Read Online Whisper Their Love by Valerie Taylor - Free Book Online
Authors: Valerie Taylor
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implications and possible outcomes. She was all right in the restaurant where they went for creamed chicken and salad in aspic; in fact, the food tasted good after no breakfast. Around three o'clock they wound up at the railroad station, the best man still tagging along, and she shook hands with everybody and kissed the air beside Mimi's cheek so as not to smear her make-up. Mimi cried a little and the two men bought her copies of Life and Collier's to read on the train. She guessed they looked like a nice family party.
It wasn't until the train pulled out of the station and was clear of the rows of tracks and the overhead red and green lights, back porches of tenement houses sliding past, that her busyness began to wear off like novocain from a sore tooth. Then the words began uncurling out of the air again.
I'm sorry, baby, but you asked for it.
You wanted it, didn't you?
Mimi's a smart kid. She knew what she was doing.
That meant she hadn't taken any precautions, hadn't used anything. Joyce's former vagueness about these matters had been cleared up by living with Mary Jean. Mary Jean was loaded with information, and she had equipment which, she said, you could get in any drugstore—it was better if you had it prescribed by a doctor, though. There were things you used to keep from getting in trouble when you were with a man.
But Mimi knew about such things. She'd slept with men, different men, all these years. Now how did I know that? Joyce puzzled. Nobody had ever said a word about it, and if Aunt Gen had any suspicions she wouldn't have mentioned them to anyone, not even Uncle Will. Aunt Gen thought even married sex was a little dirty.
She did that with him, so she'd get in trouble. So he'd have to marry her. Realization jumped at her. What had happened the night before was not only whispers in the air, it took on the solid form of catastrophic fact. Mimi is pregnant, she told herself.
And so am I.
Why not? I did it too, she reasoned. Weight of Irv's body against hers, pushing her back against scratchy cloth; excitement and hunger rising in her body like bubbles in a fountain. He didn't take any precautions; I would have known. She sat up straight, looking out of the window and seeing nothing.
Until now it had been a thing terrible in itself, but over and done with. I'll never see him again, she had told herself in the depot. Now she saw that it was not over at all, because she was in trouble. I'll faint and be sick in the mornings, she thought. Then what? What happens to girls when they have babies and aren't married? They go into some kind of a charitable institution, or die in childbirth like Tess of the D'Urbervilles. Her eyes filled with self-pitying tears. She held them wide open to keep them from running over.
Whatever happens, Mimi must not know.
Joyce rocked back and forth on the seat, her hands clenched, her eyes as bright and hard as glass marbles. I could kill myself, she thought. She suddenly felt intensely alive, her toes inside her pumps and her fingers against the clean seat cover full of awareness. She could cut her throat, but suppose the blood made her afraid and she changed her mind after it was too late? Or step in front of a car. Only she might be crippled for life, in horrible pain and without even the hope of death. She shivered, although the day was hot and the car stuffy. She could take a lot of sleeping pills and simply pass out. Never feel a thing.
But she didn't want to die. There simply wasn't any answer.
By the time they chugged to a stop at Henderson, she was incapable of thought. She was afraid to get up from her seat.
The school station wagon was waiting. Mimi must have phoned or something. Her first impulse was to go back inside the depot and hide. Then she saw who was at the wheel, calm hands folded on smooth lap. At the sight of Edith Bannister her knees crumpled. She had to lean against the wall of the station for a moment, careless of dust and crumbling paint. When her
It wasn't until the train pulled out of the station and was clear of the rows of tracks and the overhead red and green lights, back porches of tenement houses sliding past, that her busyness began to wear off like novocain from a sore tooth. Then the words began uncurling out of the air again.
I'm sorry, baby, but you asked for it.
You wanted it, didn't you?
Mimi's a smart kid. She knew what she was doing.
That meant she hadn't taken any precautions, hadn't used anything. Joyce's former vagueness about these matters had been cleared up by living with Mary Jean. Mary Jean was loaded with information, and she had equipment which, she said, you could get in any drugstore—it was better if you had it prescribed by a doctor, though. There were things you used to keep from getting in trouble when you were with a man.
But Mimi knew about such things. She'd slept with men, different men, all these years. Now how did I know that? Joyce puzzled. Nobody had ever said a word about it, and if Aunt Gen had any suspicions she wouldn't have mentioned them to anyone, not even Uncle Will. Aunt Gen thought even married sex was a little dirty.
She did that with him, so she'd get in trouble. So he'd have to marry her. Realization jumped at her. What had happened the night before was not only whispers in the air, it took on the solid form of catastrophic fact. Mimi is pregnant, she told herself.
And so am I.
Why not? I did it too, she reasoned. Weight of Irv's body against hers, pushing her back against scratchy cloth; excitement and hunger rising in her body like bubbles in a fountain. He didn't take any precautions; I would have known. She sat up straight, looking out of the window and seeing nothing.
Until now it had been a thing terrible in itself, but over and done with. I'll never see him again, she had told herself in the depot. Now she saw that it was not over at all, because she was in trouble. I'll faint and be sick in the mornings, she thought. Then what? What happens to girls when they have babies and aren't married? They go into some kind of a charitable institution, or die in childbirth like Tess of the D'Urbervilles. Her eyes filled with self-pitying tears. She held them wide open to keep them from running over.
Whatever happens, Mimi must not know.
Joyce rocked back and forth on the seat, her hands clenched, her eyes as bright and hard as glass marbles. I could kill myself, she thought. She suddenly felt intensely alive, her toes inside her pumps and her fingers against the clean seat cover full of awareness. She could cut her throat, but suppose the blood made her afraid and she changed her mind after it was too late? Or step in front of a car. Only she might be crippled for life, in horrible pain and without even the hope of death. She shivered, although the day was hot and the car stuffy. She could take a lot of sleeping pills and simply pass out. Never feel a thing.
But she didn't want to die. There simply wasn't any answer.
By the time they chugged to a stop at Henderson, she was incapable of thought. She was afraid to get up from her seat.
The school station wagon was waiting. Mimi must have phoned or something. Her first impulse was to go back inside the depot and hide. Then she saw who was at the wheel, calm hands folded on smooth lap. At the sight of Edith Bannister her knees crumpled. She had to lean against the wall of the station for a moment, careless of dust and crumbling paint. When her
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