Chapter 24
Samantha
Sam signed in at the volunteer desk of Charlevoix Hospital with the same careful handwriting she used for everything lately, as if steadiness on the page might translate to steadiness in her life.
Whatever. As usual the hospital smelled crisp, like clean linen with an antiseptic undercoating.
She tucked her purse up into the volunteer locker, hung up her jacket and slipped on her bright blue smock.
Swiping her hair behind her ears, she clipped on the plastic badge that read Samantha Quinn— Nursery Volunteer.
Minutes later she was entering the nursery.
The nursery door swung open on a hush of pink light and rocking chairs.
The room was small, the walls painted a shade meant to be calming but which reminded Sam of a seashell held up to the ear.
There were only a dozen or more cribs in the area.
Some of the mothers preferred to have their babies stay with them all the time in the room where they’d delivered.
During the initial volunteer tour, Sam had seen one of those rooms. They seemed really nice and she tried to imagine having a baby there.
Her imagination didn’t reach that far. If Marlowe was approved as Izzy’s surrogate, would she deliver here? Sam’s imagination went wild.
Loretta was already in the nursery, planted solidly in the middle of the room. She always wore orthopedic shoes that looked as if she’d had them for a while. Her gray hair was swept into a bun that refused to loosen. A baby was tucked against her shoulder, red-faced and furious.
“There you are,” Loretta said, as if Sam had been expected all along.
She bounced her baby with the confidence of someone who had handled many.
She had a large family with plenty of grandchildren to shop for around Christmas.
Sam had heard a lot about that. “I’ve got a live one today,” she told Sam.
The baby’s cry rose to a siren level. Sam wished she had ear plugs but Loretta didn’t flinch.
“He’s not broken,” Loretta went on cheerfully. “Just mad at the world. Happens to the best of us.”
Sam smiled, the first real smile of the morning. “Who is he?”
“Jonah. His mother’s name is Esther. Born last night and already auditioning for the opera.” Loretta leaned closer and lowered her voice conspiratorially. “Colic, I think. Or gas. Or just a demanding personality.” She rolled her eyes as if to say, good luck with that.
Thank goodness Sam hadn’t been assigned to Jonah. As they stood there, Missy, one of the OB nurses, swept in. “There’s your little lady.” She pointed to a crib with a pink name badge.
Sam approached the crib and looked down. The baby girl lay there with her fists tucked beneath her chin, eyes wide and dark, as if she were taking notes. A pink knitted cap perched on her head.
“Hello,” Sam whispered. “Well, aren’t you serious.”
With practiced arms, Missy lifted the baby and transferred her to Sam’s arms. “Her name’s Amber.”
“Well, hello, Amber.” How astonishing. The tiny thing felt like a loaf of bread just out of the oven. The baby made a small sound that was more sigh than a complaint. The infant settled against Sam’s chest. Amber frowned and Sam tried to move away from Jonah’s bellowing.
“There you go,” Loretta looking over while she jiggled Jonah. “She likes you.”
“That’s because she doesn’t know me,” Sam said, easing into a rocking chair. “Give her time.”
Loretta snorted. “Babies can sense everything. They just don’t tell.”
Sam rocked, remembering the tips the nurse had shown her. The chair creaked in rhythm. The baby’s eyelids fluttered, then closed, then opened again. She studied Sam with frank curiosity.
“Her mama’s name is Beth,” Loretta said. “First baby. You can tell.”
“How?” Sam was learning so much.
“Because Beth apologizes every time Clara makes a sound. Beth walked in here last night, or so the nurse said. Wanted to see Amber again. She’s nursing. But Esther?”
Loretta glanced down at the baby struggling in her arms. “Esther was glad to get some sleep after this hellion refused to nurse. Second babies, you let them scream for a bit while you finish your toast.” Loretta bounced Jonah, who responded with renewed fury.
“Third babies, you prop up a bottle and hope for the best.”
Sam laughed again, a sound that surprised her with its ease.
She hadn’t laughed much lately. It had felt like tempting fate.
Maybe being here had been a leap. After all she was already volunteering at bingo.
But she hoped being with the babies would give her some experience. Now, she wasn’t quite sure.
Loretta soon left her rocker to pace, patting Jonah’s back with a practiced hand. “I had five. Lost count of the grandkids somewhere around eleven. Thanksgiving looks like a football team in my living room.”
Sam tried to imagine a house loud with voices, the smell of gravy in the air and children underfoot. They didn’t quite have that with Holly but they were all darn glad to have her.
“That sounds… wonderful,” she said, then corrected herself. “Loud, but wonderful.”
“Same thing,” Loretta said. “You got kids?”
Sam felt the question land, gentle but unavoidable. She adjusted Amber on her shoulder, the baby’s breath warm against her neck. “No,” Sam said. “Never did.”
Loretta nodded once, as if Sam had said she preferred tea to coffee. “Life takes turns,” she said, with a little laugh. “Some of them we order. Some of them show up anyway.”
Sometimes Sam wondered if Chelsey had gotten pregnant on purpose, or if it truly was an accident. But what did it matter? Her marriage was over and if she were truthful, it had been over for quite some time.
Jonah let out a hiccupping sob and passed gas. Loretta stopped pacing and swayed instead. “Oh, honey,” she murmured to baby. “I know. I know. Now doesn’t that feel better?”
Fascinated, Sam watched her, the way Loretta’s body seemed to remember what to do without asking permission.
She thought of Izzy, her younger sister.
They had never seen her with Holly as an infant.
For some reason her baby sister had kept the adoption a secret.
Maybe she was worried that Marlowe and Sam would think that her taking on a child would be another mistake.
Izzy had horrified them through the years with one mistake after another.
Oh, how Sam had scolded her through her high school years.
Now Sam felt a little guilty about that.
Marlowe had admitted that she felt the same.
There were seven years between Marlowe and Izzy.
Two between Sam and Marlowe. Maybe they had just forgotten what it was like to be a teenager.
Outside the large glass window, a doctor swept into the nurses’ station and began checking charts.
Then she bustled off to do rounds. Loretta had explained it.
Sam didn’t know a lot about how a doctor’s office worked.
Dr. Huggins came to mind. When the kind cardiologist had given her the news about her heart murmur, he’d looked as if he realized how devastated she would be.
A few days letter an official letter arrived.
“I’m so sorry that we can’t clear you.” The words had been careful, kind, but absolute.
Sam had nodded and smiled, leaving with a pamphlet she had never opened.
But now that the smoke had cleared she wanted to learn more about her condition.
The doctor had ordered more tests but she’d been putting them off.
Amber stirred, her mouth puckering. Sam froze, then relaxed when the baby settled again. “I think she’s dreaming,” Sam whispered.
“Either that, or she’s passing gas,” Loretta said with a chuckle. Her charge was between screams, trying to pull up his little legs.
A nurse poked her head in. “How are we doing in here?”
“Surviving,” Loretta said. “Thriving is still under review.”
The nurse smiled. “Beth will want to nurse Amber soon.”
Sam’s chest tightened with something like relief, mixed with gratitude.
She wasn’t sure how long she could keep holding this small, perfect life without wanting something she couldn’t have.
So far, so good. She felt no urge to tuck this little thing into her tote and run out of the unit.
Of course, they had check points to prevent that.
They rocked in companionable quiet for a while. Jonah’s cries ebbed and surged like a stubborn tide. Loretta murmured stories to him—nonsense, really, about a dog named Peanut and a mailbox that wouldn’t stay shut. It didn’t matter. Her voice was the point.
By the time Sam left for the day, she was pretty sure she couldn’t handle a screaming baby in her carefully structured life. Babies weren’t always like the ads for diapers, that’s for sure.
In her heart she knew that and more. Later that night while Aunt Cate and Marlowe were in their rooms, Sam found the flat stone she’d saved after that night of wishes with her sister.
This time she wouldn’t skip it over the waves and make a wish.
Oh no, that time in the nursery had shown her a lot about herself.
No way could she handle a baby at her age. She scrambled down to the beach.
Babies were not in her future and she was glad. Throwing the stone in an upward arc, she watched it plunk into Lake Michigan. And that was the end of that.