With Child

MINDY AWAKENED RELUCTANTLY, knowing even before she surfaced that she didn’t want to face conscious knowledge of something.

Her eyes were glued shut and her face felt stiff. She was aware without moving that she wasn’t in her own bed. A hotel?

She pried her eyes open, then squeezed them shut. The guest room. Dean.

Oh, Dean.

Grief rushed over her, wave upon wave powerful enough to knock her down if she’d been standing. She gasped for breath and turned on her side to curl into a ball as if she could resist the emotional battery by making herself compact, by covering her head with her arms.

Nausea struck with the same force, making her shudder. She scrambled from bed and ran across the hall to the guest bathroom, having the presence of mind to turn on the ceiling fan before falling to her knees in front of the toilet and retching.

Clinging to the toilet seat, she emptied her stomach. At length she sat on the floor and leaned against the wall, her bent head laid on her forearms braced on her knees. She breathed. In through her nose, out through her mouth. Ordering herself, as if a function so basic had become a challenge.

Why hadn’t she told Dean? Why, oh, why keep to herself news that would have elated him? Eyes closed, she imagined his whoop of delight and huge grin.

She’d thought maybe this weekend. She just wanted to be sure. She’d always had irregular cycles. Being late this month might not have anything to do with that morning when he’d turned to her in bed and only later did they realize neither had used protection. But she’d thrown up every morning this week, and two days ago she’d bought a home pregnancy kit and watched the little strip turn pink.

She hadn’t told him because… Oh, she hardly knew. Because she hadn’t thought herself ready to have a baby, and she’d wanted to face what this meant to her and to her alone before she got swept up in Dean’s joy. Because she hadn’t totally trusted the kit and intended to repeat the results or get a proper pregnancy test in the doctor’s office first. Because she’d wanted to make sharing the news a special occasion that she’d vaguely seen as including candlelight and a romantic dinner. He’d been busy all week, distracted, exasperated at being shorthanded at work and unable to find qualified applicants for the position he had open. She’d waited for a better moment, a better mood.

All week, Mindy had hugged the secret to herself, not stirring from bed until he left the house because the instant she moved the nausea hit. She’d always been an early riser, and he had teased her about becoming a sloth, to which she’d wrinkled her nose and laughed because he hadn’t guessed.

Sitting on the cold bathroom floor, Mindy cried until exhaustion made her blessedly numb. Then she dragged herself up, peered without interest through swollen eyes at the mirror, and splashed cold water over her blotchy face. Her hair poked out every which way, but she didn’t care.

The house was quiet, one lamp on in the living room. Was Quinn gone? She didn’t care about his presence or absence any more than she did about anything else. She put on her robe and shuffled out to the kitchen simply because going through the motions of living was all she knew how to do.

The smell of coffee brewing and bacon frying filled her nostrils before she’d taken a step into the kitchen. If she hadn’t already emptied her stomach, she wouldn’t have been able to bear either. As it was, after a brief hesitation she continued into the kitchen, made bright by a skylight and a double set of French doors opening onto the back patio. Although she could hardly have made a sound, Quinn turned from the stove and gave her an appraising look.

“How are you?”

He couldn’t tell? She only shook her head and sat down at the table set for two in front of the French doors. She and Dean had loved eating here rather than in the more formal dining room. The table was just as she’d left it last night, set with woven place mats from Guatemala and a vase of daffodils.

“Coffee?” Quinn asked.

“No, thank you.”

“Juice?”

She almost said no, but she had to eat and drink for the baby’s sake.

“Thank you.”

He brought her cranberry juice and a plate of scrambled eggs—not fried, thank heavens—and bacon. Mindy tried not to look at the bacon.

Quinn added a plate of buttered toast to the middle of the table and jam still in its jar. He sat down across from her with his own breakfast.

When she didn’t immediately pick up her fork, he ordered, “Eat.”

She complied because she’d already decided she had to eat and because she didn’t care one way or the other. Neither spoke. She managed to finish the eggs and most of one piece of toast before she pushed her plate away. Quinn’s appetite didn’t seem much better, despite the spread he’d cooked.

“Dickerson called this morning. They’ve already made an arrest.”

From a great distance, she stared at him. “What?”

“Two punks. Nineteen and twenty-one.” He talked about a meth lab and two strung-out young men who had in an instant snuffed out Dean’s life.

“How…”

“You mean, how did they make the arrest so fast? Dean. The minute he saw a burglary in progress, he called it in. We had the license-plate number.”

She did remember them talking about that last night. It just hadn’t sunk in.

“Do you think he knew…”

A nerve jumped beside Quinn’s eye. “Things like that happen fast. He probably saw that they were young, got out of his pickup to confront them, and one of them pulled a gun.”

She nodded, wanting to believe he was right, that it had happened so quickly Dean hadn’t had time for fear. She hoped he’d died instantly.

“His body…” Again, Mindy hardly knew what she was asking. Where his body was, she supposed, and what she was supposed to do to plan a funeral.

Quinn understood. “They’re doing an autopsy today, and then I imagine his body will be released.” He suggested a funeral home and they talked about when and where to hold the funeral. It was as if they were planning a bake sale, concentrating on details so they didn’t have to think about what the occasion was really for: lowering Dean’s body into a grave.

“Do you have people you need to call?” he finally asked.

“Yes, I suppose… His friends…”

He raised his brows. “I’ll let them know.”

Mindy felt a twinge of resentment at his sense of entitlement but then felt guilty. Quinn was surely grieving as much as she was.

She nodded and stood, picking up her plate. “I think I might lie down again.”

Was she imagining the disdain in his eyes?

“It’s ten-thirty.”

She stopped in the middle of the kitchen. “So?”

“There are arrangements to be made.”

“Dean…” She swallowed. “Dean hasn’t been dead twelve hours. Arrangements can wait.” She continued to the sink, set her plate down hard enough it clunked and kept walking. Out of the kitchen, to the bathroom—barely pregnant, and already she had to pee incessantly—and then back to the guest bedroom, where she climbed in and curled into a fetal position on her side.

The pillow was almost flat where her head had been when she’d awakened this morning. The sheets felt cold again and smelled faintly of fabric softener. She’d washed them just a couple of weeks ago, after Quinn had stayed over. As she’d always done when Quinn was around, that evening Mindy had tried hard to be friendly but finally made excuses and went upstairs to watch a video and then read in bed, leaving the men to their beer and basketball. She would hear shouts of laughter once she left them, and an easiness to their voices they didn’t have when she was present. Had Dean been aware how strained the relationship was between his best friend and his wife? He had to have noticed something, but he’d never said a word to her beyond, a few times, trying to explain Quinn.

“He had a rough childhood.”

“Any rougher than yours?” she remembered asking, a hint of tartness in her tone. “You grew up in a foster home, too.”

“Yes, but before that I knew my mother loved me.” Dean had frowned, his usually laughing face serious. “I trusted her. Quinn never had anyone he could trust.”