Daisy (10 page)
I washed my hands and let myself out. By the time I reached the front door, Paige was just pulling it open. She smiled at me, but then her smile faltered. I realized my eyebrows were pulled together and tried to smooth my expression.
“You okay?” she asked as I passed through the door in front of her.
“Sure,” I said.
“I’m really sorry about the comments,” Paige said. “I can’t help but feel responsible since I brought it up last month.”
I should have smiled and shrugged it off, but I didn’t. Instead, I turned to Paige as she shut the door behind her. “I can’t be pregnant,” I said in a whisper, despite the fact that we were the only two people outside. “I can’t.”
We stood there for a few seconds before we heard more good-byes from the other side of the door. In tandem, we started walking toward our cars.
“You’re obviously worried, though,” Paige said. “Why not take a test?”
“I can’t,” I said automatically. I was saying that a lot. It would be a waste of time and a waste of money, but . . .
“Take it at my apartment,” Paige said. “There’s a drugstore not half a mile away from here. Just take a test, and then you can be done with it once and for all.”
“Unless it comes back positive.” As soon as I said it, I clamped my mouth shut. It was
not
possible. I’d had my tubes tied fifteen years ago. I was forty-six years old. I was
not
pregnant. But the idea that had been planted a month ago hadn’t ever gone away completely and tonight it had been set on fire. I could see the green shoot poking out of the ground and knew the only way to pull it out was to prove it to be unfounded. I was certain even entertaining the thought was just some sadistic way to distract myself from my other worries in life, but if that was the case, then confronting it would still be effective at moving it out of the way, right?
Paige continued. “At least this way you’ll know, right? No more wondering and worrying. And I won’t tell anyone the results either way.”
I looked at my feet and accepted that it was time to take the test. My stomach completely rebelled at the idea, but it rebelled about pretty much everything these days anyway.
“You know you want to. Just come do it.”
Livvy and Athena passed by, and Paige waved at them pleasantly as they headed toward their cars—Ilana must have been the first one out the door—then Paige turned to wave at Ruby, who was still standing at the door. I didn’t even think about saying good-bye, I was totally lost in myself.
A thought occurred to me—another excuse why I couldn’t do this. Not tonight. “Isn’t Stormy babysitting for you tonight?”
“Yeah,” Paige said. “But she’ll be gone by the time you get there. Unless you wanted her to stay.”
“No!” I said too loudly. That idea was horrendous. I thought about Paul—my
husband.
I should tell him I was taking the test, right? He deserved to know, didn’t he? But I could barely admit it to myself, let alone share my suspicions.
“Not a problem,” Paige said. “I’ll be sure to have her on her way before you arrive.”
“Fine,” I said in surrender. “I’ll see you in a few. But Stormy better not be there.”
My attempt at sounding threatening only made her laugh. “It’ll be perfect. I’ll hurry, I promise.”
Livvy’s Pacifica pulled away from the curb, and Athena’s slick black car followed slowly behind her. I headed to my car and could feel Paige watching me, as if she worried I would stand her up. It was tempting, but no, I was determined to get this over with. For being so young, Paige sure was pushy.
I found the drugstore and intended to take my time, but I felt like a seventeen-year-old kid again, trying to buy a pregnancy test without anyone noticing. It ticked me off that I would revert to being that stupid little girl, so I marched down the aisle, scanned the tests, and then bought three different brands. The first test I’d taken with Stormy had been negative, and I was relieved for exactly ten days. The second test had told the truth. I didn’t want to think about that, however. There were few moments as difficult as telling the guy you think you might be in love with that he’s tied to you for life, whether he likes it or not. I’d already done that twice—three times, if I counted the pregnancy that forced Jared and me to give things one more try until it ended in miscarriage.
Paige had texted me directions to her place. I pulled into the apartment complex in Tustin, concentrating on finding the second building on the north end. There was an empty parking space right out front, and I pulled my Prius into it, took a breath, and then pushed the button to turn off the car. I regarded the bag on my passenger seat with trepidation, hoping I had wasted sixty bucks.
I went inside and took the elevator to the fourth floor. As apartment complexes went, this one was nice. I’d seen a playground when I drove in; I bet her boys lived there when they could.
I knocked on the door with the number 425 stuck to it, and Paige opened up right away.
“You’re speedy,” Paige said as I stepped past her. The apartment was quiet; the boys must have been asleep. I noticed that Stormy hadn’t done all the dishes. I made a mental note to talk to her about that. “Oh, and you almost ran into your daughter.”
I managed to laugh, even though the thought horrified me. “Well, I’m glad I didn’t.”
Now that I was there I felt silly. Paige was twenty years younger than I was, and I’d raised two daughters on my own, for heaven’s sake. I could take a pregnancy test by myself. But not at home where Paul might find the packaging. Oh, I so needed to get this over with. I held up the bag from the drugstore. “I bought three. Just to be sure.”
Paige laughed and showed me to the bathroom. “I hope you’ve got enough in you to pee on all of those.”
“Wish me luck,” I said, jiggling the bag before I locked the door.
There was a pair of swim trunks hanging over the shower rod, and the tub faucet was dripping water on a pile of bath toys. I took my time clearing the counter to make room for the tests and laid down a doubled strip of toilet paper. I was dealing with urine after all, and if someone were taking pregnancy tests in
my
bathroom, I would want them to be considerate.
My work area prepped, I took all the tests out of the boxes and read the brief instructions on how to use them; they all worked within the same basic process. I looked at all three of them, lined up like little soldiers, and closed my eyes, offering my first prayer in I didn’t know how many years.
Please don’t do this to me again.
I took the tests, washed my hands, and then sat on the closed toilet with my back to the tests. I waited a full three minutes before I stood, took another breath, and turned to see my fate.
One plus sign.
Two plus signs.
Three.
I had very little memory of what happened at Paige’s house after seeing the results of the three tests. I drove home, eventually, but I parked a few houses down the street in front of an empty house with a For Sale sign in the yard and a good view of the window of my master bedroom. I didn’t want Paul to see my swollen eyes. It was more than an hour before Paul gave up waiting on me and turned off the bedroom light. Then I stared at the darkened window and asked myself the next question.
How on earth was I going to tell him?
Tears I thought I’d run out of crept up on me as I imagined all his possible reactions. But I didn’t have enough foundation to even draw a conclusive hypothesis. Paul and I had never discussed having children together. Why would we? I had been forty-three years old when we got married, Paul had been forty, and we both had teenage daughters. He’d known early on in our relationship that I couldn’t have more children.
Couldn’t!
Not that I didn’t
want
kids—though I didn’t—but I could not physically conceive another child. I had never heard of a tubal ligation failing. I had never been told that it could “grow back.” If I hadn’t stared at those tests until I thought I was going to pass out, I still wouldn’t have believed it. At the same time, I felt so stupid. I hadn’t had a period in three months. I’d chalked it up to pre-menopause or just good luck, but I’d also been nauseated, and my breasts were swollen, and I could no longer fit into my jeans even though I wasn’t eating much. I’d been through this before—not only pregnancy, but unplanned pregnancies that snuck up on me exactly like this.
How could I possibly be facing this again? How could I have not known?
I dried my tears on the sleeve of my jacket and made a decision. I was not telling Paul. Not yet. Maybe I’d come up with the right way to say it in a few days. Or maybe . . . the pregnancy wouldn’t work out. The thought propelled me back to the moment when I lost Jared’s baby. It had been devastating because I knew that baby was the only thing holding us together. Now, I worried about the reverse. This baby—okay, I wasn’t ready to think of it as a baby—this
pregnancy
might be too much for Paul and me.
I’d be sixty-five years old when this child graduated from high school—older than Ruby—and I could honestly say at that point that I had spent my whole life raising children. I parked in the driveway so I wouldn’t have to open the garage and risk Paul waking up. I got out of the car and headed toward the front door as the shock moved out of the way and anger began to rise. This was not fair! It wasn’t fair to me. It wasn’t fair to Paul. It wasn’t fair to my daughters—I was going to be a grandmother, for heaven’s sake—and it certainly wasn’t fair to this . . . pregnancy.
I let myself into the house as quietly as possible, but I couldn’t make myself go into the bedroom. I felt guilty and angry and completely overwhelmed. I left my shoes by the front door and went into Stormy’s room. I curled up in her bed, which still smelled like her, and wished I had something else to think about. But what could possibly supersede this in my thoughts? I lay there, staring at the blank walls of the room where my daughter used to live, and thought back to the prayer I’d dared utter before I took those tests.
Please don’t do this to me again.
That’s why I don’t pray.
I’d been on autopilot before and, just as I’d adjusted to Stormy being gone, I easily fell into a routine that took me from one day to the next. I kept up at work, I kept up at home, I did what Paul wanted to do in the evenings, and I tried not to think.
Now that I knew the truth, I could finally admit that my body was changing, and it became my priority to disguise those changes. Whereas I’d lost some weight in the beginning, my shape was all wrong. I wore elastic waistband pants and pretended I was cold so I had an excuse to wear sweaters and jackets even though I was an absolute furnace. When Paul tried to be intimate, I told him I was too tired; I couldn’t stand the thought of him touching my morphing body. I’d figured I was fifteen or sixteen weeks along. Would he believe that I’d only known for a week and a half?
Did
I
really believe that?
I was at work Thursday morning, verifying some client information online, and suddenly found myself on the Planned Parenthood website. I’d had a friend back in Virginia who’d had an abortion in high school. She’d insisted it wasn’t a real baby, not yet, but the explanation hadn’t worked for me, and I’d been horrified. For all the wild times I eventually had, I believed in the soul, and I believed that destroying a body that was meant to house a soul was a sin. But I stared at the company’s logo now, thirty years later, and reviewed the arguments she’d made. What if it wasn’t a baby? What if it were just cells that weren’t really anything at all?
I’d let so many matters of faith fall by the wayside. Why not this one? If I believed everything I’d been taught, I was already going to hell for having gotten pregnant out of wedlock at seventeen, marrying a non-Catholic, getting a divorce, and not going to church. So what was one more black mark on my record?
Then my eyes caught the picture on my desk. We’d taken it last summer when Stormy and I had visited December in Ohio. My daughters smiled back at me.
They’d both once been a cluster of cells.
Getting rid of this would solve everything.
Could I pretend not to believe what I believed?
Was forgiveness better than permission?
I looked at the picture of my girls again and closed the website.
I got back to work, taking on a few projects that Eric was falling behind on in order to keep myself sufficiently overwhelmed at the office. I avoided Amy as though I had a communicable disease. What would she do when she found out about this?
• • •
Christmas was a few weeks away, and Paul and I talked about getting a tree, but without Stormy at home, neither of us made time for the errand. I tried to shop but ended up going around and around the hallways of the mall without buying anything other than hand soap. Why on earth did I need hand soap? I’d decided not to talk to Paul until I felt prepared for his reaction, but I couldn’t imagine his reaction yet. Did that mean I didn’t trust my husband? Did I think he would leave me over this? Would
I
leave if he were the one holding the key that would unravel my carefully constructed expectations of what the rest of my life would be? I walked by a life-size nativity display and stared at the baby Jesus in the manger. After a few seconds I had to look away.
Why was this happening to me?
I gave up on shopping and decided to go home, but on my way toward the exit, I saw a bookstore and remembered that I hadn’t picked up next month’s book yet. I stopped in the middle of the mall, and a woman bumped into me, nearly knocking me over. I didn’t want to go into the bookstore and have to talk and smile at people. Autopilot could get me through only so many hours of the day. But then I remembered
Poisonwood Bible
and
My Name Is Asher Lev.
I’d been able to lose myself in both of those books. I would love to get lost again. So I went in, but I couldn’t remember the name of the author, just the title—
Silas Marner.
I asked an employee to help me find it and followed him through the stacks, ending up in the classics section. When he placed the book in my hands, I was disappointed to see how slender it was. I wouldn’t get lost for long. Still, I paid for it and continued my trek to my car. I got a text from Paul saying he was going to Charlie’s to work on the deck his brother was building. I was glad he’d be gone before I got home.
Paul knew something was wrong; I could tell by the way he looked at me too long. We lived in the same house, but I was avoiding him, and he knew it. Mason had come last weekend and that had been a good distraction for him. I pretended to have year-end stuff I needed to finish at the office so they could have time together.
I drove home, let myself into my empty house, and finished off the potato chips out of spite for the healthy diet I was supposed to be following. I kicked off my shoes and changed into my frumpy-comfy clothes. In the process of getting changed, I caught my reflection in the mirror again, in profile. There was a definite bump—a perfect curve where the pregnancy was taking over. I froze. For a second. Then I picked up my shoe and threw it at the mirror.
I didn’t want to
be
pregnant, and I certainly didn’t want to
look
pregnant. I stormed out of the bedroom and grabbed
Silas Marner
out of my purse, desperate for the escape. Paige had said it was a classic novel, so I hoped it was dark and more hopeless than my life was—like the Thomas Hardy novels we’d read in my English Literature class my sophomore year. I’d wanted happy endings for other books, but not this time. This time I wanted to read a tragedy that would make my life look a little brighter by comparison.
After settling onto the couch—I couldn’t read in the bedroom because the traitorous mirror was in there—I started reading. It took me a while to adjust to the classical writing, but it was a good story, and I enjoyed the beautiful language as the book progressed. It was about a miser who treasured his money above all else until it was stolen. Then, as he’s trying to find purpose again, a child enters his life. A child with bright golden hair. Stormy had had bright blonde hair when she was a baby. I kept reading, but then the story started to change. I watched the old man change with it. His longing for his money began to fade, and in its place the love for the child began to grow.
I felt my jaw clench as I tried to talk myself out of the suspicions creeping up my spine, but the parallels became stronger and stronger until I flattened the book against my chest and tried to breathe through the heated anger rising in my shoulders.
She would not do this to me,
I said in my mind.
Paige wouldn’t be so mean.
But within a few more pages, I was absolutely livid. I leaned forward on the couch, bracing my elbows on my knees and holding my head in my hands. When I opened my eyes, though, I was staring at my stomach, which looked absolutely huge. I heard my phone ding with a text message, and I practically ran into the kitchen, beside myself with rage that I knew was illogical but was there nonetheless. I snorted when I saw the text was from Paige.
I’m done with my copy of Silas Marner. Did you want to borrow it? How are you doing?
Oh, that girl! I stared at my purse, then looked back at the book I’d left on the living room floor.
Twenty minutes later, I pulled up to Paige’s apartment complex still as mad as I’d been when I stormed out to my car. When I got to door 425, I knocked loudly and waited, my fingers clenching the book.
I heard her footsteps as she got closer and I waited. I heard the knob twisting and I waited. She pulled the door open and had the audacity to smile when she saw me standing there.
“Daisy, did you respond to my text and I missed it? I’m so sorry.” She pulled the door open to have me enter, but I held up my copy of the book instead.
“I can’t believe you did this.”
Paige’s expression fell but she simply looked confused. “Um, I’m not sure—”
“I spent my whole childhood being preached to, Paige, and the last thing I need now is for people to pretend to be my friend simply to set me up for some kind of conversion.”
Paige looked over her shoulder, and then pulled the door mostly shut. “Daisy, what is your deal?”
“My
deal
is the fact that I trusted you with something that may prove to be the biggest trial I have ever faced, and you slapped me in the face with it. You are a stupid little girl who knows nothing about me or my life. The next time you want to make some kind of statement, do it on your own time.” I threw my book at her; she stepped out of the way, but it still hit her in the shoulder.
Good.
I turned on my heel and headed back toward the elevators. “Wait just a second!” I heard her say from behind me. I didn’t wait, and I didn’t turn around until I felt her hand on my arm. Then I turned sharply enough that she fell back a step, but my aggression didn’t shut her up.
“
What
are you so mad about?” Her voice wasn’t nearly as submissive as I had hoped it would be.
“Like you don’t know?” I lashed back, putting my hands on my hips. I was only a couple of inches taller than she was, and I suddenly wished I were six foot two.
“No, I don’t know. You’re making no sense.”
“You totally set me up, and I don’t appreciate it.”
“How on earth did I set you up?” Paige asked. She held up the book. “And what does
this
have to do with anything?”
“Oh, come
on,
” I said, rolling my eyes. “An old man whose greatest treasure becomes a child? Real stealthy, Paige. I don’t know how I
ever
figured it out.”
Paige paused for half a second, and then she laughed humorlessly. I was ready to punch her. “You think this book was directed to you?” She shook her head. “Oh, that’s a bit of a stretch, don’t you think?” She put her hand on her hip. “First of all, I chose the book before you took those tests. Second, it’s a classic piece of literature that has a great message for anyone who loves anyone else. It’s about
people,
Daisy, not your baby. And thirdly”—she paused and her eyes narrowed—“you’re being a real b . . . b . . . brat about this whole thing. You’re pregnant, you don’t feel ready for it, but it’s a
baby,
and you treat it like it’s a terminal disease. You need to grow up and—”
“You have no idea what you’re talking about; no idea what—”
“Oh, whatever,” Paige said. “You are out of your head, lady. If a little book unhinges you, you’re trying way too hard to find a scapegoat for your misery. Frankly, I’ve got too many of my own problems to deal with any of yours.” She threw the book at my feet, and I stared at it while the words she’d said replayed through my mind. I tried to grab onto the vapors of my rage as her words sank in, but they were fading too fast to sustain me.
Paige stared at me for another second before she turned and went back to her apartment. Her door opened, I heard snatches of canned laughter from the TV, and then her door snapped shut. I stood there for a few more seconds until the elevator dinged and I got on. I faced forward as the elevator closed with the book still in the hallway and took me back to the ground level. I went out to my car, slid into the driver’s seat, and sat there.
What was wrong with me?
I felt my chin trembling, and I leaned forward until my forehead rested on the steering wheel.
I was pregnant . . . no, I was going to have a
baby.
And Paige was right. I might be forty-six years old, but I needed to grow up and face this. I had lived most of my adult life trying to prove to the people around me that I had it all together. Yet here I was, keeping a secret that was tearing me apart. I had to tell Paul, I might need to see a therapist to help me figure out how to handle this, but what I couldn’t do was keep myself holed up in this shell I’d created. If I didn’t trust the people I loved enough to tell them what was happening, then what did that say about my relationships? And I’d chewed out Paige, the only friend I had in this situation.