And never stops at all.

Our new hope perched precariously on my shoulder-or maybe in my belly. But I still sensed that, like d.i.c.kinson's metaphoric bird, it could fly away at any moment.

Part Three

2011

Twenty-one

After the initial euphoria pa.s.sed, unreality set in.

Pregnancy is always a long road, and since we'd frozen the embryos almost a year earlier, this one had already been longer than most.

Warren and I still had no idea how to feel about our new situation. Handling grief had been hard enough; trying to handle grief with this overlay of rejoicing seemed almost impossible. As usual, we took our emotional mayhem out on each other. Our fights intensified. Now the future wasn't just an empty void, it was filled with haze and uncertainty. Could we really be parents again?

Dr. O'Brien tried every technique he knew to convince us that we had been good parents-and could be again. Warren seemed to accept that. While I theoretically understood the premise, I couldn't accept the idea in my heart. I hadn't protected Emma, Alyson, and Katie, so how could I dream of being responsible for another life?

Good mothers don't let three children die.

My life and expectations had spun so completely out of control that I couldn't really believe that I would have another child. I had been cautious during my first three pregnancies, making sure that everything proceeded as expected, but now I expected only disaster. Every time I went for a sonogram or check-up with my obstetrician, I antic.i.p.ated bad news.

"A nice strong heartbeat and everything looks fine," the doctor said at one visit early on, looking at the sonogram on the screen.

I turned in great surprise to the image. "Really? The baby is still alive?"

"Yes, of course," she said with a smile.

Of course? I had a.s.sumed the opposite. Since the accident, I had come to believe that anything good I got in life would be s.n.a.t.c.hed away. Surely the pregnancy was just another form of divine taunting.

Early in my second trimester, my anxiety and confusion seemed to deepen. Though on one level I wanted a baby, on another, I couldn't bear the thought of being disloyal to my three girls by loving someone other than them. Warren no doubt had his own fears, but he refused to discuss them. And he didn't want to hear the details of my jittery dread, which I insisted on sharing with him morning and night. He shut me out, not wanting to be made more miserable by my endless angst.

"You're so mean!" I yelled at him one Friday night. "How can you sit there and watch TV when I'm in such pain?"

He had walked away from me in the middle of a sentence, unwilling to listen to me wonder whether we had the right to bring a new baby into our unhappy house. Emma, Alyson, and Katie had been so joyous, but now Warren and I were always so sad. A black cloud hung over us, and I shuddered to think of exposing an innocent baby to our misery.

"I can't hear this anymore," Warren called out, not moving from in front of the TV.

"You have to!" I shouted.

Our argument intensified that night and only got worse the next day. We spent all weekend in pitched battle. We screamed and cried, and our stress rose to levels that we knew couldn't be good for any of us.

"We're acting terribly," Warren said disgustedly at the end of the weekend. "We don't deserve this baby."

The fighting had left me ragged. I didn't eat or drink-all I could do was cry. I wasn't trying to undermine the pregnancy, but I just couldn't pay much attention to it, either.

"You have to take care of yourself," Warren said angrily as he left for work on Monday. "We weren't responsible for the accident or what happened to Emma, Aly, and Katie. But if this baby isn't born, we are responsible."

"I'm not doing anything bad," I said halfheartedly.

"If something goes wrong, I won't be able to live with myself," Warren said as he slammed the door and left.

I tried to take a few sips of water, but nausea overwhelmed me. I'd never had morning sickness, so the nausea had a more emotional source. For nearly two years, I'd thought of the future only as a date for when my life would end. Now the future loomed large and real and frightening. Warren's words resounded in my head.

If this baby isn't born ... we are responsible ... won't be able to live with myself ...

I remembered all the care I'd taken in previous pregnancies and thought about how carelessly I was behaving now. I started to panic that after the weekend we'd just been through, something horrible must have happened to the baby.

I called Laura. "The baby is dead," I told her tonelessly. "I know it. Can you take me to the ER?"

Laura didn't ask a lot of questions. She raced over and bundled me into her car. We drove to North Sh.o.r.e Hospital, and the next thing I knew I was stumbling to the front desk and beginning to cry.

"I need a sonogram immediately because my baby is dead," I said to the nurse in the emergency room.

Or at least that's what I thought I said. I intended to sound polite and rational, but apparently, I began blathering and sobbing and making no sense at all.

"I've been crying all weekend and not eating or drinking and now I killed another baby and I'm completely devastated. Someone please help me, I need a sonogram."

The triage nurse looked at Laura, who filled her in on who I was in quick whispered sentences.

Soon I was sitting alone in a completely bare room. A nurse had taken away my jacket, purse, and cell phone, and I had nothing to do but sit and stare. Through a gla.s.s panel in the front, I could see that a man was stationed outside the room, keeping watch. It slowly dawned on me that this probably wasn't the place to get a sonogram.

Laura must have made some calls for help, because Isabelle, Jeannine, and Melissa showed up very quickly.

"We have to get you out of here," Melissa said, all business.

"Why? What's going on?" I asked.

"They're doing a psychiatric evaluation," Jeannine explained. "They're worried about suicide. They want to admit you to a psych ward."

I closed my eyes. This hospital didn't seem so bad. After the weekend I'd been through, maybe it would be fine to stay here for a while and rest.

"I just want some quiet," I said. "It's okay. I'll stay."

But my friends had other ideas.

"We'll get you out of here and take care of you," Jeannine said firmly. "Tell them you're fine and need to go home. You were worried about the baby and just wanted to check the heartbeat."

Two psychiatric residents appeared and asked to speak to me alone. Jeannine and Melissa looked worried as they left, and Isabelle squeezed my hand. But the medical residents were both nice women, and I was happy to talk to them. I didn't care if they made me stay. I didn't really want to go home.

But when they stepped out of the room, my friends called Dr. O'Brien. As soon as they could, they came back in and handed the phone to me.

"Snap out of it, Jackie," Dr. O'Brien said, without too many preliminaries. "Do whatever you need to get out of there."