The Midwife's Confession. Diane Chamberlain

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      “Yeah, you were Miss Perfect, like always,” she said.

      “I’m not saying that,” I said. “I’m just trying to tell you some possible ways to cope.” I twisted my wedding ring on my finger. I was doing that a lot lately whenever I felt tense. Whenever I felt as though I needed Sam by my side.

      “You just stay busy so you don’t have to think about anything,” Grace said. “So you can forget about how messed up your life has gotten.”

      “Oh, Grace.” I shook my head. “It has nothing to do with that. Being involved in things is just healthy.” I stopped twisting my ring and laid my hands flat on my thighs. “You know,” I said, “we haven’t talked about this in a while, but I wish you’d seriously consider joining the drama club. You don’t have to act. You’re such a good writer. You could write plays. I know you’re afraid it would seem weird, since I’m the—”

      “You don’t know me at all!” She slapped her notebook down on her desk. “I’m not you, okay? I don’t deal with stuff the same way you do.”

      “No. I know you don’t.” I slumped a little on her bed. I was failing with her again. “And that’s okay. It was just a thought.”

      “I really need to study.” She lifted her biology book an inch or two off her lap to show me how I was interrupting her.

      “All right.” I pushed myself off her bed, walked over to her chair and leaned down to give her a hug. She was stiff as a board beneath my arms. “I’ll call you when dinner’s ready,” I said.

      I left her room, shutting her door behind me, and stood in the hallway feeling frustrated and a little lost. This chilly girl who treated me with such impatience and disdain was not the Grace I’d known and loved for sixteen years. This was a girl who was angry with me. I wasn’t sure exactly why. For going back to work only two weeks after Sam died? She’d been horrified by that, but I’d needed to stay as busy as possible to survive. Was she still angry I’d gotten rid of Sam’s things? Did she think I was betraying him by seeing Ian?

      One thing I knew for certain was that, rightly or wrongly, she blamed me for Sam’s death.

      There were moments when I even blamed myself.

      12

       Emerson

      It was Friday afternoon, and I thought I would finally have some time to myself to look through the box of Noelle’s cards and letters. Jenny was still at school, Ted was showing a property to a client and I’d closed up the café after the lunch crowd. People were telling me I should start serving dinner, but lunch and breakfast were all I could manage. Right now I could hardly keep up with that.

      When I got home, I was surprised to find Jenny and Grace in the bonus room above the garage, sorting through the stuff for the babies program.

      “What are you two doing home?” I asked, surveying the neat piles they were making of clothing and blankets.

      “Half day today,” Jenny said. She gave me a hug. Jenny was a hugger and always had been. She got it from me. She sure didn’t get it from Ted.

      “How are you doing, Grace?” I asked, picking up a tiny yellow hand-knit sweater from one of the piles. “God, this stuff is cute.”

      “I’m good,” Grace said. “I totally suck at sewing, though.” She held one of the little blankets toward me and I had to laugh at the puckered hem. “The rest I did are better,” she said. “It was the tension on the machine. Mom had to fix it for me.”

      I could picture Grace sewing. Maybe even enjoying it. She’d always loved things she could do alone. Writing. Reading. Drawing.

      “Listen,” I said. “Suzanne’s party is in a couple of weeks and Tara and I can really use some help with the decorations. Would you two have the time to—”

      “Suzanne’s having a party?” Grace looked up from the blanket she was folding.

      I nodded. “Her fiftieth birthday party,” I said. “We’re going to have it here at the house and—”

      “Will Cleve come home for it?” she asked. Her face was so hopeful, so filled with longing, that I could hardly bear to look at her.

      “I’m not sure, honey,” I said. “Maybe.” A light had gone out of Grace’s eyes when Cleve broke up with her.

      Grace dropped the blanket she’d been holding and pulled her phone from her pocket. I watched as she texted a message—to Cleve, no doubt. Jenny watched, too, and I didn’t miss the worry in my daughter’s face.

      Jenny looked up at me. “We can help, Mom,” she said.

      “Great,” I said. “And one other thing. When I spoke to Suzanne this morning, she said a couple of preemies were born overnight and asked if one—or both—of you could take a couple of layettes over to the hospital this afternoon.”

      “Sure,” Jenny said. She loved any excuse to drive now that she had her license.

      Grace looked up from her phone. “Can you drop me off home first?” she asked Jenny.

      “Don’t you want to see the babies?” Jenny asked.

      Grace shook her head, but I knew it wasn’t the babies she didn’t want to see. It was the hospital. Tara had told me that Grace couldn’t even look at the road sign for the hospital these days without going pale.

      “They need to go over this afternoon sometime,” I said, “so I’ll let you two work it out.”

      “Okay,” Jenny answered.

      I headed for the stairs and was halfway down them when I heard Jenny ask Grace, “What does he say?”

      I stopped walking and stood still, snooping.

      “Can’t miss it or she’d disown me,” Grace said. I pictured her reading the text message from her phone display. I could hear the smile in her voice. The hope.

      Oh, Gracie, I thought. He’s eighteen and in college, honey. There’s no place for this to go.

      Downstairs, I headed for our home office where the box of Noelle’s cards was waiting for me. The box was beginning to feel like another person in my house, a person with too much power for the space she took up. It was our last hope, that box. Nothing in Noelle’s house had given us answers. Tara and I had spoken with the staff at every single obstetrical office in a twenty-mile radius, and they all knew what we hadn’t known: Noelle gave up midwifery years ago. Few of them had seen her recently, so we didn’t bother asking if they knew she was depressed. Suzanne and the other volunteers were all coming to us with that question. Whatever had been bugging Noelle, she’d kept it to herself. I suspected that the box wasn’t going to give us the answer, either, but if I ignored it, at least it gave me hope.

      No more excuses. I had time now. I was going to start digging.

      Ted and I shared our home office. It was a big low-ceilinged room that the previous owners had added on as an in-law suite … for СКАЧАТЬ