness. As if occupying some antechamber of God’s house, I floated alongside a pure and vibrating force. I began to shiver as waves of joy passed over me.

  Was this the joy I’d heard other Friends describe? An ecstatic union with my Inner Light of God?

  It must have been. Yet with that joy came a crystal-clear awareness of my failings. I saw laid out the whole of my upbringing, which had urged me to live honestly; my coming situation, where lying would be the rule; and the cowardice that had kept me from admitting this divergence.

  In Meeting for Worship, at school, and at home, I’d been taught not to conform to the world as it is. My mother, grandparents, and teachers, our Meeting’s elders, and the writings of weighty Friends had exhorted me to live instead as if the world were what it ought to be. Mother reminded me not to be ruled by convention or by shallow pleasure every time she forbade me to wear a ribbon in my hair, or when she chose plain cloth for our attire, or refused to let me see a concert or a play or read a fanciful book. “Our time and skills are meant for beneficial use,” she’d say when she had me join her in sewing clothes and quilts for other families on First Day afternoons rather than roaming with the neighbor children. “We mustn’t distract ourselves,” she’d tell me. “We must keep our eyes and minds free of intoxicating influence, to perceive the wisdom that grows beneath the surface.”

  Year after year, she strove to scour away the vanity that might make me timid to stand out. I was meant to grow into a person who would dare, as she did, to act on the inspoken words of my heart, the messages of my Inner Witness to the Divine will.