What Family Means Part 18

The e-mail ended without a closing comment, so Angie went to the next in the list.

Hi, Angie,Saw the news. Buffalo looks like it's getting clobbered. I'm relieved to hear that you're at your folks' house. Sorry you're not at work, where you want to be right now. But at least you're not stuck on the road or worse. Those storms up there are harsh. Remember the one a few years ago?Love, Jesse Yes, Angie remembered the storm. She and Jesse had flown in for Blair and Stella's wedding. It was early October, so they weren't expecting bad weather, and had found themselves stranded on the Thruway for three hours. They'd made good use of the time in the car, making out like teenagers. She knew it could've been worse.

She sighed and rubbed her belly. It wasn't much larger yet, but her body felt entirely different to her.

Jesse had always made it clear that he didn't want to risk having kids in light of his childhood. His own parents had each married three times, twice to each other. They were back together now, and had been for the past five years, but their divorces and respective marriages to other spouses had occurred during Jesse's junior and senior years in high school.

He'd never forgiven them.

Angie didn't blame him, but she did think he'd let his own resentment cloud his better judgment.

Angie and Jesse had been married for seven years, most of the time very content and happy. But Angie wanted kids. Jesse still balked at the idea, although she felt his reasons weren't entirely valid anymore. Yes, science supported the theory that an addiction gene existed and they'd always have a chance of pa.s.sing it on to their offspring. But his nieces and nephews were living proof that environment played a huge part, too.

Angie never apologized for wanting children with Jesse. They just didn't address it.

Until his most recent phone call.

Her cell phone rang. The noise startled her in the still of the late hour.

It was Jesse again. Using today's ten minutes, in the first hour of his day in Iraq.

"Hi, Angie. How about meeting me in Paris instead of Garmisch?"

"Paris?" Angie's planning had revolved around Germany. Angie's planning had revolved around Germany.

"Why not? It's warmer than the Alps and you've always wanted to go."

"I just booked a flight for Germany. I'm also new at my job, Jesse. I can't just take off whenever I want to. Especially during our busy season."

"It'll be the same week you've already booked off for vacation. Besides, every season's busy up there, isn't it? They have blizzards in October, for heaven's sake. Tell them you'll do overtime on Halloween."

Angie choked back a laugh. She'd have a two-month-old baby by Halloween.

Jesse's baby.

"It's not that easy."

"Do you think doing neurosurgery in a war zone is?"

Recrimination sent a flush of shame up her chest, her face.

Even pregnant and in the middle of a Buffalo blizzard, Angie knew she was far more secure and comfortable than Jesse, given where he was.

"I'll see what I can do." Was she crazy? It was as though her tongue had a mind of its own.

Debra I STARED AT THE BOOKMARKS I'd cross-st.i.tched for Will and me back in high school. Just another way I tried to be close to him. I couldn't have him as a normal boyfriend, but I never wanted him to forget me.

It's impossible to laugh at that girl, even now, over forty years later. Because the love I had then was the start of what we had now, what sustained us over the years.

"Mom?"

Angie interrupted my thoughts. I looked up from the studio desk.

"Yes, honey?"

"Grandma's settled in for the night. How long do you think you'll be up?"

I glanced at the clock. It was after 1:00 a.m.

"I had no idea it was so late. What are you doing up?" I studied her more closely. She looked tired but otherwise okay.

"Jesse just e-mailed, and then we talked on my cell phone for a bit."

"Okay." I wouldn't ask her to tell me any more than she was ready to. Will's warning had hit home. Angie was ent.i.tled to her own life.

She walked into the room.

"He wants me to meet him in Europe."

"You were expecting that, right? Didn't you say it would be at that resort in the Alps?" I was so proud of myself-I hadn't even mentioned that skiing wouldn't be an option for a pregnant woman.

"Yes, well, that's what he said at first, and I a.s.sumed it would be Germany, since that's where most of his colleagues have met their wives."

"And now?"

"He suggested we go to Paris instead."

"Oh..."

Paris. It was responsible for Will and me finally getting together, for admitting our love to each other. Paris meant so much to us that we'd never gone back for fear it would be different. For fear of ruining our beautiful memories, besmirching them with present realities.

"Don't get all worked up, Mom. Paris isn't anything to Jesse and me but a meeting place."

"Do you really believe that, Angie?"

"Mom." Angie wouldn't make eye contact; she concentrated on the knitted items I'd laid out on the table.

"What are these for? Golf clubs?"

Angie held up the burgundy covers that, unknown to her, might as well have been a scarlet A. A.

"Yes. I never finished them." And never went through with the physical side of an emotional adultery, thank G.o.d. It had just been a fantasy, and an opportunity I'd pa.s.sed on.

"Angie, listen to me. I'm well aware that you could raise this child by yourself if you want to. But if you think you'll come to regret not mending your relations.h.i.+p with Jesse, then you have to try."

"I know." She sighed. "But there's another thing, Mom. I'll miss your opening night of the exhibit."

"That's okay. It'll still be here when you get back." Of course I wanted Angie there for opening night, but I wanted her family situation settled more.

She held up the tiny ivory cardigan she'd worn to our wedding. She'd been all of six weeks old.

"You made this for me?"

"I did." I hesitated for just a moment. What the h.e.l.l. My grandchild wasn't coming into a family of secrets, not if I had anything to say about it. And I did.

"You know we didn't get married until after you were born, right?"

"Yes, you told me in the coffee shop." Angie frowned at me. "Did you intend to marry Daddy once you left Buffalo?"

"No. Yes, of course." I sighed. "I don't know what I thought. I knew I needed to finish my degree, and I knew that I couldn't come back until it was done."

I watched her finger the delicate baby sweater.

"Your dad was going through a difficult time that year with his dad, your grandfather, pa.s.sing away, and well...Grandma wasn't always so easy to deal with."

"Mom, Grandma's never been easy to deal with. She and I have a bond, but don't think I haven't noticed her bossiness."

"Bossiness is one thing. How she was before..." I looked out at the snow that was blowing so hard it made a musical pling-pling pling-pling against the windowpanes. against the windowpanes.

"I've told you and your brothers that times were different then, even as recently as twenty years ago. You've seen a huge change in your lifetime, haven't you?"

"You're back on the color issue, Mom. I'm telling you, it's never been the problem for me that you expected it to be."

"Angie, you've been blessed with beauty and smarts. For the most part you've always been around people as educated as you. And don't lie to me. I know you've had your own struggles."

I drew in a long breath, then exhaled.

"My point is that when your dad and I got married, we could've been exactly alike, except for the color of our skin, and it wouldn't have been good enough."

"I studied African-American history, Mom. I get the social issues."

"I know you do, intellectually, and on some level, in your heart. But living through them is another matter."

I smiled at my daughter.

"I wouldn't change anything, Angie. I love your father and he's the man who I'm supposed to be with. He always was. That's why I'm saying you need to go after Jesse and work things out if you honestly believe he's the man for you. He'll come around on the family issue-it sounds like he already has. He's more committed to you than almost any husband I've met. And once he knows about the baby..."

"That's just it. I don't want him to want a family merely because he has no choice."

I had to laugh.

Angie's brows drew together. She didn't understand that I wasn't laughing at her.

"Honey, I had the same thoughts when I was pregnant with you, and right before your dad and I tied the knot. It isn't something you can control anymore, Angie. You and the baby are a package deal."

"I don't like being anybody's 'deal.'"

"Don't be so obtuse, Angie. You know what I'm getting at."

Angie gnawed at her lower lip. Her dark curls fell against her cafe-au-lait skin and I was struck again by what a beautiful woman she'd become.

"I thought by the time I was thirty-five I'd have the world figured out." I saw a tear slip out of her eye and roll down her cheek.

I walked over to her and hugged her tight.

"Oh, baby, we never get it figured out. That's the h.e.l.l of it all. But...it's also the fun part."

Angie pulled away and rubbed her cheeks.

"d.a.m.n these hormones," she muttered.

"They're a good thing. They mean your body's doing what it's supposed to."

"Were you this emotional with me and the twins?"

"Oh, yeah. Some days it was all I could do to keep my mouth shut so I wouldn't say something horrible to some poor, undeserving soul."

Angie giggled. "I bit my new employee's head off for using up the last of the copy paper. There were stacks and stacks of it in the cabinet right next to the machine, but it didn't matter. I did apologize," she added quickly.

"I'd expect no less." I smiled at her. "Are you going to be able to sleep?"

"Yes. I wish I was at the station, but this is the way it is. If they need me they can call me on my cell."

"It sounds like this storm will stop by noon tomorrow."

"Yes, that's what my systems are indicating. So I can get to the station then."

"Angie, you're forgetting one thing."

"What, Mom?"

"It'll take a day for the city to clear the streets. Just look out at that driveway. I'll bet there are three feet of snow. You're not going anywhere until it's safe."

"Something else I don't have any control over."

I remained silent. This was a precious hour Angie and I wouldn't normally get, between her career and mine. Our coffee-shop meetings were great but not the same. They didn't allow enough time for these heart-to-hearts.

Which on most days was fine with both of us.

But tonight we needed the connection.

I WOKE SUDDENLY in the middle of the dark night. The howl of the blizzard hadn't lessened, and the house continued to make its familiar groans. The storm hadn't awakened me, but my dreams had. They weren't so much dreams as thoughts that continued the conversation Angie and I had started last night.

I remembered the early years, how our marriage had begun....