and then June.
The workmen finished and the house became quiet and serene. Twice a week Jennifer would drive into the village and shop at the supermarket, and every two weeks she would visit Dr. Harvey, her obstetrician. Jennifer obediently drank more milk than she wanted, took vitamins and ate all the proper, healthy foods. She was getting large now and clumsy, and it was becoming difficult for her to move about.
She had always been active, and she had thought she would loathe getting heavy and awkward, having to move slowly; but somehow, she did not mind it. There was no reason to hurry anymore. The days became long and dreamy and peaceful. Some diurnal clock within her had slowed its tempo. It was as though she were reserving her energy, pouring it into the other body living inside her.
One morning, Dr. Harvey examined her and said, “Another two weeks, Mrs. Parker.”
It was so close now. Jennifer had thought she might be afraid. She had heard all the old wives’ tales of the pain, the accidents, the malformed babies, but she felt no fear, only a longing to see her child, an impatience to get his birth over with so she could hold him in her arms.
Ken Bailey drove out to the house almost every day now, bringing with him The Little Engine That Could, Little Red Hen, Pat the Bunny, and a dozen Dr. Seuss books.
“He’ll love these,” Ken said.
And Jennifer smiled, because he had said “he.” An omen.
They strolled through the grounds and had a picnic lunch at the water’s edge and sat in the sun. Jennifer was self-conscious about her looks. She thought, Why would he want to waste his time with the ugly fat lady from the circus?
And Ken was looking at Jennifer and thinking: She’s the most beautiful woman I’ve ever seen.
The first pains came at three o’clock in the morning. They were so sharp that Jennifer was left breathless. A few moments later they were repeated and Jennifer thought exultantly, It’s happening!
She began to count the time between the pains, and when they were ten minutes apart she telephoned her obstetrician. Jennifer drove to the hospital, pulling over to the side of the road every time a contraction came. An attendant was standing outside waiting for her when she arrived, and a few minutes later Dr. Harvey was examining her.
When he finished, he said reassuringly, “Well, this is going to be an easy delivery, Mrs. Parker. Just relax and we’ll let nature take its course.”
It was not easy, but neither was it unbearable. Jennifer could stand the pain because out of it something wonderful was happening. She was in labor for almost eight hours, and at the end of that time, when her body was wracked and contorted with spasms and she thought that it was never going to stop, she felt a quick easing and then a rushing emptiness, and a sudden blessed peace.
She heard a thin squeal and Dr. Harvey was holding up her baby, saying, “Would you like to take a look at your son, Mrs. Parker?”
Jennifer’s smile lit the room.
29
His name was Joshua Adam Parker and he weighed in at eight pounds, six ounces, a perfectly formed baby. Jennifer knew that babies were supposed to be ugly at birth, wrinkled and red and resembling little apes. Not Joshua Adam. He was beautiful. The nurses at the hospital kept telling Jennifer what a handsome boy Joshua was, and Jennifer could not hear it often enough. The resemblance to Adam was striking. Joshua Adam had his father’s gray-blue eyes and beautifully shaped head. When Jennifer looked at him, she was looking at Adam. It was a strange feeling, a poignant mixture of joy and sadness. How Adam would have loved to see his handsome son!
When Joshua was two days old he smiled up at Jennifer and she excitedly rang for the nurse.
“Look! He’s smiling!”
“It’s gas, Mrs. Parker.”
“With other babies it might be gas,” Jennifer said stubbornly. “My son is smiling.”
Jennifer had wondered how she would feel about her baby, had worried whether she would be a good mother. Babies were surely boring to be around. They messed their diapers, demanded to be fed constantly, cried and slept. There was no communication with them.
I won’t really feel anything about him until he’s four or five years old, Jennifer had thought. How wrong, how wrong. From the moment of Joshua’s birth, Jennifer loved her son with a love she had never known existed in her.