Lottery (9 page)

“You’re sick” Jenee said, half-laughing, half-crying.

“And that’s why you love me.” Brittany smiled, her brilliant white teeth set off by her flawless mahogany skin. She took out
two wine glasses. “Out with the old, on with the new. With your family’s history of cancer, you can’t risk it.”

“I know.” Jenee watched Brittany open a cupboard and take out two wine glasses. “How come you know where everything is? You have a camera watching me or something?” Jenee managed a giggle.

“I helped you unpack and put everything away when you bought this house, remember?”

“And why is it you keep reminding me?” Jenee teased, feeling better already.

“Terribly insecure. Need the kudos.”

“Right … right.” Brittany had enough confidence for both of them.

Brittany took the glasses to the table and sat down next to Jenee. She handed a goblet of wine to Jenee.

“It’s so weird.” Jenee looked up, her eyes stinging from crying. “I keep having this dream.”

“About?”

“A child who’s like two, maybe three. I can’t see his or her face.” She looked up. “The toddler has dark hair, but that’s all I’ve been able to see. I thought the dream was about a baby we had yet to have.” Jenee dabbed her eyes with a tissue.

“You’ve always been a bit—”

“Nutty. I know … I know.”

“No, that isn’t what I was going to say.” Brittany leaned back. “You always had these dreams in high school that were right on.”

Jenee waved a dismissing hand. “Well, obviously this one isn’t.”

“Who knows?”

“Hello?” Jenee stared at her friend. “I just told you my womanly organs are going to be ripped out.”

“What about adoption?” Brittany took a sip of wine.

“Sure.” Jenee smirked. “We could sell the house, plus Justin’s business, maybe Baileigh too, and then we might be able to afford to adopt a child.” She shook her head. “Adoption is for the rich.”

“You never know. Something might happen.”

Jenee managed a smile. “You have your two perfect little munchkins. Two little girls, Laura with your dark eyes, and Sophia with Chase’s blue.”

“That’s what you get when you mix black and white.” Brittany drew in a breath. “You know,” Brittany said, “the gang could do a fundraiser and help—”

“Buy us a baby?” Jenee rolled her round, blue eyes. “Not into charity. We have a beautiful daughter and I’m grateful. If this is God’s will that we have only one child, so be it.” She let out a sigh. “I don’t know how to tell Justin.”

“Um…” Brittany scooted her chair back and crossed one long leg over the other. “I hate to ask, but how soon do they want to operate?”

“Like yesterday.” Jenee pushed her hair out of her eyes. “Monday. Seven a.m.”

Brittany wrinkled up her nose. “What about softball?”

Jenee stared at her blankly.

“You forget we have two more games?” Brittany had that twinkle in her eye.

“You’re such a witch.”

“Sure. Sure.” Brittany nodded. “Let the team down because of a pair of ovaries. You’re so selfish.”

“If anyone on the team could hit a stupid ball besides me, it would be nice.”

Brittany reached out and took Jenee’s hand. “Just get it over.” Tears welled in the corners of her eyes. “I can’t imagine life without you.”

“Hey, baby,” Justin said when he walked through the back door. “How’d everything go today? I tried to call you, but no answer.”

Jenee had tried to cover the redness underneath her eyes with makeup. She walked to him and put her arms around his neck. She brushed his chestnut hair off his forehead. He looked exactly the way he had when they’d gotten married, maybe even more handsome; the large, puppy-dog hazel eyes, with dark stubble on his cheeks and chin that she loved to caress after they’d made love. Jenee was five-foot-four and petite, and Justin towered over her at his six-foot-three and a hundred and ninety-five pounds. “It’s just you and me tonight.” She turned, walked to the stove and took off the lid on the skillet. “Baileigh’s at Mom’s.”

“Special occasion?” he asked. “God, I didn’t forget your birthday or something, did I?”

“Nope.”

“Do I smell chops?” Justin asked on his way to the half-bath off the kitchen.

“You do.” She turned back around.

“Gotta wash the grease off my hands.” He nodded at the cupboard. “Brittany must have been here.”

“How’d you know?”

“Wine’s open.”

She laughed and checked the potatoes. Since Brittany had left, Jenee had rehearsed how she was going to tell him a thousand times.

“Tell me what the doc said,” Justin said during dinner.

She moved her food around her plate with a fork. “Nothing much.”

“What are they going to do about the tumors?”

She pushed her chair back, stood, and went to the refrigerator. “Made you cherry cobbler.”

“Jenee.” She heard the tingle of Justin’s knife when he set it down on his plate. “What’s going on?”

She turned around, her eyes filling with tears, her chin quivering. “Oh, God, Justin.”

He pushed his chair back abruptly and went to her, his face draining of color. “What is it, baby?”

“I … I have to have a … a hysterectomy,” she sobbed, not wanting to look at him.

“What?” Justin led her back to the table. “Why?”

“The tumors.” She slumped down in the chair. “They’re precancerous.”

He sat down next to her, laced his fingers together, and dangled them between his open thighs. “But it’s not cancer.”

She shook her head. “No, but I won’t be able to have any more children.”

“But you’ll be around to raise Baileigh.”

“I’m so sorry.” Jenee bit her lower lip, trying to contain more tears.

“What are you sorry about?” He stroked her curly blonde hair. “That I’m going to have my wife around for a long time?”

Jenee drew in a breath. She’d told herself she wouldn’t fall apart when she told Justin, and look at her, she was a mess. “We wanted more children.”

“I want my wife.” He kissed her cheek and turned her head toward him. “What the hell, Jen? Don’t you know how much I need you?”

“It doesn’t bother you? That we won’t be able to have any more kids?”

“It bothers me that you are going through this.”

She buried her head into his chest. “Maybe we could look into adoption.”

“We’ll see,” Justin whispered. “For now, let’s get this over so we can enjoy the next fifty or so years of our lives.”

How could Jenee explain to him that it felt as if a part of her had already been ripped out?

here was standing room only at Fang’s Restaurant in Chinatown where Caleb had made reservations. The Chinese lanterns, the large carved Buddha perched atop the Asian wine cabinet, and the blazes of fire that exploded from silver woks around the room provided a perfect Asian ambiance. Ling looked radiant in a light blue sundress and open-toed sandals, her hair pulled back and twisted into a thick chignon.

Caleb looked across the table at Ling’s father and then at Mei. “Thank you, Mr. and Mrs. Jameson, for bringing Ling into the world. I can’t imagine my life without her.”

“Call me Sam.” Ling’s father smiled at Caleb.

Caleb held up his glass. “Here’s to a very long and very happy marriage.”

“Here, here,” Samuel said, and the two couples touched their wine glasses together in the middle of the table.

Although he was only five-foot-six, what Sam Jameson lacked in height he made up for with his commanding presence. A man of few words, Sam’s deep love for Mei and Ling was
apparent. The receding hairline framed pensive hazel-green eyes, and the deep wrinkles in his forehead had been earned by building his dry-cleaning business for over forty years.

Mei was even shorter than Ling, who barely reached five-foot herself. With her kind, gentle spirit, Caleb wondered if Mei had ever been angry with anyone. The short, silver hair outlined a sweet round face; her half-moon shaped eyes all but disappeared when she smiled.

Caleb already admired Ling’s mother and father more than he did his own parents. After he’d won the lottery and sent a few thousand dollars to his parents, he’d received a thank-you note from his mother. His father had made a brief call and told Caleb how proud he was of him. Caleb refrained from telling his old man to go straight to hell.
Proud of him
? For winning the lottery? Screw him. Why hadn’t his father been proud when Caleb had landed the position as creative director for one of the top ten advertising agencies in the world?

“I’m hoping,” Ling said and glanced at Caleb, “that Caleb’s parents will come to California soon.”

She wasn’t going to give up on meeting his family. What Ling didn’t know is how much Caleb detested his parents.

“Oh, that would be so nice,” Mei responded. “I would like to meet your mother.”

Feeling uncomfortable, Caleb changed positions. “I’ll call them this week and see if we can line it up.” He glanced at Ling. “However, your daughter and I have somewhere we need to be before that.”

Ling turned toward him. “We do?”

“We do.” He took out two envelopes from the inside pocket of his sports jacket and set them in front of her. “We leave in a few days.”

Ling opened one of them and stared down at travel document for a few seconds, and looked back up with wide eyes. “Shanghai?”

“I have a meeting set up with The Children’s Welfare Institute.” Caleb watched Mei’s smile disappear. “I hope that’s okay,” Caleb said to Mei.

“Oh my, yes,” Mei said sweetly. “It’s just I have not been there for long time.”

“That’s where you’re from?” Caleb asked.

“Oh yes. Have uncle, aunt, many cousins in Shanghai,” Mei answered.

“Next time we’ll take you with us.” He wished the meeting with the druggie was over so he could just relax and enjoy the moment. Caleb had a plan—one he hoped McKenzie would accept.

“Caleb,” Ling said, interrupting his thoughts. “I can’t believe this is really happening.”

“I so happy you make our daughter happy,” Mei said, and then looked to her husband.

“You make us proud, son,” Samuel said.

Son
. What had Caleb done to deserve not only Ling, but parents who accepted him?

After dinner, Caleb walked Ling back to her apartment. He had forty-five minutes before he was supposed to meet McKenzie. He’d tried to mask his anxiety all night, but the meeting weighed heavily on his mind.

“You don’t want to spend the night?” Ling gazed into his eyes, tempting him.

He pecked the end of her nose. “It isn’t that I don’t want to, it’s that I have a million things to do before we leave for China.”

She stood on her tiptoes and kissed him. Caleb’s hands moved down to the small of her back and back up to her shoulders.

“Whew,” he said. “If I don’t go now,” Caleb took her hands in his and held them, “I’ll never go.”

“I need to get time off of work to go to Shanghai,” Ling told him.

“No, you need to quit.”

“But what about my clients?” Ling asked, her eyebrows knitting together.

“All the paperwork is in order. Now we need a full-time employee,” Caleb said caressing her cheek. “You need to get the adoption agency up and running.”

“You’re sure?” She gazed into his eyes. “That you want to go through with this?”

“One hundred percent.”