Heard It Through the Grapevine

by Teresa Hill

  “Sorry. It’s just that, I’ve been where you are now. I’ve been there so many times, but I don’t think you have. Because I’m not sure you’ve ever let yourself love anyone but my daughter and now this baby. But it’s all pretty new to you, and that first hit of terror at the thought of losing someone you love…well, men do stupid things, Matt.”

  “I did enough stupid things as a teenager to last me a lifetime. I’m not going to do anything like that again.”

  “I hope not,” Jim said.

  Curiosity getting the better of him, Matt asked, “What did you think I was going to do?”

  “I don’t know. Maybe decide that loving someone wasn’t worth the feeling you get when you think you might lose them. I met Mary when I was seventeen and fell for her so hard, I never even looked at another woman. Thought everything was going to be smooth sailing from then on. We were all at the beach one weekend. Her family used to vacation with mine, and she got sick. Some stomach thing. We were sure she’d be fine. Turned out to be her appendix. We finally took her to the emergency room, and the doctor took one look at her and started yelling that they had to get her into the operating room, right then. It burst before they could cut it out of her, and she was so sick, it was three days before she even knew who I was.”

  “I never heard that story,” Matt said, thinking every damned thing the man said just made it worse.

  “It wasn’t my finest hour. I sat by her bed until we knew she was going to be okay, and then two weeks after she came home, I made up some stupid lie about not wanting to be tied down and broke up with her. Broke her heart. Mine, too. But I thought I was better off never loving anyone that way. It was too much. Too big. Too scary. Lucky for me, it didn’t take me that long to realize I was dead wrong, and that she might scare me half to death at times, but it didn’t matter. Because she was my life. The only one I wanted. The only woman I’d ever love.”

  Matt just sat there. What could he say? The difference was, he didn’t love Cathie. But he sure as hell couldn’t say that to her father. Not loving her wasn’t exactly much comfort at the moment. It was hard enough, just caring about her and the baby as much as he did, and thinking something might happen to them.

  “One thing. Women are a lot stronger than we realize,” Jim said. “So much stronger than we are. Pain, sadness, tears, heartache…they’ll amaze you. They just keep going. I thought I was going to punch out the jerk who delivered Brett.”

  “Really?” Matt said.

  “Oh, yeah. Mary was hurting so bad at the end. It started in her back, and she didn’t realize she was actually in labor. By the time she did, we made this mad rush to the hospital. They said it was too late to give her anything at that point. Men stayed outside back then, pacing in the waiting room. But I was close enough that I could hear her and—” Jim broke off. “It was bad. Looking at her the next day, with that baby in her arms…I was thinking there was no way we were ever doing that again. She sat there and fussed over Brett, smelling him and singing him little songs and touching his cheeks, counting his toes. They forget, Matt. It’s hell, and they tough it out and then they forget. What I’m trying to say is…it gets bad sometimes. But the good far outweighs the bad. Try to remember that, okay?”

  “I’ll try,” he agreed, a lie if he ever heard one.

  He felt raw, like someone had peeled back his skin or just ripped open his body and exposed his soul.

  A man couldn’t live like this, could he?

  Surely no sane man would.

  He let Jim ramble on, trying to nod and say something at the appropriate times. Later that night, Mary came downstairs to tell him she was going to bed, that Cathie was awake and asking for him.

  He went upstairs, to the bed where they’d known so much pleasure. Already, it was hard to remember what life had been like without her here, and when he was on the road, he just never slept the way he used to. He was always reaching for her, and he didn’t like it when she wasn’t there.

  He walked into the dimly lit room and sat down on the bed, taking her hand. Her eyes fluttered open. They glistened with tears, and she looked so sad. “Come to bed and hold me, Matt.”

  So he did. He stripped off his clothes and carefully settled in beside her, lying on his side and pulling her up against him. One arm was beneath her head and the other one went around her waist, his hand landing palm-flat against the baby.

  He closed his eyes and felt that tiny mound, telling himself there was still life within her, and with any luck at all, there would be for four more months, and when the baby arrived, it would be just fine.

  “How’s Skipper tonight?” he asked, reaching hard for some of that old easiness that had been between them when they talked about the baby.

  “Doing cartwheels, I think. Feel that one?”

  It felt as if something rolled along beneath her skin in a wave. “Yeah. Skip feels just fine.”

  “I told her everything was. I hope she doesn’t know how scared I was.”

  He hoped so, too.

  He lay there for a long time, holding Cathie and the baby that way, thinking life would be so much simpler if he could just keep them here, within the safety of his arms. If he could hold the baby safely inside her with nothing but his palm on her belly.

  Right there, Skipper. Don’t you move a muscle until I say so.

  As if whatever might be controlling the universe had ever listened to him. As if anything important had ever worked out the way he wanted. He should know better by now.

  He should never have asked Cathie to marry him.

  Chapter Ten

  Cathie stayed in bed, as ordered. Her parents left after four days passed and nothing happened. Matt hovered, afraid to go as far as the ten minutes away to his office, with her but not really with her. She knew he was scared. She was scared, too. But this was different.

  It was like those times when she’d seen him earlier in the fall, after she’d started college but before she’d told him about the baby. He’d been friendly in his way, willing to do anything to help her, but maintaining a distance between them she never thought she’d be able to breech.

  She thought it might just be his worrying over the baby. Honestly, he’d worried more all along than she had. He drove her to her checkup two weeks after that awful stay in the hospital, and when the doctor announced that everything seemed fine, Matt looked even more grim, if that was possible.

  He took her back home and then went to his office.

  Cathie told herself not to panic. She took a long, soothing bath, then called for dinner to be delivered from Matt’s favorite restaurant, because he’d scold her if she dared stand on her feet long enough to cook. She did set the table in the dining room with some pretty china one of his business associates had sent them as a wedding present, and put some flowers on the table, but no candles. Nothing too remotely romantic. She knew he wasn’t ready to admit he loved her, but she had to hope it was there, somewhere inside of him. He’d seemed so happy before.

  He came home late and stared at what she’d done.

  “Matt, it’s takeout. All I did was make a phone call. My index finger is exhausted, but I think it will recover, and the baby didn’t even notice I exerted myself like that.”

  “It’s late.” He frowned. “You should be in bed.”

  “I’ve been in that bed for fourteen days straight. Come and eat.”

  He looked so put out with her and so serious, it scared her. Did he live such a grim existence that he couldn’t imagine something working out well? Like her and the baby being fine, and him being happy? Surely he expected to find some measure of happiness in his life, something that wasn’t going to come from anything he could buy or own?

  If she’d had the courage, she would have taken his face between her hands right then and made him look at her, while she said, I love you, Matt. I always have. And you just have to love me and my baby back.

  But she didn’t have the courage.

  All of a sudden, every
thing—not just her baby, but everything—seemed so impossibly fragile, like it might slip through her fingers like a handful of sand.

  Matt finally sat down at the table. She did, too, couldn’t have begun to say what they ate for dinner or to remember more than five words they said to each other. He told her he’d pick up the dishes, kissed her on the forehead and sent her off to bed. Alone.

  It was late before he slipped into bed beside her. He lay on his back on his side of the bed, not touching her, not moving at all, for the longest time. She summoned up all her courage and rolled over, draping the side of her body over his. He lifted his arm so she could snuggle against his side, her head on his shoulder, an arm around his waist, the little bulge of the baby pressed firmly against his hip.

  His chest was bare, but he had on a loose pair of pajama bottoms she hadn’t seen before her parents showed up.

  She breathed in the scent of him and the warm, reassuring bulk of his body beside her. She thought of the nights she’d spent like this, drowsy and not wanting to fall asleep because it was so nice to be close to him and she always worried she was here on borrowed time.

  “I’ve missed you,” she said, her hand sliding up to the middle of his chest and landing somewhere in the vicinity of his heart.

  She thought the beat kicked up a little harder and faster, but couldn’t be sure. She lifted her face to his, took her hand and turned his to face her and pressed her lips softly to his. He kissed her back, hungrily, just for a moment.

  “The doctor said it was okay,” she said, barely taking her lips from his.

  He pulled back, stared down at her. “She said not to.”

  “That was before. A precaution. She said it’s fine now.”

  “Cathie, it’s all right. We don’t have to—”

  “I want to,” she insisted.

  He frowned.

  “What?” she said. “Pregnant women aren’t allowed to want sex? My book said it’s perfectly normal. In fact, it said some women’s sex drives are even higher than usual during pregnancy. Something about hormones.”

  She slid more fully against him, her hand trailing down the center of his chest, down to the waistband of his pajamas and beyond. He guessed too late where her hand was headed, groaned as his body reacted, surging against her hand.

  “I don’t want to hurt you. Or the baby.”

  “You won’t,” she promised, thinking that maybe this connection between them could work its magic once again. Erase the distance he seemed determined to throw up between them. Let her feel truly close to him, making her a part of him and him a part of her. Let him take her into his arms like he’d never let her go and kiss her like she was the most precious thing in the world to him. She needed that.

  She straddled his body, draping herself over top of him like he was her own personal pillow. His hands went to her thighs, slipping up under her gown and sliding up to her bare bottom, pulling her into place above him. Cathie leaned over him, her hair falling to either side of his face, as they kissed hungrily, greedily.

  His hands moved urgently over her body, stripping her bare and shucking his pajamas, making sure she was ready for him, which she was. It had only been two weeks, but it seemed like forever. She’d ached for him.

  She nearly cried out at the welcome feel of his hands on her, how familiar they were already, how much she never wanted to give this up.

  In bed, he forgot all the distance he tried so hard to maintain. She could erase all the barriers here and could believe he loved her already, and that nothing was ever going to change that.

  She positioned her body over his and slowly sank down upon him.

  “Easy.” His whole body went tight, his hands on her hips, holding her back.

  “I will,” she promised, the whole world sinking down to that one pulse that seemed to beat from him into her. Her whole body throbbed around his, like she was begging him to come more fully inside of her, and with each beat, he slipped a bit deeper.

  He held himself rigid beneath her, the muscles in his arms trembling as he held onto her, trying to hold back what she knew he wanted as desperately as she did. But as much as she wanted it, she found she was scared, too. Just a bit.

  It seemed like she’d been scared forever. He’d been the one thing she’d clung to in all the craziness, and being with him like this was the only time she could truly relax. Time when she could let down her guard, too, and let him see how much she wanted and needed him. Time when she didn’t feel alone at all, when she thought maybe she never would again.

  “Oh, Matt,” she cried, tears suddenly filling her eyes, as she went limp above him, her whole body sinking into his.

  “What is it? What’s wrong?”

  “Just hold me,” she said. “Please.”

  “I will,” he promised, his mouth moving ever-so-gently over hers.

  Between them, that pulse kept going. He was fully inside of her, barely moving at all, rocking just a bit, and she thought he probably meant that to be comforting as well, but it turned out to feel wonderful. A sharp, exquisite kind of pleasure in the middle of so much pain.

  “I was so scared,” she admitted. “I don’t think I even knew how scared I was until right now. And I wanted you so much.” Wanted him in every way a woman could want a man. “It all goes away when you’re here, like this, with me.”

  “What does?” he murmured.

  “How scared I am. All my doubts. All the guilt. Everything. I feel safe here with you. I forget that any kind of bad things ever happen in the world, and I think—” She broke off, just in time.

  “What do you think?” he asked.

  That they were meant to be together. That if they could be, everything would be fine. That they could get through anything together.

  “That I don’t know what I’d do without you,” she settled for saying.

  And then, scared of what he might say or not say or how he might feel, she moved more urgently against him. It didn’t take much. She’d been so close to the edge before he’d even touched her, by just thinking about being with him again like this. He had a kind of control that had amazed her in the past. That night, he just let it all go. He pressed fully inside of her, still barely moving, just holding her close and groaning deep in his throat and kissing her tenderly.

  She felt the climax rippling through his body and hers, made all the more intense by how long it had been and how close she felt to him in that moment.

  Oh, she’d missed him.

  He called out her name, his hands biting into her hips with the effort it cost him not to thrust hard inside of her, and she felt like she hung there on the precipice with him for ages and ages, before falling over the side into the most blissful feeling of all. Like soaring high in the air. Floating on a cloud. With Matt.

  Her heart was screaming, I love you, I love you, I love you.

  She couldn’t let the words go.

  Tears ran down her cheeks, and he felt them and got worried all over again, and when she’d finally reassured him that everything was fine, he fussed over her some more, drying her tears and tucking her face into his shoulder and holding her close against him.

  He could be so tender with her, so kind. She felt utterly safe here, always had.

  And she didn’t ever want to leave him.

  Cathie took it easy, going back to school over Matt’s strenuous objections, because not going gave her even more time to worry, something she did not need. The baby was growing like crazy. Matt teased her about Skipper being a linebacker, claiming Skip was a perfectly good name for a big, mean football player.

  She finished her finals in early May, had the house looking nothing like a model home by early June and was bored as could be in July. Matt hovered, spending fewer and fewer hours at work, cooking for her, rubbing her back, talking to the baby and trying to get Skip to stop skipping around inside of her, telling the baby that was no place for games.

  It was sweet. She thought he was nervous, but she wasn’t, jus
t uncomfortable and ready to see her baby. Ready to see Matt’s reaction to the baby. Her mother claimed she fell in love with each of her babies instantly, the moment she first saw them. That it was a rush of love unlike anything she’d ever felt. A fierce, overwhelming, awed kind of love.

  Would Matt feel that way? Would he let himself?

  She seemed to sleep all the time in early July, dozed in a lounge chair in the shade of the backyard. Matt brought his laptop out there and worked at the patio table at times, not wanting to be more than a few feet away from her.

  She joked that he acted like she was the first woman in the world to ever attempt the amazing feat of giving birth.

  “Women have been doing it for centuries,” she argued one lazy Sunday morning in mid-July. “They did it in caves and outside in the fields, when there were no doctors, no nurses, no nothing.”

  He looked like he could cheerfully strangle her.

  Cathie laughed and leaned back in her lounge chair. The sun was pleasantly warm on her face. Matt had half the Sunday paper, and she had the other half. It had rained overnight, and the grass was still damp, the air fresh and clean. There was a beautiful, cloudless sky overhead, and other than feeling as big as a whale, she couldn’t have been happier.

  Other than that and the ache in her back.

  She shifted in her chair, and she must have made some kind of sound, because Matt said, “What?”

  “Nothing. My back just hurts.”

  “It hurt last night, too.”

  “If you were carrying around thirty extra pounds, all of it in a ball at your belly, your back would hurt, too.”

  She read half the paper and then just gave up and dozed again. When she woke up the next time, her back really hurt. She rolled over onto her left side, and Matt was there, rubbing her back for her.

  “Right there,” she said. “Right there.”

  It seemed to come in spasms, easing up, tightening again, and she felt so silly later, but it took her a while to recognize it for what it was, which was labor, she thought. Honestly, it looked so much simpler in the movies or on TV. The woman just knew. She went from nothing to being doubled-over in pain. Bingo. Labor!