by Ashton Lee
“Grace Ann Winston?”
“One and the same.”
Alex shook his head slowly with his eyes narrowed and a look of disdain. “Call me crazy, but I know for a fact that she spends way too much time in the designated smoker’s area next to the cafeteria loading dock. It just so happens I don’t like dating ashtrays.”
“Just single, pregnant feminists, I guess.”
Alex raised his hand with an impish grin. “Please get that outta your head. I never said I wanted to date your sister. I only said I wanted to meet her. Is that too much to ask?”
“You definitely are crazy, and I’m not sure I can let you go there. Something tells me that Maurie will feel the same way. We just can’t let you go into the lion’s den without feeling plenty guilty ourselves.”
“Don’t you mean lioness?”
“I stand corrected. But it still makes me wonder what kind of XY chromosomes you have that make you want to pursue my sister in any fashion whatsoever. You’ve got to understand that there have been times when she has regarded men as pythons, if you want to continue with the animal analogies.”
Alex seemed not the least bit perturbed by the snarky banter and said, “I just thought I’d put in a good word for myself for what it’s worth. If it isn’t meant to be, I’ll accept that like a grown man. Let’s don’t beat this to death.”
Jeremy’s skeptical attitude remained in full force. “I think you’re hiding something. I have no idea what it is, but this whole thing just doesn’t compute. I’ll find out what you’re up to eventually, you know.”
Alex did not answer, offering up only a male Mona Lisa smile.
Jeremy glanced at the clock on the wall, took a deep breath, and rose from his chair with a sense of urgency. “Well, I see it’s nearly time for me to clear my brains for my fourth period protégés. Catch you later.”
* * *
Maura Beth and Jeremy were sitting up in bed that evening revisiting Alex’s dogged, if somewhat mysterious, interest in Elise. A flickering, gardenia-scented votive candle sat on the night table, a staple for inducing sleep that Maura Beth had discovered by trial and error. Earlier, they had thoroughly discussed Alex’s request for an introduction over their dinner of pot roast with rice, biscuits, and green beans, some of which Jeremy had even lovingly pitched in to cook with aplomb. But the entire matter continued to confound them both.
“I keep coming back to the fact that Alex knows quite well what Elise’s positions are on men and what a political creature she is,” Maura Beth was saying as she fluffed up her pillows. These days, she practically had to sleep sitting up for comfort because of her increased girth and pressure on some of her internal organs. She had, in fact, grown mightily weary of peeing around the clock. “And yet he insists on entering the arena like some sort of crazed matador, according to the impression you’ve given me.”
Jeremy gave her a sideways glance. “Elise as el toro instead of a lioness? I like that image. Of course, she’s equally dangerous either way you look at it, even though there probably wouldn’t be any harm in the two of them saying hello to each other. I just have a great deal of trouble seeing it going much beyond that.”
“Even more than one sentence beyond,” Maura Beth said, gently nudging her husband.
“I can see Elise giving him the cold shoulder. Polite, but still cold. I suggest we both stay out of it. That way no one can blame us if all hell should break loose—which it very well might.”
Then she gave a delicate little gasp, briefly covering her mouth with her right hand. “Except . . .”
“Except what?”
“Well, if Alex is so all-fired set on meeting Elise, then I think it should be done out in the open where everyone can witness it for themselves. None of this ‘quiet, little dinner party’ stuff right here in our home that could easily backfire, and there’s no one but us to witness the ‘he said, she said’ part. I can just hear everyone around Cherico gossiping over their phones about that kind of aftermath—‘What do you suppose Maura Beth and Jeremy were thinking bringing them together like that? Didn’t they have anything better to do? ’ ”
“Wow! You’ve practically written a little play with that explanation, and I sweat bullets turning out even one page of my novel.”
She shot him a dubious glance. “Calm down. As I’ve told you many times before, your muse will eventually show up. So here’s what we do instead. Next time you see Alex, all you have to do is invite him to an Expecting Great Things meeting at the library. That way, he’ll get a pretty good idea of what he’s up against. Just let him listen to Elise on her soap box for a few minutes and see how he holds up. I predict major skid marks on the floor.”
“That’s not half-bad,” Jeremy said, nodding enthusiastically. “Don’t know why I didn’t think of it in the teachers’ lounge today. Maybe it was the shock of Alex being so determined to take on my sister and somehow thinking it was a good thing. It completely caught me off guard. But the Expecting Great Things suggestion certainly lets us off the hook.”
“That it does. We don’t want to become known as the Matchmakers from Hell, however well-intentioned we might have been.”
“Then that’s settled.”
But Maura Beth wasn’t ready to turn off the lights quite yet. “Well, that may be on its way to being settled, but I need to tell you that Mama called me again at work today. I don’t even have to guess why she’s calling these days. More baby name pressure. She’s done more genealogical research and come up with a dozen Old New Orleans names, as she calls them, from her side of the family that she wants us to consider seriously. Whereas your mother has been laying low in the weeds. Not so much as a peep out of her, and you’re supposed to expect at least a peep or two out of your mother-in-law. Susan has no idea how much I truly appreciate that, and I can tell you that she’s much more likely to win the cherished Grandmother Sweepstakes with that sane and sensible approach.”
Jeremy’s laugh had a wicked edge to it, and he even gave Maura Beth his best boyish wink. “Don’t worry. Let’s just see how calm Mom remains once Leesie tells her about my surprise niece or nephew over Aunt Connie’s turkey and dressing at the lodge in a couple of weeks. Leesie did tell me that that’s when she plans to drag it all out in the open. Aunt Connie’s been on her pretty good about telling our parents what’s going on down here.”
“I know all about that. Elise, Periwinkle, and I discuss our various family issues all the time, and sometimes Connie even gets in on it. It’s turning out to be the most wonderful therapy in the world for all of us.”
Then Maura Beth’s tone took on an undeniable earnestness as she took Jeremy’s hand and gave it a gentle squeeze. “By the way, how do you really think your parents will take the news?”
Jeremy pressed the fingers of his right hand to his temple in a flamboyant gesture reminiscent of a magician and closed his eyes. “So glad you asked me. Let me concentrate. Now, then. A moment more and it should be at hand. Voilà! My psychic powers tell me that—” He broke off abruptly and stared her down, though with a suggestion of a smile.
“Seriously, you’re asking me that? I have no clue how they’ll take it. You’d think they would take it in stride with all their education and sophistication and be happy for her. But they’ve been at odds with Leesie about so many things for such a long time now. Or rather, she’s been at odds with them, to be truthful about it. Politics, religion, the XX and XY gender warfare she likes to wage on the spur of the moment—you name it.”
Maura Beth cocked her head with ever-widening eyes. “I’ve never seen your parents lose it with anyone. When I think of cultured and composed, I think of Paul and Susan McShay of Brentwood, Tennessee.”
“They generally don’t betray that image. But in this instance, they could also just up and tell Leesie to her face, ‘Well, isn’t that just like you, Elise? We knew you’d probably pull a stunt like this someday.’ I’d like to think things wouldn’t get nasty or out of control, and acceptan
ce would be the outcome for the sake of family unity, but you never know. Leesie has a way of stressing people greatly, present pregnant company excepted.”
“Don’t ask me why Elise and I get along so well,” Maura Beth said with the gentlest of sighs and a dismissive flick of the wrist. “Maybe it’s because I reached out to her the way I did and convinced her to come to our wedding. I’ve never written such shining prose in my life, if I do say so myself. I was practically Maura Beth Shakespeare. At any rate, she really is like the sister I never had. I can tell her anything, although I don’t tell her everything. She hasn’t asked, of course, but if she did, I would never tell her squat about our sex life. That’s strictly off-limits.”
Jeremy wagged his brows as if he’d just heard an immature, bawdy joke. “Atta girl. Never go there. I hope you realize that I’d never volunteer any information, either. It’s sacred to me. I’ve never been one of those locker room–type guys. I just tuned that stuff out when I was growing up, and I think some of the jocks in my school viewed me with suspicion because of that.”
“How so?”
Jeremy’s tone was complacent, and it was clear that he was comfortable with who he was as a man. “Mostly that I might be gay because I wasn’t macho and wasn’t making lewd comments about girls all the time. Some rumors eventually got back to me, but I didn’t let all that nonsense bother me. Those guys were the ones who didn’t have their heads on straight. It was just more of that XY-generated stuff that Leesie campaigns against all the time. She may have a point in some instances. I do have at least that much in common with Leesie in that I take women seriously and respect them.”
“I can vouch for that,” she said, smoothing a corner of the purple quilt that covered her on such a chilly autumn night. “You’re a lover of the classics, and that’s one of the main reasons I married you.”
Jeremy moved closer to her, as it was far easier for him to accomplish the act of snuggling than it was for her; then he gave her a peck on the cheek. “Just call me your literate lover.”
She returned his gentle kiss and said, “And I fully expect you to be the most literate father this country has ever produced.”
He offered up a round of hearty laughter. “You do the breast-feeding while I read David Copperfield to our cher enfant out loud.”
7
Scream Queens
With no little effort, Maura Beth had arranged for Ms. Beryl Craine to come to Cherico from Memphis for the early-evening, mid-November Expecting Great Things meeting at the library. As a Lamaze Certified Childbirth Educator, her mission was to introduce expectant mothers to the Six Healthy Birth Practices that constituted the core beliefs of Lamaze International, and she came highly recommended from several sources. That seemed straightforward and promising enough, and Maura Beth was certain the session would be particularly helpful to those who would be attending. It would be yet another feather in her cap since moving into her state-of-the-art facility overlooking Lake Cherico. Furthermore, the much-anticipated meeting was moved back into the mini-auditorium from the boardroom so that the pregnant women and their loved ones would have plenty of space to practice various techniques onstage. Certain Greater Chericoans were already raving about the ongoing Expecting Great Things program, which was unspooling without a hitch. What could possibly go wrong?
“If all of our mothers-to-be will come up with the fathers, family members, or loved ones, we will begin,” Beryl announced after Maura Beth had introduced her to the gathering, and she had then given a brief explanation of Lamaze itself. She was a tall, slim woman with close-cropped brunette hair and a crisp, no-nonsense air, even though something about her smile was forced and reminiscent of a beauty pageant contestant getting ready to answer the “fishbowl” question.
“Very good,” she continued, once all the pregnant women and their companions had made their way onto the stage. “Why don’t we begin by introducing ourselves to one another so we’ll feel more like a family?”
Maura Beth and Jeremy smiled pleasantly as they identified themselves.
“And we’re the Places,” Periwinkle said next. “He’s Parker, and I’m Peri, and we run The Twinkle downtown, as most of you know.”
Two more couples—Sandra and Christopher Barnes and Mandy and Jimmy Nixon followed suit.
Finally, “I’m Elise McShay. I’m a single mother-to-be.” Her nose was in the air, and there was a touch of defiance in her voice.
Beryl seemed entirely unfazed and continued. “So you have no family member with you today?”
Elise quickly pointed to Jeremy with a chuckle that came off as forced. “Well, my brother is right over there, but he’s here with his wife, who is my sister-in-law, of course. So that pretty much ties him up. Two women at once is a bit much to ask, don’t you think?”
“I do. Would you like for me to stand in for you?” Beryl continued. “Or maybe we could ask for a volunteer from the audience? It would definitely be helpful to have someone encouraging you with the breathing techniques once we get started with that. I recommend it.”
A male voice shouted, “I’ll be happy to volunteer!”
Alex Brandon shot up from his seat and headed toward the stage while Elise looked on disapprovingly.
“Is this absolutely necessary?” Elise said.
Beryl wrinkled her nose and then expanded her smile further. “Why don’t we just play along, shall we? I think it will make things go a lot smoother.”
Alex introduced himself to everyone and held his hand out to Elise, who grasped it limply.
“Very good,” Beryl said, drawing herself up to her full height. “Now. The first birth practice I’d like to emphasize is that we always want to let labor begin on its own. Once that starts, we do encourage bringing that special someone or friend along for that continuous support—”
But at that very moment, something inside Elise snapped, and her crusading academic nature burst forth. “Excuse me, but do you mind if I say a few words to the group, Ms. Craine?”
“Uh, well . . . of course not.”
Suddenly, Elise turned and started addressing those still seated in the audience almost as if she were running for office. More than a few people from Brentwood to Evansville had observed that a soapbox was her favorite piece of furniture.
“Ladies and gentlemen, I had my reservations about coming here tonight in the first place, and already I can feel this is going south on me. In retrospect, I probably should have listened to my inner voice and stayed home. You see, Ms. Craine, I did some considerable research on Lamaze International, and I found a few things that were disturbing and controversial to me. I feel it’s my duty to bring them up now so that the other women can judge for themselves.”
Beryl’s smile disappeared instantly, but she maintained her composure. “Disturbing? What could possibly be disturbing about helping mothers have an easier, more comfortable delivery? What’s controversial about that? I’m not sure I understand exactly where you’re coming from, Ms. . . . McShay, was it?”
“Yes, anyhow, Ms. Craine, to cut to the chase—are you aware of Sheila Kitzinger’s criticisms of Dr. Fernand Lamaze’s methods? Specifically, that he actually preferred to rank women’s performances in childbirth? For one thing, he graded them based on their screams. Can you believe that? Do you think that’s appropriate? I find it reprehensible. In my opinion, it makes a mockery of the whole experience. Far too many people believe that women are out-of-control, emotional creatures, and that only adds to the perception.”
Beryl suddenly seemed to be grasping for words. “I’m . . . aware of what you’re bringing up. But, well . . . those criticisms. . . well . . . they’ve been completely debunked, and you’re taking them out of context anyway. At any rate, that was a long time ago—back in the fifties, I believe. Lamaze has stood the test of time. Many millions have benefited from it, and that’s a matter of record.”
Elise did not let up. “That may be, but the research I did also said that extremely intellectual
women were often not good candidates for Lamaze because they asked too many questions and provoked their providers. As in ‘how dare these women act so uppity?’ In today’s world, women are far too docile and do exactly what they’re told without questioning. My life’s work has been based on that premise, and not only that, but—”
“Leesie, this is not the time and place,” Jeremy interrupted, as Maura Beth looked on uneasily.
“What do you mean this is not the time and place? We’re going to be instructed in these Lamaze exercises, and the information I’ve gathered indicates that we could all end up competing as scream queens for best in show.”
Then a full-fledged showdown between brother and sister broke out as it had many times over the years. “Leesie, please don’t ruin this for everybody else. If you don’t want to participate, no one’s going to make you. You’re absolutely right. You shouldn’t have come in the first place with all this stuff backed up on you.”
“Keep your male opinions to yourself, Jer.”
“I can’t believe you and your raging hormones are acting like this in front of all these people, Leesie.”
“If I may say something,” Beryl began, having gathered herself and trying earnestly to salvage the tense situation. “The purpose of Lamaze is to help our mothers relax and gain self-confidence, not to rile them and drive their blood pressure up. Feeling the way you do, I doubt you would get very much out of this meeting, Ms. McShay. I’m so sorry you feel as you do, but perhaps you’ll give the others a chance to participate, and we can get on with this?”
“I suppose that’s fair enough,” Elise said after a pause, finally lowering her voice. The surge of adrenaline had come and gone that fast. “Please, continue with your . . . meeting.” Then she turned to Maura Beth with downcast eyes. “Sorry. I really never should have come.”