The Gift

Chapter Four

On Friday, his father let him leave work at eleven o'clock, and he picked her up at eleven-thirty. Maribeth was waiting for him in an old pair of jeans and saddle shoes and a big shirt that had been her fathers. The jeans were rolled up almost to her knees, and she was wearing her bright red hair in pigtails. She looked about fourteen, and the big shirt concealed her growing paunch. She hadn't been able to zip her jeans up for weeks now.

“Hi, I finished earlier than I thought I would. I told my dad I was going fishing. He thought it was a great idea and told me to get going.” He helped her into the truck, and they stopped at a small market on the way to buy some sandwiches for lunch.

Tommy ordered roast beef, and she had tuna. They were big homemade-looking sandwiches, and they bought a six-pack of Cokes, and a box of cookies.

“Anything else?” Tommy asked, excited just being with her. She was so pretty and so alive, and there was something very grown-up about her. Not living at home, and having a job, somehow made her seem very mature and a lot older.

Maribeth picked up a couple of apples and a Hershey bar, and Tommy insisted on paying. She tried to split the expense with him, but he wouldn't let her. He was long and tall and lean as he followed her back to the truck, carrying their groceries and admiring her figure.

“So how come you left home so young?” he asked as they drove to the lake. He hadn't heard the story yet about her being a widow. He figured maybe her parents had died, or something dramatic had happened. Most kids their age didn't just drop out of school and move away. Something about her suggested to him that there was more to the story.

“I … uh … I don't know.” She glanced out the window for a long time, and then back at him. “It's kind of a long story.” She shrugged, thinking about what it had been like leaving home and moving to the convent. It had been the most depressing place she'd ever been, and she was glad every day she hadn't stayed there. At least here she felt alive, she had a job, she was taking care of herself, and now she had met him. Maybe they could be friends. She was beginning to feel she had a life here. She had called home a couple of times, but her mom just cried, and they wouldn't let her speak to Noelle. And the last time she called, her mother said that maybe it would be better if she wrote and didn't call them. They were happy to know that she was well, and doing all right, but her father was still very angry at her, and he said he wouldn't talk to her until after “her problem was taken care of.” Her mother kept referring to the baby as Maribeth's “problem.”

Maribeth sighed, thinking of all that, and then looked at Tommy. He had nice clean-cut looks, and he seemed like a good person to talk to. “We had a big fight and my father made me move out. He wanted me to stay in our hometown, but after a couple of weeks I just decided that I couldn't. So I came here, and got a job.” She made it all sound so simple, with none of the agony it had caused her, the terror, or the heartbreak.

“But you're going back?” He looked confused, she had already told him she was going back to school after Christmas.

“Yeah. I've got to get back to school,” she said matter-of-factly, as the road curved lazily toward the lake. His fishing pole was in the truck behind them.

“Why don't you go here?”

“I can't,” she said, not wanting to elaborate further. And then to change the subject for a little while, she looked at him, wondering what his family was like, and why he never seemed to want to be with them.

“Do you have brothers and sisters?” she asked casually, as they arrived, realizing again how little she knew about him. He turned off the engine, and looked at her, and for a long moment there was silence.

“I did,” he said quietly. “Annie. She was five. She died just after Christmas.” He got out of the truck then, without saying anything more, and went to get his fishing pole as Maribeth watched him, wondering if that was the pain one saw so easily in his eyes, if that was why he never went home to his parents.

She got out of the truck, and followed him to the lake. They found a quiet spot at the end of a sandy beach and he slipped off his jeans. He had bathing trunks on, and he unbuttoned his shirt as she watched him. For the flash of an instant, she thought of Paul, but there was no similarity between them. None. Paul was sophisticated and smooth, and very much the man-about-campus. He was also married by then, and he was part of another life. Everything about Tommy was wholesome and pure. He seemed very innocent, and incredibly nice, and she was startled by how much she liked him.

She sat down on the sand next to him, while he baited his hook.

“What was she like?” Her voice was very soft, and he didn't look up from what he was doing.

“Annie?” He looked up at the sun, and then closed his eyes for a second before glancing at Maribeth. He didn't want to talk about it, and yet with her he felt as if he could. He knew they were going to be friends but he wanted more than that from her. She had great legs, and great eyes, a smile that melted him, and a sensational figure. But he wanted to be her friend too. He wanted to do things for her, to be there for her when she needed a friend, and he sensed that she did now, although he wasn't sure why. But there was something very vulnerable about her.

“She was the sweetest kid that ever lived, big blue eyes, and white-blond hair. She looked like the little angel on top of the Christmas tree …and sometimes she was a little devil. She used to tease me, and follow me everywhere. We made a big snowman right before she died….” His eyes filled with tears and he shook his head. It was the first time he had ever talked about her to anyone, and it was hard for him. Maribeth could see that. “I really miss her,” he admitted in a voice that was barely more than a croak, as Maribeth touched his arm with gentle fingers.

“It's okay to cry …I'll bet you miss her a lot. Was she sick for a long time?”

“Two days. We thought she just had influenza, or a cold or something. It was meningitis. They couldn't do anything. She just went. I kept thinking it should have been me afterwards. I mean, why her? Why a little tiny kid like that? She was only five years old, she never did anything to hurt anyone, she never did anything but make us happy. I was ten when she was born, and she was so funny and soft and warm and cuddly, like a little puppy.” He smiled, thinking about her, and moved closer to Maribeth on the warm sand, laying his pole down beside him. In a funny way, it felt good talking about her now, as though it brought her back to him for the briefest of moments. He never talked to anyone about her anymore. No one ever brought her up, and he knew he couldn't say anything to his parents.

“Your parents must have taken it pretty hard,” Maribeth said, wise beyond her years, and almost as though she knew them.

“Yeah. Everything kind of stopped when she died. My parents stopped talking to each other, or even to me. No one says anything, or goes anywhere. No one smiles. They never talk about her. They never talk about anything. Mom hardly ever cooks anymore, Dad never comes home from work till ten o'clock. It's like none of us can stand being in the house without her. Mom's going back to work full-time in the fall. It's like everyone's given up because she's gone. She didn't just die, we did too. I hate being home now. It's so dark and depressing. I hate walking past her room, everything seems so empty.” Maribeth just listened to him, she had slipped her hand into his, and they were looking out over the lake together.

“Do you ever feel her there with you, like when you think about her?” she asked, feeling his pain with him, and almost feeling as though she knew her. She could almost see the beautiful little girl he had loved so much, and feel how devastated he had been when he lost her.

“Sometimes. I talk to her sometimes, late at night. It's probably a dumb thing to do, but sometimes I feel like she can hear me.” Maribeth nodded, she had talked to her grandmother that way after she died, and it had made her feel better.

“I'll bet she can hear you, Tommy. I'll bet she watches you all the time. Maybe she's happy now …maybe some people just aren't meant to be in our lives forever. Maybe some people are just passing through …maybe they get it all done faster than the rest of us. They don't need to stick around for a hundred years to get it all right. They get it down real quick …it's like …” She struggled to find the right words to tell him, but it was something she had thought about a lot, especially lately. “It's like some people just come through our lives to bring us something, a gift, a blessing, a lesson we need to learn, and that's why they're here. She taught you something, I'll bet …about love, and giving, and caring so much about someone …that was her gift to you. She taught you all that, and then she left. Maybe she just didn't need to stay longer than that. She gave you the gift, and then she was free to move on …she was a special soul …you'll have that gift forever.”

He nodded, trying to absorb all that she'd said to him. It made sense, more or less, but it still hurt so damn much. But it felt better talking to Maribeth. It was as though she really understood what he'd been through.

“I wish she could have stayed longer,” he said with a sigh. “I wish you could have met her.” And then he smiled. “She would have had a lot to say about whether or not I liked you, who you were prettier than, and whether or not you liked me. She was always volunteering her opinions. Most of the time, she drove me crazy.”

Maribeth laughed at the thought, wishing she could have met her. But then maybe she wouldn't have met him. He wouldn't have been going to the restaurant to eat three or four times a week, he'd have been home with his family, having dinner.

“What would she have said about us?” Maribeth teased, liking the game, liking him, comfortable sitting on the sand near him. She had learned some hard lessons in the past few months about who to trust, and who not to, and she had sworn she would never trust anyone again, but she knew to the bottom of her very soul that Tommy Whittaker was different.

“She'd have said I like you.” He grinned, looking sheepish, and she noticed freckles on the bridge of his nose for the first time. They were tiny and almost golden in the bright sunlight. “She'd have been right too. Usually she wasn't.” But Annie would have sensed immediately how much he liked her. Maribeth was more mature than the girls he knew at school, and the most beautiful girl he'd ever seen. “I think she would really have liked you.” He smiled gently, and lay back on the sand, looking at Maribeth with unconcealed admiration. “What about you? You have a boyfriend back home?” He decided to ask her now so he'd know where things stood, and she hesitated for a moment. She thought about telling him the fiction of the young husband in the Korean war, but she just couldn't. She'd explain it to him later on, if she still had to.

“Nope. Not really.”

“But sort of?”

She shook her head firmly this time in answer. “I went out with one guy I thought I liked, but I was wrong. And anyway, he just got married.”

He looked intrigued. An older man. “Do you care? That he's married, I mean?”

“Not really.” All she cared about was that he had left her with a baby. A baby she couldn't keep, and didn't really want. She cared about that a lot, but said nothing about it to Tommy.

“How old are you, by the way?”

“Sixteen,” and then they discovered that their birthdays were only weeks apart. They were exactly the same age, but their situations were very different. However useless to him they were at the moment, he was still part of a family, he had a home, he was going back to school in the fall. She had none of those things anymore, and in less than five months she was having a baby, the baby of a man who had never loved her. It was overwhelmingly scary.

He walked out into the lake after a little while, and she went with him. They stood together while he fished, and when he finally got bored, he walked back to the shore and left his fishing pole, and dived into the water, but she didn't join him. She waited for him on the sand, and when he came out, he asked her why she hadn't gone swimming. It was a hot sunny day and the cool water felt good on his flesh. She would have loved to swim with him, but she didn't want him to see her bulging belly. She kept her father's shirt on the entire time, and only slipped her jeans off while they stood in the water.

“Can you swim?” he asked, and she laughed, feeling silly.

“Yeah, I just didn't feel like it today. I always feel a little creepy swimming in lakes, you never know what's in the water with you.”

“That's dumb. Why don't you go in? There aren't even any fish, you saw I couldn't catch one.”

“Maybe next time,” she said, drawing designs in the sand with her fingers. They ate lunch sitting in the shade of an enormous tree, and talked about their families and their childhoods. She told him about Ryan and Noelle, and how her father thought that sons should get everything, and girls didn't need to do anything except get married and have kids. She told him about how she wanted to be something one day, like a teacher or a lawyer, or a writer, how she didn't want to just get married and have kids straight out of high school.

“You sound just like my mom,” he smiled. “She made my dad wait for six years after she finished high school. She went to college and got her degree, and then she taught for two years, and after that they got married. And then it took her seven years to have me, and another ten to have Annie. I think they had a really hard time having kids. But education is really important to my mom. She says the only valuable things you've got are your mind, and your education.”

“I wish my mom felt like that. She does everything my dad tells her to. She thinks girls don't need to go to college. My parents don't want me to go. They would have let Ryan, probably, if he'd wanted to, but he just wanted to work in the shop with my dad. He'd have gone to Korea, except he was 4-F, but Dad says he's a great mechanic. You know,” she tried to explain things to him she had never said to anyone before, “I always felt different from them. I've always wanted things no one else in my family cares about. I want to go to school, I want to learn a lot of things, I want to be really smart. I don't just want to catch some guy, and have a bunch of kids. I want to make something of myself. Everyone I know just thinks I'm crazy.” But he didn't, and she sensed that, he came from a family that felt exactly the way she did. It was as though she had been dropped off at the wrong place when she was born, and had been doomed to a lifetime of misunderstandings. “I think my sister will do what they want in the end. She complains, but she's a good kid. She's thirteen, but she's already boy crazy.” On the other hand, Noelle hadn't gotten pregnant by Paul Browne in the front seat of his car, so Maribeth felt she was in no position to cast aspersions.

“You really ought to talk to my mom sometime, Maribeth. I think you'd like her.”

“I'll bet I would.” And then she looked at him curiously. “Would she like me? Moms are usually pretty suspicious of the girls their sons like,” especially her, in a few months. No, there would be no way she could meet Mrs. Whittaker. In another month she wouldn't be able to hide it anymore, and she wouldn't even want to see Tommy. She hadn't figured out what she would tell him yet, but she would have to tell him something eventually, even if he just came into the restaurant and saw her. She'd have to tell him the story about a young husband dying in Korea, except that now it sounded so stupid. She would have liked to tell him the truth, but she knew she couldn't. It was too terrible, too irresponsible, and much too shocking. She was sure he'd never want to see her again. She'd just have to stop seeing him in a few weeks, and tell him she was seeing someone else. And then he'd be going back to school, and he'd be busy anyway, and he'd probably fall for some high school junior, a cheerleader probably, some perfect girl that his parents knew …

“Hey …what were you thinking about then?” he interrupted her. She had been a million miles away, thinking of all the cheerleaders he was going to fall in love with. “You looked so sad, Maribeth. Is something wrong?” He knew she had something on her mind, but he had no way of knowing what it was, after they'd known each other for such a short time, but he would have liked to help her.

She had made him feel better about Annie for the first time in months, and he would have liked to return the favor.

“Nothing …just daydreaming, I guess …there's nothing special …”Just a baby growing inside me, that's all, no biggie.

“Want to go for a walk?” They walked halfway around the lake, sometimes balancing on rocks, sometimes walking through the water, and sometimes across sandy beaches. It was a pretty little lake, and he challenged her to a race on the way back, once they hit a long stretch of beach, but even with her long, graceful legs, she couldn't keep up with him. And they finally collapsed side by side on the sand, and lay there, looking up at the sky, trying to catch their breath and grinning.

“You're pretty good,” he conceded, and she laughed. For her, in some ways, it was just like being with a brother.

“I almost caught up with you, except I stumbled on that rock.”

“You did not …you were miles behind …”

“Yeah, and you started before I did by about eight feet …you practically cheated …” She was laughing, and their faces were inches apart, as he looked at her, and admired every single thing about her.

“I did not!” he defended himself, wanting desperately to kiss her.

“Did too …I'll beat you next time …”

“Yeah …sure …I'll bet you can't even swim …” He loved teasing her, lying next to her, being with her. He often thought of what it would be like to make love to a woman. He would have liked to know … to find out with her …but she seemed so womanly and so innocent at the same time that he was afraid to touch her. Instead, he rolled over and lay on his stomach on the sand, so she wouldn't see how much he liked her. And she lay next to him, on her back, and suddenly she got an odd expression. She had felt a twinge, just the oddest feeling, like butterfly wings flapping inside her. The feeling was entirely unfamiliar, but within an instant she knew what it was …the first signs of life … it was her baby …

“You okay?” He was looking down at her, concerned, for a moment she had such a funny look, as though she had been startled, and was distracted.

“Tine,” she said softly, suddenly stunned at what had happened as she lay there. It brought it all home to her again, how real the baby was, how alive, how time was moving forward, whether she wanted it to or not. She had thought about going to a doctor to make sure everything was all right, but she didn't know one here, and she couldn't really afford it.

“Sometimes you look a million miles away,” he said, wondering what she thought about, when she looked like that. He would have liked to know everything about her.

“Sometimes I just think about things …like my folks … or my sister …”

“Do you talk to them?” He was intrigued, there were still so many little mysteries about her. Everything was new and so exciting.

“I write. It works better that way. My dad still gets kind of mad when I call.”

“You must have really made him mad at you.”

“It's a long story. I'll tell you one day. Maybe next time.” Assuming that there was one.

“When's your next day off?” He couldn't wait to go out with her again. He loved being with her, the scent of her hair, the look in her eyes, the feel of her skin when he held her hand or accidentally touched her, the things she said to him, the ideas they shared. He loved everything about her.

“I've got a couple of hours off on Sunday afternoon. But after that I'm not off again till Wednesday.”

“Want to go to a movie Sunday night?” he asked hopefully, and she smiled. No one had ever taken her out like that. Most of the boys at school had no interest in her, except creeps like David O'Connor. She had never really dated anyone …not even Paul …this was all new to her and she loved it.

“I'd love it.”

“I'll pick you up at the restaurant, if that's okay with you. And if you want, Wednesday we could come back here, or we could do something else if you d rather.”

“I love it here' she said, looking around, and then at him, and meant it.

They didn't leave until after six o'clock when the sun started to sink a little lower in the sky, and they drove slowly back to town. He would have liked to take her out to dinner, but he had promised he would help his mother install a new bookcase. And she had insisted she was going to cook dinner, which was rare these days. He had said he would be home by seven.

At twenty to, he was at the little house where Maribeth lived, and she got out of the truck regretfully. She hated to leave him.

“Thanks for a great time.” It was the happiest afternoon she'd had in years, and he was the best friend she had ever had. It seemed like providence that he had come into her life now. “I really loved it.”

“So did I,” he smiled, standing next to her and looking into her shining green eyes. There was a luminous quality about her that mesmerized him. He was dying to kiss her as he stood there. “I'll come by the restaurant tomorrow night for dinner. What time do you get off?”

“Not till midnight,” she said regretfully. She would have liked to be free to go everywhere with him, at least for the rest of the summer. After that, everything would change anyway. But just now she could still pretend that it wouldn't. Although, after feeling the baby move that afternoon, she knew that those days were numbered.

I'll drive you home tomorrow night after work.” His parents didn't mind his going out, and he could tell them he was going to a late movie.

“I'd like that,” she smiled at him, and she stood on the front steps and waved as he drove off with a huge smile. He was the happiest boy alive when he got home, and he was still grinning when he walked in the front door of his house at five to seven.

“What happened to you? Did you catch a whale at the lake today?” His mother smiled at him, as she finished setting the table. She had made roast beef, his father's favorite, and Tommy had the odd feeling that she was making a particular effort to please him.

“No … no fish …just some sun and sand, and a little swimming.” The house smelled wonderful, she had made popovers too, and mashed potatoes and sweet corn, everyone's favorites, even Annie's. But the familiar stab of pain at the thought of her seemed a little less acute tonight. Talking about her to Maribeth had helped, and he wished he could share that with his mother, but he knew he couldn't. “Where's Dad?”

“He said he'd be home at six. I guess he got delayed. He'll be home any minute. I told him dinner was at seven.” But an hour later, he still hadn't come home, there was no answer when she called him at work, and the roast was well done by then, and her mouth was set in a thin line of fury.

At eight-fifteen she and Tommy ate, and at nine, his father walked in, obviously having had a few too many drinks, but in very high spirits.

“Well, well, the little woman cooked dinner for a change!” he said jovially, trying to kiss her, but missing even her cheek by several inches. “What's the occasion?”

“You said you'd be home at six o'clock,” she said, looking grim, “and I told you I'd have dinner on the table at seven. I just thought it was time this family started having dinner together again.” Tommy panicked at her words, but it didn't look as though that was going to happen again anyway, at least not for a while, so he decided not to worry prematurely.

“I guess I forgot. It's been so long since you cooked, I didn't even remember.” He looked only mildly apologetic, and made an effort to seem more sober than he was as he sat down at the table. It was rare for him to come home drunk, but his life had been pretty bleak for the past seven months, and relief in the form of a whiskey or two hadn't seemed so bad when offered by two of his employees.

Liz served him up a plate, without saying another word to him, and he looked at it in surprise when she handed it to him.

“The meat's pretty well done, isn't it, dear? You know I like it rare.” She grabbed the plate from him then, and poured all the food on it into the garbage can, and then banged the empty plate in the sink with an expression of disappointment.

“Then try coming home before nine o'clock. It was rare two hours ago, John' she said through clenched teeth, and he sat back in his chair, looking deflated.

“Sorry, Liz.”

She turned around at the sink then and looked at him, even forgetting that Tommy was there. They always seemed to forget him. It was as though, in their minds, he had left with Annie. His needs no longer seemed to be of importance to anyone. They were too desperately distraught themselves to ever help him.

“I guess it doesn't matter anymore, does it, John? None of it does. None of the little niceties that used to seem so important. We've all given up.”

“We don't have to,” Tommy said softly. Maribeth had given him hope that afternoon, and if nothing else, he wanted to share it. “We're still here. And Annie would hate what's happened to us. Why don't we try and spend more time with each other again? It doesn't have to be every night, just sometimes.”

“Tell your father that,” Liz said coldly, and turned her back on them as she started to do the dishes.

“It's too late, Son.” His father patted his shoulder and then disappeared into their bedroom.

Liz finished the dishes, and then, tight-lipped, put up the new bookcase with Tommy. She needed it for her schoolbooks in the fall. But she said very little to her son, except about the project they were working on, and then she thanked him and went to the bedroom. It was as though everything about her had changed in the past seven months, all the softness and warmth he had known had hardened to stone, and all he saw in her eyes now was despair, and pain, and sorrow. It was obvious that none of them were going to survive the death of Annie.

John was asleep on the bed with all his clothes on when she walked into the room, and she stood and looked at him for a long moment, and turned and closed the door behind her. Maybe it didn't matter anymore what happened between them. She'd been to the doctor several months before and he had told her there wouldn't be any more children. There wasn't any point even trying. There had been too much damage when Annie was born. And now she was forty-seven years old, and she had always had a hard time getting pregnant, even when she was younger. This time the doctor had admitted to her it was hopeless.

She had no relationship with her husband anymore. He hadn't touched her since the night before Annie died, the night they'd convinced each other all she had was a cold. They still blamed each other and themselves, and the thought of making love to him now repulsed her. She didn't want to make love to anyone, didn't want to be that close to anyone again, didn't want to care about anyone, or love that much, or hurt that much when she lost them. Even John, or Tommy. She was cut off from all of them, she had gone completely cold, and the iciness only masked her pain. John's pain was a lot more blatant. He was in agony. He desperately missed not only his beloved little girl, but his wife, and his son, and there was nowhere to go with what he was feeling, no one he could tell, no one to bring him comfort. He could have cheated on her but he didn't want sex with just anyone, he wanted what they had had before. He wanted the impossible, he wanted their life back.

He stirred as she walked around the room, putting away her things. She went into the bathroom, and put her nightgown on, and then woke him before she turned the lights off.

“Go put your pajamas on,” she said, as though she were talking to a child, or perhaps a stranger. She sounded like a nurse, caring for him, not a woman who had once loved him.

He sat on the edge of the bed for a minute, clearing his head, and then he looked up at her. “I'm sorry about tonight, Liz. I guess I just forgot. Maybe I was nervous about coming home and starting all over again. I don't know. I didn't mean to ruin anything.” But he had anyway. Life had ruined things for them. She was gone, never to return to them again. They would never ever see their little Annie.

“It doesn't matter,” she said, not convincing him or herself. “We'll do it again sometime.” But she didn't sound as though she meant it.

“Will you? I'd really like that. I miss your dinners.” They had all lost weight that year. It had been a rough seven months for all of them, and it showed. John had aged, and Liz looked gaunt and unhappy, particularly now that she knew for sure there would never be another baby.

He went into the bathroom and put his pajamas on then, and he smelled clean and looked neat when he returned to lie beside her. But she had her back to him, and everything about her felt rigid and unhappy.

“Liz?” he asked in the darkened room. “Do you suppose you'll ever forgive me?”

“There's nothing to forgive. You didn't do anything.” Her voice sounded as dead as he felt, and they both looked it.

“Maybe if we had asked the doctor to come that night … If I hadn't told you it was just a cold …”

“Dr. Stone says it wouldn't have made any difference.” But she didn't sound as though she believed it.

“I'm sorry,” he said, as tears choked him, and he put a hand on her shoulder. But she didn't move, if anything she seemed even stiffer and more distant from him after he had touched her. “I'm sorry, Liz …”

“So am I,” she said softly, but she never turned back to him. She never looked at him. She never saw him crying silently in the moonlight, as he lay there, and he never saw her tears sliding slowly into her pillow. They were like two people drowning quietly, in separate oceans.

And as Tommy lay in his bed that night, thinking of them, he figured there was no hope left of ever getting them back together. It was obvious to him that too much had happened to them, the pain was too great, the grief too much to bear or recover from. He had lost not only his sister, but his home, and both his parents. And the only thing that cheered him, as he lay there, thinking about them, was the prospect of seeing Maribeth … he thought of the long legs and the bright red hair, the funny old shirt she had worn, and their race on the shores of the lake … he thought of a thousand things, and then drifted off to sleep, dreaming of Maribeth walking slowly down the beach at the lake, holding hands with Annie.