Vada Faith (15 page)

“What more can we say.” He turned, putting his hands in the pockets of his shorts. “Celebrities do this all the time. Why can’t we? My wife and I cannot have children. We want a child. Is that a sin? We found someone who has agreed to help us.”

“Certainly that’s understandable,” the talk show host said, putting her hand out to the white poodle in Dottie’s lap.

“Who’s this?” She asked. The dog eyed her outstretched hand and snuggled deeper into his owner’s lap.

“This is Baby,” Dottie said, her smile growing wider, “and I must admit he is a baby. His brother or sister is coming soon.” She frowned. “I do wish everyone would go away and leave us alone.”

“The question on my mind,” the news woman said, leaning toward Dottie, and ignoring what she’d just said, “doesn’t it bother you to buy a baby?”

“No. We buy bread and milk,” the woman said. “We bought this land.” She waved at the property around her. “Why not buy a baby?”

“That’s not quite the same thing now, Sugar,” Roy Kilgore said, moving his chair closer to his wife. He leaned over and put his hand over hers. “We simply do not think of it as buying a baby,” he said, patting her arm. “We think of it as paying the medical costs for all the procedures. The tests. Paying for the care and safety of the birth mother. For the safe delivery of our child. That is how we look at it. Really, that’s all we have to say. Come here Baby.”

He took the dog from his wife’s lap. The poodle growled and leaped back into her arms.

“One more question,” Maddie said, raising her voice to drown out the barking dog, “on the allegations surfacing regarding your home improvement business. Can you add anything that might clear this up?”

“Allegations. Nothing more.” He raised his voice. “There is no truth to any of it. That’s all we have to say.” The couple with the perfect tans faded from the screen.

“Well, folks,” she turned back to the audience, “you can make up your own minds about all this.” She got up and walked down into the audience. “We’ll take a few questions. Anyone have a question for our guest?”

“How could you give your baby away?” The person who stood at the mike in the baggy old lady dress was my sister. The red wig and sun glasses couldn’t hide her squeaky little voice. Who had she left in charge of the shop? That was my question. At times she was more impulsive than me.

“I am doing this,” I snapped, “to help these people. That poor childless couple you just saw.” I couldn’t believe my eyes as I leaned forward. There was my husband seated beside Joy Ruth with mama wedged into the seat beside him. You couldn’t keep anything quiet in this town. Not for one second. It was bad enough that someone thought I was selling a baby. Now my own family had to be here to witness it.

“It appears that the couple might need more than a baby to help them,” my sister said, into the mike. “What if this baby looks just like one of your own children, Vada Faith? Will you give it away then?”

The nerve of that girl. I would wring her skinny neck when we got back to the shop.

“Let’s move on,” the talk show host said, walking down another aisle. “Does anyone here want to be a surrogate mother or do you have any questions?”

Several hands went up.

“Yes.” She pointed to a short brunette with glasses. “What would you like to ask?”

“How much are you getting paid to give them your baby?”

“It’s not my baby and I can’t discuss money. I can tell you money isn’t the issue.”

“Would I get more than I get at my secretarial job?”

“I wouldn’t know but,” I caught my breath, “this is something you can’t take lightly.”

“I just want to say,” a young woman said, hopping up, “that I was given away at birth. Until I found my sister here,” she nodded at the girl sitting beside her, “it was like a piece of me was missing. Now I’m complete. For the first time in my life. We are so alike. Not just in looks.” She smiled at her sister. “Everything about us. And,” she said solemnly, “as a child who was given away, I would never advise giving away a baby. Not for any reason.”

I stared hard at the girl. She reminded me of someone. I couldn’t figure out who.

“Hey, what are your feelings for that man?” A guy had grabbed the mike and pointed up to the screen where Roy had been. “Does he turn you on?”

“Vada Faith,” John Wasper called, “you do not have to answer any more questions.”

“Well,” the talk show host said, taking the mike back and heading over to John Wasper. “You must be Vada Faith’s husband.”

“Yes.” He stood, his face redder than I’d ever seen it. “I’m her husband.”

“How do you feel about all this?”

“Whew,” he said, “I don’t feel so good about it. It’s hard.” He put his hands in the pockets of his jeans. “I wish she still sold Mary Kay. She never got a pink car,” he shrugged, “but she was happy and it took up her time. Maybe that’s what she needs. She has too much free time. She could go back to Avon. She never won a cruise but she always smelled good.”

“Are you happy with the surrogacy agreement your wife has made. Her giving away her baby and all.”

“I wouldn’t keep a baby that belonged to that man. Even if it was part hers.” My husband looked at me with hurt and anger in his eyes. He hadn’t known about my own egg being used and I could see he was shocked.

I felt nauseous and thought I might throw up. I gripped the arms of the chair and prayed that the show would soon end.

“A baby she has with someone else,” he swallowed hard as though the words were stuck in his throat, “would never be her baby. I wouldn’t want it.” He said, defiantly, looking straight at me again, “If my wife is set on having a baby and giving it to those people, well, she can do just that. She’s a big girl. But, I don’t want the baby.”

“You’re very broad-minded. More than most men. We appreciate hearing your views,” she said. “Thank you.” She looked up at me. “Thank you, dear. Please come back and update us on this very interesting topic.” She turned to the audience. “It’s time to go to commercial. Stay tuned,” she smiled into the camera, “next a girl with a two headed kitten and a fitness guru from New York City who is going to help us all get healthy. So don’t go away.”

After the show, there was no sign of my family and I was relieved. My husband seemed supportive enough but I knew he was plenty angry and I had to figure out how to smooth things over with him.

As I pushed open the station door, I saw a group of women marching back and forth on the sidewalk. They carried signs and chanted, “Unite! Unite! Unite!”

“Vada Faith!” My old friend Midgy threw down her sign and hugged me. Her frizzy red hair bounced around her shoulders. “We’re so proud of you, honey, and what you’re doing.”

“Why, thank you.” I recognized some of our other customers among the women. Here they were marching on my behalf, when my own family had gone underground.

“We are behind you 100%,” she said. She turned to the group and shouted, “We must unite. Girls! Who do our bodies belong to?”

“To us!” they cried.

“If we wish to house babies for other women?”

“We will house babies for other women!”

“Unite!” They chanted as my old friend picked up her sign and joined them.

I hoped, as I drove away, she hadn’t let her cemetery project slide to take up my cause. However, it felt good to have someone behind me. I had my own voice. Those people out at the cemetery didn’t.

Besides, I wanted someone I loved to believe in what I was doing, not just friends. Secretly, though, I was having some doubts myself. I was furious at my news reporter friend, Barry. He’d made this whole interview sound appealing. He could find a new hairdresser. I was finished with him and his bald spot.

When I drove up in front of the shop, I noticed a group of men standing around. Thank goodness they weren’t chanting or carrying signs. I parked the car and walked toward them curious to see what they were doing. Suddenly the men burst into song. “Oh-when-the-Saints-go-marching-in! Oh-when-the-Saints-go-marching-in! Oh-Lord-I-want-to-be-in-that-number-when-the-Saints-go-marching-in!”

“Who,” a male voice rang out above the singing voices, “will be in that number? Who will be leading the Saints?”

“John Wasper!” The men cheered.

“Who will NOT be in that number?”

“Vada Faith!”

They cheered and clapped. Someone whistled.

I ignored them and slipped into the shop. I was finding that the more stuff I was able to ignore, the more room I had for the stuff that had to be dealt with.

My dear sweet mouthy sister was just putting an unhappy Alberta under the dryer as the temp she’d hired picked up her things and left. Alberta muttered to me, “That new girl had earrings in her eyebrows, dear.”

She cupped her mouth toward me. “Her tongue. Did you see that?”

“I saw that. I did indeed.” I frowned for her benefit. I didn’t care who pierced what as long as it wasn’t my body parts being pierced. Our business was going to hell in a hand basket. It was a good thing we were the only hairdressers in town.

“I can’t believe you brought mama and John Wasper to the television station,” I hissed at my sister on my way past her. “Now I have to work things out with him again. I shouldn’t even speak to you.” I sighed. I went into the lounge and put away the package I’d bought at the drugstore.

“I suppose I’ll have to talk to you though,” I said, leaning over to whisper in her ear as I went to my station.

“Don’t I feel privileged, Miss Television Star.” She was posting a paper on the bulletin board listing our monthly specials. I noticed as she tacked the paper up it was a cream color and very familiar.

“I didn’t bring them. They don’t need me to bring them anywhere. They know what’s going on. So,” she said, raising her eyebrows, “what has caused all this goodwill toward me?”

“Nothing you’ve done. You made a fool out of yourself in that red wig and that old lady dress. You had no business saying all that stuff.”

“I thought the red wig was clever. I’m taking up acting, like you, sister dear. It’s a free country. I’ll say what I want.”

“I’m ignoring that,” I snapped, but I was too nervous and needed her support too much to be mad at her for long. “Look,” I said, “Here’s the deal.” My stomach was doing flip flops. “I forgive you. Because number one, we both know you’re stupid, and can’t help yourself. Second, you will want to be in on what I am about to do. You know you always want in on my stuff.”

“I am not stupid. Speak for yourself.” She put her hands on her hips which meant I was pushing her a little too far. “I don’t want to be in on your stuff. I have my own stuff, thank you.” She dabbed at her face with a tissue. “It’s too hot in this shop to even think today. The repair man should have been here by now to work on the air conditioner.” She pushed her hair off her shoulders. “Besides what’s so great I’ll want to be in on it?”

“I’m not saying yet. I want the tension to build.” I went back and put a cape around Sally Hensen’s neck and started cutting her hair. I was trying to act glib. I was so shaky I could barely concentrate. Thankfully Sally wasn’t a talker and hair cutting came as natural to me as breathing. It took only a few minutes and she was gone.

There was only one customer left under the dryer when I went into the lounge and got the pregnancy kit. I took it into the bathroom. I wouldn’t call my sister in until the last minute. Until I knew for sure one way or the other. One part of me was saying, “Hurrah! I hope you’re pregnant. Here we come, house in Crystal Springs.”

The other part of me was saying, “You better pray hard girl you’re not pregnant. You don’t know what you’re getting into. Back up the truck. Hell-o. You don’t need a house out in Crystal Springs. You better hope this test is negative. If it is, honey, you’d better forget this whole mess. Forget you ever met those people. Listen to your husband for once in your life.”

As I sat in the bathroom awaiting my fate, it hit me like a ton of bricks. The girl in the audience reminded me of myself. She’d experienced the same feelings of abandonment I had as a kid. Would I be abandoning a child if I had it and gave it away?

“Your situation is way different,” the voice in my head reasoned, when tears formed in my eyes. “You are not giving up a child, honey. You are giving a child life. You are giving a couple a baby. That is not giving up your own child.”

I had to keep repeating that line to myself. “You are not giving away your own child. You would never do that. Just because your mother left you and you felt abandoned, it doesn’t mean this is what you are doing. You’d never hurt a child the way you were hurt. No, this is way different.”

I wasn’t convinced.

I had to pee again and raised the toilet seat. “Yes, this is way different,” I whispered to the pink flowered walls of the bathroom, trying to convince myself. “Way different.”

Proof of my pregnancy stared up at me in blue. Sky blue. One of my favorite colors. This was no coincidence. I was destined to have a child for this couple.

I pushed all negative thoughts away and tried to cheer up before calling Joy Ruth in to see the results.

Of course the first thing she did was have a conniption fit inside the tiny bathroom waving her arms in front of my face. “I asked you,” she said, between clenched teeth and in a low whisper so our last patron wouldn’t hear, “no, I begged you not to do this. There it is. Done. A done deal.” She shook her head at the bit of blue. She was pale as could be. “So now you can go into this pregnancy happy as a lark. Give birth to a little baby, your own flesh and blood,” she breathed deeply, “and then give it away. Just like it’s normal.”

“Get off your high horse,” I said, trying to act calm when my insides were shaking, “have a baby of your own and then you can make decisions about it.”

“I wouldn’t give it away that’s for sure. You’re mad. You act like you are about to take a walk in the park instead of give away your baby.” She squinted at me. The lighting in the tiny bathroom wasn’t very good. “Besides, you know I am not ready for motherhood or marriage.” She raised her voice. “Please don’t do me any more favors by fixing me up with any of your husband’s friends or his relatives. You have that look in your eye.”