Wendy Corsi Staub - Lily Dale: awakening

LILY DALE
AWAKENING

WENDY CORSI STAUB

Walker & Company
New York

Dedicated to my nieces and nephews, littlest to biggest:
Andrew Sypko, Dominick and Lil Ricky Corsi, Leo James and
Hannah Rae Koellner, Caroline and Elizabeth Staub

And to Brody, Morgan, and Mark, my boys.

Written in loving memory of my mom, Francella Corsi

The author is grateful to agents Laura Blake Peterson and Holly Frederick, as well as to Tracey Marchini, all at Curtis Brown, Ltd.; to Nancy Berland, Elizabeth Middaugh, and staff at Nancy Berland Public Relations; to Rick and Patty Donovan and Phil Pelleter at The Book Nook in Dunkirk, New York; to Emily Easton and Deb Shapiro at Walker & Company; to David Ginsberg of Turnpike Entertainment; to Mark and Morgan Staub for their literary expertise and creative feedback; and to Brody Staub for pure sunshine and hugs.

CONTENTS

Seventeen years ago

Breathe, Stephanie. And focus on the lilacs, like they taught you in class. Come on...

Theyre... not... freaking... lilacs... Jeff, Stephanie pants to her husband, straining forward with the exertion. Theyre... lilies.

Calla lilies, to be precise, but shes in too much pain to utter an extra word. And if she had enough energy to get one more out, it sure wouldnt be calla.

No, it wouldnt be pretty.

Are you sure? Jeff is asking above her.

If she had the strength, she would probably reach out and jab him. Hard. This whole baby thing is his fault. If it werent for him Stephanie, sweetheart, dont forget to breathe.

It takes a moment for Stephanie to recognize the new voice, coming from somewhere near the bed. Odelia Lauder isnt prone to quiet, soothing inflection.

Stephanies mother is more likely to jabber on and on in her usual excitable, opinionated way... unless shes giving a reading.

Shes always quiet and soothing toward the strangers who come to her door day after day.

Breathe, Stephanie. Breathe.

They dont always get alongall right, they rarely do but Stephanies glad shes here. Purely for her mothers sake, of course, she tells herselfOdelia would have been upset if she missed the chance to welcome her first grandchild.

But you need her here, too. Youre in pain and youre afraid and youve already gone through helland shes the only one who knows about that. Just her and

A tremendous contraction nearly tears her in two. Oh, God....

She might be twenty-three years old, but she desperately needs her mommy. Needs to see her. She strains to get a glimpse of the familiar face.

Mom! she exclaims as her mother comes into view at last.

For Gods sake, Mom, blue eye shadow?

Thats what she wants to say, but she doesnt. Mostly because she cant.

All she can manage is, When? before shes forced to break off, unable to push another word past the pain.

I caught the first flight out of Buffalo this morning, and I had to change planes in Charlotte, and...

Mom rambles on about her spur-of-the-moment trip to Florida, oblivious to the fact that another brutal contraction is sweeping in, until Stephanie screams in agony.

Then she says, again, calmly, Breathe, Stephanie.

Dammit! Im... breathing... , she bites out as the midwife bustles at the foot of the bed.

Not the right way, Jeff reminds her. He gives an example of the rhythmic panting they learned in a childbirth prep class a few months ago.

So now she cant even breathe right?

Well, theyre the wrong damned lilies. So there!

Shed say that aloud, but her abdomen is currently being crushed in an invisible vise.

They were supposed to be lilies of the valley, dammit!

She craves the delicate white blooms that grow wild in the woods near Lily Dale every spring; never tires of their heady scent. They have special meaning for her.

But nobody here, not even Mom, knows about that.

Anyway, a vase filled with lilies of the valley was supposed to be her focal point for labor, a technique suggested by the woman who taught the childbirth class at the hospital.

That was back when Jeff was still trying to convince her that a home birth attended by a midwife was dangerous. He couldnt understand why she was so reluctant to go to a hospital... and she couldnt tell him the truth.

The hospital might require too much information about her... past.

When Odelia visited from western New York, she took it upon herself to find a midwife and bring her over to meet Stephanie, all in the space of a day. Ordinarily, Stephanie would have resented her mothers meddling. This time, she welcomed it.

Jeff was effectively overruled. It would be a home birth.

Still, Stephanie agreed that some of what they learned in the hospital class was useful.

Like the breathing.

And using a visual focal point.

But instead of her chosen lilies of the valley, the bedside table holds a stupid water glass filled with stupid supermarket-bought calla lilies. They were the best Jeff was able to do on short notice.

Theyre white lilies, he said cluelessly when she told him they were all wrong. You said white lilies.

She probably shouldnt have cursed him out, regardless of her excruciating pain. He was only trying to help, almost as nervous about becoming a father as she is about giving birtheven though she at least knows intuitively that everything will be all right.

She and the baby will both survive, and the baby will be a girl, regardless of the so-called penis the doctor saw on the ultrasound screen back in December.

Stephanie is no doctor, but that was no penis. It was the umbilical cord, or a shadow.

Her baby is a girl.

She knows that with absolute conviction, the way shes always known certain things.

Odelia doesnt realize her daughter shares that gift, though. And, of course, Jeff doesnt know about any of it. There are some factshugely important factshe doesnt know about her past. And he never will, as far as shes concerned. He would never understand any of it. Look at Stephanies father. He didnt get it... and he couldnt live with it... so he left.

If Jeff ever left...

Dont even think about that.

Shes loved him from the moment they met. Hes solid, stable, practical, reliableeverything shed hoped for in a husband. Everything she never had, growing up with an eccentric mother and an absent father.

So she cant share everything with him. So what?

Everyone has secrets. Some more profound than others.

Their babys gender has been an amusing secret for her to keep, considering how her husband has already bought a miniature Tampa Bay Buccaneers jersey for his son, whom he plans to call Robert.

They havent discussed girl names, and Robert is clearly out, so that little detail will have to be left until the last minute, which is a little frustrating.

Far more frustrating is the fact that Stephanie cant ever choose which information she receives.

It would have been most helpful if she knew that her water was going to break last night, a full month before her due date, in the middle of a crowded aisle at Publix.

She wasnt supposed to go into labor until mid-May. Which is why her mother was going to bring a bouquet of freshly picked lilies of the valley with her on the plane down from western New York.

But everything went wrong.

The baby is coming early, and the lilies of the valley arent yet in bloom back home, and God knows you cant find them anywhere in Tampa on a moments notice, even if you know what youre looking for, which Jeff apparently didnt, and Oh, no! Stephanie cries out as another wave of brutal pain radiates through her swollen body.