Can't Stop Loving You

by Peggy Webb

  Angelica was as pleased as if he'd given her a priceless gift. She'd always felt maternal toward Brick. She knew his background, knew he had grown up in an orphanage, knew he had no one to turn to for motherly advice. It pleased her to think that he would turn to her. It even made up for all the emptiness in her own life, the fiancé that somehow never got around to taking her down the aisle, the empty years of waiting for somebody else to come along, the sudden realization that even if he did, she was too old for children.

  "Why don't you hold off on accepting Macbeth? Take some time off. Call Helen and ask her to do the same thing."

  Brick stood with his hands in his pockets, rocking back and forth on his heels.

  "Well?" Angelica said.

  "Damned if I'm not scared. What do you suppose that means?"

  "I think it's a good sign."

  "Of what?"

  "That I'm right."

  He grinned. "I guess you want to celebrate with champagne."

  "I can't think of a better occasion. I'll go get the bottle."

  While she was gone, Brick stared out the window. He knew she was right. He and Helen couldn't spend the rest of their lives onstage in different cities. He had to see her again. Needed to see her.

  But what if she didn't want to see him?

  As soon as he got back to his hotel he took down Helen's itinerary. Looking at her schedule, he realized that something was dreadfully wrong with a marriage when a husband had to have an itinerary to locate his wife.

  Picking up the phone, he dialed her hotel in Seattle. She'd be checking in late that night.

  "This is Brick Sullivan. I'd like to leave a message for…"

  "Sir? Who is the message for?"

  He didn't want to converse with his wife via messenger; he wanted to do it personally. Suddenly it occurred to Brick how very much he wanted to see his wife, how very foolish he had been to stay away all this time.

  "No one," he said. "No messages." What he had to say could only be said in person.

  Helen had never been airsick before. And the plane wasn't even off the ground. It sat on the runway, held by thunderstorms that swept through Dallas.

  Locked in the tiny bathroom on the plane, she bent over the toilet, her face sweaty and her stomach heaving.

  Maybe Marsha was right. Maybe she needed a break.

  She ran water over a paper towel and pressed it to her face and neck, then returned to her seat.

  "Are you okay?" Marsha squeezed her hand.

  "I'm fine… Don't give me that look. It's lack of sleep, that's all."

  The plane taxied slowly behind a long line of jets awaiting takeoff. The intercom crackled, and the pilot came on the air.

  "Another short delay, folks. Sorry about that. We should be taking off in another hour."

  "Hmph. He said that two hours ago. Why we can't just go back to the terminal and…"

  Marsha was suddenly talking to thin air as Helen raced back toward the toilet.

  Helen leaned against the tiny sink, splashing water on her face. Dripping, she came up and stared at herself in the wavery mirror. She looked like a ghost. And she felt even worse. She was so tired.

  How long had she been on the road? Eight weeks. It was enough to make anybody tired.

  Eight weeks since she'd seen Brick, not counting the brief encounter at Matt's wedding. Eight weeks since they'd shared a home, a meal, a bed. Eight weeks…

  Helen pressed her hands over her abdomen. She was pregnant. She didn't need early pregnancy tests and doctors to tell her. She knew. She was going to have a baby.

  Joy filled her. A baby. A little girl who would wear frilly dresses and pink hair ribbons. A little angel who would have tea parties in the backyard and impromptu piano recitals in the den. A little doll with her long legs and Brick's black eyes.

  Brick. Helen groaned. How would she ever tell Brick?

  She saw him as he had been at Matt's wedding, the quick smile, the easy charm, the carefree manner.

  Brick's too smart to saddle himself with children, right?

  Right, Brick had said.

  A wave of nausea hit Helen once more, and she bent over the toilet, heaving. When the sickness passed, she wrapped her arms protectively around her abdomen and leaned against the wall.

  What was she going to do?

  SIXTEEN

  Brick paced the airport like a crazy man. Chance had put him in Seattle before Helen—chance and bad weather.

  Thunderstorms. He didn't want to think of Helen caught in a plane in a thunderstorm.

  Think of something else.

  Think of what he would say to her when he saw her. This time he had to do it right. No more postponing. No more getting sidetracked. No more running.

  He checked the monitor for the hundredth time. Helen's plane was finally scheduled for arrival. He had time for a quick snack before she was due to land.

  Sitting at a cramped table with the soup and sandwich he'd ordered, he realized he couldn't possibly eat. How could he eat when his stomach was tied in knots?

  He dumped the food in the garbage can and made his way toward her gate. A huge crowd had lined up to meet the plane. Brick tried to get closer, but short of stepping over bodies, there was nothing he could do except hang around at the back of the crowd.

  A cheer went up from the crowd when the jet from Dallas landed. Brick watched over the heads of the crowd as passengers began to deplane. He saw Marsha first, and then Helen.

  "Helen," he called to her, waving to attract her attention.

  She didn't see him. He tried to get through the crush of people but forward movement was impossible.

  Craning his neck to see her over the crowd, Brick began a lateral movement that would put him on a collision course with his wife.

  She looked pale from her long ordeal on the plane. She was thinner too. He knew Helen. Sometimes when she was on the road she didn't take the time to eat properly.

  He should have been at her side, taking care of her. What kind of husband paraded around onstage in strange cities while his wife got pale and thin?

  She was coming out of the crowd now, headed for the baggage claim.

  "Helen!"

  Her head jerked around. She went even paler. There was no welcome smile on her face, no welcome light in her eyes.

  For a moment he wasn't certain she would even stop. Fear mingled with joy as he hurried toward her. She clutched her carryon bag as if it were a life raft.

  "Brick… what are you doing in Seattle?"

  "I came to see my wife." She was stiff in his embrace. And damned if she didn't offer her cheek instead of her lips.

  Wounded pride replaced both joy and fear.

  "Happy to see me, Helen?"

  "Surprised."

  She pulled out of his embrace and moved toward the escalators that would take them down to the baggage claim area. He fell into step beside her.

  "You don't have to go with me. Marsha and I can manage this."

  "I'm going."

  "Suit yourself."

  Marsha rolled her eyes but kept her silence. That was the thing he'd always admired about her; she never butted in, never took sides.

  They lined up on the escalators, Marsha in front, Helen behind her, then Brick. His wife's shoulders were as stiff as if they'd been set in concrete.

  What in the devil was going on? Hadn't he flown all the way across country to find out?

  "Why don't we find a quiet place where we can sit down for a minute and talk, Helen?"

  "I need to get my bags so I can check into the hotel. I'm tired."

  "Why don't you and Marsha go directly there. I'll take care of the bags and join you later."

  "You're booked at our hotel?"

  That did it.

  "Am I booked at your hotel!"

  "You needn't shout. I'm not deaf."

  Heads began to turn in their direction. Someone in the crowd shouted, "It's Brick and Helen Sullivan," and a small crowd began to gather at the foot o
f the escalator.

  "I realize that old saying about absence making the heart grow fonder is a bunch of hogwash, but I didn't think my own wife would turn me out after only eight weeks."

  "You're making a scene." The only sign Helen showed that she was irritated was a slight frown.

  "You're my wife, for Pete's sake. I think you're worth making a scene over."

  "Can't we discuss this later, Brick?"

  "When? Next week? Next month? Next year?"

  The escalator malfunctioned and ground to a stop. Neither of them noticed.

  Helen turned her back and stoically faced forward. He caught her shoulders and forced her to look at him.

  "When, Helen?"

  "Not now, Brick. I have a headache."

  Helen had never acted this way before, not even when she'd left him at the end of a five-year marriage. Brick began to panic. Logic fled.

  "I won't be shut out, Helen. Not now. Not ever again." Her bottom lip trembled, and she caught it between her teeth. If Brick hadn't been in such a state of panic, he'd have crumbled at that small sign of Helen's distress.

  He was like a snowball on a downhill roll; he'd gotten off to a bad start at the beginning, and now there was no way he could keep himself from crashing into everything in his path.

  "Helen, you put me off at Matt's wedding…"

  "I put you off?"

  "You wouldn't change your plans."

  "I wouldn't change plans? What about you? You wouldn't change your precious plans either."

  "The important thing—"

  "Yes, Brick. Let's talk about the important thing." Her face flushed, and she brushed a lock of hair out of her face. "The important thing is that you told that . . that gorilla that you were too smart to have children."

  "You're the one who's always been too scared to have children, Helen. Not me. I always wanted children…"

  "You did?"

  "Yes. But I don't have to have them to make my life complete, Helen. I have you, and that's all that matters." Her lip trembled in earnest now, and a tiny tear eased out of the corner of her eye. Brick was too overwrought to notice.

  "It's not all that matters," she said.

  "Yes, it is. Let's leave children out of this…"

  "I can't."

  "You can if you want to, Helen."

  Tears streamed down her cheeks now. Silently, Marsha passed her a tissue.

  "I'm afraid not, Brick. It's too late."

  "Helen, don't be…" Comprehension dawned slowly but surely. Brick studied his wife's tear-streaked face. The light of love he'd looked for earlier was now shining in her eyes. "You're pregnant?"

  Ever the actor, his awed stage whisper carried to the crowd waiting at the bottom of the stalled escalator.

  "Helen Sullivan is going to have a baby," someone yelled.

  The rest of the crowd took up the cry.

  "Brick and Helen Sullivan are pregnant."

  "Do you think it will be a boy or a girl?"

  "Do you think they'll let it act?"

  "What do you think they'll name it?"

  Marsha pulled out another tissue, but she didn't hand it to Helen. She used it to wipe her own eyes.

  "Glory be," she said. And then as Brick caught his wife in a tight embrace, "The saints be praised."

  "Why didn't you tell me sooner, darling?" Brick murmured against his wife's lips.

  "I just found out myself."

  "Are you happy, Helen?"

  "Ecstatic… now that I know you want her too."

  "Her?"

  "The baby. I'm going to dress her in pink and stroll her around the neighborhood in a pram with a ruffled top."

  "It's going to be a boy. And no son of mine is ever going to ride in a pram with ruffles."

  "It's not a boy."

  "How do you know?"

  "Because I've decided to have a girl first."

  He pulled her so close, she lost her breath. Bending her over backward, he pressed his lips to her throat.

  "First?" he whispered.

  "We're going to have lots of babies."

  "Don't you think we ought to get started, darling?"

  "I think we already did."

  As the power came back on, his lips closed over hers, and they rode the escalator toward the cheering audience. When they reached the bottom, Brick Sullivan scooped his favorite leading lady into his arms and took a bow.

  "Encore," somebody in the audience said.

  His lips closed over Helen's once more.

  "With pleasure," he said. "Always."

  EPILOGUE

  "Would you look at that little smile, Brick? I think she already knows me. Don't you, darling? Don't you already know your mother? Yes, you do."

  Helen and her daughter were both dressed in pink. Pink roses filled her hospital room and a pink rose corsage was pinned to her pillow. She leaned over the tiny pink bundle in her arms, cooing.

  Brick was so full of pride and love, he thought his heart would burst. Standing at the window, he drank in the sight of his wife and daughter.

  A family. After all these years he had a family of his own.

  A tiny enraged person let out a big squall, and Helen glanced at Brick in alarm.

  "He wants his mother," she said.

  "How do you know?"

  "I can tell."

  Brick smiled down at the tiny blue bundle in his arms.

  "Listen to that voice projection," he said. "My son will soon be ready to play Macbeth."

  "John's not practicing oratory. He's hungry."

  Smiling, Brick placed his son at Helen's breast, then picked up his daughter.

  "How's Daddy's little girl? How's my little Jennifer?" The baby's tiny hand closed around Brick's finger. "Look at that, Helen. She knows who her daddy is." He leaned close to coo at his daughter. "Don't you, sweetheart? Don't you know your daddy? Look at that, Helen. She's smiling."

  "That's gas."

  Brick gave his wife an offended look, then carried his daughter to the window.

  "Look out there, sweetheart. That whole big world is yours. It's just waiting out there for you to take it by storm. You'll be the finest Ophelia who ever graced a stage. When you play Kate, you'll have the audience at your feet. And do you know who your biggest fan will be? Your daddy."

  Baby Jennifer made squeaking, contented baby sounds, and Brick smiled at his wife as if he'd invented babies.

  Helen smiled back. She thought perhaps he had.

  Three years later…

  Marsha tucked the letters she was going to mail into her handbag, then left her desk to peer into the bassinet. Baby Oliver lay on his stomach with his little rump in the air and his thumb in his mouth.

  "Do you need anything else before morning, Helen?"

  "No. Brick and I are taking the children to the park."

  Marsha paused on her way out the door to lean over the bassinet and pat the plump little baby's bottom.

  "The nanny is completely redundant. I don't know why you and Brick waste your money."

  "We thought you needed help in trying to keep us straight."

  "You've got that right. If you have any more babies, I'm going to have to ask for a raise. This job's getting too big for me to handle." Marsha's grin belied her words. She righted the hat she'd taken to wearing lately, then gave the baby one final pat. "See you in the morning, sweet pea."

  Helen lifted her sleeping son from the bassinet and went to the nursery. John was on a little rocking horse with his baseball cap askew and his sneakers on the wrong feet. Brick sat in the middle of the floor, trying to fashion a bow of Jennifer's sash.

  "You're letting her wear that frilly dress to the park?" Helen asked.

  "She wanted to."

  "She'll be much more comfortable in shorts."

  "Ruffles, Mommy." Jennifer stuck out her little chin.

  "She wants ruffles." Brick wore the look of a man totally besotted with his daughter.

  Helen knew when she was outnumbered.
r />   "Here. Hold the baby while I change John's shoes."

  "No, Mommy," he said when she bent to put his shoes on the correct feet.

  "He wanted to put on his shoes all by himself," Brick said.

  "What am I going to do with you?" Helen said, smiling.

  "Take me to the park?"

  Brick, Helen, and baby Oliver lounged on a quilt under the shade of an oak tree while Jennifer and John romped in the sandbox nearby. John had both shoes off now, and was wiggling his feet in the sand while Jennifer raced around with a miniature dump truck making roaring noises. Her sash was untied, her dress was ripped, and her pink hair bow was perched rakishly over one ear.

  Brick smiled at all his children, then reached for his wife's hand.

  "I think we should reprise The Taming of the Shrew."

  "I'm not ready to go back on the road."

  "Who said anything about the road?" Brick turned Helen's hand over and kissed her palm. "How would you feel about starring right here in Atlanta at The Sullivan Theater."

  "The Sullivan Theater?"

  "We can build the kind of theater we've always wanted to play in, everything state of the art."

  "It sounds wonderful."

  "Just think, Helen. No more road trips. Total control of the plays we do. Onstage together whenever we want. Eventually we could bring a troupe in. The Sullivan Players."

  Helen watched the twins frolicking about, screaming with laughter. Baby Oliver rolled over on his back and gave a big yawn before tumbling back into the baby dreams that occupied most of his day.

  "We could have our own troupe," she said.

  "Three is a good start."

  "Four."

  "Four?"

  Smiling, Helen nodded. Brick stretched full length beside her and pressed his face against her abdomen.

  "Hello in there, sweet little one. This is your daddy talking." He grinned up at Helen. "He didn't answer me."

  "She."

  "She?"

  "I've decided to have another girl."

  "The next time I get to choose the sex."

  "Do you think there will be a next time?"

  His grin was decidedly wicked as he pulled her down beside him on the quilt.