“What are you telling me?” Clay demanded.

The doctor regarded him warily, probably because he’d sounded so harsh. She was an attractive red-haired woman with a stethoscope around her neck and a white jacket over her clothes. She wore a name tag: Dr. A. F. Johannson, Obstetrics and Gynecology.

Clay reminded himself that he needed this woman on his side. “I’m sorry, Dr. Johannson. I’m…not at my best right now.”

The doctor’s freckled face relaxed. “I understand. And what I’m telling you is that your wife is in active labor.”

Clay blinked and shook his head. He’d known that something was happening, of course. He didn’t have to be a doctor to understand that the baby was probably coming. But the mad rush through the dark streets to the nearest hospital hadn’t left him a lot of room for thinking. And now, actually hearing the word labor made it suddenly all too real.

Clay struggled to recall what all those books had told him. “Active labor?” he asked rather idiotically.

“Yes,” Doctor Johannson replied. And then she began speaking calmly and clearly about the high quality of care the obstetrics wing of this particular hospital would provide, about nonstress tests, about effacement and dilatation, about the baby’s presentation and the frequency of Andie’s contractions. Clay hardly understood a word of it. All those books he’d read to be prepared for this moment were totally useless to him now that the moment was actually here.

All he could say was, “Is she all right? Is the baby all right? It’s early. She’s not due for—”

“A few weeks yet—we know. But so far, we’re doing just great. The baby seems to be okay and is in a fine position. And Andie’s a real trooper.”

“A trooper.” Clay looked at Dr. Johannson as if he’d never heard that word before.

The doctor gave him an understanding smile. “What I’m saying is, so far, so good.”

“Can I go be with her now? I’ve filled out every damn form they shoved under my nose.”

“Yes. She’s in our labor room at this point. You may go in there as you are. But when the time comes to move Andie to delivery, you’ll have to scrub down and wear a gown.”

“Fine. Whatever. Where is she?”

Clay was led down two or three hallways to a big room with several beds in it. There was a woman in one of the beds moaning and crying out in a language Clay didn’t understand. Andie lay in another bed, on her side, turned away from him.

He went to her. “Andie?”

She opened her eyes and forced a smile. Her face looked so tired, swollen and oily with sweat. A contraction gripped her. She moaned and her hand clawed for his. He gave it and then somehow managed to murmur something soothing and soft as she ground his bones together with her grip.

When the contraction passed, she panted, “Clay, I’m sorry. You were right. I make such bad, thoughtless decisions. I shouldn’t have come here, should I? I should have stayed home, not put myself and the poor baby under such stress.”

He agreed with her. In fact, he feared he would always nurse a certain resentment against her for her reckless foolishness in all this. She was just like Jeff, doing what she wanted, no matter what the consequences. But now was not the time to think of all that.

He repeated what the doctor had told him. “They say it’s going to be all right, Andie. They say the baby is fine.”

“But what if—?”

“Shh.” He made his voice tender. “No what ifs. The baby is fine and you’re fine. That’s what matters now. Relax.”

“They hooked me up to a monitor before they brought me in here.”

“And?”

“They said what you said. No signs of fetal distress.”

“See?” He smoothed sweat-damp hair back from her face. “What did I tell you?”

Andie didn’t get a chance to answer, because another contraction took her voice away. Her hand was in his. He didn’t let go. He concentrated on what he’d learned in their childbirth classes and forgot all the reasons he was frustrated with her.

Andie needed him. And so did the baby. And for now, that was all that mattered.

 

They stayed in that room for four and a half hours.

For Clay, everything blended together. The whole world centered down to the woman moaning and wailing from the other bed, Andie’s clutching hand and those strange, dreamlike periods that came between the contractions. Then, Andie would ask Clay to rub her back or she would take sips of water or even stagger to the commode behind the door at one end of the room.

And then, at last, Dr. Johannson returned, examined Andie and said that she could start pushing, something Andie had been begging Clay to let her do for what seemed like half a lifetime. Since this was Andie’s first baby, she started pushing right there in the labor room.

When Clay could actually see a tiny bit of the baby’s head between contractions, Dr. Johannson, who was sticking close by now, said it was time to for Andie to be moved.

Clay was led away to a place where he could scrub his hands. Then, wearing hospital greens, he was taken to the delivery room where Andie already was.

It was there that he truly began to understand why, for generation upon generation, labor and birth had been the province of women. It was simply too much for the average guy to take.

But somehow Clay did take it. And in the end, he was caught up in the excitement, the sense of exhilaration, as each of Andie’s contractions brought the baby closer to the world. The doctor stayed beside Andie, monitoring the baby’s heart rate after each contraction.

And Andie seemed changed now, totally exhausted, yet suffused with a hot, powerful kind of energy. When the baby’s head had crowned and no longer sank back inside between contractions, things moved with alarming rapidity. At the last minute, tearing seemed imminent, so the episiotomy they’d hoped to avoid was performed, after all. Andie took it well, though Clay found he had to look away.

The rest was fast. The head emerged, red and angry, wet with blood and fluids. The doctor guided the shoulders out. The rest of the baby followed quickly.

It was a she. Clay, who had been allowed to catch the tiny body as it emerged, could hardly believe that he was holding her. Her eyes were scrunched closed. And she let out a big, angry wail.

“A girl,” said the delivery nurse, who quickly scooped the child away from him. “Skinny, from lack of finishing time. But the lungs are just fine from the sound of that wail.”

The afterbirth came as they clamped the cord. Clay only stared, stuck midway between awe and nausea. Then they laid the tiny, messy creature on Andie’s breast while down below the doctor went to work sewing up the incision she’d made. “Emily,” Clay heard Andie say in a soft voice. “We’ll call her Emily.” She looked for Clay, found him. “Is that okay with you?”

He nodded, since right then his throat was too tight to allow words to come.

 

Clay spent the next half hour on the phone, calling Andie’s mother and his mother, and, of course, Ruth Ann. He assured them all that both Andie and the new baby were fine and said he didn’t know how long it would be until they came home. A few days, at the very least.

His aunt Thelma was ready to hop the next flight south, but Clay convinced her to wait until at least tomorrow when they’d have a better idea of how long Andie and the baby would have to be in the hospital.

When he hung up from the final call, Clay dropped into the plastic hospital chair that was right there by the phone and stared at the wall for a few minutes.

“Hey, fella, you through?”

There was a man standing over him, waiting to use the phone.

“Yeah. Sure. Go ahead.” Clay staggered to his feet.

He wandered off down the hall like a man in a trance. After walking for several minutes, he took an elevator down two floors and then, by instinct perhaps, found himself at the door to the cafeteria.

Clay went through the line and bought scrambled eggs, wheat toast and a big cup of black coffee. He sat down and ate. The toast was slightly soggy and the eggs reminded him of something he used to play with as a kid—Goofy Putty, he thought it was called. But it was eleven in the morning and he hadn’t eaten since early last night. After everything that had happened, his body craved fuel.

When the food was gone, he went back to the obstetrics floor. The nurse told him where Andie was, that they’d just moved her to one of the private rooms. The nurse pointed out the room.

Clay went in and found Andie asleep. He stood over her for a few moments, thinking how drained she looked and yet peaceful, too.

Her right hand was outside the blanket, the hearts-of-gold bracelet gleaming there along with the plastic identity band the hospital had snapped on. When they’d first arrived in emergency, the admitting clerk had tried to convince Andie to give the gold bracelet to Clay for safekeeping, or at least allow the hospital to store it in their safe.

“No way,” Andie had informed the clerk. “This is my lucky bracelet.”

The clerk had given in.

Clay stared at the linked hearts, feeling a little bit guilty. He’d jumped to conclusions about that bracelet at first. In fact, if he hadn’t asked her where it came from, he probably would have been eaten up with jealousy when she wouldn’t part with it. He’d have been positive that she cherished it because an old flame had given it to her. And in reality, the “old flame” had only been Ruth Ann.

He should be more understanding of her—he could see that. And yet, she was reckless. She did throw herself into things, never considering the cost.

Because of her ill-considered decisions, Madeline had been compelled to endure even more suffering. And the baby had been forced into the world ahead of time.

Both Madeline and the baby would survive.

But look at Jeff. A sharp pain twisted inside him at the thought of the dead man. In the end, Jeff hadn’t survived the consequences of his own recklessness.

Jeff had been dangerous to know, in the truest sense of the word. He’d left heartbreak in his wake.

And Andie was the same.

A small sigh escaped Andie’s lips. She turned her head on the pillow but didn’t open her eyes.

Clay watched her, as it seemed he had always watched her, his emotions all tangled and knotted inside him. Bemused. Aching. Confused. Resentful. So many feelings, so much turmoil in his life. Because of her.

Yet to consider his world without her now was to imagine emptiness. A blasted, forsaken terrain.

So he wouldn’t consider that. Ever. She belonged with him, and he with her. Eventually, this anger and hurt he felt every time he looked at her would fade. Time would do that.

They didn’t need to do any more talking, as she seemed to think. They didn’t need to dredge up all the hurtful details of her brief love affair with his ex-best friend.

They just needed to forget it. It was over. That was all.

Clay bent and lightly kissed his wife’s forehead. She mumbled something and turned to her side, tugging at the blanket with one hand. He helped her, pulling up the cover and tucking it around her chin.

She murmured something else. It sounded like “Thanks.”

“You’re welcome.” He hardly breathed the words. And then he quietly left the room.

He went to see Emily next. They’d cleaned her up and she was in the nursery. They told him he could look through the observation window. Or, if he would scrub down again and put on another gown, they’d let him in among the rows of tiny beds to hold her.

Clay washed and dressed in green. And then they let him in with her. He stood over her and looked down at her, all swaddled up tight in a white blanket. Then the nursery aide lifted her and handed her over.

She was so light, like a warm puff of air in his arms.

A tiny red fist wearing an armband like Andie’s broke free of the blankets and waved at him. Clay touched that fist, so soft and wrinkled and powdery dry with its perfect tiny nails. It instantly opened and closed around his finger in a strong, needful grip.

“Yes,” he whispered. “Yes, I’m here. I’ll always be here.”

And Emily opened her eyes. She looked at him. Something happened in the deepest part of him. It was as if she reached down into him with that tiny perfect hand of hers and took hold of his heart.

He saw Andie in the shape of her jaw and the curve of her mouth. Perhaps he even saw Jeff around the eyes. But those were physical things, insignificant to Clay against the enormity of what he looked at.

He looked at Emily. A person in her own right. And she looked back at him.

He bent close to her so that the baby smell of her surrounded him and he whispered his vow to her. “I won’t leave you. I’m right here. You will have what matters. A mother and a father to love you and pay attention to you and teach you what life should be.”

She seemed to grip his finger all the tighter. He rubbed her hand against his own cheek. She made a little sound, a gurgling, cooing noise.

Clay looked up. The aide was watching him, a fatuous smile on her face.

“You’ll be a good father,” the woman said quietly. “I can tell just by watching you. And your daughter is a beautiful child.”

 

Three days later, Andie and Emily were released from the hospital. Before they left, Clay signed the birth certificate as he had sworn he would do. Thelma, who had flown down the day before, was there to help with the mountain of equipment having a new baby seemed to require.

They rode straight to the airport and boarded the plane for home. The flight was uneventful, aside from the fuss the flight attendants made of the newborn.

At home, since Della and Ruth Ann had been hard at work getting things ready, all was in order. It was decided that during these first days, Emily would stay near her mother in the master bedroom. Della had bought a bassinet for this purpose. With great pomp and ceremony, mother and daughter were installed in their beds.

Seeing that the women had everything under control, Clay went to the office to relieve his father, who had stepped in temporarily while they were in L.A. Thelma, who had already decided that she would stay over in one of the spare rooms for a while, made lunch for everyone and began planning the dinner menus for the next week.

Over the days that followed, Andie was grateful for her mother’s help and support. Thelma cooked and cleaned and sympathized with her daughter unstintingly when Andie’s breasts were sore from nursing and when Andie looked at her pouchy stomach in the bathroom mirror and burst into tears.

“I kept waiting to be thin again,” Andie wailed. “And look at me. I’m like an empty paper sack.”

“It will go down,” her mother assured her.

Andie was shameless. “You promise me, Mom?”

Thelma was, too. “Absolutely. I guarantee it. Especially if you start exercising soon.”

“I will. I swear I will.”

From the bedroom, Emily started to wail.

Andie groaned, thinking about the pain when that small mouth latched on to her breast.

“You could go ahead and switch to formula,” Thelma suggested gently, reading correctly the expression on her daughter’s face.

“No, just a few more days and it won’t hurt anymore. All the books say so.”

On the second Monday in September, when Emily was a little over two weeks old, Thelma went back to her own house. Joe wanted his wife back. Like everyone else, Andie’s father adored his granddaughter. But he was tired of sleeping alone and foraging in the freezer when dinnertime came.

Andie was feeling much stronger by then. She took over the maintenance of her own house without much difficulty. She was even able to start dropping in at the office for a few hours twice a week or so, since Thelma was more than happy to keep an eye on Emily for a while.

And Clay was wonderful, he really was. He worked all day. Yet in the middle of the night, when Emily cried, he would get up and check for a full diaper, even rock her before waking Andie for the feeding that was usually required.

Looking back in later years, Andie remembered those first weeks of Emily’s life as a stressful yet magical time. A time during which Emily daily performed miracles. She kicked her arms and legs; she gurgled and cooed. Clay swore she smiled, though Thelma insisted that was only gas.

Andie would have been happy. She was happy. Except for the distance between herself and Clay. A distance that, somehow, seemed to inch a little wider every day.

Clay ate breakfast across from her. He went to work and came home right on time—there were no more detours to Doolin’s pub. He slept beside her. He was kind and considerate and always ready to do whatever she asked of him.

Except to let her beyond the wall.

Three and a half weeks after Emily’s birth, the doctor gave Andie the go-ahead to resume, as he put it, “intimate relations.” He even fitted her for a cervical cap, which she went right to the drugstore and bought. She felt so nervous and happy at the prospect of making love with Clay once again.

That night, Andie told her husband what the doctor had said. Clay patted her arm and muttered something about that being fine.

And that was all. The next day he left for Lake Tahoe for a week of continuing-education classes, which were necessary for him to keep his CPA license.

Andie told herself that as soon as Clay returned, they would rediscover the physical side of their marriage.

But when he came back, they rediscovered nothing. Over the next weeks, she tried dropping subtle hints, cuddling up against him, even asking him outright if there was something wrong that he didn’t seem to desire her anymore. Clay managed to be vague and distant and neither answer her questions nor respond to her attempts to arouse his interest.

Sometimes Andie dared to imagine that he looked at her with the old hunger in his eyes. But it was always just a glance, quickly masked. It could have been no more than wishful thinking.

There were certainly no other signs that he had any interest in her sexually. Though Clay slept in their bed with her, he kept to his side of it. It almost seemed as if he was making a conscious effort not to let his body so much as brush against hers.

How could she get close to him when he so constantly kept her at bay?

The answer was, she couldn’t.

At least, that was what Clay hoped.

Because he was doing just what she suspected. He was keeping clear of her physically. It was driving him nuts, but he was doing it.

Clay was determined to avoid making love with her for as long as he could hold out. Too much happened when he made love with her. He was weakened by the sexual power she had over him.

He knew her too well. With Andie, physical intimacy and emotional intimacy were one and the same. As soon as they made love, she’d be at him, wanting to talk about things he never even wanted to think of again, wanting to root around in the past like a pair of emotional archaeologists at some major dig.

Clay didn’t want to do it. He wasn’t going to do it.

But, damn, he did want her.

If he believed in such things, he would have sworn she was a witch, that she’d put some sort of sex spell on him so he’d finally go crazy from wanting her so much.

And he knew she was exercising to get back in shape. He’d seen the workout pants and T-shirts hanging to dry on the service porch, noticed the stack of exercise DVDs by the TV.

And the exercises were working. Her body was slimmer again. It was taking on its former tight contours. Except for her breasts. They were disconcertingly ripe, heavy and fuller than ever because she was nursing Emily.

The maddening changes in his wife’s body weren’t all Clay had to contend with, either. She was spending more time at the office, as well. While she was there, she seemed to make it her personal mission to single-handedly wreak havoc with his concentration.

Clay found that he couldn’t walk into the copier room or look for a file without dreading the possibility that he’d have to confront the sight of her, bent over a table stapling papers together. Or standing on tiptoe reaching into a file drawer, the muscles of her calves flexing in a way that sent his libido into hyperdrive.

And then, in bed at night, he didn’t know how he bore it. The warmth and scent of her came at him every time she moved. She was so close, just an arm span away. All he had to do was reach for her.

But he refused to reach for her.

It was pure hell. Sometimes he’d lie there, staring at the ceiling, scenting her and knowing that he wasn’t going to last a split second longer. That he was going to roll over and grab her, pull her beneath him and shove himself into her without any preliminary at all.

He’d grit his teeth and turn away, to the very far edge of his side of the bed. He’d think of the shirts he needed laundered, his least favorite client, anything to reduce his state of total arousal.

Sometimes Emily, who was now sleeping in her own room, would start to cry. Clay always sighed with relief when that happened.

“I’ll go,” he’d whisper.

He’d slide out of the bed and pull on his terry robe over the pajama bottoms he slept in nowadays. He’d slip over to the little room next door.

And there he’d find a brief peace, even if it turned out, as it usually did, that Emily was hungry and he couldn’t give her what she wanted. There was still that first moment, when he bent over the crib and she blinked and focused in on him, forgetting to wail for an instant.

“What’s the problem here?” he would ask.

She’d wail again, flailing her little arms that had grown so fat and round.

He’d pick her up, put her to his shoulder. Every once in a while, that would do it. She’d let out a little burp and snuggle against his neck. But even if burping her didn’t work, there was still the chance that changing her was all she needed.

In any case, if she didn’t need to be fed, he could sit for a few minutes in the rocker that Granny Sid’s mother had brought from the old country. He could hold Emily close and look at the moon out the window.

He could whisper to her how it would be for her, how she would learn to crawl, to walk and to talk. How she’d go to school and take gymnastics or play soccer or maybe even the violin. And how he and her mother would always be there, to teach her about the world and to see that nothing ever harmed her.

Those moments alone with Emily held the greatest peace Clay had ever known. Right now, Emily’s wants were so simple, so pure. Food, a dry diaper and a caring touch. Clay could give her those things without much effort at all. Loving Emily was the easiest thing he’d ever done in his life.

Just as what he shared with Emily’s mother was the hardest.

 

The first storm of the season came on a night in late October, nine weeks after Emily’s birth.

That night had been a tough one. Another of those nights when Clay lay in bed awake, wanting his wife and yet somehow managing to hold himself away from her.

The gathering storm outside made it all the worse. There was so much electricity in the air, such a heavy waiting feeling. Storms always made him want to break free of all the controls he normally put on himself.

After the first few thunderclaps, he’d heard Emily’s cry. Andie had stirred. He’d told her to go back to sleep. And he’d come in here, to hold Emily and soothe both her and himself.

He’d rocked Emily and told her all about storms, how he loved them, how one of his two mothers, whose name had been Rita, had loved them, as well. He whispered what he remembered of Rita in the red coat, turning in circles beneath a downpour. He’d said that storms were nothing to be afraid of. A good storm was one of the best things in life.

Now, Emily was asleep over his shoulder. Clay could feel her stillness, the evenness of her breath moving in and out of her little chest.

Outside, rain lashed the window and the sky lit up. Emily didn’t even flinch when the thunder crashed.

Slowly, Clay stood from the rocker. He went to the crib and laid the sleeping child down. She cuddled right up, never stirring, as he covered her with the blankets and tucked her in.

He stood watching her through three more thunderclaps. But she simply went on sleeping. Her little body didn’t so much as twitch.

Clay tiptoed back to his own room. But when he got there, he couldn’t quite bring himself to climb into the bed beside Andie.

He was drawn to the glass door on which the rain was beating, to beyond that door, where the wind and lightning and thunder ruled. He spared a glance for Andie. She seemed to be sound asleep.

And the storm was pulling at him, inviting him out into it. He went, padding across the floor like a man in a trance.

But he was careful. He slid the door open as smoothly as he could, just wide enough that he could slip through. And he closed it all the way behind him so no icy drafts would wake his wife.

The storm embraced him. He went to the edge of the deck and turned his face to the sky.

 

In the bed alone, Andie slowly sat up.

She knew where her husband was. She had heard his return, knew that he stood by the bed, felt his hesitation as the storm beckoned to him.

The storm had won. Now he was out in it.

A feeling of sweet anticipation rose inside her. It tingled along each and every one of her nerves.

She probably shouldn’t…

Yet when it came to Clay, Andie really had no shame.

She threw back the covers and flew to the bathroom where her clumsy fingers almost defeated her in the insertion of her new contraceptive device. But at last she succeeded. The darn thing was in.

Andie looked at herself in the mirror, a shadowed form. She hadn’t dared to turn on the light. It was just possible that Clay might have noticed if she had, since there was one high window over the bathtub that looked out on the deck where he now stood.

Andie wore a modest cotton gown with a button front. The gown was perfect for a nursing mother, but not so great for what she had in mind. She gathered up the hem and pulled the gown over her head, dropping it to the tiles at her feet.

She looked at the dark shape of herself in the mirror. Naked, slim, her hair a black cloud. Her breasts were very full. Her milk could come, she knew, if he kissed her in a certain way. She felt the heat in her cheeks at the thought.

But it couldn’t be helped. And surely women had made love with their men for century upon century with milk in their breasts. She’d just have to deal with it when and if the moment came.

On the counter not too far from the sink, there was a monitor, as there was in the master bedroom and in all the major rooms of the house. The monitor picked up noises from the baby’s room. It was blessedly quiet right then. And Clay had just been in to check on Emily. The chances of her daughter’s interrupting them were minimal.

Andie’s heart was beating very fast. What if he rejected her? What if she walked out on that deck stark naked and he turned her away?

Oh, that would be terrible.

But she couldn’t let herself think that way. If she thought that way she’d give up trying and worse things might happen if she gave up trying. Sweet Lord, he might never make love with her again.

That awful thought mobilized her. She went out of the bathroom and across the floor of the bedroom. At the glass door, she hesitated, pressing her face against the glass to look for him.

She saw him at the railing. He wore his robe and his pajama bottoms, both of which were wet through and clinging to his broad back, his hard, strong legs. He stood with his face turned up, transfixed, beneath the angry sky. His proud, tall body yearned toward the roiling clouds.

Andie’s own body relaxed as she watched him. In the space of an instant, everything was changed. All her little fears of rejection, of embarrassment, faded to nothing. The world shimmered under the onslaught of the storm. And she herself was shimmering, needful, hungry for the man outside.

Andie slid the door open, not even bothering to turn and close it behind her. The storm attacked her, pelting her naked body, raising the goose bumps on every inch of her skin.

It was glorious. She lifted her hair and shook it so it fell down her back. And then she tipped her face up, as Clay was doing, letting the rain wash over her, drenching her hair, running down her body in a thousand tiny streams.

When she lowered her face, he was looking at her. His face was naked, washed clean of all pretense. She saw in it the hunger that answered her own.

He said her name, a low, needful sound. And then he covered the distance between them in three long, urgent strides.