I had to force myself to eat, knowing I needed it, but there was hardly any taste to it. Lillian kept giving me the eye as she worked around the kitchen, and at one point when she refilled my cup, she put a comforting hand on my shoulder. Tears sprang to my eyes, and I almost choked on a piece of cantaloupe. I didn’t often give up once I’d set my mind to something, but this situation with Hazel Marie had about defeated me.
I looked up as the door from the dining room was pushed open and Hazel Marie walked in. I tried to smile but was stopped in my tracks at the expression on her face.
“Miss Julia,” she said, grasping the back of a chair, her face white and drawn. “I think I need to go to the doctor.”
I sprang from my chair. “What is it? Are you throwing up again?”
“No’m, it’s something else—bad. Worse, even. Please, would you take me? I don’t think I ought to drive.”
Lillian ran to her and put an arm around her. “Lord, lord, honey. Set yo’self down and don’t be movin’ too much. Miss Julia, we better get her on ’fore she lose that baby.”
“Oh, my goodness, yes.” I grabbed my pocketbook and looked frantically for the car keys. “Help her out to the car, Lillian, and let’s go.”
Lillian practically carried Hazel Marie to the car, even though she protested that she felt well enough to walk by herself. But Lillian got her settled in the front seat, then climbed into the back. “I’m goin’, too,” she said, and I was glad to have her.
Little was said on our way to the doctor’s office, so intent was everybody to get there. At one point I mentioned the fact that Dr. Hargrove should be back by now and saw tears streaming down Hazel Marie’s face.
“I was hoping I wouldn’t have to see him,” she whispered.
“And I was hoping you would,” I said. “He will be nothing but professional. And
kind
, Hazel Marie. You will be in good hands.”
There was no question of waiting our turn when we got there and told the receptionist the problem. Hazel Marie was immediately taken to an examining room, and Dr. Hargrove himself came out and ushered Lillian and me to his office.
“Wait in here, Miss Julia,” he said. “You’ll be more comfortable and I’ll see you after I’ve looked her over.”
If I hadn’t been so worried I’d have been pleased. This was how a physician should treat a long-time patient, dinner companion, and fellow church member.
“Lillian,” I murmured as we waited, and after I’d looked at the bookshelves, the family pictures on the desk, and the diplomas on the wall. “I hate to say this, but if Hazel Marie’s in no danger, this could really solve all our problems.”
“No’m, Miss Julia, don’t say that. We don’t wanta lose that little baby. Miss Hazel Marie might think she don’t want it, but she do. If she lose it, she be worse upset than if she don’t. When the Lord send a baby, he send the wantin’, too.”
I nodded, deciding to stop praying for either outcome and leave that to the one in charge, but my poor pocketbook got kneaded to death as we waited.
After a good half hour, the door swung open and Dr. Hargrove, still with that beard I couldn’t understand why he’d grown or kept, walked in and took his seat behind the desk.
“Lillian,” he said, “she’s getting dressed and might need some help. She’s in the second room across the hall.”
Lillian jumped up, eager to be of help, and left.
“How is she, Doctor?” I asked, leaning toward him.
“She’s fine for now. These things happen, Miss Julia, sometimes as a warning of worse to come and other times for no reason at all. There can be ups and downs in any pregnancy, as you know. Well, perhaps you don’t. But right now, all we can do is wait and see.” He propped his large arms on the desk and looked directly at me. “Now, I assume that Hazel Marie’s condition has created some problems for all of you, and anytime you want to talk about it, I’ll be glad to listen. But for now, my concern is for Hazel Marie. What I want you to do is take her home and put her to bed. I want her flat on her back for several days until we see what’s going to happen. She can get up to go to the bathroom, but no going up and down stairs and no strenuous activity. If at any time she gets worse, get her to the hospital and call me.”
I was nodding all the way through these instructions, yet when he stopped I hardly knew what to ask. “But she’s all right for now?”
“She is,” he confirmed, and I was reassured by his confidence. That’s what a patient wants from a doctor, not any of this hemming and hawing and possible this and possible that. “Now, while I had her here, I went ahead and did a sonogram, but I’ll let her tell you about that.”
The last time a doctor said similar words to me, I got a shock I still hadn’t recovered from. But I nodded agreeably, thinking that modern science was remarkable for being able to predict the gender of an unborn child a little more accurately than dangling a pencil on a string. So Hazel Marie perhaps knew whether we were to have a little Pickens or a little Puckett when the time came to have it. Not that it mattered, since I still didn’t know what we’d do with either one.
Chapter 25
“Two!”
My foot slipped off the brake onto the gas pedal as I backed out of the parking slot. The car jolted to a stop with a shattering crunch, snapping my head forward. Metal scraped against metal, and Lillian ended up hung over the front seat, screeching her head off.
“Oh, sweet Jesus!” Lillian shrieked. “You done hit something.” She had her arms wrapped around Hazel Marie, holding on tight. “You all right? Are you all right?”
“Oh, Lord!” I cried, thinking I’d ruined Hazel Marie as well as my car. I flung open the door and sprang out to see what the damage was. I knew what I’d hit. I’d seen it big as life before I started backing out. I mean, who wouldn’t have seen something as big as a Dempster Dumpster?
Walking to the rear of the brand new car I’d purchased for my trip to Palm Beach only a few months before, I surveyed the result of a foot slippage. There was a huge dent in the trunk and the bumper was caved in with one end dangling on the pavement. The corner of the Dumpster where I’d hit it had only a little chrome and black paint on it, which would wash off in the first rain and nobody’d ever be the wiser.
I got back in the car, reassured myself as to Hazel Marie’s welfare, and moved the gear shift into drive. Then I proceeded out of the parking lot, looking straight ahead as if nothing had happened, while one end of the bumper bounced up and down, scraping against the pavement with sparks flying everywhere.
“Hazel Marie,” I said, “I will never forgive myself if you got jolted too much. How’re you feeling? Are you all right? Lillian, is she all right?”
“I’m fine, Miss Julia,” Hazel Marie said. “Really I am. It wasn’t much of a jolt.”
“It big enough to th’ow me over yo’ head,” Lillian said as she sat back and searched for the seat belt, which she should’ve had on to start with. “I better strap myself in good, what with people runnin’ into Dipsy Dumpsters an’ messin’ up they cars.”
“Don’t worry about the car,” I said grimly. “I’m worried about Hazel Marie. Besides, they don’t make cars like they used to.”
What was a repair bill, even of monumental proportions, in the face of not just one, but two, illegitimate babies? There’d be no way to explain away twins as Hazel Marie’s sudden impulse to adopt a needy child, no way to let her go off by herself and deal with two plus Lloyd. All I could think of as the grinding, clattering bumper scraped along behind us was that Mr. Pickens had an awful lot to answer for.
Twins!
What had the man been thinking?
After I’d pulled into the driveway, Lillian and Hazel Marie walked behind the car to behold the wreckage.
“Law, Miss Julia,” Lillian said, “that gonna cost you a mint to get fixed.”
Hazel Marie moaned and began to tear up again. “It’s all my fault. I’m so sorry, Miss Julia.”
“It’s nobody’s fault,” I said, not wanting to talk about it. “I got distracted, that’s all. Now, stop worrying about it. I still have my little car, so I’ll be driving it for a while. Oh, look, Hazel Marie,” I went on as we got to the back door. “Here’s Mr. Pickens’s card. I guess he came by like he said he would.”
“Well, he can keep on going,” she said. “Besides, he came to get you.” She turned to me, her mouth trembling. “I’m sorry I messed up your plans. I know you’re doing something for Mr. Sam.”
“Hazel Marie,” I said, pushing open the door and walking in, “will you please stop being sorry for everything? We have to get you taken care of and nothing’s more important than that, including doing something for Sam with Mr. Pickens. They can both take a backseat for a few days. Now, I want you to sit right down and rest. Lillian and I have some moving to do. I’m going to put you in our room, and Sam and I will move upstairs.”
“Oh, Miss Julia, you don’t have to do that.”
“Yes, I do. The doctor said no going up and down the stairs. Come on, Lillian, let’s get started.”
It took the rest of the afternoon to get the job done, but before we started, I’d called Ralph Peterson to come get my car and tell me in dollars and cents what the damage would be. I urged him to get a move on before everybody in town saw what I’d done and never let me forget it.
Lillian and I changed the sheets on my and Sam’s bed first and put Hazel Marie in it. Then we moved a few necessary clothes from one closet to another and exchanged toiletries in the bathrooms, going up and down the stairs a hundred times. I declare, though, like Lillian had said, Hazel Marie’s room was covered in clothes she’d had out getting ready to pack. We got those hung back up and made a little room for what Sam and I would need for the next several days.
Hazel Marie watched the comings and goings from our bed, but I had to keep telling her to keep her head flat.
“But I feel all right,” she said. “And nothing’s happening now.”
“Well, I’m glad,” I replied, “but that’s not the point. Dr. Hargrove said flat on your back, and that’s the way I want you.”
She turned her face away and murmured, “Maybe it would be better all around if . . .”
“No,” I said firmly, “we’re not going to think that way. Why, Hazel Marie, one or both of those babies could be president one day. Or they could discover the cure for a terrible disease, or one could be a famous musician or even a preacher.” I stopped and considered for a minute, wondering what would impress her more than that. “Or just be fine and decent men or women, or man and woman, who would be a blessing to you in your old age.” I leaned over and straightened her covers. “There’s a purpose for every soul that comes into this world, and what you have to do is follow the doctor’s orders. Then if you lose them, you can rest assured that that’s the way it’s supposed to be. And if you don’t, then that’s the way it’s supposed to be, too. Just be Presbyterian enough, Hazel Marie, to trust that whatever happens is what is supposed to happen. What will be, will be, you know.”
She smiled a little. “I think that’s a song.”
The back door slammed and Lloyd came running in, sweaty from his tennis exertions and highly agitated. “Miss Julia! Your car’s all messed up!”
“Oh, my word,” I said, meeting him in the hall. “Ralph Peterson was supposed to have that car in the shop. I’m calling him again.”
“But what happened?” Lloyd asked. “Somebody wrecked it?”
Lillian walked out just then. “Wadn’t no
somebody
,” she said. “A Dipsy Dumpster did it.”
So then I had to explain, but when I got to the point of telling him that his mother had been put back to bed, he lost interest in car wreckage. “Just a little relapse,” I assured him, as he headed in to see her.
“Oh, Lillian,” I murmured, leading the way to the kitchen, “I don’t know how long we can keep this up. Something’s got to give, sooner or later.”
“Some lemonade be good right about now,” she said. “Let me make us a pitcher.”
“Gladly,” I said, collapsing in a chair at the table. “Hazel Marie looks all right, doesn’t she? I mean, she’d let us know if something happens, won’t she?”
“Yessum,” she said, getting out the sugar and the lemons. “Like I tole you, she don’t want to lose that baby.
Them
babies, I mean. Law, Miss Julia, can you believe us having two of ’em? Think how many years this house have no chil’ren at all, an’ now it gonna be crawlin’ with ’em.”
So I sat there and thought about the empty years. Then I thought about what it would be like with two more besides Lloyd. If they turned out to be as satisfactory as he was, I would have no complaints. None at all, regardless of what the town thought.
Lillian put a glass of lemonade in front of me, then left to take two more glasses in to Hazel Marie and Lloyd. I’d just picked up my glass when I heard Sam’s footsteps outside.
“Julia,” he said, coming in the door, “what happened to your car?”
“Oh, nothing much, Sam,” I said, getting up to pour lemonade for him. “It’s just a little ding, nothing to get upset about.”
Sam’s eyebrows went up. “You didn’t get hurt, did you?”
“Nobody got hurt but the car and a Dumpster. But I’ve already called Ralph to come get it. So let’s not worry about it.”
I had had enough of the inordinate interest everybody was taking in the condition of my car. When something goes wrong, the polite thing to do is to pretend you don’t notice and carry on with general conversation. I just hated having attention drawn to any little mishap that could’ve happened to anybody, but if Ralph Peterson didn’t come on soon, half the town would stop by to tell me my car was wrecked. As if I didn’t know it.
“One good thing,” I told Sam that evening after I’d related, out of Lloyd’s hearing, the highlights of the afternoon, “she won’t be going anywhere anytime soon. But can you believe twins? It’s more than I can take in and just complicates matters that much more.”