The Atonement Child

  Gladys surveyed the gathering, heart drumming. On the surface, all looked grand and congenial. Gladys liked to “put on the Ritz” as she called it. Hailing from Queens, she said she was born to put on airs. True to form, she had brought out her best—the delicate bone china from Victoria, the silver tea service from London, and the crystal platters from Ireland. She was dressed in a pretty turquoise outfit that probably had never been out of doors.

  “I should’ve laced your coffee with Valium,” Gladys said sotto voce, standing over Evie with one of her plates of goodies. “You’ve got that pinched look.”

  “What do you expect? I’m facing the gallows.”

  “You underestimate your friends. We won’t desert you. Now have a tea cake.”

  “I’m not hungry.”

  “Have one anyway. It might sweeten that look on your face.”

  Evie took one just to shut her up.

  “And don’t you dare sneak out that door,” Gladys said in parting.

  Disgruntled, Evie ignored the remark and looked at her friends. She had known Virginia, Doris, and Marva as long as she had known Gladys McGill. Over the past eighteen years, they had all shared triumph and tragedy. Doris, the first to lose her husband, had served with Evie as church deaconess. Evie had been with Marva at the hospital when her husband died after open-heart surgery. Virginia Hart had coaxed Evie into taking over the presidency of the women’s auxiliary when her husband had been in the last stages of Parkinson’s disease. Gladys was the only one not a widow in deed. Her husband had Alzheimer’s.

  Over the past four years, every Sunday after church, Evie had met these women at one of the local eateries to share lunch, sorrow, and joy. They jokingly called themselves the Widows’ Brigade. In all seriousness, they had been through wars together—grieving over spouses who died, children who divorced, grandchildren on drugs, deaths of siblings, living alone, paring down households, and moving into “assisted-care retirement facilities.”

  She loved these women like family, and they loved her. Or had. Would they still feel the same when she was finished baring her heart and soul and confessing her sin? Even as close as she was to these women, she had withheld part of herself from them. She wanted them to know the best of her, not the worst. Never the worst. So she had kept some of her struggles secret, buried with the dead. Only Gladys knew the whole of it, and Evie wondered what sorry weakness in herself had made her spill the beans to even one soul under heaven.

  God, I wouldn’t be in this mess if I had kept my mouth shut!

  Gladys was looking at her, waiting.

  Evie looked back at her. I’m not ready.

  “Ladies,” Gladys said, drawing everyone’s attention. “I called you all here for a purpose. We have some trouble that needs addressing.”

  Evie felt the heat come up into her cheeks. She glared at Gladys, annoyed. Gladys looked back at her unintimidated, her expression clearly encouraging. The old coot was all but sending telepathic messages: I know all about you, Evie Daniels, and I love you anyway. Trust us.

  Evie was most worried about Virginia and how she would take the news. Virginia was a staunch advocate and financial supporter of a pro-life organization. In the beginning of her involvement, she had been lividly verbal about her revulsion of babies being killed. If anyone was going to throw stones, it would be her.

  “What’s happened?” Marva said, looking around the room for enlightenment.

  “Evie has something she needs to discuss with us,” Gladys said, and all eyes swung to her, pinning her back against the wing chair.

  Evie rolled her eyes heavenward and then looked around at Virginia, Doris, and Marva. “My granddaughter Dynah was raped, and she’s pregnant.”

  “Oh, my heavens,” Doris said, always the first to shed tears for others. She had reached the ripe old age of eighty-one and still had a difficult time believing people could do awful things to one another.

  “I swear,” Marva said, the one ready to do battle in any crisis, “our world is going to hell in a handbasket! Did they catch the man?”

  “No. Dynah couldn’t identify him.”

  “Why not?”

  “Because it was dark, Marva. Very dark. And she never saw his face.”

  Virginia remained silent, assessing Evie’s expression, seemingly not drawing any conclusions, making no remarks.

  “Since the rape and learning she’s pregnant, her fiancé has dumped her, and she was asked politely to withdraw from school. Things got even worse when she came home. Doug and Hannah both tried to pressure her into having an abortion. She ran away seven weeks ago. No one knew where she was. She called several times, just to let us know she was all right. A few days ago, she called to say she’s coming home.”

  “Poor girl,” Doris said.

  Evie looked at Gladys and then the others. “I want to go and get her and bring her up here to live with me so she can have that baby.”

  Virginia seemed to breathe again. She leaned back slightly and sipped her cappuccino.

  “Is that what Dynah wants?” Doris said.

  “That was the impression she gave Hannah, but as I see it, nothing’s changed. She’s walking right back into the same situation she faced when she left. Doug was dead set against Dynah’s having the baby. He despises the thought of it and is convinced Dynah will ruin her life by having it. And Hannah is so confused, she’ll go along with him.”

  “Maybe they’re right,” Doris said. “I mean, if any girl has a good reason for an abortion, it’s Dynah.” When the others fell silent, she looked around, her eyes fixing on Virginia. “Would you want to have the child of a rapist?”

  “I don’t think that’s the issue,” Virginia said quietly, a troubled expression in her eyes.

  “Maybe not, but I can certainly see Doug and Hannah’s point of view.”

  “So can I,” Virginia said, surprising everyone, “but adding abortion to rape won’t lessen Dynah’s trauma. It’ll add to it.”

  “You can’t get involved without alienating your daughter and son-in-law,” Marva said to Evie. “She’s their daughter. I’m sure they have her best interests at heart.”

  Best interests. Killing words. Anger stirred within Evie, an anger that had been sparked decades before.

  Here we go, like it or not.

  “Let me back up and explain why I feel so strongly about Dynah’s having this child,” she said. With a steadying breath, she told them her own story—every painful, shameful detail.

  No one said a word when she was finished. They all sat stunned, unsure what to say or do after such a confession. Virginia sat pale and still, eyes closed.

  Evie let out her breath slowly and drew it in again. “Frank had my best interests at heart, Marva, and so did that doctor. Or I’d like to think so. The problem is, I think I would’ve made it. But I didn’t take the risk. I gave in and let them take my child’s life, and there hasn’t been a week during the last forty-six years that I haven’t regretted it and wondered what my son might have grown up to be.”

  She leaned forward, setting the rattling cup and saucer on the coffee table. It was done. They knew everything about her. If they decided to stand in judgment, so be it. She looked at her friends, chin up slightly, waiting for the blow. It hurt to stand alone.

  “What about Frank?” Virginia said quietly. “Did he get over it?”

  “No.” She struggled against the tears building. “We agreed never to talk about it, and we didn’t. Then he mentioned it the week before he died. He looked at me and said he was sorry. So sorry. I knew what he meant.” Her hand trembled as she smoothed a wrinkle in her skirt. “I don’t want Dynah to live with the guilt and anguish I’ve lived with all these years. I don’t want her growing old with an abortion on her conscience.”

  Only Virginia looked her in the eyes, her own filling with tears as she did so. Evie searched for condemnation and saw none. The tight ball of fear in her stomach uncoiled, relaxed. She wasn’t forsaken after all. Oddly, it broke her
heart all the more. Had she met opposition, she could have been strong. Seeing compassion and love, she felt herself crumble inside as the walls of self-defense came down and grief and tears were free to rise.

  “Oh, Evie,” Virginia said softly. “It must hurt so much. I miscarried years ago, and there are still times when I feel guilty about it and wonder if I lost that child because of something I did or didn’t do.” Tears slipped down her cheeks. “I hurt for you. . . .”

  No one said anything for a long moment, but Evie felt only compassion in the room. Until this meeting, she hadn’t realized how afraid she’d been that her friends would turn away from her.

  “Tell them the rest,” Gladys said quietly.

  Sniffling into her Kleenex, Evie glowered at her. “The rest doesn’t matter.”

  “Oh, yes, it does. Tell them, or I will.”

  Evie pressed her lips together and glared at her, refusing to be bullied.

  “Evie has breast cancer.”

  “Oh, Evie!” Doris said. “Not you, too.” Her sister had succumbed to cancer the year before. “Has it metastasized?”

  “It’s gone into the sternum and spine,” Gladys said. “And there are a few hot spots in her right leg. She’s in pain, but she’s too stubborn to admit it.”

  “Aspirin takes care of it,” Evie said, embarrassed.

  “Aspirin, my foot,” Gladys muttered.

  Doris dug in her purse for a handkerchief.

  Pale, Virginia set her cup and saucer down carefully. “Howard told me once that there may be a connection between breast cancer and abortion. When a natural process like pregnancy is disrupted, it has long-term repercussions to the body. Some friends of his were doing research on it.”

  “Oh, dear! I’m sure that can’t be true,” Doris said. “I’ve never seen anything about that in any of the women’s magazines.” She subscribed to half a dozen and bought others in the supermarket.

  “I’ve read about it, too,” Evie said, struggling to keep her voice even. “Hormonal changes permanently alter the breast’s structure. And when a pregnancy is terminated through abortion, the process is interrupted, which leaves cells in a state of transition. And they say cells in this state have a very high risk of becoming cancerous. So the woman’s chances of developing breast cancer later in life may be greatly increased.”

  “Actually,” Virginia added, “I’m not surprised you haven’t read about it in the magazines, Doris. Howard and his colleagues had little success getting their results published, and funding was a never-ending problem. Can you believe they actually had to find private sources because the government didn’t seem to want to know the adverse effects of abortion on women?”

  “Well, good gracious, think about it,” Marva said. “What women’s magazine would even open the question? They wouldn’t dare for fear of the protest letters they’d receive.”

  “Why would women protest?” Doris said. “Young women are very astute these days. I’ve listened to my granddaughters talk. They want to know all the facts.”

  “Perhaps, but those selling abortion don’t want them to have them,” Virginia said heatedly. “Besides, the Supreme Court doesn’t agree with you. The judges seem to think we poor women would fall apart if we knew the facts, so they decided women don’t have the right to know the full truth.” She shook her head. “They’ve made it legal to withhold vital information, even when a woman requests it, for heaven’s sake.”

  “That doesn’t make sense!” Doris looked at the others wide-eyed.

  “It makes absolute sense when you’re trying to protect a billion-dollar business,” Marva responded firmly. “The less a woman knows about what’s being done to her body and what her baby looks like as it develops, the more likely she is to buy an abortion. When you’re told the fetus is nothing but tissue, a quick fix to a long-term problem seems appropriate.”

  “It sounds so—so cold,” Doris said.

  “It is cold, but they’d like you to think they’re acting out of mercy and compassion.” Virginia’s eyes snapped. “And do you know the argument used for withholding information? They say it spares the woman trauma. I wonder how those judges would feel if we told them the sad truth is that they betrayed the million and a half women each year who go into an abortion clinic and aren’t given the truth. It doesn’t take two minutes on an examining table for a girl to know that abortion is painful and destructive and it’ll have far-reaching effects on her life. Besides the emotional trauma of going through something so violent, there are the physical aspects, the aftereffects. Unfortunately, by the time she’s gone that far, it’s too late to change her mind.”

  “You sound as though you know firsthand,” Gladys said, casting Virginia a curious glance. “Have you had an abortion?”

  “No, but one of my granddaughters did. Tracy went to a reputable clinic. When they didn’t inform her of the risks, she didn’t think there were any. They told her it was a simple procedure. She believed them. Unfortunately, it wasn’t simple enough. The doctor didn’t get everything. He was probably rushed. She said the waiting room was full that day. All it takes is a tiny piece of the fetus left in the womb to cause serious infection and complications. And that’s what happened. Now she can’t have children.”

  Virginia looked at Evie, her eyes glinting with tears. “The awful part is that Tracy wanted that baby as much as you wanted yours, Evie, but her husband said no. It wasn’t health in her case; it was money. They’d made a budget early in their marriage, and Tom wanted to stick to it. He insisted they shouldn’t have a baby unless they could provide a proper home for it, and to him, that meant a house in the right neighborhood. He told her if she quit her job to have the baby, they wouldn’t have enough money to move out of their condo for another six months. Six months, for Lord’s sakes! Six months! They sacrificed their child for a budget.”

  “How are they doing now?” Evie asked with quiet compassion.

  “As the world sees it, I guess they’re fine. They bought a house, a nice big house with four bedrooms. It’s in a cul-de-sac in a very nice neighborhood. It has a big backyard. There’s even a swing set left from the previous owners. There’s a paseo at the end of the block so children can walk to school without ever crossing a street. A school is less than three blocks away, and there’s a nice park. Everything was all carefully planned. The perfect setting for an all-American family. Unfortunately, that plan has blown up in their faces.” She shook her head, her mouth trembling. “They’re two very unhappy people. It breaks my heart.”

  No one said anything for a long moment.

  “It reminds me of what we were reading about in Bible study on Wednesday,” Marva said, holding her coffee cup between both hands. “When the Israelites turned away from God, they sacrificed their children to the god Molech. Remember what Pastor said? The babies were laid in the arms of that stone god so they’d roll down into the fire.”

  “What an awful thought,” Doris said, shuddering.

  “And children were sacrificed on the walls of the city because the people thought it would help them win a war,” Gladys said, her horror clear in her voice.

  “Pastor said people in Ephesus buried babies in the foundations of their homes in hopes of having good luck,” Marva said. “Can you imagine believing a dead child can bring prosperity?”

  “It’s easy to believe when you base your happiness on money and material possessions,” Virginia said flatly. “It does cost money to have a baby. It costs money to raise children. Money. All anyone seems to think about these days is money. I would’ve given them the money to buy that house. So would my son. Tom was too proud to ask. He wanted them to do it all by themselves. He wouldn’t bend his timetable by even six months. And now they’re going to live the rest of their lives in a big empty house.”

  “‘Children are a gift from the Lord,’” Gladys recited quietly, “‘they are a reward from him. Children born to a young man are like sharp arrows in a warrior’s hands. How happy is the man whose
quiver is full of them!’”

  “This generation seems to see children as a financial burden and responsibility to be avoided,” Marva said. “My granddaughter just got her master’s degree in business. She and her husband have no plans to have children at all.”

  “I remember my son going through a period when he said he didn’t want to bring children into such an awful world,” Evie said. “I told him people who cared that much about children should be the ones having them.”

  Virginia’s face crumpled. “It makes me so angry!” She drew a ragged breath, tears coming. She pressed her hand over her heart. “I miss my great-grandchild. I know that doesn’t make much sense, but I do. I ache for that baby, and I ache for my son and daughter-in-law, and I ache for Tom and Tracy because we’re all living with the loss, Tom and Tracy most of all.”

  She looked at Evie, her eyes brimming with tears. “They always wanted children. I remember them talking about it at family gatherings when they were just newlyweds. They looked forward to the day they would begin having babies. They even had names picked out. I wish I knew how they got so caught up in the foolish notion that all the circumstances had to be perfect before they could have them.”

  Evie felt her anguish and couldn’t speak.

  Gladys sat down beside Virginia and laid her hand gently on hers. “That’s why you became so involved in the pro-life group, isn’t it?”

  She took a deep breath, calming herself. “Yes, initially, but I’m going to withdraw my support.”

  “Why?” Doris said, surprised. “It’s a good cause.”

  “Yes, it is, but this group’s focus is so fixed on saving the child, they have no compassion whatsoever for the mother thinking about having an abortion.” She fixed her gaze on Evie again. “You’ll have to be very careful about that.”

  “I love Dynah. I want what’s best for her.”

  “I’m sure you do, Evie. Just be sure you’re not interfering in order to atone for the child you aborted.”

  That was direct. And painful. Yet, Evie saw Virginia hadn’t meant to sting with cruel words but make her think about her motivations.