She Woke Up Married (7 page)

She must have some serious illness. That was it. She’d been coming down with something for months, and it had finally arrived. That
must
be it. It had to be.

Well, she was going straight back to bed until it went away. God Almighty, she felt terrible. And she felt even sicker knowing she was lying to herself like a bold-faced, corrupt politician. Who was she kidding? Herself? Hardly.

After a while she quietly opened the bathroom door. Maybe Turner had left—if she was lucky. Which she wasn’t.

Or maybe Turner was sitting in a tall kitchen chair, leaning on the high counter with his arms crossed across his chest, staring at her with his
big, serious brown eyes, looking concerned. Him and his look of concern. She broke his gaze and trudged toward her bed.
Bed…give me bed,
she thought to herself.

But he was hot on her trail. He pulled the covers open for her and let her fall into the bliss of her bed without any dignity left. He rolled them back over her curled-up body that would not face him if it had to. She made herself into a ball in the darkness of the down comforter and its many quilt companions. “Uuhhhhh,” was all she said.

“Paris, I’m going to the drugstore now and get a pregnancy test. Let’s just face the facts and see what we are dealing with.”

“Flu. Plague,” she muttered.

“How long?” he asked.

“Long.”

“We’ll see. Drink some water because I’m going to need a few drops of pee.”

“Charming,” she muttered again.

Turner put his coat on and strode out the door.

Outside in the hallway Turner locked the dead bolt with her keys. He walked toward the elevator and looked at the indicator above the doors. She was on six, and the elevator was hovering on twenty-six. Turner decided to take the stairs. A particular urgency overtook him. What was six
flights of stairs compared to obtaining certain knowledge that he was going to be a father?

He wondered how Paris could have gotten pregnant wearing her birth control patch, but it sure wouldn’t have been the first time a determined soul had made it through to stir up some couple’s life. He smiled thinking of that determined soul meeting up with Paris.

But Paris—she’d be devastated. Fear washed through him as his boots hit one stair after another. What would her reaction be?

As he rounded the landing on the third floor he felt his wave of panic subside. It was replaced by an odd calm. Whatever came up, he was going to be there for her.

In the drugstore he found a friendly guy to grill for information on the entire shelf of tests before him. “Which of these is the most accurate?”

“Well, these are mid-stream tests, and these are strip tests. The strip is faster, but this one detects minute amounts of pregnancy hormone. It’s pretty darn sensitive. That’s about eight or ten days after conception,” the pharmacist rattled on.

“I’ll take two of each kind, thanks.” Turner went for his wallet and started pulling out twenties. “What do I owe you?”

“Fifty three dollars and twelve cents.”

Turner handed him fifty-five dollars.

“Here you go, that makes fifty-four and one more is fifty-five. Good luck, sir,” the pharmacist added.

“Thanks, I’m going to need it.” Turner took the bagged-up tests and steadied himself against the counter before shoving off.

Outside the drugstore, a kind-looking old man was handing out religious pamphlets. “Bless you, my child.” He smiled and nodded at Turner as if he knew something.

“Thank you.” Turner took the flyer and smiled back at him. He kept moving down the sidewalk, thinking of the odd string of coincidences that had led him to this moment in time. How strange it was that he and Paris should cross paths after all these years. Or maybe collide was the proper term. He and Paris had collided into each other, each for their own reasons, and now life would never be the same for either of them. He saw his path very clearly, all of a sudden. Like fog lifting off the city streets and leaving a ribbon of road clearly visible. He knew the way.

Paris rocked herself back and forth in her overstuffed rocking chair, her knees drawn up, her retrieved nightshirt stretched over her gray leggings, her arms wrapped around her captive legs. She put her head forward and let her curtain of hair fall around her, blocking out the
light. She didn’t have much experience with this stuff, but she was pretty sure from the talks she’d had with her friend Marla that she was indeed pregnant with Turner Pruitt’s child.

She had about fifteen minutes to prepare herself and be ready for whatever Turner’s reaction was. She’d probably have a hard time convincing him to put the baby up for adoption, but if he had a brain in his head he’d see her point. She was going to have to be very, very strong with him. She took a few deep breaths. If she was going to be strong, she better pull her fear back into herself and use it to focus. No one, not Turner, not any man she’d ever known, or woman for that matter, could make her do anything she didn’t choose to do. When she made up her mind about a matter, it was written in stone, just like her heart. Her stone-cold heart.

She’d be ready.

The little blue line didn’t just faintly hint: it glowed like a strip of neon as Turner stared. Paris glanced, then crossed her arms and braced her back against the white wooden chair.

“So that’s it then?” she said.

“That would be the fourth one, so I’d say that’s it.” Turner placed the test alongside the other three tests of various types they had lined up down the center of the dining room table across the Sunday funny paper section. Turner found that somewhat amusing at the moment, with each test taking up another square of the Garfield comic.

“You’re smiling?”

“I was reading the comics.”

Paris sat forward in her chair. “Before you start with the bighearted speech I’m sure you have planned, I have something to say to you.”

“Actually I don’t have a speech planned, Paris, I’m just going to take things as they come.” Turner reached for her hand, but she tucked it under her other arm, as if to keep herself from accepting comfort from him even if she weakened and reached out. He left his hands on the table. “I’m listening.”

“You are the only person in this city that knows about this. You’re also the only person here that knows what happened with my mother and father. I know because of that you’ll understand that I can’t be a mother to this child.

“I intend on going away somewhere until the baby is born, then finding a suitable family to adopt it. When it’s over, I’ll return to New York, pick up the pieces of my career, and get back to work. You and I are going to get a divorce, and I expect you’ll go back to where you came from. In nine months I’d like to be able to put this unfortunate mistake behind me and that includes you. Do you understand?” Paris let out a breath, as if she’d been holding it, and sat herself back against the chair again.

“Yes, I understand. I understand that you’ve thought this through for the last hour since I left the apartment, and this is what you’ve come up with as a solution.”

The look on Paris’s face told him she was going over what he said carefully. Good, she was paying attention, anyway.

“So we’re clear on this? I can’t tell from what you just said.”

“I have a few questions.” Turner laced his fingers together and looked at her with all the love he felt for her. “Do you understand that just because your mother had postpartum psychosis doesn’t mean that you will repeat that?”

“I see that she and I have extremely similar temperaments. I’m not even willing to take a chance of that happening. The child needs to be placed away from me immediately. I’d like to arrange to have the adoptive parents at the birth and take the child home from the hospital. I don’t want to see it, bond with it, or anything. Don’t even think I’m going to change my mind about that, Turner. I’ve already given it up in my mind. I’ve suspected for a week at least that I might be pregnant. I’ll just be the carrier.”

Turner had to keep himself from getting angry with her. It was his only chance to keep communication open between them. He bowed his head silently for a moment to regain his composure.

“I’m only a little ways along anyway, I might have a miscarriage. It’s very common, actually.”

“I sincerely hope not.”

Paris glared at him, but at least she had the wisdom not to pursue the subject.

“I figure I’ve got a few months before I start to show, but I might as well leave now before I start to puff up and people start talking about how much weight I’ve gained. This place is worse than high school the way gossip flies around.”

“You know the idea of leaving town and hiding out while you’re pregnant is pretty old-fashioned. This is the new millennium. You’re a married woman.”

“And then have everyone ask where the baby went? I don’t think so. I’m going to take a leave of absence. Rita will figure I’m having a nervous breakdown or something.” Paris smiled a wry smile. “Who knows, I might be.”

“They have treatment now, Paris.”

“They had treatment then, too. It didn’t work. Somewhere out there I have a sister that was taken away from my mother because they couldn’t help her.”

“Paris, they didn’t know what was wrong with your mother back then.”

“They were smart to give my sister up for adoption. She was neglected and sick. I didn’t realize my mother wasn’t taking care of the baby right. Dad was so messed up himself, he didn’t see it either. If I’d realized it, I’d have done something.” Paris’s voice broke for a moment.

Turner watched as she pulled her emotions back up like a drawbridge and shut the door. He got up from the table and went to get Paris a
glass of water. “Paris, you were only a child. Your father didn’t realize what was happening. Those were different times.”

“He should have given me up too. But no, he keeps me, gives my sister away, and two years later I end up in a convent. He killed himself over my mother’s illness, Turner. Is that the kind of tragedy you want?”

“Your father died of a heart attack, Paris.”

“I watched him do it, Turner. He would never rest. He worked three jobs. He drove himself to that heart attack. At night he’d never sleep or eat right. He did it on purpose. He killed himself all right, just slowly.”

“Paris, it wasn’t your fault.”

“I’ve got their genes, Turner. I’m not going to let that happen to a child of mine. That baby will be safe with other people.”

Turner set the glass of water in front of Paris and put his hand on her shoulder. It was hard as a rock—tensed up to the point of pain, he was sure. He gently rubbed the tight muscle.

Paris let out a cry and jerked her hand across the table. The water glass flew as she struck it. It hit the kitchen counter behind them, shattering. Turner moved as she shoved her chair back and ran from him.

There was nowhere to run in this apartment to get away from Turner, so she headed for her bed.

Paris couldn’t take another minute of Turner’s kind heart or kind gestures—water, peppermint tea, all his good deeds. His touch was full of sympathy for the pain she’d suffered as a child. She hated that sympathy.

She wanted with all her heart to never have her child know that kind of sympathy. She wanted people to say
Oh, that child was so lucky to be adopted by Mr. and Mrs. Jones. They wanted a baby so much.

Paris kicked off her slippers and clawed her way back into her bed covers. She wrapped them around herself and made a cocoon. And then she cried until she thought she’d never be able to stop. She cried for her father, for her mother, and for her sister, whom she’d only known for two months. Her tiny, helpless sister, who, she hoped, was in a place where no one had to pity her, ever. Then she cried for herself and for the baby she was going to give away.

Turner pulled the upholstered bedside chair up close to Paris’s bed after he let her alone for about an hour to cry. Crying was sometimes the only thing to do to get your soul rinsed out from all the pain. He cried for her as he sat there and wiped away the tears with his shirt sleeve. Then he sat quietly beside her until her cry subsided, her breathing changed, and he knew she was sleeping.

He had a lot of thinking to do. Funny thing was, most of it had come to him as she’d described her plan to him. Now he just had to figure out how he was going to carry through with his part. Paris was a force to be reckoned with. Her strength was amazing. But her strong walls were built on sand, because she didn’t have the foundation that loving parents can give. He needed to be the foundation she never had. For her…and for their baby.

He looked around her apartment at the odd assortment of childlike things: her bear collection, her dolls, even her piles of pillows and quilts. Paris had never gotten to be a child. She’d taken care of her mother as she’d fallen to pieces after the birth of Paris’s sister, and after that she’d taken care of her father. Under such unfortunate circumstances, her childhood had been taken so early from her. She was right about one thing—they should have adopted her out with her sister. He supposed the father couldn’t bear parting with Paris too, after having lost everything.

And after all that caretaking she’d done, all those people had died or been lost to her anyway. No wonder Paris felt the way she did.

Turner knew it was his job to get Paris through this. Her pain and her past were a storm that they’d have to pass through to get to the other
side. And he would have to be a firmly rooted tree that bowed in that storm but always stood steady. He just hoped he could stand the hundred-and-twenty-mile-an-hour winds that were about to hit.

As the afternoon sun shifted downward from the peak of the tall windows, Paris stirred under her bundle of covers. She was too hot, and she pushed them aside with her feet.

“Good morning again,” Turner said.

Paris rolled herself toward the sound of his voice, pulling the sheets with her. He stood next to her bed. He was shaved, dressed in jeans and a clean white shirt. She could smell his clean scent. She breathed him in and felt a smile cross her face. He was the only thing that didn’t make her feel nauseous right now. She adjusted her bleary eyes to the clock beside her bed. It was one o’clock in the afternoon.

“I left you some lunch in the kitchen—a pot of soup and a sandwich. Just warm the soup back up. Paris, take a nice shower and put on some clean clothes. You’ll feel better. I’m going to the bar and I’ll be back late. We’ll talk more tomorrow.”

“Thank you,
Dr. Phil,
I’ll be sure and spruce myself up. I’m sure a shower and some lipstick will fix everything.”

Turner sighed, then bent over and kissed her
on the forehead. “It won’t fix everything, but it will make you smell better.” He smiled big at her, shrugged on the big Nevada shearling coat he was holding, and headed toward the door.

“Go ahead. Leave me,” she hollered, sitting up in the bed.

“Good-bye, Paris, I’ll be back about eleven tonight. I’ve got your spare key from the rack here.” He held it up in the air, then stepped through the open door and closed it behind him.

She was alone. Alone with her miserable self. She usually liked her own company. No one to tell her what to do. But today she was too horrid to be around. Turner might be right. A nice shower and maybe a little lunch might perk her up.

She showered.

She shaved her legs.

She washed her big red piles of hair and conditioned them. The smell of the apricot conditioner almost made her yak again.

She got out and toweled herself off and wrapped a smaller yellow towel around her hair. Then she stared at her naked body in the mirror. She knew she was barely two months along, but she could swear her belly was puffed. Her breasts were definitely puffed. They hurt like hell. This was going to be like never-ending PMS.

She bolted out of the steamy bathroom and walked naked across the apartment to the wardrobe closet she’d had built on one end of
the room to house her big clothing collection.

First she went for the favorite jeans. They wouldn’t button. She found her black velvet pull-on leggings and squiggled into them. Then she located the Fat Bra. The one she used when she was retaining water and didn’t want to be underwired to death. It was black satin with scalloped edges. Very 1940s.

Last came the black velvet pullover with a cowl neck. She might as well be a lounge lizard today and just pull-on-pant matching-top herself right up.

There was no way she was going to keep herself from thinking about all this. She might as well call Marla in Indiana and spill her guts. Marla might be willing to put her up till the baby was born, and Marla could keep her mouth shut better than any girl on earth. Marla kept her own career as a mystery writer a secret from the entire world for years! Surely she could keep one pregnant coworker-almost-best-friend in her guest house for seven months.

Paris went in the kitchen with her hair still rolled in a towel. It was starting to give her a chill. She nosed around at what Turner had left her; chicken soup, the old-fashioned kind—Campbell’s—out of a can, a cheese sandwich on sourdough all wrapped in wax paper, which was probably the only kind of wrap left in the house, and soda crackers. She ripped open the soda
crackers and nibbled on a few. That was the only thing she remembered from her talks with Marla during her pregnancy—soda crackers cut the nausea.

Just the thought of eating anything else made that wave of horrible feeling rise up in her again. Surely this must be the worst case of nausea on record. This couldn’t be normal. Maybe something was wrong with her. She must have super-nausea. Women couldn’t have it this bad and still work and carry on with their lives. Hers must be worse. She leaned against the counter and steadied herself while it passed, nibbling on the soda cracker as best she could. Maybe she should go to the doctor before she left town. Dr. Yee had been watching over her female health for the last ten years.

Then again, maybe his receptionist would talk to her pal at the coffee shop and the pal would tell her hairdresser and it would be all over town in about an hour.

Kakkkk.
The crackers were stuck in her throat. Paris went to the fridge and grabbed a bottled water. She glugged it down and got rid of all the cracker bits. Now she had soda cracker crumbs all over her black velvet cowl-neck.

She better just plant herself on a chair and call Marla right now. Surely Marla would take her in. What would she do with her apartment? What about all her stuff? A year in storage? And then
the apartment would be gone, and no way was she losing her Manhatten apartment. It would take her another two years to find a big open loft like this!

She’d sublet to someone. Paris walked barefoot across the large open room. Her feet got cold. She slipped back into her bed and warmed her feet under the covers. She found the remote on her recently cleaned bedside table and turned on the Collector Channel. Maybe a nice bear would come up today. She muted out the sound and watched the sales pitch with closed captions.

Her portable phone was on the table beside her, waiting. Waiting till she got the nerve to dial. Finally she grabbed it up, propped pillows around her, and speed-dialed Marla Meyers Riley in Indiana. It had been several years since she’d flown down to Richmond to attend Marla’s wedding, but they’d kept in touch. Marla e-mailed her, and Paris called her on the phone because she wasn’t that great on computers. Except for eBay. She could now say she’d mastered eBay.