“Who cares? Look at it as a gift.” He looked soberly at his wife. “Mel, I deal with death every day of the week. I fight it, I hate it, I try to outsmart it by putting plastic hearts in people's chests, pig's valves, and valves from sheep, I do transplants, I do anything I can to cheat that old boy Death always watching over me. And here you are, with a precious gift of life, given to us gratuitously. It would be criminal not to appreciate that.”

She nodded quietly, touched by what he had said. What right did she have to question such a gift? “What'll we tell the kids?”

“That we're having a baby, and we're thrilled. Hell, I thought you were sick.”

“So did I.” She smiled, feeling better again now that the champagne was far from her lips. “I'm glad I'm not.”

“Not half as glad as I am, Mel. I couldn't live without you.”

“Well, you won't even have to try.” And with that, Matthew came and pounded on the door to announce that it was dinnertime and before they went into the dining room to eat, Peter called them all into the living room and made a little speech.

“We have something exciting to tell you all.” Peter beamed and looked at Mel.

“We're going to Disneyland next week!” Matt filled in and everyone laughed and began to offer their best guess. Mark thought they were building a tennis court, Pam thought they were buying a yacht, the twins decided on a Rolls-Royce, and a trip to Honolulu, an idea of which everyone approved, and each time Peter shook his head.

“Nope. Not quite. Although Honolulu does sound nice. Maybe at Easter time. But we have something much more important to tell you than that.”

“Come on, Dad, what is it?” Matthew was dying to know, and Peter looked straight at him.

“We're having a baby, Matt.” And then he looked at them all, and Mel watched their faces too, but they were no more prepared for the reactions they got from the kids than they had been for the test results from Sam Jones.

“You're what?” Pam leapt to her feet, clearly horrified, and she stared at Mel in disbelief. “That's the most disgusting thing I've ever heard.” And with that she burst into tears and fled to her room, as Matthew looked at them with trembling lips.

“We don't need another kid around here. We've already got five.”

“But it might make a nice friend for you, Matt.” Peter looked at him as tears filled the child's eyes. “The others are so much older than you are.”

“I like it like that.” He followed his sister to his room, and Mel turned to her own children, to see Val dissolve in tears.

“Don't expect me to be pleased for you, Mom.” She stood up and her copious bosom heaved. “I just killed my baby two months ago, and now I suppose you expect me to be pleased about yours?” She ran from the room in tears, and Mark shrugged, but he didn't seem to think it was much of an idea either, and Jessica simply stared at them, looking stricken. It was as though she knew how much they already had on their backs, and couldn't understand how they could even consider taking on more. And the worst of it was that Mel thought she was right. She went upstairs with the excuse of checking on her twin and Mark disappeared too, and they sat alone in the living room, as Mel wiped tears from her own eyes.

“Well, so much for that.”

“They'll come around.” He put an arm around his wife, and looked up to see Hilda Hahn staring at them.

“The dinner is getting cold.” She looked fierce, and Mel stood up, obviously depressed. The children were all in an uproar at the prospect of another child, and she was still having problems at work. Somehow it all seemed like more than she could cope with right now, and they went in to dinner, as Mel felt her heart drag. And she looked up to see Mrs. Hahn staring at her.

“I couldn't help overhearing the news.” Her heavy German accent always grated on Mel's nerves, there was nothing warm or kindly about the way she spoke, unlike the other German women Mel had known. And she stared at Mel again now. “Isn't it dangerous to have a baby at your age?”

“Not at all”—Mel smiled sweetly—“I'm only fifty-two.” Knowing full well that Mrs. Hahn was fifty-one. And Peter smiled at her. Anything that Mel did now was okay with him. And he didn't give a damn how their kids behaved, he was thrilled and he wanted Mel to know it. But she couldn't eat dinner, all she could think of were the children and their reactions. She went up to see them, but all doors were closed and nowhere did she get a warm reception. When she came downstairs to their bedroom, Peter insisted that she lie down and she laughed at him. “I'm only about four or five weeks pregnant, for chrissake.”

“Never mind. You might as well start out right.”

“I think we did that in the living room about two hours ago.” She sighed as she lay on their bed. “That was some reception we got, wasn't it?” Their reactions had cut her to the quick, and left her feeling unprotected and unwanted and alone.

“Give them a chance. The only ones who really have grounds to be upset are Val and Matt, and I'm sure they'll both survive the shock.”

“Poor Matt.” Mel smiled thinking of him. “H e wants to be our baby, and I don't blame him a bit.”

“Maybe it'll be a girl.” Peter looked thrilled and Mel groaned.

“Not another one. We already have three.” She was already adjusting to the idea and the miracle of it seemed remarkable to her. They talked about it that night for hours, and he kissed her tenderly the next morning before he left. But when she went down to breakfast and saw Matt and Pam and the twins, she felt as though she had ventured into the enemy camp. She looked around at them and felt despair wash over her. They would never adjust.

“I'm sorry you all feel this way.” Val wouldn't look her in the face, and Jess looked intensely depressed, Matthew wouldn't touch anything on his plate, and when Mel looked into Pam's eyes she was terrified by what she saw there, it was hatred and fury mixed with terror. It was as though she had run away to a distant place in her head where Mel could no longer reach her.

Of all of them, Pam was by far the most upset. And Mel tried to talk to her about it that day when she came home from school, but when Mel went up to her room, she slammed the door in Mel's face, and locked the door. And even when Mel pounded on it, she wouldn't open it again.

Theirs became a house filled with grief, and hurt and anger. It was as though they each wanted to punish her, each in their own way, Mark by never being home, to his father's despair, the twins by keeping away from her and shutting her out, Matt by whining all the time and having trouble in school, and Pam by turning off and skipping school. They called Mel four times in as many weeks that Pam had disappeared before her second class, and when she questioned the child about it, she shrugged and went upstairs and locked her door. And her final act of viciousness was to hang her mother's portrait boldly over the bed in Mel and Peter's room. When Mel came home one day and saw it there, she gasped and stared.

“Did you see her do this?” she asked Mrs. Hahn, as she held the portrait of Anne in trembling hands.

“I see nothing, Mrs. Hallam.” But Mel knew that she had. And when they called Mel from Pam's school again to tell her that she had cut class again, she decided to stay home that day and wait for her to turn up. But by four o'clock she still had not. And this time Mel began to wonder if there was a boy involved. At five o'clock, she sauntered in with a grin on her face, amused that Mel had waited for her all day long, and when Mel took a good look at her, she could see that the girl was stoned. She sent her to her room after confronting her, then left for the newsroom. Later, she told Peter what she thought.

“I really doubt that, Mel. She's never done that before.”

“Take my word for it.” But he shook his head. He didn't believe his wife, and when he questioned Pam, she denied everything Mel said. Pam was beginning to cause a serious rift between them, and Mel felt she was losing her only ally now. Peter always took Pam's side against her. Her home was filled with enemies, and it wasn't even her home, and now Peter was on his daughter's side. “Peter, I know that she was stoned.”

“I just don't think she was.”

“I think you should talk to her school.” And when Mel attempted to discuss it with Val and Jess, they were distant but polite. They didn't want to get involved, nor did Mark. Mel was a pariah now, to all of them, because of the unborn child she was carrying. She had betrayed them.

And two weeks later when the L.A.P.D. called, it was an empty victory. She had been right. Pam had been caught buying a lid of grass from some kids downtown when she should have been in school. Peter went right through the roof and threatened to send her to boarding school, but again the child turned on Mel. “You turned him against me. You want me sent away.”

“I want no such thing. But I want you to behave, and I think it's about time you did, time you stopped cutting school every other day, and smoking grass, and behaving like a little beast around this house. This is your home and we love you, but you can't behave any way you want. In every society, in every community, in every home, there are rules.”

But as usual, Peter let Pam off the hook, put her on restriction for a week and let it go at that. He didn't back the position Mel took and two weeks later, Pam was picked up again. This time she got even more attention than before, and Peter called up her old shrink. A series of appointments were set up and he asked Mel if she could get Pam there. And the result of that was that Mel had to almost drag her there four times a week, break her neck to get to work, and run home again at night, trying to pay some attention to Matt and the twins. And all she wanted to do was sleep, between throwing up the heavy meals persistently prepared by Mrs. Hahn.

“This is what the doctor likes,” she'd say as she put another plate of sauerkraut in front of Mel, and finally after a month of it, she wound up in the hospital one Friday night with bleeding and cramps, and her obstetrician looked at her soberly.

“If you don't slow down, you're going to lose the baby, Mel.”

Tears filled her eyes. Everything was a fight these days. “I don't think anyone would give a damn.”

“Would you?”

She nodded her head, tired, sad. “Yeah. I'm beginning to think I would.”

“Then you better tell everyone around you to shape up.”

Peter came to see her the next day, and looked mournfully at her. “You don't really want the baby, do you, Mel?”

“Do you think I'm trying to get rid of it?”

“That's what Pam says. She says you went horseback riding last week.”

"What? Are you crazy? Do you think I'd do that?”

“I don't know. I know this interferes with your work, or you think it will.” She stared at him in disbelief, got out of bed, and packed her bags. “Where are you going?”

She turned to look at him. “Home. To kick your daughter's ass.”

“Mel, come on … please …” But she checked out of the hospital, and went home, climbed into bed, despite all of Peter's apologies, and that afternoon she went downstairs and ordered Mrs. Hahn to make chicken and rice that night, something she could eat for a change, and she literally lay in wait until all the children came home. By six o'clock they were all there, surprised to see her again. And when they came downstairs to eat, she was waiting at the table, with eyes of fire.

“Good evening, Pam.” She started with her. “How was your day?”

“Fine.” She attempted to look confident, but she kept glancing nervously at Mel. “I understand that you told your father I went horseback riding last week. Is that true?” There was dead silence in the room. “I repeat. Is that true?”

Her voice was low. “No.”

“I can't hear you, Pam.”

“No!” She shouted at Mel, and Peter reached for his wife's arm.

“Mel, please, don't upset yourself …”

Mel looked him right in the eye. “We need to clear the air. Did you hear what she said?”

“I did.”

Mel turned back to Pam. “Why did you tell your father a lie? Did you want to make trouble for us?” Pam shrugged. “Why, Pam?” She reached out and touched the girl's hand. “Because I'm having a baby? Is that so awful that you have to punish me? Well, I'll tell you something, no matter how many babies we have, we'll still love you.” She saw Pam's eyes fill with tears while Peter kept his grip on her arm. “But if you don't knock off the shit you've been pulling ever since I moved in, I'm going to kick your ass from here to the other side of town.” Pam smiled through her tears and looked at Mel.