Gold Hill by Claudia Hall Christian Page A

shoulder. He looked at
Valerie, “Are we ready?”
    “ Ready,” Valerie said. She
stood from the couch and picked up the car seat.
    “ But the
tunnels . . . ” Mike said.
    “ We’ll do it together,”
Perses said. “Take the baby from your Valerie.”
    Perses gave Mike a little
shove on the shoulder. Mike took the car seat from Valerie. Perses
herded them out of the living room.
    “ I wouldn’t allow your
mother to drive in a car with you when you were a baby,” Perses
laughed. “Too dangerous.”
    They made it to the tunnel
door and Delphie punched in her code. She held the door for
everyone and followed them into the tunnels.
    “ Oh, your mother was mad,”
Perses laughed. He imitated her accent, “You t’ink you can control
every leettle t’ing!”
    “’ e steell does,” Mike’s
mother, Anjelika, mocked Perses from the bottom of the stairs. She
hugged Mike and said hello to Jackie. She hugged Valerie and asked,
“How are you feeling?”
    “ A little tired, but
good,” Valerie said. “She’s a really good baby.”
    They began walking along
the tunnels.
    “ Do you mind if we join
you?” Anjelika smiled.
    “ I don’t know how you’ll
fit in the car,” Valerie said.
    “ Perses brought one of
those big government cars,” Anjelika said. “But we don’t have to
go. I just thought . . . ”
    She nodded her head to
where Mike and Perses were walking ahead of them. Perses had his
arm around Mike and the men were talking.
    “ Mike’s been crazy since
Jackie was born,” Valerie said in a low voice.
    “ I’m not surprised,”
Anjelika said. “His father went completely nuts when the kids were
born.”
    “ But why?” Valerie
said.
    “ Because he knows what’s
out in the world,” Delphie said, as if it was obvious.
    “ I think it’s harder for
men like my husband and my son,” Anjelika smiled. “They’ve seen the
worst the world has to offer.”
    “ Was Dad like this?”
Valerie asked.
    “ Was? He’s waiting for us
at the garage,” Delphie laughed. “Wanted to make sure the doctor
didn’t screw anything up.”
    Anjelika
laughed.
    “ You should have seen him
when you were born,” Delphie chuckled. “It was mayhem.”
    “ Crazy men,” Valerie
said.
    “ What would you do if you
felt someone was going to hurt Jackie?” Anjelika asked.
    “ No one’s going to hurt
Jackie,” Valerie growled.
    “ That’s the difference,”
Delphie said. “We women know what we’re going to do.”
    “ Yes,” Anjelika laughed.
“This is one time that we know we’re powerful and men feel
powerless.”
    Valerie and Delphie
laughed.
    “ There you are!” Sam said
from the stairwell to the garage. “We’re going to be
late.”
    The women
laughed.
    ~~~~~~~~
    Thursday afternoon — 1:15
p.m.
     
    “ I don’t know why we’re
here,” Jeraine said. “Miss T did some sleep walking last night and
now she won’t have anything to do with me.”
    He walked into their
couples therapist’s office and dropped down on the couch. The woman
smiled at Tanesha and closed the door after them.
    “ Thank you for making time
for us,” Tanesha smiled and sat down on the opposite end of the
couch.
    “ What’s going on?” Their
therapist looked at Jeraine and then at Tanesha. “The last time we
met, you were doing really well.”
    “ We were last night. We
were yesterday. We were doing well the day before that and the one
before that and . . . ” Jeraine made a
frustrated gesture. “Now she won’t talk to me. Just says we need to
come here. So here we are.”
    “ What happened?” the
therapist asked.
    “ She did some sleep
walking and . . . ” Anxious, Jeraine responded
quickly.
    “ Tanesha?” their therapist
asked.
    “ I can’t do this,” Tanesha
said.
    “ What?!” Jeraine jumped
out of his seat.
    “ Jeraine, please.” The
therapist indicated that he should sit down. “What is it that you
can’t do, Tanesha?”
    “ I can’t do this
relationship,” Tanesha said. “I