“But you saw him introduce bills in the Senate. It’s a good one I don’t have.”
“From what you’ve said about Dad, I’d prefer your version of my past rather than my own. Not only did you have him longer, but he was home every night. In my memories, Mom and Dad were rarely home. They were always campaigning.”
“I don’t know if it’s worse for a boy to lose his dad at ten or twenty. At either age, it’s life-altering.”
Jack glanced around the nursery he had helped her decorate, insisting it be filled with boy sorts of things, too, particularly University of Kentucky basketball and New York Yankees paraphernalia. She had enjoyed shopping with him, and the expeditions to the mall and specialty shops had helped them both heal.
“I really screwed things up, didn’t I?”
She shrugged. “It is what it is. We’ll deal with it. At least we’ll never bore each other retelling old stories.”
“You wouldn’t have been so kind before. You would have cussed me out, and I would have deserved it. Have you noticed how different you are now?”
She patted her belly. “I’m definitely different. I’m carrying around what looks like a bowling ball.”
“Not just that. You’re as relaxed as you used to be only after a long run. There’s sadness about you, but it’s not hopelessness. It’s more like a wound that’s almost healed, but it’s still red around the edges. Having David here has been good for you.”
She picked a small book up off the table. Jack had found it in a bookstore in Los Angeles. It was titled The Abyss of War, and had been written by one Michael Abraham McCabe. “Thanks for this. I can’t believe you found it.”
“It was on a shelf behind the table and chair set up for me to sign books. I stretched and my hand knocked it off the shelf. My hair practically stood on end when I realized who wrote it.”
“I understand now what Braham was trying to tell me about being broken.” She thumbed through several pages. “The experience left on a generation horrible scars which would remain long after the war. I hear in the silence even now the cries for help. Men begging for a drop of water. Calls to God for pity.” She shivered. “Later he quotes Lincoln saying, ‘If there is a worse place than hell, I am in it.’
“Then Braham continues, saying he can’t find his way out, he can’t stop the cries, the pleas for help he hears in the night.” She thumbed to another page marker. “I can’t rid my mouth of the taste of gunmetal or rid my mind of the painful memories of the years I failed to live up to my ideals.” She thumbed to a page toward the end of the book. “The war changed me profoundly. It touched everything and left nothing unchanged, and left me a different person in every respect. There is now a great divide between who I was, who I am, and who I will become.”
She closed the book and held it to her breast. “I will treasure this always. It’s a precious gift.” She patted her belly. “Perhaps our impending progeny might read it one day.”
She swept her hair, longer now than it had ever been, to one side and let it drape over her shoulder. When she noticed Jack running his eyes over the fall of hair, she said, “The day we got back from Washington, David undid my hair, and kept doing it until I stopped wearing it pulled back. He knew what happened in the past would haunt me for the rest of my life if I didn’t let my hair down, relax, and stop worrying. You know I still have occasional flashbacks, and I’m working through them, but I’ll never forget what happened. I pray Braham found peace in the person he became.”
A popping sensation startled her and fluid gushed down the insides of her legs. “Oh my God.” She glanced down at a spreading wet stain on her maternity leggings. “Looks like my water broke.”
He frowned at her dubiously. “Are you sure you’d didn’t just pee in your pants?”
“I think I can be trusted to know the difference,” she informed him sarcastically. Her baby was coming.
“Seriously?” he said.
“Yep.”
Jack jumped up, spilling coffee down the front of his shirt. “David.”
David pounded up the stairs and appeared at the door with his phone pressed to his ear. He pointed to let them know he was on a call.
“Hang up the goddamn phone. Her water just broke.”
David’s face lit up with a big grin, and he nodded. “I have an emergency. I’ll call ye later.” He disconnected the call and hurried to Charlotte’s side to help her stand. “Jack, go get her bag and meet us at the door.”
Jack pointed to the diaper bag on top of the dressing table. “Do you want me to take the baby’s bag, too?”
“No, leave it. We’ll get it tomorrow,” David said.
“You know you’ll need it. Why not take it now?”
“Leave it, Jack,” David said, giving him a look which brooked no further comment.
Charlotte was aware she was a high-risk patient and something could happen to her or to the baby. She’d never discussed it with Jack and didn’t intend to now.
“I need to change my clothes.”
“Only a quick change. I won’t let ye delay any longer. Ye should ha’ gone to the hospital hours ago.”
A few minutes later, with David at her side, she waddled down the stairs. Jack waited by the front door, wearing a clean shirt and holding her overnight suitcase, laptop bag, and purse, and chewed on a corner of his lower lip.
“Leave the laptop here. If I decide to check email, I’ll use my phone.”
He put the computer bag on the table. “God, you have changed. Do you want your purse?”
“I’ll take it,” she said, tucking the clutch bag under her arm. “Give the car keys to David. I’d
