Chapter 29
29
Tegan is still asleep when the sun goes down.
I crack open the basement door to check on her, and I can make out her heavy breathing. Actually, it’s more like snoring. Anyway, she is still out like a light. That Benadryl really did the trick.
When my mother was still alive and staying in our basement, I sometimes used to crack open the door to the basement and listen to the sounds of her breathing. I knew we didn’t have much time left together, so every inhale and exhale felt like a gift. My mother was a great mother. She taught me everything: how to tie my shoes, how to read, how to cook a perfect turkey for the holidays with all the trimmings. Every time I think of these memories, I can’t help but smile. I always dreamed of passing on that knowledge someday to a child of my own.
There’s some irony in the fact that the woman occupying my mother’s death bed will be the one to make my dream come true.
Someday, your family will be complete.
Hank comes home at seven o’clock, greasy and hungry like he always is at the end of the workday. He catches me at the stove, cooking some meatballs. Hank loves my meatballs. I use 80 percent lean ground beef, with lots of seasoning and breadcrumbs and a pinch of Parmesan cheese, and I let them simmer in tomato sauce for about half an hour. Hank could devour an entire pot of them all on his own.
“Smells like meatballs,” Hank notes as he leans in to give me a kiss and gently brushes the hair from my face, the way he always does when he greets me in the kitchen after work. “My favorite.”
I laugh. “What isn’t your favorite?”
“Hey, it’s not my fault my wife is such a good cook.” He swipes at a dot of oil on his forehead but just manages to spread it. “Seems like the phones are working again. That lady get picked up by the paramedics?”
“Yes,” I lie, giving the sauce a stir.
“Good. Hope she’s okay.”
He’s going to find out sooner rather than later that Tegan is still in our basement. It isn’t the sort of thing I could hide from him. But it’ll be easier to talk to him about it after he’s had a shower and there’s some food in his belly.
Hank goes upstairs to shower while I throw some spaghetti in a pot of boiling water. I always dreamed of getting my own pasta machine and making fresh pasta, but it didn’t seem worth it for just the two of us. I always figured when we had children, that would be something I could do with them. I could show them how to make pasta, their little chubby hands covered with flour. We would cook together every night.
Hank was whistling in the shower, and he’s still whistling when he comes downstairs, dressed in a fresh T-shirt and jeans, his hair still damp. He flashes me a smile, wider than any I’ve seen in the last few years—even the fine lines around his eyes crinkle. When he smiles at me like that, it suddenly hits me how unhappy we’ve been. He used to smile all the time, but now it’s a rare occurrence. I had almost forgotten what it looked like.
I serve Hank a plate of spaghetti and meatballs, piled about three times as high as my own plate. He flashes me that smile again, and he digs into the food. I twirl some spaghetti around my fork, my stomach filled with butterflies. This is not going to be an easy conversation.
“Hank,” I say.
“Uh-huh.”
“There’s something I need to tell you.”
He pauses mid-chew, his brown eyes wide. “Are you pregnant?”
How could he ask me that? How could he think I could possibly be pregnant? Why would he even say it? And the worst part is the hopefulness in his eyes. Even after all these years, he’s still hoping.
“ No ,” I say tightly. “I’m not pregnant.”
“Oh.” He does his best to mask his disappointment. “Sorry, I…”
“Never mind.” I wave a hand. “Anyway, what I wanted to tell you is that…Tegan is still here. She’s sleeping in the basement.”
A look of confusion floods my husband’s features. “What? Why?”
“Because she’s tired. I didn’t want to make her run to the hospital right now.”
“Okay, that’s fair,” he says slowly. “So we can call for the paramedics as soon as she wakes up.”
This is the hard part. I’ve got to play this exactly right. “That’s the thing. I don’t think we should. She’s better off recovering here.”
Hank wipes at a glob of tomato sauce on the side of his mouth with the back of his hand, even though there’s a perfectly good napkin right in front of him. “She’s hurt, Polly. She needs to go to the hospital.”
“Does she?” I reach out with my own napkin and dab at his lips, which still have a little sauce clinging to them. “She’s fine. She just needs a few days of TLC, then we can send her on her way. Hospitals aren’t always best—I know after working at one for so many years. Don’t you remember when we brought my mother to the hospital for a urinary tract infection, and then she got pneumonia?”
“Tegan is hurt. She needs the hospital.”
Hank’s logic is so black-and-white sometimes. It’s maddening. “I am a nurse, you know. I can take care of her.”
“With a broken ankle?”
I wave a hand in dismissal. “It’s not broken,” I lie. “It’s barely a sprain.”
“It looked pretty bad.”
“You didn’t even get a good look,” I point out. “And she doesn’t have insurance. She can’t pay for the hospital. It would bankrupt her.”
That crease between his eyebrows is back again. The smile is a distant memory. “And Tegan wants to stay here?”
“She… Yes, more or less.”
Hank inhales sharply. “Polly…”
“Look, she’s just a girl. She’s in no state of mind to know what’s best for her. She’s confused, and she’s looking to me to tell her what to do.”
He pushes his plate of spaghetti and meatballs away, even though he’s only eaten half of it. “I’m calling 911. Now.”
“Hank, no.” I push back my chair, and it topples to the floor. “You don’t understand. I’m trying to do the right thing here.”
“Polly, I’m not holding a pregnant woman hostage in my basement, okay?”
“God, we’re not holding her hostage . Don’t be so dramatic .”
He isn’t listening anymore though. He gets up out of his chair and stomps over to the telephone right by our sofa. I try to grab his arm, but he easily shakes me off. I sprint after him, and before he’s able to start dialing, I yank the phone cord out of the wall. The entire phone goes clattering to the floor with a loud thump that breaks it into four pieces and echoes throughout the room.
“Polly!” He rarely raises his voice, but now it’s as loud as I’ve ever heard it. “What the hell do you think you’re doing?”
I hug my arms to my chest. “Wait. Just wait, okay?”
“My cell phone is charging upstairs. I’ll just call on that.”
I contemplate running up the stairs and tossing his phone out the window before he can get to it. But I’ll never make it. My eyes fill with tears. “Can you please just listen to me for five seconds?”
Hank turns to me, his shoulders sagging. “Look, Polly, I know you’ve been feeling kind of lost since your mom passed. And all this baby stuff…it’s been hard on me too. I understand that. But there’s something not right about all this. I’m going upstairs, and I’m going to call 911 for Tegan, and then we’ll talk about… Maybe you need to get some help again. We should give Dr. Salinsky a call. Okay, Polly?”
He looks at me, waiting for me to nod in agreement, to tell him it’s a great idea to call for an ambulance and then give my former shrink a jingle. When I don’t, he lets out a loud sigh. “Okay, then,” he says.
He turns around, heading for the stairwell. Just as he places one large hand on the banister, I call out, “Hank!”
He climbs the first step, showing no signs of stopping.
“Hank, wait! Will you please wait!”
He’s not listening to me. He doesn’t want to talk about this anymore. All he wants to do is call 911 and get Tegan out of our house.
I can’t let him do that. I can’t let him ruin everything.
“Hank!” I cross the living room until I’m at the base of the stairs, where I’m sure he can hear me. “Hank, if you do this, I’m going to call the police.”
He freezes midway up the stairs, his hulking frame rigid.
“And,” I add, “I’m going to tell them what you did.”