Then one morning in September, I woke up and felt like walking again.
“Do you want some company?” Tanya rasped.
I shook my head. My mother watched me lace up my sneakers, her brow furrowed. “Do you want to take the baby?” she asked.
I stared at Joy. I hadn’t even considered it.
“She might like some fresh air,” said my mother.
“I don’t think so,” I said slowly.
“She won’t break,” said my mother.
“She might,” I replied, feeling my eyes fill. “She almost did before.”
“Babies are stronger than you give them credit for,” she said. “Joy’s going to be okay… and you can’t keep her inside forever.”
“Not even if I home-school?” I asked. My mother grinned and handed me the Snugli baby carrier. Awkwardly, I strapped it over my chest, and lifted Joy inside.
She was so small, still, so small, she felt like an autumn leaf against me. Nifkin looked at me and pawed my leg, whining softly. So I hitched him to his leash and took him, too. We walked slowly, down to the edge of the driveway, then out onto the street, moving at a pace that would have made an arthritic snail look speedy. It was the first time I’d been out on the street since I’d arrived, and I felt terrified— of the cars, of the people, of everything, I thought ruefully. Joy nestled against me with her eyes closed. Nifkin marched beside me, growling at cars that went by. “Look, baby,” I whispered against Joy’s downy head. “Look at the world.”
When we got back from our morning walk Peter’s car was parked in the driveway. Inside, my mother and Tanya and Peter were sitting around the kitchen table.
“Cannie!” said my mother.
“Hello,” said Peter.
“We were just talking about you,” Tanya said. Even after close to a month smoke-free, she still sounded like Marge Simpson’s sisters.
“Hey,” I said to Peter, pleased to see him. I gave a genial wave, then unstrapped Joy, wrapped her in a blanket, and sat down with her in my lap. My mother poured me tea as Joy stared at Peter, wide-eyed. He’d been over before, of course, but she’d always been asleep. So this was their first real meeting.
“Hello, baby,” Peter said solemnly. Joy screwed up her face and started to cry. Peter looked distressed.
“Oh, I’m sorry,” he began.
“Don’t worry about it,” I told him, turning Joy so that she faced me, and rocking her until her sobs subsided into whimpers, then hiccoughs, then quiet.
“She isn’t used to men,” said Tanya. I thought of at least six snappy comebacks to that, but prudently kept my mouth shut.
“I think babies are scared of me,” Peter said, sounding mournful. “I think it’s my voice.”
“Joy’s heard all kinds of voices,” I said tartly. My mother shot me an evil look. Tanya didn’t seem to notice.
“She’s not scared,” I said. She was, in fact, asleep, her lips slightly parted and her eyelashes long and dark against her rosy cheeks where there were still tears drying. “Here,” I said, “see?”
I wiped her face and tilted Joy toward him so he could see. He leaned down, looking at her. “Wow,” he said reverently. He reached out one long, slender finger and gently touched her cheek. I beamed down at Joy, who promptly woke up, took one look at Peter, and started bawling again.
“She’ll get over it,” I said. “Rude baby!” I whispered in her ear.
“Maybe she’s hungry,” said Tanya.
“Wet diaper,” suggested my Mom.
“Disappointed with ABC’s prime-time lineup,” I said.
Peter cracked up.
“Well, she’s a very discerning viewer,” I said, bouncing Joy against my shoulder. “She really liked Sports Night.” Once she’d settled down, I helped myself to tea, and to a fistful of the chocolate-chip cookies in the center of the table. I added an apple from the fruit bowl and went to work.
Peter looked at me approvingly. “You look much better,” he pronounced.
“You say that every time you see me,” I told him.
“You do,” he insisted. “Much healthier.”
And it was true. With three meals a day, plus snacks, I was quickly regaining my old prediet Anna Nicole Smith proportions. And I continued to welcome the changes. I could see it all differently now. My legs were sturdy and strong, not fat or ungainly. My breasts now had a purpose besides stretching out my sweaters and making it hard to find a non-beige bra. Even my waist and hips, riddled with silvery stretch marks, suggested strength, and told a story. I might be a big girl, I reasoned, but it wasn’t the worst thing in the world. I was a safe harbor and a soft place to rest. Built for comfort, not for speed, I thought, and giggled at myself. Peter smiled at me. “Much healthier,” he said again.
“They’ll kick you out of the weight-loss center if it gets out about your telling me that,” I said.
He shrugged as if it didn’t matter. “I think you look fine. I always did,” he said. My mother was beaming. I shot her a mind-your-own-business look and settled Joy in my lap.
“So,” I said, “what brings you to these parts?”
“Actually,” he said, “I was wondering if you and Joy would like to go for a ride.”
I felt my chest tighten again. Joy and I hadn’t gone anywhere in the car since her arrival, except for checkups at the hospital. “Where to?” I asked, trying to sound casual.
“Down the shore,” he said, using the typical Philadelphia construction. “Just for a little drive.”
It sounded nice. It also sounded absolutely terrifying. “I’m not sure,” I said regretfully. “I’m not sure she’s ready.”
“She’s not ready, or you’re not ready?” asked my helpful mother. I sent her an even more intense mind-your-own-business look.
“I’ll be there,” Peter said. “So you’ll have medical assistance, if you need it.”
“Go on, Cannie,” said my mother.
“It’ll be good for you,” urged Tanya.
I stared at him. He smiled at me. I sighed, knowing I was defeated. “Just a short ride,” I said, and he nodded, eager as a schoolboy, and stood up to help me.
Of course, it took a while— forty-five minutes, to be precise, and three bags full of diapers, hats, socks, sweaters, stroller, bottles, blankets, and assorted baby paraphernalia, all shoved in the trunk— before we were ready to leave. Then Joy got stowed in the infant seat, I sat on the passenger’s side, Peter took the wheel, and we headed down to the Jersey shore.
Peter and I talked a little at first— about his job, about Lucy and Maxi and how Andy’d actually gotten a death threat after savaging one of Philadelphia’s famous old fish-houses that had been coasting on its reputation and so-so snapper soup for decades. Then, when we turned on to the Atlantic City Expressway, he smiled at me and touched a button on the dashboard, and the roof over our heads slid away.
“A moon roof!” I said, impressed.
“Thought you’d like it!” he shouted back.
I looked back at Joy, tucked snug in her infant seat, wondering if the wind would be too much. But she actually looked like she was enjoying it. The little pink ribbon I’d tied in her hair, so that everyone would know she was a girl, was bobbing in the breeze, and her eyes were wide open.
We drove to Ventnor and parked in a lot two blocks from the beach. Peter unfolded Joy’s complicated carriage while I got her out of the car, wrapped her in more blankets than the warm September day merited, and set her into the carriage. We walked slowly down to the water, me pushing, Peter walking beside me. The sunshine felt wonderful, thick as honey on my shoulders, making my hair glow.
“Thank you,” I said. He shrugged and looked embarrassed.
“I’m glad you like it,” he said.
We walked on the boardwalk— up for twenty minutes, back for another twenty, because I’d decided I didn’t want Joy outside for more than an hour. Except the salt air didn’t seem to be bothering her. She’d fallen fast asleep, her little rosebud mouth slack, her pink ribbon coming unfurled, and her fine brown hair curling around her cheeks. I leaned close to hear her breathing, and to check her diaper. She was fine.
Peter returned to my side with a blanket in his arms. “Want to sit on the beach?” he asked.
I nodded. He unfolded the blanket, I unstrapped Joy, and we walked down close to the water and sat there, watching the waves break. I worked my toes into the warm sand, and stared at the white foam, the blue-green depths, the black edge of the ocean against the horizon, and thought of all the things I couldn’t see: sharks and bluefish and starfish, whales singing to each other, secret lives that I would never know.
Peter draped another blanket over my shoulders, and let his hands linger there for a few seconds.
“Cannie,” he began. “I want to tell you something.”
I gave him what I hoped was an encouraging smile.
“That day on Kelly Drive, when you and Samantha were walking,” he said, and cleared his throat.
“Right,” I said. “Go on.”
“Well,” he said. “I, um… I’m not actually a jogger.”
I looked at him, confused.
“I just… well, I remember how in class you used to say you went on bike rides there, and you’d go for walks, and I didn’t feel that I could call you…”
“So you started jogging?”
“Every day,” he confessed. “Morning and night, and sometimes on my lunch hour. Until I saw you.”
I sat back, surprised by the extent of his dedication, knowing that if it were me, no matter how much I felt that I wanted to see the other person, it probably wouldn’t be enough to get me to jog. “I, um, have shinsplints now,” he mumbled, and I burst out laughing.
“It serves you right!” I said. “You could’ve just called me…”
“But I couldn’t,” he said. “First of all, you were a patient…”
“Was a patient,” I said.
“And you were, um…”
“Pregnant with another man’s child,” I supplied.
“You were oblivious!” he exclaimed. “Completely oblivious! That was the worst part! There I was, mooning after you, giving myself shinsplints…”
I giggled some more.
“And first you were sad about Bruce, who even I could tell wasn’t right for you…”
“You were hardly objective,” I told him, but he wasn’t through.
“And then you were in California, and that wasn’t right for you, either”
“California’s very nice,” I said, in California’s defense.
He sat down next to me and wrapped his arms around my shoulders, pulling me and Joy tightly against him. “I thought you were never coming home,” he said. “I couldn’t stand it. I thought I’d never see you again, and I didn’t know what to do with myself.”
I smiled at him, turning so I could look him in the eye. The sun was setting over us, and seagulls swooped and squawked above the waves.
“But I did come home,” I said. “See? No shinsplints necessary.”
“I’m glad,” he said, and I leaned against him, letting him support me, with the setting sun glowing in his hair and the warm sand cradling my feet, and my baby, my Joy, safe in my arms.
“So I guess the question is,” I began, in his car on the way home, “what do I do with my life now?”
He smiled at me quickly before turning his eyes back to the road. “I was actually thinking more along the lines of whether you wanted to stop for dinner.”
“Sure,” I said. Joy was asleep in her infant seat. We’d lost her pink ribbon somewhere, but I could see sand glittering on her bare feet. “So now that we’ve got that settled…”
“Do you want to go back to work?” he asked me.
I thought about it. “I think so,” I said. “Eventually. I miss it,” I said. Knowing, as soon as I said it, that it was the truth. “I don’t think I’ve ever gone this long without writing something. God help me, I even miss my brides.”
“So what do you want to write?” he asked. “What do you want to write about?”
I considered the question.
“Newspaper articles?” he prompted. “Another screenplay? A book?”
“A book,” I scoffed. “As if!”
“It could happen,” he said.
“I don’t think I’ve got a book in me,” I said.
“If you did,” he said seriously, “I’d devote all of my medical training to getting it out.”
I laughed. Joy woke up and made a questioning noise. I looked back and waved at her. She stared at me, then yawned and went back to sleep.
“Maybe not a book,” I said, “but I would like to write something about this.”
“Magazine article?” he suggested.
“Maybe,” I said.
“Good,” he said, sounding like it had been settled once and for all. “I can’t wait to see it.”
The next morning, after I’d walked with Joy, had breakfast with Tanya, talked to Samantha on the phone, and made plans to see Peter the next night, I went down to the basement and fetched the dusty little Apple that had gotten me through four years of Princeton. I wasn’t expecting much, but when I plugged it in it chugged and bleeped and lit up obligingly. And even though the keyboard felt strange under my hands, I took a deep breath, wiped the dust from the screen, and started writing.
Loving a Larger Woman
by Candace Shapiro
When I was five I learned to read. Books were a miracle to me— white pages, black ink, and new worlds and different friends in each one. To this day, I relish the feeling of cracking a binding for the first time, the anticipation of where I’ll go and whom I’ll meet inside.
When I was eight I learned to ride a bike. And this, too, opened my eyes to a new world that I could explore on my own— the brook that burbled through a vacant lot two streets over, the ice-cream store that sold homemade cones for a dollar, the orchard that bordered a golf course and that smelled tangy, like cider, from the apples that rolled to the ground in the fall.
When I was twelve I learned that I was fat. My father told me, pointing at the insides of my thighs and the undersides of my arms with the handle of his tennis racquet. We’d been playing, I remember, and I was flushed and sweaty, glowing with the joy of movement. You’ll need to watch that, he told me, poking me with the handle so that the extra flesh jiggled. Men don’t like fat women.
And even though this would turn out not to be absolutely true— there would be men who would love me, and there would be people who’d respect me— I carried his words into my adulthood like a prophecy, viewing the world through the prism of my body, and my father’s prediction.