Chapter 24

Erica turned to Christy and smiled.

“You know what seems ironic about today?”

“What’s that?” asked Christy, looking up from a magazine.

They were in the waiting room of the orthopedics clinic at the VA hospital in Wichita. Will had been wheeled down the hall about an hour ago by a busy nurse that sent little zings of jealousy through Erica. She knew what was probably going through Will’s mind as the pretty nurse pushed him.

“It’s tax day,” said Erica. “That’s usually a day everybody hates. But for us, it’s going to be one of the greatest days of our lives.”

Christy smiled and looked at her new friend. Erica had been abrasive and surly, when Christy first met her. She’d been very worried about how Erica might react, when Christy had followed her heart and begun to get to know Will Bradford. Since then she had fallen hard for the crippled man. While his body was wrecked on the outside, she had been given a glimpse of the healthy beauty that lay on the inside, and she had been unable ... unwilling, really ... to let his scars get in the way of a chance to find what she thought of as “true love” again.

Then Bobby Dalton, who had worked an almost miracle in Christy’s life, had stepped in and worked another one on Erica. Since Erica had been spending time with Bobby, her personality had blossomed. She smiled more, was easier to talk to, and just generally more pleasant to be around. It didn’t hurt that Christy ran her own business and had done so without a man’s help for years. Erica approved of that and respected Christy.

“I love him any way I can get him,” said Christy, referring to Will, whose final, permanent prosthetic leg was being fitted as they waited. “In a chair or walking ... I don’t care.”

“You’ve been so good for him,” sighed Erica. “He was so angry when he first got here.”

“Oh, he still has his moods,” said Christy. “But I can usually pull him out of one.” She resisted the urge to ask Erica how things were with Bobby. She was aware that Erica was trying to pretend there was no Bobby. She understood that. Christy had spent probably hours, waiting at the window for Bobby to come and make her feel so good. At the same time, she had always worried that a neighbor would see him too often and that she would be exposed as the unmarried woman who let him between her legs. Having his baby had cured her of that. She didn’t care what people thought about her any more. She had her friends and her business was doing well. And now ... she had a man she could cleave to forever.

She glanced at Erica, only to see the woman looking past her in shock. She turned to see Will ... alone ... walking toward them.

His gait was clearly the gait of a man with troubled legs, but it was also smooth and confident. Will had told her of the hours he spent practicing, under the careful tutelage of the doctors and nurses and physical therapists. He was so used to hopping, that it was almost instinctive now and he had to overcome that. Now, though, other than his too-short left arm and the visible scars from the burning, he looked almost like any other man walking down the hall.

He even was able to compensate for two women almost crashing into him and didn’t lose his balance.

“You two are making a scene,” he said, grinning as much as the tight skin on the left side of his lips would let him.

Everything was new, at least for the women. They had only known the hopping man ... the man in the chair. Even Erica, who had grown up with him, had not been able to equate the wreck who had gotten off the airplane six months ago with the healthy young man she had known when they were younger.

Will insisted on pushing each of the women in his chair, as if they were the invalids. Both felt foolish sitting in a chair being pushed by a man with an artificial leg, but they both did it ... for Will. He couldn’t put the chair in the car by himself, but he could get into the car, himself, like any other person.

They had taken Christy’s car that day and she was driving as they returned to Granger.

“You know,” said Will, looking over at her. “This car has an automatic transmission. I bet I could drive it now.”

“You don’t use your left leg to drive an automatic anyway,” pointed out Christy.

“Yeah, but I always felt like it just wouldn’t work,” said Will. “I don’t feel like that anymore.”

It would be only one of many changes in his outlook over the next few months.

“You don’t have the flu,” said the doctor.

Erica looked at him. She’d gotten a substitute so she could go to the doctor to find out how to get rid of whatever it was that had been making her sick for the last two weeks.

“What do I have?” she moaned. She had hoped it would be something simple that she could just take a pill for. It had been two weeks since she’d been able to spend a night with Bobby, because she didn’t want to infect him with whatever bug was making her throw up so much.

“I’d like to examine you more thoroughly,” he said.

Ten minutes later, Erica Bradford was trying to control her urge to go off on her doctor, who was obviously using this visit as an opportunity to expose his sexist pig ways. He’d already felt her breasts and now her feet were in stirrups as he peered at her naked vagina. She was quite sure that this had nothing whatsoever to do with her cold or virus, or whatever it was.

“There’s going to be some discomfort,” came the warning voice.

The doctor slid his gloved finger to find the patient’s cervix and rimmed it, feeling for the mucus plug that would tell him what the tests had already suggested. It was there and it was firm. He remembered seeing this woman at the musical he’d attended with his wife several months back. She was the teacher. He’d noticed her, like any man would notice her. He’d also noticed that Bobby Dalton had been sitting next to her. Another of his patients, Christy Brown, was there near him too. He had a theory about Bobby Dalton, but he couldn’t really prove it. And he couldn’t ask this patient. That would be going too far. Still, it would be most interesting to see what the baby she was going to have looked like, when he delivered it.

He stood up, stripping off his gloves, to find the woman glaring at him. That wasn’t unusual. Lots of women glared at him. It was the ones who smiled at him that he had to be careful with.

He didn’t say “Congratulations, you’re pregnant.” He was aware this woman wasn’t married.

Instead, he just said: “You’re pregnant, Erica. I think it’s just morning sickness, and maybe a vitamin deficiency.”

In the 13th century, it was not uncommon for Christians to flog themselves in association with the flogging their savior suffered before his crucifixion. There are still sects of Christianity today who practice self flagellation, such as the Carmelites. Though it isn’t related to Jesus, in Islam, for hundreds of years, the Shiites have also practiced whipping or beating themselves and many still do in the Middle East and Asia. Various mystics use whips on themselves to attempt to enter an altered state of consciousness.

But flagellation, by and large, is thought of by most people as punishment. There was no one to whip Erica Bradford, though, so she had to whip herself. She didn’t use straps, a belt, cane or a switch. She used her own passions. By the time she returned home - she couldn’t go back to school - she was, again in her mind, beaten almost bloody and senseless by her own mental cat o’ nine tails.

Her litany of self confession was endless. She had been stupid. She had been rash. She had been weak. She had been stubborn. She had succumbed to the lure of the flesh. The list went on and on. But uppermost in her mind was the fact that she had subverted her own principles and now she was being made to pay for it.

Part of her anger and confusion was because, as a feminist, she had always supported a woman’s right to choose. Only three years earlier she had been elated when Roe v. Wade had been decided in the interests of women just like her. Of course, at that time, her reaction had been ideological. Now, however, it was personal. And that was the primary problem Erica was torn by.

As often as she had trumpeted the right of a woman to choose to abort the life within her, she could not make that choice herself.

The doctor had mentioned it. He’d seen many women react to the news that they were pregnant, and had developed the ability to tell pretty consistently which women were happy about it and which weren’t. Of course there were many reasons a woman might not be happy. It could have to do with finances or career paths or, perhaps, the particular man who had gotten her that way. But he could tell that Erica was not happy. And so, he had mentioned that there was a way to make her not-pregnant.

He also could tell when that option was not acceptable and had not taken it any farther. It was, after all ... by law ... her decision.

Imagine that you’re driving along and something comes on the radio that you don’t care for. As you reach to change the station, somebody slams into the rear of your car. Now imagine that, as you’re trying to deal with that, somebody slams into the side of your car too. You’re bleeding. The engine is making a horrible knocking sound. There are fumes in the car. Maybe there are other passengers in the car. Maybe it’s freezing outside and you don’t know where your coat is any more. It’s possible that the hot coffee you had is now all over you. You have to do something. But what do you do first?

That was how Erica felt. The irritating music on the radio was her illness. The rear end accident (no pun intended) was the fact she was pregnant. Then the concept of abortion was the side impact. She was dazed and her emotions were bleeding freely. The yammering of her various thoughts was so loud that she had a hard time concentrating on anything. There was, in fact, another passenger on board ... a tiny life she had just become aware of. And the cold outside was all the people who would find out what she’d done ... what kind of woman she was ... and freeze her out of their lives.

Have I forgotten anything? Ah ... yes ... the hot coffee.

That was Bobby Dalton, who was so warm and satisfying when sipped of ... but who had spilled inside her body to create something that she felt would burn her to cinders.

They say there are five stages to grieving: Denial, Anger, Bargaining, Depression and Acceptance. Usually those are associated with the loss of a loved one. For Erica, it was the loss of her ideals, her lifestyle, her very future, which can be the same thing. Sometimes it can take years to work through all the stages. Sometimes it happens much more quickly.

She flashed through denial, because her brain was quite sure it was possible for her to be pregnant. Anger set in, starting at anger with herself, then transferring to Bobby. As she lay on her bed, staring at the ceiling, the bargaining that went on concerned what the doctor had said. She could abort this baby. It would be gone and no one, except the doctor and a few nurses, would ever know it had existed. Bobby wouldn’t even know it had existed. Her life could go back to normal.

All she could think about was the time her father had taken her to the dog pound to try to find a family pet. There had been so many cute, little puppies to choose from and she’d gotten to pick, because she was the older child and would be charged with taking care of it. As she’d held her new, wiggly, happy puppy in her arms at the front desk, she’d asked, “What will happen to the rest?” Her father, distracted by filling out the paperwork, had told her the truth. If they weren’t adopted, they’d be killed. She’d hated the Humane Society ever since.

She knew she couldn’t kill the life inside her. The only bargaining option left to her was to have the baby and put it up for adoption.

That’s when the depression set in and she cried, weeping bitterly about the unfairness of it all and how her life was ruined.

There was a week during which Will knew something was wrong. Erica was listless. She didn’t care what happened and sat for long hours paying no attention to the TV. They still slept together, but now it was more out of habit than because their passions needed a route for release. He’d passed his driving test with the addition to a knob that fastened to the steering wheel and rotated freely to let him turn the wheel with one hand. Now he dropped Erica off at school, so he could go to work.

He asked her repeatedly what was wrong, but only got “nothing” in return.

Erica’s grief now was for herself. Soon people would know. Her belly would swell, and the gossips would stare, point, and then talk. She knew she wouldn’t lose her job ... but her authority in the classroom would suffer. She’d have to go through the entire first semester of next year’s classes grotesquely swollen, the laughing stock of everyone. The only bright spot she could think of was that at least no one would know for the remaining portion of this year’s classes.

Two weeks into May, Will was still trying to figure out what was wrong. They were lying in bed. She hadn’t cuddled with him for weeks, always lying inches away from him, staring at the ceiling until she finally closed her eyes in sleep. That was where she was now.

He unhooked “Josh,” which he had named his leg in honor of the dead man who had saved his life, and set it aside. He hopped to the bed and settled into it, rolling to face his sister.

“I got a letter today,” he said.

“Oh?” Her voice was distant.

“I got approved for an artificial hand.”

“That’s good.” It was as if he’d said he’d found a new book to read.

His hand went to her stomach. She’d started wearing a nightgown to bed recently and he wished she hadn’t. Her reaction to his hand on her was both astonishing and violent. She slapped at it, pushing it off her like it was a bug or something.