For the first time in her life Annalee began a program of daily exercise, which did not include naked jumping-jacks for the doddering doctor. The exercise helped burn off the rancidity of confinement and answered some faint maternal intuition that she needed to be strong for this birth.
Annalee’s regimen occupied about two hours a day. The rest of her time she daydreamed, long spiraling reveries. A week later she felt the baby move inside her for the first time, and her entire attention began a slow pivot inward. Using the spoon that came with her meals, working in the few minutes available between eating and the retrieval of her tray, she scratched what she’d learned into the cinderblock walclass="underline" ‘Life goes on.’
When she returned to her dorm, she was welcomed as a heroine. Sister Bernadette was still eating through a straw, and it was rumored she was being transferred. Annalee didn’t particularly care about Sister Bernadette’s fate. She was worried about her own and her baby’s. The new Mother Superior – Sister Christine, who the girls said was ‘cool’ – told her that Sister Bernadette had decided not to press charges for assault.
‘Why not?’ Annalee demanded.
Surprised by Annalee’s aggressive tone, Sister Christine sat up straighter at her desk. ‘Perhaps Sister Bernadette found some compassion in her heart.’
‘Only if you could find some in a mustard seed. And if there is any, it’s not much.’
Sister Christine said softly, ‘It saddens me to hear you say that. I’ve given my life to Christ because I believe in His Divinity and His Wisdom. Central to both, in the heart’s quick, is the power of forgiveness.’
Annalee leaned forward, conscious of her swelling girth. Just as softly, she said, ‘Sister, I’ve devoted half my life to survival because I’ve found life mean. Forgiveness is a waste of spirit because there’s nothing to forgive. I believe in the wisdom of what is and the power of right now. I’m pregnant. I intend to keep the baby. It’s my life and the only real power I have is taking responsibility for it. If you deny me that power, we go to war, hopefully on front pages and the six o’clock news. “Pregnant Waif Sues Catholic Prison.” “Little girl orphaned by murder/suicide of parents prays every night in tears: Please God, don’t let them take my baby, she’s all I have left.” Forgive me, Sister, but that’s how it is.’
Sister Christine, eyes bright with tears, reached across the desk and gently squeezed Annalee’s shoulders. ‘Oh, I wish they were all like you. There are so many who must seek God; only a few whom God must find. I’ll do what I can, but beyond Greenfield my influence is minimal. And I do think you should consider adoption, because you have no way to support the baby once you leave here – assuming by some miracle you’re allowed to keep it here – no skills, no home, no family. If you think life is mean so far, try it with a kid. You’ll end up a thirty-year-old waitress with hemorrhoids and a third husband, so depressed that drugs don’t help, and a kid who hates your guts.’
‘How would you know?’ Annalee said sharply.
‘Because I’ve seen it so many times I can’t even feel the heartbreak any more – or not until I meet someone like you, so strong, so real.’
Annalee covered Sister Christine’s hands with her own. ‘I’ll make you a vow of my own: If you don’t break my ass, I won’t break your heart.’
At the beginning of her last trimester, Annalee radiated a powerful and vital tranquility. Her roommates held her in awe. Their attitudes and touches softened. They made sure she had extra pillows and any food she desired. They asked her excitedly what it felt like. Annalee told them it felt like she was becoming someone else, and that it was the most amazing thing she could imagine.
The birth was without complications. Nineteen hours later, after the nurse had brought Daniel for his third feeding, Annalee swung out of bed, dressed quickly, and left the hospital with Daniel bundled in her arms.
It was drizzling outside, cold but not quite freezing. Annalee turned left and started down the street, looking for keys in ignitions. The drizzle thickened. She pulled the blanket closer around the child. ‘Okay, kid,’ she said, ‘here we go.’
Letting the road rock the baby against her breast, Annalee sang along with Smiling Jack Ebbetts, the Singing Truck Driver, as they roared down I-80 West in the tuck-and-roll cab of his ’49 Kenworth. Annalee had stolen a car five blocks from the hospital, but, deciding it was too risky to stay with for long, had ditched it near the Interstate and put out her thumb. In less than a minute Smiling Jack pulled over, and they were fifty miles gone before the engine had cooled on the stolen Ford.
Smiling Jack Ebbetts didn’t haul freight. He made his living singing at truckstops and bars across the country, performing as it pleased him or finances required. He lived in the long-box trailer the Kenworth hauled. The trailer had a small kitchen, cozy living room, cramped shower and toilet, and two tiny bedrooms in the rear. The rig, Smiling Jack explained, represented a compromise between his homebody heart and his vagabond soul.
As good-humored as his name implied, Smiling Jack was in his late thirties. He had a faded IWW button on his Stetson’s band and a pair of rolling dice on his belt buckle. Annalee liked him immediately. When he asked what she was doing on the road with such a young baby – ‘looks like he’s barely dried off’ – Annalee told her story. He sounded two long blasts on the airhorn when she recounted breaking Sister Bernadette’s jaw.
‘Well all right!’ he crowed admiringly when she’d finished. ‘You got it straight as far as I’m concerned.’ He reached over and patted her shoulder. ‘You’ll do fine. You got heart, you got brains, and you got the spirit to keep ’em glued together.’ He turned his attention back to the road. ‘You got any idea where you and this newborn fellow here are going?’
‘California, I guess. I want to be warm.’
‘Got people there?’
‘No.’
‘Any money?’
‘No.’
‘I’m a mite depleted myself at the moment,’ Smiling Jack said, ‘but when we hit Lincoln I want to buy li’l Daniel here some duds for his birthday. Shirt and jeans and stuff. And some diapers.’
‘That’s kind,’ Annalee told him, ‘but please don’t spend what you can’t afford.’
Smiling Jack smiled. ‘If I don’t spend it, how do I know what I can afford?’
Smiling Jack taught her some of the songs in his bottomless repertoire, and they practiced them together as they crossed Wyoming, down through Evans and Salt Lake City. They worked out harmonies as the big diesel hauled them across the salt flats into Nevada, Daniel asleep between them on the seat, or nursing.
Annalee and Smiling Jack sang together three nights at a bar in Winnemucca, followed by a weekend gig at a small club in Reno. Smiling Jack gave Annalee forty percent of the take and paid all expenses. When they crossed Donner Pass and dropped into California, Annalee had a used bassinet, an old stroller with bad wheel bearings, and seventy-five dollars in the pocket of her Salvation Army jeans.
They stopped that afternoon east of Sacramento, Annalee washing diapers at the laundromat while Smiling Jack changed the oil in the truck. Back on the road, Smiling Jack said, ‘I was thinking back there, all scrunched up under the rig and watching oil drip in the pan, that I might have a proposition for you and the boy. You see, I got this half-ass ranch way the hell and gone out Spring Ridge, which is about a hundred and fifty crow-miles north of ’Frisco, couple of miles inland from the coast. My uncle won it in a card game back in the thirties – four deuces against aces full. Not the dead mortal nuts, but like Uncle Dave said, good enough to take it all. Uncle Dave willed it to me when he cashed out five years ago. It’s about two hundred acres, big ol’ redwood cabin, clean air, good spring water. Nearest neighbor is seven miles of dirt road, so it’s bound to cramp your social life, but it might be just the place to hunker down a spell till the wind drops, if you know what I mean. I can’t stand the ranch because it’s always in the same place and the taxes come right out my tank, so if you’re interested, I’m in the mood to deal. Rent would be taxes and caretaking; stay as long as you want. The taxes are $297 a year, and they’re already paid till next January. If you want to give it a shot, country life is great for kids. And if you’re still there next time I come through, I might have a job that’ll make you a little money. Till then, you’d be on your own. What do you say?’