Brooke sat on her childhood bed in her childhood room with Jodie finally asleep on her lap. The baby had been a champ throughout the trip—handling the ferry crossing and long car ride and several days jammed with parties and other gatherings leading up to, including, and following Christmas. She’d been terrified by Mr. Nicholson dressed in his red suit and black boots and fake white beard (the designated Santa at the church Christmas social) but otherwise happily accepted the free and frequent passing of her body from one stranger eager to make her acquaintance to another, a skill she’d long since mastered on Shawnituck. But somewhere among all those pawing hands and slobbery kisses she’d picked up a virus. She started coughing last night and this morning woke with a runny nose and a low-grade fever. Momma wanted to take her Doctor Manning—the pediatrician that had treated her and Leah and Matt—but Brooke had resisted. On the island they didn’t have a pediatrician, and Brooke had treated Jodie’s two previous illnesses with a mix of over-the-counter medication, home cures, and lots of attention and care. She’d apply those same techniques here, for now anyway.
But earlier this afternoon, with Father at work and Momma out returning gifts and Leah at a matinee with friends, Brooke’s adamant self-sufficiency had been sorely tested. Jodie would not stop crying no matter what she tried. She’d walked around the house and up and down the stairs what seemed a hundred times, bouncing Jodie on her shoulder or swinging her in the cradle of her arms. She’d rocked her in the rocking chair, snuggled her on the bed, tried cool cloths on her forehead, warm cloths on her stomach. Nothing worked. Jodie’s tears and plaintive wails produced first frustration then fear within Brooke. What if she’d miscalculated this illness? What if her home care wasn’t sufficient? What if Jodie had a serious illness that was already beyond control? She’d never confronted such a prospect, and now she was having to face it alone. She had no car to drive somewhere if she had to, and no one to call to ask advice—Father was on the road for a sales meeting, and Momma and Leah beyond phone contact. She could try to reach Onion at the restaurant, but what would he do? She was alone in this crisis. And her fear and isolation grew with each scream from her inconsolable baby until she finally dissolved in tears herself, burying her face in Jodie’s chest and sobbing uncontrollably.
She couldn’t say when Jodie stopped crying for the deafening roar of her own sobs. Nor could she say how long she’d kept her face buried in Jodie’s nightshirt, now damp with their mixed tears. When her sobs finally abated, all she heard was Jodie’s beating heart. She lifted her head. The room had grown dark in early twilight, and the house was utterly still. But she could see Jodie clearly enough, stretched out on her lap, drawing hoarse sleeping breaths through her mouth as her nose was clogged. Brooke bushed Jodie’s damp hair from her face then felt her forehead. It felt cool for the first time today. She took the corner of the blanket and wiped the tears from Jodie’s cheeks and cleared away some of the mucous around her nose. Jodie scrunched up her face and Brooke gasped in fear the wailing would resume. But Jodie’s eyes never opened and she rolled to one side and pushed her face into the cleft formed by Brooke’s legs. Her breathing grew less labored, and her body relaxed against Brooke’s legs. Slowly Brooke’s body relaxed also, drained not only of fear but of all energy. She felt totally empty.
She thought of Momma from twenty years ago confronted with these same challenges and fears, possibly seated in this very spot with the baby Brooke asleep in her lap. How had she managed it? How had she raised three children and never once seemed confused or uncertain or frightened? Where had her strength come from and why couldn’t her daughter summon it now? Bearing a child was one thing but having the skills to raise her quite another. The calm certainty that Brooke had so often rebelled against now seemed the very quality she needed—not to benefit herself but for Jodie, for her child’s safety and well-being. But where could she find it in her thin reserves of self-control and equanimity? Those were Leah’s traits. Brooke had none of that.
She heard a rustling and looked up. As in a dream she saw Leah, clad in a bulky dark sweatshirt and jeans and stockinged feet, walk across the carpeted floor and sit on the bed beside her. The mattress creaked slightly.
Leah glanced at the sleeping Jodie then focused her eyes on Brooke. She reached up and gently wiped away the trails of tears still left on her sister’s cheeks. She smiled then signed You will be O.K.
Brooke sighed, a sound lost to all in the room, even herself. She signed back. How?
Leah considered that a minute then signed the only thing she knew. Love will show you.
Brooke thought but didn’t say That’s not enough. Then she rose, set Jodie in the crib Momma had borrowed, then headed to the bathroom down the hall to shower before dinner.