Chapter 32 #2
I stared at him, uncomprehending. “We’re . . . going to adopt?”
“No, damn it. Aren’t you listening? No adoption’s needed. It’s mine.” He thumped his chest with his right hand.
I sat there, trying to take this in. Charlie had been unfaithful?
The thought sent my mind reeling, but the matter of adultery didn’t hurt at first. Oh, it did later—but I knew I was largely at fault for that.
At that moment, I simply couldn’t process what he was saying.
“You want everyone to know you’re having an illegitimate baby? ” I asked.
“No. And no one ever will, because they’ll think the baby’s yours.
You’re going to start wearing padding.” He leaned back against the kitchen counter, a pleased smirk on his face.
“People will think you’re pregnant, and when it gets close to time, we’ll go to Mississippi.
Dad’s planning on opening a store up there anyway; I’ll stall it until the timing’s right. Folks’ll think you had the baby there.”
I felt as if I were in a nonsensical dream. “That’s crazy. It’ll never work.”
“Why not?”
“Well, for starters, no one will believe I’m pregnant.”
“They will if you look like you are.”
“But it’s ludicrous, Charlie. Women touch other women’s pregnant bellies. Especially family. Your mother. My mother. My grandmother. Your grandmother. It will never, ever work.”
“It Goddamned better work!” His fist thundered on the kitchen counter so hard the toaster keeled over. I don’t know what was more surprising, the toaster falling or Charlie taking the Lord’s name in vain. In all the years I’d known him, I’d never heard him do that.
“You’ll make it work. You’ll keep them from touching you.”
“How?”
“That’s your problem.” He staggered back to the table. “I’m sure you’ll think of something. You do a damn fine job of keeping me at a distance.”
“I’d—I’d have to see Dr. Henry.” He was the town doctor who’d attended me during both pregnancies.
“Nah. We’ll say you’re seeing someone in Mississippi since that’s where the baby’s going to be delivered.”
My thoughts were like a goldfish in a bowl, circling round and round, making no progress. “Charlie, this is insane. I won’t do it, and you can’t make me.”
He leaned toward me. “Can’t I?”
“No.”
“You want to lose your children?” His mouth curled into something that sent a shiver up my spine.
It was evil, pure evil. He pulled a flask out of his pocket, unscrewed it, and took a long swig.
“I’ve kept some of your letters from Loverboy.
You think any judge in this parish would think you were a fit mother if I were to pull those out? ”
Eddie woke up in his crib and started to cry. I left the room to see to him. When I came back to the kitchen, Charlie was gone, and so was his car.
· · ·
Charlie came back before midnight and passed out in bed beside me.
The next day was Easter, so I got up, pulled my church clothes out of the closet, then slept the rest of the night on the sofa.
I wasn’t going to awaken him. Let him miss Easter service.
Let him miss the family luncheon. I’d say he wasn’t feeling well and wouldn’t get out of bed; everyone could draw their own conclusions.
Let the whole town talk about him, for all I cared.
But he woke up and got dressed and acted just as nice and pretty as you please, playing with the children and making them both laugh.
He even helped hide the eggs for Becky’s Easter egg hunt and changed Eddie’s wet diaper.
I thought he might have been in a blackout the day before, because he didn’t mention a thing about a baby or another woman.
I figured he probably just made the whole thing up to terrify me.
After church, we all gathered at his mama’s house for Easter dinner.
My mother and father were there, along with my grandmother, and, of course, Charlie’s parents and grandmother.
I took both a peach pie and a butterscotch pie.
We all sat and ate ham and green bean casserole and carrot and raisin salad.
Right before we served the desserts, Charlie stood up.
“I have an announcement to make.”
My heart thudded hard in my chest. Oh, no. Please, God, no. Maybe it was something to do with his father’s business. I looked at my father-in-law, but his face looked just as puzzled as I felt.
“Adelaide and I are havin’ another baby.”
Everyone broke into excited chatter. “When?” Mama asked.
“In September,” Charlie said.
“Why, Adelaide. You’re not showin’ at all!”
“We wanted to keep it a secret because she’s been having a bit of a hard time,” Charlie said.
“Oh, my dear!” my mother exclaimed, turning toward me. “What’s the problem?”
“I—uh . . .” I was literally speechless. I couldn’t believe that he’d just announced such a falsehood like that, so publicly, with no warning.
“Woman troubles,” Charlie said. That was code for bleeding.
And no one—not even mothers and daughters—talked about that back then.
Why, when I’d started my period at age thirteen, I’d thought I was dying.
My grandmother on my father’s side had died of colon cancer, and I thought that’s what I had.
My mother noticed blood on my underwear the next day when she did the laundry.
She handed me a sanitary napkin, told me women had this happen every month, that it was a woman’s curse, and I’d just have to wear a pad and bear it.
“What does Dr. Henry say?” Charlie’s mother’s face was scrunched with worry. I suddenly recalled Charlie telling me she’d miscarried several times after his birth. My own mother had had a difficult labor with me and was unable to have any more children.
“She’s not seeing Dr. Henry. She saw a specialist in Mississippi when we went to the lake a few weeks ago.
” Charlie turned to his father. “We’ll be opening the branch store in Jackson in September and I’ll want to be there, so I figured we’d rent a place for a few months.
I wouldn’t dream of being away from her at a time like this. ”
My mother cocked her head and looked at me oddly. “You went to a doctor on a Saturday?”
“Yes. This doctor sees patients six days a week,” Charlie said smoothly.
“You don’t have to go to Mississippi, son,” Charlie’s dad said. “I can handle that store opening.”
“No, this expansion is my responsibility. I’ll go get it started, hire a manager to run it, and then after the baby is born and things are running smoothly, we’ll come back here.”
Charlie’s father pushed back his chair. “Well, I think this calls for a toast!”
He went to the cupboard in his study, and returned with a bottle of sparkling wine. And everyone toasted and drank to my health, and I sat there, miserable, the lie lying like a boulder on my heart.
“Do you want me to come and stay with you in Mississippi?” my mother asked.
“Thank you, but no,” Charlie said before I could even open my mouth. “We’ve talked about it, and we don’t want to take you away from Grammie. What would be most helpful would be if you and Mom could take turns keeping Becky and Eddie for us once we get close to the due date.”
“Of course. We’d be thrilled to do that.”
Oh, he was smooth. I never knew how smooth he could be. This wasn’t the same Charlie I knew, the insecure, bumbling Charlie. Evil had made him a silver-tongued devil.
I wondered if the other woman had taught him how to lie so adroitly.
How many times had he lied to me when he was seeing her?
I’d always thought I could see right through him.
Somewhere along the line, he’d turned into a world-class deceiver.
If I hadn’t known he was lying now, I would have been as sucked in as my family; he was just that smooth.
“Mommy—you’re havin’ a baby?” Becky asked me.
I swallowed. This was the point of no return. It was one thing to lie to my parents, quite another to lie to my child.
Charlie did it for me. “Yes, honey. You’re going to have another baby brother or a baby sister.”
“A sister! I want a sister.”
Later, as we were cleaning up, my mother looked me up and down. “My word, child—you’re not showing at all. And you must be four months, give or take.”
“You know, Beula was like that,” said my grandmother. “She carried her second baby toward her back. The doctor said he was sitting near her spine. Guess that’s what’s going on with Adelaide here.”
She reached out her hand to touch my stomach.
Charlie grabbed her arm, stopping her. “The doctor said people should keep their distance from Adelaide’s stomach, that she and the baby might be vulnerable to, um, electrical impulses from other people. He said just patting her belly can cause a transfer of electricity that can be harmful.”
“Why, I never heard of such a thing!” my mother exclaimed.
My grandmother and Charlie’s mother murmured in agreement.
“Me, neither,” said Charlie, “but this doctor says it’s a brand-new medical theory, and since Adelaide’s had problems, we want to follow his advice to the letter, no matter how odd it sounds. Can’t be too careful.”
“Well, I guess that’s right,” my mother said. “But what about the children? She’s going to be holding them and picking them up.”
“The doctor said that children don’t have near as much of an electrical current as the hands of adults, so that should be all right.”