“I’m no good at this sort of thing,” Sandra complained.
“You didn’t have any trouble telling me,” Pam said with a raised eyebrow. “Just blurt it out when the spirit moves you.”
Sandra couldn’t help herself; embarrassed, a giggle popped out of her mouth. “Okay, I got it.” She’d be on her own. But it was important to her that this baby be placed in the family hierarchy, so she’d make sure to tell Lisa as soon as possible.
In a few minutes, Lisa appeared with baby Marcus in her arms. “Have you been here long?”
“We just arrived,” Pam said, going to her. “Did you get a nap?”
“I did. About an hour, wouldn’t you say, Mum?”
Gladys nodded. If Pam minded Lisa using the term of endearment to Gladys, she didn’t show it.
“Let’s look at that hair again,” she said, surprising herself.
Lisa pulled the blanket back and exposed his black hair for everyone to see.
“Take a look at this, Sandra.”
“Hi, Sandra, I didn’t see you back there,” Lisa said. “Let’s see your little one. Do you call him Tommy?”
Pam stayed back while Lisa walked to the table where baby Brent sat propped up in his car seat.
“Oh my God! He looks exactly like Megan did when she was a baby.” Lisa cooed over the baby, holding on to Marcus, mesmerized by this other baby. She looked at Miranda.
“Does baby Miranda like her little brother? You know, he looks enough like Miranda to be her natural brother. Isn’t life funny?”
Pam watched her daughter make these few connections, back and forth between her daughter and cousin Miranda, who were related, and this new baby, who shouldn’t be, yet looked enough like the others to be siblings. But Lisa was truly an innocent and didn’t get it. No one spoke as Lisa handed Marcus off to Gladys.
“Can I hold him?”
Sandra nodded her head, breathing shallowly, afraid to move.
All eyes were on Lisa as she struggled to unbuckle her nephew out of his car seat. “Hey, little guy, look at those cheeks? You call him Tommy?” she repeated. This time Lisa looked up at Sandra, who was silent.
“Sandra, what do you call him?”
“She calls him Brent,” Nelda answered.
Lisa frowned. “Aw, that’s awfully sweet, but we were actually thinking about calling Marcus Brent. We were waiting to get everyone here to get Mom’s approval.” Lisa looked at Pam. “What do you think?”
Pam put her hand to her mouth and gave a little nod of her head.
“My son is Brent’s baby,” Sandra finally said softly. “He looks like Megan and Miranda because he has the same genes.”
Lisa stopped fussing with the straps. Her body language spoke volumes as she stepped back, looking down at the baby. He was awake, jamming his fists in his mouth. Pam could see Jack in him from across the room.
“You’re kidding, right?” Lisa said. A flush had worked its way up her neck and across her cheeks. “My brother got you pregnant. Just like that.”
“Not exactly, not just like that,” Sandra said, trying desperately not to sound defensive. She knew what she said now would be the story she’d stick with for the rest of her life, the story that the baby would grow up knowing, that might shape the way he felt about himself and his father’s family. It would squeeze virtuous lies out of the whole, ugly truth. “We just connected on his first visit back after he and Julie broke up. It wasn’t premeditated; it simply happened.”
Lisa picked up Megan and went to Gladys. “Mum, let’s trade kids, okay? I’m not sure how much comprehension we have going on here,” she said, handing Megan off and taking Marcus in her place. “Noni, will you and Bernice excuse us? Keep an eye out for Miranda? Come with me, Mom and Sandra, if you’d please.”
Pam hid her pleasure at Lisa’s take-charge demeanor. Either she’d learned from her mother’s mistakes or her character was developing. In any event, Pam forgot for just a second that she had every reason in the world to be sad. She couldn’t wait to hear what Lisa would say.
Sandra and Pam followed Lisa down a narrow stairway into an older part of the house. The den was formerly a television room Ed had used. Pam had no way of knowing it was also where Dan and Lisa had sex for the first time a year before, with Ed sleeping in the room above.
“Have a seat,” Lisa said, pointing to the couch. She sat in a chair and unselfconsciously pulled her T-shirt up, unhooking her lacy nursing bra, and let Marcus Brent latch on while Sandra watched her, a combination of admiration for Lisa’s poise, and jealousy. Lisa could nurse her baby because she wasn’t HIV positive.
“Mother, I take it you knew about this.”
Pam put her hands up in surrender. “Hey, I just found out myself.”
“I spent the evening with Brent before he died,” Lisa said, fighting tears. “It was heartfelt, intimate. He told me he was in love with Julie and was going there to confront her parents, to offer to make restitution for the money they spent sending her out to California, to apologize and reinstate their engagement. He never mentioned you. As a matter of fact, he talked a blue streak about going to work at Lang, following in Dad’s footsteps. But not a word about you.”
Sandra was embarrassed; she wanted the baby to be ushered into the family joyously. Lisa’s words rankled, and she bit her tongue, determined not to alienate either Lisa or Pam. She needed them, especially Pam.
“We’d agreed we’d keep our relationship a secret,” Sandra said, breaking the silence. “I had so much to lose because if Tom left me, I could lose Miranda. My life revolves around her.” Although not exactly true, Virginia Adams had more interaction with Miranda than Sandra did. But that would soon change. “I was more worried about your mom finding out,” Sandra said, looking directly at Pam. “I didn’t see how I could tell you I was in love with your son after, well, after everything we’d been through.”
“Mother, what do you think of all of this?”
Pam was thinking about what Sandra had just said…everything they’d been through. Lisa didn’t know that Sandra lost a baby that had been Jack’s. Lisa’s half-sister. Pam didn’t often allow herself to fantasize about what it would have been like if baby Ellin had lived; she’d be a little older than Miranda, the living proof of Jack’s infidelity. For months after Jack’s death, Pam worried about having to tell her children about Sandra’s baby, their sibling. When Sandra miscarried, Pam felt relief, and the guilt was awful. The secret would be theirs to keep.
Now baby Brent was here, filling the void Ellin left behind. He was a blessing to Sandra and to Pam, if she’d allow it. Pam decided she would focus on the here and now. The ability she had to bury her true feelings would continue to serve her well.
“I think it’s wonderful,” she answered. “He’s a gift, a delightful surprise. Once I get used to the idea of him, I think he is going to help me recover from Brent’s death. Don’t get me wrong, I’ll never get over losing my son. But part of him will live on in his son.”
“What would have happened if Brent was still alive? I can’t see him being happy about it,” Lisa said, still not convinced.
Lisa’s words penetrated Pam’s thoughts. Looking at her beautiful daughter nursing the black-haired baby stirred something in her chest that she could only define as annoyance. The whole Dan thing cropping up again, it would be something that would color every interaction she had with Lisa.
“Well, Brent’s dead,” Pam said. “It doesn’t matter whether he’d be happy or not. Who knows where his head was? Baby Brent is here and now. Just like baby Marcus is here. Just as I have to accept him, we have to accept Sandra and her son.” Pam looked intensely over at Sandra and had a feeling there was more to the story than was revealed. Although she’d never guess the real story in a million years, that her beloved son had drugged and raped Sandra, Pam thought perhaps it had been a one-night stand at the very most. That made her doubly angry because it meant Sandra had knowingly exposed her son to the HIV virus. Closing
her eyes for a second to pull it together, Pam could see how easily the situation might escalate into a battle if they didn’t stay alert. What difference does it make now? Brent’s dead. Standing up, she walked to Sandra’s chair. “Can I hold him?”
Sandra was back at Lisa’s words, Brent not being happy about it. Making a spur-of-the-moment decision, she was going to embrace whatever these women would offer her. And Pam had just said it didn’t make any difference if Brent was happy or not. Sandra had gone through the scenario just as she had when she discovered she was pregnant with Jack’s baby after he died.
Hindsight was so wonderful; she imagined going to the ER when she discovered the evidence that she might have been raped. At the time she’d rationalized that it was left behind by her encounter with Tom that morning, even though they practiced safe sex. But for the sake of fantasy, she went to the ER and had blood drawn, which would prove she’d been drugged with Rohypnol. The evidence left behind would belong to Brent. Sandra went through the narrative in her head: going to Tom with the story, he and his cronies getting a warrant for Brent’s arrest. He’d be dead by then, though. But Sandra sped things up a bit as fantasy enabled one to do; the arrest would be made before he drove to White Plains.
In her fantasy, there was the baby to deal with. If she stayed with Tom, he’d pressure her into aborting, and it was something she wouldn’t be able to do after already losing a baby. So her relationship with Tom would end, and that would make a relationship with her rapist possible. Repeatedly, she asked herself if it was something she’d be able to do. There had been so much chemistry between Brent and her. Was it enough to transcend violence and disrespect? I am really living in a dream world. This story is for the well-being of my child and nothing more.
“Of course you can,” Sandra replied to Pam’s request. “I was just going to ask if I could hold that little darling over there when he’s done with lunch. You must be exhausted, Lisa.”
Lisa watched her mother lift the little baby from Sandra’s arms. So sweet, her brother’s baby. The only child Brent would ever have. He’d never see the kind of man he’d grow up to be. The only input he’d have would be what her and her mother offered him. She made a snap decision at that moment that she’d support Sandra and embrace baby Brent.
“I think I’m pretty much done in. But who can sleep? There’s too much excitement going on around here.” She held Marcus up for Sandra. “You can take him. I might go get a shower and lay down for a bit, if you don’t mind.”
They agreed she should rest. Pam wondered what would bring Dan back, good old Dan. She didn’t want him to think for a second that he was going to keep her from her grandchild. These two, so close in age, would they become friends or rivals? Only time would tell.
Chapter 9
In the kitchen, Gladys, Nelda and Bernice watched in awe as Megan and Miranda played together. Close enough in age to parallel play, neither child expected anything from the other, except not to take a toy in their possession. A few times a scuffle ensued when the older Miranda wanted the blocks Megan was playing with, but the women smoothed over the fuss by distraction.
“I forgot how exhausting this is,” Bernice said. “I guess that’s why eighty-year-old women don’t have small children.”
“You’d get used to it,” Nelda said. It was less than two years ago she cared for Miranda every day while her father went to work. It was only after she fell off a ladder that they made the decision to allow Sandra and Tom to take over her care. “I miss it. I think we made a smart move leaving that assisted-living place. We need to be more independent.”
“Don’t forget Annabelle,” Bernice said. “I don’t know if I could do my own hair after having her all this time.”
“You don’t need to worry about Annabelle; she’s here to stay. I mean, what a gig! Sitting by the beach, doing a couple of old ladies’ hairdos. When I saw my daughter bringing her coffee yesterday, I almost had a stroke.”
“Where is she, anyway?” Gladys asked. “It was always my dream to have an assistant.”
“She’s taking a day off,” Bernice answered. “And just my two cents, don’t let my granddaughter make you a nanny.”
“Bernice, that’s a terrible thing to say!” Nelda exclaimed.
Gladys was making them coffee and hid her grin from the women; she’d been on her feet attending to their every request for the past half hour.
“No worries. I love being here with Megan. She reminds me so much of my Ed.”
Nelda grimaced behind Gladys’s back. She’d later tell Pam that Ed Ford would be the last person on earth she’d want her great-granddaughter to remind people of.
“She loved him the way we loved Marie and Brent,” Pam would say, avoiding mentioning the peccadillos of either.
Dan tied up loose ends on his desk and checked his watch; it was almost five. His wife had given birth to his first child less than four hours ago, and he was trying to kill time to avoid having to interact with his mother-in-law. He got up, stuffing a few last things in his briefcase, when his phone rang. He frowned when he looked at the number. It was Cara Ellison, former Miss New York and former girlfriend. Hesitating, he didn’t want to talk to her, but figured she must have heard about Marcus somehow. They broke up because she didn’t want children at the time; he thought it might be fun to hear her grovel.
“Hello there, daddy!” she said after he answered. “I ran into your sister Catherine today, and she told me all about it.”
“I can count on my sister to get the word out,” Dan replied.
“Well, congratulations. I think that’s great.”
“We’re very excited,” he said, somber. She had an edge to her voice that made him nervous, like she was going to poke fun at him for settling down.
“It happened awfully fast. Was she hearing her biological clock?” Dan was taken aback but kept his cool. Evidently, his sisters were using discretion after all if she didn’t know how young Lisa was.
“Not at all, Cara,” Dan said. “She’s only twenty-four.” That was a zinger; Cara was in her late thirties. There was a lull for a moment.
“I’m happy for you, Dan. You finally got that son.” He wasn’t sure, but he thought he heard a sniff. Oh, what the hell.
“Say, do you want to meet me at Cooper’s Pub? Lisa has her mother and grandmothers over there, and I could use a drink.” He didn’t mean to make it sound like he was dreading going home, but that was the way she would take it and would set the tone for what was to come.
“Oh, I’m surprised you’re looking for a way out of going home already. Didn’t she just have the baby today?”
Dan knew he should hang up and go home, but her taunt was driving him. “I’m not looking for a reason not to go home. Come home and see the baby with me if you’d like. He’s amazing. Either you want a drink or you don’t.”
She gave a seductive little giggle and agreed to meet him. Locking up the office, he remembered the only time Pam had ever come there, as a client. She’d commented on a watercolor his great-great-grandfather had painted of the salt marsh that covered much of his family’s acreage years back, now drained and filled and covered with small bungalows. The painting still hung on the wall of his office, and he decided it would come home with him and find a place of honor at Lisa’s house.
That house was another thing; it represented too much of what could potentially be wrong with their marriage. Pam paid for most of it, including an ostentatious kitchen remodel that was more than ridiculous because Lisa didn’t cook. Her mother was an amazing cook but, evidently, didn’t bother to teach Lisa anything. So far, they’d depended on Gladys Ford for most meal preparation unless Dan brought something home. Dan was ready to hire kitchen help if Lisa wasn’t willing to take over. Gladys was useful as long as there was a new baby in the house, but she had to go home eventually.
Once he got into his car, thoughts of the house and cooking and new babies disappeared, replaced with cold beer and Cara Ellison’s lon
g legs. He pulled around the corner, and he could see Cara as she was leaning up against a white BMW, waiting for him with a smile and a wave.
“Hey!” she said, walking around his car to meet him. “This is a nice way to end the day.” She kissed his cheek, and he smiled but didn’t reciprocate, a zing to his groin echoing a warning.
“Hey, yourself,” he said. “So what’s new?”
“News is that you’re a daddy, that’s what’s new. So what was it like?”
Dan’s phone beeped, and he saw that Lisa had texted him. They’re gone, it said. That meant the coast was clear for him to come home.
“Hold that thought,” he said. “It looks like I need to get back after all. The in-laws have returned to the beach.”
“Gonna run home to mommy, then?”
“You got it,” Dan said, smiling. “Take a rain check?” He could see that Cara was angry, but that was too bad.
“Maybe,” she said, standing at the side of his car as he got back in.
“Call me,” he replied, starting the car and pulling out of the space. He waved but didn’t look back. It wasn’t important if she was smiling or giving him the finger. There was a new baby and a beautiful wife waiting for him, and he didn’t waste any time getting back to them.
Lisa was standing in the door, holding the baby, smiling, when he pulled up. It was remarkable that she’d just given birth. Her body was amazing, and although she did look a little tired, the old Lisa had already returned.
“Did you get any rest today?” he asked, bending down to kiss her.
“About an hour. I’m feeling it now, though. I wanted to see you home. If you don’t mind, I might get into bed. I haven’t even been upstairs yet.”
He stepped into the house, and the smell of something savory wafted out from the kitchen. “Gladys is cooking?”
“Yep. Beef stroganoff. Are you hungry?”
“Starving,” he said, putting his briefcase down. “I’ll wash up and take the baby off your hands.”
In Memoriam Page 7