All the Good Parts
Read All the Good Parts Online
Authors: Loretta Nyhan
PRAISE FOR LORETTA NYHAN
“
All the Good Parts
by Loretta Nyhan is a tender, warmhearted, and fast-paced story of a family finding its way through an uncertain time for everyone. Nyhan’s writing delicately balances the stress and love felt between sisters Leona and Carly and examines the intricate dynamics of Leona’s unusual friendships. These pivotal relationships are the story’s backdrop as Leona decides if she’s going to have a baby on her own at thirty-nine. I laughed, I cried, and I cheered as Leona fought herself and others, stumbled, and in the end became a better version of herself—which is always a good thing, baby or not. I read this book way past my bedtime.”
—Amy Sue Nathan, author of
The Good Neighbor
“Quirky and laugh-out-loud funny,
All the Good Parts
is a story we love! Nyhan had us at page one with this unique yet relatable story of the deep bonds between sisters and family and the yearning for motherhood. Readers who want to be swept up and taken on an emotional roller coaster will love this book!”
—Liz Fenton and Lisa Steinke, authors of
The Year We Turned Forty
and
The Status of All Things
“A deceptively sweet and funny, ultimately poignant and heart-tugging novel with a twist near the end that will take your breath away.”
—Barbara Taylor Sissel, bestselling author of
Crooked Little Lies
“Leona Accorsi, thirty-nine, suddenly decides she wants a baby, simply to love. The decision leads her on a journey of self-discovery and puts a unique twist on the idea of looking for love in all the wrong places. Her funny, tender, and heartfelt interactions with each of the not-necessarily-appropriate people on her short list of potential daddy donors all ultimately bring her to new insights about herself. The story kept me smiling and wondering
What’s going to happen next?
from the first scene to the very satisfying finish.”
—Jackie Bouchard, author of
House Trained
and
Rescue Me, Maybe
ALSO BY LORETTA NYHAN
I’ll Be Seeing You
Empire Girls
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, organizations, places, events, and incidents are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously.
Text copyright © 2016 by Loretta Nyhan
All rights reserved.
No part of this book may be reproduced, or stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without express written permission of the publisher.
Published by Lake Union Publishing, Seattle
Amazon, the Amazon logo, and Lake Union Publishing are trademarks of
Amazon.com
, Inc., or its affiliates.
ISBN-13: 9781503937383
ISBN-10: 1503937380
Cover design by Janet Perr
To Kristi Bost and Jodie Senffner, two women who showed me the true meaning of bravery.
CONTENTS
CHAPTER 1
Nursing 320 (Online): Community Health
Professor Larmon:
Welcome to Community Health, future nurses! Please start this week’s discussions by introducing yourself to the class. Online learning can feel isolative unless you reach out—this is your first opportunity to forge a connection with your classmates. Remember, we’re in this for ten weeks, so make an impression!
Leona A:
Hi! This is my second-to-last course, which is so exciting! I’m so happy to e-meet all of you! I look forward to learning about community health! It’s very exciting!
Good Lord. Or rather, Good Lord! DELETE.
Leona A:
My name is Leona Accorsi. I’m a thirty-nine-year-old nontraditional (read: old) student who never finished college the first time around. I live in the basement of my sister’s house in the western Chicago burbs. I keep busy running around after my nieces and nephews, painting watercolors, and working part-time as a home health aide.
Blah. Boring. Or . . . portrait of a serial killer. DELETE.
Leona A:
I’m Leona, but everyone at the strip club calls me Miss Vixen. I’m five six, with hazel eyes, tawny hair, and a bod so hot I’m accelerating global warming. Interested in forming a private study group? Call—
Kidding! Kidding! DELETE.
Leona A:
I’m Leona and I—
“Leona?”
Startled, I clicked SEND before finishing. “Shit.”
“Oh, don’t worry, it won’t be so bad.” The cute, round-faced nurse gestured for me to follow her. She led me into a vanilla-scented room and conducted the preliminaries—weight, blood pressure, pulse—with friendly efficiency, and then handed me a fresh-from-the-warmer cotton gown cheerfully patterned with rainbows and daisies. “The doctor will be in shortly,” she promised, and then we both burst out laughing at the lie.
Dr. Bridget Rafferty, OB/GYN, was always late because she never rushed anyone out the door, which was one of the reasons I loved her.
She was two grades above me when we attended St. Monica’s High School, and though she stuck close to the honor society crowd and I to the gloomy, black-eyeliner-loving artistes, Bridget Rafferty always said hello in the hallways and smiled like she meant it. When I moved to Willow Falls three years ago and saw her shingle hanging in front of a refurbished Victorian, I walked in to make an appointment and never regretted it.
In addition to her gentle touch and lax attitude toward sketchy insurance companies, Dr. Bridget also offered free Wi-Fi in the waiting room, discount cards for local masseuses, an exotic selection of herbal teas, and a wild sense of humor. Photos of hot, shirtless guys were tacked to the exam room ceilings, which made lying bare-assed with your feet in the stirrups a not entirely unpleasant experience.
I made it through an entire issue of
Marie Claire
before I heard an assertive knock and an “Are you decent?”
Dr. Bridget came in and gave me a tight hug. “You’re looking good on the outside,” she said, smiling warmly at me. “So what’s going on with the inside?”
“Weird bleeding. I had my period last month, and then I had it again ten days after it finished. That’s never happened. I’m always every thirty days, like clockwork.” My voice sounded pissy, and I realized I was pissed off. I didn’t like catching my body doing what it shouldn’t be doing. It was a slippery slope. “I felt strange before it happened, foggy and tired, with major, soul-shatteringly bad PMS.”
“Have your PMS symptoms been more intense lately?”
“Yes. And if you asked my family, they’d say,
hell yes
.”
“It’s probably nothing,” Dr. Bridget assured me. “We’ll do an exam and maybe take a sample just to cover our bases.”
I loved how she always said “we,” like any gynecological battle would be fought side by side, but then a few minutes later, it was only
me
on the torture table, staring up at a poster of a shirtless Chris Hemsworth, my knees splayed open. “Ow!”
“This test really bites,” Dr. Bridget murmured, handing a vial with a tiny piece of my uterus to the nurse. “But it’s over. Get dressed and I’ll come back for a chat.”
I’m a quick dresser, so when she returned I was standing with my car keys in hand, messenger bag secured across my shoulder, ready to bolt.
Dr. Bridget wasn’t having it. She settled onto her doctor stool and put her feet up on the hazardous-materials receptacle. “Sit for a minute. Let’s talk.”
“Okay.”
“I’m going to be straight with you.”
“That’s good,” I said, though I felt a twinge in my lower belly that had nothing to do with the procedure I’d just endured.
Dr. Bridget exhaled. “Do you want to have a child, Leona?”
“Like, now?”
She leaned forward, and I could see the faint freckles splattered across her nose. “Don’t freak out, but I think what’s happened here is your ovaries have taken their first stumble. It’s a little early, but not uncommon. Did your mom go through menopause early?”
“She didn’t make it that far.”
Dr. Bridget looked stricken. “Oh, I’m sorry. I forgot.”
My mom died during my sophomore year of high school. The memories I had of her were as immovable as formal portraits—her copper-penny hair and confident smile fixed forever in place. Mom always seemed so poised, so polished, so
finished
as a person, but she’d only been thirty-seven when she passed away. I shook off my lingering sadness and refocused on Dr. Bridge. “So . . . you think I’m going through menopause?”
“No! Not yet. You might be in perimenopause, and that can last a long time. You’ll have symptoms—hot flashes, night sweats, anovulatory cycles . . .”
“Meaning?”
“Cycles where you don’t ovulate.”
“Oh.” That seemed like a waste.
“What I’m saying is, you’re thirty-nine years old. If you want a child in your life, then have one.”
“It’s that easy?”
“Well, maybe, maybe not. It depends on your situation.”
“My situation is I haven’t been on a date in nine months and the closest I’ve had to sex in over two years was when you just stuck that sadistic little scissors up my hoo-ha.”
Dr. Bridget laughed. “So glad you’re learning appropriate anatomical terminology in nursing school.” Eyes bright, she studied my expression, her relaxed posture telling me she had all the time in the world if I wanted to talk.
Did I? I’d laughed in doctors’ offices plenty of times, and cried in a few, too, but this topic was something I should think about by myself, late at night, just me staring at the ceiling and sorting carefully through my tender, fragile hopes and knife-sharp fears. I glanced away from the good doctor to give myself a moment, and my attention strayed to a photo set next to a bunch of IUD brochures—small, blonde Bridget with three smaller, blonder girls crawling all over her, their adorable rosebud mouths stretched open from laughter.
Did I want a baby? I liked babies. I even liked them when they weren’t babies anymore, but messy, loud, energy-zapping children. Did that make me mom material? Maybe. Maybe not. I was helping my younger sister, Carly, and her husband raise their own children, but more often than not I was a complete disaster. I could never remember to use the A+D when changing a diaper and often swore a blue streak using my outside voice inside the house, and I could not for the life of me figure out how to install a car seat without needing an emergency chiropractor appointment.
But I wasn’t always useless. Yesterday, Maura, Carly’s oldest, screeched and stomped around, claiming she’d hate me until the end of time for making her vacuum the house when her friends were outside having way more fun than anyone had ever had in the history of fun-having. I wouldn’t budge. Door slamming followed, and plenty of tears, but at the breakfast table this morning, she’d rested her cheek against my open palm and apologized, saying she was probably due for her first period, and would I believe her if she said she was trying really hard to not be such a head case?
I wanted to hug her, to tell her everything was fine and to not think twice, but instead, I took her small, pointed chin in my fingers and said, “I know you’re sorry, and I love you for it, but you need to understand that you’re too old for tantrums. Next time, take a deep breath, and tell yourself that real women know how to keep it together.”
“Okay, Auntie Lee,” she said, and kissed me on the cheek.
Carly nudged me on her way out the door. “And that’s the way to do it, sister. Brav-oh.”
So . . . I could do it. I could
parent
. If I wanted to.
Did
I want to? I closed my eyes and tried to imagine myself with a baby, but all I could picture was my nephew Patrick holding one of Maura’s old dolls on his lap, calmly braiding her plastic hair when he thought no one was looking. Was that symbolic, or simply evidence I was incapable of picturing myself with a child because it had been too long since I’d thought about myself with anyone? Then again, I couldn’t discount the possibility that my imagination had worn itself down to nonexistence from constant neglect.
I tried again, focusing on the emotions swirling inside me. Were they the right ones? Could I even tell?
“Leona? Is everything all right?”
“Yes,” I said in a quiet but steady voice. The word had come quick and sure and strong. “I mean, yes, I would like to have a baby.”
Dr. Bridget placed her hand over mine. “There are all kinds of ways to make that happen. I just want you to know that. Give it some thought.”
We stood, and she walked me out, her arm around my waist. “Take some time for yourself. Do some reflecting, and not too much Googling. Talk to someone you trust.”
When we reached the waiting room, she opened the door to half a dozen hopeful-looking women, most of them in advanced stages of pregnancy, clothes stretched tight across rounded bellies. Dr. Bridget gave them a little wave, and they all straightened their posture and grinned at her like bachelorettes competing for a rose.
“I’m not trying to pressure you,” Dr. Bridget said, turning to me, her voice soft and low, “but I’ve seen my share of regret over the years. It weakens the heart more insidiously than grief, and only gets worse instead of better. I don’t want that for you.”
I don’t want that for me either,
I wanted to say, but Dr. Bridget had already closed the door behind her. The pregnant women dismissed me with quick, sidelong glances toward the exit. It was time for me to go. I didn’t belong.