Chapter 20

When Izzie returned to work and moved back to her own apartment, she left Zach’s clothes in the closet. She wasn’t ready to give them up yet, and she had no reason to. She never heard from his father again, nor his mother. No correspondence came for him. It was as though she had married a drifter who had existed in her life for eighteen months and then vanished. But he had left their baby behind as a memory of him. And Zach had made a profound impression on Izzie. She realized afterward that she would never have changed him, and regretted the pressure she had put on him to get a job and become responsible. That wasn’t who he was. And you couldn’t marry someone like that and expect them to be different. He remained true to himself till the end, drugging, drinking, in trouble with the law. She realized that he probably would have ended up in prison sooner or later. It was almost unavoidable. And they might not have stayed married, but she had loved him anyway, and it was hard to let go of the good memories, along with the bad. But her mother had been right, you couldn’t win when the odds were against you. And they had been with Zach.

She had decided to continue working until the delivery. She didn’t want to sit around at home thinking, and she was going to take a month off after the baby came.

The day she went into labor she had a court appearance, and managed to finish it, without letting on to anyone what was happening. She called her assistant to say she wouldn’t be coming back to the office, and she called her doctor on her way home to pick up her bag for the hospital, take a shower, and call her mother. She stayed matter-of-fact about it or she knew she would fall apart, knowing that she had to go through this alone, and Zach would never see their baby. The thought of it made her cry every time it came to mind. Kate hadn’t been surprised to hear from her. It was Izzie’s due date. As usual, she did everything on schedule, her mother teased her.

The doctor said she could stay home for a while, since the pains were still far apart, her water hadn’t broken yet, and it was her first baby. Izzie had toyed with the idea of doing it naturally but had finally decided to have an epidural for the pain. Why be a hero?

Kate promised to come over as soon as Izzie called her, and Izzie said there was no rush. Kate arrived half an hour later, having changed into jeans and flat shoes, with her own little bag of supplies for the hospital. And once she was there, as though the baby had waited politely for his grandmother, the contractions started in earnest.

“Ohhh, this is worse than I thought it would be,” Izzie said as she tried to breathe through the contractions. She called Julie, and they talked for a while, and then Izzie was in too much pain, and called her doctor again. She told her to come in, and Kate and Izzie took a cab, while Kate timed the contractions.

“They’re getting closer together,” Kate commented, relieved that they were on their way to the hospital. It was rush hour and traffic was heavy. And the pains had gone from four minutes apart to three to two by the time they got there. Izzie looked at the nurse desperately as they wheeled her down the hall to a labor room.

“Can I have the epidural now?” she asked, panting between pains and the nurse smiled.

“Let’s have the doctor take a look at you. I think she’s already here.” Izzie didn’t care if the president of the United States was there, she wanted the epidural now and she said so. “Are we waiting for Dad to get here?” the nurse asked pleasantly, as she helped Izzie take her clothes off and get into bed.

“No, Dad is dead, and I want my epidural now, goddammit!” Izzie shouted at her and Kate smiled. She could tell that Izzie was in hard labor from her behavior and the desperation on her face. And a moment later the doctor came in and examined her. Izzie screamed as a wave of pain washed over her as the doctor checked her cervix and the nurse put a fetal monitor on her belly that constricted her and made the pains worse. “Take that thing off!” Izzie shouted at her, and the doctor looked at her calmly. She knew that Izzie was a widow, and assumed that Kate was her mother.

“The good news is that you’re already at seven,” the doctor told her, which was about what Kate had guessed from her daughter’s outbursts. The unflappable counselor who could handle anything in the workplace was losing her cool rapidly. Izzie looked panicked. “The bad news is that it may be too late for an epidural. We’ll try, but it’s going pretty fast since you called me. I think you can do this without one if that’s what we have to do.” Izzie burst into tears as soon as she said it.

“I can’t do this without one.” Not without Zach, not after everything that had happened.

“We’ll try to get a line in as fast as we can,” she promised. The anesthesiologist showed up ten minutes later. He had been in a labor room down the hall, and a nurse was checking Izzie when he walked in. She was clutching Kate’s hand, and crying from the pains now.

“We’re at nine,” the nurse told him. “First baby.” It had gone like lightning, but the pains were overwhelming her. It was infinitely worse than she had ever dreamed it would be.

The anesthesiologist looked at Izzie apologetically, as she let out a scream. “We can try, but I think it’s too late. Do you think you can lie still on your side for me to put in the catheter for the epidural? It will feel like a bee sting,” he said gently.

“Just do it!” Izzie shouted at him as she nearly broke Kate’s fingers. They rolled Izzie onto her side, and she clutched her mother’s arm as they put the catheter in for the epidural, and she waited to feel some relief, but there was none yet, and then she looked at her mother and the nurse in terror. Something was happening, a force was powering through her that nothing could stop. Kate kept talking soothingly to her, as the nurse went to get the doctor. Kate knew the pressure Izzie was feeling was the baby. And the epidural hadn’t taken effect yet. The anesthesiologist checked the dose and upped it, and Izzie closed her eyes for a minute between pains as the doctor walked back into the room. Everything was moving quickly. Too quickly for Izzie. The doctor warned Izzie that she was going to check her again, but the epidural had some slight effect by then.

“Okay, Izzie, we’re at ten,” the doctor told her. “You can push now.” And then she told her how to do it, as the nurse held one leg and Kate held the other. She was lying on her back, with the epidural in place, but she said she could feel the pains. The fetal monitor said they were big ones, and the baby’s heartbeat sounded good. She pushed for half an hour and nothing happened, and Izzie fell back against the pillows looking exhausted. The doctor told her to keep pushing. “I see the baby’s head!” she said victoriously a minute later, as everyone in the room cheered Izzie on and she pushed with all her might, and fell back against the pillows exhausted between pains. She’d never worked so hard at anything in her life. Slowly the baby’s head emerged, and he gave a wail. The doctor delivered the baby’s body, and laid him on Izzie’s stomach, and she looked down at him and smiled through her tears. He was beautiful and he was the image of his father. She smiled at her mother in relief. It was the hardest thing she’d ever done, but it was worth it. They cut the cord, cleaned up the baby, and put him to her breast. He looked up at his mother in wonder, as Kate gazed at mother and son and cried. She was sorry about everything that had happened to Izzie, but at least she had her baby now. Izzie held him in her arms and seemed totally at peace. The agony of only minutes before was already receding as she held the reward in her arms.

“Thank you for being here, Mom,” she said, her voice barely more than a whisper. Izzie looked like a Madonna as she held her son.

Kate leaned down to kiss them both, and the doctor came in to check Izzie again, and told her what a great job she’d done. Everything was fine. It had all gone smoothly, even though it had been more painful than Izzie had expected. She called all three of her siblings a little while later, and they were thrilled for her. Julie was ecstatic to hear the news and the joy and elation in her sister’s voice. It was midnight in New York, and nine o’clock in California by then.

Peter listened to Julie’s side of the conversation and gave her a warning look when she hung up.

“Don’t even think of going back there,” he said, glaring at her. They were living in their own apartment, and Julie loved it. It was open and airy with glass sliding doors into the garden, and they had use of a pool. And their furniture had long since arrived from New York.

“Of course I’m going to go back there,” Julie said, trying to sound confident and not scared of him. She had discovered that he had a nasty temper when he didn’t get his way, and several times recently he had made fun of her handwriting and spelling and told her she wrote like a five-year-old, which hurt her feelings. She had finally told him about the dyslexia when they got married, and he told her he didn’t care. And now he was acting like the kids who had made fun of her in school. She couldn’t understand the shift in his attitudes and behavior. He was often frightening and sometimes cruel, and then tender and apologetic later. He was almost like two people now. One she loved and one she feared. “My sister just had a baby, Peter. I want to see them. This is an important moment for her.” She always tried to reason with him.

“I told you before, your loyalties belong to me now,” he said harshly, and as he said it, he grabbed her arm and yanked her hard until he hurt her. He had bruised her that way before. This was all new since they’d gotten married. He appeared to be an old-fashioned man who believed that he should rule the roost, and she should do what he told her to, as an obedient wife. She had mentioned getting a job in L.A., and he told her it was out of the question, a good wife belonged at home, waiting to serve her husband. She always thought he was joking when he said things like that, but in the past three months she had discovered that he wasn’t. He meant it. As far as he was concerned, she was to take orders from him. She wanted to try to discuss it with him, or maybe go to a counselor, but he didn’t believe in that either. “You don’t need to see your sister’s baby,” he said tersely. “All babies look alike.”

“That’s not the point. I want to see my sister. This is an important time for her, especially without Zach.”

“She’s better off without him. It’s just too bad the baby survived.” He had said it before, and Julie no longer argued with him about it. But she was planning to go to New York sometime in the next week. And Justin was coming down from Vermont too.

Julie made her reservation the next day when Peter was at work. She was still happy with him at times, and loved him. But he was different, and unduly harsh. She had discovered that he was totally without compassion for anyone else. His entire world had to revolve around him and his needs, and Julie most of all. It was as though he expected her to make up for all the love he’d never had, and prove herself to him by giving in to whatever he wanted and all his demands. And he wanted to make love to her constantly now, several times a night, to the point that she dreaded it sometimes. He was so acrobatic and relentless that he wore her out. It wasn’t tender and sensual the way it had been in the past before they were married. Most of the time now it was rough, and he took her anytime and anywhere he wanted to, whether she wanted to make love or not. And then he would surprise her and be gentle again.

She printed out her ticket and left it in the bedroom drawer, and was planning to tell him about it in a few days. She was going the following week. She was reading a book one night when he stormed into the living room and grabbed her by the hair.

“What is this?” he said, waving the ticket in her face.

“It’s my ticket to New York,” she said in a small voice.

“What were you going to do? Just sneak off without telling me?” He was livid, and his eyes were bulging with rage. He even looked different now. His face had changed. She almost didn’t recognize him at times.

“Of course not. I was going to tell you. I didn’t want to upset you.” He was shaking with fury as he looked at her and slapped her hard across the face. She was so shocked she didn’t even know how to react at first, and she started to cry as a trickle of blood ran from the corner of her mouth, where his watch had hit her.

“Cancel your reservation. You’re not going. You’re staying here.” She said nothing, but cowered on her side of the bed that night, and then he grabbed her and made love to her again, more gently this time, but not like the old days. It was all different now that they were married. He didn’t mention slapping her, and didn’t apologize. And the next day she didn’t cancel her reservation. She was more determined than ever to go. He couldn’t keep her from her family by slapping her. He was cold to her for the rest of the week, and the day before she was to leave, she told him quietly that she was going to New York the next day. They had had very little conversation since he slapped her, and she’d had a bruise on her cheek that was just starting to fade. She had covered it up with makeup, but she knew it was there.

“I’m only staying a few days,” she said quietly. She had packed while he was at work. He didn’t forbid her to go, but he made love to her so brutally that night that she bled afterward and could hardly sit down. She went to bed with an ice pack between her legs. She was frightened of him now, and relieved when he went to work in the morning and she finished packing. She thought about him all the way to New York, and she was tempted to say something to Justin, but she didn’t know what to say. She didn’t know what had happened to Peter or why he had changed. She kept waiting for him to go back to the way he’d been before. And she didn’t want Justin to hate Peter. In many ways Julie thought he was a good man. He just had a terrible temper he couldn’t seem to control.

Julie was staying at Izzie’s apartment, and fell in love with the baby. She helped her with him, and they spent hours talking, but she never mentioned Peter’s rages. She was ashamed too. He somehow always made it feel like his behavior was her fault. And she wanted to be a better wife. But Justin noticed that she was very subdued when he arrived from Vermont. She didn’t need to say anything to him. He could sense that something was wrong.

“Is everything okay?” he asked her. He had never known her to be that quiet, and almost withdrawn. She had always been shy but not to this degree.

“Of course, it’s great!” Julie looked falsely cheerful, and Justin wasn’t convinced. His twin radar was on full alert.

“You’d tell me if it wasn’t great, wouldn’t you?” Justin asked her.

“Of course I would. I’m just tired from the flight.” She loved holding the baby, and soaked up the love and warmth of her family before she went back. She was afraid of saying too much to Justin because he knew her too well, and might see right through her. After she left, he mentioned it to their mother.

“She seems awfully quiet, doesn’t she?” he asked Kate thoughtfully.

“Maybe she’s homesick. The first year of marriage is a big adjustment. And she’s not used to not having a job.” Julie seemed all right to her, but she hadn’t spent much time with her, since she had stayed at Izzie’s, and Izzie thought she was fine. And Kate was focusing on Izzie at the moment.

Julie let herself into the house in L.A. when she got home. She was surprised to find Peter waiting for her. She had expected him to be at work. She had texted him when she’d arrive.

“Well, look who’s back,” he said in a derisive tone. “How was your trip to see your mommy and your brothers and sister?” She could sense his anger as soon as she walked in.

“I had a nice time,” she said nervously, pretending she didn’t notice his tone. “The baby is very cute.” And Izzie was crazy about him. She was blossoming as a mother, and very good at it.

“I stayed home to welcome you back,” Peter said to her, and then forced her down on the kitchen floor, tore her clothes off, and raped her as he banged her head into the floor. She saw stars and was half conscious when he stopped. “I keep telling you to stop running home to Mommy, and you just don’t listen, do you?” he said as she struggled to get up and was dizzy when she did. She couldn’t believe he would do that to her. She had married a monster, and she was afraid of him now. She wished she had never come back. She went to her bathroom to clean herself up, and looked at the clothes he had torn off her. He came into her bathroom then, and turned on the water for a bath. “Let’s take a bath together. I always love it when we do that,” he said, in a silky tone, oblivious to what he had just done to her on the kitchen floor without remorse.

“I’ll take a shower in a few minutes,” she said, trying not to let him see her cry. He was worse when he knew he’d hurt her.

“No, we’re taking a bath.” He turned the water off when the tub was full, took off his clothes and got in, and handed her into it with him. She didn’t want to be in the bath with him, but she was afraid to object. All she wanted to do was get away from him now. He waited until she sat down and tried to relax, and then he grabbed her by the neck, and held her head underwater until she was fighting and clawing at him and was sure he was going to drown her, and then he pulled her head up by her hair. “Are you going to learn your lessons now? Are you going to listen to me when I tell you that you can’t go somewhere? And if you tell your family a word about this, I’ll kill you.” She was sobbing as she looked at him, as she coughed and sputtered the water she had swallowed. He climbed out of the bath then, wrapped himself in a towel, and walked out of the room as Julie sat there and sobbed. Julie knew then that he was insane.

When Justin drove back to Vermont after seeing his new nephew, he was excited thinking about their own second baby, due in six months. It was easier than the first time, because they knew what to expect. And they trusted Shirley, so her second surrogacy for them was smooth as silk. And she’d had no problems with the pregnancy. Justin had left Milagra with Richard when he’d gone to visit Izzie over the weekend, and he was glad he’d seen Julie, although he still thought something about her was strange. She seemed different to her family. Maybe his mother was right, and she was just adjusting to marriage. She said she loved L.A., although they had no friends there yet. She said Peter worked too hard to go out much, and he had a lot to learn about the office in L.A., and was tired at night.

Justin had told Richard he’d be back late that night, but he had left New York a few hours earlier than planned so he could spend the evening with Richard, and be there before Milagra went to bed. He loved playing with her. At seven months, she was a lively, happy baby, and she was crawling everywhere. They’d had to childproof every inch of their home. There were corner guards on every piece of furniture, everything was bolted, locked, or shut down, including the toilets, since they had read about near drownings with toddlers falling into them head down and getting stuck. He and Richard were the poster boys for a childproof home and were devoted parents.

Justin pulled into the driveway at six o’clock, and the lights were off. He didn’t know where Richard would have gone, but he hadn’t called to say he was coming back early. He’d wanted to surprise him. And as he walked in, he turned the kitchen lights on and bounded up the stairs to their bedroom, but thought he heard Milagra in her room. He found her in her crib and picked her up. She’d been having a nap, and he walked into his own room, with the baby in his arms, flipped on the light, and then stood rooted to the spot, when he saw Richard in bed with another man. Justin didn’t even know what to say, he was so stunned. Richard turned to look at him and closed his eyes, as the other man leapt out of bed. Justin recognized him as one of the teaching assistants at the school where Richard taught. He looked about twenty-six years old.

“What the hell is this?” Justin said, staring at them both as the younger man pulled his pants on and looked panicked, and Richard got out of bed with a devastated expression.

“I’m sorry,” was all he could think of to say, as the teaching assistant rushed past Justin and ran down the stairs and out the front door.

“You do this with our baby in the next room?” Justin said in a fury to Richard. “What the fuck is wrong with you? And how long has this been going on?”

Richard knew it was time to be honest with him. “Since Christmas. A few months. He’s just a kid.” Richard looked mortally embarrassed to have been caught. And Milagra was cooing at both of them.

“And you’re an asshole. And you let us start another baby with Shirley while you were sleeping with someone else?”

“I told you we should wait,” Richard said as he sat down on the bed again.

“Why? So you could have another baby with him? Are you in love with him?”

“No, it was just fun for a while. Everything has gotten so serious with us. We never get to have fun anymore. We’re always parenting or trying to save money. I feel like we’ve given our whole life up for her.” He glanced at the baby in Justin’s arms and felt guilty for what he’d said, but it was the truth. “And now you want another one. I’m not ready to give up my whole life for kids. I feel like we’ve lost each other and all we have left is her.” Justin stared at him in dismay.

“Why didn’t you say something before you started sleeping with other people?”

“He’s the only one,” Richard said. “I’m sorry, Just. I feel overwhelmed. I’m tired of being broke, being a father, and never having any fun.” Justin listened to him and went to put the baby in her crib without saying a word, and then came back into the room. By then Richard was dressed. The two men looked at each other in despair.

“Now what?” Justin said to him as he sat down in a chair. “We can’t give her back, and I don’t want to.”

“Neither do I. It’s just so relentless. We never get away from it.”

“That’s what parenthood is. It’s not part-time. You either are or you aren’t. And we can’t afford a nanny.”

“Maybe we should have waited,” Richard said.

“I thought you were ready.” Justin looked at him, wondering if this was the end. He was so shocked by what he had walked in on that he didn’t even know what he felt. Sad, hurt, surprised, disgusted, angry. They had a second baby on the way, and Richard was already tired of the first one. It didn’t bode well for their future together.

“You wanted it more than I did,” Richard said accusingly.

“I guess I didn’t understand that. So what do we do now? It’s too late for Shirley to have an abortion. And I wouldn’t let her anyway. I want the baby. You don’t have to be part of it if you don’t want to.”

“I think we need a break,” Richard said quietly. Justin had figured out that much when he had walked into their bedroom that night. “I’ll move out.” Justin nodded and went downstairs to regain his composure, and then returned upstairs to take care of their daughter. Justin slept in Milagra’s room that night, on the floor. And the next morning when Richard left for work, he took a bag with him. He had packed the night before after they talked. Justin could hear him moving around in their room until late. Neither of them had gotten much sleep.

Richard looked at Justin feeding Milagra breakfast, and he was happy to be free of it for a while. Justin didn’t know if he’d ever feel the same way about him again. He thought it was pathetic that Richard was sleeping with a young guy, instead of growing up and being the father he had promised to be. He was thirty-seven, not a kid. The kid was the one he was sleeping with.

“I’m sorry,” he said before he left.

“So am I,” Justin said coldly, and then burst into tears after he was gone, but that wouldn’t change anything. He had decided not to tell Shirley for a while, because he didn’t want to upset her and make her feel her money wouldn’t be paid as regularly. Whatever it took, Justin was going to handle it all on his own. When his work sold, sometimes he made more than Richard did.

He put the baby down for her morning nap and waited till a decent hour to call Julie in California, when Peter would have left for work. He had just gone when Justin reached her and told her what had happened and what Richard had said. She was shocked and sympathetic and sounded like she had a cold. He was so upset, he didn’t realize she’d been crying.

“Maybe he’s just scared of all the responsibility,” she said thoughtfully.

“Yeah, I guess, but he should have said something before it got to this. The baby will be born in six months.”

“Are you still going to go through with it?” Julie was worried for him.

“Of course.” She admired him for that. He had no doubts about it, unlike Richard.

After they talked about it for a while, he thought Julie sounded strange. Sad and subdued. “Are you okay?”

“Yeah, I’m fine. I’m just tired. We were up late last night.” But he’d had the same impression in New York. She seemed different and down. They talked about Izzie’s baby then. She named him Thomas Zachary, after her own father and the baby’s, and Kate was pleased.

“Is everything okay with Peter?” He was just checking.

“Of course,” she said blithely, but some strange ripple in Justin’s gut made him wonder. He knew his twin like his own soul.

“Well, that’s the news from here,” he said, depressed about his own problems, and he was beginning to think he would never be able to finish his novel, especially with a new baby coming, and a toddler in the house by then. Milagra kept him running even now, crawling everywhere.

Shirley figured it out for herself three weeks later, when every time she dropped by, even in the evening, Richard was never there, and Justin was managing Milagra alone. It was mid-April by then, she was almost four months pregnant, and they would know the baby’s sex at the next sonogram.

“Do you still want this one?” she asked him, pointing to her belly, when Justin finally admitted that he and Richard had split up.

“Yes, I do,” he said seriously. “Breaking up with Richard doesn’t change anything for me.” She nodded, relieved to hear it. She had suspected something was wrong for several weeks.

“Is it over for you two?” She felt sorry for him. He was a friendly, warm person. They both were, although they had very different personalities. Richard was more frivolous and fun, and Justin warmer, more responsible, and nurturing.

“I don’t think either of us knows if this is permanent or not,” Justin said sadly. “For now, we’re taking a break.” They weren’t seeing each other. They had agreed not to. Richard visited Milagra once a week, which was all he wanted. Justin hadn’t said anything to his mother, or his other siblings about it, and he’d asked Julie not to. He was always closer to her and she knew all his secrets, as he did hers, or he used to. Now that she was married, she wasn’t telling him anything, and all she ever said when they talked was that everything was “fine.” His gut told him something different, but he couldn’t put his finger on what was wrong, or even guess. And Peter was always so perfect that it couldn’t be him. Maybe their mother was right and she was just homesick, or adjusting to marriage, but she sounded strange to her twin. He had an uneasy feeling, but nothing to base it on, so he ignored it.

When Kate called Julie a few weeks after that, in early May, she was worried about her. She mentioned it to Izzie, who hadn’t noticed anything when she saw her, but Julie called her less often now. Kate was suddenly reminded of when Julie was a little girl and hated school because the kids were teasing her about her reading, and bullying her, and she didn’t tell anyone about it. She was afraid to, and ashamed then.

“Has Julie said anything to you?” Kate asked Izzie, when she came to visit Tommy one day and have dinner. Izzie had hired a nanny and gone back to work by then.

“No, she seems fine,” Izzie said, looking surprised. And the next day, Kate called Justin and asked him. He always knew what was happening with Julie even though he didn’t always tell her.

“She says she’s okay, but I thought she sounded down, and kind of distracted. I haven’t talked to her this week. I’ve been working on my novel again when the baby sleeps, so she’s been texting me.”

“Maybe you should call her. I talked to her the other day and she sounded odd to me. I hate that she’s so far away.” She liked laying eyes on her chicks, which always told her a lot more than what they said to her. And she was worried about Julie and didn’t know why.

Justin called Julie the next day at noon California time and she sounded like she’d been crying, but she said she had a cold when he asked her about it. The previous time she said she had allergies.

“You wouldn’t lie to your older brother, would you?” he teased her, trying to listen intently to any clue in her voice.

“You’re only five minutes older, you jerk.” She laughed and wiped away the tears that he had heard and she’d denied. Peter had hit her again before he left for work. He had accused her of flirting with the neighbor, which wasn’t true. She’d gone swimming the day before and worn a bikini, and Peter had come home and seen it, and accused her of sleeping with him. Peter was no longer someone she even remotely knew. After four months of marriage, he had become truly terrifying. He was a monster. Now he made her read to him every day and when she made a mistake he would laugh at her and tell her how stupid she was and then hit her. It only made it worse. And Peter had hit her hard that morning. Her ear was still ringing. Her life was a nightmare and she was afraid to leave. If he found her, he’d kill her. He said so and she believed him.

After she and Justin hung up, she went to her computer and looked something up on Google. She knew it had to be there somewhere, and it took her less than a minute to find it. She wrote down an address on a piece of paper and left the house on foot. She caught a cab in front of a hotel nearby. And twenty minutes later she was at a church in a run-down part of Hollywood. She walked inside and down a flight of stairs to the basement. She didn’t know what else to do. It was an anonymous twelve-step group for abused women she had found online. Justin questioning her had made her think of it. She was afraid of Peter all the time now. Julie knew that, for now, the group was her only hope. She didn’t even dare tell her family what he was doing to her. And they were too far away to help her. She had nowhere to go.