“Okay.”
Jacy looked straight at me. “My dad said, ‘Lynnelle, you own the husband in me—the romantic spirit and heart of me—but don’t you ever jerk me around about Justin or Jacy again.’” Tears blinked in Jacy’s eyes. “My dad never even says cuss words, but he threw multiples that night.”
“I guess he saved it for the right time.”
“Even my father asks about Bailey. The neighbors ask about Bailey. The church members ask about Bailey. Ya know it’s one of the reasons I stopped going to church. How in heck do I watch my mother and Thomas worship, pray, read their Bibles, all the while letting you raise their kid?”
I waited.
She wiped her nose on the sleeve she had pulled down over her hand.
“Sometimes I’m mad at God.”
“How’s that?”
“How come He is okay with what my family is doing?”
“He’s not.”
“How do you know?” She furrowed her brow and peered into my eyes.
“Well, I talked to Him just this morning.”
“Big deal. My mom would say she did the same thing.” She shrugged.
“Well, there is saying and then there is doing.”
“What’s the doing?” she asked.
“Taking care of Bailey,” I whispered. “After I talked to God, I went about taking care of your sister.”
“Oh, dear Lord.” Jacy laid her face in her hands and sobbed. Her whole body shook until she slumped into my arms.
I cradled her as she melded herself to me.
Jacy needed me at that moment, just as much as Bailey. I gently massaged her back and shoulders, asking God to heal the ugly pain gnawing at this beautiful girl.
She sat up and blew her nose effusively into a tissue that had been reduced to fibers.
I asked, “So what’s this about a baby?”
She resorted to blowing her nose on the tail of her red-and-gray plaid-flannel shirt that she’d pulled from under her sweatshirt and smiled. “It’s a girl,” she beamed between blowing.
“Oh, I love girls.”
Her grin spread across her face. “What would you have said if I’d told you it was a boy?”
“Oh, I love boys.” I laughed.
“Catherine …”
“Yes?”
“One of the reasons I married Ryan—besides the baby—was to make room in my mother’s house for Bailey.”
“I feared so, but I hope you also love him.” She nodded. “The problem, however, was never about space,” I said. “If there wasn’t room for Bailey in Jillian and Thomas’s house—even in the smaller house you guys had when her mother was killed—the room wasn’t missing from their house. The room was missing from their hearts.”
She bit her lip and nodded yes.
“I’ve never known a single incident where a couple couldn’t make room for a child they loved and wanted.”
Jacy stared at me. She nodded yes, then immediately followed with a no wag. She bit her bottom lip. “Do you know how I felt when we moved from our old house into the new one and I knew where the money came from?”
“How did you feel?”
“Humiliated. Angry. I couldn’t look at my mother’s excitement over larger rooms and new bedspreads. Ryan and I are happier in our tiny little apartment than they’ll ever be in that rambling house.”
“I like your Ryan. He’s good people.”
“He loves me.”
“Yes, I know.” I smiled at Jacy. “And you are having a girl, and he is thrilled, and you are glad, and Jillian is thrilled, and you’re mad at her.”
“Bingo.” She made an exclamation point in the air with her index finger.
“Want some water?” I asked rising from the swing.
“Yes,” she said, staying put.
“I need a second.” I keyed my way inside, reached for the light switch out of habit, and of course, found it useless. Groping my way through the darkened hallway, I found my way to the kitchen, brightened by the little bit of light coming through the window, and opened the fridge. A stale, unpleasant odor greeted me. Crinkling my nose, I reached inside for two warm bottles. I then felt around the coffee bar until I found a box of tissue, then shoved a wad in my pocket.
I stepped out the door, down the steps, and ambled over to the swing. I reseated myself next to Jacy and handed her a bottle. I broke the seal on my water, turned it up, and took a tepid swig. “Do you want to tell me why you are mad at your mom for being excited about your baby?”
“Don’t you know?” She looked indignant again.
“I probably do, but I won’t say it for you, Jacy.”
“How dare my mother reject one little girl—Thomas’s baby—then be all ooey-gooey about my baby?”
I took another sip from my drink.
“We had a terrible fight.” Jacy looked at me. “I told her she had a choice to make, and I meant it.”
“Okay.”
“She can have two little girls or no little girls. Not mine anyway.”
My breath trapped somewhere, midway through my lungs as the back porch became a scarier place. “What did she say?” I gripped the bottle until it crinkled, and I released it.
“Oh, she sputtered and spat and said, Bailey is in my life. That made me madder.” Jacy put her hands over her face, splayed her fingers and looked at me through them. “How dare my mother call allowing Bailey to sleep at her house one night a month having her in her life? After someone else has taken care of her the other twenty-nine or thirty days?”
I didn’t say anything, choosing not to tell her Bailey had stopped going months ago, after only a few visits.
“How?”
“What do you think she will do?”
“I think … I hope she will come get Bailey.”
I couldn’t swallow. Come get Bailey? My Bailey?
“Don’t you hope they will?” she asked.
I called on all my professional reserve to appear composed. “I understand that they should,” I said, but my voice sounded like someone else’s. I don’t hope they’ll get her. What does get her mean? My neck refused to turn in Jacy’s direction. My bladder ached, and I needed to run to the bathroom. I tried to lift the water to my mouth, but the bottle slipped due to the tremor and soaked my jeans. I didn’t feel wet or cold. Heat coursed up from my feet like a straw filling with warm liquid.
Jacy looked at me waiting for me to say something else. “Are you all right?”
“Yes,” I said. No. I’m not okay. In a perfect world, people took care of their own kids, but Bailey wasn’t theirs anymore. “I’m fine,” I said. “This weather is leaving us all a bit shaky.” And she’s mine. Bailey is mine!
She looked at me closely as understanding dawned in her eyes. “Will you be okay if my mom and Thomas start caring for Bailey?”
I had no voice.
“Will you?”
I sat, mute. Unable to breathe. I didn’t seem to have a choice.
Jacy shifted in the swing. “Well, I better go home. I don’t want Ryan to worry.” She looked at me. “Catherine?”
“Yes, go,” I whispered. ‘“There’s no place like home. There’s no place like home.’”
Jacy kissed me on my cheek and walked away. She turned at the end of the porch, looking like she wanted to say something else, but instead simply waved at me. Then she left.
The heat went away, and a deep chill crawled inside my bone marrow. No amount of swinging could comfort me now. Jacy had been right. The still half frozen trees did look spooky. A second slab of ice broke loose, skipped across the porch roof, and collided onto the half-frozen ground, smashing into multiple pieces.
I didn’t feel so good. Nothing will change, Katie. Shake it off. The conversation had been hypothetical. Jillian will not come get Bailey. Jacy is mad at her mother, but she, herself, is a kid. She doesn’t have the power to change Jillian’s or Thomas’s heart. She’ll threaten her mother about not seeing her baby. Her mother will cry and b
e pitiful. Thomas will tell Jacy that she is breaking Jillian’s heart. Justin will tell Jacy to be nice to their mother. Jacy will fold, and Bailey will stay with me. With me and Alicia and Isabella … and Jordan.
But I still didn’t feel so good.
During dinner that evening, Bailey asked why I kept staring at her. “You okay, Miss Katie?” she asked, looking worried. She also asked why I squeezed her so tight every time I hugged her.
“I’m just fine,” I said, forcing myself to smile. But I wasn’t, and there wasn’t anyone to run to. To confide in. Not this time. Not now. Because the person I wanted was my husband who I couldn’t call since this was the very reason he’d left.
No, no, no. This could not be what he had predicted.
Somehow, I knew … it was. Still, I couldn’t call him.
I learned from Monday evening’s news report that we should have power by midnight on Tuesday. So, I’d shown up at the clinic Monday night with a work lamp, OdoRid, Carpet Fresh and scented candles. I had opened the building to air it, cleaned out the fridge, put Lysol in the toilets and did what I could to freshen the building. I called Alicia and told her we could work Wednesday. She, of course, had grabbed the scheduling book and carried it home with her when she’d learned that threatening weather headed our way.
When I entered my office on Wednesday, mingled smells of good intentions greeted me. I walked to the front, as always, to check my schedule and say good morning to Alicia. When I rounded the corner, it was to see Jillian and Jacy standing at the sign-in counter. I hadn’t noticed their car. Jillian laughed and chattered to Alicia who sat stone-faced in the presence of such uncharacteristic jabbering. Jillian had never been much of a laugher. Always more of a whiner. But that morning, Jillian laughed.
Jacy saw me and cast a tentative smile in my direction. Alicia turned and, seeing me, bit her lip. My toast and juice felt strange in my belly.
“What’s up?” I asked. Keep it friendly, Catherine. Just walk right up to them and pretend they’re here for any other reason than—
“We have the best news, Catherine,” Jillian said.
Jacy’s pressed-together lips asked me not to tell her mom I already knew about the pregnancy.
I armed my face with a smile. “Do tell.”
“I,” Jillian announced, “am going to be a grandmother.” She threw herself into my arms.
I received her with stiff limbs.
Stepping back from me she said, “Can you believe it? My baby is going to have a baby?” She turned to Jacy and put her arm around her waist. “She’s glowing. Don’t y’all think she’s glowing?”
“Glowing.” Alicia, who’d never made a one-word response in her entire life.
“My goodness,” Jillian said, “we are so excited.”
Jacy watched my face carefully and said, “We have other news.”
I nodded, feeling my smile congeal.
“Let me tell her,” Jillian said. Her voice lost most its excitement, but still she announced, “We, all of us, Justin, Thomas, Jacy and me,” she pointed at Jacy and herself dramatically, “want our precious little Bailey to be a full-time member of our family.” She grinned, turning from me to Alicia and back to me. “Aren’t you excited, Catherine? I’m finally ready to be Bailey’s mother.”
Sometimes … I hate … my job.
Chapter 30
The storm must have done damage to the building after all. The walls tipped in at the top. The pictures hung at odd angles. The room grew darker. Count and breathe. Count and breathe. In. Out. One, I hate you. Two, I hate you.
“Well,” Jillian said, “don’t you have anything to say?” She looked from me to Alicia, then back to me. “We’re so excited. We called all our family and all our church family. We wanted to be here first thing to tell you.” She arched her brows. “Cat got your tongue?”
I grasped the counter ledge with my right hand, knowing full well I was about to fall.
Jacy watched my face and swallowed hard.
“Well, Catherine,” Jillian droned on, “I’ve never known you to be so quiet. I figured you would be jumping with joy. I am here to take the burden of Thomas’s kid off your shoulders.”
Three, I hate you. Four, I hate you. “She’s not a burden.”
“Oh, don’t be silly. Nobody wants somebody else’s child thrust into her lap. Believe me, I know.” She swatted at the air with her right hand like a beauty shop patron commiserating with a friend over some shared aggravation. “Well, your worries are over. Jillian to the rescue.” She grinned, then looked around like the befuddled only guest at a highly-anticipated party.
Alicia turned her back to us and shuffled papers.
I did nothing … nothing.
“We’ll pick her up from school today and tell her she’s gonna be with us now. I thought Thomas was gonna cry last night when I told him.” Jillian paused, waiting for some affirmation.
I just stood, quiet as a whisper.
“Is it just me, or am I the only one talking?”
“Isabella picks her up,” Alicia stammered. “Bailey won’t be expecting your car.”
“Oh, I’ll lay on the horn,” she said, swatting at the air again. “I think she’ll recognize my car.”
Five, I hate you. Six, I hate you.
“Now, Catherine, thanks for all you’ve done,” Jillian said, with renewed energy, “but it’s time we put this place behind Bailey and moved on as a real family.” She took another step toward me. “Here, Catherine, let me give you another hug.”
Alicia cleared her throat. “We’ll need to contact the school … let them know…”
Jacy’s eyes remained focused on my face. She put her hand on her mother’s arm to squelch her incessant chatter.
I struggled to decipher what my brain failed to register. I let go of the counter and curled my hands around both of Jillian’s upper arms. “You don’t mean today.” I’d found my tongue. “You cannot mean that you are ending the only life Bailey knows without a chance for us all, mostly her, to adjust to the idea.” I was going to vomit for sure.
“Yeah,” Jillian said. “That’s what I mean. And I don’t mean to be rude, but frankly, I’m tired of this place.”
The sharp intake of my breath could be heard next door. Tired? Tired of a place she rarely walked into?
“This place has outlived its usefulness to me,” Jillian said. “I’m ready for us to get on with our lives. We’re having a baby, and that marks a whole new period for us.” She turned to leave. She just turned to leave.
“Wait,” I said. “Please. Jillian, this place … we … are all Bailey knows as family.”
“Here?” Jillian asked in an ugly voice. “This is a clinic, for heaven’s sake.” She took a loud breath. “God knows it’ll be stressful, but His mercy will see us through. We,” she said, pulling Jacy in close to her, “are Bailey’s family.”
“Yes, you are.” No. You. Are. Not. “And, Jillian, this might be the right thing,” I said, “but only if it’s done with extreme care and lots of love.” This is a wrong thing. You do not love her. I am Bailey’s family. Jordan is Bailey’s family whether he knows it yet or not. Isabella is Bailey’s family. Alicia is Bailey’s family. “But, please,” I said, “give her some adjustment time. Let me talk to her. For the love of Pete, let me explain to her what to expect.” I heard myself begging.
Jillian’s eyes narrowed in calculation. “Okay, you can see her two more weeks,” Jillian, looking put out, informed me. “You have two weeks, two days a week to see her, and then this,” she swept her hand at the room, at me, at Alicia’s back, “is over.”
“One month, four days a week,” I pleaded. “She needs to get used to the idea.”
“What idea? We want her home. Period. The end.”
“A month, please, ” I begged. “She’s just a little girl.”
“Mom,” Jacy said, “please listen to Catherine. She knows Bailey.”
“We all know Bailey,” Jillian replied. “She’s T
homas’s child for goodness sake.”
Seven, I hate you. Eight …
“Three weeks, three days a week, but you’ll need to pick her up.”
“Okay, then … after that … of course, I will see her once a week indefinitely.”
“Nope,” Jillian said through thin lips. Her eyes, empty. “Time for us to get on with our lives.” She turned, and this time she did walk out the door, pulling Jacy by the arm behind her.
I dashed through the doorway behind them. “Jillian, please let Isabella pick her up today and bring her here. I need to talk to her. Please.”
“Fine,” she barked, stopping to turn and look at me. She stood on the front porch amid my flowers that drooped and matted together in mushy clumps. Jillian’s presence took the glow off the evergreens. “I sure don’t know what the big deal is.” She turned again and trotted down the front steps.
Jacy glanced back at me through pleading eyes, begging me to be okay.
“Thank you,” I muttered. I turned and walked back inside my office. I think I forgot to shut the door.
Alicia turned an ashen face toward me. “Kat,” she said.
“No,” I said, then headed down the hall to the bathroom.
“My dad wants me?” Bailey said that afternoon. Her purple backpack slid from her shoulders, down her arms, and heaped onto the floor.
She threw her arms around my neck. “He really wants me?”
“Yes, girlfriend, he really wants you.” Look happy, Katie. Please look happy.
Bailey’s cheeks bloomed from the cold. Her green eyes sparkled. “I knew it.” She danced a jig around the playroom. “I just knew it.” Radiance kissed her face. She was never more beautiful than in that moment. She spun around me as I sat at the table. She called her dresses that would spin with her, spinners. This red dress with tiny white flowers spun beautifully.
“I’m so happy for you.” I want to be happy for you. But I didn’t know if they would be good to her. Either way, I was devastated for me. They were taking my daughter.
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