CHAPTER 19 Nancy 
JULY 1984
On a Thursday afternoon in the height of the summer heat, Nancy and her boyfriend Michael are sitting in a patch of welcome shade outside the café in Kensington Market where they had their first date. They happily sip fresh-squeezed lemonade and share a piece of truly exceptional almond coffee cake while people-watching out of the corner of their eye.
Nancy is on her summer holiday from work this week, and Michael planned his to coincide with hers. And at his suggestion, they whiled away the morning in the cool air-conditioned refuge of the art gallery, wandering its wide halls and dark exhibits. It was a welcome respite for Nancy, who has spent most of her vacation with her parents. Her mother is in remission from the cancer now. Her treatment went well, but she’s a weaker, diminished version of her former self, somehow much more vulnerable than she used to be. Nancy worried that she should stay home with her, but when Frances heard that Michael was taking her out, she shooed her out the door.
Nancy had debated bringing Michael home to meet them last summer, but after a few dates, she’d realized quite quickly that he might be worth hanging on to, and decided to introduce him to her parents. The first time he leaned in to kiss her, on her front step after a date at the movies, he’d asked for her permission first. He supported her desire for a career of her own, worked hard, and didn’t drink too much. And he turned out to be incredible with Frances. He connected with her in a way that Nancy had certainly never been able to, helping her off couches she was too weak to stand up from and telling jokes to distract her from the bouts of nausea she was still susceptible to. Nancy had never heard her mother laugh like she did with Michael, not before the cancer, and certainly not after. He even cooked the whole family dinner one night when Frances’s blood pressure dropped so low that Nancy and her father had to rush her to the hospital. They came home to find Michael in the kitchen wearing her mother’s floral apron with a pasta dinner ready on the table, complete with salad and wine.
“Hang on to this one, Beetle,” Nancy’s dad muttered under his breath as he helped her mother out of her jacket.
She worried then about what might happen if they broke up. Her mother would be devastated, and Nancy couldn’t stand the thought of that. But nearly a year has passed since then, and she and Michael are still crazy about one another. It’s the best Nancy has felt about her life in a long time, and for the most part she’s comfortable being herself around him. She hasn’t, however, shared with him that she’s working with the Jane Network.
Not long after she ran into Dr. Taylor outside St. Sebastian’s the previous summer, she went to the recruitment meeting. Her relationship with Michael was still so new, she told herself, and what she was doing was illegal. While her girlfriends are out doing normal things like shopping or going to the movies, she revels in the knowledge that she’s helping other women gain power over their own lives. And although she trusts Michael, the less anyone knows about the network and its activity, the better, which is also why she’s never told him about her own abortion.
“What next?” Nancy asks Michael now, as he insists she take the last bite of cake.
A family with three noisy children passes by their table on the sidewalk outside the café. The little girl points at Nancy’s lemonade and starts shrieking that she wants one, too. Her rather harassed-looking, sweaty mother nods feebly and directs her family toward the doors to the café.
Michael smirks and shakes his head as though clearing his ears of the lingering squeal of the girl’s high-pitched shriek.
“I was just thinking that myself,” Michael says. “What’s next.”
Nancy stares back at him, brown eyes meeting blue over the tip of the straw from her glass. “I’m easy. Want to go down to the Queen’s Quay? Or out to the island? Maybe rent some bikes?”
Michael rakes a hand through his sandy hair, then glances over his shoulder at the few other patrons who have braved the scorching heat of the patio on a day like this. He turns back to Nancy. “I was thinking a bit bigger than that.”
Nancy sets down her empty glass. “Okay. What did you have in mind?”
Michael smiles and lets his breath out in one long, hot stream. Birds twitter in the small privet bush to Nancy’s left.
“Well,” Michael says, rising from his seat.
He reaches deep into the pocket of his shorts and pulls out a tiny black box. Nancy watches him kneel in front of her as though it’s being played back to her in slow motion, like a dream. Her surroundings become blurred. All she can see is Michael’s shining face looking up at her over the sparkling diamond ring in his hand.
“I was kind of thinking about forever. I think forever is next.”
“Oh, Michael.”
Nancy vaguely registers a gasp from one of the other patrons on the patio. “Look! Look!” the woman hisses at her husband.
“I wanted to bring you back to the place where I first fell in love with you. I knew as soon as I met you that you were the one for me. I was a goner. We sat at this table and you ordered me a double espresso that was so strong I nearly had a heart attack, but I didn’t care. There was a glow about you that night just like there is now. Like a spotlight was shining down on you, leading me home.”
Nancy presses her hand to her mouth and blinks back the tears.
“I love you, Nancy Mitchell. Will you marry me?”
Nancy throws her arms around Michael, burying her nose in his neck. She can feel him shaking.
“So, is that a yes?” Michael asks her, laughing.
She pulls back to see his face. “Yes! It’s a yes. I love you.”
Michael rises awkwardly to his feet, pulling Nancy with him as they kiss each other deeply. Only now does Nancy hear the applause issuing all around them. Even across the street, people are whooping and cheering for them.
When they pull apart, Nancy wipes her eyes with the back of her hand, then holds her left one out to Michael, who slides his ring onto her trembling finger. It fits perfectly. They kiss again, and Nancy feels like her feet might leave the ground. Or maybe she’s already floating.
“I love you,” she whispers, grinning.
“I love you, too.”
“You’re shaking. Are you okay?”
Michael nods. “Yeah. I mean, I was pretty sure I knew what the answer was going to be, but no one ever tells you how scary it is. My God, that was terrifying!”
That night, Nancy and Michael change into fresh clothes at their respective apartments, then meet up to walk over to Nancy’s parents’ house to relay the happy news.
They already know, of course. Michael phoned them one night in June to invite himself over for an Important Conversation. He certainly didn’t have to wrangle their blessing out of them.
“It was intimidating, to ask your dad,” Michael tells her now as they stroll hand in hand the last few blocks toward the Mitchells’ house.
Nancy smirks. “He’s all bark. He loves you.”
“I keep trying to figure out which of your parents you look more like. With most people you can usually see more of one than the other, but I can’t really tell with your folks.”
Nancy clears her throat and squeezes Michael’s hand, her eyes on the sidewalk beneath her feet. She’s thought about telling him the truth for a while, but has kept putting it off, telling herself that it’s a conversation for another day. Now isn’t the time. Not when their engagement is casting such a warm glow over everything. The truth might ruin all that, and what if Michael decided it was all too much for him? What if he got angry that she’d waited this long to tell him?
“Well,” she says, deflecting the comment, “honestly, don’t let anything my dad says bother you. He’s just a giant teddy bear.”
Michael chuckles. “And your mom is beyond thrilled. She started sobbing, said it gives her something to live for.”
Nancy halts abruptly on the sidewalk. “That didn’t…” She tries to stop herself from asking it but can’t. “Her cancer doesn’t have anything to do with you proposing, does it?”
Michael stops walking and turns to face her. His blue eyes squint into the sun as a lock of sandy hair falls across his forehead. “What?”
Nancy registers the unfamiliar sensation of her engagement ring between her fingers. “I just mean you’re so close with her, and what you just said, about her saying it gives her something to live for…”
Michael drops her hand. “Jesus Christ, Nancy. You think I asked you to marry me because your mom was sick?”
“I—no, of course not.”
“But that’s exactly what you just asked me.”
Nancy’s breath is coming quicker. She regrets saying anything now. “I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have said anything. It was just her comment, that’s all. Why would she say that?”
Michael scoffs, shakes his head. “I don’t think she was serious, really. Not in the literal sense. She was just excited, that’s all. Jesus. What’s your issue with her? You’ve done this before, gone out of your way to find issues with your mom. She’s your mom. It’s like you’re… suspicious of her or something. Or me,” he adds.
“I’m not suspicious of you, Michael,” Nancy says, reaching out for his hand again. He lets her link her fingers through. He must feel the ring, too, because his face softens. “I’m sorry I said anything. Just forget it. Please.”
Michael takes a deep breath. “Okay. All right. Because I love you, you hear?” He brushes her cheek with his other hand and kisses her. “I’m not marrying your mom, I’m marrying you. She just finds me irresistible, that’s all. And who can blame her?”
Nancy chuckles as Michael gives an exaggerated swagger, and they continue down the sidewalk, reaching her parents’ house a moment later.
After the news is relayed and bone-crushing hugs are delivered, Nancy’s father sneaks away to the kitchen.
“I’ve had a bottle of bubbly chilled ever since Mike came to chat with us,” he calls from inside the refrigerator. “Glad he finally got around to asking! Thought I was going to have to drink this all myself.”
“Oh, Bill!” Nancy’s mother hisses. “It’s his sense of humor, Michael,” she adds.
“So I’ve heard,” Michael says, winking at Nancy.
Nancy’s dad returns to the living room with a frosty bottle of Brut and four champagne flutes. He sets them down neatly on the coffee table, then wiggles the cork out with the familiar pop that signals the start of something exciting. He pours champagne into the flutes with an expert hand; the foam reaches the very tops of the glasses, where it mushrooms threateningly but never overflows. They each take a glass.
Nancy’s dad is still standing, as though about to make a speech, and affection bubbles in her chest as Nancy pictures him standing up just like this to give a toast at their wedding.
“To Nancy and Michael,” he says now. “May the road rise to meet you.”
He nods at them both as Frances once again gasps, “Oh, Bill!” this time with tears in her eyes.
“Thank you, Daddy,” Nancy says, standing to kiss him on the cheek.
“So happy for you, Beetle,” he mutters in her ear. His bristly moustache tickles her skin. “He’s a good egg.”
“I know, Dad.”
They sit down again, and all four of them clink glasses over the coffee table. Nancy leans back on the couch, smiling at her mother across from her. Michael wraps his arm around her shoulders.
Frances reaches up and straightens her wig. Her hair has grown back since the chemo, but it’s thin. Nancy suspects she might just wear wigs on a permanent basis now.
Frances claps her gloved hands together. “Well,” she says. “I say we all go out for lunch tomorrow to celebrate. Somewhere smart. Us four, and your parents, too, Michael. We’re so very excited to meet them.”
Nancy winces guiltily. She has a shift with the Janes tomorrow, helping Dr. Taylor and Alice. They have three appointments lined up in the afternoon at a secret location off Spadina Avenue. Nancy is scheduled in for pre-op counseling.
“I actually can’t tomorrow. I’m so sorry. How about Saturday?”
Frances’s hand pauses midair, the champagne glass halfway to her red-stained lips. “Why not? What are you doing?”
“Can that air conditioner blast any stronger than this?” Dr. Taylor asks.
Nancy mops her damp face with a piece of paper towel and glances toward the metal box in the apartment window. Its motor is grinding and humming as the paper ribbons tied to the grill flutter feebly. It’s working, but barely.
She, Dr. Taylor, and Alice are clustered around a small wooden table in the kitchen of the apartment the Janes are currently using as their clinic, waiting for their next appointment. The unit is on the fourth floor of a cheap low-rise in Chinatown. They can hear the screech and dinging bells of the streetcars off in the distance, latchkey children shouting and playing skipping games in the street.
The Janes move around frequently to avoid detection and reduce the likelihood of police raids. Henry Morgentaler’s clinic was nearly bombed the previous summer, and he was almost stabbed by a protester. The anti-choice movement is gaining momentum, and the Janes are determined to stay at least one step ahead.
In the past ten months, they have used space in the homes of three of their volunteer members—including an attic and a large backyard shed—as well as a dentist’s office, thanks to Penny, one of the older Janes. This apartment in Chinatown belongs to the mother of one of the volunteers. She rents it out to university students from September through April, but it’s been vacant since May. It has a kitchen, a living room that serves as their waiting area, and two bedrooms: one they use as their surgical room, the other as the recovery room. The apartment is discreet, centrally located, and the price is right, but the sweltering July heat and humidity have become almost unbearable. The rickety old air conditioning unit in the film-coated window isn’t enough to stop Nancy from sweating through her shirt.
“It’s not quite at full blast,” Alice says with a frown, her own upper lip beading with sweat. “But Leslie says if we run it any harder, it’s likely to kick the bucket. This is all we’ve got. We can try to bring some fans in from our houses, if anyone has extras they can spare. And I’ve still got Popsicles in the freezer, if you want one.”
“Oh, yeah, excellent,” Nancy says. Pushing her chair back with a screech, she strides to the refrigerator. The box of Popsicles is the only thing in the freezer besides some half-filled ice cube trays. Skipping over the grape Popsicles, she fishes three orange ones out of the bottom of the box and rips off the paper wrapping, stuffing them into the bin lined with a medical-grade garbage bag. She hands one to each of the other women.
“Has Kathleen been discharged yet?” she asks Alice.
“Just about to be. She’s in the second bedroom on the recovery couch. Doris is in there with her.” Alice drops her voice, and Dr. Taylor and Nancy lean in. “Poor thing had a really rough go. Three kids already and her husband is an unemployed drunk. I saw bruises on her arms, and she said he forces himself on her. Won’t even let her use birth control. So we may see her again.”
“Well, fuck that guy,” Dr. Taylor says, biting the end off her Popsicle.
Nancy looks up at her. She’s never heard her curse like that before.
“Yeah,” Alice continues. “Doris said she’s going to see if she’s willing to go to a shelter. But they rarely are. I wish we could let them bring a close friend, or sister, but…”
“We can’t. Not after Montreal—”
“I know,” Alice says. “I just wish it were different.”
The women exchange a dark look across the table. Dr. Taylor nods. “No kidding.”
They used to allow their clients to bring their mother or sister, a friend, or even their boyfriend, if he was supportive of the decision. Until three months ago, when an underground clinic in Montreal got raided after a client’s fickle friend reported the location to the local police. Charges are pending against the volunteers and doctor, a professional acquaintance of Dr. Taylor’s from her medical school days. The network was destroyed. The Janes simply can’t risk it. And if that weren’t bad enough, their previous informant at the police headquarters, Mary, had to leave her job to stay home with her first baby. The Janes don’t have anyone on the inside anymore to give them a heads-up about potential raids. Their advance warning system is gone.
They have two more procedures scheduled this afternoon. Normally they book their patients for Saturdays, when the volunteers are more available and the women can come see the Janes under the guise of running errands, but Alice is getting married tomorrow, and it’s generally frowned upon for the bride to arrive at her wedding sweating buckets and covered in blood and amniotic fluid.
“Is everything all ready to go for tomorrow?” Nancy asks her now. Her own brand-new engagement ring glitters on her finger. She shared the news with Evelyn and Alice the moment she walked through the door this morning.
A smile creeps across Alice’s usually stoic features. “Yes. It’s a bit more splashy than I wanted, but you know Bob’s mother. Everything is pink and peach.” She rolls her eyes. “I never thought I would have a wedding at all, let alone some big ostentatious affair like this.”
“You and Bob love each other,” Dr. Taylor says. “That’s all that matters. Just make sure you don’t choke on peonies and lemon custard cake. I need you. Same goes for you, Nancy, when the time comes.”
Alice and Nancy laugh as Dr. Taylor pops the rest of the Popsicle into her mouth. A buzzer sounds, and all three stiffen, alert.
“Just the two o’clock coming in,” Nancy says, picking up her clipboard. She goes to answer the door. “Hello?”
“Hello,” the crackly voice echoes back.
“What can I do for you?” Nancy asks.
“I’m, uh, I’m looking for Jane?” The voice sounds unsure.
“Is she expecting you?”
A pause. “Yes.”
“What’s your name?”
“Patricia.”
“What number did Jane give you when you first called her?” Nancy asks.
“Hang on, it’s in my purse. One sec.”
The buzzer clicks off, and Nancy drums her fingers against the wall beside the door, waiting. The crackly voice returns.
“One-three-five-nine-two-two.”
Nancy consults her clipboard to confirm the code is correct for their two o’clock appointment.
“Come on up,” she says, and buzzes Patricia in.
Nancy will do a brief pre-screening counseling session in the operating room and explain the procedure to the patient before handing her off to Dr. Taylor. The Janes developed this two-step system to help spread out the responsibility so the doctors could focus solely on the medical side of things. Realizing she forgot to bring a pen for Patricia’s intake, Nancy walks back to the kitchen, where Dr. Taylor and Alice are still in conversation.
“Will this always be necessary?” Alice asks.
“The code?” Dr. Taylor asks. “I think so. It’s too—”
“No, not the security. I just mean abortions. Sometimes I think we’ve come so far, and with the pill and the movement and everything, the Birth Control Handbook. But we’re still doing, what, four procedures a week? And that’s just our clinic. I can’t believe there’s still that much of a need.”
Nancy grabs a pen from the jar on the counter as Dr. Taylor looks down into Alice’s kind face. The face she’ll present to her husband tomorrow at her wedding, made-up and polished, full of love and commitment and hope for their future. The face that will calm the nerves of nearly ten thousand aborting women over the course of her forty-two-year career in obstetrics. Because it will never stop.
Dr. Taylor sighs heavily, but manages a weak smile nonetheless. “Yes, Alice. There will always be a need.”
Nancy shakes her head sadly and returns to the front door. A minute or two later, her patient arrives.
“Patricia?” she asks, pen poised over her clipboard.
The woman standing in the doorway is exactly her age, according to the docket in Nancy’s hands. She’s wearing Bermuda shorts and a plaid shirt, dark hair pulled back in a loose ponytail. Nancy introduces herself and Patricia steps over the threshold. Her eyes flicker around the living room. Nancy knows how it looks: a cluster of old chairs, a coffee table, and some out-of-date magazines. It doesn’t matter, though. Almost all the women who pick them up end up flipping through them without absorbing a single word, recipe, or beauty tip. Their eyes slide over the pages while their minds race; some balancing on the precipice of changing their decision, waffling back and forth between yes and no with every robotic turn of the crinkled, glossy pages. Others are far more sure, like Nancy was, and can’t wait for it to be over.
Nancy leads Patricia into the master bedroom and gestures to one of the chairs beside the operating table. It’s not a proper operating table, just a sturdy, fold-up portable table with a thin camping mattress on it, covered in plastic sheets. But it’s the best they can do under these clandestine circumstances.
As Patricia sits down, her eyes flicker over to the tray next to the table, the silver instruments laid out on the blue paper. Her brows pinch together as she lowers her purse to the floor beside her.
“Would you like some water?” Nancy asks, trying to distract her from the sight of the surgical tools. It’s always the first question she poses to her patients. A simple yes or no, non-threatening, and it puts them in control.
Patricia shakes her head no.
“And just to confirm, you’re here of your own volition? We have to ask that of every woman who comes to see us. If you’ve been forced to come here by anyone, we can try to help you in other ways,” Nancy says.
“Yeah. Yeah I’m here because I want to be.”
“Okay, good. And have you ever had this procedure, Patricia?”
Patricia clears her throat and sits up straighter in the chair. “Um, no. No, I haven’t.”
“Okay, so the procedure itself is quite safe. We haven’t yet had any issues or emergencies, and no one has ever gotten a post-op infection on our watch. Our doctor and nurse are highly trained professionals. They do about four of these a week. They’re kind, compassionate women. You’re in good hands here.”
Patricia swallows and leans forward. “Could you tell me how it’s done?”
“Of course, but you should tell me how much detail you want. Some women just want the general idea, and others are more comfortable if they know the specifics, so they can know exactly what to expect.”
“I’d like to hear it step-by-step. If that’s okay.”
“Okay, if you’re sure. So, the doctor will first examine your uterus using a speculum—the same kind they use for PAP tests. She’ll then inject some medication into your cervix to numb the area, and stretch it out a bit,” Nancy continues, eyeing Patricia closely. This is sometimes where she starts to lose a patient; some people have no idea what they’re about to hear, and it’s where even the most determined woman’s resolve can start to splinter. “She’ll insert a tube, and then—”
A piercing screech issues from somewhere on Patricia’s body. Like the shrill tone of a poorly tuned violin, the sound hovers in the air, vibrates, then dissipates in a whistle.
The two women freeze in tableau.
“What…?” Nancy trails off.
Patricia fumbles around with her shirt, lifting it to reveal a small black box with wires strapped to her midsection. “Shit,” she whispers. There’s a soft click as she flicks a switch.
Nancy opens her mouth to speak again, and at the same moment, Patricia reaches down to the floor and pulls a handgun out of her big black purse. Rising from her chair, she points it directly at Nancy.
“I’m going to need you to stand up slowly and put your hands behind your head.”