The Beach Quilt

by Holly Chamberlin

  “Nice save, kiddo.”

  “Thanks, Dad. But really, this is going to be so much fun. When was the last time we all went away somewhere? I can’t even remember!”

  “Well, we did have that weekend in Boston last spring,” her mother pointed out.

  “Oh, right! The aquarium, the MFA, that seafood place. And the shopping!”

  “Does having fun necessarily involve shopping?” Her father shrugged. “I’m just asking.”

  “Yes,” Cordelia said firmly. “It most certainly does!”

  Chapter 18

  Sarah knocked on the open door to her sister’s bedroom. Stevie, seated at her sewing machine, turned her head.

  “Can we talk?” Sarah asked.

  Stevie nodded and turned fully around. Sarah went in and sat on the edge of her sister’s bed.

  “Mom told me,” Stevie blurted.

  “Okay.” Sarah felt relieved. Breaking the news to Stevie was not something she had been looking forward to. Still, it would have been nice if her mother had let her know that she had already talked to Stevie. Was the pregnancy her mother’s news to tell? Maybe it was. Sarah wasn’t at all sure how much say she had in this situation. By being so careless, she might in effect have relinquished all control over her own life. It was a disturbing thought.

  “I’m sorry,” Stevie said now. She patted her leg, and Clarissa, who had been sitting at her feet, jumped onto her lap.

  “Thanks. I mean, don’t be sorry for me.”

  “Why not?”

  Sarah struggled to find an answer that made some sense. “It’s not all bad,” she said finally. “I’ll have a baby. I mean, I always knew I was going to have kids someday. Just not so soon.”

  Sarah became very aware of Clarissa staring at her, round green eyes steady and boring into her own eyes.

  “Is he going to be around?” Stevie asked.

  “Justin?” Sarah looked away from the unnerving gaze of her sister’s cat. “No. I don’t think so, anyway. Why?”

  Stevie shrugged. “Just curious.”

  Sarah wasn’t really sure what to say next. “You’re going to be an aunt,” she said finally.

  “Yeah.”

  Stevie’s tone was neutral. At least, Sarah couldn’t tell if the idea of being an aunt appealed to her sister or not. Did being an aunt—a quasi figure of authority—mean anything to a thirteen-year-old? Should it?

  The silence dragged on. Sarah realized that she felt embarrassed. Clarissa was still staring fixedly at her and that didn’t help.

  “I like your bracelet,” she blurted. “Is it new?”

  Stevie glanced down at her wrist. “Sort of. I made it a few weeks ago. They’re amethyst beads. Mrs. Kane got them for me wholesale.”

  “That was nice of her. I wish I were creative like you.”

  “It’s no big deal. Anyway, I guess a lot of stuff around here is going to change.”

  “I guess,” Sarah admitted. “I’m sorry for that. A lot of babies keep everyone up all night. But I’ll try to figure all that out before anyone goes crazy.”

  “I can wear earplugs.”

  Sarah smiled. “I’ll buy you a whole box of them. And I’ll never ask you to change a diaper.”

  “What about school?” Stevie asked. “What are you going to do about school?”

  Sarah flinched. She suspected that an awful lot of people were going to be asking her that question. “I don’t know yet,” she said. “I want to finish high school. I have to. But college . . .”

  “A lot of people go to college when they’re adults. There are those places like Kaplan University. And you can get a degree online, too. Even a PhD I think.”

  All of that was true, and Sarah was thankful for Stevie’s support, but it wasn’t what she had planned; it wasn’t what she had wanted. “Yeah,” she said with an obvious lack of enthusiasm. “We’ll see what happens.”

  Clarissa suddenly took it into her mind to leap off her perch on Stevie’s leg and bound out of the room. Sarah startled.

  “She always surprises me when she does that.”

  Stevie smiled. “Cats change their minds very quickly. They give no notice of it. None that humans can see, anyway. But I’m used to it.”

  I’ll never be used to change, Sarah thought. Not now. It will always be something I’ll fear.

  “How do you think Clarissa will feel about the baby?” she asked. “I don’t think cats and babies mix very well. And animals can get jealous of a new baby in the house. That’s what I’ve read anyway.”

  “Oh, she won’t sit on his face and suffocate him, if that’s what you’re thinking. But when he’s able to crawl around, I think Clarissa will stay way off the ground.”

  “And it’s you she loves, anyway,” Sarah added. “Not me. She won’t be jealous of the baby with you there to pay attention to her.”

  Stevie nodded. “She pays as much attention to me as I do to her. We take care of each other. Some people might not understand that.”

  Sarah thought about it. A baby was not the same as a cat or a dog; the relationship between a human and her pet was not the same as that between a human and her child. Still, like Stevie and Clarissa, Sarah and her baby would be in a relationship all their own, utterly unique, necessarily intimate, and even to some extent, mutual. She couldn’t deny that it was a pretty exciting—and terrifying—prospect.

  “I’d better get back to my homework,” Sarah said, rising.

  “Me too. Sarah?”

  Sarah, at the door, turned back.

  “It’ll be okay,” Stevie said.

  Sarah felt tears prick her eyes. “Thanks,” she said, and went back to her own room.

  Chapter 19

  Adelaide was concerned. Earlier in the day, she had found Cindy crying over her work. This was very unusual behavior; Cindy was probably the most emotionally stable person she knew. When Adelaide had asked her what was wrong, Cindy had just shook her head, wiped her eyes, and gotten back to her stitching.

  But the tears began to leak again before long. “Why don’t you cancel your afternoon lesson and go on home?” Adelaide, now truly worried, had suggested. “I can reschedule with Mrs. Brown for you.”

  “No, no,” Cindy had protested again. “I’m fine. Sorry.” Obviously determined to fulfill her duty, she had soldiered on through the remainder of the day, even instructing Mrs. Brown with a smile and her typical patience.

  Adelaide thought it best not to mention Jack’s idea of the Kane family taking a vacation that summer. Cindy didn’t seem in the right mood to be receptive to the idea of running the shop on her own for an entire week. Besides, there was plenty of time. They hadn’t made any definitive plans yet; they hadn’t even decided if a house on the water (with nearby shops and a sports bar) was preferable to a week in Montreal.

  And boy, by mid-summer she would need a break. She loved running The Busy Bee, but as with any business, there were innumerable stresses that could really add up to one giant pain in the neck. Difficult customers, orders gone missing, random plumbing issues (her landlord wasn’t always great about keeping the building in good working order), unexpected overstock, and competition from sometimes surprising places.

  No, owning your own business wasn’t easy. And owning a retail establishment in a small town, even one that doubled as a destination location, meant that you had the added potential stress of dealing with any unhappy customers face-to-face outside of the shop, like in the grocery store or even in church.

  Thank God Adelaide had Cindy as her right-hand woman. Adelaide shot a glance at her friend, wrapping up the lesson with Mrs. Brown. Her eyes were a little red and swollen, but otherwise there was no sign of her earlier distress.

  Maybe, she thought, Cindy was just having a very bad headache. That would explain it all.

  Chapter 20

  Mrs. Brown had taken her leave with many thanks and a smile of accomplishment.

  “She’s so enthusiastic,” Adelaide commented as they prepared to clos
e up the shop for the day. “It must be gratifying to teach someone with such a positive attitude.”

  “Yes,” Cindy said. It was gratifying, but Mrs. Brown’s positive attitude didn’t seem to matter much at the moment.

  “Back when Jack was still teaching, he used to tell me how frustrated he would get when a student just didn’t want to engage with the subject.”

  Cindy cleared her throat. “Yes. Adelaide, I have to tell you something.”

  Adelaide looked up from a piece of fabric she was folding. “What is it?”

  Cindy took a deep breath. It was better to rip off a bandage than to slowly peel it back and prolong the agony.

  “Sarah is pregnant,” she said.

  Adelaide’s face paled. She dropped the bit of fabric and put her hand over her heart. “Oh my God.”

  “And she’s going to have the baby and live with us.”

  “I’m sorry.” Adelaide shook her head. “I’m having trouble taking this in. I never in a million years . . .”

  “I know. On some level, I still think it’s all a bad dream.”

  “The father . . .”

  “Justin. Yes.” Cindy managed a lopsided smile. “He offered to marry her. She said no.”

  Adelaide reached out and put her hand on Cindy’s shoulder sympathetically. “No wonder you were crying earlier. I would be crying, too.”

  “It wasn’t the first time I’ve broken down, I’m afraid. And it won’t be the last, though I’m trying to be strong around the girls.”

  “How is . . . how is Joe handling this? He must be devastated. God, he must want to kill Justin. I know Jack would, if it were Cordelia.”

  “You know Joe,” Cindy said, retrieving the fabric Adelaide had dropped. “He doesn’t talk about what he’s feeling. But I know he’s heartbroken. I know he wants desperately to make everything better. I know he’s horribly frustrated, too.”

  “Have you told anyone else?” Adelaide asked.

  “No. Not yet. Well, except for Stevie. And Sarah said she would tell Cordelia soon, as well. Unless you think you should be the one to tell her?”

  “No,” Adelaide said promptly. “Let the girls talk about it first. I’m sure Cordelia will come to me afterward.”

  “And Jack will need to know, of course. Not only because he’s a friend.”

  “Right. As principal of Sarah’s school, well, she’s one of his responsibilities, at least during school hours.” Adelaide paused and shook her head. “My God, I don’t think he’s ever had a pregnant student before. Not that I know of, anyway.”

  Cindy failed to prevent a grimace. And who, she thought, would ever have imagined that my daughter, reasonable, reliable, and straight-A student Sarah Bauer, would be the first?

  “I don’t think there’s a reason she couldn’t continue on, at least through the end of the school year,” Adelaide was saying. “And then certainly she would be welcomed back in the fall. Maybe it would be different if she were due during the academic year. She’s not, is she?”

  “I don’t think so. Sarah estimates that she’s due sometime in August. But we’ll see what the doctor says.”

  “Yes, of course. Oh, Cindy, I wish I could . . . I wish I could wave a magic wand and make everything . . . different. Turn back time, something.”

  Cindy felt the tears begin to come once again. “But you can’t,” she said, “can you? None of us can.”

  Chapter 21

  “So, I thought, well, I can justify spending forty dollars on a pair of mint green jeans if I use them as a neutral and not only as an accent. That way I get, like, twenty outfits instead of maybe only ten. Right? Sarah, did you hear a word I said?”

  Cordelia frowned at her friend, who was sitting across from her on the second bed in her room.

  “I have something to tell you,” Sarah said.

  I was right, Cordelia thought. She didn’t hear a word I said. “Okay. What?”

  “It’s pretty big.”

  Cordelia regarded Sarah closely. She couldn’t read her friend’s expression and there was something tentative in her tone of voice. And she had been so—well, so weird—these past few weeks.

  “What?” she said. “The suspense is killing me.”

  Sarah took a deep breath and said, “I’m pregnant.”

  Pretty big? This was colossal! Cordelia felt sick to her stomach, and tears seemed to spring from her eyes; if she had been wearing her glasses she was sure they would be wet.

  “Oh, God, Sarah,” she gasped. “Are you sure?”

  Sarah nodded.

  “Oh, God,” she said again, “what are you going to do?” Congratulations, Cordelia felt sure, were not in order, not in this case. Sarah couldn’t have wanted this, she simply couldn’t have!

  “I’m going to have the baby,” Sarah said simply.

  “And then what?” Cordelia asked, aware that there was an odd tone of pleading in her voice. “Are you going to keep it? I mean, him or her?”

  “Yes. My parents agreed. I’ll—I mean, we’ll—live with them.”

  “Is . . . is Justin the . . .”

  “Yes. Who else would it be?”

  “I’m sorry.”

  “He offered to marry me.”

  “Oh.” Cordelia really didn’t know what to make of that. Maybe Justin wasn’t such a bad guy after all. But . . .

  “And I said no.”

  Cordelia nodded. She was still not entirely sure she wasn’t having a particularly vivid nightmare. She wiped at her cheeks to clear them of the tears. “You’re so young!”

  “Well,” Sarah replied sharply, “there’s nothing I can do about that.”

  “But what about college? We wanted to go to the same college. What about our plans?” Was that a childish and self-centered question? Cordelia wondered. Probably, but she was childish and self-centered, so what? And suddenly her best friend was leaving her. . . .

  Sarah looked down at her hands, resting flat on her knees. “I don’t know.”

  Neither girl spoke for some time. Cordelia couldn’t imagine what Sarah was feeling, but she knew for sure that what she, Cordelia, was feeling was bruised and beaten.

  “I can’t believe this is happening,” she said finally. “Not to you of all people.” And, Cordelia added silently, not to me.

  Sarah laughed, but it was not a pleasant laugh. “Why not to me? I’m just like everyone else after all. Nothing special. Definitely not smarter.”

  “Don’t say that.”

  “Well, it’s true, isn’t it?” Sarah snapped. “If I was smart, I wouldn’t be in this mess, would I?”

  Cordelia felt that whatever she might say right then would probably be wrong. She didn’t like feeling so confused, so out of her depth. It made her feel as if she were on the verge of a panic attack. She had never had one, but she knew they could be seriously frightening.

  “Do you know if the baby is a boy or a girl?” she asked after some time. It seemed like a neutral question, but what did she know. This was all violently new to her; this was the sort of reality that wrenched you from your safe and comfortable place in the world and threw you into a place that was dangerous and irritating.

  “Not yet,” Sarah said.

  “Do you want to know?”

  Sarah shrugged. “I haven’t thought about it.”

  “Oh. How do you feel?”

  Sarah laughed a bit again. “Fine. I’m not sick, you know. Just—” Her voice broke.

  Just pregnant, Cordelia said to herself. Just going to have a baby. Just going to be a teenage mother. No, there was no just about it.

  “I’ll help you, you know,” she said then. “With the baby, I mean. I’ll do anything I can.”

  Sarah put her head in her hands and began to weep, long, deep sobs that tore at Cordelia’s heart. She wanted to call out for her mother, for Sarah’s mother, for anyone who could make it all stop, make this new and dreadful reality go away.

  But she knew that no one could work such magic.

 
Hesitatingly, Cordelia crossed the room and sat next to Sarah on the bed. Sarah had never really been comfortable with demonstrations of affection. Cordelia remembered the time when they were little, maybe in kindergarten. They were in the public playground, and she had taken Sarah’s hand like all the other little girls were taking the hands of their best friends. But Sarah had yanked her hand away. Cordelia had burst out crying. All these years later, she couldn’t remember how they had gotten past that unhappy moment, but somehow Cordelia had come to understand that Sarah didn’t really like to be hugged and kissed like so many other girls did. It didn’t mean that she didn’t feel love; it just meant that she could be awkward expressing it.

  Now, Cordelia took a chance and put her arm around her friend’s shoulder anyway. Maybe, with the old reality so exploded, Sarah would welcome the gesture.

  She did. Sarah slumped against Cordelia, and after a time her sobs quieted. And Cordelia realized that in the space of a few moments she had become the strong one, the comforter, in their relationship.

  Chapter 22

  Sarah looked at her reflection in the mirror over her dresser. She didn’t look pregnant. Her stomach and breasts were as flat as they ever were. It was so hard to believe there was a very tiny life growing inside her.

  She turned away from the mirror, embarrassed by her own gaze. She had woken that morning to a feeling of intense resentment toward her unborn child. She had been horrified by the ferocity of those feelings and ashamed. She knew that this resentment was misplaced. No, worse, it was morally wrong. You could rarely say to another person, “It’s all your fault that my life is a mess,” and be right. How much more ridiculous was it to say that to an unborn child? The baby hadn’t even been conceived when she had agreed to go to bed with Justin!

  The baby, her baby, was the only completely innocent one in this entire mess and should never be made to pay for the mistakes of the adults. When a child was made to suffer for sins he had not committed, well, that was called child abuse, and it was absolutely and entirely intolerable.