"I guess I'll take you home then," he said. "We'll work out the details of all of this later."
"No," I said. "I want to do this now. Tonight. If you want to marry me, then marry me tonight."
"But there's no time to plan anything. You'll want to call someone, your family. You'll want to get a dress to wear."
"I don't need a wedding," I said. "I need to get married. I don't care about anything else."
Son sat down beside me. He thought it over. "I know there's a justice in Owensboro. If we called him now he might stay open for us."
"Then call," I said.
Son spent a couple of minutes on the phone and then came back. "He said he'd wait for us."
"Good." I got up and Son brought me his coat. "Do you have one?" I asked.
"Sure," he said, "I've got something in the back."
We walked out to his truck and climbed inside. My shoes were soaking wet and cold. "I'll drive you over to the hotel so you can change," he said.
"I don't want to change." I didn't want the time to stop or think. I just wanted to go.
"You're going to get married in my clothes?"
"It looks that way."
So we headed toward Owensboro. The road was covered with snow, but it didn't seem to bother Son. He was a little worried, happy about the way things were turning out, but took my clothes and lack of desire to plan as troubling signs.
"We can get a bigger place in town," he said.
"Later, maybe. Your place is fine with me for now. The baby won't need her own room for a while."
"Her?"
"Sister Evangeline told me. It's going to be a girl."
Son smiled. "A girl," he said. "That's something, all right." He looked at me for a second, me or my stomach, it was hard to tell. "I'd like to give her my last name, if that suits you."
"That would be nice," I said, and then thought about it for a minute. "What is your name, Son?"
"Abbott," he said. "Wilson Abbott."
"Wilson," I said, and nodded.
"You don't have to tell me about the father. That's your own business. As far as I'm concerned, we start from right now, right this minute. Whatever's in the past belongs to you. Private."
"I'd like that."
"So if you want, this baby can be yours and mine, you know, as far as she's concerned. I think that would be easier on a kid than knowing the truth."
"I think so."
"I've always wanted a baby, Rose. I'll be a good father."
"I know," I said. "That's why we're doing this." I should have been kinder to him. He was changing his life for me, some woman he really didn't know at all, but I couldn't seem to bring a kind word out of my mouth. I wanted him to know what this was all about for me, so that if he wanted to change his mind he could. I didn't want to think I was tricking him in any way.
The driving was slow because the roads were still bad, even where the plows had come through. I hardly ever got out at night. I thought about going to the movies as a teenager, out to dinner. I was getting married. I tried to remember something about my first wedding, but I couldn't, not even the dress I wore.
We weren't in Owensboro until seven. The judge told us he was just about to give up. "I've got a family," he said. "I can't be waiting around on folks all night."
When I took off Son's coat he stared at my stomach and then at Son. "So that's all the rush," he said. "Looks like you coulda got here a mite quicker."
"We just want to get married," Son said.
"Have to is more like it from where I'm standing." He was a man in his fifties who wore a dark suit and red tie. He was so happy to see scandal, so pleased for a little diversion. "Most times we see a girl like that she's got her papa holding a shotgun on some poor boy. But you're no boy, mister. You could be this girl's daddy yourself."
Son put his hand on the man's shoulder. The hand said, Remember how small you are, how easy this would be. Get about your business.
"I'll have to call my wife and my son over to witness," he said, dialing the phone. "They just live around the block. I told them you'd be coming. They're waiting on you, too." The man rang up his wife and by the time we were comfortable in our chairs they had arrived, a short, round woman with tight curls and a boy who was tall and thin and not bad looking. I wondered if they had picked him up at Saint Elizabeth's eighteen years before, as he bore no resemblance to his parents.
"Take your places here," the man said, and arranged us in front of his desk, Son and I standing together, his wife beside me, his son beside Son. They looked bored. They were tired of marriage, had seen it all before. The woman pulled at a thread on her dress which came out and out without end. She snapped it off and dropped it to the floor. She was trying hard not to look at my clothes, Son's clothes. I had a hand up underneath my sweater, holding up his long underwear, which was dingy from too much washing and a little frayed around the seams. The man opened his book and started reading quickly. I remembered those words. Dearly beloved. Honor and obey. Sickness and in health. Until death do us part. I had said them before and for that second I wondered if Son had as well. When the man asked me my name so that he could say, do you, Wilson Abbott, take, I said, Martha Rose Clinton, and Son looked at me surprised. He didn't know my name either and had been too polite to ask. I thought about giving my maiden name, Sloan, but I was used to Clinton. There were people who knew me by that name, and consistency is the most important part of a lie.
When the service was over the man started in on the paperwork, and his wife and son said good night and shook our hands and wished us luck. "It was a real nice wedding," the woman said to me. "Prettiest I've seen in a while." Her voice sounded like a record. Her kind words were part of what you bought. They were meant to leave a good taste in your mouth, so that for the next marriage you would remember to come back and try them again. The boy smiled politely but was quiet. Then they were gone.
"I'll need to see birth certificates," he said.
Son took his out of his wallet and unfolded it. I said I didn't have mine.
"Don't have it?" the man said. "Then what did we just go through all of this for? No birth certificate, no marriage. It's as simple as that."
"She's from California," Son said, by way of explanation.
"I don't care if she's from France. A person needs a birth certificate to get married in this state."
Son sighed and reached into his wallet. He laid five ten-dollar bills on the desk. The man touched them with his finger. "Plus the cost of the service. That's twelve dollars."
Son counted out twelve dollars. A five and seven ones, and put his wallet back into his pocket. The justice showed us where to put our names and then signed the paper with a flourish. "Done," he said. "Married."
Son and I stood out in the snow and looked at each other for a minute. "So," he said.
"Well," I said.
There wasn't much to say in the car going back. "Martha is a pretty name," Son told me.
"I never use it," 1 said.
"That was my sister's name, Martha."
I thought about asking him about his brothers and sisters, his family, where he was from, but there would be all the time in the world for that. I rested my head against the glass and watched the dark white world.
"Well," he said when we pulled up in front of Saint Elizabeth's, "I guess I'll see you tomorrow, dinner for sure."
"What do you mean?" I asked him.
"Well, you're going to go to bed, right? It's getting late."
"I'm coming home with you."
"Tonight?"
"You married me, Son. I guess that's the way it should be, unless you'd rather I didn't."
He rubbed his neck uneasily. "No, no. You should do whatever you want. I mean, of course you're welcome with me. It's your house, too. I just thought you might not want people to know."
"We haven't done anything wrong. They'll all know sooner or later."
"Sure," he said. "You're right."
"I want to t
ell Angie is all."
"I'll wait for you."
"Go home," I said. "I may be awhile. I'll walk over later."
"I'll wait for you in the kitchen," he said, and we went into the Hotel Louisa through separate doors.
Angie was asleep when I came in, and I wondered if she had gone to bed early or if she had been asleep all day. I sat down on the edge of her bed and looked at her pretty face. Asleep she was a child. You could almost read her dreams across her forehead. I touched her hair. "Hey," I said.
She opened her eyes, blinked, and smiled. "I was so worried when you left," she said.
"I'm okay."
"Son told us he found you out in the snow. You must have gone a little crazy, huh?"
"A little."
"Me too," she whispered. "I went into the bathroom and locked the door and I couldn't stop crying, you know. Just couldn't stop. I thought I was going to jump out the window there for a second."
"Angie."
"What?"
"I'm married now. I got married tonight."
She raised up on her elbow. "Go on," she said.
"No, I did." I touched her face. I wished I had a sister. I wished there was blood between us. "I married Son."
"You're not joking, are you?"
"No."
"Why, Rose?" she whispered.
"I'm going to keep the baby and I just didn't see how I could do it alone. If I married Son then I can stay here. This wouldn't be such a bad place to raise a baby."
She stared at me, her eyes open wide. She was completely awake. "I'm jealous," she said. "I'm happy for you, but I wish it was me." She looked down at her stomach, pushed at it with one finger. "You're doing the wrong thing. Nobody gets married like that, it's crazy. You did it because of Beatrice, not because you love him, but I would have done it, too." She looked at me. She wanted me to tell her how it could all be the same again. "If I had been the one to walk outside. If I was the one he found. I would have married him, too."
"I know." I was quiet for a second, waiting to tell her the rest. "I'm going over there tonight," I said finally. "I have to get things started now before I think about it too much."
"You married him," she said. "I figured you'd go over there." We looked at each other for a long time. I was moving to a little house not a quarter of a mile away. I would still be at Saint Elizabeth's every day. We would have been split apart soon anyway, when the babies were born, and knowing all of that I still could not stand to leave her. She scooted over in her bed and lay down flat on her back. "Come here," she said.
I lay down beside her. We were too big to face each other, but we lay there together and looked up at the dark ceiling and held hands. "It's going to be fine," she said. "It's going to be good, even."
"You too," I said.
"But I wish you weren't leaving. I wish we were going to be together."
After a while she pretended to be asleep, but I could tell she wasn't. I got up and took a few things, a clean dress, my toothbrush, some underwear. I would get the rest later. When I finally did leave, neither one of us said anything about it.
Son was in the kitchen with Sister Evangeline, having something to eat. When I came through the door she nearly threw herself at me. "This is just the way it should be," she said. "I was going to tell you, a million times, but I didn't." She clapped her hands. "I kept it all a secret all this time. I am so happy, Rosie. I've never been so happy. What a big day. I deliver two babies in the morning and my best girl gets married at night. There's never been a day like this in all the world."
"You knew?"
"Sure I knew." She waved her hand, dismissing me. "Of course I knew. I know all sorts of things."
"More than just the babies?"
"It's in my diary. The week you started working in the kitchen, I said, Rose will marry Son, sure as I'm born. Why, I don't know that you two had even properly met then. I had to drop my rosary down next to the stove. My rosary! That's how sure I was."
"I don't want to hear this."
"That's your problem, Rosie, you never want to know. All sorts of things going on out there and you don't want to know about them until they land on your plate."
Son sat at the table, smiling. He didn't care how it happened, only that it had. I was tired.
"Well, you two get going," she said, and gave me a little push toward Son. "I'll see you in the morning, if you're feeling up to work. You've had a big day today. You might want to take tomorrow off."
"I might," I said. I kissed her good night, even though I felt strangely angry at her for knowing my business. Then Son and I went home.
The house looked different than it had five hours before. It was my house now, at least to a small part. I looked around the living room.
"Are you Catholic," I asked him.
"No," he said. "I'm not much of anything. Does that matter?"
"No," I said. "I was just wondering."
We took off our coats and stood in front of the fireplace, which was cold. "I could start a fire," he said.
"I think we ought to go to bed, probably."
"Sure," he said. "You must be tired. You can have the bedroom, I'll sleep in here. I fall asleep in here half the time, anyway."
"I know I'm no great find," I said. "But you might as well get used to sleeping with me. We're married. We've only got one bedroom."
Son looked surprised, as he had a hundred times that night. "You, Rose? Dear God, there was never such a find." He came to me and put his hand on my face. With the base of his palm against my jaw, his fingers curved all the way up the side of my head. And then he kissed me, very lightly on the side of my nose and then my lips, then on my lips again.
We went into the bedroom and I took off my clothes. I would not be embarrassed, I told myself. This was the body he had married, this is the one he would have to see. We kept the lights off, but the moon against the snow made the room seem nearly bright. "Look at you," he said. "Look how pretty you are."
"I'm not pretty," I said.
"You have no idea."
I slid in between the covers, not lightly, not sexy, and pushed my back against the wall. At least it was a double bed. Son took off his overalls and sat down beside me in his shirt and underwear. "You might as well get used to it," I said.
"It's been a long time."
"Well, nothing's going to happen, at least not for a while. Just sleep with me." I touched his back. A tree, a wall, a city.
He took off the rest of his clothes and lay down beside me. I saw something on his arm, a birthmark or a scar, and leaned over to look at it. It was a tattoo. It said Cecilia in green letters near his shoulder, a cluster of leaves beneath the name. "Who's Cecilia?" I said.
"Someone I knew a long time ago."
"You must have loved her, to put her name on your arm."
"I thought I did."
"Don't say that," I said quietly. "Don't change your past because of me. There's her name on your arm." I ran my fingers across the letters, up the C, over the e and the l, down to the a. I could feel his skin tense beneath my hand. "That means you loved her."
"Okay," he said.
We didn't say anything for a while but didn't sleep either.
"It's going to be all right," he said to me finally. "We've done the right thing."
"Yes," I said.
"And it will be good for the baby."
"Yes."
"What are you going to name her? If you know it's going to be a girl, you must have picked out a name."
"No. I never did. I was always so sure I was going to give her up. I thought it would be better to not give her a name. I thought that would only make things worse."
"But you must have thought about it, even if you didn't want to."
"No, I didn't."
"So now you should think about it."
And I did. I thought about it for a long while. "Cecilia," I said finally. "I'm going to name her Cecilia."
"No," he said.
"It would be pe
rfect. We'll tell her you had her name put on your arm the day she was born, that you loved her so much you went out and had her name written right here." I touched the tattoo again and he flinched.
"Don't do that, Rose. I'm asking you."
"Cecilia," I said. "That's her name."
SON
1
THERE ARE SO MANY pretty names for girls, Caroline and Emily and Bess. Those are the three I thought of right off. Then there are all the names you could choose 'cause you wanted to make somebody else feel good. Angie, Evangeline, June. Or Beatrice, since she was the one who brought us together in a way. She could call her Elizabeth for the saint or Louisa for the hotel. In the hospital gift shop, I bought a book called Naming Your Baby. You wouldn't believe all the pretty names in there, ones you'd never think of, like Madeline and Isabel. In the end, there was only one name that wouldn't be right, which is the name Rose had settled on.
Cecilia.
In the weeks before the baby was born, I begged Rose a hundred different ways to change her mind. Once I even tried putting my foot down. "You will not," I said over breakfast, and looked at her straight enough to scare her, but I must have forgot who I was dealing with. Rose don't scare. She don't even ruffle. She just whisked my plate up off the table, her belly so big in front of her you hardly know how she could move about at all, and she looks at me as if to say, who are you to tell me what to name my baby?
"Rose," I said, "listen."
"Come on now," she said. "I've got to get to work."
Before I know it she's got the dishes clean and her coat on and she's out the door to make breakfast for twenty-five other girls, none of them as far along as her. She didn't stop working in the kitchen. She stayed there till the last possible minute, was stirring up a birthday cake for someone when her own water broke out on the tile floor.
Rose was a strong girl. She's the only woman I ever knew who felt as big as me. Not that she's anywhere as tall as me, but her hands and feet are big and the bones across her shoulders are sturdy. When you find a beautiful woman who's small, small like Cecilia, there's something about her that makes you want to cradle her in your hands. You want to keep her in your pocket, and show her to people like a little secret that you own. But Rose's beauty was something that no one person could keep. It filled up every room she went into. I remember the first time I saw her, standing up on the porch with Angie. She put a shadow over every girl there. Her white neck, the length of her thighs against the worn blue cotton of her dress, the line of her jaw under her dark hair. I thought, what's she doing here? What kind of man would let her get away?