Leaving Haven (41 page)

Georgia sighed. “I don't know.”

“So you'd put him up for adoption.” Alice said it as a statement, not a question. She saw Haven's gray eyes, his solemn gaze. She saw the photo of baby Wren's dimpled fist, clutching Duncan's shirt.

“I don't know! I just gave birth a week ago. I never imagined I'd have to deal with something like this, feel something like this. How can I tell Liza she's not going to have a baby brother after all, especially now that she's seen him?”

“You can't.” Alice's certainty returned. “You need to take more time, figure out what you really want.”

They sat in silence for a few minutes. Alice wished she could put her arm around Georgia, hug her to her. She wished they could laugh away this trauma, as they had commiserated and laughed over so many things.

“Are you moving?” Georgia said. “I mean, when you and Duncan separate?”

“I don't think so. He said something about moving into the apartment over his office, so I could stay in the house with Wren.” Alice tried to push down the terror that rose in her at the thought.

“You know, the girls will still be friends,” Georgia said. “They'll be back and forth at our houses. We're still going to have to see each other.”

Alice nodded. “It's your call. You decide how you want it handled, and I'll do whatever you say.”

“What I want is not to have to see you again, at least for now. It hurts too much.” Georgia stared out at the street, at the fountain in the park across the road splashing brilliant drops of water into the sunlit air.

“If I keep the baby, people will notice that he looks like you,” she continued. “They'll notice that we're not close friends anymore. I don't want to put Liza—and myself—through that, being gossiped about that way.”

Alice shifted on the bench. “I don't think people will notice. Anyone who knows you will expect the baby to look like you or John or Liza; they won't be looking for a resemblance to me.”

“You don't have to look for it to see it,” Georgia said.

Alice felt her practical self take over; it was like the old days. “
When
and
if
it becomes an issue you can talk to people on a case-by-case basis. Tell them I donated an egg and that then we'd both felt a little funny about it and pulled back on our friendship.”

“And we both got separated or divorced at the same time?” Georgia said.

“People might think the egg donation was the issue. They'll take their lead from you, Georgia.” Alice bit her lip, uncertain how far to go. “If you love him, if you feel like Haven is really yours, what everyone else thinks won't matter.”

“That's the million-dollar question, isn't it?” Georgia said.

They sat side by side in silence for a long time, and then Georgia got up and walked away.

29

Georgia

June 26, 2012

I
t could have been worse,” Georgia said.

She and Polly stood in the upstairs bedroom of the cabin, in the dresses Chessy had given them to wear for the wedding. Both dresses were white. Polly's was strapless and made of satiny cotton, with a gauzy lace overskirt that fell from her waist to the ground. Georgia's knee-length dress was all lace, with a scoop neck and three-quarter-length sleeves. Chessy had given them each ribbons to wear in their hair, but neither Polly nor Georgia could figure out what to do with them, so Polly had tied hers around her head like a headband, and Liza had braided the others into a friendship bracelet and tied it around Georgia's wrist.

“I guess,” Polly said. “With four kids and a station wagon, it's hard for me to feel like a Boho hippie.”

“But you
look
like a Boho hippie,” Georgia said. And Polly did look lovely, with her glossy blond hair and the dress highlighting her lean figure.

“I guess we should be glad she didn't expect us to get tattoos,” Polly said.

Georgia heard a loud clumping on the stairs. The door opened and Chessy came in. She wore a sleeveless dress, with tiers of white crochet cascading to the floor and rows of gold and turquoise beading along the V-neck. Stacks of gold bangle bracelets covered her wrists, and her chestnut hair fell in loose curls around her shoulders. She had no veil, just a circlet of pink roses on her head.

“What is that God-awful noise?” Polly said. “What are you wearing on your feet?” She caught herself. “You look beautiful, by the way. Really, Chess.”

Chessy lifted the hem of her dress to show off her shoes, wooden platform sandals with gold straps.

“You're going to break your neck—or at least an ankle—walking around the beach in those,” Polly said.

“I'll take them off on the beach,” Chessy said. “I just really, really like them so I wanted them for my wedding. Here.”

She held a stack of the fabric squares she had been cutting out earlier, and she handed them to Georgia, along with two fabric markers.

“What's this?”

“Wishes. I want everyone to write down two or three wishes for our marriage. Then the girls will string them on that twine I brought and we'll stretch it across the beach.” Chessy looked very pleased with herself.

“Really?” Georgia said.

“Yes. How hard can it be? I like the idea of having all those wishes at our wedding. I got the idea from a coffee shop I was in once, that had customers write down their wishes on wooden rectangles and then hung them all on strings from the ceiling.”

Georgia and Polly looked at each other.

“Nothing snarky,” Chessy said. “Especially since Chef Boyardee is going to be here.”

John had returned with the baby that afternoon. Georgia had called him after she went to town to retrieve Polly's car and asked if he would please come back for the wedding and bring the baby, to keep things as sane and ordinary as possible for Liza. She had offered to keep the baby overnight, so John could go to a motel and get some sleep.

“Is Polly going to throw anything at me?” he had said.

“No,” Georgia said. “And Chessy's getting married so she won't be throwing things at you, either.”

John had paused for a long time then, contemplating, Georgia was sure, all the possible things that could blow up were he were to attend the wedding.

“Will Duncan be there?

“No,” Georgia said. “And neither will Alice.”

“I had no idea Alice was here,” John said. “In the Adirondacks. I want you to know that. I was stunned to run into her in that restaurant.”

Georgia sighed. “Okay.”

“It would be nice to be a family again for one night,” John said. Another long silence, then: “I could help with the food. I'd feel less awkward being there if I could just be off doing the cooking.”

Georgia had asked Chessy, who hadn't really had a plan for the dinner beyond grilling something on the beach, and who had admitted that well, yes, it might be nice to have Chef Boyardee handle the wedding dinner.

“I already gave squares to Liza and Wren for their wishes,” Chessy said. “And Ez”—Chessy smiled—“Ez took a bunch with him to town and told everyone in the Grand Union about it, and the cashiers and the manager and everyone who was shopping there wrote down wishes for us. I think this is going to be my favorite part of the wedding.”

“You're my favorite part of the wedding,” Georgia said. She leaned forward to kiss Chessy on the cheek.

Georgia felt as strange as she had ever felt in her life, caught in a whirlpool of emotion about John, Liza, Alice, Chessy, and, to her surprise, Haven. She could not stop thinking about that moment when she had seen the police car in the driveway; the bottomless sense of loss when she thought Haven might be dead. It was exactly the same gut-wrenching pain she had had when she thought Liza might be hurt, the awareness that the words “I'm sorry to inform you” from the trooper's mouth were a machete that could slice her in two, cut her life into before and after. At that moment, she hadn't cared at all if the baby looked like Alice or John or an orangutan—he was part of her.

Now Chessy, who was in a sense another of Georgia's babies, was getting married. Georgia missed her mother, the mother Chessy had never known. But Evy had known Chessy, Georgia thought, had carried Chessy all those months, talked to her, sung to her, imagined what she might look like, dreamed about her, soothed her,
loved
her—just as Georgia had done with Haven.

“I wish Mom was here,” Georgia said, stating the obvious. Polly looked at her, and their eyes filled at the same moment. “And Dad.”

“
You're
here,” Chessy said. “Oh, God, don't cry. I do not want a wedding where everyone cries. The only people allowed to cry at this wedding are Lily and Haven.” But she wrapped one arm around Georgia and one arm around Polly and hugged them both. Then she pulled away. “And if Ez cries, you have my permission to push him in the lake.”

And before Georgia could wipe the tears from her cheeks, her sister the bride had clomped off down the stairs.

T
HE
WEDDING,
OF
course, was beautiful. A light breeze rippled across the tops of the trees when they gathered on the beach at six. There were eight “guests,” as Chessy said, with Georgia and Polly, John, Wren, Liza, Ez's friend Harris, and Lily and Haven. Polly said it was ridiculous to call them “guests” when they were all family, but Chessy said she could call them whatever she wanted on her wedding day, and Polly had agreed.

Ez had set two poles on either end of the beach, close to the water's edge, stretched a long rope between them, and pinned up all Chessy's fabric squares with the wishes written on them. The wishes fluttered in the breeze like prayer flags, bright red and yellow and green and white and orange against the backdrop of the silvery blue water, the green mountains, the cloudless sky.

Ez and Chessy stood underneath the banner of wishes with Reverend Finster and recited their vows, with everyone gathered around them in a tight circle. Georgia and Polly cried even though Chessy glared at them. Georgia thought she saw tears in John's eyes, too, at one point, but since she spent most of the ceremony trying
not
to look at John she decided it was probably just a trick of the light.

Ez had brought a giant cooler filled with flowers from home; Chessy carried a simple bouquet of pink roses, and Liza and Wren made little nosegays they placed in jelly jars on the arms of the Adirondack chairs along the beach, wound more flowers along the front of Lily's stroller, and pinned roses in their own hair. The girls were barefoot, in gauzy white dresses, their feet caked with sand and their hair tangled from running in the wind. Liza's loud laugh sounded more spontaneous to Georgia; she looked even prettier without her usual makeup or too-tight jeans. Liza held Haven throughout the ceremony, but had turned him over to John as soon as he started to cry—the limits of sisterly love.

After the ceremony Liza and Wren ran under the banner of little flags, trying to read the wishes before the wind swirled the fabric up, twisted the squares, and hid the words. Georgia and Polly sat in Adirondack chairs nearby, sipping the champagne Ez had brought and watching the clouds turn pink over the lake.

“This one says ‘Peace,' ” Liza said. She ran under the rope. “And on the other side it says”—she squinted and held a hand up over her eyes to block the late sun—“on the other side it says, ‘May you learn to fight well.' That's dumb.”

“This one says ‘Money,' ” Wren said. “That's not very creative.”

“Money certainly makes marriage easier,” Polly said.

“This one says ‘Yo mama,' ” Liza said.

“It does not,” Wren said.

“Look.”

Wren came around and stood next to Liza and squinted at the turquoise square. “It's not even English,” she said. “It says ‘U-M-A-M-I.' ”

Georgia blushed.

“What?” Polly looked at her. “What is that?”

“I don't know,” Georgia said. “Maybe one of those people at the Grand Union wrote it, someone who's visiting from Japan or somewhere.”

“Uh-huh,” Polly said.

John grilled fresh trout on the kettle grill Ez and Harris had brought down to the beach earlier, and roasted fresh ears of corn on the grill, too. Ez made a bonfire inside a circle of stones on the sand, and they pulled up the Adirondack chairs and ate dinner there in a circle. Wren and Liza watched the babies while John cooked, and then Georgia walked with Lily so the girls could eat. Haven slept in his stroller. Then they had the chocolate velvet groom's cake Georgia had somehow managed to get done. At one point Liza tripped and landed with a splash in the lake. Lily crowed with delight and Wren ran down and jumped in, too.

The first stars had appeared over the white pine on the eastern edge of the lake when they started to pick up everything to go home. Georgia untied the line of wish flags from the pole at one end of the beach, and then walked along unpinning and collecting the flags in a pile. Chessy would want to save them. She was curious, too, about what the others had written, whether John had written anything else. She began to flip through the pile of fabric squares, reading.