50

NETTIE RETURNED with a pot of steaming water and an array of midwifery instruments I chose to ignore. Having birthed five children, I was frightened, even in the hands of a loving God, yet tried not to show it.

I’d pondered many names for this baby and had discarded each, protecting myself perhaps. Although given that I’d bestowed a name on each of my previous precious babies—for their gravestones—maybe I was only delaying the grief.

Nettie closed her eyes and pressed her fingertips against the curve of my throat. “Breathe, Miss Charlotte, like this . . .”

I attempted to match her breathing when a crushing pain sucked my breath away. In a blink, my world narrowed to a single, frantic focus—pushing this child from my body.

Nettie gave commands, and I blindly obeyed, my strength ebbing with every push.

“Miss Charlotte!”

Her voice came to me from far away.

“You stay with me, Miss Charlotte! You hear me?”

“I’m here,” I said, or thought I did, the building pressure in my body vowing to tear it apart. Then suddenly, mercifully, the pressure gave way, and I fell back onto the bed.

“Jeremiah!” Nettie screamed.

I raised my head, and in a blur of tears and blood, I waited to hear my baby’s cry. “Nettie?” I whispered.

She didn’t answer.

O please, God, not again. I opened my mouth to speak, but fatigue dragged me down. My eyes kept closing. Finally, hearing nothing and dreading the awful truth, I surrendered myself to grief that—

A swift smack, and a fledgling cry rang out.

Joy sluiced through me like rain in a parched creek bed, and peace filled me. I wanted to see my baby, but the gentleness cradling me silently encouraged me to rest. So I gave myself to it—until I heard footsteps on the stairs.

Jeremiah raced into the room and stopped short. “Lord in Heaven, how did—?”

“Take the baby into the hall! I need to help her!”

I glimpsed the precious bundle in Jeremiah’s arms. So tiny. A gift from heaven. I drifted, swept farther and farther out—

A sharp sting struck my cheek. I heard my name, but still I drifted. So peaceful.

Another sting, sharper.

“Look at me, Miss Charlotte! Open your eyes! Open your eyes!”

I did as Nettie said. It took me a moment to focus.

“There you are,” she whispered, cradling my face, tears streaming down her own. “Don’t you dare go leavin’ me. Not after just birthin’ a beautiful little girl.”

I blinked. “A girl?” I managed.

“And she’s perfect. Just like her mama. You can meet her in a minute. First, I need to take care of you. You bled some, so that’s probably why you’s so weak. I just want to make sure things is as they should be.” She kissed my cheek, then saw to my needs, confident yet gentle. “Keep them eyes open!”

“I will . . .” The sheer absence of pain was heavenly. “Nettie?”

“I’m here,” she said. “Just addin’ compresses to stop the bleedin’. Steeped ’em with yarrow and winterbloom to help the healin’.”

I felt only a slight pressure. “Nettie, I’m so grateful. To you. To Jeremiah. To God.”

“I’m grateful too.” She helped me sit up. “Now drink this. It’ll help with the soreness that’s comin’.” She called for Jeremiah. “I still need to clean your baby good and proper, but not till after y’all done meetin’ each other.”

She took the sweet bundle from his arms and placed it in mine.

I looked into my daughter’s face and gasped. In an instant, my heart was hers. “So beautiful.” I ran my fingertip over her smooth brow, her tiny nose, her head of dark hair. And enamored though I was, I couldn’t deny that nature had played some sort of trick. The beauty of her skin, a shade far closer to Nettie’s than my own. “But I don’t understand.”

Jeremiah’s expression mirrored mine.

“I know you don’t,” Nettie said softly, settling on the edge of the bed. “And I can help sort that out. But first I want you to know how much your papa loved you. And how much your mama loved you too.”

I frowned. “But she didn’t love me. You know that. She couldn’t stand to—”

“That be the woman you thought was your mama.” Her smile turned bittersweet. “Your true mama, the one who birthed you, the one who loved you ’fore you was born, was a slave on your papa’s plantation.”

The joy in my heart turned to ash. “You’re telling me that my father—”

She held up a hand. “You’s thinkin’ the worst of him right now, but that ain’t it.” She grimaced. “And don’t hear me wrong. Your papa shouldn’t have done what he did. Made a mess of things and hurt a load of folks. But from what I been told, he loved your mama, and she loved him. I didn’t know the truth till long after your papa bought me to care for you. Remember, I’s only eight when I come. It was Ol’ Sal told me the truth of it years later.”

I frowned. “The old woman who lived down by the creek. She was always so kind to me.”

Nettie’s features softened. “She the one took you in the day your mama died givin’ birth.”

“To me,” I said, fitting the pieces together.

My precious girl began fussing, and Jeremiah immediately glanced away.

“Got stuff I need to be doin’,” he said. “I check back soon enough.”

Nettie moved a bed pillow to the chair. “Let me help you get over here, and you can let that sweet girl start nursin’. Then I fetch some fresh bedsheets and compresses.”

Later, grateful to be back in bed but even more tired, I stared at my sleeping daughter, overwhelmed at the wonder of her.

Nettie rinsed her hands in the washbasin. “Know what you gonna name her yet?” she asked.

“I’m ashamed to say I don’t.”

“Well, for now we can just call her baby girl.” Her smile faded as she sat beside me on the bed. “Ol’ Sal told me your mama—Lisette—went into labor early and had a hard time of it, what with her bein’ so tiny herself and you bein’ her first. There was nothin’ the midwife could do for her. You come out squallin’, drawin’ up them skinny little legs. And white as snow.”

I shook my head. “But that still doesn’t make any sense.”

“It does when you know Lisette was from down New Orleans way. A mulatto, only a quarter black. But enough that whites wouldn’t keep company with her, and most of the black folk wouldn’t either.”

I stared into my daughter’s beautiful face, her little lips puckering. “So this could have happened with any of my children with Jonathan? She gets her color from me?”

Nettie shrugged. “In all my years helpin’ to birth babies, I seen lots of things I just gotta shake my head at. Each time you birthed a child, I held my breath, wonderin’ if some of Lisette’s blood would live on in it.” She gently touched my daughter’s head. “And here we are.”

“So how did I come to live the life I lived?”

“That’s one of the hardest pieces to all this, Miss Charlotte. And sad as it is, it ain’t particular to your story either.” She sighed. “Your papa’s wife was with child ’bout the same time as Lisette. But she lost her baby girl—stillborn. Just hours after you was born, Ol’ Sal took you to the big house, showed you to your papa, and tol’ him ’bout Lisette dyin’. Ol’ Sal say your papa broke down right in front of her. None of the slaves was gonna take you, she told him, with you so lily white. Word is, he told his missus there was a baby from town needin’ a home, and they was gonna take it in out of charity.” Nettie shook her head. “But o’ course the missus knew the truth.”

I closed my eyes. “And was reminded of it every day when she looked at me.”

“So many times, Miss Charlotte, when you was mournin’ the lack of feelin’ your mother had for you, I wanted to tell you. But I couldn’t without tellin’ it all. Ol’ Sal warned me ’bout tellin’ stories that ain’t mine to tell.” Nettie gently touched the head of my dark-haired daughter. “But sometimes the truth just won’t stay hidden no more.”

I cradled my baby, asleep at my breast, and patted her back, thinking about my father, my two older brothers, and the woman whose life I had shattered—though I never knew it. All the hurt and bitterness I’d harbored because of lies piled atop long-buried truth.

“Why don’t I get you somethin’ to eat, then I’ll clean baby girl up real good, and you can get some rest. You gonna need it.”

Not hungry, I knew better than to argue. What I really wanted—other than to hold my precious daughter in my arms forever—was to sleep, and for the pounding in my head to ease. But perhaps food would help.

Nettie returned bearing a tray with a large bowl of broth and a crusty hunk of bread. She traded it for the baby, softly cooing to her. “I want you eatin’ every bit of that, Miss Charlotte. Not only for you, but for this sweet little one.”

I dipped the bread and forced down several bites under her watchful eye, but she looked worried. “Whatever you’re thinking,” I finally said, “tell me.”

“Jeremiah says we got to be leavin’ here at dark tomorrow. Them overseers is still tied up, but we gotta be gone. We got two horses left, ’sides Master Achan’s stallion. Course, we can’t take him. He bound to turn heads. Same as that fancy carriage in the barn. So we takin’ the freight wagon. And I hate it, but it’s gonna be a rough go for you and baby girl.”

“I’m not worried about us, Nettie. I’m worried about you and Jeremiah and what will happen if you’re caught.”

“Ain’t gonna lie: we’s worried too. But the Almighty ain’t ever been caught on the wrong foot.” Her lower lip trembled. “He see us to the Promised Land, one way or ’nother. Now you get some rest. And be thinkin’ on a name for this precious girl.”

“Nettie?” I said as she left with the baby.

She turned at the door.

“I love you.”

She appeared to fight back tears. “I love you, too. Always have.”

I smiled. “Always will,” I finished, as we had done every night when I was a little girl. Another lifetime ago.

Sometime later I awakened, feeling as though I were floating in a dream. Sunlight drenched the bedroom, the sweetness of honeysuckle tinged the air, and Nettie’s rich alto drifted up the staircase. I sang along with her, my voice a pale, sickly shade compared to her deep luster. “In the morning when I rise, in the morning when I rise, in the morning when I rise, give me Jesus.”

As she sang the second and third verses, I reached for my journal, feeling an urgency I couldn’t explain.

I sat up, and the room swayed. Chilled, I pulled up the bed covers, then put pen to paper. I started where I’d left off before the birth, wrestling with fatigue to recall the details and eager to record every struggle and joy. I included Nettie’s revelation about my own birth and wished I could go back and offer my mother more grace. How odd to look back on life through a different lens. Truth lent startling clarity.

My hand cramping, I hurried to finish, hearing Nettie singing yet another hymn she’d sung to me . . .

Lord Jesus, my heart overflows. You have delivered me from suffering and given me my heart’s desire. I trust you with my life. How could I not? Even as Achan stood over me earlier, such hatred in him, I knew you were with me. That you wouldn’t forsake me. Same as when I heard my daughter’s first cry. Even as my soul rejoiced, your voice told me to rest. Just rest. And I knew that whatever came, I was in your hands.

Hearing Nettie on the stairs, I stashed the journal, eager to hold my daughter again.

“Baby girl’s all cleaned up and ready to nurse again!” As Nettie placed my beautiful girl in my arms, she frowned. “Gracious, you’s lookin’ pale. You feelin’ all right?”

“Tired is all, and a bit dizzy. And this”—I gently touched the gash at the back of my head—“still hurts.”

“Time for me to stitch that up.”

I cuddled my little one. “Nothing wrong with her appetite.” I drank in her sweetness as she drank in mine and peered up at me. “She’s perfect,” I whispered.

“Yes, ma’am, she is.” Nettie smiled. “You come up with a name yet for this sweet—”

When she didn’t finish her sentence, I looked up to see her eyeing the side of the bed, frowning.

She lifted the blankets near my feet. “Oh, dear Jesus!”