Olivia (Logan 5)

I would die a woman, and I would not be used or abused to satisfy some man. Yes, there was a part of me that wanted to be like Belinda, but that was the part men planted in me, the part I could subdue.

Call me little general. Call me Miss Cold and call Belinda Miss Hot, I thought.

But in the end, they will call me with respect, and really, in the end, what mattered more, respect or love? No one really knew what love was. How many husbands and wives had this so-called magical bond?

The choice was simple, I thought: be a dreamer or be a realist and make the day conform to what I wanted and not what I hoped.

Belinda danced and my father smiled. My mother fled from pain and darkness, and I, I stood behind them all, like some impregnable wall, keeping disaster away from our doorstep. In the end they would all appreciate me.

And what would anyone want more than that?

The tinkle of Belinda's laughter fell along the dark corridors of my own doubt, filling my mind with little sparks, keeping me from being absolutely sure.

1

Cries in the Night

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At first I thought I was dreaming, for when I

woke and opened my eyes, I heard nothing but the low whistle of the wind blowing up from the ocean. The stream of moonlight filtering through my sheer white curtain bathed the walls in a pale yellow glow. My window shutters banged against the clapboard and then, I heard the sound again, this time with my eyes wide. I listened, my heart tapping like a steadily growing drumbeat in anticipation of some important announcement or event. After a moment I heard it once more.

It sounded like a cat in heat, but we had no cats. Daddy hated pets, finding them more of an obligation than a pleasure. The only animals he said had any purpose was a watchdog or a seeing-eye dog, and he had no need for either. Our house was far enough away from the downtown Provincetown area and surrounded by walls ten feet high with an entrance gate Daddy had Jerome, our grounds keeper, lock every night. Daddy also kept his shotgun under the bed, "just in case." It was, he said, a lot cheaper than feeding some mongrel, and that, he concluded, "was the bottom line."

This time the sound was even louder. I sat up so quickly someone would think I had springs under me, but I realized the shrill cries were not in my imagination or from nightmares. The noise was coming through the wall between my room and Belinda's. It wasn't a howl, e

xactly, nor was it a screech. There was something familiar about the sound and yet something starkly unusual. It was certainly not a noise Belinda would make herself, but there was no doubt it was emanating from her bedroom.

I stepped off my bed, scooped up my robe from the chair beside my bed, and shoved my arms into the sleeves as I left my room. Daddy and Mother had already come out of their bedroom. Mother was still in her nightgown and Daddy was in his pajamas. The dreadful sound continued.

"What in all hell . . ." Daddy started for Belinda's closed door. I followed, with Mother a distant third, but when Daddy opened the door and realized the horrendous scream came from Belinda, Mother charged forward.

"Winston, what's wrong?" she cried.

Daddy flicked on the light, illuminating the most amazing and alarming sight before us. Belinda was sprawled on the floor, her nightgown bloody and crumbled up to her breasts. There, lying between her legs was a newly-born infant, the umbilical cord and afterbirth still attached.

Belinda's eyes were wild with terror. The baby's eyes were closed, and it jerked its tiny arm and then stopped moving.

"Jesus, Mary and Joseph," Daddy exclaimed under his breath, his feet hammered to the floor by astonishment.

Mother's eyes rolled back in her head and she folded at Daddy's feet as if her spinal cord had turned to jelly. "Leonora!"

"Take her to bed, Daddy," I said. "I'll see to Belinda."

He gazed back at the sight once more to confirm it was indeed still there and not in his imagination. Then he squatted, slipped his arms under Mother and lifted her like she was a baby herself, carrying her back to their bedroom.

I entered Belinda's room, quickly closing the door behind me. Our servants downstairs were surely awake by now as well. Belinda whimpered. Her eyes rolled as if the room were spinning. She had her arms raised, but she was afraid to touch the infant or herself.

"I couldn't stop it. It just happened, Olivia," she moaned. Her whole body shook. I stepped up to her and gazed down at the bloody sight.

"You were pregnant? All this time you've been pregnant?" I asked incredulously.

"Yes," she said, gasping.

Now everything made sense. A number of times during the past few months Daddy and I had made comments about Belinda's gaining weight. She was ravenous at every meal lately and didn't seem at all concerned about her widening hips and bloated face. I really didn't care. It was more Daddy who complained. His precious little Barbie doll was disappearing right before his eyes and in its place grew this self-indulgent creature I called my sister.

Oh, once or twice, I said things like, "Aren't you afraid you'll lose your entourage of boyfriends?"