One Christmas Knight

“I didn’t believe you,” he said softly.

She gave a dry snort of irony. “You didn’t-I couldn’t believe I’d said it. It’s not something I go around telling people, ordinarily.”

“I didn’t believe you,” he said again in a muffled voice, talking to the boards between his feet. “How could I? There you were, havin’ a baby.”

“And then…” Her breath sighed and the rocker creaked softly as she leaned back. “I told you I’d been artificially inseminated.”

His short, dry laugh was an echo of hers. “Then I believed you. I figured nobody would make up somethin’ like that.”

“You were so shocked.” Her voice was gentle; not accusing, just stating a fact. “I know it…changed things. Between us. The way you felt about me.” He shifted uncomfortably, wishing he could deny it, knowing he owed her the truth. Knowing she wouldn’t let him deny it, even if he’d tried to. Her eyes were steady on him now, the light from the living-room windows shining in them like moonlight on water. “I know it did, Jimmy Joe. I felt it. What I couldn’t understand was why?”

He looked at her for a long time without answering, trying to pick apart the knots of feeling inside him. He was discovering that knowing something in your gut was one thing; trying to reason it out so you could explain it was something else. Finally he shook his head and began, “I never meant to judge-”

“But you did.”

He looked down at his clasped hands. “Yes, I guess I did, for a while.” He paused, then went on in a voice he kept low to hide the intensity of the emotions inside him. “I know what it’s like, you know, raising a child all alone-I’ve been doin’ it for eight years, now. And dammit all-I can’t help it if I have strong feelings about a kid needin’ two parents. Me, I know I’m one of the lucky ones, because of Mama and Jess bein’ so close by, so even when I’m gone I know J.J.’s always got somebody around to love him and care for him. But I’ve seen what happens to kids, left alone with the TV or some computer for a baby- sitter.”

He left the rocking chair, propelled by the tension he couldn’t keep to himself any longer, paced to the railing and stopped. Leaning his hands on it, he stared into the darkness and said quietly, “I know things happen to people they can’t help, and when they do they’ve got no choice but to make the best of things. But I thought, for somebody to do that to a child on purpose, that it was kind of…” He looked over at her, hating to say it to her now, because of the way he felt about her, but knowing it was best to get it said and over with right up front, too. So he took a breath and murmured, “Selfish.”

She sat hunched forward in the chair, rocking it slightly, making faint creaking sounds, not saying anything. He watched the way her hair shone warm in the light, like polished cherry-wood, and thought again of the nursery rhyme about the robin.

“Selfish…” She whispered it, then shook her head and said slowly, “And yet, you brought me here.”

His feelings burned inside him like fire. He wanted so much for her to understand. “But that’s just it,” he said with gravel in his throat. “I know you’re not selfish.”

“No-maybe I am selfish.” She left the chair rocking, empty, and came to the railing, her chin lifted in that uppity way she had. And he caught his breath, filled with a sudden burst of pride and delight in her, so it was all he could do to keep himself from bursting out in smiles and dragging her into his arms then and there.

“I wanted to be a mother,” she said, roused and angry. “That’s pretty selfish, I know. And I had a good job, plenty of money, a really nice home, and all this love and warmth and security-everything a child could want or need, right? Except for one thing-oops. no father! Bummer. But then I thought, so what? The important thing is the love, not who it comes from, or how many. I know lots of kids with two parents who’d be a helluva lot better off with one-or none at all, if you want to know the truth. So I thought, I’ve got enough love for two people, and I knew I’d make one terrific parent, so I decided to do it. I planned to try it this way first, and if that didn’t work, I’d adopt. But it did work. And if you want me to say I’m sorry I did it-wett, I’m not.”

He listened to the angry rhythm of her breathing and felt his own pulses quicken in response, and his body heat with a passion to match hers, although he knew it was a different kind. He meant to change that as soon as he could. He didn’t move toward her, though, but said in a slow, soft drawl, “Well, Marybell, like I said, I know you’re not selfish. And I won’t say you’re wrong about anything you just said, especially the part about the love bein’ what’s important, and you bein’ a terrific mama. Which I guess just leaves me with one question.” He turned his head to look at her. “Why? Why did you have to do it this way? I mean, look at you-you’re smart, funny, warm, a whole lotta fun to argue with, and probably the most beautiful, the sexiest woman I’ve ever seen in my life!”

Her breath caught, and surprise flashed like summer lightning in her eyes. His own heart stumbled, then began to pound like answering thunder. He whirled away from her, not trusting himself so near her, heat pumping through his body. Struggling with it, searching for a way to say it without being crude, he finally burst out with, “Woman, there must have been men fallin’ over themselves to be the father of your child!”

Behind him, she laughed softly and unevenly, as if someone had taken her by the shoulders and shaken her. “Maybe so. But not the right one.” Silence pulsed between them.

Then she said in her brisk, businesslike Mirabella voice, “I guess you want to know how come I’m a virgin at thirty-eight. Well, like I said, I didn’t exactly plan it that way. My problem has always been, you see, that I don’t look anything like who I really am. I told you what I was like as a child. Well, there was a poem I remember-it was about this little girl who was a tomboy on the outside, but inside she was something completely different. That was me. It still is. When I was fat and homely, I kept waiting for some little boy to see how funny and smart and generous I was.

“By the time I got prettier, I’d developed this enormous chip on my shoulder. So now I looked like this cute, sexy little airhead, when actually I was an angry, resentful witch. And…I I kept waiting for some guy to see how funny and smart and generous I was in spite of all that.”

Remembering the thought that had come to him way back in that truck-stop diner in New Mexico, Jimmy Joe wanted to burst out with, ‘I would have! Me!“ It took all the patience and good manners he had in him not to interrupt her.

“Guess what? Nobody ever did. Oh, I had crushes, of course-always on somebody who didn’t have a clue. Guys who were attracted to me because of my looks-which was pretty much all of them-got turned off as soon as they found out who I really was. They just weren’t expecting somebody who looks like I do to have a brain, I guess. They thought they’d be getting this adorable little someone they could dominate and control, and when they found out I was bossy and independent and headstrong and just as capable as they were-if not more so-boy, did they back off in a hurry.

“So…” She gulped, and suddenly there were tears in her voice. She lowered it to a whisper and went on, hurrying now, determined to get it all said. “I kept waiting for some guy to come along who would see how smart and funny and generous, and headstrong and independent and capable I was, and love me anyway. And no one ever did. I could have settled for just…someone, I suppose, but I’ve never been much good at compromising.” She stopped there for a short huff of dry laughter, then finished in a flat, matter-of-fact tone. “For me it was the right man, or none at all. Eventually, I realized that the right man wasn’t going to come along in time, and if I was going to have a child, I’d have to do it without one. So I did.”

“Maybe,” Jimmy Joe said hoarsely, “you just gave up too soon.”

Chapter 16

“I’m gon‘ be rollin’ into home ‘bout twelve, one, tonight. My wife’s gon’ be lyin‘ in bed a-waitin’ for me.”

I-40-Texas

“Oh…Jimmy Joe.”

He turned to her then, all primed and ready to take her in his arms, but when he saw the way she was looking