When Horses Had Wings Read Online Free PDF

future instead of succumbing to fate? I longed to know. Maybe I could start setting goals instead of idly waiting to see what each day might deliver. Maybe I could salvage my situation the same way I’d saved our supper. Maybe that was what Kenny had been trying to do when he’d brought me the necklace.
    It was a good gift, a thoughtful one. Later, I’d have our family portrait made. And inside it, I’d keep a photo of the three of us: me, Kenny, and our baby. Smiling at that image, I split the pendant open and noticed the clasp was broken.

 
     
    FOUR
     
     
    T he smell of baby oil permeated the bedroom even with both windows open. I’d been greasing my belly because Granny Henderson had sworn that if I kept my stomach and breasts anointed, my stretch marks would vanish along with my pregnancy. And I’d believed her on the grounds that anyone who’d had seven babies ought to know. However, most of what Granny Henderson told me was suspect. Like when she said that if I stared at that stray dog, the one that had been run over in front of our house, I would mark my baby. “Your child’s gonna have a birthmark shaped like that flattened mutt.” But I’d looked anyway, out of pure identification with the victim.
    “Wanna see Mr. Wiggly?” Kenny said, stroking himself. I didn’t know why he felt the need to name his privates.
    “No. Really. I’d rather not. I don’t feel well.” I rubbed at my belly, hoping he’d notice, then climbed into bed, socks and all.
    “You never want to do it with me anymore,” he fumed. “Ever since you got pregnant .” He said it as if pregnancy was something I might have purchased through mail order or found packaged inside a cereal box. Rolling onto his side, Kenny walled himself against my assorted ailments, sneering under his breath, “You ought to be glad I still find you worth screwing.”
    He was right, I figured. Nobody but Kenny would take a second look at me. On a regular basis, he reminded me of that. “You think anybody besides me would want your fat ass?” Then he’d add, “But I’ll keep you, I guess. You’re still young enough to train. Like they say, old enough for bleedin’s old enough for breedin’.” But he saved that kind of talk for intimate times like these.
    “I’m sorry.” I traced his lower back with my fingertips. The apology turned him around. Substituting my hands for his, I took up his rhythm, hoping that he might settle for something less than expected. But he didn’t.
    Two hours later, I felt a tightening in my abdomen and pressure mounting along my spine. A steady squeeze gripped me like a python. The torturing pains tapered off, only to return again within twenty minutes. My middle grew rigid; my toes curled under. I held my breath, but that only made things worse. If this was labor, I wanted none of it.
    “Kenny?” His back was turned to me, in typical fashion. I nudged him with one elbow. “Kenny, wake up.”
    “Nnn. Huh? Wha’da you want?”
    “I think I’m in labor. We’ve got to go to the hospital. Now!”
    He turned his face away and pulled a pillow over one ear. “Go back to sleep. It’s nothing.”
    Right then, more than ever, I wanted Momma. If only she were there to protect me, take my hand and guide me through this mysterious passage, I’d be okay. I needed to grasp the palms of someone experienced, someone comforting and compassionate. While that might not have fully described Momma, it didn’t remotely identify Kenny Ray.
    The contractions rolled over me in waves. I tried telling myself that each one would be the last. Midnight. Any minute, the pain would stop and I’d go to sleep. But no amount of denial could make the spasms cease.
    I checked the clock: two a.m. Had I dozed off? I couldn’t be sure. My insides rose and fell like the seas. At any second, I feared it would be high tide. If only I could hang on a little longer maybe the moon would free me from its gravitational spell.
    I drifted into a