Selena Kitt: Grace

“Let’s go bless you, beautiful,” Father Michael murmured to the baby, cuddling her in his arms. She cooed and kicked her feet under her long, white satin gown.

“Hey, Leah, can I talk to you for a minute?” Erica asked, tugging on her twin’s sleeve. Leah looked annoyed at first and then she saw Erica’s face, doing a double take.

“We’ll be right there, Father!” Leah called after the priest as he carried the baby down the hall. “What is it?”

Erica took a deep breath, blurting it out. “I’m pregnant.”

Leah gaped at her, blinking in response. No words, just blinking, like a mute’s version of Morse Code.

“No one else knows,” Erica rushed on. “Except Clay, and I was so afraid to tell him because he knows about the Mary Magdalenes and the operation and I know it’s impossible and it’s crazy but I went to a doctor sure I was dying or had cancer or something because I hadn’t had a period in two months but he did a pregnancy test, and I made him do it again, and then I made him to do again -I swear to God, Leah, I made him kill three rabbits-and when I told him I’d had an operation so I couldn’t have children he said if they didn’t take my womb, if they just tied those tubes, those filipino tubes or whatever they are-”

“Fallopian tubes,” Leah corrected, her voice just above a whisper.

“Right, those, he said if they had just done that, it was possible that the ends of those tubes could have grown back together so that my eggs could have been, I don’t know, ripe or something, and whatever, however it happened, I’m going to have a baby…” Erica stopped, looking at Leah in the silence. “Say something.”

Leah laughed, and then Erica did too, and they hugged and laughed some more and Leah, wiping tears from her eyes and kissing Erica on the cheek and whispered, “You are going to be a mother.”

Those words made Erica burst into tears instantly. She had become accustomed to her infertile state, had even moved into a place of acceptance with it-and then wham! God had a funny sense of humor sometimes. Funny, strange-not funny, ha ha, as Clay liked to say.

“What did Clay say?” Leah asked.

“He thought I was kidding of course. Started making jokes about the immaculate conception.”

“Oh no!”

“Luckily I had the doctor give me a note.”

Leah laughed. “You’re kidding.”

“Nope.” Erica giggled. “The doctor wrote it on his prescription pad. And told Clay to call him if he had any questions.”

“And did he?”

“At four in the morning.”

“You told him at four in the morning?”

“I told myself I was going to sleep on it and tell him in the morning, but I woke up and couldn’t keep it a secret one minute longer.”

Leah and Rob and the baby had rented a little apartment until the house they were having built in the suburbs was finished-Leah had changed her mind about New York and dancing the minute Grace had been back in her arms-but Gertie had invited Erica to live with them after the fire-in the guest room of course. Clay slipped into her room after everyone was asleep though.

“Well, it looks like we’re going to be twins in everything again.” Leah took her sister’s hand, teasing. “You always do this. Steal my thunder. Gotta one up me on everything, don’t you?”

Erica froze, jaw dropping. “No!”

“Just a month or so along.” Leah grinned. “And I haven’t told anyone. Not even Rob. Not yet.”

“Mom is going flip.” Erica laughed, hugging Leah and congratulating her while trying to imagine their mother’s reaction. “Both of her daughters managed to end up unwed mothers.”

Leah smiled. “I have no doubt you’re going to have a ring on your finger before long. And we’ll get to plan another wedding!”

Erica groaned, following her sister down the hall. “I just hope we don’t both have twins.”

“Hush your mouth!” Leah gasped. “Anyway, that skips a generation. Doesn’t it?”

“I sure as hell hope so…”

Leah shushed her as they neared the chapel, where the pews were full of family, friends, Rob’s clients, people they had gone to school with, had attended church with. Solie and Ada were up front with Patty, Donald Highbrow sitting on her other side. Erica spied Judge Solomon up front and waved at him. He dropped her a wink. Erica even spotted Rebecca and her baby in the crowd, sitting with a few other former Magdalenes-Lizzie/ Carolyn and Frannie/Marguerite among them. No Marty though, although Leah told her she’d sent a lovely set of knitted white booties that Grace was wearing under her gown.

Erica followed Leah up the middle aisle to the front of the chapel where Rob had his daughter cradled in his arms, and Father Michael was waiting for the girls before he started the ceremony.

Erica stood next to Clay, taking his hand as they looked at Father Michael, who was quieting the congregation and talking about the history and importance of baptism in the Catholic Church. Clay leaned over and whispered, “What’s the difference between Jesus and Picasso.”

Erica stiffened beside him, trying not to laugh, whispering back, “Shhh. We’re going to be godparents.”

“Good, we need the practice.”

“Shhh.” She hushed him, remembering how they had met, so similarly, standing up in front of another congregation pretending to be parents. Clay had tried the whole time to make her laugh with his sacrilegious jokes, and she had to hide her smiles by looking down at the baby in her arms.

It wasn’t until Erica saw baby Grace for the first time that she realized, the baby she’d been holding during the “live Nativity,” had been the Webbers’ youngest foster child, borrowed for the night by Father Michael, who had never seen baby Grace and didn’t recognize her either. Erica had been cradling Grace in her arms that night and didn’t even know it.

Clay and Erica said that yes, they were ready to take on the responsibility of being Grace’s godparents, and Father Michael went on with the ceremony, but Clay was clearly bored with the process and he kept whispering wicked things into Erica’s ear, trying to make her laugh.

“You are going to be in so much trouble when we get home,” she hissed, watching as Father Michael balanced Grace over the baptismal fountain and poured water through her thick, dark hair. The baby squealed but she didn’t cry.

“I christen thee Grace Patricia Nolan,” Father Michael said and Erica smiled at the way Leah had given her daughter their mother’s name, as well as Erica’s middle name. “May grace be with you and with us all, now and evermore. Amen.”

“Do you know why Mary was having sex with God for money?” Clay whispered too low for anyone but Erica to hear.

“Clay…” Erica warned softly, pleading at him with her eyes..

“She was just trying to make a little prophet.”

Erica snorted laughter and covered it with a cough, Father Michael looking at them sharply, and she straightened up and glared at her boyfriend, the future father of her children, and her future husband, once he stopped joking around long enough to propose. He grinned, rocking back on his heels, and she knew she was in for trouble with him, for the rest of her whole damned life.

And she couldn’t wait.

The End