It Happened One Night (7 page)

Of course it was only fitting that the day she’d realized she must be pregnant would be the day Calvert resurfaced. And yet
for a moment when she was sitting on the closed toilet seat under the harsh bare bulb in the bathroom of the Wildflower Barn,
Calvert’s appearance had felt no more significant than if she’d got the hiccups after having just learned she had nine months
to live.

The pregnancy was what mattered, the thing happening to her body that she could not stop. In a way it was lucky for Calvert
that he’d called when he did: The fact that she was so consumed with her missed periods meant that coming face-to-face with
him again seemed a bit removed and unreal. She wondered: If his call hadn’t come right at that second—right at the instant
when she herself so desperately needed help—would she have gone to him? Probably not. She’d felt such an overwhelming sense
of claustrophobia she would have taken any excuse to escape from the moment. The world had gone upside down, and she’d needed
to do something—anything at all—to right it.

Not even her memory of Calvert was safe from being distorted by the heaviness of realizing that she was pregnant. She’d remembered
him as being larger-than-life, like some brooding tyrant who could order men dead with only the flash of his eyes. And yet
at the police station today, his face was long and gaunt. His hair—once blonde like hers—was mostly gone on top, and his bald
crown was pocked with liver spots. His shoulders were thin and bony, and the collar of his shirt had yellowed. She couldn’t
find the connection between the shrunken, feeble Calvert who had shown up in Burlington and the terrible, mythic Calvert of
her youth.

Eli had been a godsend through the whole ordeal. He’d taken care of everything, and he did most of the talking. Except to
say hello, Calvert hadn’t spoken directly to Lana at all, as if he was afraid to push his luck. She’d sat in the front seat
of the car while Eli dropped her father on the doorstep of a run-down former hotel. He hadn’t asked her any questions or tried
to make small talk—and she loved that about him, that he knew her so well.

She wondered, What would he think when she told him what she’d inadvertently done? What would Karin think? She knew they would
support her, no matter what, and part of her wanted to call Eli back inside right now and confess. But at the moment, she
was far too ashamed and stunned to speak.

The enormity of the situation was only just beginning to sink in. She knew she was being reckless when she decided to sleep
with Ron. But she hadn’t realized just how
big
the risk was, how far and wide the consequences reached.

Some of her neighbors and customers would look down on her—another unwed mother with no respect for the sanctity of family.
Eli might be affected too—they’d always taken great pains to never talk with each other about their sex lives, or romance,
or anything too intimately female or male. But all that was about to change. Lana worried that her best friend would feel
alienated when her belly grew big. It would be like flaunting her sex life—and her irresponsibility—in his face.

Karin and Gene too would be affected by the shock waves—poor Karin, who had wanted her own baby so badly and for so long.
How on earth would Lana tell her? She might as well confess that she’d stolen for herself the experience that Karin had wanted
all along.

Ron would be affected too, though she had no idea how she was going to get in touch with him to tell him what had happened.
She didn’t have his number or his e-mail address, and she didn’t know where he lived. With the exception of her birthday,
their dates had never been preplanned. She’d liked the spontaneity of being with him, of not knowing when he would drop by.
He was a nonconformist, a wanderer—and he probably wouldn’t want to parent anyone’s child, not even his own.

Then there was the baby to consider—it deserved a good and loving home to grow up in. But Lana wasn’t sure she could give
a good life to a child, even if she wanted to. She simply wasn’t cut out for the job.

She banged her fist against the door. She loved her life as it stood right now. She loved the Wildflower Barn and she loved
working with her sister. She loved not having a mortgage, or a car payment, or even a dog. She loved that her life was fundamentally
good, and she also loved that she stood on the brink of something even better, something out of a fantasy. As a young girl,
she’d watched men coming and going—servants of the open road—but she’d never let herself become bitter over the fact that
her lot in life was to stay home. Eli was a traveler. Ron too. And Lana had pinned all her hopes on the idea that she could
level the playing field—that despite her obligations she was as much entitled to freedom of movement as all her male counterparts.
But now… now she was pregnant. Her uterus was dictating her future, doomed her to it in a way.

She leaned her forehead against the window. Of course, there was a way to end all this doubt, fear, and self-hatred: The prospect
of abortion flitted through her mind. But could she go through with it?

She’d always been a free spirit—an adolescent who had petitioned town hall to permit skateboarding in public parks, a teenager
who had loved the Grateful Dead, and a college student who had regularly protested political injustice. It hadn’t been a stretch
to conclude that women were better off deciding for themselves whether abortion was right or wrong.

But in her heart, her personal instinct had always been to protect life in all its forms—whether that meant using organic
fertilizers over synthetics, or choosing soy products over meat. Abortion was a choice, but it wasn’t a choice for her. If
she gave in to the temptation of abortion, she would lose a fundamental part of her identity—and she would never be able to
live with herself again.

Through the window she watched Eli jerk open the heavy green door of his VW Bug. In the few moments that had passed since
he’d crossed from her door to his car, she felt like she’d aged a thousand years. Yesterday, she’d seen the timeline of her
life stretching out before her, bright and clear. Now, she still felt as if she was on the verge of a new beginning—but of
what future, she could no longer say.

June 24

As Karin pulled into the parking lot of the Wildflower Barn, she saw that Lana hadn’t brought the wicker chairs outside for
the second day in a row. Lana was always forgetting things, missing appointments, and showing up late. Karin often joked with
customers that Lana was predictably unpredictable.

But she resolved not to say anything about her annoyance over the chairs. She suspected she was a bit more irritable than
normal. Knowing that Calvert was around was like being told someone had planted a land mine in town, but no one knew where.
To make matters worse, last week Gene had compared making love with her to taking out the garbage or doing the dishes. Not
a good sign.

She parked the car at the far end of the parking lot, leaving the best spaces for her customers, then walked toward the store.
Yesterday Karin had fretted over choosing the right words to apologize about her behavior the other day, about yelling when
Calvert had called from jail. But Lana had interrupted her even before Karin got the words out, dismissing the apology so
fast that Karin knew she would have been forgiven even if she hadn’t apologized at all.

As she pushed open the front door she saw that Lana and Charlotte were talking near the gardening DVDs, their heads bent low,
their voices hushed. Even from across the room, Karin could tell that their conversation was both intense and intensely private.

“Hi, Lana. Hey, Char.” Karin smiled.

“I brought this for you,” Charlotte said. She picked up a small wicker basket with a purple bow tied around the handle. Karin
took it with both hands.

“I had nothing to do with this,” Lana said, laughing.

Karin grinned and flicked her sister’s arm with the backs of her fingers. “So this is what you two were whispering about.”

“Go on. Look through,” Charlotte said. Today she wore a violet skirt and a gauzy cotton shirt. She was almost fifty, with
a round face and lively green eyes. Lana had met her at a yoga retreat ages ago, and the two had become quick friends. “There’s
pumpkin seeds,” Charlotte said, pointing. “An egg candle. Some incense. And a few other odds and ends.”

“What for?”

“For fertility,” Charlotte said, her smile beaming. She reached into the basket and pulled out a small clay medallion. There
was a crudely drawn woman on the front, her breasts rendered as two half-circles with dots for nipples. Wiry serpents twisted
in her hands. “It’s a Minoan snake goddess. You don’t have to wear it if you don’t want to. I just thought…”

Karin felt her eyes begin to tear up. Part of her thought that if Charlotte told her the key to getting pregnant was eating
nothing but cupcakes and learning to walk on her hands, she would do it.

“Thank you,” she said sincerely. She didn’t believe in Charlotte’s gifts, but she appreciated the sentiment behind them. She
gave Charlotte a big, heartfelt hug. “That was really very sweet.”

“This must be hard for you. Especially with Calvert coming back.”

“I’m trying not to think about it so much,” Karin said.

Charlotte put a hand on her shoulder. “That’s probably a good thing.” She glanced at Lana, her expression softening. “I have
to go. Lana? I’ll see you?”

“Right,” said Lana. “We’ll talk later on.”

When Charlotte was gone Karin couldn’t help but feel a little off, as if she was being kept out of the loop somehow. On good
days Gene called her “overly sensitive”; on bad days she was merely “paranoid.” But Karin believed that even if her suspicions
were right only one time in ten, that was still a high enough percentage to make her trust her gut.

She tried to hear Gene’s voice in her head, telling her to not be jealous, to not grip Lana so tightly to her heart. Every
day Karin lived with the knowledge that Lana would leave Vermont if the opportunity ever arose—not that Lana ever mentioned
it. Lana was like a kite that sailed in whatever direction the wind happened to be blowing; only Karin kept her from drifting
away.

“I drove past the Madison,” Karin said, hoping Lana would want to talk. “I can’t tell if he’s still staying there or not.”

Lana didn’t answer. She was staring at a daisy that she rolled between her fingers. She was somewhere else.

“Did you hear me?” Karin asked.

“Right,” Lana said. “Yes.”

“Don’t you think it’s kind of ironic that the man who made us so miserable with his endless procession of boarders is now
nothing but a boarder himself?”

“What goes around comes around.”

“What do you think he wants?”

“I have no idea.”

Karin tried a few more times to get Lana to talk about Calvert, but Lana had clammed up. Her answers were always appropriate
but never really intimate. Finally Karin said she was going to go sort the storeroom items, pleased to find a reason to sneak
away. She threw herself fully into the task, and an hour later she looked up from the new canvas carryall bags to see Lana
standing in the doorway to the storage area, her purse on her shoulder.

“Leaving?”

“I’m sorry. I have to go out.”

“Oh.” Karin bit her tongue. She had a very, very strong sense that she was not allowed to ask where. “Can I help you do something?”

Lana raised her arms over her head, pulling her straight blonde hair into a ponytail. “I just have to run some errands before
everything closes.”

“Okay. Well, good luck.”

Lana nodded and left.

Karin stood up from the box that she’d been leaning over, something ugly and suspicious roiling around in her guts.
Of course
Lana was going to run errands. So why didn’t she feel better knowing that?

It wasn’t until she was back to the register at the front of the Barn that she realized: What if Lana wasn’t going to run
errands? What if she was going to see someone?

Like
Calvert
.

Karin’s stomach tightened. She didn’t want to believe it. And yet there was no other logical explanation. Lana had been so
distracted lately, so different from her usual, cheerful self. It was as if some part of her had been sectioned off, tucked
away, and was even more unavailable than usual.

The pieces fell together. Lana had been surprisingly insistent that she pick Calvert up from jail. And now she was whispering
with Charlotte and leaving the Barn in the middle of the day. What if her loyalties were shifting? What if Karin—who had practically
raised her sister after Ellen died—was being relegated to a lesser role now that Calvert was around?

She pulled a bundle of beige bags out of a box and let them flop over her forearm.

Maybe she was overreacting. That was probably it. And yet knowing that she was overreacting didn’t lessen her fear. Whether
it was irrational or not, Karin couldn’t shake the idea that her sister was hiding something. She hoped that the truth would
come out. Fast. Because until she saw an alternative, she wouldn’t be able to shake the suspicion that Calvert had come to
Burlington to drive a wedge between her and her sister, though why he would want to, she couldn’t say.

Along the eastern shore of Lake Champlain, the sun was turning the atmosphere translucent, the stars emerging through the
gossamer sky. Eli and Lana sat together among the pines on the high red rocks alongside the lake. Lana’s bare feet hung over
the rock’s edge, her shoulders slumped prettily as she leaned back on her palms. Below them the waves sloshed against the
cliff. The sound it made, sucking wetly on the rocks, was like a pulse—the irregular and wild heartbeat of night.

He and Lana sat in rare silence. Usually Lana liked to talk. About anything and everything. The first time Eli had come up
here with her, Lana had told him a story her mother had told her—a fable that explained the origin of Lake Champlain, which
had been called Odepsék before the French settled the area. Another time she had talked about the historic shipwrecks that
were hidden under the surface of the water, preserved perfectly by the motionless cold at the lake’s deep bottom. She’d always
delighted in sharing the things that made her happy. But there were no charming stories from her tonight.