“Did you take care of it?” he had said.
“I tried.”
“Did you invite your mother?”
“Sort of.”
He gave her a narrow-eyed look that said he didn’t believe her. A muscle jerked in his jaw, and he rose, stepped past her, and went upstairs with his briefcase.
From the look of him now, she figured he hadn’t removed his armor.
Choruses of bitter voices jabbered in her head, dredging up the hurts from the past. Every hurtful word he’d ever spoken was played again, fast-forward. Self-pity filled her, bringing along with it a boiling anger that steamed away love, patience, gentleness. Self-restraint hung by a thread.
They sat down at the dining room table together and ate the spicy meat loaf, mashed potatoes, and carrots Hannah had fixed. Doug liked things hot. She watched him douse his meat loaf with Tabasco sauce and felt her temperature rising. He hadn’t even bothered to taste the meal before he doctored it up.
Evie was saddened by what she saw happening between Hannah and Doug. She remembered their being like this in the early years of their marriage. Stony silences. Tension. She used to wonder if it was her and Frank who weren’t welcome. It wasn’t until later, when Hannah told her the whole story about Jerry, that she began to understand what was tearing at her daughter’s marriage.
Well, she had her own secrets. Maybe unveiling them would help these two come to terms with their past—and their future. . . .
Or was she just going to be opening Pandora’s box?
Doug finished quickly and excused himself. Hannah fumed as she heard the television go on again. A boxing match this time. A suitably violent sport. Too bad hockey wasn’t on tonight. Or he could pull out one of those god-awful war movies he loved to watch so much. He said they were cathartic. What was so cathartic about seeing blood and mayhem?
She stacked the dishes noisily and carried them into the kitchen. “I can handle it, Mom. Go sit down and relax.”
Evie itched to do something, anything. So she picked up a sponge and went back in to wipe the table, rearrange the flowers in the center, and push all the chairs into place.
They all sat in the family room together, separate islands with their own hurricanes. Doug stared at the television. Hannah sat fidgeting. Evie dug into her travel sewing basket and pulled out a pillowcase she was embroidering. A Christmas present for someone.
No one talked about what was on their minds. The issue could have been a pink elephant in the middle of the room, trumpeting and leaving scat about, and they would pretend they didn’t notice. They’d tiptoe around it and try not to arouse it.
“We need to talk,” Hannah said finally.
Doug stared at her. “We talked already.”
“We haven’t talked at all.”
He glanced pointedly at Evie.
“Mom knows everything.”
“I should’ve guessed. No insult to you, Evie, but this is our business.”
Evie anchored the needle and lowered the project to her lap.
Hannah grimaced, feeling the tension mounting in the room. Pompeii must have felt like this just before Vesuvius erupted. No matter what she said, Doug was going to blow. Better she take the blast than her mother.
“We have to talk about it.”
His gaze turned on her. “What more is there to say?”
She let out her breath. It was just like him to dump the whole thing in her lap. Fix it, Hannah. Don’t bother me with it. “I spoke with a doctor today.” She didn’t dare tell him she knew Jim Wyatt from college days. Doug would make all kinds of assumptions. He’d probably think she’d slept with him, too. “He said he can admit Dynah to General and do the procedure there. She’d stay overnight for observation.”
“When?”
“Tomorrow afternoon.”
“So, it’s settled. What do you want from me?”
She began to shake. She wanted to scream at him and pound on him. Instead, she clung to her self-control. “Dynah has to say yes. I can’t drag her there.”
He looked at her then, eyes fiery. “I didn’t say drag her, did I? Did I ever say that? No. I told you to help her through this.”
“Meaning it’s up to me to convince her.”
“You know more about it than I do.”
Oh, God, here we go again.
Doug turned his head away, staring at the television.
Hannah sat silent, wallowing in her pain, filling her cup with resentment. Sometimes she almost hated him.
Evie looked between them and wanted to weep. She wondered if she was somehow to blame, planting that tiny seed all those years ago, never guessing the consequences in generations to come. She had thought Hannah was too young to know anything, but maybe she’d absorbed it somehow, taken it into herself, and kept the sorrow growing.
She dumped her handwork heedlessly in her travel basket, quietly got up, walked across the room, and turned the television off.
“Mother!”
“What’re you doing?” Doug said, furious.
She didn’t mind being the target. Better they were united against her than fighting one another. “Don’t let Dynah have an abortion,” she said simply, ready to do battle.
“Mother,” Hannah said, sure she would launch into a diatribe about the unborn.
Evie saw Doug’s eyes narrow and the muscle in his jaw jump. “Please hear me out,” she said and returned to her seat. She strove to stay calm though she wanted to burst out loud and say she was older and wiser and knew more than both of them put together.
“Dynah’s situation has nothing to do with how you or anyone else thinks,” Doug said pointedly, eyes fierce.
“You know how I feel about the issue, Doug, but you don’t know why.”
“It doesn’t matter.”
“She’s my granddaughter, and I love her.”
“She’s my daughter, and you think I don’t?”
“I know you love her. You love her more than your own life. All I ask is that you hear me out.” She sat forward, her hands clasped tightly in her lap, and bowed her head. This was going to be harder than she expected. “I’ve carried this around in my heart for years, and now it seems I have to tell you whether I want to or not.”
Doug looked from her to Hannah and clenched his teeth. He was struggling to maintain control—that much was clear. He let out his breath, as though loosening his muscles through an act of will.
Good. At least he was trying. Evie knew her son-in-law admired her spunk, but she also knew that didn’t mean her opinion mattered on whether Dynah should have an abortion or not. She was fairly sure Doug thought he knew what she was going to say. He was well aware she belonged to a fundamentalist church. Her Bible was sitting beside the swivel rocker right now, looking frayed and ragged around the edges, half a dozen ribbons sticking out of it—which he probably figured marked all the suitable passages for the upcoming sermon he expected. But the last thing she was going to do was preach.
After the first few years Doug and her daughter had been married, she had learned to stay out of their affairs. It had been harder for Frank, a retired executive who was used to running the show. Evie was aware that distance and poor health had saved Doug from having to tell his father-in-law to back off. She was sure it hadn’t been easy for Doug and that it probably hurt knowing it had taken fifteen years to convince Frank he was sticking with Hannah through the long haul. Another residue from the past. Frank had seen his daughter hurt before and hadn’t wanted to see it happen again.
Noting Doug’s closed expression, she wondered if he would hear a word she said. Whatever the case, she had to take the risk. “Before Frank and I were married, I had tuberculosis.”
“We know that, Mom—”
“And I relapsed after you were born,” Evie went on, seeing she was going to have to plow ahead and override Hannah’s desire to avoid the uncomfortable and Doug’s antipathy to the truth. “The doctor wanted me to go into a sanatorium, but Frank insisted I
remain home. He wanted me close, and I wanted that more than anything, too. You were three, Hannah, your brother six, and I didn’t want to be away from you for months on end.
“Your father had a hospital bed brought in. We didn’t let you come into the bedroom. Granny would hold you in her arms at the door, and you’d say good morning and good night to me. Sometimes we’d let you sit in a chair in the doorway so we could talk. You broke my heart, Hannah. You’d ask me over and over why you couldn’t come in and cuddle with me that way you used to do. You didn’t understand what TB or infection meant.” She looked at her grown daughter, knowing she had felt rejected despite the reassurances. “It was so hard not to hold you and kiss you.”
Her throat closed, remembering how much it had hurt to turn her children away. Even knowing her own mother was there to scoop them up and nurture them hadn’t eased the pain of those months of separation. And what damage had it done in the years following?
She knew she was digressing. She could see by Hannah’s and Doug’s expressions that they had no idea where she was going with all this. She had to gather her wits and courage.
Oh, Lord, help me!
She thought she knew how she would say it. Hadn’t she planned every word on the long drive south from Oregon? Now that the time had come, she couldn’t remember a single word of the speech she had prepared.
She took a deep breath and let it out slowly. “I became pregnant.”
“Daddy told me,” Hannah said, wanting to spare her mother, afraid of where all this was going and what Doug’s response would be.
Evie struggled past the tears that threatened. Odd how time never healed some wounds. “Yes, I remember. On the night of your first miscarriage, your dad told you we’d lost one, too. He told you that because he wanted you both to know we understood and grieved with you. But the thing is—” Evie said, looking from Hannah to Doug—“I didn’t miscarry. I had a therapeutic abortion.”
Doug stared at her, clearly stunned; the look on her daughter’s face was indecipherable.
Evie rushed to fill the shocked silence, wanting to get it all said and done. “You see, the doctor told your father I wouldn’t survive another child. Frank believed him. I told him I was well enough to carry the baby to term, but I couldn’t convince him. He was afraid my health would decline and he’d end up a widower rearing three small children by himself. He said he didn’t want to risk losing me. God forgive me, I went along with his decision. I allowed the doctor to admit me to the hospital, cosigned the papers with your father, and went through with it.”
She looked at Hannah through her tears. “I was five months along. The baby was a boy. Your brother would be forty-six had he lived.”
Doug stared at her, then shook his head. “You did what you had to do, Evie. Frank was right.”
“No, he wasn’t, Doug. And worse, he knew it, though he never said so aloud. It might have helped both of us to talk about it. All the years we were together, we never spoke of it. I was angry and hurt for several years afterward, and he just wanted to forget. For a while, I didn’t know if we’d stay married. You’ll remember that time, Hannah. You were about six when things leveled off. Granny moved home, and we sold that house and started building another. Gradually, we buried thoughts of what we had done and went on with our lives.”
Evie watched Doug glance at Hannah to see how she was taking this new information. She was pale, her eyes glistening with tears.
“Some things can’t be buried, no matter how hard or how long you try.” She looked at Doug. “Frank spoke of it before he died. He never got over it any more than I did.” She broke off, fighting the tears that threatened to overcome her.
Hannah couldn’t utter a word, her throat hot and tight.
It was a moment before Evie could continue to speak. “You prayed for Dynah to be born, and God gave her to you. You have both raised her up before the Lord. You know her tender heart as well as I. Do you honestly think she could have an abortion and not suffer for it for the rest of her life?
Doug clenched his hands. “She’s strong.”
“She’ll be broken.”
“She’s already been broken! She’ll be broken even more if she goes on with this. She doesn’t even know what the man looked like, for God’s sake.”
“And you think to undo one act of violence upon her with another?”
He didn’t speak for a moment, again clearly striving to control his temper. “It won’t be that way. We’ll make sure. It’ll be legal and safe.”
Hannah flinched inwardly, feeling the darts.
Evie felt the anger coming up inside her and smothered the flame with cold reason. “My abortion was legal. It was safe. It was performed in a hospital by a medical doctor with several nurses in attendance. And I will tell you this, Douglas. It was an act of violation and violence upon me such as I will never forget. And I’m a lot harder and stronger than Dynah.”
“You think giving birth to a rapist’s child isn’t going to cause worse trauma?”
“Childbirth is natural.”
“Natural! The child she’s carrying is anything but natural.”
“So your answer is to sacrifice the child for what the father did?”
Doug’s blazing eyes met hers. “I don’t give a rat’s scat about the child! And I’m not getting into a philosophical or theological discussion with you. It’s decided. She’s going to have an abortion, and that’s the way it’s going to be. We’re not going to let our daughter ruin her life by having some crack baby. And that’s all there is to it!”
Evie looked at her daughter, appealing for an ally.
“Doug . . . ,” Hannah said.
He glared at her, and Evie saw he felt betrayed. “I said no. You took her to the clinic today. Why didn’t you get it done then instead of dragging this thing out longer?”
“Because she couldn’t decide if that’s what she wanted or not!”
“You should have helped her! You should have made it easy for her! You’ve been through it.”
“And she’s still not over it,” Evie said, furious that after all these years he dared throw that in Hannah’s face again. “Don’t you get it yet? What does it take to make you understand?” Would he never be man enough to forgive her? Hannah had been a good wife, faithful and loving. How long did she have to do penance for a sin committed before she knew Douglas Carey existed?
Doug turned his growing fury toward her. “Stay out of this! It’s none of your business!”
“I’m making it my business! Dynah’s my granddaughter, and I’ve a mind to go upstairs right now, pack her things, and get her out of this house!”
He half rose from his chair. “You can pack. And you can get out. But you’re not taking my daughter.”
“Stop it!” Pale and rigid, Hannah made fists against her temples. “Just stop it. Both of you!” Hunching forward, she wept.
Dynah sat on the stairs, her head pressed against her knees, listening to the people she loved most in the world tearing one another apart.
Over her.
She hadn’t known about her mother. Now that she did, she felt doubly forsaken. How could her mother take her hand and encourage her to have an abortion when she had suffered so?
They were quieter now, having already ripped open their most vulnerable spots. Dynah could hear their voices, still tense and angry, though more restrained. Probably worried they would awaken her.
Oh, God, I never wanted this to happen!
She could hear her father dictating what she should do, her grandmother arguing with him, her mother, usually the peacemaker, lashing out at both of them in her own pain.
Dynah raised her head, tears streaming down her cheeks. She couldn’t stay here. If she did, she would come between all of them. Anything she did would hurt someone. If she aborted the child, her grandmother would be hurt. If she didn’t, her father would cast her out. In either case, her mother would suffer, caught between the two, confused and full of anguish.
/>
God, what do I do? Do I buy another bottle of pills? Do I jump off the Golden Gate Bridge?
She thought of Joe. “I wouldn’t get over it. Not ever.” She could see his face, intent, sincere.
Her parents wouldn’t get over it either. Or her grandmother. No matter how miserable she was, she couldn’t take the easy way out. She loved them too much.
So, what else is there, Lord? What do I do?
A whisper came, a Scripture she’d learned long ago drifting into her mind: “‘Come out from them and be separate,’ says the Lord.”
As the angry voices droned below her, she knew she had to leave, even if she didn’t know where to go and how to get by. Come out from them and be separate.
She had to get out of here.
True to his word, Joe Guilierno was on the doorstep early in the afternoon of June 15. It was Saturday.
His heart thumped crazily as he rang the doorbell. He heard someone approaching and took a deep breath, hoping it would be Dynah. It wasn’t. When the door opened, he faced Dynah’s mother. It was easy to tell, they looked so much alike.
“Hello, Mrs. Carey, I’m Joe. Joe Guilierno. A friend of Dynah’s. She’s expecting me.”
Hannah was surprised by his appearance. She remembered Dynah speaking of him. “He’s nothing like Ethan, Mom. He’s just a nice guy.”
Hannah had to agree Joe Guilierno wasn’t anything like Ethan. He was taller, broader, darker, rougher. He didn’t wear slacks, a button-down shirt, coordinated tie and sports jacket, or have a neat haircut. He was wearing faded Levi’s, a white T-shirt, and a black leather jacket. His hair was curling over his collar. She wondered vaguely how he’d gotten away with that at NLC. He smiled slightly, as though he knew what she was thinking, and she blushed. “I’m sorry.” So this was the young man who sent a letter a week. The envelopes were stacked on Dynah’s bedside table, unopened. “Won’t you come in, Joe?”
“How is she?” he said, stepping into the foyer and glancing up the stairs, hoping to see Dynah.