by Ashton Lee
Maura Beth was silent for a while, finally emerging from her thoughts with a fist pump. “I’ve just had another of my brilliant ideas. What Cherico needs is a support group for pregnant women like ourselves. And guess where it’s going to meet?”
“The library, of course.”
“Right. In our new mini-auditorium where we crowned the Queen of the Cookbooks this past summer. There’s more than enough room there, and we have the stage with the audio equipment and everything. Of course, I designed everything way better than I knew. I gave our architect all the input, and he came through beautifully.”
Elise’s excitement clearly registered in her voice. “I think that’s a terrific idea. I always encourage my students to support one another outside of class and get involved with other women in the various relevant organizations on campus. I tell them to always be expecting great things from their lives and to act upon that impulse. Run with it right away.”
This time, Maura Beth snapped her fingers, looking and sounding supremely confident. “That’s it!”
“What’s it?”
“That will be the name of our support group—Expecting Great Things. We’ll invite anyone who is pregnant or has been pregnant to come and share their insights and concerns. We can have visits from doctors and nurses and other healthcare professionals, too, and it’ll be fun organizing the whole thing. It’ll be like a mini Cherry Cola Book Club. Of course, I can see Jeremy pitching right in and doing more than his fair share. He wants to help out in the worst way, and this will give him an outlet, too. Otherwise, I think he’ll end up driving me crazy.”
Elise laughed and patted Maura Beth on the shoulder. “I don’t have to worry about Vittorio, though. I picture him as busy right now on a model shoot in Rome for one of those cologne ads. He’s probably posing on a motorcycle with a beautiful woman holding on to him for dear life as his passenger. Then later, he’ll probably take her back to his apartment and have sex with her.”
Maura Beth couldn’t resist. “For someone who claims she doesn’t need a man in her life, you certainly do spend a lot of time fantasizing about it. Or am I reading you wrong?”
“In this case, fantasy is so much better than reality. There’s no harm in it. So, when do you want to get started on this?”
“Right away. Tomorrow I’ll set the wheels in motion. You can come to my office, and we’ll spend the day brainstorming. It’ll be so much fun, and we’ll turn all our doubts into something constructive. And I’ll go to my Cherry Cola Book Club for my first recruits. Becca Brachle just gave birth not long ago—nine months to be exact—and her little Markie is my godson. I’m sure she’d be willing to share her experiences with us. I know Aunt Connie would pitch in about being pregnant with her Lindy, too. This is going to be fun, even if we have to play it by ear at first.”
As if on cue, Connie stuck her head out the deck door, smiling in that pleasant, matronly way of hers. “Now you two have been out here long enough, and the wind is picking up off the lake. I don’t want either of you catching a chill. Which reminds me, have either of you gotten your flu shots yet?”
“Ah, the voice of reason. That’s your nurse’s training kicking in, isn’t it, Aunt Connie?” Elise said.
“Guilty. Once a nurse, always a nurse,” came the good-natured reply. “Particularly in the ICU. Looking after people is my thing, but I’m really enjoying tending to family this time around.”
“You’ve done that beautifully for me so far,” Elise said. “You wait on me hand and foot to the point I’m a bit embarrassed by it all. Come on, Maura Beth. She’s right. It is getting right nippy, and we’ve done good work out here tonight.”
“Yes,” Maura Beth added as they headed in with a snap to their step. “We have some exciting news to share with you, Connie. Let’s join the men by the fire and see what everyone thinks about my latest brainstorm.”
3
Beginnings
A few weeks later, the first meeting of Expecting Great Things was well under way in the library’s mini-auditorium with a crowd of sixteen or so in attendance, and Maura Beth was congratulating herself mentally once again as she sat back in her seat on the front row. If there was one thing she knew how to do, it was to get the word out about her favorite project of the moment. In a supremely successful effort, she had managed to entice many of The Cherry Cola Book Club core members to attend—both female and male, as it happened—to share their most amusing experiences regarding the hallowed state of pregnancy.
These were to be all about beginnings and the hopes and dreams that accompanied them. Everyone was to keep it lighthearted as the perfect way to ease into becoming an effective support group. Weightier issues would be dealt with later on, including informational visits from healthcare professionals. For now, there were to be no graphic horror stories about lengthy, difficult deliveries, or, God forbid—tragedies such as miscarriages. Those dark episodes might be an unfortunate reality for a few, but they weren’t particularly helpful or inspiring. Nice and easy was going to get the job done. The idea was to make the monthly gatherings of Expecting Great Things as welcoming as the potluck reviews of The Cherry Cola Book Club itself, even if some of those had gone astray here and there over the past couple of years.
At the moment, Connie McShay was holding forth at the podium, getting into the gist of her most amusing experience, her good-natured energy clearly evident.
“There was this family-owned market that I went to in Nashville for our groceries,” she was saying. “It was called Betty and Bob’s, and they had all these homemade deli items that Douglas and I really enjoyed, like German potato salad and overstuffed corned beef sandwiches with Dijon mustard. The Kuhns were a wonderful German couple. I don’t mean they were recent immigrants, though—they just specialized in that kind of food. Betty and I particularly became good friends, and I loved the way she pitched in with everything, even performing cashier duties from time to time when someone was out sick. It was that kind of ‘backbone of the country’ place. I think what really made us click was our figures. We both were and still are somewhat Rubenesque, if you will. And not a bit ashamed of it, either. I’ve always taken comfort in the knowledge that women with our curves were once much in demand as models. I find myself thinking all the time what fun it would have been to have been born in that century and been captured for posterity on canvas as a museum piece.”
Connie briefly stepped from behind the podium and modeled the loose-fitting, brightly colored garment she was wearing, turning this way and that to show off her pleasingly plump bulges to good advantage. “It seems I’ve always been watching my waistline and hips, but I can also tell you that Douglas has always liked me this way. Never any complaints from the mister. Even though I have to admit I envy him his manly metabolism. I don’t think he’s gained an ounce she we got married thirty-eight years ago. Plus, he gets to show off his graying temples while I’m a slave to my color touch-ups at the salon.” She paused to point to her husband sitting in the front row next to Maura Beth and Jeremy. “There he is, just as pretty and preening as big as you please.”
“There’s always been lots of you to love,” Douglas said, waving at his wife affectionately and then blowing her a kiss. “I wouldn’t have it any other way. And if you ever decided to go gray and give up your coloring, I would support you one hundred percent.”
Connie resumed her spot behind the podium and cleared her throat while the group laughed politely and briefly whispered among themselves. “Thank you, sweetheart. You know I’d do the same for you if you ever went bald.”
“Sixty-two and still not receding, though,” Douglas said, pointing to his thick, dark hairline.
“At any rate,” Connie continued, nodding diplomatically, “it seems that Betty and I were always zigging and zagging on the subject of pregnancy. We never did get it right. The first time the zigging happened, Betty was checking out my groceries, and all of a sudden she stops in the middle of ringing things up and says to me, �
��When are you expecting, sweetie?’ Of course, I realized immediately we were in an awkward ‘oops’ moment, but I decided to level with her. ‘I’m not,’ I told her, trying not to sound upset with her in any way. ‘Douglas and I are trying—but nothing yet,’ I went on. I had, of course, put on some extra weight. So what else was new? Then, Betty went all pink in the face and was at a total loss for words hemming and hawing the way she did, so I put her at ease. ‘I promise you’ll be the first of my friends to know when it does happens,’ I told her.
“Then I zagged with her because I knew she and Bob were trying, too. That was just one of those things that came out as we shared confidences over time. Just idle conversations at the checkout counter, but you do learn a few things if you take the time to listen. ‘Ooh,’ I said to her later on, ‘is it my imagination, or do you have some good news to share with me?’ ‘Nope,’ she said. ‘I’ve just gained ten pounds over the holidays. Too much eggnog and my mother-in-law’s wicked rum fruitcake and such.’ We were always guessing wrong, and it got to be a thing with us. Finally, I thought of a way we could both stay out of trouble. ‘Have you lost weight?’ would be our standard greeting until the real announcement came along for either of us. We’d laugh and laugh about that all the time, but I got there first, giving birth to our Lindy.”
“Our daughter was worth waiting for, too,” Douglas added quickly. “And Lindy’s given us our only grandchild, Melissa.”
“Lindy takes after her father. Tall and slim and can eat anything she wants. Isn’t that always how it goes?”
Then Connie turned her attention to Maura Beth and Elise, nodding in their general direction. “As for those of you who don’t know how it will all turn out yet, just be patient and enjoy the journey. I don’t have to tell you that your lives will never be the same, but you have no idea what that will mean to you until whoever it is arrives and takes that first breath out of water. You’ll both gasp at the sight of each other, and that’s the teary-eyed game changer that will never leave you.”
* * *
Everyone was a bit surprised when both Justin “Stout Fella” and Becca Brachle took the stage together next. They had all assumed that Becca would be the one talking about her Markie, who was a couple of months away from his first birthday now, and it was she who did speak first.
“First of all, I’d like to say that I can fully appreciate Connie’s anecdote, but every pregnancy is different,” she began, pointing to her friend and fellow Cherry Cola Book Club member. “I didn’t gain all that much weight with Markie, but then I’ve always had trouble keeping weight on. I call it The Eternal Cheerleader Syndrome. It’s Stout Fella standing here beside me that’s fought the battle of the bulge after his college quarterbacking duties were over and done with. Of course, I didn’t help him all those years The Becca Broccoli Show was on the radio. I filled him up with comfort food right and left, and he loved every one of the recipes I trotted out on my cooking show that all of you are still probably using.”
The tall, big-boned Justin looked a bit sheepish at first but gathered himself. “She’s telling y’all the truth. When you work out in the weight room and expend all that energy on the field, you don’t have to worry about pushing away from the table. Actually, that training table really gives you a distorted view of things. You think you can eat that way forever. Then, I was a sucker for my wife’s wonderful cooking. But selling real estate the way I do now all over Cherico is kinda sedentary compared to the demands of my playing career. So I can understand our good friend Connie McShay’s struggle. I’ll never know what it’s like to be pregnant, but I’m here to tell you something you may not know. Especially you men. I want you to follow along closely.”
Justin hesitated as he quickly surveyed his wife from head to toe. “This cute, little, blond wife of mine who got her figure back right away never looked more beautiful than when she was carrying our Markie. She didn’t have much of that morning sickness, did you, baby?”
Becca shook her head and shrugged. “Nope, and I can’t say why. I was told to expect it.”
“What she did have was a major case of glowing, though,” Justin continued. “Now I see all those puzzled looks out there, but I’ll explain. I don’t mean like something out of a science fiction movie or a rerun of The Twilight Zone. There were just lots of times when her face seemed to have this kinda inner glow to it. The way I figured, it was more that something wonderful was going on inside her, and she was showing it off to the world without even trying.”
“That’s so sweet of you to say, Justin. You’re making me blush,” Becca said, gingerly touching the tips of her fingers to her face as if testing it for color.
“But that’s the thing. It wasn’t like a blush, folks. It was definitely more a glow she had, particularly in the mornings. It got to where I couldn’t wait to wake up so I could see it all over again.”
“Sometimes he even woke me up early just to see it, folks,” Becca added with a pleasant smile. “Even before the alarm went off. I don’t see how I could have looked all that appetizing after having my sleep disturbed and a great dream possibly cut short. Cranky and glowing just don’t seem to belong in the same sentence, but Justin still swears by it.”
Maura Beth spoke up from her seat. “Did you ever ask your obstetrician about that glowing thing?”
“No, I didn’t think to do that,” Becca told her. “When Justin first told me about it, I immediately went to the bathroom mirror to figure out what he was talking about. But I didn’t see what he was seeing no matter how long I stared or no matter how many different ways I turned. I even tried different levels of lighting. We have one of those knobs on the wall that controls that, you know. I looked like I was auditioning for a play or was on one of those model shoots. Finally, I just attributed it to a proud father being in love and left it at that.”
Maura Beth turned to Jeremy during the outburst of “Awws!” that filled the room. “Have you experienced that with me?”
“The glowing thing?”
“Of course.”
Jeremy thought for a moment, looking very unsure of himself. “Not exactly, though I think you’re the most beautiful thing in the world no matter what. But I do like to talk to the baby bump now that it’s finally showing up. We’re solidly in the second trimester now. It’s really moving along.”
“You should hear him sometime,” Maura Beth said to the group. “I could swear he’s going to launch into a reading of A Tale of Two Cities one of these days and then give the baby a homework assignment to boot.”
“A little Dickens never hurt anyone.”
Maura Beth shook her head, but there was an affectionate smile on her face. “English teachers! You have to be in love with one to really understand them.”
“Same goes for librarians,” Jeremy said. “They don’t at all fit that old stereotype about spinsters wearing glasses with their hair pulled back severely in a bun. Not my redheaded Maurie with all her curls and that feisty spirit of hers.”
“Well, for what it’s worth, I talked to the bump, too,” Justin added. “And I read this article while waiting for getting my teeth cleaned at the dentist’s that said listening to music was also a good thing for the baby inside. I stopped short of singing to my son, though. I don’t have any kind of voice to speak of, even though I try when I’m soapin’ myself up in the shower.”
“No, he can’t really sing a note. Take my word for it,” Becca said. “Plus, he really has a thing for country music like the kind that Waddell Mack sang at the Fourth of July concert a few months ago when the library opened. Now I ask you, can jangly, twangy notes be all that soothing for a fetus? Can ‘she done him wrong’ songs be the ticket for a future father-son relationship?”
“Hey, now, the kid’s gotta find out about girls and women and broken hearts sometime.”
The auditorium broke out in generous laughter. Then Justin said, “I just wanted to contribute something here tonight from the father’s point of view. Some of us m
en are all in on raising a child. As far as I’m concerned, it’s way better than selling every last house and plot of land in Cherico. Coming from me, that’s sayin’ a lot. After all, I had a heart attack not all that long ago worrying myself to death about my next big deal. It changed my priorities but good. It was a huge wakeup call, and I’m here to say that my next big deal is our son, Markie, and that’s that.”
* * *
Maura Beth and Elise decided to step up together next since they had been spending so much time sharing their experiences. They had even begun to think of themselves as a couple of sorts.
“We’re almost like sisters these days,” Maura Beth said, taking the mike first. “You have no idea how reassuring it is to know that all the crazy things you’re doing and saying aren’t that unusual.”
“Tell us about some of the crazy things,” Voncille Nettles Linwood said. “I missed that boat, you know.”
Maura Beth and Elise exchanged amused glances. “You go first, sister-in-law dear,” Elise said.
“Well, I seem to be very sensitive to light now. I’m always shading my eyes whether I’m inside the house or outdoors. My obstetrician, Dr. Lively, says it’s nothing to worry about, but if this keeps up too much longer, I think I’m well on my way to crow’s feet as I hit thirty,” Maura Beth explained, pointing to her temples.
“Won’t make a bit of difference to me,” Jeremy added. “You’ll still be beautiful in my book.”
“With me, it’s music—of any kind,” Elise said. “It seems too loud all of a sudden, particularly when I’m driving around with the car radio on. Is it my imagination, or am I worried that I’m somehow offending the baby? There are times when I could swear I hear the baby shouting, ‘For God’s sake, change that channel!’ You see how crazy that sounds?”