family values, aggressively insulting her mother, and doing something that would affect her life forever, and the child’s. A baby and no marriage was huge, with a man she’d known for three months, and who might or might not stick around. At least he had offered to marry her, and Claire had refused, but much of what she’d said to her mother was cruel.
Kate sat nursing her wounds all weekend. She didn’t want to talk to anyone, and didn’t hear from Claire. Bart called her from Washington, but she didn’t pick up and texted back that she had the flu. She wasn’t ready to tell him about it. They had a good time together, but Kate’s soul felt raw, and she didn’t want to share it with him. Her children and her relationship with them had always seemed so perfect compared to his. He always talked about what a good mother she was, and now her youngest was having a baby out of wedlock. She felt deep shame over it, and she couldn’t tell him, or anyone.
She went for a walk on Sunday morning, and without thinking, she ended up at her mother’s building, and called from downstairs.
“I’m sorry to show up without calling first,” Kate said, sounding distressed. “Are you up?”
“I was reading the paper. Is something wrong?” She was worried. It was so unlike Kate not to call first and just show up.
“Nothing dangerous. Everyone’s fine.” Kate was quick to respond. After Tom’s fatal accident years before, they were both sensitive to what could happen. This was serious, but not tragic, even if Kate felt like it was.
“Come on up,” Margaret said, relieved. Kate walked past the doorman with a wintry smile, and Margaret opened the door to her daughter and saw that she looked ravaged. “Did something happen to Bart?” It was all she could think of unless Kate had been lying to her about the children being all right.
“No, and the kids are fine. They’re all alive anyway.” She walked into the kitchen and sat down, and Margaret followed her with an anxious expression. Kate looked at her mother mournfully. “Claire is pregnant. She’s having the baby, and not getting married. She doesn’t think marriage is ‘necessary’ anymore, it’s an archaic tradition, according to her. She doesn’t feel ‘ready’ for marriage, not for several years anyway, but she does feel ready for a child. According to her, they’re ecstatic. He offered to marry her, and she refused.” Margaret sat down across from her daughter at the kitchen table and looked at her intently.
“When did you find all this out?” Margaret looked as unhappy as her daughter.
“Friday night. I haven’t stopped crying since. She hates me because I’m not happy about it. Maybe this is my punishment for setting the bar too high for them, as you always say. I never knew she had such an aversion to marriage. She’s known Reed Bailey for three months. This is insane.”
“Did she tell you how it happened?” Margaret said thoughtfully.
“The usual way, I assume,” Kate said with a wry smile.
“I meant was it an accident, or did she plan this?”
“I was so shocked it never occurred to me to ask, and I don’t think she’d tell me the truth anyway. I wouldn’t be surprised if it was a decision on both their parts, since he told her he wanted her to be the mother of his children. I didn’t think he meant this soon.”
“She always gets carried away,” Margaret said with a sigh, “although this is definitely extreme.” Then she narrowed her eyes as she gazed at Kate. “It’s not the end of the world though. Don’t let it destroy you.”
“It feels like it. It’s so wrong.”
“By our standards, not hers,” Margaret said, sounding like a therapist again.
“She’s not even embarrassed or remorseful. She was incredibly hostile with me. I’m so disappointed in her, Mom. And I know it sounds stupid, but it’s embarrassing.” She had a million emotions about it, and was proud of none of them, nor of her daughter, for the first time in her life. Claire was rejecting everything her family believed in, and the values she’d grown up with.
“The embarrassment is irrelevant. You’ll get over it. My real concern is if she’s ready to mother a child, and if this man is someone she can count on, or if she’s just a passing fancy to him. We don’t know him, and neither does she.”
“She says he wants to meet me, but