My husband's sister is a blossoming writer and is writing a novel. At the beginning of November, she entered a writing contest and posted an excerpt of her book on Facebook on a Fan Page she created for her pen name. I read the sample chapter and was shocked by her inclusion and description of a "grotesque" stillborn baby girl at 8 months. I couldn't help but wonder if she is missing her emotion chip? November is the month of my daughter's birth. I was 8 months pregnant when my daughter died. How could she overlook this detail or even consider including this in her text knowing what happened to us and that we are so close to our daughter's 3rd birthday? Please read the chapter and tell me if you think I am overreacting. She is very angry at us right now because my husband confronted her about this. And we had already decided not to attend all of the "expected" family gatherings over the coming weeks (we're going to Christmas, but not to every play and party on the family calendar). We want a quiet Christmas and expectations to be minimal. The recent posting of her book excerpt certainly does not make us want to spend more time together. We have a long history of difficulty in this relationship and have worked hard towards peace, but my husband felt he needed to say something about the novel. I bolded the paragraph referencing the stillbirth. Let me know what you think ...
Sample Chapter:
The day was warm and humid and a gentle breeze blew Stephanie’s hair into her face. Some stuck in her mouth when she smiled at her little brother, Kirk. ‘Little’ was a relative word. Technically the 28 year old man was her younger brother but he was anything but little. He was six foot two and was as thick as a football player. She watched as he stealthily pivoted around other players on the basketball court. He was taller than the other men and more agile even though most were younger.
The Clemet’s End Campground, a yearly retreat for the Radcliff family, boasted over 200 campsites and over 100 of those had electrical RV hookups. One area had a small stream flowing though it. It was lined by tents of all colors and fishermen, women and children. There was also a small lake, more of a pond to Stephanie, which had rental canoes and paddle boats. At night near the lodge a huge bonfire was lit. Families made s’mores and sang songs. After the little ones went to bed the older ones sat around drinking and laughing.
Frank and Laura Radcliff were creatures of habit. Every year since their marriage they came to Clemet’s End to get away from their routine normal life and have some routine fun. When Stephanie and Kirk entered their life they continued the pattern. It was close to many antique stores that Laura loved and Frank liked to sample all the Amish food. As the children grew they did not always come with their parents. Sometimes it was only one teenager or the other and when they were in college they rarely went anywhere with their parents.
Stephanie got married and that first year she brought her new husband, she had heard stories and because of her accident she did not remember, but it had been a disaster. After her accident, though, things had changed. Her parents had insisted that Kirk and Stephanie visit with them for a weekend if not the whole week. “Life is too precious to waste on strangers,” her mother would say. Her mother hovered over her constantly but Stephanie could not be too upset with the woman but she did get annoyed sometimes. She did not know how she would react if someone she loved, especially her husband Eddie, would nearly die.
Four years after the brutal car accident and years of physical therapy she was fine. She was back to normal. Sure, she had a scar that ran from her right eyebrow, behind her right ear and ended on the bottom left side of her head. She had contusions, swelling and surgery. Her broken leg was healed and it did not bother her when it rained or snowed. Her right ring finger was scarred but it wasn’t disfigured. She was totally fine and healthy.
Well, almost totally.
She was missing a few memories. The doctors could not tell the Radcliffs if it was from the head trauma or brain surgery. She had a gap in her life. Because of this memory loss, her mother treated her like an invalid or a mental case. She was fully capable of leading a normal life sometimes she just couldn’t remember.
Kirk slam dunked the ball again. Two of the other teens cursed. Kirk sheepishly waved at his sister. His light brown hair was matted wet with sweat and looked black. His chest and back glistened like he was oiled. Her brother was a handsome kid and she constantly wondered why he did not have a girlfriend. She then remembered his fickle personality, vanity and anger, much like a little boy’s, with tantrums. He was her brother and she loved him but he was still her pestering little know-it-all brother. At least he treated her the same way.
She wished she could forget the many practical jokes that Kirk had played on her but, no, she the memories of her childhood were intact. She remembered the time when she was ten and the whole family was staying at Clemet’s End. She went into the small tent that she shared with her brother. She heard buzzing and ran out screaming and stung. Somehow he had captured three bumblebees and trapped them. She remembered Kirk’s smirk when he tipped the canoe over in front of a boy she had a crush on. She was fourteen. She had been mortified.
She smiled at a fond memory of her father once left alone to cook while her mother went to some ladies’ craft night. She laughed.
Kirk rubbed his face on his gray shirt and jogged over to her. He picked her up rubbing his sweat all over her. “Hey, Stef!”
“Gross, get off me! You stink!” she crinkled up her nose at his stench. She assumed she would need a shower just as much as he did now.
He released her and they started back to their campsite. “What were you laughing about?” he said, his gray-green eyes sparkling with wanting to share the joke.
“Remember when mom left dad to cook dinner for us? He put the Jiffy popcorn in the microwave oven?” she laughed again as the fire, smoke and look on her father’s face replayed in her mind.
“Oh, yeah. That was classic dad. Mom will never let him live that one down,” he smiled.
“The smell was horrible. I think that was the reason they got a new pop-up camper,” she smiled. She remembered her mother dragging her by the hand through a store looking for a new microwave. Her mother was a fast paced walker normally but add anger to her gait and it was hard for a kid to keep up. Laura made sure her new microwave was the latest style.
“I think I’ll get Dad some Jiffy Pop for his birthday,” said Kirk with a grin. He grabbed his towel and a backpack. “I’m off to the showers. Want to do lunch when I get back?”
“Sure, as long as you don’t stink, that will be fine,” she said. He ran towards her and threatened to hug her but she shrieked and ran around behind the picnic table. He laughed and headed towards the showers at the lodge.
Stephanie grabbed her purse and sat at the picnic table. She pulled out a trashy novel and her cell phone. First she sent a text message to her husband telling him she missed his sweet face. Eddie, the love of her life, was a petite guy. He seemed scrawny next to Kirk. At only five foot eight Stephanie found him easy to kiss. He had soft thick black hair and dazzling blue eyes with lashes any woman would kill to have. His hands were the size of hers and his skin was pale. Even though he was dwarfed by Kirk he was not all bones. He was very lean and muscled and she loved the way his pants fit him.
She missed him. She wished he would have had some vacation time left. He would come join them on the weekend. She valued her time with him. She loved making memories with him. All her memories of him were after her accident there were none of him before it.
She sighed heavily. That morning at the hospital she woke up and her head pounded. The pain made her nauseas. Her mother sat in the corner looking pale and reading. A very good looking man sat next to her bed. He held her hand. He smiled at her and though he felt familiar to her she did not remember anything about him. Her mother introduced him as Eddie but nothing more. He was there daily smiling and making her blush. She did not know but at that time the doctors thought her memory would come back so they did not over load her mind. Eventually, she found out he was her husband.
They lived in a two bedroom condominium. It had a living room with vaulted ceilings and a stone fireplace with a rough hewn mantel. The smaller bedroom was an office that held a futon for guests. The larger bedroom had a king size bed. All the walls were white and nothing looked like it had a woman’s touch. She doubted very much that she had ever lived there.
She found out that they had just moved before she was hit and her car totaled. She spent a year rehabbing her leg and had some speech therapy. There were many tests trying to provoke her brain to reveal her past but it never did and she was left with a void, a six year void. She had memories through her sophomore year in college. A few of the fall season of the junior year then bits and pieces of pictures. Her mind was like the static on a TV until that morning in the hospital.
Six years of her life were gone. She did not remember graduating college, meeting and falling in love with or marrying Eddie, nor starting her career.
Her mother said she had a miscarriage about a year into her marriage. She was grateful she did not remember that. She was only three months but she knew it would have been upsetting. A year after the accident she had another miscarriage but this time she was eight months along. She delivered a still born girl that was grotesquely malformed. Eddie wouldn’t even let her look at the baby. He had said that she would not have survived outside of the womb if she had been alive.
So they were childless and married for eight years, four of which she did not remember. He was a good husband and her best friend. He worked long hours fixing computers for a corporate company. He went to all different locations rebuilding and rebooting. He made decent money allowing her to stay home and recover first from the accident then the miscarriage.
She was growing restless. It was time to go back into the world and find a career. Eddie thought this was a good idea mainly because he was going broke from her constantly redecorating the condo. She mentioned this two nights ago at the campground. Her mother had balked at the idea and given her the silent treatment the rest of the night but Stephanie did not even notice until Kirk had mumbled something about his selfish mother.
In the end her mother had said, “Whatever makes you happiest honey.” Kirk mumbled something else and her mother had thrown a dish towel at him and then chased him away with a wooden spoon. Frank and Stephanie had had howled in laugher at the site of giant fleeing from the mock wrath of his small mother.
Kirk reappeared clean and put his backpack in the tent. He hung his towel over the bench of the picnic table so it could dry in the sun.
They jumped in his white F-150 truck and headed to town. There was a small diner that her family liked to frequent when they visited Clemet’s End. It had great food and old time prices. Breakfast was available all day long. The waitress had on a pink polyester dress with a short skirt and her name, Diana, embroidered on it. Diana handed them menus and took their drink orders as they slid into the last open booth.
The diner was loud. There was a large group of people in the central part of the restaurant. A handful of boys had baseball uniforms on. Some were streaked with mud. They were getting sundaes after a game. Moms, dads, siblings and baseball players all talked excitedly to the people around them.
Kirk and Stephanie ordered and ate their food all the while watching the happy team. One little girl sat on the end and kept staring at Stephanie while spooning her melting ice cream into her greedy mouth. She was around three and had big green eyes. Her head had wispy light brown hair with big curls down to her shoulders. She was wearing pink, shirt, pants, socks, shoes and headband all pink.
Stephanie was just as fascinated with her as the girl seemed to be with her. A short woman saw she was staring and must have scolded her because the little one pouted and pointed to Stephanie. Stephanie picked up her dill pickle and it crunched between her teeth. She gave her full attention to her brother. He was looking at her oddly. “Since when do you like pickles?”
She blushed and batted her eyelashes with innocence. “I’ve always loved them. Where have you been?” She tried to hide her grimace at the sour taste.
He wadded up his napkin and threw it at her.
She gasped in mock horror, “I’m going to tell mom you hit my head with that!”
His eyes narrowed and he glared at her, “You wouldn’t dare.”
She threw the napkin back at him. It bounced off his nose and landed on his empty plate. He growled, “Why, I oughta-“
Diana appeared with a slip of paper in her hand. Kirk's glare melted into a smile sweeter than honey. She blushed and said, “Everything okay? I’ll get your bill.”
Stephanie said, “Yes, will you please get Bill? I think he might be able to protect me.”
The girl looked confused. “Diana,” Stephanie started to reason with her. Diana jumped back at the mention of her name, shocked and pale she stared with her mouth hanging open. Stephanie kept herself from rolling her eyes. She pointedly looked at the name on her dress and said, “It says Diana. Did you borrow it from her?”
Looking very relieved she said, “No, I thought you knew me. I forget my name is there.”
“No crap!” thought Stephanie with a smile. “About Bill? I need him to protect me from this worthless bum across from me.”
Diana appraised Kirk with her eyes. The young girl must have seen something in his ornery grin because she said, “He don’t look worthless.”
Kirk smiled, put his arms behind his head and leaned back against the booth in triumph. His face said, “Take that!” and “Ha ha!” at the same time as “You should have known better than to ask a female about me!”
“Sisters can say that. We know the truth about our little brothers,” she said to Diana. She smiled with she heard Kirk mumble “little” under this breath.
He turned his honeyed grin to Diana again and said, “Diana, the goddess of love, isn’t it?” The girl giggled.
“Oh brother,” said Stephanie and she quickly stood. “Give him the bill. Make sure you say something about his beautiful eyes and nice legs so you get a big tip.” She had the pleasure of seeing the 6’2” man blush. She walked quickly to the bathroom and washed her hands. She peered out the door. Her brother was at the register paying.
The little girl was watching her again. Without thinking Stephanie walked over to her and squatted so she was eye level with the girl. The girl grinned big. She wore hot fudge lipstick and had a brown soul patch on her chin. “Is that good?” Stephanie asked.
She nodded and said, “Uh, huh.”
The small end table had become silent as the two baseball players, numbers 21 and 14, watched the little girl and the stranger’s interactions. The girl offered Stephanie a bite of her melted treat. “Oh, thank you, sweetie, but my belly is full. I just had lunch.”
Her little face turned serious. “Do you live here now?”
“What a curious child,” thought Stephanie. “I don’t live in this town. I’m camping with my brother and my mom and dad up at the campground. Do you know the campground?”
Her eyes were big again. She nodded. A small hand gripped the girl’s shoulder. It belonged to a short mousey woman with wider hips than she had shoulders. She frowned at Stephanie. Stephanie swept her eyes to the man leaning over baseball player number 21. He was shocked and so was the boy. The other boy whose number was 14, across from 21, gaped at her. Stephanie froze then smiled at them.
Apparently, a stranger talking to a child in a public place was taboo. Normally she would have thought this was a good thing but the parents were present as were lots of people. This was rudeness plain and simple. So she was an outsider but that did not excuse her manners. She refused to be rude. She turned her attention to the little girl. “Now make sure you eat all your ice cream so you don’t have to eat your broccoli tonight,” she teased.
The girl pouted, “But I like broccoli.”
“You’re a good girl, aren’t you? Broccoli is one of my favorites too.”
The girl beamed. The mouse behind the girl pinched her face together in anger. Stephanie thought it was sad that this woman was the child’s mother. In just a few years the girl would be ruined. She looked again at the father. He met her eyes and his face softened. He looked like a bigger version, a Kirk sized version, of Eddie. He had a dark crop of hair and blue eyes that seemed to know what she was thinking because he smiled at her and a dimple appeared.
She missed her Eddie. It was sad when strangers and even her brother reminded her of her husband. She stood and said to the little girl and the others, “Have a good day.” Her brother was still at the register. It seemed that the elderly man in front of him had decided to pay with his saved up pocket change. She laughed and waited by the door.
The little girl stood in her seat and the mother said, “Sit down now, Haley!”
Kirk’s face went pale and he looked strangely at Stephanie. Maybe she embarrassed him. Her sight blurred with tears. Her daughter’s name had been Haley and she would have been about the same age as the little girl if she would have lived. Stephanie pushed blindly back against the door. She had to get out. She had to get away.
