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  “Red is your color, darling. There’s no doubt about it.” John stood back and admired Jane standing amid the trees in her baby-doll swimsuit.

  “And black suits you perfectly,” Jane said. John raised an arm behind his head, striking a pose in his trunks, and she could not help but notice the delectable lines of his abdominal muscles, the impressive breadth of his chest.

  John took Jane’s hand and helped her up to a rock in the middle of the water. There they lay side by side, soaking the delicious sun into their skin. Jane remembered rows of Government Girls tanning on sidewalks. A lifetime ago, it seemed.

  Finally John propped his head on his elbow and looked at Jane. “Do you love me?” he asked.

  “Of course, darling.” It was true. She loved John the way one loves any pleasant thing in one’s life—a kitten, a good book, chicken à la king. He was kind to her and her parents, he got on well with her brothers, and he always smelled pleasant.

  “Do you think you would marry me?” John asked.

  “I’m sure I would.” Jane turned lazily to her back to sun her belly.

  “Will you?”

  Jane opened her eyes and saw that John had produced—from where, she did not know—a box containing a diamond ring, a baguette-cut accent stone at each shoulder of the center gem. He looked quite nervous.

  “Oh, John,” Jane said. “It’s beautiful.”

  “I love you, Jane. I’ll be a good husband. I promise you.”

  She could not quite believe that someone loved her—that someone wanted to marry her, knowing the truth of all she had done. She felt very, very grateful.

  She looked at John’s dark hair, his classically handsome face. John’s face was the comfort of home. It was leaving and returning. It was the unconditional love of her parents, the promise of family. It was shared history, generations of solid hard work. It was West Virginia—dependable and reassuring.

  A month later, family and friends arrived at the farm after church, and Jane and John said “I do” under a canopy of maples. Everything was sunny and bright.

  The guests ate and drank and danced and laughed, and then went home, leaving Jane’s cheeks thoroughly kissed, until only close family remained. Finally, when the summer sun lowered and little Henry started fussing, Ding added her lips to the pile, and whispered in Jane’s ear. “You deserve all of this,” she said, before she and Cal and the baby took off over the hill.

  “I love you, Jane,” Arzella said, holding her close and then kissing her forehead. Philip and her brothers each took a turn too. “You lovebirds get on now,” Frank said, patting her on the shoulder with his remaining arm, then winking at John.

  Jane’s groom said his own goodbyes and opened her car door. Together, they rolled down the winding driveway, through the dense trees, holding hands.

  “Stop,” Jane said as they reached the gate, which opened onto Shumaker Road.

  “What is it, my bride?” John asked, hitting the brakes and grinning at her.

  “I forgot something.”

  “I’ll turn around.”

  “No, no,” Jane said. “I’ll run and get it.”

  She had forgotten something, she knew it. She had the strongest sense that she was leaving something behind, though for the life of her, she didn’t know what.

  Shoes in hand, Jane stepped out and darted back down the driveway. The trees of her childhood enveloping her, she did not feel afraid or even alone in the dark. As she rounded the first turn, the dirt hard under her feet, she was met suddenly by a doe, no more than a yard away. Neither moved. The deer’s tail stood straight up in attention, her sinewy body strong and confident.

  Jane’s blue eyes met the dark globes of the doe’s, and Jane saw in that moment that they understood each other. She was a mother, this deer—Jane knew it. The doe inched closer and nudged Jane’s midriff with her snout. Jane drew in a sharp breath of the fresh summer air, and her nostrils filled with the scent of crushed sassafras. She saw in a flash an image of her own stomach growing and growing, until a baby boy appeared, a thick blond curl smack-dab in the middle of his forehead. She was a mother too, or would be soon.

  “Thank you,” Jane said, and the deer lifted her head, then turned and walked into the woods to her waiting fawns. Jane took in another deep breath and surveyed the farm—the trees, the creek, the mountain, the ground, at once changing and eternal. “Thank you,” she whispered again.

  No, John had not been the love of Jane’s life, but he’d brought her to Ken and to Cassidy, to the new baby she would meet any day, and he’d done it without judgment. For that, Jane had loved him. In the dark of the nursing home, she settled under the ugly blanket. “Thank you,” she said, and closed her eyes.

  Cassidy

  The call was fuzzy, and Noeli’s voice dropped in and out.

  “Gas station . . . payphones still exist?”

  “I can’t . . .” Cassidy started but Noeli didn’t seem to be able to hear her either. “Are you okay?” she tried.

  “Fucking . . . service . . . fuck. Fine—” The call ended.

  Cassidy sat back, both jarred from the mysterious phone call and relieved to be distracted from her own thoughts. She wouldn’t let herself add hope to the mix.

  Ten minutes later, when the familiar crunch of gravel made its way to her ears, and she peeked out between the dusty horizontal blinds to see the shadowy outline of an unfamiliar sports car making its way up the driveway, she scolded herself for the excitement that leapt to her chest. When the car drew closer and in the driver’s seat appeared the silhouette of short, bobbing ringlets, still Cassidy refused to consider it. It was not until the head full of curls emerged atop a petite figure and walked toward the house that Cassidy allowed herself to try to reconcile the cognitive dissonance that arose when she tried to understand how Noeli could be here. She’d been too wrapped up in grief the last time to truly notice how out of place Noeli seemed.

  It was as strange as if a palm tree had popped up among the maples, and yet here she was. Cassidy watched her swat at a mosquito and heard her cursing to herself, and she had to restrain her laughter. It came out instead as a hiccuppy sob, which transformed into heavy cries of surprise, joy, and relief. Noeli was so tough, so gritty in her own element, but here she looked so vulnerable. It made Cassidy love her even more, she thought as she ran to the door. “What are you doing here?” she exclaimed, throwing it open.

  “Oh, am I the first brown person you’ve seen since you got back?” They laughed and hugged, tears still streaming down Cassidy’s face.

  “Come in!” Cassidy said, wiping her cheeks. She felt protective now, like Noeli might be swallowed by the woods or eaten alive by mosquitoes.

  Inside, Noeli collapsed in a heap, propped her worn-out Chucks on the coffee table, and sighed. Cassidy watched in awe, still trying to process the reality of her visit and wondering what it meant.

  “What a fucking pain,” Noeli began, and Cassidy nodded sympathetically. “I went through my own hero’s journey to get here.” Outside, an owl hooted and something scampered under the window. Cassidy didn’t even flinch. The interior of the house, which had felt so oppressively quiet an hour ago, now felt alive with Noeli’s dancing voice.

  “And then I got stuck in a ditch,” Noeli said flatly.

  “What!” Cassidy exclaimed. “How?”

  “I don’t even know, but I had zero cell phone service. Literally zero. So I stood on a hill and waited for someone to come help me.”

  “Oh my God.”

  “Yeah. Some old guy and his son got under the car with chains and pulled it out. It. Was. Terrifying,” she deadpanned. “But also kind of awesome? Can you imagine that happening in California?”

  “No.”

  “Well, now I’m here and I’m pretty sure the bugs are trying to destroy me,” Noeli finished.

  “Wow. So now
you’re here.”

  “So now I’m here,” Noeli repeated. “And Jesus, why am I so sweaty?” She paused. “It’s pretty, though. I mean, from what I can tell. The drive was prettier with the leaves back.” They both laughed again.

  “It is,” Cassidy agreed.

  “Really, it’s beautiful,” Noeli said, serious now.

  “You are,” Cassidy said. “You look beautiful.”

  “Seriously? Because I feel like I’m swimming in my own body odor.”

  Cassidy kissed her. “Okay, you definitely do smell.” She pulled away and they both laughed. “Do you want to shower?”

  “Please.” Noeli leaned in this time and they kissed again. “I’m sorry, Cass. For everything.”

  “Me too.” She took Noeli by the hand and led her to the bathroom, then kissed her again before stepping in behind her. She watched Noeli, asking silently if this was okay. Noeli slipped off her jeans. Cassidy took off her own pants, leaving them in a pool at her feet. Noeli reached over and lifted Cassidy’s shirt over her head, stopping when she was done to put her hands on Cassidy’s belly. “It’s gotten bigger,” she said. Cassidy nodded and helped Noeli out of her hoodie and shirt. She’d worn the Selena tee. When they were undressed, Cassidy turned on the hot water.

  How long was Noeli going to stay? Were they okay now? Cassidy’s thoughts cascaded one on top of another as they stepped one at a time into the shower’s stream. Her thoughts were eclipsed by the reality before her, every curl, every angle of Noeli’s body—her nose, her wrist—so familiar, so totally Noeli, and yet so new, like Cassidy was noticing them for the first time. They were here, their stomachs pressed together, without even clothing between them. Their barriers, their defenses, all had been stripped away, and they were here, in the bodies they lived in, naked and vulnerable and alive.

  They helped each other wash, rubbing soap slowly over each of their curves and angles, until their skin was clean and soft between them. When they’d finished, they stood wordlessly under the water, holding each other, until Noeli began to shiver. Cassidy shut off the water with a clunk.

  Steam rolled out behind them as they opened the door, wrapped in two of Paloma’s light purple towels. Noeli’s ringlets were damp now, longer and thinner, flattened down her back, and Cassidy marveled at the clean freshness of her freckles.

  “This is what I need to wear in this weather,” Noeli said, and they walked together back to the couch to sit, Cassidy draping her bare legs over Noeli’s.

  “I hated the way we left things,” Cassidy said after a moment.

  “I’m sorry,” Noeli said again.

  “I’m sorry too. I’m so sorry.”

  “I’m also fucking exhausted.” Noeli let her body fall across Cassidy’s lap and Cassidy stroked her damp hair.

  “Let’s go upstairs.” Cassidy would have to wait to ask questions, to figure out where they stood. It was better, maybe. Not knowing might be better for tonight.

  Still wrapped in their towels, they curled beside each other and slept, Cassidy pressed in close behind Noeli, her nose in Noeli’s curls.

  Paloma

  In the darkness, Paloma looked around her new room, still decorated for a sixteen-year-old boy, a Bob Marley poster over the bed, a navy-blue beanbag chair in the corner. It felt unbelievable that Hank could be headed off to college when Paloma could still remember her friends announcing their pregnancies.

  “There’s something in the water,” Jean had said, laughing.

  “Our cycles are synced,” May had said.

  Margaret had raised a finger in the air. “It’s the chasteberry supplements.”

  All three were pregnant, and all three had arrived at their monthly tea date in the back room of Margaret’s store, ready to announce the good news.

  Three sets of eyes turned cautiously toward Paloma, all aware of her struggles with fertility.

  “You’ll have to bring the babies over,” Paloma gushed. “Finally! We’ll all be mothers.” The women exhaled with relief and talk turned to pregnancy-safe supplements and the best vegetarian sources of various nutrients.

  As Paloma looked at each of the women’s faces, she tried to picture the process happening within them—cells dividing, life building itself one day at a time. She was both jealous and overjoyed for her friends.

  These were the people of her life. Until now, she’d thought of the people around her as ephemeral—minor. She’d always had the sense that she would do so much, meet so many people, that whomever she was with now would become insignificant. Penny Moscowitz had been her best childhood friend by circumstance. Growing up, she’d imagined that when she left Long Island, the girl would fade into obscurity, her stringy brown braids disappearing into the void, but in the story of Paloma’s life, Penny was forever her first friend. Lovers, too, had felt trivial, expendable, interchangeable, but in the story of her one life, those were Paloma’s lovers. And these were her true friends. These people right here. Gratitude and awe at their presence bloomed within her.

  The months flew by and soon, while Cassidy grew ever more sullen and reserved, four babies crawled around on Paloma’s wooden floors. Paloma fielded questions about breastfeeding, and her friends commiserated about teething and sleepless nights.

  “He doesn’t understand how exhausted I am,” May said. “I haven’t slept more than two hours straight in months.”

  “David has changed exactly one diaper,” Jean said.

  “Ken didn’t change diapers either,” Paloma said. “He’s always been great with Cassidy, but he assumed that was my job. No discussion or anything.” The other women nodded knowingly.

  “We’ll have a stronger bond with our babies, though,” Margaret said. “They can sense all the time we put in. It’s worth it.”

  Paloma kept her mouth shut.

  Jean’s fuzzy-headed daughter looked up at the four of them with her huge brown eyes, mirror images of her mother’s. Jean lifted the girl to her breast, and she suckled as the women continued talking. May’s twins, named after philosophers, scooted after Cassidy, who cooed back at them. Paloma bent and scooped Margaret’s son into her lap.

  “These thighs!” she exclaimed, squishing his baby rolls. “They’re irresistible.” She buried her nose in his soft blond hair. She’d thought people were making up the baby smell thing when Cassidy was born. She hadn’t noticed it until it was gone.

  Ken swung open the door, smiled at the women, set down his briefcase, and got down on all fours to grin at the babies. A familiar pang of guilt ran through Paloma as she wondered for the thousandth time what their life would have been like with more children.

  The women said hello to Ken and goodbye to Paloma, explaining that they needed to get home to their own husbands. They scooped their pudgy offspring from the floor and left, a haze of exhaustion and joy trailing behind them.

  Paloma stood and moved past Ken. “I need some things from the garden for dinner.”

  Outside, May struggled to get the twins settled into the car.

  “Let me help you,” Paloma said.

  “Thank you!” May handed her one of the squirming boys, who relaxed into her arms. “I forgot to ask if you wanted to do a vegetarian Passover. I’ll call Jean and Margaret.”

  “I’d love that.” The baby gave Paloma a gummy smile as she lowered him into his seat.

  May drove down the gravel path, and Paloma trudged over the damp ground to the garden, reached up to open the latch on the deer fence, and let herself in. The house door slammed and Cassidy came running out.

  “Can I help?”

  “Of course.” Paloma tried to hide her surprise at seeing her daughter here voluntarily for the first time in months.

  Together, they clipped spinach leaves and popped sugar snap peas from the vine. Cassidy didn’t seem to notice the light dimming around them. The first sprinkles of rain pricked P
aloma’s skin, as small as the heads of pins.

  “Go on back to the house,” she said. “I’ll be in in a minute.”

  Paloma watched as her daughter ran through the tall grass, up the wooden steps, and into the house that her husband had built. The sky was darker now, and she shivered in the chilly evening. A doe stood in the darkness beyond, watching, and Paloma watched back, filled with a calm contentment. The doe looked skyward and Paloma followed suit, the light rain moistening her cheeks. She watched as the sky filled with its million stars, points as small as the raindrops. The sky was black now, each star a perfect silver circle, and looking at them, Paloma felt her consciousness transported to another time, another body. It was the body she called hers before carrying and losing pregnancies, before birthing a baby, before nursing a child at her breast. Her mind, too, returned to one from long ago. For a moment she was Paloma, but not Paloma. She was young Paloma, looking out over the Vltava, the stars, transformed too—the twinkling lights of Prague.

  Paloma closed her eyes and breathed in, arriving. It was not a singular occurrence in her life. She had arrived and arrived and arrived.

  Cassidy

  “This is the Simon? Father of your baby, Simon?”

  Cassidy confirmed and Noeli smirked.

  “And we’re having lunch with him.” They’d risen in the morning and gotten dressed for their day, just as they’d done for months in Fontana.

  “I have to make it better.”

  “So . . .” Noeli started. “Are we? Better?”

  This was the closest they’d come to really discussing things and Cassidy wanted to keep the tone light, worried that if they talked seriously, the dreamlike quality of their reunion would be ruined.

  “On my end, we’re better. You battled mosquitoes and humidity for me.”

  “And a ditch!” Noeli added.