“You did great.” Mitch set his tape recorder aside. “And I’d say you’ve had enough for today.”
“It’s been a busy one.” She worked up a smile as she looked around the room. “Did I wig everybody out?”
“You could say that. Look, why don’t you go up, stretch out,” Stella suggested. “Logan will go out, check on the kids. Right?”
“Sure.” He stepped over to Hayley first, gave her head a pat. “Go on up, beautiful, take a load off.”
“I think I will, thanks.” Harper straightened, took her hand to bring her to her feet. “I don’t know what I’d do without you guys, I really don’t.”
Roz waited until they were out of the room. “This is wearing on her. I’ve never seen her look so tired. Hayley’s a bundle of energy most times. Hell, she wears me out just watching her.”
“We’ve got to finish this.” Logan walked to the door, opened it. “And soon,” he said before he went outside.
“What can we do?” Stella spread her hands. “Waiting and watching doesn’t seem like enough. I don’t know about the rest of you, but seeing that happen, seeing it, shook me right down to the bone.”
“I could go to Boston, help Veronica sort through the papers.” Mitch shook his head. “But I’m just not comfortable leaving right now.”
“Safety in numbers?” Roz reached out a hand for his, squeezed. “I feel the same. To tell the truth, at this point I don’t like David spending so much time alone in the house.”
“She doesn’t bother me.” He’d poured a glass of wine and lifted it now in a half toast. “Maybe because I’m not a blood-related male. Add gay to that and I’m not of much interest to her. You can factor in that she’d see me as a servant. That puts me bottom of the feeding chain.”
“A lot she knows,” Roz replied. “But that’s logical, from her point of view, and does a lot to relieve my mind. Find her. She’s said that before.”
“Her grave,” Mitch put in.
“I think we’re all agreed on that.” Roz walked over, helped herself to a sip of David’s wine. “And how the hell are we supposed to do that?”
LATER, WHEN THE house was quiet and Lily slept in her crib, Hayley couldn’t settle. “One minute I’m ready to drop, and the next I’m all revved up. I must be really annoying.”
“Now that you mention it.” With a grin, Harper pulled her down on the sofa beside him. “Why don’t we watch the game. I’ll raid the kitchen for junk food.”
“You want me to sit here and watch baseball?”
“I thought you liked baseball.”
“Yeah, but not enough to zone out in front of the TV.”
“Okay.” He heaved an exaggerated sigh. “I’m about to make the ultimate sacrifice for my breed. Pick a DVD. We’ll watch a movie, even if it’s a chick flick.”
She eased back. “Really?”
“But you have to make the popcorn.”
“You mean you’ll sit here and watch a girlie movie without making snide comments?”
“I don’t remember agreeing to the second part.”
“You know, I like action flicks.”
“Now we’re talking.”
“But I’d love to watch something romancey, with a couple of good weep scenes. Thanks!” She pressed her lips noisily to his, then jumped up. “I’m loading the popcorn with butter.” At the door, she stopped and beamed back at him. “I feel better already.”
SHE’D NEVER HAD so many ups and downs in her moods in all of her life. From manic energy to exhaustion, from joy to despair. She ran the gamut, it seemed, every day. And under the swings, the spurts, and the tumbles was an edgy anticipation of what happens next. And when.
When she spiraled down, she struggled to remind herself of what she had. A beautiful child, a wonderful man who loved her, friends, family, a good interesting job. And still, once the spiral began, she couldn’t seem to control the fall.
She worried there was something physically wrong with her. A chemical imbalance, a brain tumor. Maybe she was going as crazy as The Bride.
Feeling harassed and overtired, she swung into Wal-Mart on her morning off to pick up diapers, shampoo, a few other basics. She could only thank God to be able to snatch this little window of alone time. Or alone with Lily time, she corrected, as she strapped her daughter in the shopping cart.
At least nobody felt they were obliged to watch her when she was away from Harper House or work. And watching was what they did. Like hawks.
She understood why, God knew she appreciated the concern and care. But that didn’t stop her from feeling smothered. She could barely start to brush her teeth without whoever was hovering offering to spread the paste on the brush for her.
She wandered down aisles, listlessly picking up what she needed. Then she detoured into cosmetics, thinking a new lipstick might cheer her up. But the shades seemed too dark or too light, too bold or too dull. Nothing suited her.
She looked so pale and wan these days, she decided if she put anything bright on her lips they’d look as though they walked into the room a foot ahead of her.
New perfume maybe. But every tester she sniffed made her feel slightly queasy.
“Just forget it,” she muttered, and glanced back at Lily who was trying to stretch out her arm to reach a spin rack of mascaras and eye pencils.
“Not for a long time yet, young lady. It’s fun being a girl though, you’ll see. All these toys we get to play with.” She chose one of the mascaras herself, tossed it in the cart. “I just can’t seem to gear myself up for it right now. We’ll just go on, get your diapers. And maybe if you’re good, a new board book.”
She turned down another aisle, reluctant to leave. Once she did, she’d need to take Lily to the sitter’s, go to work. Where somebody would be attached to her hip for the rest of the day.
She wanted to do something normal, damn it. More, she wanted to feel like doing something. Anything.
And an absent glance to her right stopped her in her tracks.
Something that was both panic and nausea, with a helping of dull realization spurted into her belly. It continued to rise as she did hasty calculations in her head.
While everything inside her sank, Hayley closed her eyes. She opened them again, looked into Lily’s happy face. And reached for the home pregnancy test.
SHE DROPPED LILY off, kept a smile plastered on her face until she walked out the door to her car. Afraid to do otherwise, she kept her mind blank while she drove home. She wouldn’t think, she wouldn’t project. She would just go home, take the test. Twice. When it came out negative, which of course it would, she’d hide the packages somewhere until she could dispose of them without anyone knowing she’d had a panic attack.
She wasn’t pregnant again. She absolutely couldn’t be pregnant again.
She parked, and made certain the boxes were buried at the bottom of her bag and well hidden. But she’d taken two steps into the house when David appeared like some magic genie.
“Hi, sugar, want a hand with that?”
“No.” She gripped the bag to her chest like a cache of gold. “No,” she repeated more calmly. “I’m just going to take these things up. And I have to pee, if that’s all the same to you.”
“It is. I often have to pee myself.”