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Authors: Rosalind Noonan

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BOOK: All She Ever Wanted
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She would tough it out without therapy.
I can do this,
she told herself.
“Honey, with your determination, I believe you can do anything.”
That was what Mom used to tell her. When Chelsea announced that she was going to run for class president, find a job as an editor, or restore their little house one tile at a time, her mother always gave her the green light.
“If anyone can do it, it's you.”
Mom would have understood. She would have driven up from Florida, parked her suitcase in the guest room, and sent Dad grocery shopping while she fussed over Annabelle and cooked up a storm. Chelsea had seen Mom take over at her older sister's house every time Melanie had a new baby. For Mom, it had been a labor of love, and people were always happy to submit to Judith Maynard's loving authority.
Mom should be here . . . but she wasn't. They had lost her just days before Annabelle was born . . . so close to Chelsea's due date that she hadn't been allowed to fly to Florida to attend her own mother's funeral. Sometimes anger flared when Chelsea thought about it. Resentment that she couldn't be there to say good-bye and fury with her mother for refusing treatment. They could have had more time together. Mom could have met her granddaughter. . . .
As if on cue, Annabelle let out a little squeak.
Chelsea saw the baby's lips moving. It would be time to feed her soon. The poor little thing. Did she sense that she was the source of so much pain and contention? A baby needed to feel love and comfort. She needed smiles and happy words . . . not the quavering voice of the person who was supposed to care for her and shape her world.
“Okay, then.” Dr. Volmer closed the file and took off his glasses again in what she now recognized as his “wrap it up” gesture. “I'll have Val give you a list of therapists in case you want to go that route.” He rose, and Chelsea had no choice but to get to her feet and leave.
He cleared his throat as he seemed to notice Annabelle for the first time. “You got a good baby there. Most of them would be screaming by now.”
Annabelle's hat was off, and the white flakes of her cradle cap were visible on her scalp. The pediatrician had told them to rub mineral oil into her scalp, but it left her skin flaky and her scalp slick. “A butterball head,” Leo had called her. Her face was turning red as she squirmed. A storm warning. Any minute, the hunger cries would come.
As soon as Volmer opened the door, Chelsea wheeled her good baby out to the reception area, where she searched the faces of the women there, searched for someone to take her baby. Maybe Val could take her home. Maybe some other lactating woman sitting in the waiting room could take her into the bathroom and sit on the toilet to breast-feed her. Surely there was a woman here with the confidence to nurse right out in the open, sitting grandly in a chair, while Chelsea scrambled to her car and drove south on the Interstate . . . south toward Florida and warmer weather.
Annabelle was a good baby, but right now Chelsea wished she could hand her off to someone else while she went off with her happy pills. And she hated herself for it.
All hope of a quick exit faded when Annabelle let loose with her hunger cry. Chelsea paused, panic burning a path up her throat. There was no way she could make it home with a hungry baby screaming in the backseat of the car, but she wasn't able to breast-feed in public. Neither the waiting room nor the car would work.
The dinky little bathroom would have to do.
Chelsea put the toilet cover down and huddled on the seat with Annie heavy in her arms. The sweet stink of deodorizer reminded her of orange Creamsicles, in a sickening way.
“Why are we here?” she asked.
Annabelle's whimpers dissolved as she started nursing. Her baby didn't care that they were trapped in an airless bathroom with cloud wallpaper from the eighties. Annie could find contentment with food and a nap.
Unlike her mother.
Looking down on her baby, Chelsea tried to swallow back the keening wail of loneliness deep in her throat. Annabelle was physically attached to her and comforted by it, but Chelsea felt no comfort in being a provider. She was tapped out, exhausted, and the baby at her breast was draining her of her last ounce of energy.
She reached over to turn on the water.
Maybe that would drown out her sobs.
 
The ride home loomed before Chelsea. Weariness dimmed her vision as she navigated the parkway, watching the pillars of the guardrail whip past. Her hands gripped the wheel, but the car was hard to steer. The guardrail tugged at the car like a powerful magnet.
One turn of the wheel, and she'd plow into it. She imagined a pillar tearing into the car. Cutting it in half.
Or would the car hit head-on and spin around, slamming into other vehicles swimming along behind it? She saw it all, as if caught in slow motion. Cars pressing into each other, collapsing, wrapping and twirling together like lovers on a dance floor.
The bold confidence rising inside her was the most solid emotion she had felt in weeks.
She was going to do it.
One slight turn of the wheel would end her pain.
“I'm losing it.” As she reached for her cell phone in her bag, she realized she was fishing through the diaper bag—the only purse she carried these days. The sweet baby smell reminded her that Annabelle was sleeping in her car seat in the back. If she crashed, something terrible could happen to her baby.
She jerked the wheel in the opposite direction, overcompensating, making the car wobble on the road.
How could I even think of crashing?
But as the thought escaped, the barrier seemed to beckon from the side of the road, promising a way out, luring her to finally do something.
Do something.
Stop sitting around and take action.
Her hands shook as she called her sister on speed dial. The bleating ring stretched before her like the broken white line at the center of the highway. When Emma's message came on, she was about to hang up, but something kept her pressing the phone to her ear. As soon as the beep ended, desperate words spilled out.
“I need help. . . .”
Chapter 3
E
mma Wyatt walked away from the lockers, casually paused in front of the mirror, and opened the towel just enough to reveal the swell of her belly. Even in the harsh light of the locker room, the slight curve of her pale stomach was a beautiful sight, like a Michelangelo figure sculpted in marble.
She was really pregnant.
After all the mornings in bed with the basal thermometer, the embarrassing doctors' appointments for her and for Jake, the trip to the clinic with a little vial of Jake's swimmers tucked between her breasts to keep it warm . . . now, at last, she could press a hand to her abdomen and make contact with the life growing in the cradle of her hips.
She stepped away from the mirror before one of the other women began to think she was stuck on herself. Though right now, the sense of well-being that cloaked her made her feel immune to anyone's disapproval. This prenatal swim class was the perfect way to end a busy week, though she did have to rush here as soon as the last parent picked up their kid each Friday afternoon. The forty-five minutes of pool exercise made Emma feel loose and invigorated. For the first time in days, her feet and toes were warm. Life was good and full of promise.
Holding the towel to her breasts, she leaned into the open locker and noticed that her phone was buzzing from a message.
Three messages, actually. All from her sister.
Poor Chelsea was struggling through a bad patch, and Emma wasn't sure how to help her. Her normally articulate sister had grown quiet and sullen. It was as if the thoughts and feelings that had once bubbled forth couldn't even find their way to the surface anymore. Emma had cajoled and prodded, but Chelsea didn't want to talk about it. In fact, Chelsea didn't want to talk at all. These days she seemed grateful to hand off little Annabelle so that she could frown into the shadows of the room or doze off.
Having suffered through depression, Emma recognized the symptoms. Difficulty concentrating. Fatigue. And the guilt. More than once Chelsea had worried aloud that she was a terrible mother, and though Emma had reassured her, it was a worry. Chelsea was so hard on herself, but there was something to her concern. Surely Annabelle could sense the sadness around her.
Chelsea didn't want to admit that anything was really wrong, but Emma was pretty sure she was suffering from postpartum depression. She had searched online and talked with Chelsea and Leo—more than once. For a while, neither of them could fathom that Chelsea could be depressed about the thing she'd wanted most—a beautiful little baby.
“But this isn't about whether or not you love Annabelle,” Emma kept telling her sister. “You're reacting to all the physical and emotional changes that your body is going through. After delivery, hormones can be all out of whack. Estrogen and progesterone levels drop and prolactin and oxytocin shoot up.” She had reminded Chelsea that her body was still healing from a difficult C-section. The traumatic surgery was one risk factor for postpartum depression. Losing Mom within a week of Annabelle's birth was number two, although that was something Chelsea didn't want to talk about. And then there was the transition from being managing editor at a successful magazine like
Home Handyman
to being a stay-at-home mom. On top of everything else, the loss of status and social support had isolated Chelsea, leaving her alone at home for most of the day. Of course, that was the way she and Leo had planned it; no one could have foreseen the depression that would overwhelm Chelsea after the birth.
But there was no disputing the reality: Chelsea was depressed. She needed help, starting with her doctor.
Emma leaned into the locker to check the phone for text messages. Maybe this was good news. Today was Chelsea's appointment with her ob-gyn, right?
But there were no texts. Emma was tempted to take the messages now, but cell phone use wasn't allowed in the locker room, and Emma understood why. She'd heard the story of the group of teenage girls who had inadvertently snapped a photo of a nude woman while they were posing in front of the big mirrored wall. One of the many “exposures” of the electronic age.
Emma dressed quickly, pulled her hair back with a clip, and then made her way out to the lobby, a phone-safe zone.
“I need help.” Chelsea's voice was tight and strained. “I'm driving home from the doctor and I . . . I think I'm going to slam into the barrier.”
Emma's heartbeat began to pulse in her ears as her sister's frantic words played on. Where was Chelsea now? Had she pulled over? Did she make it home? Emma slid into her jacket as she forced herself to listen to the rest of the desperate message.
Unable to wait, she cut off the message and dialed her sister's number.
No answer . . .
Shouldering the gym door open, she plunged out into the cold as her finger hit the redial button again and again. “Come on, Chelsea. Answer the damn phone.”
She thought about calling 911. This was an emergency, but what could the police do? Telling them that her sister was driving around somewhere with suicidal thoughts wouldn't give them enough to go on.
She needed more information. She needed Chelsea to pick up the damned phone.
The third time it went to voice mail, Emma was already behind the wheel, tearing down the street.
Chelsea's house . . . she would meet her sister there, praying that Chelsea made it that far. Yes, Chelsea would be there . . . with Annabelle. Oh, dear Lord, was Annie in the back of the car? Of course she was. Chelsea had realized she would have to bring the baby when she found out Emma couldn't sit for her. Emma set her teeth and punched the gas pedal, angry with herself for not intervening sooner.
At the amber glow of a traffic light she had to force herself to press the brake, slow it down to a safe pace.
You have to make the right choices, too,
she reminded herself. It was up to her to take care of herself and her unborn child.
Stay calm.
Which was hard for her. Emma had always been excitable, sensitive, and nurturing; it was the reason she'd been drawn to nursing. She was sure she had been put on earth to take care of others. Chelsea was the one who was calm and in control. A superwoman.
She drummed her fingers on the steering wheel as she waited for the light to change. But she blasted through the intersection as soon as the light turned green.
This couldn't be happening. If Mom were here, she'd know how to fix things. How to snap Chelsea out of this funk and bring her back.
One of her last conversations with Mom came back to her. Emma had hopped a plane to Florida when the doctors warned that the end was near. Sitting by Mom's hospital bed, she had sobbed into her hands. Silent but without shame, she had cried for Mom.
How she'd longed for the days of her childhood when Mom was healthy. She saw Mom doling out treats to the girls and the neighborhood kids, their feet bare in the lawn, cool and dark with clover. There were the “Surprise City Days” Mom had sprung on them once or twice a year when they were in grade school: Emma remembered trading her Keds and jeans for a baby-doll dress with lacy biker shorts to take the train into the city and see a Broadway show or visit a museum. Mom had not worried that they were missing school, and the girls had put aside their usual bickering to enjoy the day in the city with their mother.
Lost in thought, she hadn't noticed Mom stirring in bed. “Emma?” Despite the brutal rounds of chemo and radiation, Judith Maynard's voice still held the smooth dignity that had always reassured Emma.
“I'm here, Mom.” Emma sniffed. “Crying, as usual.” It was a family joke; the sight of a lost puppy or a sentimental coffee commercial could bring Emma to tears.
“You always were the crier, but it's not a bad quality. I never had to worry about you bottling things up inside. But Chelsea . . .” Judith lifted the arm that didn't have an IV line attached and pushed hair off her forehead. “You need to watch out for Chelsea.”
“She's the strongest of all of us. Nothing ever gets her down.”
“Everyone has a weak spot. Some are better hidden than others.”
“I guess. But if you look at Chelsea, she's led a charmed life. The perfect job. A wonderful husband. A charming house and a baby on the way.”
“Everyone has problems, sweetie.”
“I know that.” She had thought it didn't apply to Chelsea to the same degree as the rest of the world. Nothing ever seemed to bother Chelsea. When Emma got up to pour Mom more water, Judith's eyes were clear and shiny as dark stones in a riverbed.
“Promise me you'll watch out for Chelsea,” Mom had said. “She doesn't have the tools you have.”
“Oh, Chelsea has plenty of tools. How do you think she and Leo rebuilt the downstairs of their house?”
But Mom didn't go for her joke. “Promise me. She's going to need your help. I know she comes on like a bear sometimes. But she hasn't learned about the middle ground in life. She hasn't learned to see the gray areas yet.”
“It seems to be working for her.”
“The problem with thinking like that is that you're crushed when you don't achieve perfection, and this is not a perfect world.”
Although Emma didn't really get what Mom was saying about Chelsea, the conversation had stuck with her. Of course, Emma had agreed, though the promise wasn't necessary. The Maynard girls supported each other in any way they could.
When her thoughts snapped back to the present, she was exiting the parkway and turning into the little neighborhood where Chelsea and Leo had bought a house last year. Her pulse pounded in her ears as she made the turns she knew by heart.
Please, God, let them be there. Let them be safe. . . .
BOOK: All She Ever Wanted
6.46Mb size Format: txt, pdf, ePub
ads

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