By Anne Heinrich
As women, we have tremendous capacity to wound and heal one another.
Even in extending acts of generosity, we are filling our own pockets with something that satisfies the hungriest parts of ourselves. The central characters in my debut novel, God Bless the Child, are bound by what they crave and withhold from one another as they exist within circumstances that have been thrust upon them.
When heavyweight Mary Kline and the vulnerable Pearl Davis meet those first few weeks of high school, their friendship is forged by two sad facts: nobody else will have them and they need protecting. Both are also in sore need of mothering that eludes them. Pearl’s mother has passed away. Mary’s is consumed with keeping her daughter’s expanding body covered and contained, leaving her big girl starving.
By the time Pearl winds up pregnant, Mary’s need to love and be loved is in overdrive. She and her parents swoop in to take on Pearl and her baby, Elizabeth. It’s an extravagant gesture that looks charitable, even heroic from a distance, but up close, not so much. Mary’s smothering brand of love barely conceals her insatiable appetite for affection, leaving Elizabeth feeling resentful and smothered, and her birth mother, Pearl, further exposed to harm. As their story unfolds, themes about complicated love, motherhood, daughterhood, and friendship are explored.
Just how much are we expected to bring to the mothering table? Do we naturally know what will be expected of us? Are we prepared to provide it? How much of our daughterhood do we bring with us to the role as mother? Is unconditional love between women even possible, or do we only gravitate and give generously to those who have something to give us in return? And what happens when these women cannot or will no longer give us what we want and need?
As I developed the complex characters for God Bless the Child, I thought it was important to allow each of them to ponder these questions and reckon with the broad swath of gray area that exists in their answers. The explorations they have with themselves are raw one minute, and quite touching the next. I think that space between ugly and beautiful is where much of the true nature of relationships between women sits in the sun.
Even as a teenager, Mary Kline recognizes the unhealthy, predatory nature of her friendship with Pearl:
Pearl Davis was one lucky girl to have the Klines take over like we did. That baby she housed in her ignorant belly would want for nothing, and neither would she. All we wanted in exchange was for Fat Mary to play Mama…What none of us could anticipate was how seriously I would demand my due. Pearl’s inadequacies were bountiful indeed, but I was all too ready to fill in the gaps and satisfy my own needs at the same time…I took over because I was good. I took over because I was huge and not to be denied. I took over because I could not resist that baby any more than I could turn down seconds and thirds at dinner. If that baby had been edible, I would have devoured her, and Pearl, too.
Elizabeth, saddled with two inadequate mothers in Pearl and Mary, feels the weight of Mary’s need and the responses that are expected of her, even as a child:
Mary Kline tried so hard to anticipate my desires. It often seemed like she was waiting with bated breath for my next request, ready to smother me with her response…I once made the mistake of mentioning that I liked chocolate milk. Mary came home from the grocery store with four large jugs of milk, more than the three of us could consume in a month. In another bag, she had collected all the ingredients to make enough chocolate milk for my entire fourth grade class.
Our kitchen became a laboratory and Mary the mad scientist, determined to concoct the best chocolate milk possible, something perfect enough for my spoiled palate. She had purchased two types of dry cocoa mix, three kinds of syrup and even a bag of semi-sweet chocolate chips, which she melted in a double boiler, all in a furious effort to unlock the secret to my happiness…All I wanted was a glass of chocolate milk. Mary turned everything into an elaborate, sticky-sweet, big fucking production.
Readers could be tempted to classify Mary’s brand of love as suffocating and manipulative, but will likely stop short as she reveals what she’s really been hungry for all along:
There wasn’t a box big enough to package me, but Mama worked with what she had. As she held the tape measure to my waist or across my shoulders, sucking in her breath with each expansion, I longed for her to touch me like I was her girl, not a mound to be measured…Once, when I was home from school for a few days with a cough and sore throat, I felt her cool hand on my forehead as she checked for a fever.
It was gentle and soft, and when she moved it to rest on my hot cheek, I reached up to hold it there a moment longer. I kept my eyes closed, so we could both pretend I was asleep, that she had not let herself linger and that I had not so greedily soaked in her fleeting display of affection. I wondered if her eyes were also closed, so she could feel her way in the dark to my fever and pretend I was a girl who was easier to hide, package, and love.
Easy to love. Must our friends, daughters and mothers be easy to love, to serve up affirmation only to deserve our love, or are we called to challenge one another? How much space and grace can we spare? I hope readers explore these issues with soft eyes as they get to know the complex characters they might already know.
Anne Shaw Heinrich lives in Kirkwood, MO. Her debut novel, ‘God Bless the Child’, will be released in June 2024. It is the first in a three-book series, The Women of Paradise County, to be published by Speaking Volumes.
About the Book: Mary Kline has always confronted the challenges of her obesity and infertility with unyielding determination, refusing to succumb to societal expectations. But she desires one thing above all; a child of her own. When her vulnerable friend Pearl unexpectedly finds herself pregnant, Mary steps forward as both caregiver to Pearl and guardian to her child, Elizabeth. Mary sees an opportunity in motherhood to heal the wounds of her own loveless past, but Elizabeth resents Mary, finding her repulsive and stifling her upbringing. As the years pass, Elizabeth grapples with unresolved anger and struggles with her mental health, seemingly destined to repeat the same mistakes with the family she makes for herself. Can Elizabeth break free from the pains of her adolescence finding forgiveness for her mothers’ shortcomings, in order to become the mother she’s always wanted?
A seasoned writer with over 35 years of experience as a journalist, columnist, and nonprofit communications professional, Anne brings her wealth of expertise to this compelling narrative. Deftly weaving a tale of love, loss, and redemption, she explores the bonds between mothers and daughters and how Elizabeth’s upbringing with her two misfit mothers created a disturbing adulthood filled with personal traumas brought on by an early abortion, mental health battles, and motherhood.
To learn more about Anne, visit anneshawheinrich.com. You can follow her on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram.
