The Book Club

by Mary Alice Monroe

  “I was not!” Doris exclaimed, but she was laughing.

  “I loved that you got so hot and bothered,” Gabriella said, flapping her towel in the air. “Hearing all that helps me to pick apart my own feelings, you know?”

  “But we don’t always know what will get us going,” Midge argued from under the sink. “Some books just don’t have enough complexity to generate a discussion, so we at least have to try and pick ones that do.”

  “Sure,” persisted Gabriella. “But we still have to read all kinds of books, books we might never pick up on our own. And there’s no way I’d dissect and study a book on my own as much as we do in the group. So sometimes a book I think I’ll hate turns out to be wonderful after all. Remember that book on civil rights?” She shrugged. “So maybe you don’t like mysteries, Doris, and maybe you don’t like romance, Midge, but at least you know that about yourself.”

  “And maybe you’ve only read one,” added Doris wryly. “How can you judge a genre by one book?”

  “You’re right,” said Gabriella. “I think it’s a mistake to only read literary books, or nonfiction, or classics. Or any one genre. Then we’d be stuck. I’m curious about those books that get the buzz, or make the Times list.”

  “And paperbacks. Can’t afford those hardcovers every month.”

  “That’s for sure. Do you know how much they...” Eve stopped short, catching sight of Annie’s pale, drawn face as she walked into the kitchen from the hall. Their eyes met and Eve read a cry of worry in them.

  “I’m spotting,” Annie whispered.

  The work was instantly abandoned as the women gathered around Annie, getting her to lie down on the couch, feet up, while they plied her with questions. Gabriella was furious when she heard Annie hadn’t yet been to her doctor.

  “I’m only a few weeks late. What’s all the excitement about? Women have babies every day. I’ll get there.”

  “But you’ve been trying to get pregnant for months,” Gabriella sputtered. Her face was red with indignation. “Do you mean you haven’t talked to her yet?”

  “No! I wasn’t pregnant yet! What’s to talk about? I’ve been taking my vitamins, drinking my milk and not drinking alcohol. I’ve read tons of books. So what else is there?”

  “A physical, for one,” snapped Gabriella, placing pillows under Annie’s feet. “Blood tests. Oh, why am I even explaining any of this to you? You don’t listen.”

  “Yes I will, Gabby.” Her soft voice, so uncharacteristic for Annie, was a testament to her fear. “But what should I do now?”

  “Well, there are a lot of reasons why you might be spotting. Hormones are all crazy in the first trimester.”

  “That’s true,” added Eve, placing a hand on Annie’s shoulder and offering a reassuring squeeze. “I spotted in my first pregnancy.”

  “Did you?” Annie’s eyes were hopeful, relieved.

  “You should call your doctor. Now.” Midge’s face was set. “Tell her it’s urgent.”

  “Okay, okay. Where’s the phone?”

  The women clustered in silent support as Annie called the doctor. Her brief hushed conversation ended with an appointment for the following morning and strict orders to go home, go to bed and stay there. They hung around her, chatting, but no one wanted to mention what was upmost on their minds: Annie’s pregnancy. It was as though their collective silence on the topic was a protective wall.

  After John came to take her home, however, it was all they could talk about. Their worry rang in their criticisms. “How could she not have seen her doctor?”

  “She didn’t even take one of those home pregnancy tests!”

  “She works too hard.”

  “You’ve got to sit down when you’re pregnant or you’ll get all kinds of problems. Especially for a first baby at her age.”

  “Everyone knows that. Why, I had...”

  And the war stories began, one after the other, about their swollen ankles, a month of bed rest, the odd cravings and the long, longer, longest deliveries, keeping them going as they toiled through the rest of the afternoon.

  By the time the sun set, the condo was comfortably settled and the women began unwrapping the mountains of food they’d all contributed, smacking their lips. Pans and bowls filled with lasagna, marinated vegetables, cold grilled chicken and shrimp, brownies and chocolate chip cookies, tiramisu, loaves of freshly baked bread from the bakery next door, and bottles of champagne. The mood rose like the bubbles after Annie called.

  “Relax girls, false alarm!” she reported. “The spotting’s stopped and John’s serving me in bed like I’m the Queen of Sheba.”

  Finney and Bronte returned home on time, each carrying small brown bags of minor purchases in their hands, weary frowns on their faces. Finney loaded his plate with food while Bronte picked a few nonmeat portions, then they both sneaked off to their new bedrooms and closed the doors. Eve could hear their favorite music gently playing through the walls—Bronte’s rhythmic, Finney’s rap—and stared at the closed doors clutching her towel, feeling very shut off from their worlds.

  Later, while Midge, Doris and Gabriella were in the kitchen chatting and wrapping up the leftovers that would carry her for days, Eve stole a moment alone to walk through the five rooms of her new home. Flicking on lights one by one, she regarded the altered effect in each as the day’s light dimmed. The hall seemed so long and dark, the rooms so small. She collapsed onto her sofa that fit so well before the fireplace and laid her chin on the soft green velvet. She was feeling moody and introspective. There was something unique about the first night in a new home, not filled with anticipation like Christmas Eve, or fraught with worry, like before an exam or an interview. She couldn’t put her finger on it, but everything was so foreign, so different and new. Everything held promise.

  The lights from her favorite antique Japanese porcelain lamps made soft yellow halos in the corners of the room. Despite the warm night, Midge had lit a fire with good, dry cedar, filling the condo with a heady fragrance. All around her were her favorite things, her favorite people, each specially chosen to go the distance.

  As the night deepened, her friends tossed in the towels and came to join her in the living room. The heat rose as the fire grew so they opened the large bay windows. Outside, waiting for them, was a symphony of music from the streets below. The women sat together in a comfortable silence; there was nothing more to say. They yawned, closed their eyes, stretched their legs and listened in a companionable mood to a different music, the music made by the low laughter in the next condo, the shouts of strangers in the park, the atonal horns of traffic and the high soprano of a mother calling a child indoors, all against the rhythmic backbeat of pulsing life and movement. This magical song took them all far from the muted peace of the suburban blocks they were familiar with, far, farther back to their youth, when they were smooth skinned, slim and sassy, when they walked the city streets with swinging hips, when their worlds delivered pearls.

  On that balmy spring night that smelled of rain and new promise, each of the women who came from her large home, with comfortable furnishings and extra rooms to store all her many things, felt a disquiet in her breast that she could not put into words. It would take time to sort out, but it felt at the moment a little like envy. Not jealousy. They only wished the best for Eve. But in some as yet unvisited place in their hearts, in varying degrees, each woman settled back into a chair or leaned against the wall and listened, wondering what it must be like to embrace change and start fresh.

  * * *

  Much later, when the Book Club left for their own homes, when the night music ended and it seemed the whole world was in a deep sleep, Eve lay on her back in her room staring at the ceiling, terrified of the changes in her life. Her breaths came short, her heart was palpitating wildly, she couldn’t seem to get a chest full of air. Worst of all was an ov
erwhelming sense of panic that held her in its monstrous grip.

  It wasn’t the first time. These attacks began soon after Tom’s death, waking her from her sleep or sometimes, like tonight, not allowing her to fall asleep at all. This foreboding fear struck out of the blue but she’d thought, hoped, they’d dissipated in the past months. He’d been dead ten months next week. Tonight, however, the fear returned full force when she’d turned off the lights, locked the door of this unknown place, climbed into the cool, cotton sheets of the double bed and reached out automatically to Tom’s side of the bed.

  She still couldn’t lie down in bed without expecting to be scooped up in his arms, to feel his smooth, cool hand caress her breasts with comforting possessiveness before tucking her bottom slap back against his groin, sometimes hard, sometimes soft, like spoons, each matching one’s breathing pace to the other’s before drifting asleep. It was that ingrained pattern, those tender, nonpassionate, achingly familiar gestures that she missed more than the tumultuous passion of sex—feeling Tom beside her, the bone of his chin in her neck and the fine hairs of his arm against hers, hearing him snore, smelling his skin. It was as natural to her as breathing. She sometimes still wriggled her bottom, jutting it back inches, expecting to feel him there. Instead, feeling the emptiness broke her heart.

  Tonight especially, in this dark, strange apartment that smelled, sounded, felt different, she was smacked with the reality that Tom was really gone. That her skin would be cold that night. That the only smell in these sheets was her own. That she didn’t have him to cover her with his strength any longer.

  She reached over and placed one of the pillows long-side down on Tom’s side of the bed under the blanket, then another, to form a mass beside her. It was silly, she knew, but in the wee hours, when she closed her eyes, she could butt back against the pillows and fool herself, just for a while, that Tom was still there beside her.

  Eve didn’t want change. She wanted Tom back.

  Eight

  “All you need is confidence in yourself. There is no living thing that is not afraid when it faces danger. True courage is in facing danger when you are afraid...”

  —L. Frank Baum, The Wonderful Wizard of Oz

  “What do you mean, I’m not pregnant?”

  “Annie,” said Dr. Maureen Gibson folding her hands and looking Annie straight in the eye. “Your HCG results are negative. The tests don’t lie. I’m sorry, but you’re not pregnant. You never were.”

  “But—” she sputtered, feeling the injustice of this verdict and a tremendous sense of loss over what was apparently nothing more than a dream. Emma Bovary running after Rudolphe flashed unbidden in her mind. “But I should be! John and I are screwing like rabbits. I’ve been off the pill for months. I don’t understand.”

  “We’ve talked about this. At your age, you can’t assume you’ll just get pregnant.”

  “I’m not typical,” she replied, feeling a flush of frustration at the mention of that age thing again. “I eat healthy foods. I’m a runner, I ride my bike, exercise. Look at these thighs,” she cried, pointing to her long, sinewy, tanned legs that John compared to those of a racehorse. “And my biceps. Go ahead, feel them. They’re like iron. I’ve got the body of someone ten years younger.”

  Dr. Gibson refrained, holding the chart close to her chest. “Your insides are forty-three years old. Your uterus, your eggs...you can’t change that.”

  “Oh, no,” she said, shaking the image of Gabriella pointing her finger from her mind. She didn’t want any negative thinking now. She needed to rally. “It’s too soon to throw in the towel. We haven’t even begun to check out my options here. I can afford to play this game.”

  Dr. Gibson pursed her lips, her knitted brows giving away her worry. Or was it frustration? Still, she calmly leaned against the table and replied, “Yes, that’s true. We can begin to explore fertilization procedures. Some of them are expensive.”

  “That’s no problem.”

  The doctor paused a second, registering, then continued in the same tone, “And some of them take time, which is a problem.” She looked up into Annie’s eyes, letting her know in no uncertain terms that she was not going to allow Annie to “play a game.” Annie swallowed and nodded, respect sparking in her chest. She knew Maureen Gibson was no-nonsense, but she was fair and had a big heart. Annie came to her six years earlier on Gabriella’s recommendation—she worked in the same women’s health clinic. Annie hadn’t seen a gynecologist in three years—she was always too busy and put it off—but when Gabriella had heard that juicy fact at a Book Club meeting, she went nuclear as only Gabby can when it came to health issues. Annie was sent to Dr. Gibson, a woman—which Annie had insisted on—of about the same age—which Annie liked—who ran every test in the book and had Annie toeing the line ever since.

  “There’s a procedure where we can harvest your eggs by laparoscopy, then fertilize them with your husband’s sperm. Of course, we’ll have to test those critters, too.”

  “No problem. He wants a baby as much as I do. More. As soon as possible.”

  “Good. We could also consider in vitro. It’s eight thousand dollars a pop, with no guarantees.”

  “Sign me up.” She started wagging her foot. “Let’s get started.”

  The doctor scratched her head wearily. “Annie, slow down. Don’t set such high expectations.”

  “I always set high expectations. That’s how I’ve achieved as much as I have. Raising the bar and kicking higher.”

  “I admire that, as long as it’s realistic. But the fact is, we’re pushing it at your age, battling against time.”

  Annie shifted her weight. She could handle most things in life, but not this trampling of time. It made her edgy, it was so out of her control.

  Dr. Gibson paused to remove her glasses and chew at the end of one side in thought. “There’s something else we need to consider here,” she began slowly. “Why you’re skipping periods. There’s always the possibility that you could be entering early menopause.”

  Annie felt the blood drain from her face and her limbs hung loose like noodles. Menopause? That was for old women. Not her. She was young. Vibrant. Attractive. Her boobs were still perky. There wasn’t a goddamn wrinkle on her face.

  “Menopause?” she blurted out. “What, are you crazy? I’m still young. I’m still fertile. I’m only forty-three, not fifty. And John just hit forty.”

  “It’s a common misperception that menopause only happens after fifty, that your periods suddenly end. In fact, it’s a long, slow process that can take months, even years, before the actual cessation of menses. Premenopausal symptoms can start in the late thirties to early forties.”

  “Well, it’s not happening to me.”

  “Maybe not. Have you had any hot flashes, palpitations?” Dr. Gibson pushed on.

  Annie could have killed her for the calm she’d admired moments ago, especially now that she did feel palpitations of anxiety racing through her. And any sweats now were because they were even discussing the dread M word. She shook her head vehemently.

  “Any vaginal dryness during sexual intercourse?”

  “No, no, none of that.”

  “How about your periods? Would you say they were regular in the past?”

  She shrugged. “To be honest, I’ve never been all that regular.”

  “Okay. We already know you’ve only had spotting this cycle, and you missed the last one. Something’s going on in there. Any excessive bleeding?”

  “Oh, yeah. Very heavy, but lots of women have that from time to time. It doesn’t mean anything.”

  “It might. Take it easy, Annie, you look like you’re facing a firing squad.”

  “I feel like it.”

  “There’s nothing to be afraid of. Menopause is a natural phase of life.”

  “
Not for me it isn’t. I’m not ready!” She swallowed down the panic that was rising. She didn’t feel different, why did her body have to change? “Dr. Gibson, be honest. Do you think that’s what’s going on with me?”

  Dr. Gibson smiled and shrugged her slim shoulders. “No, probably not. You’re getting a reprieve. I’m going to run a few tests and I want to take a Pap smear. Says here,” she said, putting on her glasses and studying her chart, “that you missed your last one.” Her tone was censorial. “We sent you reminders.”

  “God, I forgot to reschedule. I’m sorry. I had a case that went to trial and, well...”

  “It’s not a good idea to let these things slip.”

  “Wait, wait, I can hear it coming. Not at my age.”

  “Precisely.”

  “Well, at my age, Dr. Gibson, I want to have a baby.” She said the words, needed to say them, to hear them spoken aloud in order to focus the goal in her mind and dispel the cloud of gloom. Her face set in an expression of rock determination that John would have recognized and which would have immediately sent him stepping out of her way. “And I intend to have one.”

  * * *

  Alone, Annie finished dressing in slow motion, feeling as if she’d just stepped out of a dream, a nightmare. As she buttoned the small pearl buttons on her blouse, tucked it in her suit skirt and smoothed away the wrinkles from her flat, unpregnant belly, she couldn’t think beyond these simple movements. Her mind was dazed, taking a break. But her body, her crotch, felt as if it had been pinched, poked and probed. She wanted nothing more than to slip on her shoes and get far from the smell of antiseptic and the cold tile walls.

  It wasn’t until she entered the waiting room and saw John nervously tapping his foot that it really hit her. She wasn’t pregnant. There was no baby inside her, no little bun in the oven. The sense of loss rose up to hit her, shaking her equilibrium, causing her to sway and grip the door. And now she’d have to tell John. She’d have to be strong, for him.