“I'll hold him for you, Mom,” Lizzie volunteered and Maddy hated to give him up even for a minute. If she had ever wondered if it was the right thing, she knew for certain now that it was, and had been exactly what she needed and wanted.

“Where've you been?” the familiar voice asked. It was Bill, calling from Vermont. He had just come back from an afternoon of ice skating with his grandson. And he couldn't wait to tell her about it. “Where were you, Maddy?” he asked again, and she smiled as she answered.

“Picking up your godson,” she said proudly. Lizzie had just turned the Christmas tree lights on, and the apartment looked cozy and warm, although she was sorry not to be with Bill on Christmas. Especially now that Andy had joined them.

For a moment, he didn't understand what she meant, and then he realized, and smiled. He could hear in her voice how happy she was. “That's a pretty major Christmas present. How is he?” He could hear how she was.

“He's so beautiful, Bill.” And then she glanced at Lizzie and smiled at her as she held her new brother.

“Not as pretty as Lizzie was, but he's pretty cute. Wait till you see him.”

“Are you bringing him to Vermont?” But he knew it was a silly question as soon as he said it. She had no other alternative, and he wasn't a newborn. He was a healthy two-and-a-half-month-old. He would be ten weeks old on Christmas morning.

“If it's all right with you, I'd love to.”

“Bring him along. The kids will love him. And I guess he and I better get acquainted if I'm going to be his godfather.” He didn't say more to her, but he called her again that night and the next morning. She and Lizzie went to midnight mass, and took the baby with them, and he never woke up once. Maddy put him in the elegant blue carrying basket she had just bought him, and he looked like a little prince as he lay there in a brand-new blue hat and sweater, beneath an enormous cozy blue blanket with his teddy bear tucked in next to him.

And on Christmas morning, she and Lizzie opened all their gifts for each other. There were bags and gloves and books and sweaters and perfume. But the best gift of all was Andy, as he lay in his basket and looked at them. And when Maddy leaned over and kissed him, he beamed at her. It was a moment she knew she would never forget. A gift she would eternally be grateful for. And as she took him in her arms, she said a silent prayer of thanks to his mother for her incredible gift.





Chapter 24




ON THE DAY AFTER CHRISTMAS, Maddy and Lizzie set out for Vermont in a rented car, and the car looked like a gypsy van with all the equipment for the baby. He slept most of the way and Maddy and Lizzie talked and laughed. They stopped for a hamburger, and while they ate, Maddy gave Andy his bottle. She had never been as happy in her life, or as sure that she had done the right thing. It made her realize now what Jack had taken from her when he had forced her to have her tubes tied. He had taken a great many things from her, her confidence, her self-respect, her self-esteem, her trust, the power to make her own decisions and run her own life. It had been a poor exchange for the job and material things he gave her.

“What are you going to do about the offers you've had?” Lizzie asked with interest on the way to Bill's house in Sugarbush, and Maddy sighed.

“I don't know yet. I want to go back to work, but I want to enjoy you and Andy for a while. This is my first chance, and my last, to be a full-time mother. Once I go back to work, they'll crawl all over me again. I'm in no rush.” And she had some legal things to work out. Her lawyer was organizing a major lawsuit against Jack and his network. He owed her a huge severance for kicking her out of her job, and there was the issue of slander, malicious intent, and a number of other things the lawyer wanted to incorporate in the lawsuit. But mostly, she wanted to stay home for a while and enjoy Lizzie and the baby. Lizzie was starting Georgetown in two weeks, and she was wildly excited about it.

They reached Sugarbush at six o'clock that night, just in time to meet all of Bill's children, and join them for dinner. And his grandchildren went crazy over the baby. He laughed and smiled at them, and the youngest one, who was two and half, played patty-cake with him, and he loved it.

Lizzie took him from her mother after they all ate, and said she'd put him to bed for her. And after Maddy helped Bill's daughter and daughters-in-law clean up the kitchen and put the dishes away, she settled down with him in front of the fire, and they talked for a while. And when everyone went upstairs, he suggested they go for a walk. It was freezing, but the stars were bright, and the snow crunched beneath their feet as they walked down the path his son had shoveled. It was a large, comfortable old house, and it was obvious that they all loved it. They were a nice family, and they enjoyed spending time together. And none of them seemed shocked by his relationship with Maddy. They had made a point of welcoming her, and they were even nice to Lizzie and the baby.

“You have a wonderful family,” she complimented him, as they walked hand in hand, with their gloves on. Everyone's skis were lined up outside, and she was looking forward to skiing with him the next day, if they could find someone to stay with the baby. It was a new aspect to her life, and she knew it would seem strange for a while, but she loved everything about it.

“Thank you,” he smiled at Maddy, and then put an arm around her in her heavy coat. “He's a sweet baby,” he said with a smile. And he could see easily how much she already loved him. It would have been wrong if she could never have experienced that. And she was able to give him a life he would never have had, even with his natural mother. God had known what he was doing in the rubble of the mall that night when he had put the three of them together. And who was he, Bill realized, to take that from her? “I've been thinking a lot,” he said after a while, as they started to turn back toward the house, and he saw that she looked terrified when she looked at him. She thought she knew what was coming.

“I'm not sure I want to hear about it.” Her old terrors shone in her eyes, as she looked away from him so he couldn't see the tears that were forming.

“Why not?” he asked gently, turning her around to face him as they stopped on the snow-covered track. “I figured some things out. I thought you might want to hear them.”

“About us?” she asked in a choked voice, afraid that so soon after it started, it was already ending. It didn't seem fair, but nothing in her life had been so far, except what she had now. Bill and Lizzie and Andy. They were all that mattered to her. Her life with Jack seemed like a bad dream.

“Don't be afraid, Maddy,” Bill said softly. He could feel her trembling as he held her.

“I am. I don't want to lose you.”

“There are no guarantees against that,” he said honestly. “You've got a lot more road ahead of you than I do. But I think I've figured out at this point in my life that it's not about when you get there, or how fast, it's about the journey. As long as you travel the road together and do it well, maybe that's all you can ask. None of us is ever sure of what's around the corner.” He had learned that lesson the hard way, but so had Maddy “It's kind of a trust walk.” She still wasn't sure what he was saying to her. But he wanted more than anything to reassure her. “I'm not going to leave you, Maddy. I'm not going anywhere. And I don't ever want to hurt you.” But they would from time to time, as long as there was no malice in it. They both understood that.

“I don't want to hurt you either,” she said softly, clinging to him for dear life, but slightly reassured by what he was saying to her. She could sense that she had nothing to fear from him. This was a new life, a new day, a new dream they had found together, and carefully nurtured.

“What I'm trying to say to you,” he said, as he looked down at her with a smile in the cold night air, “is that I've figured out that it might do me good to play baseball in my seventies. If all else fails, Andy can throw the ball at me in my wheelchair.”

She looked at him with a funny smile, “I hardly think you'll be in a wheelchair by then,” but she could see now that he was laughing.

“Who knows? You might wear me out. You've already tried. God knows, explosions in malls, babies, crazy ex-husbands … you certainly keep my life exciting. But I don't just want to be his godfather. He deserves more than that. We all do.”

“You want to be his Little League coach?” she teased him. She felt as though her ship had just come in, and it was one she'd waited for for a long time, all her life in fact. But she knew that with Bill, she was finally safe and in good hands.

“I want to be your husband, that's what I'm trying to say to you. What do you think, Maddy?”

“What will your kids say?” She was worried about that, but they had been incredibly nice to her so far.

“They'll probably say I'm crazy, and they'll be right. But I think it's the right thing to do, for both of us … all of us…. I've known it for a long time. I just wasn't sure what you were going to do, or how long it would take you.”

“It took me too long,” she said. She was sorry about it now, but she also knew that she couldn't have done it any faster.

“I told you, Maddy, it's not about how fast you get there. It's about the journey. So what do you think?”

“I think I'm very lucky,” she whispered.

“So am I,” he said, as he put an arm around her shoulders and walked her back to the house, as Lizzie held the baby in her arms and watched them from an upstairs window. And as though Maddy sensed it, she looked up at her and smiled and waved, as Bill led her into the house, stopped her in the doorway, and kissed her. For them, it was not about a beginning or an end. It was about a life they shared, and the joy of knowing that the journey would continue for a long time to come.