The Weird Sisters - Eleanor Brown [94]
Bean looked up, unsurprised. She was still dressed from work, a lavender jacket over a white T-shirt, tucked into jeans she would tell you honestly had cost more than three hundred dollars. Mrs. Landrige would not have approved of the denim, despite the price tag. “Wow,” she said.
“You’re kidding.” Rose, tight-lipped, brow furrowed.
“What?” our mother asked. She was humming to herself, cutting a tomato into small pieces, her knife scraping against the plate.
There you have it. Our family in a nutshell.
“I’m pregnant. I’m having a baby.” Cordy said it again, as though we had not all heard her. Well, our mother had not, but that was nothing new. She was always delayed in her responses, spent most of her time picking up the threads of conversations as they spun across the table and weaving them back together herself.
So much was explained now, the weight gain, her quietness in the morning, the way Rose had noticed her stomach swelling against the waistband of her pants, her desperate urge to feed us all. And yet there were a million questions to be asked.
“Who’s the father?” Rose asked, leading the charge, and Cordy looked shaken, as though she had been unprepared for this question, as though it had never occurred to her that there was a father, that people might be curious as to his whereabouts.
“I don’t know,” she said, and our father flushed red, the streaks of white at his brow standing bright against his skin. “No one who matters.”
“Goddammit, Cordelia,” our father said, and his knife clattered to his plate, a sharp sound that made our mother jump. “You can’t have a child.”
“Too late,” Bean said, and smiled to herself. “I think the horse is out of the barn on that one.”
“Jim,” our mother said, a spill of silk over his anger.
“How are you going to support yourself? Pay bills? Feed the baby? Pay a doctor, for heaven’s sake?”
“I’ll manage,” Cordy said, and it was as much an oath to herself as a promise to our father. “I’ve got my job, and I’ll take another one if I need to.”
“And who will take care of the baby while you’re working all the hours God sends?”
“We will,” our mother said, and now the silk was steel. “We’re not going to leave a child of ours alone if she needs our help.”
The look that passed over our father’s face was painful to see. Had we ever seen our father cry? At his own father’s funeral, yes, he crumpled and wept in the church as the priest called a litany of Pop-Pop’s good works. But this expression was sadder, a thousand betrayals screaming across his face in an instant. He got up and stalked out of the kitchen, leaving his napkin on his chair as an afterthought.
“Nice going,” Bean said.
“Shut up, Bean,” Cordy said, and she looked miserable. “Like you’re not just as big a fuckup as I am.”
“Girls,” our mother said mildly. “Language.”
“You haven’t heard of birth control?” Bean asked. Cordy closed her eyes as the memory flashed across her mind. The painter, the desert, their last night on his tired futon. How long ago had that been? No more than three months. It seemed like forever.
“I’ve heard of it,” Cordy said.
“When are you due?” our mother asked, speared a piece of tomato delicately and chewed.
“December,” Cordy said. “Maybe Christmas.”
“Well, this is certainly going to change your life,” our mother said.
“I know,” Cordy said, and it was impossible to tell what the tears shining in her eyes were for. “I know.”
Later that night, we sat in the living room, pretending to read. After years living in this house with wooden floors, we had learned each other’s steps. Our mother, quick and light. Our father, heavy and purposeful; Rose, heavy and hesitant. Bean, firm and sharp, and Cordy, a flat run every few steps. We listened to the steps passing above us, our mother walking across the bedroom to the vanity, sitting down to put on her moisturizer. Standing again, walking across to the bathroom door, where her nightgown hung. Our father,