Sweet Salt Air (25 page)

“Maybe what?” Nicole cried, then begged, “Tell me, Charlotte. Anything.”

In mere seconds, with Nicole looking at her like she was the only one who could possibly help, Charlotte wavered a dozen times, weighing the knowledge that Nicole would be hurt against the possibility that Julian might be saved. In the end, it was a moral issue. Hurt could be handled; death could not.

“Umbilical cord cells,” she said with barely a breath.

“No no! That’s what I
don’t
want! I don’t care how close the match is, Julian’s body will reject it. It’s rejected everything else. If I’d had a baby, we’d have frozen the cord blood and had a better chance with that, but I don’t
have
a baby.”

“I do,” Charlotte mouthed, afraid to say the words aloud.

Nicole’s eyes widened. “What?”

“I had a baby,” Charlotte said softly. “I gave her up for adoption, but there’s cord blood. I own it until she turns eighteen.”

Nicole let out a frustrated breath. “That won’t help. You can’t just take any cord blood and think it’ll work, not with Julian’s body.”

Charlotte stared at her, frozen in a last minute of indecision. There was still time to take it back, just say that she’d gotten pregnant after she left here.

But she couldn’t say that. It would have been an outright lie—and through all of this, ten summers before and now, she had never lied outright to Nicole. Sweet, innocent, generous, and kind Nicole. Impending doom? Absolutely. It was ready to hit. But as painful as the truth was, life was life and still the most precious thing in the world.

So she didn’t take anything back, simply stared at Nicole until she figured it out.

*   *   *

It took a minute, not because the idea didn’t come, but because it was so off-the-charts impossible that Nicole couldn’t believe it. But Charlotte had to know she was thinking it and didn’t correct her. Not impossible, then. But wrong, so wrong that she had trouble taking it in. “
Julian’s
baby?”

Charlotte’s nod was so small that Nicole might have missed it if she hadn’t been watching closely.

Sitting straight, she put a hand on her chest. “You had Julian’s baby? You and Julian … together?”

“Just once. Before you were married.”

In a sickening instant, Nicole saw a tangle of arms and legs, the lock of undulating bodies. With the scrape of chair legs on the tile floor, she rose and stepped back. “You and
Julian
?”

“It was an accident. We were drunk.”

Nicole wanted to misunderstand, but the guilt on Charlotte’s face wouldn’t let her. She backed up farther, needing to distance herself from the words, but they didn’t fade. Barely able to breathe, she continued to stare at Charlotte, seeing something totally different from what should have been there, someone she didn’t know at all. And Julian? Her
husband
?

For a minute, she felt faint enough to pass out. All it took to recover was Charlotte coming toward her and she shot out a hand,
stop.

“Don’t
touch
me,” she whispered and fled into the Great Room, which was as far as her legs would take her. Sinking against the edge of the sofa, she tried to take in what Charlotte had said, but her thoughts were fragmented, torn by questions that had nowhere to go but out.

Jumping up, she ran back to the kitchen. Charlotte hadn’t moved.

“When did this happen?” she asked. She needed to know. Didn’t know why. Just needed to know.

Charlotte looked terrified. “A month before the wedding. It was like a circus here. We were painting guest rooms, moving furniture, trying to decide where the tent would go.”

It was a blur to Nicole. “What night?”

“Saturday, I guess, because he left the next day. You have no idea how sorry—”

“What time?”

Charlotte flinched. “I don’t know. We were all exhausted. Julian had been making margaritas.”

“Where was
I
?”

“You were with us for a while.” She swallowed. “Then you went to bed. We could feel the margaritas, so we switched to wine. We were drunk, Nicki. It didn’t mean anything.”

And that was supposed to make it
all right
? Nicole stared at her in disbelief. Unable to even
begin
to respond, she walked out. Seconds later, though, she was back. There were more questions. Asking them seemed her only link to sanity. “When did you know you were pregnant?”

“Not until after I left here.”

“And you’re sure it was Julian’s?”

“I hadn’t been with anyone else in ten months.”

“Ten months,” Nicole echoed. “Exactly ten months.” Were there that many men? “You keep count?”

Charlotte held her gaze. “Not the way you mean. I agonized afterward. Getting drunk isn’t my style. I wanted to know why I did it that night. So I dug back. I remember feeling lonely. There was so much happiness here, but I remember feeling alone.”

“We included you in
everything
.”

“Yes, you did, but you were planning a wedding. I had been planning one the year before—not planning, just dreaming. I’d done a piece in Sweden and met a guy and thought that was it.”

Nicole was skeptical. It sounded like just another excuse. “You never mentioned it.”

“It ended badly. I couldn’t talk about it. I didn’t want to
think
about it. But after a few drinks, I must have been. I must have been wondering if I was right to break up with him and if there was something wrong with me that I couldn’t find love and if I’d ever have
my
day walking down the aisle.”

“So you screwed my husband instead.”

“No, I got
drunk
instead. I’m guessing that I was desperate to feel wanted. It could as easily have been the gardener as Julian.”

“Blind sex?
Indiscriminate
sex? You were my
maid of honor,
Charlotte. How could you be that after what you’d done?”

“How could I
tell
you?” Charlotte cried.

“How could you
not
?
You were pregnant by my husband.”

“Your fiancé, and I didn’t know I was pregnant until after the wedding.”

Unable to look at her a second longer, Nicole started out, but she hadn’t even made it past the door when another, horrible thought made her pivot. “Did
he
know you were pregnant?”

“No. I haven’t talked with him since I left here ten years ago.”

“You didn’t think he had a right to know you were
carrying his child?
”

“By the time I found out, you were married. I couldn’t do that to you.”

“You did it!” The words
carrying his child
were bleeping front and center. She started to cry, but stopped herself and screamed, “How
could
you, Charlotte? You knew I wanted a baby.”

“I didn’t plan it,” Charlotte cried. “I didn’t plan that night, didn’t plan a
baby
. It was the most difficult thing I’ve ever lived through.”

As was this for Nicole. Anger was the only thing keeping her erect. “Am I supposed to feel sorry for you?” she asked, tasting bitterness and hating that, too. But how not to resent Charlotte for having the baby she should have had? More quietly, unable to shake the image, she asked, “What was it?”

“Oh, Nicki, don’t—”

“Don’t ask? Don’t
wonder
?
If not now, when?” A detached part of her said she had to know these things, that as long as she kept asking questions, the awful,
awful
whole of it wouldn’t hit. “What was it?” she repeated.

“A girl.”

“Where is she now?”

“Washington.”

“D.C.?”

“State. It was a private adoption. The parents were at the hospital for the birth.”

“And you didn’t think Julian should have been there?”

“He was married to you. It would have killed you.”

“Didn’t you think he should have had a say about what happened to his child?”

Charlotte’s mouth tightened. “No. I didn’t. We avoided each other that last month, then he was married to you, and I was gone. He never asked if there was a chance I’d get pregnant. Neither one of us wanted to remember that night.” Her voice softened, pleading. “I agonized, Nicole. I was pregnant. I was terrified. I thought of every possibility. I knew you’d be the best mother in the world, but how could you raise a child conceived this way? And if I told Julian, he’d either have to keep it from you or risk ruining his marriage. Adoption seemed like the only choice.”

“Did you hold her?” Nicole asked quietly. How many times had she imagined holding her own child immediately after its birth?

“This won’t—”

“Did you?”

“For a minute.”

“Did you name her?”

“No.”

“Are you in touch with her now?”

“No.”

“But you kept the umbilical cord cells.” Charlotte nodded. “Why?”

“In case I had other children who might need them. Or me.”

“What about Julian’s other children?” Nicole added, thinking of children she might have had herself, children who would have been half siblings with this one. The question hung in the air without answer. “Did your friends know?”

“What friends? I was doing community outreach in Appalachia when I found out. I didn’t know anyone there.”

“They must have seen that you were pregnant.”

“By that time, I was gone. I got my first writing assignment. It was for a story in Oregon. I spent most of the pregnancy there.”

She looked ashamed, but that didn’t help Nicole. Somewhere in the back of her mind was Julian … guilty Julian …
cheating
Julian.

But Charlotte was here, and Nicole wanted to hit back. “It makes sense in a sick way. Your parents were always fooling around. You said you hated that.”

“I did.”

“But then you did the same.” The numbness was starting to wear off. Trembling inside, she wrapped her arms around her middle. “Do you have any idea how I feel? Did you think about that at all?

Charlotte nodded. “It’s haunted me for ten years.”

Resentment flared. “I loved you like a sister.”

“And I you,” Charlotte said, forearms on the table now, earnest and intense. “What I did was wrong, Nicole. I never wanted you to know. Then I got here and you told me about Julian, and I’ve been praying ever since that it wouldn’t come to this. But if he needs those stem cells, how could I not speak up?”

“You could have told
him,
” Nicole fired back. “Why me first?”

“Because you’re the one I care about.”

“By wrecking my marriage?”

“That’s the last thing I want. I went away after the wedding and I stayed away. I tried to remove myself from your life. But you invited me back, and I’ve missed you. Everything seemed so right when we talked that I hoped the past was done and we could regain what we had. I did something awful, Nicole. If these cells give you hope, I’ll have been able to give something back for all I’ve taken away.”

“Really,” Nicole said in a swirl of fury, because fury was the most obvious thing to feel. There was also disbelief and disappointment. There was emptiness. She had always thought she and Julian were the couple. Now to learn that it was
Charlotte
and Julian? She had no idea where that left her.

Charlotte didn’t speak.

Nicole’s fury did. “You had my husband’s baby.“

Still nothing.

“I can never forgive you for that.”

“I understand,” Charlotte said, turning beseechful, “but listen to me. This isn’t
about
the baby. It’s about stem cells. I have them. They could be the answer.”

“Answer to
what
?
” Nicole shouted, letting anger give her strength. “Saving my husband’s life? Right now, I couldn’t care less. He betrayed me as much as you did.”

“Neither of us knew what we were doing.”

Nicole didn’t buy that. She could understand a lapse of morals in Charlotte, in whom they were poorly rooted to begin with. But Julian? Her
husband
?
Even with his being married before—even with his dating other women between—she had assumed faithfulness, and if not on the eve of their wedding, when?

Charlotte drew her arms from the table and, in a faint voice, said, “Do you want me to leave?”

“Yes,” Nicole said, then, “No.” She thought about the cookbook, which was why Charlotte was here. On one hand, the cookbook seemed irrelevant right now. Food … place settings … tens of thousands of followers? Her whole
career
seemed irrelevant.

On the other hand, it was all she had. And Charlotte had committed to help. And kicking her out would only let her off the hook.

What to do? Nicole’s thoughts were muddled by thick globs of emotion. Dismayed, she simply said, “I can’t look at you,” and, turning on a heel, ran through the Great Room and up the front stairs.

*   *   *

Charlotte waited for her to return. There was no sound from above—no crying, no yelling at Julian, not even the slam of a door.
I can’t look at you.
Charlotte deserved that. She deserved worse. Still, it hurt.

Needing the comfort of the ocean, she went out the kitchen door. In the distance, the boom of fireworks at the pier marked the start of festivities for the Fourth, but festive was the last thing Charlotte felt. Crossing the patio, she settled on the beach steps and hunched over her knees. The tide was out, leaving a deep stretch of seaweed-blotched sand. Beyond it, the surf frothed in, broke, rolled out, echoing down the Quinnipeague coast. She tried to see the poetry in it; life ebbed and flowed. Bob Lilly had talked about that when she first came here, an eight-year-old child, troubled by what was happening at home. His voice, his words, and the echo of the poetry had given her strength during the loneliest times in her life.

None of it helped now. She had betrayed Bob, too. Wondering if Nicole was right—if she was as defective as her parents had been—she felt worse than ever. She rocked lightly. She put her head to her knees, listening, waiting, but though the ocean thundered rhythmically, it didn’t soothe.