Birth Row

Part Two

Mark felt the heat of Clara’s stare from across the bedroom. Still, he resisted the urge to turn and face her. He expected to be brow-beaten over the unmade bed and dirty clothes scattered across her Brazilian cherry floor. Never mind that they had servants to clean the mansion as soon as they left the room. He knew she thought he was a pig, and wanted to berate him for the mess. But, today she seemed more concerned with the family issue at hand.

It began months ago as a discussion, grew to an argument, and finally escalated to an angry plateau from which there was no descent.

Her frosty expression told him she didn’t want to hear his opinion about the exorbitant cost of the rebirthing procedure, or that he no longer cared.

He understood that as a member of the Gannett family, she had been engrained from childhood with a family purpose, and sealed her obedience with a deathbed promise to her Grandmother.

   After Mark finally turned to face her, Clara poured out the next round of the argument, “Unless you want to lose most of what you have in the divorce, you better get used to the fact that this is the cost of marrying into my family. You knew that from the beginning. It’s my family’s business, even as president you’re just a caretaker. You know damned well that if we got divorced you’d lose more than money. Anyway, it would be a lot less stressful if you’d stop complaining and get with the program. It’s not like you have to do anything more difficult than transfer the money.”

   Mark knew she had a point, even if he didn’t agree. Yes, rebirthing was enormously expensive, but it was more than the money.

The money was the only part he truly understood.

The rest of it confused him. Watkins had caused great pain to Mark’s adopted family, but still, he felt this torture wasn’t right. No matter what he said, Clara could not be dissuaded, she was filled with purpose and her confidence steamrolled his doubts. Everything about rebirthing Watkins felt wrong. It rattled Mark to his core.