The Art of Saying Goodbye - Ellyn Bache [62]
Country life was supposed to strengthen the Feld family in a number of ways. Richard and Iona were still in the throes of trying to make a baby, or at least Iona was, ever more desperately because of her advancing age. The landscape was supposed to reacquaint her with the natural rhythms of things, which no doubt would include reproduction. Jeff, deep into his rebellious phase, was also supposed to find peace, throwing off his issues one by one as he wandered the surrounding woods and fields with his new dog.
As it turned out, Jeff was never at home. At fourteen, he was theoretically too young for a summer job, but he got one mowing lawns for a landscaping company, which took him into town where he could meet up with his buddies and get into as much trouble as ever. Iona was the one who ended up with Chance. Gentle as he was with people, the dog was not so kind to wildlife. He’d chase anything that ran from him, including deer at least four times his size. Iona often wondered what he’d do if he ever caught up with one.
His favorite prey that summer was woodchucks—chubby, guileless creatures Iona couldn’t help liking, but too slow and stupid for Chance. They’d feed out in the open, far from shelter, and often didn’t see the dog until he was practically upon them, poised to seize them by the scruff of the neck. The dog who loved everyone would spring swiftly, clamp his prey in his jaws, and shake it viciously, his gaze a picture of bloodlust until the creature was dead. Then he lost interest. No point trying to eat the woodchucks. Their hide was too thick for him to pierce.
The carnage went on against the backdrop of extravagant summer mornings and into the golden days of fall, a violent, senseless sport Iona grew to dread. Mercifully, the woodchucks disappeared for the winter. Maybe they hibernated. She didn’t know. By the next spring, when the dormant grasses metamorphosed once more into thick green clumps, Iona had no desire to see the cycle of rural life repeat itself. The warmth that had teased the earth into fertility hadn’t done the same for her. She was still barren. And Jeff, whose winter misery had settled into a quiet cloud of dislike, bristled again like Edward Scissorhands, ready to take a swipe at anything that got in his way. It was Richard who suggested that country living didn’t really suit them. The place felt too isolated. Too dangerous. Who would have imagined, then, that Richard would meet his death not in some snake-infested field in the country, but in the manicured confines of a suburban park?
Nature. If they’d stayed in that house many years more, the woodchuck population would have been decimated entirely. It didn’t escape Iona that the flood that claimed Richard was a natural occurrence, too. That was nature for you—trees in such a blaze of color that they took your breath away, and systematic genocide.
Compared to that, what could a bunch of pampered suburban women accomplish with a prayer meeting? As far as Iona was concerned, the cancer was as quick and deadly with its iron jaws as Chance had been. The cancer was the blood-crazed dog. And Paisley was the woodchuck.
Her cell phone rings again. Jeff. No doubt still trying to get her to run another errand. She almost doesn’t answer. Then she does.
“Iona?”
“Did you expect someone else?”
“We’re on our way to the doctor,” Jeff says.
“I didn’t know today was the appointment.”
“Lori thinks she might be in labor.”
“No more Braxton Hicks?”
“She’s not sure.”
“Oh, my.” Iona