Chapter 43
But even with things less up in the air with Jack, I couldn’t sit still on Sunday.
Between knowing I was going to confront a spy with only what Spanish I had learned from Frank, the fight I had with Betty right before she went to the hospital, and the noise from Betty’s kids, my nerves were shot.
Betty had almost died thinking that I was insulting her life and choices.
And if things went south with Alejandra, bravado to Jack aside, I didn’t want that to be our last conversation.
My mother said Betty was doing well enough for visitors, so I decided to go see her.
I took the bus down to Hofberg’s, got two sandwiches, and then took the bus back across town to Suburban Hospital in Bethesda, where Betty was recovering.
I was directed to the maternity ward. I knocked before entering, though I didn’t wait for her to respond because her door was open.
“Hungry?” I asked, holding up the Hofberg’s bag. Betty was in the bed, the baby in her arms as she fed her a bottle. She was incredibly pale, with dark, haunted circles under her eyes, but she was sitting up and alert.
“Pastrami?”
“On rye with sauerkraut and spicy mustard dressing.” I did know her favorite.
“Are you just trying to keep me too fat to take my clothes back?”
I sat on the end of her bed and passed a sandwich to her. “Am I that transparent?”
But instead of biting my head off, Betty chuckled. “Do you mind holding her while I eat?” I nodded, and she handed me the baby. “Support her head now. And angle the bottle so she doesn’t get too much gas.”
I looked down at her scrunched little face. My only experience with newborns was with Betty’s first two, and they all kind of looked like little old men until they were a month or so old.
“Meet your aunt Judy,” Betty said as she unwrapped her sandwich. “Judy, meet Brenda.”
“She’s beautiful,” I said as she curled her little fingers around my pinkie.
“Mom says she looks like you did.”
“Then she’s definitely going to be a looker.” Betty laughed. “Let’s hope she’s taller than me though.”
“You’ve done all right for a half-pint,” Betty said around a mouthful of sandwich. “God this is good. Hospital food is miserable.”
I smiled at her. “There are chocolate top cookies in there too.”
“You really do want to keep my clothes, don’t you?” She shook her head. “Did you know those are only in Maryland and DC? Reuben had never had them when he moved down here.”
I didn’t know that. She finished her sandwich while I admired my new niece, wondering what it would be like to someday hold a baby of my own in my arms. I didn’t want to forgo all of this, I realized.
“I can take her if you want to eat.”
I shook my head. “I’m okay. Have a cookie.”
She took one from the bag, closing her eyes as she bit into it. She swallowed, then looked at me. “So what did you steal my green cocktail dress for?”
I kept my face neutral. “I don’t know what you mean.”
“A thief and a liar, huh? Do you really think I didn’t go through my closet after you came over that day?”
Betty had known me my whole life.
I opened my mouth to speak, but she stopped me. “The truth, please. Or I tell Mom.”
I decided not to lie for once. If things went badly the next night . . . No. I didn’t want to think about that.
“I’m working on a story.”
“I thought you were in the typing pool?”
“I am. Jack and I found a lead, and we’re following it.”
She looked me over appraisingly. “So dinner the other night was for show?”
My shoulders dropped. “No—maybe—I don’t know.”
For a minute, neither of us said anything, and I was grateful she didn’t press me.
“What’s the story?”
I shook my head. “I can’t tell you that yet.” She took another bite of cookie. “I was really scared the other night.”
She looked at me sympathetically. “I was too, to be honest. I’d been having a lot of back pain—I probably owe you an apology. I think that’s why I’ve been so cranky lately—but the doctor said it was all in my head. I knew something wasn’t right. But no one listened. And it almost killed me.”
I looked down at the baby in my arms, her eyes closed as she drank the last of the bottle and continued sucking. “Her head isn’t even that big. Grandma was wrong too.”
Betty let out a hearty laugh. “No, thankfully this one does take after our side.” Then she sobered and shook her own head.
“I knew something was wrong though.” She looked back at the baby, then set the rest of her cookie on the bag.
“Give her here. She needs to be burped.” I passed Brenda to her, and she held her expertly to her shoulder and patted the baby gently on the back.
“It’s funny. You think you know what you’re doing and then, BAM! Life throws a curveball at you.”
I watched her cuddling the tiny little thing that had almost killed her.
Then she looked up at me. “You like this Jack, don’t you?
” I nodded, suddenly afraid. Kissing him had been one thing.
Even falling asleep on the sofa like an old married couple.
But admitting that I felt something somehow made it real.
“He likes you too. I could tell. But you want this career too, right?” I nodded again, surprised by how easily Betty could read me.
We had always been polar opposites. “Maybe he’s okay with that. For now at least.”
My voice came out as almost a whisper. “What if I’m never ready for—” I gestured to her and the baby.
She shrugged. “Then you die an old, lonely aunt.”
I barked out a small laugh. “How comforting.”
“Listen, you’ve always done everything your own way. Which has been frustrating for me, as someone who had to follow the rules. But why would this be any different?”
She had a point there.
“Truth be told,” she continued. “I’ve always been a little jealous of you.”
“Of me?”
Betty nodded. “You’ve known what you wanted and didn’t let anything get in your way since you were what? Five?”
But Betty had wanted what she had since then too. Hadn’t she?
“Six,” I said, and she laughed.
“I met Reuben freshman year of college,” she reminded me. “I didn’t get a chance to figure out if I wanted something else.”
I disagreed. She didn’t have to marry a ridiculously boring man. I had met my share of boring men at school and didn’t give up. But saying that wouldn’t help anything. Three kids in, the deed was definitely done by now.
“There’s still time,” I said. “When the kids go off to school, you could do some part-time work.”
She shrugged. “Maybe. I need to convince Reuben to agree to the pill first. I need a break. And honestly—after all this—I don’t think I want to risk it again.” Her face had a vulnerability to it that I hadn’t seen since we were kids.
But that was an area I could help with. Or Patricia could at least. “If he won’t, I may know someone who can get you a prescription even if Reuben doesn’t go with you. Or at least a diaphragm.”
“I don’t want to know how you know that.”
I laughed. I couldn’t remember the last time Betty made really me laugh. It was definitely before she had kids.
“Keep the green dress,” she said, reaching for her half-eaten cookie. I slid the bag closer to her so she didn’t have to disturb the baby, who was now asleep on her shoulder. “It suits your complexion better anyway.”
I looked at her, still so pale from all the blood loss, in the hospital bed, and it hit me again that we really almost lost her the other night. “Thank you. And Betty?” My voice was thick as I held back tears. “I’m awfully glad you’re okay. I do love you. You know that, right?”
“And here I was thinking you were rooting for me to go so you could have my whole wardrobe.” She set the cookie down and put the hand that wasn’t holding the baby on mine. “I love you too. Promise you’ll tell me about the story when you can?”
I nodded and quite honestly would have started telling her about it, except Reuben walked in with Sandy and Gary, who immediately scrambled up onto the bed and woke the baby, who began to cry.
“She does have a set of lungs on her,” I said.
“Tiny but mighty, like her aunt,” Betty said as she tried to hold all three kids.
“I should be going,” I said, moving out of their way. The room was too small for so much chaos, and I knew firsthand how much the older two missed their mother these last couple of days.
“Don’t you want your sandwich?” Betty called, pointing toward the bag.
I shook my head. “It’s another pastrami for you. You know I like their corned beef better.”
“Cookie!” Sandy shrieked as she lunged for it, making the baby cry harder as I left the room, feeling lighter.