Mixed Blessings (6 page)

In fact, it had amazed her when she first saw Brad with his children.

He was so natural with them, so open, so unafraid, they talked about everything, and he was so demonstrative, and so easily able to show emotion. Pilar couldn't even imagine having a relationship like that with anyone, certainly not a child, until little by little, Brad had helped her to open up to what she felt, and share it with those she cared about. In time, she had grown to be completely at ease with his children, and with him. But it still never led her to want children of her own. And seeing her mother now, even on her wedding day, reminded her again of how deeply her parents had failed her.

"You look lovely today, Pilar," her mother said awkwardly, almost as though she were speaking to an acquaintance, or a stranger. She was completely unable to let anyone in on the deep mystery of her feelings, or whether she even had any to just an experiment that hadn't worked out for them. But whatever I was, it was always clear that I was not exactly what they had wanted. My father was relieved when I went into law. I think it was the first time he was actually reassured that they hadn't made a terrible mistake having me in the first place.

They didn't even bother to come to my graduations before that. And of course my mother was furious that I wasn't interested in medicine, but I can't say she ever made it very appealing." In effect, Pilar had grown up in schools. She had once jokingly said to one of her law partners that she was institutionalized, just like some of the people she had defended who had grown up in prisons. And for whatever reason, the coolness of her parents' relationship, their indifference to her, and the politics of her own times had made marriage unappealing to her, and having children something she would never even consider. She didn't want anyone to live a life like hers, and she had no idea how to bring a child up herself. She had had no example in her own childhood.

In fact, it had amazed her when she first saw Brad with his children.

He was so natural with them, so open, so unafraid, they talked about everything, and he was so demonstrative, and so easily able to show emotion. Pilar couldn't even imagine having a relationship like that with anyone, certainly not a child, until little by little, Brad had helped her to open up to what she felt, and share it with those she cared about. In time, she had grown to be completely at ease with his children, and with him. But it still never led her to want children of her own. And seeing her mother now, even on her wedding day, reminded her again of how deeply her parents had failed her.

"You look lovely today, Pilar," her mother said awkwardly, almost as though she were speaking to an acquaintance, or a stranger. She was completely unable to let anyone in on the deep mystery of her feelings, or whether she even had any to begin with. "It's a shame you and Brad are too old to have children."

Pilar looked at her in complete amazement, unable to believe what she'd just heard. "I can't believe you said that," Pilar said so softly that even Brad didn't hear her. "How dare you make assumptions about our life, or our future?" Her eyes blazed as, from the distance, Marina watched her.

"You know as well as I do that, clinically, you're hardly a reasonable age to start having children." Her mother looked cool and professional as Pilar lost the battle over her emotions.

"Women my age have children every day," Pilar blazed, annoyed at herself for taking the bait again. The last thing in the world she wanted was to have a baby. But on the other hand, her mother had no right to assume that she wouldn't, or worse yet, shouldn't. After the little she'd done for her over the years, the least she could do was offer her privacy, and the right to her own choices and opinions.

"Perhaps in California they do, Pilar. But I see those babies every day, damaged, retarded, children with Down syndrome, some with severe abnormalities and complications. Believe me, you don't want that."

"You're right." She looked her mother right in the eye. "I don't. I never have wanted children . . . thanks to you and Daddy And on those words, Pilar disappeared into the small crowd, feeling herself tremble as she looked for Brad. He had drifted away to talk to someone while Pilar seemed to be chatting with her mother.

"You okay?" Marina whispered to her, her own gray hair looking curly and a little frumpy. She was the mother Pilar had never had, the friend she had always longed for. She was wise in many ways, and she had made many similar choices to Pilar's, although for different reasons. The oldest of eleven children, she had raised all ten of her siblings when her mother died, and she herself had never married or had children. "I gave at the office," she always explained, and she had always been sympathetic to Pilar's agonies about her parents. In recent years, the younger woman's pain had dimmed, except on the rare occasions when she saw her mother. "The Doctor," as Pilar called her, only came out to California every two or three years, and the truth was that in between times, Pilar didn't miss her. She called her dutifully, and she was always amazed to find that in the years since her childhood nothing had changed, the calls were still "interrogations."

"Looks like the Doctor was giving you a hard time." Marina eyed her kindly, and Pilar smiled. Just being with Marina always made her feel better about the human race. She was one of those rare people, great souls, who enhance the lives of all those who know them.

"No, she just wanted to be sure that Brad and I understood we're too old to have children," Pilar said with a smile, but her voice sounded surprisingly bitter. It wasn't the lack of children that bothered her, it was the lack of kindness or warmth from her mother.

"Says who?" Judge Goletti looked annoyed on her behalf.

"My mother was fifty-two when she had her last one."

"Now, there's something to aspire to." Pilar grinned. "Promise me that won't happen to me, or I'll shoot myself now."

"On your wedding day? Don't be ridiculous." And then, she surprised Pilar by asking a question. "Are you two thinking of having kids?"

She knew lots of people older than they were who had had children recently, but she was curious, and she felt that she was close enough to Pilar to ask her. She had been so startled by the idea of Pilar marrying Brad, after being so adamant about staying single all her life, that now all her earlier decisions seemed to be in question.

Pilar laughed openly before she answered. "I don't think you need to worry about that. The last thing on my wish list is kids, in fact, it's so low on my list that I never wrote it down at all, and I don't plan to." She wanted Brad, but the one thing she was sure of was that she didn't want children.

"You don't plan to what?" Brad joined them and slid an arm around his bride's waist with a happy expression.

"I don't plan to retire from the law," Pilar said, looking calm again.

His soothing effect made her forget her irritation at her mother.

"Who ever thought you would?" He looked surprised that anyone would even ask the question. Pilar was an excellent attorney, and she was devoted to her career. He couldn't imagine her ever leaving her profession.

"I think she should join us on the bench," Marina Goletti said solemnly, thinking that there was some truth in that, and then she was distracted by someone and moved away, and Pilar and Brad stood looking into each other's eyes, alone for a moment, in the swirl of good friends around them.

"I love you, Mrs. Coleman. I only wish I could tell you how much."

"You have a lifetime to tell me . . . and I you . . . I love you, Brad," she whispered.

"You were worth the wait, every minute of it. And I'd wait another fifty years if I had to."

"Then you'd really make my mother nervous." Pilar laughed, and she looked young and mischievous as she did.

"Oh? Is your mother worried that I'm too old for you?" He was, after all, only a few years younger than she was.

"No . . . she's afraid I am. She thinks we might go crazy and decide to have half-witted kids, who would then become her patients."

"How nice of her. Is that what she said to you?" He looked mildly annoyed, but he wasn't going to let anything seriously upset him on this special day he had waited so long for.

"Yes, it is actually. The good doctor thought she ought to warn me."

"See if we invite her out for our twenty-fifth anniversary," he said softly as he kissed her.

They danced with each other, and with their friends. And at midnight, they slipped away quietly to the suite he had reserved at the Biltmore.

"Happy?" he asked, as she leaned against him in the rented limousine.

"Ecstatic." She beamed, and then yawned as she rested her head on his shoulder, and her white-satin-shod feet on the jump seat. "Oh, God .

. ." She suddenly frowned as she looked up at him. "I forgot to say good-bye to my mother, and she's leaving in the morning." She was gong to L.A. for a medical convention. She'd been very pleased Pilar's wedding date was so convenient for her.

"You're allowed this one time. This is your wedding day. She should have come to kiss you and wish you happiness," Brad said as Pilar shrugged. She really didn't care now. It had taken a long time, but for her the war was over. "I'll wish you happiness instead," Brad said softly and she kissed him again, and knew that she had lived her entire life for this moment. He was everything she had ever wanted, and more, and for just an instant, she was sorry that she hadn't married him sooner.

Her past no longer mattered to her, her parents, or how they had failed her. All that mattered now was Brad, and the life she was gong to share with him. And all she could think of as they drove up to the Biltmore that night was their future.

The week after Thanksgiving, Diana was swamped with coordinating shoots for their April issue. They were doing extensive pieces on two homes in Newport Beach, and another in La Jolla. She drove to San Diego herself to oversee the one there, and by the end of the afternoon she was exhausted. The people were difficult, the woman who owned the house hated everything they'd done, and the junior editor she'd assigned to the piece spent most of her time crying on Diana's shoulder.

"Take it easy," Diana told her calmly, feeling on edge herself, and since noon that day she'd had a raging headache. "If she thinks you're upset, she'll get worse. Just treat her like a little girl. She wants to be in the magazine, and you have to help her get there." But shortly after that, the photographer had a fit and threatened to walk out, and by the end of the day, everyone's nerves were raw, most especially Diana's.

She went back to the Valencia Hotel, let herself into her room, and lay on the bed without turning on the light. She was too tired to move, or talk, or eat. She didn't even have the energy to call Andy. She knew she would eventually, but she decided to take a hot bath first, and order some soup from room service. She did that before she ran the tub, and then she went to the bathroom. And when she did, she saw it there. The terrible telltale trace of blood she prayed not to find each month, and always found anyway, despite her prayers, despite their attempts to schedule their lovemaking at the right time to get her pregnant. Despite all of it, it hadn't worked. Again.

She wasn't. And for six months, they'd been trying. It was getting discouraging, to Diana if not to Andy.

She closed her eyes when she saw it there, and tears were running down her cheeks when she stepped into the tub a few minutes later. Why was everything so difficult? Why did it have to be that way for her? It had been so easy for both her sisters.

She called Andy at home after her bath. He had just gotten home from a late meeting at the network.

"Hi, baby, how'd it go today?" He sounded tired, too, and at first she decided not to say anything to him till she got home, but he heard the sorrow in her voice, and wondered what had happened. "Something wrong?"

"No . . . just a long day." She tried to sound normal for him, but her heart ached. It was as though every month someone died, and she went into mourning.

"It sounds like more than that. Trouble with your crew, or the people who own the house?"

"No, no, it was fine. The woman is kind of a pain in the ass, and the photographer threatened to quit twice, but that's par for the course."

She smiled sadly.

"So what's up? What are you not saying?"

"Nothing . . . I . . . it's nothing. I just got my period, that's all. It's kind of depressing." Tears welled up in her eyes again as she said it to him, but he sounded undaunted.

"No big deal, kiddo. It just means we get to try again. Hell, it's only been six months. It takes some people a year or two.

Just relax. Don't worry so much, and enjoy the ride. I love you, silly girl." He was touched by how devastated she was each month, but he knew nothing was wrong. Besides, they were both under constant stress in their jobs, and that didn't help.

Everyone knew that. "Why don't we go away for a couple of days next month, at the right time. You figure it out and tell me."

"I love you, Andrew Douglas." She smiled through her tears as she held the phone. He was such a nice man, and he was so reasonable about her attempts to get pregnant. "I wish I felt as relaxed about it as you do. I keep thinking I should go to a specialist, or at least talk to Jack and see what he thinks."

"Don't be ridiculous." For the first time Andy sounded annoyed, he didn't want her discussing their sex life with her sister's husband.

"There's nothing wrong with either of us, for heaven's sake."

"How do you know that?"

"I just do. Now, trust me."

"Okay, okay. I'm sorry . . . I just get so upset . . . every month, I interpret every twinge, every sign . . . every time I'm tired or sneeze or have indigestion, I let myself think I'm pregnant, and then zap . . . suddenly it's over." It was hard to explain to him the disappointment she felt each month, the anguish, the fear, the ache, the emptiness, the terrible longing.

They had been together for almost three years, married for six months, and now she wanted his baby. Even the empty third floor in their house suddenly seemed like an accusation. They had bought the house to have kids, and it just hadn't happened.