She was saying something, but I couldn’t entirely make it out.This ranch issomething.
“What is it, Shannon?” I said patiently. “What are you trying to say?”
This ranch, this ranch.
“Spit it out!” I said merrily. “I don’t have all day.”
Shannon looked at me with a terrified, tear-streaked face. “This ranch,” she said, with willful slowness, “is cursed.”
I allowed myself to think, for one long second:I should have strangled you to death.Then I smiled wide, and the thought fell away, like a scrap of paper fluttering over the side of a cliff. “I’m sorry you feel that way. Why don’t you take a half day to yourself? Relax. Take a nap. You can meet me in the kitchen at one.” I cocked my head like a good boss, a generous boss.You’re welcome.
I turned to leave, then remembered something. “Oh, I meant to ask: Are you pregnant?”
If she was, then of course we would get rid of it. Take her to another state. Bring her to a doctor we trusted. Doug would know how to find one. It was a shame.It broke my heart to even think about!But the Lord would certainly understand.
“No,” Shannon said, still rubbing her neck. “I’m not pregnant.” She wiped the tears from her cheek, glaring at me like—like—
Like my own daughter, I realized, right as she added softly, “I would never be stupid enough to have a child with that man.”
By the time I stepped outside and into the sunlight, I was grinning so fiercely my cheeks hurt. A sudden nausea overtook me.
Sometimes it makes me sick, how perfectmy—and how goodI—
I stepped back, and back again, until I was leaning against the barn wall.
“Mama, what’s wrong?”
The world was so bright it felt broken, like a lamp without a shade. I frowned, trying to see straight. Squinted down to see two boys looking up at me. I looked up and past them to find twobarns, two houses, two sets of two nannies playing with two sets of children. I blinked rapidly, lifted my head back, and stared up into a pair of snake-eyed suns, which blazed madly from a double-helix sky.
“Mama.”
He’s not as dumb as you think.
Mama?
They’ll never forgive you.
Mamamamamamamamamama—
I would never be stupid enough to have a child with that man.
My gaze spun across the landscape, circling the mountains and the paddocks and the barns and landing back again on my little boys. No, just one boy. My son. Samuel.The future man of the house!I tried to smile, swallowed a scream.
Mama?
A man may work from sun tosun—
Get up, Natalie.
In the name of the father, son, and homewreckercunt—
Doug answered my call on the seventh ring.
I was sitting in the pantry in the dark, just a sliver of light visible through the crack in the tightly shut door. My back was pressed uncomfortably against the large plastic containers that held our baking materials. “It’s time for Caleb to run for office.”
“Pardon?”
“He needs to run for office. Immediately.” The thought had occurred to me as I was power walking back to the house. What had Doug said to me nearly a decade earlier, that strange night at the Mill Estate?He could be pretty perfect for politics some day … one of the few positions of power where it benefits you to underthink.“He threatened to leave me last night, Doug. He said he’s in love with Shannon.”
