Spare Change (Wyattsville #1)(9)

That evening when they sat down to a supper of fried chicken and dumplings, he told her he’d changed his mind about New York City. “I’ll take you to Norfolk or Virginia Beach,” he said. “Those are fine vacation spots.”

“Virginia Beach!” Susanna screamed, “In the dead of winter?”

“Okay, we’ll go to Norfolk. Shop, eat in fancy restaurants, see a show.”

“See a show? Watch another woman who got discovered? Some vacation that would be!” She pleaded for Benjamin to change his mind, “I’ve got talent,” she sobbed. “I could be somebody.”

“You are somebody,” he answered. “You’re my wife. It seems like that ought to be enough for a woman.”

“Well it’s not!” Susanna shouted; then she overturned the bowl of dumplings into his lap and ran crying to the bedroom. Benjamin followed after her, but she’d slammed the door and twisted the lock. That’s when he decided that if he was to hold on to his wife, he’d have to trick her into staying there on the Eastern Shore of Virginia.

The next morning, Susanna was sick again. “See what you’ve done,” she said. “All that talk of canceling our vacation has upset my system.”

Benjamin, with his eyes averted from her face, answered, “I didn’t say we’d never go, I just said this wasn’t the right time.”

Susanna’s face brightened.

He watched her from the corner of his eye. “New York winters are bitter cold,” he said. “I’ve heard tell the temperature drops below zero and the wind can freeze a person’s tongue if they open their mouth long enough to ask directions. You think any talent scouts are gonna be out in weather like that?”

She sat down alongside him and slid her hand onto his thigh. “Can we go to New York in the spring?” she asked.

“Late spring, early summer; depends on what needs doing around here.” He tugged loose the strap of her nightgown, “And…whether or not you’re being a good girl.” He gathered a rough handful of her breast, but before he could slide himself into her, Susanna became sick again and went running to the bathroom.

Three weeks later, when Doctor Kelly told her she was pregnant with a baby due to be born the third week of May, Susanna flew into a rage of crying and hollering, the likes of which the nurses had never seen. Barbara Ann Taylor, who had snow white hair and thirty years nursing experience, tried to calm her by saying how a wonderful little baby was well worth all the pain and suffering of childbirth; that’s when Susanna heaved a tray full of sterilized instruments across the room. “You think a baby’s so wonderful,” she told Barbara Ann, “then you can have it!” Susanna begged and pleaded with Doctor Kelly to do something to get rid of the baby, but of course, he said such a thing was against the law. “They do it all the time in China,” she sobbed.

Benjamin was delighted with the news, not because he was wishing for a baby, but because it seemed to be just the thing to prevent Susanna from running off to New York. “No talent scout’s gonna be looking for singers the size of a milk cow,” he’d said; then he ducked when she hurled a pitcher of orange juice in his direction. Susanna was always quick to show her anger and that winter was worse than most. She broke the kitchen window three different times, smashed an entire set of dishes and flushed her wedding ring down the toilet.

In February, she started to retain water, her feet swelled up to the size of melons and throbbed if she dared to stand for longer than a half-hour, which meant she had to quit her job at the furniture store. Although she’d sold only one maple sofa and three lamps in eighteen months, the manager, who it was rumored had a weakness for attractive women, had given her five raises. Once she was no longer working in town, Susanna grew more foul-tempered and quicker than ever to fly off the handle. “What kind of a career can a singer expect to have,” she’d scream, “with a kid hanging onto her!”

The baby was ten days late in coming; and when it finally arrived it was with a tearing and ripping apart of her flesh. Susanna kicked at the doctors and screamed profanities that bruised the nurses’ ears. “I can’t stand it anymore,” she cried, “Get this f*cking thing out of me!”

Even after Doctor Kelly announced that she had delivered a fine healthy boy, Susanna continued to call the baby it. “Start it on formula,” she said, “I’m not about to have my tits look like a litter of pups has been sucking them dry!” She was in the hospital for three days and not once did she cross over to the nursery to see the baby.

As she was getting dressed to come home, a nurse came into the room and handed her a copy of the birth certificate. “How can he have a birth certificate,” Benjamin asked, “he’s not even been named.”

“He’s got a name,” the nurse answered.

“He has?” Benjamin picked up the birth certificate and read it. “Shit, almighty!” he growled, after reading the boy’s name. “You named the kid after that f*cking furniture store!”

Susanna laughed like a person satisfied with the results of a practical joke. “Maybe I can sell him,” she said, “like that maple sofa.”

That’s how it was the boy came to be called Ethan Allen. Once Susanna came home from the hospital, she ignored the child altogether and spent her days crying. She’d wake in the morning, then slide right back under the bedcover and pick up where she’d left off the night before. “Why me?” she’d howl, “…why me?”