Chapter Text
Peggy took one last drag, letting the smoke fill her lungs before tossing the cigarette carefully into the toilet. She hit the flush button and watched the soggy white stick whirl around the bowl before it disappeared to disintegrate in the depths of the New York sewers. She picked up her purse, unlocked the cubicle door, and strode out.
A countertop containing three pristine white sinks lined the opposite wall. She rested her purse on the counter next one of the sinks and started rifling through it. She pulled a bottle of Chanel No. 5 and applied a few drops to her chest and neck, hoping that it would be enough to hide the tell-tale scent. If Stan knew she had been smoking again he’d kill her. They had given up tobacco together after Sara was born.
Peggy deposited the perfume back into her purse, along with her pack of Virginia Slims and the old lighter Stan had given to her for her thirty-second birthday because he was tired of her borrowing his. She turned to leave but stopped short when she caught a glance of herself in the mirror.
“Jesus,” she muttered to herself under her breath. When had she gotten so old?
She was fifty now, an age that had seemed ancient to her when she was in her twenties. Now it seemed like she was constantly reminded of the passage of time wherever she went. Most of the secretaries at work weren’t even born when Kennedy died.
Pulling herself away from the mirror, she smoothed down her black Versace dress before leaving the bathroom and making her way to the entrance hall of the funeral home. She shot a small smile to Sally Draper, who was standing against a wall smoking a cigarette as she watched niece and nephew, Elizabeth and Jason Draper, who were noisily playing on the floor with the ancient toys the funeral home kept around to amuse small children. Peggy was privately thankful that her own children, as much as she loved them, had outgrown the toddler stage.
She weaved her way through the crowd of mourners, giving cursory nods to people as she passed. How could there be so many people here? Were all of these people really friends of Don? Where on earth had her husband gotten to?
Just when she was about to give up and check outside, she heard a familiar voice call her name. Peggy glanced around Pete and Trudy Campbell waving her over. Trudy still looked as gorgeous as ever. Her hair was done up in an elegant bun and she was wearing a form fitting black dress that showed off her slim frame. Pete had evidently chosen to stop wearing the toupee that had occupied the space on top of his head for the past fifteen years. To be honest, Peggy thought he looked much better without it.
“How have you been?” Peggy asked, as Pete hugged her in greeting. “You look tanned.”
“We spent two weeks in the Bahamas,” Trudy told her. “It was heavenly.”
“No,” Peggy answered. “We’re not really a Bahamas family. Stan could probably handle it, but the kids and I would burn to a crisp. We went to Europe last month, though. That was nice. Stressful, but nice.”
“We took Tammy to France and Italy for her fifteenth birthday,” Pete said.
“How is Tammy?” Peggy asked. The last time she had seen Pete and Trudy’s daughter, she was still in middle school and had an intense obsession with horses.
“She got married in June.” Pete dug around in his wallet and produced a photograph of him standing proudly next to his daughter, who looked the spitting image of Trudy at the same age. She was wearing one of those big wedding gowns that were all the rage nowadays, the ones that looked they had been plucked straight from the closet of a Civil War-era debutante.
“She’s beautiful,” Peggy said, handing the photograph back to Pete. “She looks just like you, Trudy.”
“How about your kids?” Trudy asked. “How old are they now?”
“Sara just turned twelve in July,” Peggy said. “And Vicky is five.”
“A five year old?” Pete said. “She must be a handful.”
“I love Tammy, but it’s a relief to have her out of the house,” Trudy said. “I can’t even imagine having a five year old at our age.”
“Vicky can be a handful,” Peggy said. Her youngest daughter could be a little intense to say the least. “But she’s a sweetheart most of the time.”
“Well, we just wanted to tell you that we loved your eulogy,” Trudy told her.
“Hard to believe Don’s gone,” said Pete. “It’s hard to believe he could die. Part of me thought he was immortal.”
“I did too,” Peggy admitted.
She said her goodbyes to Pete and Trudy and went back to attempting to navigate her way through the mass of people. She had just narrowly avoided eye contact with Ted Chaough when she heard her name being called again. She looked back and saw an elegant older woman striding towards her. Joan Holloway-Harris still looked incredible. Despite nearing sixty, she could still easily pass for a woman in her early forties. She was clutching the arm of a handsome young man with sandy blond hair.
“Joan, it’s so good to see you.” Peggy hugged her, and then turned to the young man she was with. “Kevin, it’s good to see you again, too.”
“That was a beautiful eulogy, Peggy,” Joan said. "I have to admit, I did tear up a bit. Anyway, we just came to say goodbye. We have to get going. Kevin’s got a lot of studying to do. He’s at NYU’s School of Medicine, you know."
Peggy smiled. Joan, so proud of her son, had mentioned this to Peggy every time they had met in the past few years.
"Your kids are at Beringer, right?" Joan said, glancing back at Peggy. "Victoria must be starting school this year.”
“She is,” Peggy said. “Her first day was last week actually.”
Peggy had taken the morning off to take Vicky to her first day of kindergarten. Stan had even persuaded her to leave her cell phone at home. It was an idyllic scene. A warm end of summer’s day. Vicky skipping along as she held tightly onto each of their hands as they walked. Sara following along behind them listening to her Discman. She and Stan had stopped for coffee on their way back. By the time they got home, there were six messages on her answering machine. Don had been found in his office at work, slumped over his desk, dead of an apparent heart attack.
“So how’s work?” Joan asked
“Good,” Peggy answered automatically before she caught herself. “I mean, I haven’t been at work lately, but it was going well before all this happened. What about you?”
“The usual. Educational films, public service announcements, political campaign ads, industrial films,” Joan said. She paused, her face turning serious, and put a hand Peggy’s shoulder. “How are you holding up?”
“I’m fine,” Peggy insisted. “I’ve been getting a lot of reading done, actually. Spending time with Stan and the kids. It’s been nice.”
“Are you sure?” Joan frowned.
“I’m fine,” Peggy assured her. “I’m going to be fine.”
Finally, she saw him. Stan was sitting with Megan in a corner, showing her a picture from his wallet. They looked up as she approached them. Megan looked exactly like she had twenty years ago, with just a few extra lines and wrinkles.
"Stan was just showing me a picture of your trip to Europe,” Megan told her, kissing Peggy’s cheek as she greeted her. “Sara looks just like you, doesn't she?"
“People say that.”
Peggy looked down. It was the photo Stan had taken of the girls pretending to hold up the Leaning Tower of Pisa.
“Did they enjoy the trip?” Megan asked.
“I think Sara did,” Peggy said. “She loved all those art galleries. But Vicky was too young. We got to the first floor of the Eiffel Tower and she started screaming bloody murder as soon as soon she looked over the edge. Stan had to take her down to ground while Sara and I went to the top.”
“She’s scared of heights,” Stan told Megan. “That was probably a bad idea. It’s our fault.”
“Perhaps taking a five year old on a tour of Europe was a bad idea,” Peggy agreed, laughing a little.
“We probably should have gone to Disney World instead,” Stan said.
“Well, I should get going,” Megan said, glancing at her watch. “My flight leaves in three hours.”
“We won't keep you then,” Stan said.
Megan hugged them both, and went to find the Draper kids so that she could say goodbye to them. Ken approached them soon after.
“Peggy, Cynthia and I have to pick Andrew up from basketball practice,” he told her. “You back at work on Friday?"
“I am,” said Peggy. She looked at her husband. “If Stan will let me, that is. He's the one who wanted me to take time off.”
“She’ll be there,” Stan told Ken. He turned to Peggy. “We should probably get going too.”
As Stan and Peggy started walking towards the door, she caught a glimpse of Don’s coffin, still sitting in the large room they’d held the funeral in. It was draped in an American flag, as was customary for veterans. It occurred to her just how little she knew about Don’s life, before he worked in advertising, before he met her.
November 9 th , 1970
“You asshole.”
Peggy slammed Don’s office door shut behind her. He looked up at her from his desk, bewildered, a mug of coffee halfway to his lips. This was clearly not the greeting he had been expecting.
“You’ve been gone for two months,” Peggy said. She leaned over his desk and pushed her face up against his. “Two months, Don. Do you have any idea what we’ve been through? What I’ve been through? I was so worried.”
“Peggy-”
“I thought you were about to hurl yourself off a cliff when you called me last week.”
“Can you please-”
“Joan’s gone. Pete’s gone. Meredith’s gone too in case you were wondering. They fired her because you ran off.”
Peggy had never particularly cared for Meredith. If it were up to her, Meredith would have been fired years ago. However, that didn’t change the fact that she had lost her job entirely because of Don’s unreliability.
“I’ve already heard about all that,” Don assured her. “I want to talk to you. Have a seat.”
Peggy relented and sat down opposite Don. He pulled a pack of cigarettes out and offered her one. She took it, and he pulled a lighter out of his pocket and lit it for her.
“Peggy, I’ve got an idea.”
That night, Peggy shut herself in her office on the second floor of their townhouse. There was no work to do, as she had been cut off from news from the agency for the past week. She just wanted to be alone.
It was only just beginning to dawn on her that Don was really gone. For the past week, she hadn’t really let herself think about it. She had been asked by Don’s children to write and deliver his eulogy at his funeral, and she had complied. She had spent the week distracting herself with memories of Don when he was alive. It wasn’t until today that it finally sunk in. They had asked if she wanted to view the body before the funeral. She had agreed. It wasn’t until she was looking down at Don’s unnaturally frozen handsome features that it finally hit her. Don really was gone.
As she poured herself another glass of whiskey, her eyes fell on a picture on her bookshelf. It was of her and Don, taken at her wedding reception eighteen years previously. He had walked her down the aisle. He had been the only choice in her mind for the role that her father never lived to fill.
Her train of thought was interrupted when she heard the door open behind her. She turned around and saw Stan standing in the doorway.
“Vicky wants you to say good night,” he told her. He glanced at the photograph in Peggy's hands and frowned.
“I’ll be up in a minute,” Peggy said.
Stan turned to leave, but stopped as his hand hit the doorknob. He looked back at her.
“Everything’s going to be alright, Chief,” he said, reassuringly. “It’s not like this is the first time he’s disappeared.”
“But this time he’s not coming back,” Peggy said. She put the photograph back on her desk and took a sip of her whiskey.
“I’m just saying, you can handle this,” Stan said. “You’ve done it before.”
“I guess so,” Peggy looked down and considered her whiskey. “It was… just so strange seeing him like that, you know? Lying there in that coffin. He looked like he was sleeping.”
“Everything’s going to be alright,” Stan said again. It was something he’d said repeatedly over the last week. Peggy would have gotten sick of it if it were coming from anyone else but him.
“I know,” she whispered. “I know.”
October 23rd, 1971
To say Peggy was nervous was understatement. Her stomach was twisting itself into knots and she had become uncomfortably aware of her own heartbeat. Something bad was going to happen, she just knew it.
They were standing in the vestibule of St. Agnes’s, just a few minutes before the ceremony was due to begin. Joyce, her maid of honor, was busy chatting up her fellow bridesmaids: Stan's twenty-one year old twin cousins, who were completely identical, right down to the dimples on their backs(as Joyce had later confided to Peggy, though she hadn't revealed exactly how she had learned this piece of information). The page boy and flower girl, the offspring of Peggy's cousin Erik, were in the corner being reprimanded by their mother because the page boy had intentionally spilled his sister's basket of pink rose petals onto the floor and she had responded by biting him on his bare leg.
Peggy was running down the list everything that could go wrong during the ceremony in her mind. She could trip over her own dress. Her mother could try to confront Don in the middle of the ceremony. Stan could have a sudden change of heart and leave her stranded at the altar.
She felt someone put a comforting hand on her back. She looked up to see Don smiling warmly at her.
“Everything’s going to be fine,” he assured her.
“Thank you for this,” Peggy said. “I didn’t know who else to ask. My mother and sister aren’t happy, of course. They were still trying to convince me to have my brother-in-law Gerry do it this morning. I’m paying my nephews ten dollars each to keep Ma away from you. Hopefully Little Gerry can tear his eyes away from Sally for long enough.”
Don had arrived half an hour early to fulfil his duties as the surrogate father-of-the-bride with his daughter Sally, seventeen years old and on a weekend break from her final year at boarding school, in tow. Peggy’s nephews were the ushers. Gerry Jr was the oldest of the three at sixteen, though Peggy had never quite lost the habit of calling him Little Gerry despite him being a foot taller than she was. He had been tasked with keeping Sally company during the wait. You could practically see his heart beating out of his chest like an old Bugs Bunny cartoon as soon as he laid eyes on her.
“I was honored you asked me,” Don told her, smiling warming at her. “You know, Sally told me today that she never wants to get married herself. This may be the only chance I get.”
“Little Gerry will be heartbroken when he finds out,” Peggy said, and she finally managed to smile and relax, though her chest was still packed with butterflies.
Organ music started filtering out from beyond the huge wooden doors that led to the nave of the church. The rest of the bridal party took their place in front of Peggy and Don. Stan’s cousins were blushing and giggling and shooting glances back at Joyce, who had a deeply self-satisfied look on her face. One by one, the bridal party filtered out into the nave of the church until, finally, Don and Peggy were alone.
“I should probably give you some advice about marriage, but given my track record I’m not sure you’d want it,” Don said. He thought for a moment. “Do the exact opposite of me and you’ll be fine.”
“I’ll try to keep that in mind,” Peggy said, and she grinned.
“Stan’s a very lucky man.”
Peggy looked down at the little sapphire ring on her left hand and felt a warm sensation in her chest.
“I’m an even luckier woman,” she said.
There was a brief pause in the music and a few seconds later, they heard the familiar opening notes of the Bridal March.
“That’s our cue,” Don said as he linked his arm around hers.
He led her through the large wooden doors and into the nave. Roger and Marie were sitting in the back with Megan, who was clearly trying her hardest to avoid looking at Don. Ted was with his new wife and looked as if he didn’t know if he belonged there. She saw Pete and Trudy. Ginsberg and his dad. Joan, Ken, Harry. And then she saw Stan standing at the altar, watching her walk towards him, looking so happy you would have thought he had just won the lottery.
It felt strange walking back into the office again. It wasn’t just because she had taken a two week break at Stan’s insistence. She’d taken most of 1984 off, after all. It wasn’t just because Don was gone either. Despite being an advertising genius, Don was the most unreliable business partner anyone could possibly have. He would regularly disappear without notice, often for weeks at a time. Everyone was used to Don’s absences by now.
“Good morning, Ms. Olson. Welcome back!” Shannon chirped as she handed Peggy her usual mug of coffee.
Shannon was a sweet little twenty year old blonde thing who had just started working there in July that year. Peggy had been disturbed to find out that she had been born on the day of the moon landing. But she was good at her job, much better than Peggy had been when she had first started working as a secretary.
“Good morning, Shannon,” Peggy said, and she downed half the mug in one gulp.
“How are you feeling?” Shannon asked.
“Fine,” Peggy insisted, and she forced a smile. “I’m fine.”
“Mr. Cosgrove wants to see you,” Shannon told her, following Peggy into her office.
“Send him in.”
Peggy set herself down at her desk. Her eyes scanned the photos on her desk. Her and her father taken on her twelfth birthday, just a month before his fatal heart attack. Her and Stan’s wedding portrait. Stan gazing adoringly at newborn Sara as she slept in his arms. Six year old Sara holding baby Vicky in her lap. Her and Don at the 1972 Clio awards, the year she won for the first time.
Her office door swung open and Ken strode in, a mug of coffee in his hand.
“You still going to Tokyo next week?” he asked, sitting down opposite her.
“Of course,” Peggy said, glancing through the papers on her desk. “Don died. That doesn’t mean the world has to stop turning. So, how have things been here?”
“Well.” Ken shifted uncomfortably in his seat. “We’re still dealing with the fallout of Don’s death.”
“Why?” Peggy frowned. “What’s going on?”
Ken hesitated, running his finger around the rim of his mug thoughtfully.
“Some of our clients are uncomfortable with an agency run by a girl,” he admitted.
“A girl? I’m fifty,” said Peggy in disbelief. “Which clients?”
”Dr. Pepper slash Seven Up for one.”
“Jesus.” Peggy pulled her top drawer open and pulled out a pack of gum. She was dying for a cigarette, but the gum would have to do for now. “Why do these companies think only men drink soda?”
“We have a meeting with the Dr Pepper and Seven Up people on Monday. We need to come up with something before then.”
“For Dr Pepper or Seven Up?”
“Dr Pepper.”
“Ugh.” Peggy leaned back into her chair. “I hate Dr Pepper.”.
“I don’t mind it. Cynthia buys it for the boys,” said Ken.
“It tastes like medicine,” Peggy said, wrinkling up her nose in disgust.
“I guess that’s the point,” said Ken.
“I guess I’ll call Stan and tell him I’ll be home late tonight,” said Peggy.
November 23rd, 1976
“Oh good, you’re here,” Peggy said, walking into Don’s office without knocking. She tossed her purse onto the couch. “ I wanted to catch you before you left for DC. I have something to tell you.”
“We’re not going until tomorrow morning,” Don said, standing up from his desk.
“Are you excited?”
“About seeing my two oldest children for the first time in months? What makes you think that?”
Peggy frowned.
“You haven’t seen them in months?”
“Sally’s in law school and Bo-I mean Robert’s in college. They’re busy,” Don said with a shrug. “What did you want to tell me?”
“Well,” Peggy took a long, deep breath. “I’m pregnant.”
“Oh.” Don looked as if he wasn’t entirely sure how to react to this information.
“It’s okay,” Peggy said, and she smiled and put a hand to her abdomen. “We planned this, actually. This was completely intentional.”
“In that case, congratulations.”
“Thank you,” Peggy said. “It’s still early, but we’re excited.”
“I didn’t think you and Stan wanted kids,” Don said. “That’s what I get for making assumptions.”
“Kid,” Peggy corrected him. “Singular. We’re only having one. One and done, as they say.”
“We should celebrate,” Don said, gesturing towards his bar. He looked down at her abdomen. “Or is that not allowed anymore?”
“It’s okay,” Peggy said. “The books say I can have one drink a day.”
Don handed Peggy a glass of whiskey before pouring one for himself. She sat down on the chair in front of his desk.
“We always said we were going to have a baby eventually, but we just kept putting it off. We were going to start trying a few years ago, but then Stan lost his job and we started this.” Peggy put her arms up, gesturing around the entire office. “And then I turned thirty-seven, and Stan turned forty-one, and we just realized that we don’t have much time left. If we don’t have one soon then we’re never going to have one.”
“How are you feeling?”
“Okay. My feet are killing me. I feel sick all the time. I haven’t been able to keep a meal down in weeks. I don’t remember that happening last ti-”
Peggy stopped herself
“I’ve been thinking about him a lot lately. Since this happened.” She touched her stomach again. “It’s his birthday today, you know? November twenty-third. He’s sixteen. Can you believe it? Sixteen. Old enough to drive.”
Peggy bit her lip to stop herself from crying. Pregnancy hormones or not, she thought she was over this. Sixteen fucking years and she still couldn’t talk about it without having an emotional breakdown.
“Anyway, I should go,” Peggy said, standing up quickly. “We’re flying down to Texas to see Stan’s family for Thanksgiving tomorrow and I still haven’t packed.”
She swallowed the rest of her whiskey in one gulp. The alcohol burned her throat as it went down.
“I guess I’ll see you on Monday then,” Don said.
“I will. Say hello to your kids from me.”
Peggy grabbed her purse and hurried down the hallway. She waited until she was safely enclosed in the elevator to burst into tears.
It was almost ten when Peggy finally got home to their townhouse on East 17th Street. Laughably early, considering how many nights she’d worked well past midnight throughout her twenties and thirties. She found Stan watching television in the living room, a beer resting on the coffee table in front of him. Vicky sat crosslegged on the floor in front him, absentmindedly running a tiny pink brush through the hair of a ballgown-clad Barbie as her eyes remained transfixed on the television screen. She looked up when Peggy walked into the room.
“Mommy!” she cried, leaping up and wrapping her arms around Peggy’s stomach.
“What are you doing up?” Peggy crouched down to return the hug. “You should be in bed.”
“Daddy said I could stay up to wait for you. It’s your turn to read to me.”
“Go upstairs and get ready, Vicks,” Stan said. He stood up and touched the top of her head with his palm. “Mommy will be up soon.”
Vicky turned and reluctantly trudged up the stairs, her Barbie gripped tightly in her left hand.
Stan turned back to Peggy.
“Have you eaten yet?” he asked. “I can put some ravioli in the microwave.”
“That’s fine,” Peggy said. “Where’s Sara?”
“She’s in her room.”
Peggy rolled her eyes.
“Why did I even ask?”
Stan’s expression turned serious.
“She failed her math test.”
“Again?” Peggy said. “Jesus Christ. I’ll go up to speak to her.”
“Just don’t be too harsh on her, okay? She’s already upset.”
Peggy made her way up to the top floor of the townhouse, where the girls’ bedrooms were. Sara was hunched over her desk, her brow furrowed in concentration as she carefully sketched something in her drawing pad. Her long dark blonde hair was held back by a navy blue headband. She wore a pair of large headphones, the kind that was supposed to block out sound entirely. Peggy had bought them as a gift for her twelfth birthday. She had come to regret this action.
“Sara," Peggy said.
Sara remained laser-focused on her drawing, the music from her headphones drowning out everything.
“Sara,” Peggy said again, much louder this time.
No response.
Peggy carefully slid the headphones off her daughter’s ears. Sara looked around in surprise.
“Oh. Hi, Mom. How was work?”
“Exhausting. Your father told me you failed your math test.”
“Oh, yeah," Sara said dejectedly, and she dropped her pencil to her desk and turned around to properly face Peggy.
“Why?” Peggy demanded.
“Because I didn’t know the answers,” Sara said, rolling her eyes as if it were the most obvious thing in the world.
Peggy frowned. Sara had developed an annoying sarcastic little streak lately. Stan had said this was par for the course for kids her age.
“You don’t try hard enough. You need to study more.”
“I do try, Mom," Sara said, looking down at the ground. "I’m just not good at math. Or science. Or anything really.”
“You’re lazy,” Peggy said decisively. “Do you know how much money I have to pay so you can go to the best school in New York?”
“Then maybe I should go to a regular school,” Sara said, throwing up her arms in frustration. “They all teach the same stuff, Mom!”
“I want you to get into a good college, Sara. I didn’t get to go to college, you know.”
“Exactly! And look at how you turned out.”
“I had to work very hard to get where I was," Peggy said. "I started from the bottom. You don’t know how lucky you are, Sara. You are so privileged and you don't even appreciate it.”
“You just don’t understand, Mom," Sara said. "Not everyone can be as perfect as you. Get lost, Vicky.”
Peggy looked around and saw her youngest daughter clad in a nightgown and holding a copy of Charlotte’s Web in her tiny hands, her giant blue eyes watching the exchange curiously.
“I’ll be there in a minute, honey.”
Vicky nodded and padded back to her room across the hall. Peggy turned back to Sara.
“Don’t talk to your sister that way. Get ready for bed. It's late.”
After kissing Vicky good night and assuring her that there was no monster under her bed, or her closet, or the ceiling vent, Peggy went back to check on Sara. She found her already lying in bed, reading a Babysitter’s Club book.
“Good night, Sara.”
“Good night, Mom,” Sara murmured, not meeting Peggy’s gaze.
"Finish that chapter and go to sleep, okay?"
"Yes, Mom."
“I love you, sweetheart.”
“Love you too, Mom.”
Sara closed her eyes and allowed Peggy to plant a kiss on her forehead.
“I just want you to do well. You know my family didn’t have much money, especially after my father died. I just want you to have more opportunities than I did.”
“I know, Mom,” Sara murmured.
Peggy went down to her office. Stan had left a steaming Tupperware container of ravioli on her desk. She collapsed into her desk chair and pulled it towards her.
July 15th, 1977
“You’re here.”
Peggy blinked her eyes furiously as her hospital room slowly came into focus. Don was sitting next to her bed, a bouquet of pink roses resting in his lap.
“I was wondering if you’d come,” she said, sitting up in her hospital bed. “Have you seen her yet?”
“I have,” Don said. “In the nursery. She’s adorable. Looks just like you.”
“We’re naming her Sara, after my grandmother,” Peggy told him. “Stan’s in love with her already. The nurse practically had to drag him out of the room to let me get some rest.”
“I’m happy for you,” Don told her. “Having kids is tough, but it’s rewarding. It’s like learning to see life through another person’s eyes.”
Peggy looked down at her stomach, still somewhat distended despite giving birth a full two days ago. The nurse had told her that it would take a few weeks, perhaps months for it to shrink back to normal size.
She should have remembered this from last time, but there wasn’t much she remembered from last time. Her brain had successfully blocked most of it from her memory. She had flashes, occasionally, especially in the last few months. A soft-spoken doctor. A bossy nurse. A crying baby. But she mostly just remember how terrified and alone she had felt. And the pain. She would never forget the pain. Her labor had been too advanced for her to be put to sleep last time.
Peggy had been fully prepared this time. She’d read every single book recommended by her doctor. She and Stan had gone to childbirth classes together. He was with her every step of the way, from the moment she felt her first contraction to the moment the nurse placed the baby in her arms.
They hadn’t expected the city to be plunged into a blackout nor did they expect to be in the only hospital in the city with a faulty backup generator. Fortunately by the time the blackout started, the epidural had kicked in and Peggy was too full of drugs to care that she had to give birth by flashlight.
“Are you going to tell her?” Don asked.
Peggy bit her lip. She knew what he meant.
“When she’s old enough,” Peggy said. “She deserves to know.”
“She’s lucky to have you,” Don said, and he reached out to hold her hand reassuringly. “You’re going to be a great mother.”
Peggy smiled.
“I hope you’re right.”
An hour later, she went back upstairs to check on the kids. Vicky was sleeping soundly, sucking her thumb and clutching her favorite teddy bear to her chest. Her face was lit up by the glow of her Hello Kitty night light. Her long wavy brown hair was spread out over her pillow like a halo. Adorable.
She quickly peeked in on Sara to make sure she was asleep before heading downstairs. She found Stan sitting on the long bench in the small outside terrace area, waiting for her.
“Kids asleep?” He asked as Peggy sat down beside him.
“They are.”
“Excellent.” Stan dug around in his pocket and pulled a joint and an old lighter out. “Did you talk to Sara?”
“I did.”
“She’s a smart girl, Peggy, she just needs some assistance.” Stan lit the joint in his mouth and took a drag. “I try to help her with her homework, but I was no good at math either. Maybe we could get some college kid to tutor her after school or something?”
Stan offered the joint to his wife. Peggy took it gratefully.
“You know what Sara called me?” Peggy said, inhaling the smoke deep into her lungs. “Perfect. No one’s ever said that me before.”
“The only Peggy Olson she knows is the rich lady who wears expensive clothes and gets two hundred dollar haircuts,” Stan pointed out. “She never knew the dowdy Peggy Olson who accidentally stabbed her boyfriend.”
“You’re never gonna let that go, are you?”
Stan ran a hand through his hair and grinned at her. He was almost fifty-four years old and his hair had only just started to turn grey. It actually made him look quite distinguished and handsome. Though she would never admit it, Peggy was deeply jealous of this. She had found her first grey hair just a week after Vicky was born, and had been dyeing her hair ever since.
“Why would I? It’s my favorite story about you.” He took the joint back from her and took another toke. “I just wish I had been there to see it.”
Peggy rolled her eyes and decided to change the topic of conversation.
“Did you see the doctor today?” she asked.
“I did.”
“And?”
“Rightie’s as healthy as a horse. Old Leftie still hasn’t grown back yet but here’s hoping.”
“But you’re okay?” Peggy asked, raising an eyebrow.
“Peggy, if I had cancer I’d tell you,” Stan said, exasperated. “Relax, okay? I’ve been in the clear for almost five years. I’m fine.”
“It’s just… I don’t want to lose you too,” Peggy admitted.
“That’s not going to happen, I promise,” Stan told her. “Not anytime soon, anyway.”
Peggy leaned on his shoulder and brushed her hand against the stubble on his chin. Stan had shaved his beard just after Sara was born because she used to cry whenever he leaned down to kiss her forehead. He had tried to grow it back after chemotherapy, but it never came out exactly right. Stan attributed this to the loss of one of his testicles, though Peggy privately suspected it was because he was getting older.
“I hope you’re right,” she said softly. She snuggled up closer to him. “It’s getting so cold already. It’s only September.”
“You want to go back inside?” Stan asked, rubbing her shoulder.
“Not yet.”
Stan leaned back further so Peggy could press her head against his chest. The sound of Stan’s heartbeat drowned out the noise of the New York traffic, and the arguing couple in the neighboring townhouse, and the screaming baby off in the distance. She felt Stan’s hands brush through her hair and land on her back.
“It’s going to be alright, Chief,” she heard Stan whisper into her ear. “Everything’s going to be alright.”