Different Seasons - Stephen King [250]
She came in for her monthly checkup on the first of September, laughed ruefully, and told me she had discovered the Breathing Method had another use.
'What's that?' I asked her.
'It's even better than counting to ten when you're mad as hell at someone,' she said. Those hazel eyes were dancing. 'Although people look at you as if you might be a lunatic when you start puffing and blowing.'
She told me the tale readily enough. She had gone to work as usual on the previous Monday, and all I can think is that the curiously abrupt transition from a slim young woman to an obviously pregnant young woman-and the transition really can be almost as sudden as day to dark in the tropics -had happened over the weekend. Or maybe her supervisor finally decided that her suspicions were no longer just suspicions.
'I'll want to see you in the office on your break,' this woman, a Mrs Kelly, said
coldly.
She had previously been quite friendly to Miss Stansfield. She had shown her pictures of her two children, both in high school, and they had exchanged recipes at one point. Mrs Kelly was always asking her if she had met 'a nice boy' yet. That kindliness and friendliness was gone now. And when she stepped into Mrs Kelly's office on her break, Miss Stansfield told me, she knew what to expect.
'You're in trouble,' this previously kind woman said curtly.
'Yes,' Miss Stansfield said. 'It's called that by some people.'
Mrs Kelly's cheeks had gone the colour of old brick. 'Don't you be smart with me, young woman,' she said. 'From the looks of your belly, you've been too smart by half already.'
I could see the two of them in my mind's eye as she told me the story-Miss Stansfield, her direct hazel eyes fixed on Mrs Kelly, perfectly composed, refusing to drop her eyes, or weep, or exhibit shame in any other way. I believe she had a much more practical conception of the trouble she was in than her supervisor did, with her two almost grown children and her respectable husband, who owned his own barbershop and voted Republican.
'I must say you show remarkably little shame at the way you've deceived me!' Mrs Kelly burst out bitterly.
'I have never deceived you. No mention of my pregnancy has been made until today.' She looked at Mrs Kelly almost curiously. 'How can you say I have deceived you?'
'I took you home!' Mrs Kelly cried. 'I had you to dinner with my sons.' She looked at Miss Stansfield with utter loathing.
This is when Miss Stansfield began to grow angry. Angrier, she told me, than she had ever been in her life. She had not been unaware of the sort of reaction she could expect when the secret came out, but as any one of you gentlemen will attest, the difference between academic theory and practical application can sometimes be shockingly huge.
Clutching her hands firmly together in her lap, Miss Stansfield said: 'If you are suggesting I made or ever would make any attempt to seduce your sons, that's the dirtiest, filthiest thing I've ever heard in my life.'
Mrs Kelly's head rocked back as if she had been slapped. That bricky colour drained from her cheeks, leaving only two small spots of hectic colour. The two women looked grimly at each other across a desk littered with perfume samples in a room that smelled vaguely of flowers. It was a moment, Miss Stansfield said, that seemed much longer than it actually could have been.
Then Mrs Kelly yanked open one of her drawers and brought out a buff-coloured cheque.
A bright pink severance slip was attached to it. Showing her teeth, actually seeming to bite off each word, she said, 'With hundreds of decent girls looking for work in