Raising Hope (29 page)

I can’t bear my own feelings anymore; I can’t bear any of this. I finally make myself stop breaking apart the damn scone on my plate and stand up. “We need to go down to the diner right now to find out what’s going on.”

Jack pushes back his chair and says grimly, “I think that’s a good idea. She’s too independent—to a fault. She may need us more than ever.”

He offers me his arm as we walk around front to his car, and I think it’s the nicest thing. Ruth’s lucky to have him, and I’ll make her see that she needs us both right now.

And I need her! My shoulders shake as I realize how much I need her, how much she’s taught me, how much a part of me she’s become since we started raising Hope together.

I had never set foot in the Tellers’ house until the day I followed Ruth home after our meeting at Dick Dawes’s office. I looked around closely, trying to picture Bobby growing up here, eating at the rectangular table and sitting on the blue corduroy sofa where Ruth directed me to sit.

“This is lovely,” I trilled, hearing my mother’s voice come out of my mouth. It wasn’t lovely at all, of course. The rooms were low-ceilinged, small squares, the furniture was worn and mismatched, and the carpets were cheap remnants. Not to digress, but a good carpet can do wonders for a room. “It’s quite charming, Ruth.”

I waited for the appropriate response. “Thank you, Sara Lynn” would have done just fine. Instead, she shook her head as if she were trying to get a mosquito out of her ear. “No, it’s not,” she said, holding the baby close and jutting out her pointy Teller chin. Bobby had looked at me with the same expression that snowy day when I’d told him I couldn’t see him anymore.

“Well . . .” I whipped out a pad and pen from my purse, busying myself to stop thinking about Bobby. “Let’s get some details sorted out.”

“Don’t you even want to know her name?”

“Hmm?” I blushed. Why hadn’t I thought to ask that? “Of course I want to know. Why don’t I hold her and you tell me everything about her.”

Ruth hesitated before placing the baby into my arms. “Her name is Hope. You know Sandra died having her?”

I nodded as I cooed at the baby. Everyone knew everyone else’s tragedies in town.

“And you know that’s why Bobby took off.”

I didn’t nod this time, because everything in me resisted believing that Bobby had left because of Sandra’s death. It was ridiculous, I knew, but I didn’t want to believe he could hurt that badly over anyone but me. It had stung deeply that he’d found someone so quickly after we broke up, that he had completely moved on from me by the time I was ready to tell him I was sorry, that I wanted him back. It hurt even now, looking at his baby. His baby he’d had with a woman who wasn’t me.

“Hope’s a good baby. She’s not too fussy. She likes to be fed every three hours or so, and she’s pretty quiet when she’s not hungry.” Ruth shrugged, as if she didn’t have anything more to say. “She’s a good baby,” she repeated.

“I can see that,” I said, although I was speaking with no authority whatsoever, never having cared for a baby in my life.

“That’s all I know about Hope,” Ruth said. “The sum total.”

I continued to coo softly at Hope, and Ruth shifted in her seat. “I suppose we should figure out how we’re going to do this together,” she said.

“Yes,” I said. “Yes.” I handed Hope back to Ruth and picked up my pad and pen. “First thing is where she should live.”

Ruth scowled. “That’s easy. Right here.”

“Hmmm,” I said, buying myself some time. That wouldn’t do. If Hope lived at Ruth’s house, I’d never see her. I had Mama to contend with and my job at the magazine. I couldn’t be driving over here and back every day. Besides, it wasn’t as if I felt particularly welcomed in this house. “I don’t know. I’m so busy with my mother and my job that I’d never see her if she lived here.”

Ruth jiggled Hope in her arms and snapped, “Well, what about me? God! This is just like you, Sara Lynn. Always thinking about what would be best for you.”

“Just like me?” I laughed in a hard way. “You don’t even know me.”

“I know enough,” she muttered.

“Like what?” My heart was pounding. I wondered what Bobby had told her.

“I was in the same class with you all through school. I listened to enough teachers—my own mother, for God’s sake—talk about how wonderful you are. You don’t have me fooled, though. You’re nothing but a spoiled little brat.”

She was jealous, I thought, closing myself to her words. Jealous because I was pretty and smart and rich and she was none of those things. What could Bobby have been thinking, throwing me together with his bad-tempered sister who hated me? I took a deep breath and tried a different argument. “Hope will have more advantages living with me. I’ll be able to give her nice clothes, ballet lessons, trips, anything she wants.” Every minute I stared at that baby in Ruth’s lap, I wanted her more.

Ruth snorted. “It’s just money. Might turn some people’s heads, but not mine.”

“Our house is bigger. There’s more room for her to play.”

Ruth was silent, and I thought I had her. I was ready to leap across the scuffed-up coffee table, grab Hope from Ruth’s arms, and drive her home.

“I’m not living apart from her, Sara Lynn,” Ruth said. “I think you’re a bitch, but I’d sooner have you move in here and live with Hope and me before I’d just hand her over to you.” She paused, then asked, “Why do you want her so much, anyway? She doesn’t have any of your genes. She doesn’t have anything to do with you.”

But she did; of course she did. She had everything to do with me because she was part of Bobby. I deeply regretted having broken things off with him—it had been a decision made purely out of fear. This was a chance to . . . to heal, I suppose. I felt as if Bobby were reaching out a hand to me in the guise of his daughter; and I wanted to take it, hold it, and never let it go.

“Well?” Ruth asked. “Do you or don’t you want to come and live with me and Hope? That’s my final offer, the best I can do.”

Who did she think she was—talking about final offers and what she could and couldn’t do? “I can take you to court, you know,” I said.

She laughed. “Your lawyer bullshit doesn’t scare me. You quit your big-time lawyering job. You didn’t have the teeth for it.”

What had Bobby told her? I smiled through my gritted teeth to prevent her from seeing she’d gotten to me. “Suit yourself,” I replied, tossing my hair. “I may have quit practicing law, but I still have the training.”

Hope started to wail, and Ruth jiggled her, saying, “See what you’ve done? You’ve upset her.”

“Oh, that’s lovely,” I scoffed. “Blame me instead of your own stubborn self.”

She strode to the kitchen, where she tried to hold a still screaming Hope and prepare a bottle.

“Here . . .” I followed her and held out my arms. “I’ll take her and you get the bottle.”

“I’m not the maid around here,” she snapped at me over Hope’s howls. She shoved the bottle into my hand. “Why don’t you get the bottle and I’ll keep a hold of my own niece?”

I looked dumbly at the bottle I was holding. “I don’t know how to do it.”

“Good God,” she said, placing Hope into my arms and snatching back the bottle.

“Well, there’s no reason on earth I should know how to do it,” I argued. I hated that Ruth Teller knew how to do something I didn’t.

“Stop talking to me and start walking her,” Ruth hollered over Hope’s rising screams. “She likes to be walked.”

“Okay,” I said meekly, scared by Hope’s cries into listening to Ruth. I started to walk her and jiggle her a little bit.

“She’s not stopping crying, Ruth.” My arms tightened around Hope as I willed her to please, please stop crying. “It’s okay; it’s okay,” I murmured frantically.

Ruth came over with the bottle and shook her head. She shoved the bottle into my hand, saying, “Now, I know you haven’t done this before, but sit down over here and I’ll talk you through it.”

Ruth sat me in a kitchen chair and positioned Hope’s little head so she was poised to take her bottle. She guided my hand so the angle was right, and pretty soon Hope was quietly sucking away.

“Oh, my gosh, she’s doing it!” I looked down at Hope’s little face, her rosebud lips sucking away, and she snuggled into my arms. “Thank you, Ruth,” I said humbly. “Thank you for showing me what to do.”

“Well,” she said gruffly, pulling out the chair next to mine and sitting down, “I don’t think we’ll need to go to court to settle our differences if we only work together.”

It was an olive branch she was offering, and I took it gratefully. “Yes . . . I agree. I agree that we should work together to do right by this child.”

Hope fell asleep in my arms, and I handed her awkwardly back to Ruth, who put her in the car seat. “No crib,” she said, shrugging.

“I’ll buy her one today,” I told her. I had tons of money, more than I needed, anyhow, and I was going to buy Hope the prettiest and best crib a baby could have.

We watched her sleep, the blue veins on her little eyelids visible. She stirred a bit, putting her hand to her mouth, and we held our breath in tandem, breathing again only when it was clear she wasn’t going to wake. I glanced at my watch, the Cartier my father had given me when I graduated from law school, and I thought of him with a quick tightening of my throat. Had he looked at me like this when I was a baby? He and Mama?

“I’ve got to go,” I whispered. “Mama will be wondering where I am.”

“Okay,” she said. “We’ll talk more later about what arrangements to make.” She walked me to the door and nodded to me curtly, as if I were a traveling salesman who had come by to sell her an encyclopedia she didn’t need. But something had opened between us, and when I looked at her and said, “Good-bye, Ruth,” she grunted and smiled a little as she said, “Bye, Sara Lynn.”

“Ready?” Jack says grimly. He doesn’t wait for an answer, just pulls open the door and nods at me to go ahead of him. I see Ruth right away, waiting on the Dolan brothers, wisecracking with them. She sees me and then Jack right behind me, and she rushes over to us, her face twisted in torment.

“Oh Jesus, what’s wrong?” she says. She’s looking from one of us to the other, and it’s my face she fixes on when she says, “It’s Hope, isn’t it. Tell me—”

“No, angel, no,” says Jack, putting an arm around her. “Hope’s fine. This is about you.”

“Good Christ.” She leans her head against Jack’s chest in relief, then immediately pushes him away. “What is this—an intervention?” she hisses. “And what the hell is she doing here?” She jerks her head at me. That’s Ruth—the more frightened she is, the tougher she acts.

“Ruth,” I say, putting a hand on her shoulder, “we need to talk.”

“I’m busy here.” She shrugs my hand away and narrows her eyes at Jack. “I don’t have time to talk.”

“Yeah, you do.” He walks over to the door, puts up the
CLOSED
sign, and then walks back toward the kitchen.

“What the hell is going on?” Ruth demands of me when Jack disappears behind the swinging door.

“Honey, everything’s going to be all right,” I tell her, hardly trusting myself to speak without crying.

“‘Honey’?” She puts her hands on her hips. “Since when do you call me ‘honey’?” She stomps back to the Dolan brothers, snapping over her shoulder, “Jesus, I feel like I’m on a bad acid trip.”

Jack comes back from the kitchen and motions for me to join him at the Dolan brothers’ booth. “Chet’ll take care of you guys,” he tells them. “We need to talk to Ruth a second.”

“Sure, sure,” they say, “not a problem.” But their eyes look worried as Jack takes Ruth’s arm and steers her along through the kitchen and out the back door, with me following behind.

“What the hell!” Ruth says once the door is closed and we’re in the back lot of the restaurant by the big green Dumpster. “I’m trying to work!”

“Ruth,” I say, “we have to know something.”

“What?” she asks, tapping her foot on the pavement. “Spit it out, Sara Lynn.”

Tears well up in my eyes and I shake my head, looking at Jack. He’s got to say it, because I can’t. I’ll fall at her feet crying if I open my mouth, begging her not to leave us.

“Sara Lynn says you’re not feeling well,” Jack says. His eyes are moist, too. “We’re worried you’re shutting us out.”

“Shutting you out of what?” Ruth says, narrowing her eyes and sticking out her chin.

“Angel, are you sick?” Jack pleads. “If you’re sick, you have to tell me. I can’t stand it if you won’t let me be with you. I want to take care of you. I want you to be as comfortable and happy as you can be.”

Ruth looks from one to the other of us as though we’ve lost our minds, and then she bursts out laughing. “Oh Jesus, you think I’m dying or something, don’t you. Ha, ha, ha . . .” She’s laughing away, bending over, holding her stomach and howling.

Well, this is simply the limit—having a laughing fit when all our lives are falling apart here. “I don’t think this is at all funny, Ruth,” I say, restraining myself from reaching over and shaking her.

“Oh God . . .” She wipes her eyes and chuckles again. “This is the best laugh I’ve had in weeks.”

“Are you sick?” Jack asks insistently, putting his hands on her shoulders and looking her in the eyes.

“No, no.” Ruth waves her hands in the air and laughs again. “Jesus, no.”

I practically sink to the ground, I’m so relieved, and poor Jack lets out a sob and hugs her close to him, kissing her hair and saying, “I couldn’t stand to lose you, angel. You don’t know how scared I was when Sara Lynn told me you were sick. You’re everything to me. Oh God, Ruth.”

I expect Ruth to tell him to get a grip, that of course she’s fine, but of all things, her shoulders shake and she starts crying in his arms. “There’s still something you don’t know,” she wails. “Something I don’t want to tell you.”

“Tell me anything, sweetheart.” Jack pulls away from her and wipes his eyes on his sleeve. “Tell me anything. As long as you’re not sick, I don’t care.”

She gets real quiet and looks down at her feet as she half whispers, “I’m pregnant.”

Well, if I were Mama, I’d faint. That’s how many surprises I’ve had to endure today.

“Pregnant?” Jack asks, the start of a smile playing around his lips. “You’re pregnant?” He hugs her again and lifts her off the ground. “We’re having a baby!”