Becca's Baby

She just didn’t know what she could do to help him.

Rehearsals for the Fourth of July play, The Hero, were in full swing. The whole town seemed to be contributing as the teenagers brought Samuel Montford’s history to life. Parents were involved in set-and costume-making, merchants were donating supplies. A musical score had been written and the Save the Youth music program was participating, as well.

Becca stopped in for rehearsal on the third Tuesday in June and was gratified to see how well everything was coming together. She watched the scene that depicted the discovery of gold in Shelter Valley just a couple of years after Samuel and Lizzie had settled there, and the corruption resulting from that discovery.

There’d been an influx of prospectors and gold-miners who brought with them the greed and mistrust that accompanied many of the stakes in the Old West. The boys playing the prospectors were better than good, bringing the scene to such life Becca felt a shiver.

Martha’s oldest daughter, Ellen, was on stage in the next scene, playing Grace Montford—Samuel’s granddaughter—who fell in love with George Smith—Mayor Smith’s father—an avaricious and crafty man who came to town, planning to make a fortune of his own. Though a handsome and superficially charming man, George Smith was empty inside. Grace married him, shared with him her portion of the Montford inheritance. Coming to Shelter Valley had paid off for him. And the town had been paying for it ever since.

Becca knew the rest of that story. Leaving the auditorium for her next stop—Sari’s house, to see how her sister was doing with the costumes she was sewing—she remembered what her mother had told them about old George. Had he squandered Grace’s inheritance, the town of Shelter Valley might have been better off. But he hadn’t, of course. With his cold heart and calculating mind, he settled alongside the other Montford heirs and became a patriarch in his own right. The Smiths had always been a thorn in the side of the townspeople.

“You’re not looking too good,” Sari said, greeting her at the door.

“Other than this heat, I’m perfectly fine,” Becca said, dropping into a chair in Sari’s family room, soaking up the divine air-conditioned coolness while Sari went back to work at the cutting table she’d set up. “I saw Dr. Anderson just last week and everything’s fine. I’m getting enough rest, I’m eating well. Baby’s growing according to the charts.” Used to Sari’s honesty—a right she’d gained through sisterhood—Becca was surprised at her own defensiveness.

“I wasn’t talking about your physical state, Bec,” Sari said softly when Becca had finished. “You don’t look happy.”

Becca drooped, all the fire draining out of her. She watched Sari cut pieces from a bolt of brown fabric, told herself to get up and help. But at five and a half months pregnant in the Arizona heat, she just didn’t have the energy to move. The trek across town had done her in.

“I’m not happy,” she announced baldly.

“Because of Will?” Sari stopped cutting and glanced up.

Becca looked around her at the furnishings that were more comfortable than fashionable, the sewing paraphernalia sitting on Sari’s table, the books and other objects on the ledge between the family room and the kitchen. All things that meant something to Sari. The house was clean, but it looked lived in. Like a home.

Her own house just looked clean.

Her eyes rested on the picture of Tanya on the mantel over the fireplace. Taken just a couple of weeks before Tanya died, it showed the sixteen-year-old grinning at the camera as if she owned the world.

Sari’s only child. Lost to her. And Sari had the courage to live, anyway.

Becca had been so frightened of losing her child that she’d contemplated not giving birth to it. That way her baby could never be taken from her.

“It’s more than that,” she admitted, although if she could talk to Will, really talk to him, she’d feel a lot better.

Sari was cutting fabric again.

“I’ve been thinking a lot about why I was going to have that abortion,” Becca admitted. “Maybe because Will needs answers so badly, I don’t know, but I’ve been trying to figure out what was really prompting me to do something that seemed so out of character to the people who know me best.”

“And?”

“I was afraid to have the baby.”

“Yeah,” Sari said, unpinning the pattern she was using and placing it on another part of the material for repinning. “From the medical report you received, you had reason to be afraid.”

Becca shook her head. “I don’t think it was just that,” she said, only now realizing it, as she voiced thoughts that had been haphazardly running through her mind.

Raising her head, pins between her teeth, Sari mumbled, “Then what?”

“I think I was afraid to have it because I knew I’d never survive losing it.” Becca looked at Tanya’s picture again. “Chances of me miscarrying were higher than if I’d been younger or had a baby before. Birth defects are still a distinct possibility. And if we make it through all of that…well then, the danger really begins. Then my baby goes out into the world and a million other things can befall him.”

Hearing Becca’s anguish, Sari dropped the pins and the scissors, and came over to kneel beside Becca. Putting her head in her sister’s lap, she rubbed Becca’s leg.

“I’m nothing but a coward,” Becca confessed.

“Being aware of the dangers doesn’t make you a coward, Bec,” she said. “It makes you human!”

Sari was so strong, Becca loved her more than she’d ever thought possible. Stroking Sari’s hair, she thought about letting it go at that. But she and Sari had always been honest with each other.