"Okay, Kate, a nice big one now ... steady ... there ... that's it ... a little more ... come on, girl, harder ... there ... okay. Rest for a minute now." For a moment Kate's face had been contorted with the effort, and the damp pallor gave way to a hot flush of bursting effort. She was breathless from the strain, and let her head fall back on the pillow, with a quick look at her friend.

"Oh Licia, I can't ... help me." Felicia looked frightened and helpless for a moment and a nurse came rapidly up to the head of the table where she stood.

"If you'd support her shoulders while she pushes, it would help a lot."

"Me?" It was the only word Felicia could think of, but Kate was looking like a tired child again-the joy and antic.i.p.ation had gone. She was exhausted. And then another pain roared through Kate, and everyone seemed to tense with antic.i.p.ation as the doctor did something between her legs.

"Licia ..." Without thinking, Felicia gently scooped Kate's shoulders into her arms, and held her as the laboring girl shook with the effort. She had never worked as hard at anything in her life. "I can't ... it won't ..."

"Harder, Kate! Come on, now!" The doctor sounded urgent and alarmed, the nurses seemed to be doing a lot of running and clattering, and Kate was starting to cry again.

"I can't ... I ..." Felicia felt sweat begin to run down her own face as she continued to support Kate's shoulders. Even that was almost too much effort, and she knew it was nothing compared to what Kate must be feeling. Why the h.e.l.l didn't they give her something to speed it up, or use forceps, or something dammit?

"Push harder!" The doctor sounded merciless, and Felicia hated him as she watched Kate's face contort with what she thought was pain. It was more work than pain, but Felicia couldn't know. And then suddenly the nurses were buzzing around them again.

"Come on, Kate. You can do it now. Just one more good hard push. That's it ... come on ... " There was no respite, and then suddenly Felicia realized the tension in the room had heightened. As she glanced at the doctor she saw a different look in his eyes, and one of the nurses was checking a monitoring system they had looped to Kate somewhere. And then Felicia heard it, softly, at the other end of the table. She prayed that Kate was too distracted to hear. "Fetal heart monitor, Doctor."

"Slowing?"

"Irregular."

He nodded in answer, and another pain ripped into Kate.

"Okay, Kate, this is it. I want one nice big push from you. Now!" But this time she only flinched at the command, and fought against Felicia's arms behind her. She let her head fall back, and an endless sob burst from her.

"Oh Licia ... Tom ... Tom! Oh Tom ... please ..."

"Kate. Please, baby. Please, for us. For Tom. Just one more try." Tears had begun to pour down Felicia's cheeks now and into her mask. She was blinded by them, as she held the frail shoulders in her trembling arms, and prayed that the ordeal would end. It had to. Kate couldn't take any more. Felicia knew that. But maybe for Tom ... "Please, baby, I know you can do it. Push as hard as you can." And then a riot of sounds, the clattering of instruments, a grunt from the doctor, a little cry from a nurse, sudden silence from Kate, and a long, cackling little wail.

"It's a boy!" The doctor slapped him firmly on the bottom and Kate lay back with tears streaming from her eyes and smiled up at her friend.

"We did it."

"You did it, champ!" Tears poured from Felicia's eyes too. "Oh and he's so beautiful." He was small and round and his face was an angry red as he wailed on, and then suddenly he stuck a tiny thumb in his mouth and the crying stopped as Kate laughed, watching her son. Felicia had never seen anything as beautiful as the way Kate looked. She couldn't stop crying, and Kate just grinned, silent and proud. And then without another word, they wrapped him carefully and handed him to his mother. The cord had been cut. He was free now. And he was hers.

Kate lay there with her son in her arms, tears still flowing from her eyes, and she looked up at Felicia again. And Felicia understood. She had seen it too. Tiny as he was, he looked just like Tom.

"What's his name?" The nurse who had been with Kate the longest came to look at the tiny pink face snuggled in his mother's arms. He was a big baby, just under nine pounds.

"His name's Tygue." And then in the lull of activity, as the doctor looked on and smiled, Kate laughed a long happy laugh. She sounded like a girl again, and she picked up her head and looked around the room. "Hey, everybody, I'm a mom!" They laughed with her, and Felicia couldn't stop laughing despite the tears still in her eyes.

CHAPTER 5.

"You're sure you'll be all right?"

Kate grinned across the room at her friend. "No, I'm going to panic and call the Red Cross before noon."

"Smarta.s.s." Felicia grinned, and sipped the last of her coffee. It was a peaceful Sunday morning, and Tygue was almost nine days old. Felicia had gone back to San Francisco and had returned to the country for the weekend. Now she watched as Kate nursed the baby. "Doesn't that hurt?"

Kate shook her head with a slow smile, and then looked down at her son, pink and white and s.h.i.+ny after his first week of life. "No, it doesn't hurt. It sounds corny, but it almost feels like this was what I was made for. And I didn't really think I'd like it."

"I never thought I would either. But you know, you're beginning to make me wonder about a lot of things. I always thought having a baby had to be the ultimate horror. Until Pipsqueak here came along." Felicia smiled at him again; she still hadn't gotten over the beauty of the experience. "I'm going to miss you two something awful."

"It'll do you good. I haven't been to Europe in so long, I forget what it looks like." Felicia was going over for a month, for the store.

"Want to come along on my next trip?"

"With Tygue?" Kate looked surprised, and Felicia smiled.

"Either way. It would be fun."

"Maybe so." But she looked away and her face was very closed.

"Kate, you're not really serious about staying down here, are you?" It was beginning to worry her.

"Very much so. I just signed another lease on the house."

"For how long?"

"Five years."

Felicia looked appalled. "Can you get out of it?"

"I have no idea, love. I'm not planning to. Licia, I know you don't understand it, but this is my home now. I don't think I'd ever have wanted to go back, no matter what. But with Tygue, I'm ready to start a new life. I'd have had to do it somewhere, and this is where I want to be. It's a good place for a child. He'll have a simple, healthy life. I can get up to see Tom. And in a town like this, Tygue never really needs to know what happened to Tom. Harper is a perfectly ordinary name. No one will ask questions. If we go back to San Francisco, one day-it'll all come out." She sighed deeply and looked Felicia square in the face. "I'd be crazy to go back." Just thinking of the reporters still made her cringe.

"All right. Then what about Los Angeles? Someplace civilized for G.o.d's sake." Kate grinned at Felicia's fervor, but she knew that she meant well. There was an even stronger bond between them now, ever since Tygue's birth. They had shared one of life's most precious moments.

"Why Los Angeles, Licia? I have nothing there. It's just a city. Look, love, I have no family, no place to be, nothing I have to do. I have a little boy who will thrive here, and it's a good place for me to write. I'm happy here."

"But you are planning to come up to the city from time to time, aren't you?" There was a long pause, and Felicia was finally seeing it all. "Aren't you?" Her voice was soft and sad. She was sad for Kate, who was gone for good. This was no place for her, but by the time she realized it, it would be too late. Maybe not until the boy was grown and gone. "You will come up to the city, won't you?" She was pressing the point, but Kate's face was set when she looked up from Tygue's sleeping face at her breast. She b.u.t.toned her blouse.

"We'll see, Licia. I don't know."

"But you don't plan to, is that it?" Dammit. How could she do that to herself?

"All right. I don't plan to. Does it make you feel better knowing that?"

"No, you a.s.s, it makes me feel like s.h.i.+t. Kate, you can't do that to yourself, shut away down here in the weeds and the fields. That's nuts. You're beautiful, you're young. Don't do this!"

"I have nothing back there, Licia. Not anymore. No family, no memories I want to keep, nothing. Except you, and I'll see you here, when you can get away."

"What about life and people? Theater, opera, ballet, modeling, parties? Jesus, Kate, look what you're throwing away!"

"I'm not throwing it away. I've walked out on it. It'll all be there if I ever change my mind."

"But you're twenty-three now. This is when you should be out there enjoying it all, taking advantage of everything life tosses at your feet."

Kate smiled at the words and looked down at her son again, and then with a purposeful look she brought her eyes back to Felicia's. There was nothing left to be said. Felicia had lost.

Felicia closed her eyes for a moment and then stood up. "I don't know what to say."

"Just tell me you'll come to see us when you have time, and that you'll have a good time in Europe." Kate wore a firm little smile that didn't invite argument or discussion.

"And what'll you do?"

"I am going to start work on a book."

"A book?" Christ, it was like adolescence. Kate was throwing her whole d.a.m.n life away, all because her husband had gone bananas and wound up in a sanitarium. But it wasn't her doing. Why did she have to bury herself alive because he was? The bracelets on Felicia's arm clanked as she nervously put her coffee cup in the sink. She wished she could talk sense into the girl, but she'd just have to give it another try when she got back from Europe. Something told her, though, that she would never win. Kate had changed a lot just in the few days since the baby was born. She seemed much surer of everything. And stubborn as h.e.l.l.

"Why does it surprise you so much that I want to write a book?"

"That just seems like such a funny thing to do. And awfully lonely, frankly."

"We'll see. And I've got Tygue to keep me company now."

"After a fas.h.i.+on." Felicia looked bleak. "What'll you do with him when you go to see Tom?"

"I don't know yet. One of the nurses at the hospital thought she might know of a reliable sitter, an older woman who is wonderful with babies. Or I might take him with me. But it's really too long a trip, and ... well, I'm not sure." Tom wouldn't understand. It would be better leaving him home with a sitter.

"The sitter sounds like a good idea."

"Yes, mother."

"Up yours, Mrs. Harper. You know, you're going to give me more gray hairs than the store does."

"On you, it'll look marvelous."

"Such remorse!" But Felicia was smiling again. "Just remember me in one of your books." Kate laughed at the thought, and put the baby in the elaborate blue and white basket Felicia had brought down. And in another month she would start to use the antique cradle his father had bought, but it was still a little too big. He would have been lost in it. Felicia walked over, and stood looking at him for a long time. "Is it neat, Kate?" There was infinite softness in her eyes.

"It's better than I ever dreamed it would be. It's perfect. Until the four A.M. feeding." She grinned at Felicia. "Then, I begin to wonder."

"Don't. Just enjoy it." Felicia couldn't shake off the mood of seriousness that had fallen over her. She felt as though she were saying good-bye to Kate for good. But Kate had already seen that in her face.

"Don't take it so hard, love."

"I still think you're a fool to stay down here. But I'll be down the first weekend after I get back. And whenever I can after that." But they both knew it wouldn't be every weekend anymore. They had their lives to get on with. Things wouldn't be the same. There were tears swamping Felicia's eyes as she picked up her bag, and Kate looked sobered as she opened the door. They walked slowly to Felicia's little red car, and then silently Kate hugged her tight.

"I'm sorry, Licia." There were tears in her eyes now too. "I just can't go back."

"I know. It's okay." She laughed through her tears and gave Kate another fierce squeeze. "Take good care of my G.o.dchild, kiddo."

"You take good care of you."

And with that, Felicia saluted, tossed her bag into the car, and slid behind the wheel with a smile. She stopped for a moment and looked at Kate. Both women smiled a long quiet smile full of love and understanding. Their s.h.i.+ps had set sail. And they waved to each other as Felicia faded from sight.

Kate looked at her watch as she walked back inside the house. She had another two and a half hours before Tygue woke up for his next feeding. That would give her plenty of time to work on the book. She had already written thirty pages, but she hadn't wanted to admit it to Felicia. The book was her secret. And one day-she smiled to herself at the thought-one day ... she already knew.

PART.

TWO.

CHAPTER 6.

"Kate? Kate!"

Kate jumped in surprise at the sound of her name, as she sat barefoot at her desk in an old s.h.i.+rt and a worn pair of jeans.

"Hey, lady, is your hearing going too?"

"Licia!" She was standing in the doorway, looking as trim and fas.h.i.+onable as ever in a wine-colored suede suit. "You didn't tell me you were coming down!"

"I wanted to take a look at the Santa Barbara store, so I thought I'd surprise you. That's some outfit. Things getting as bad as that?" Kate flushed in embarra.s.sment and zipped up her fly.

"Sorry. I was doing some work. I wasn't expecting guests."

"How's it coming?" Felicia hugged her and cast an eye at the typewriter.

"Okay, I guess. It's hard to tell." She shrugged and followed Felicia into the living room. She hadn't seen her since Christmas, two months before, when Felicia had spent a week with them, spoiling Tygue rotten.

"Don't be so hard on yourself. If you sold one, you can sell another one."

"Tell my publisher that, Licia."

"I'd be happy to. Care for a martini?" Kate grinned but shook her head. Felicia never changed. Her outfits followed the fas.h.i.+on of the moment, the men in her life came and went, and once every few years she rented a slightly larger, more expensive apartment, but essentially she hadn't changed in years. It was rea.s.suring. The martinis, the husky voice, the style, the loyalty, the solidity, the good legs, none of them changed a bit.