Ten Thousand Saints - Eleanor Henderson [139]
“Mom? I don’t think you quite know everything.”
Her mother stopped massaging.
Eliza said, “Johnny’s not the father.”
Her mother sat up straight in her chair, spilling her tea in her lap.
I knew it. I knew that kid was acting.” Les punched the button with the side of his fist, and a can of Coke clunked down through the vending machine. “It’s nothing to be ashamed of, champ. Why cover it up?” He extracted the can, opened it, and took a long sip.
“It’s not me,” Jude said. “Why do you always think it’s me?”
“No? Come on. I’ve heard the way you talk about her. You’re telling me you two haven’t . . . ?”
“We haven’t, we haven’t.” Did everyone think they had? Why was Jude the last one to assume the two of them were a possibility?
Les leaned against the vending machine. They were in an alcove of the waiting room. No one could hear them. “Who’s the daddy, then?”
Jude told him.
Les chewed over the name, sliding it around on his tongue, trying to recall who Teddy was exactly, how he might fit in. “Teddy. Yes. That makes sense, now that you mention it. When she went to visit you, right?” He shook his head: what a shame.
“We thought if we said Johnny was the father, Di would let her keep the baby. They could raise it together.” The opposite now seemed just as likely. Would Di have insisted Eliza give up a dead boy’s baby?
“You know, Lady Di was pregnant more than once. She had some . . . procedures.” Les slurped his Coke, his eyes distant. “One of them was Daniel’s. Her husband. It was before they were married. They were young, they weren’t ready.” He was speaking with some bitterness, but Jude didn’t think it was the abortion he was bitter about. “I know she regretted it, after he died. Wanted a son. I bet she wished she could bring her husband back to life.”
They strolled into the waiting room and took two seats in front of the TV. The news. Jerry Falwell endorsing Vice President Bush. “Dipshits,” Les muttered, crossing his legs, ankle to knee. He’d arrived on the red-eye from San Francisco that morning, after Harriet had called him, worried about Jude. Eliza’s hospitalization was a surprise, and Les was happy to take advantage of the coincidence. Concerned parent, times two. Jude was inclined to resent him for this posture, as he had the last time they were stuck in a hospital waiting room together. But his dad had flown across the country. He’d come to his rescue again.
But who did Jude need rescuing from? Not himself this time. He was not on drugs. Not Tory or Hippie, who were hundreds of miles away. Not the cops who had bruised a few of his ribs but had saved the bulk of their bruising for Eliza. Not Di anymore. Eliza had made her decision, and he doubted there was anything anyone could do to change it. Jude saw himself now for what he was: inessential. He was the tissue that bound the essential members together—Teddy, Johnny, Eliza, those who were joined by blood or by sex. Jude was joined to no one by neither. He was beyond rescue.
Now the news was showing footage of Tompkins. The cops had yielded around six this morning, leaving the park to the remaining protestors. Dozens arrested, dozens injured. A skirmish, a melee. In the daylight, the park looked no more ruined than usual; for the first time Jude could remember, people were pushing brooms through the street. Jude knew he was supposed to be angry at the pigs, but Jude was the one who’d started the fight. Jude was the one who’d put Eliza in the hospital. But if Johnny had been a good husband, they wouldn’t have been in the park in the first place. If Johnny had been a good husband, Eliza wouldn’t be giving up the baby.
They’d allowed only one person in the ambulance with her, and Johnny had pulled the family card. Jude had run through the dark streets to Beth Israel—just let her be okay, just let the baby be okay, and he’d give her up, he’d give up the baby—only distantly aware of the ache in his ribs. The nurse had insisted on getting him cleaned up and into a bed. When she applied some antiseptic to his busted lip—“This’ll sting a second,