The smell of coffee, banana and something rich and eggy wafted into the hallway as Dena descended the stairs from her apartment. She felt a pang of hunger but, at the same time, couldn’t imagine actually eating anything. Still, as she looked at the closed door of Peter’s apartment, she felt a kind of yearning, an envy of Peter and his daughters, in there together, having their breakfast, while she was about to embark on this painful visit to Jennifer’s now-forlorn nursery.
As if she had read Dena’s thoughts, Tory threw open the apartment door just as Dena reached the bottom step. She was wearing an apron and had a spatula in her hand. ‘We made banana pancakes,’ she said. ‘Do you want some?’
Dena smiled at the child, looking so grown-up and … motherly. ‘Oh, what a lovely offer,’ Dena said.
‘We made extra,’ said Tory.
Dena hesitated and then thought that it wouldn’t hurt to step in for a minute. She was dreading going out into the gray morning. It was dark and rainy once again. And she was dreading the sight of Ron, and having to look at all those baby things with him, reminding him of his loss. ‘All right, I’ll have one bite,’ Dena said.
The child’s face lit up with joy and Dena was glad she had agreed. But when she walked into the apartment, her spirits sank once again. ‘My, you got a lot done,’ she said, looking around at the bare shelves, everything emptied and packed, as she laid her coat on a chair by the door.
‘We’ve been up for hours,’ Tory confided as she led the way to the kitchen, where Peter was dividing pancakes onto plates and pouring milk.
‘Guess what. Make a plate for Dena!’
Peter looked up in surprise. ‘Good morning,’ he said.
‘I was waylaid by the chef,’ Dena said, blushing.
‘Here, sit,’ he said, indicating a chair.
‘Just one for me,’ said Dena, shaking out a napkin and tucking it into her jumper, since she no longer had a lap in which to set it. Carrying the plate with both hands, Tory set it down in front of her.
‘These look delicious,’ Dena said.
‘Dad’s recipe,’ Tory said proudly, beaming at her father.
Dena nodded, and waited until they were all seated. Megan came in at the last minute, still wearing pajamas. They began to pass butter and syrup. Then the children bent their fair heads over their plates and began to eat. A recording of The Four Seasons played softly in the background. The scene was so idyllic that Dena sighed, in spite of herself. How did Peter do it, she wondered? He was mother and father both to these girls. Dena had doubts about her own ability to even be an adequate mother.
The landline rang and Tory dropped her fork and lunged to answer it, turning her back on the table.
‘Who is it?’ Peter demanded.
Tory turned around with her hand over the mouthpiece. ‘A girl in my class,’ she said.
Peter watched his daughter intently as she talked to her schoolmate.
Tory said, ‘I don’t know. I’ll ask.’ She looked at her father. ‘Can I go over to Jacqueline’s and play tomorrow?’
Peter looked at her incredulously. ‘Tory, we’re leaving tomorrow.’
Tory did not miss a beat. She said calmly, ‘No, I can’t. I’m moving tomorrow. But thank you for asking.’ She hung up the phone and sat back down at the table.
Megan, who was watching this exchange with wide eyes, suddenly began to wail. ‘No, I don’t wanna go.’
‘You have to,’ said Tory. ‘Dad, tell her she has to.’
‘That’s enough now,’ said Peter, clapping his hands. ‘You girls still have work to do on your room. Tory, help your sister.’
Tory obediently bent down, wiped Megan’s face with a napkin and took her hand. ‘Come on,’ she said. ‘I’ll let you pack my Barbie trunk.’
Reluctantly, tears still streaking her cheeks, Megan gave in to the alluring offer, and allowed herself to be dragged down the hallway.
Dena watched them go, and then wiped her own mouth and stood up. ‘I’d better be going too. I’m going to meet Ron over at his house. To go through the baby stuff. Thank you for the pancakes.’
‘Glad you could join us,’ he said.
She shook her head and looked toward the doorway where the children had disappeared. ‘You know, I watch you with your children and I’m just amazed. I didn’t know men existed who were so committed to their kids. It makes me … jealous for my own baby. Every child should have a father like you.’
‘Ideally,’ he agreed with a smile.
‘I hardly remember my dad. He died when I was six. But I believe that he loved me like that. My mother always said he did.’
Peter stood up and began to collect the plates. ‘My dad played piano on a cruise ship, or so my mother told me. I was the result of a one-night stand,’ he said. ‘I guess that’s where I got my musical gift,’ he said wryly.
Dena shook her head. ‘Oh, Peter, that’s a terrible thing to tell a child.’
‘She was nothing if not blunt,’ he said, smiling thinly.
‘So you had no … model for fatherhood, so to speak.’
‘Or motherhood. I’m a self-made parent,’ he said.
She sighed. ‘Well, you’re a good one. I wish you weren’t leaving tomorrow. I’ll miss you … all so much.’
Peter put the dishes in the sink and turned on the tap. ‘I think you should come with us,’ he said.
‘I wish I could,’ she said.
He turned, wiping his hands. ‘It’s on the way. We could take you as far as your sister’s.’
‘That’s very nice,’ she said. ‘But I’m sure I’ll be leaving soon.’
Peter walked her to the door. ‘It’s up to you …’ he said curtly.
Dena turned at the door and impulsively put her arms around his neck, hugging him. He stiffened against her embrace as if it were unwelcome. She pulled away from him in confusion. Avoiding her questioning gaze, he patted her swollen belly.
‘A baby is the greatest gift there is,’ he said. ‘You should treat it like a treasure.’
Dena wondered if he was annoyed about the ride. ‘I really appreciate the offer,’ she said. ‘But I think I’m doing the right thing.’
‘Let’s hope you don’t live to regret it.’
‘I should hope not,’ she said. She picked up her coat and purse and left the house.
The yellow tape still encircled the Hubbells’ cottage, but there was no patrolman at the door as there had been before. Dena climbed the steps reluctantly, and peered into the porch windows. The house was completely dark, and she wondered if she had gotten the time mixed up when Ron had asked her to come. She knocked once, and then tried the bell. The house was silent and Dena felt a distinct desire to turn away. At that moment, she saw an unsmiling face materialize in the gloomy interior.
‘Ron?’ she asked.
Ron came out onto the porch and opened the door for her. He was wearing the same clothes he’d had on the day before, and he looked exhausted. ‘Come in,’ he said.
‘Where’s your friend?’ Dena asked.
Ron looked at her in confusion. ‘Who?’
‘Your friendly policeman seems to be missing.’
‘Oh, yeah,’ he said. ‘They called him in. I heard him talking on his radio. It sounded as if something happened to the chief. They were taking him to the hospital.’
‘Oh,’ said Dena. ‘I wonder what.’
‘This way,’ said Ron, pointing to the stairs. It was clear that he did not wonder at all about the chief.
He indicated that she should walk in front of him and she hesitated and then said, ‘Could you put the light on?’ She put a hand on her belly. ‘I’m so clumsy these days.’
‘Oh, sure,’ he said.
Dena began to climb up the stairwell, now illuminated, toward the second floor. She knew what she was going to find. She had looked longingly into the nursery when she was staying here. Still, when she reached the doorway in the hall, she was reluctant to push it open.
‘Go ahead,’ he said. Ron came up behind her, and she could smell his clothes, the mixture of aftershave and perspiration on them settling into a stale, suffocating funk around him. Partly to get a little distance from him, she steeled herself and opened the door.
The nursery was exactly as Jennifer had left it. The crib was set up with bolsters, bedding and a mobile hanging over it. The changing table was equipped with lotions and powder and an unopened bag of newborn Pampers. The cheerful hooked rug, the painted cushioned rocker and the framed nursery rhymes combined to make a heartbreaking tableau. For a minute, Dena was overwhelmed by the sheer hopefulness of the room, and had to turn away. Ron waded in, however, like a man used to swimming below the surface of murky waters. He walked over to the wall and rubbed his fingertips onto an invisible pattern that only he could see, waist-high.
‘She was going to stencil this part,’ he said. ‘She showed me a couple of different colors and designs. She was good that way. She really was. She had the ability to take something plain and make it beautiful. That’s the way she was,’ he murmured.
‘Yes, she was,’ Dena agreed, not knowing what else to say.
‘Go ahead and look,’ he urged her. He pulled open the dresser drawers. ‘Full of clothes. All of them are unisex. We didn’t want to know the secret, so she bought all colors that either a boy or a girl could wear. Take them all.’
In what? Dena thought. She hadn’t planned to carry stuff away today. ‘These clothes are beautiful,’ she said, gently patting the pastel coveralls, pajamas and sweaters. ‘My baby will be lucky to have such wonderful clothes.’
Ron opened the doors on the changing table and pulled out a diaper bag. ‘Here, put them in this. Top of the line. She pored over the catalogues until she found a diaper bag that did everything but change the baby itself. Here, take it,’ he said, pushing it at her. ‘Fill it up with anything you want,’ he cried. ‘The stuff cost a fortune.’
He was roaming around the nursery, pulling toys down off the shelves and tiny outfits on hangers from the closet, and tossing them behind him so they fell on the floor.
‘Ron,’ Dena said anxiously. ‘I don’t think this is the right day for this. It’s too close. It hurts too much.’
Ron turned and looked at the heap he had made on the yellow hooked rug. ‘I thought she was spending too much money,’ he said. ‘I had heard rumors I was going to lose my job. And the house was costing more than we anticipated. Meanwhile, she kept buying things for the baby. She tore off all the tags so that nothing would go back. She wasn’t taking anything back.’
‘Well, she was excited about the baby …’ Dena said, not sure what he expected her to say.
‘Yes, the baby. She wanted that baby more than anything. She thought that’s what I wanted too. She assumed it. She assumed every man wanted to have a child …’
‘You didn’t?’ she asked softly.
Ron stared into the dark closet, one hand resting on the edges of an empty drawer. ‘No. Not really. Not at first. What was the big rush? I wanted it to be the two of us for a while. But, I’m a “yes” man. I tell people what they want to hear.’
Dena frowned. Every marriage was a mystery, she thought. The secret fears and disappointments partners kept from one another and the world. It was sad to hear him saying these things now, in the wake of Jennifer’s death. There was no need to admit to any faults in their marriage anymore. She wondered why he was telling her this.
‘Are you surprised?’ he asked coldly.
‘Surprised at what?’ she asked.
‘The truth,’ he said.
Dena searched for the right words. ‘I think you’re being a little hard on yourself,’ she said. ‘I saw you at those Lamaze classes. You can’t tell me you weren’t happy about that baby. I mean, everybody has reservations at first, I think.’
‘No, not everybody,’ he insisted.
‘Sure,’ she said gently. ‘Such a big change in your life. Jennifer understood that. I’m sure she did. I think women just have some kind of … I don’t know what … some chemical in their body that makes them look forward to babies. Tides the men over until they can get used to the idea.’ The good men, anyway, she thought.
‘I was worried about the money,’ he protested, as if he wanted to convince her of how loathsome a person he was. ‘I thought about it all the time.’
Dena walked over and put a hand gently on his shoulder. ‘It’s only natural. Babies are expensive. You can spend a small fortune on getting them outfitted.’
‘She was determined to have everything ready when the baby came. Everything in its place and it didn’t matter to her what it cost. I wanted her to stop, but I didn’t know how to tell her that,’ he said.
Dena could see that he was determined to prove that he was stingy and mean-spirited. In spite of what she knew to be true, he wanted her to agree that he was a terrible person. ‘All right now. Come on,’ Dena said firmly. ‘Come downstairs. I don’t want to do this today. I’ll be happy to have these things and I’ll come back and get them. But you need to get out of here. You’re torturing yourself over this and you shouldn’t be. You were only concerned about them. Jennifer and your baby. Worried about their security, like any good dad would be.
‘Besides,’ she said, trying to lighten the gloom a little, ‘many a husband has wished his wife liked shopping a little less. It doesn’t mean anything. It’s just one of those things between men and women.’
‘So innocent,’ he said, his shoulders sagging. ‘Just buying things for her baby.’
‘Ron,’ Dena said. ‘Look. If she were here today she’d be proposing a trip to Babies “R” Us and you’d be cheerfully fuming. Right?’
Ron stared bleakly at the empty crib.
‘And, oh, how we wish that could happen,’ Dena said, with a catch in her voice. ‘That she could walk in that door, credit card at the ready, and say, “Let’s go shopping.” Right?’
She saw a tear slide down his sallow face.
‘Now, you get out of this room right now. Get out of the house. You shouldn’t be here.’
He started to gather up the clothes and toys on the floor. Dena intervened. ‘Go on now. I’ll do that.’ She waited until he had shuffled out of the room and then she quickly gathered up and folded the tiny clothes and put the toys back on the shelves. It was strange to realize that she would soon be using these things for her own baby. And she could not suppress a secret feeling of joy that she had her baby to look forward to. She didn’t begrudge herself the feeling. She knew Jennifer would understand.
When she had finished, she closed the door to the nursery and went back downstairs. ‘Ron,’ she called, but there was no reply in the dark house. She walked through the living room and the dining room, avoiding looking at the place where Jennifer’s body had been found. She went out into the kitchen, which was much brighter thanks to its many windows. Looking out, she saw Ron standing, coatless, in the drizzly backyard. He was ankle deep in brightly colored leaves, his hands in his pockets, looking around, as if for the last time.
Give him a minute, Dena thought. You couldn’t hurry someone through their grieving. She had grieved enough to know. She sat down at the breakfast table, in the very seat where she had last sat when Jennifer was alive. She looked around the neat kitchen, remembering that morning. She and Jenn had talked about their day, their plans, the fact that it was Jennifer’s anniversary. And then, she remembered something else.
There had been that phone call, about the flowers. They were going to deliver flowers to her that afternoon. She thought of Sergeant Watkins, asking her to call him if she remembered anything. Did it matter about the flowers? she wondered.
She heard footsteps coming up the back, and then the kitchen door opened, and Ron came in, shivering.
‘Ron,’ she asked.
He looked at her dully.
‘The day that Jennifer was killed. It was your anniversary.’ He nodded. ‘Someone called about delivering her some flowers that afternoon. Did they ever deliver them?’
Ron peered around, as if trying to visualize the room in the past. ‘I don’t … recall seeing them. I mean, I wasn’t thinking about flowers.’
‘But you did order them?’
‘Yeah, I ordered them.’
‘Where?’ she said.
‘A place near the station. Quilty’s, I think it’s called. Why?’
Dena shook her head. ‘Just a thought, she said, reaching into her pocketbook on the table. I’m going to make a call.’