No Names to Be Given

By Julia Brewer Daily

"A gorgeous, thrilling, and important novel! These strong women will capture your heart."—Stacey Swann, author of Olympus, Texas

 

1965. Sandy runs away from home to escape her mother's abusive boyfriend. Becca falls in love with the wrong man. And Faith suffers a devastating attack. With no support and no other options, these three young, unwed women meet at a maternity home hospital in New Orleans where they are expected to relinquish their babies and return home as if nothing transpired. 

 

But such a life-altering event can never be forgotten, and no secret remains buried forever. Twenty-five years later, the women are reunited by a blackmailer, who threatens to expose their secrets and destroy the lives they've built. That shattering revelation would shake their very foundations—and reverberate all the way to the White House.

 

Told from the three women's perspectives, this mesmerizing story is based on actual experiences of women in the 1960s who found themselves pregnant but unmarried, pressured by family and society to make horrific decisions. How that inconceivable act changed women forever is the story of No Names to Be Given, a heartbreaking but uplifting novel of family and redemption. 

• Language: English
• Publisher: Admission Press
• Release date: Aug 3, 2021
• ISBN: 9780998426167

Book preview

Prologue

Magnolia Home Hospital

New Orleans, 1966

Men loved Sandy’s body. She didn’t have the option of leading with her wit or intellect. Her looks arrived first. It was both a blessing and a curse.

Now, Sandy placed her hand on her formerly taut stomach. It felt bloated and mushy. How long would it be before she was back in her sparkly dance costumes and performing for audiences? The provocative bustiers and garter belts would not fit her now.

She slid up in her hospital bed and peered through a crack in the curtain. They were all in the same recovery room, separated by thin blue fabric. She heard the other two moaning as they awakened. A nurse worked among the three of them and whispered, as if the others were out of earshot, What a coincidence y’all went into labor on the same day. We were inducing you next week.

An acidic smell of disinfectant and the rusty odor of blood invaded Sandy’s nostrils. She swallowed and found her throat parched and lips chapped. Her head throbbed with a dull drumbeat, and she tasted a metallic tang.

What have I done? Why did I think this was the better choice? Sandy’s thoughts jumbled, like a bad movie looping in her head. She squeezed her eyes shut as she remembered how her heart once pounded whenever she heard Glen’s voice. The curtains separating the roommates’ beds reminded Sandy of those in her home in Illinois, and her mind projected Glen’s image into the hospital room.

You see what happens to trashy girls? She imagined him sitting at the end of the bed, sneering at her. Sandy’s teeth chattered, and her body quaked in small jerks. Her chest rose and fell so rapidly, she became faint. Sandy imagined dying in the hospital. Women died from childbirth all the time. Would her mother ever find out? Probably not. Sandy covered her tracks pretty well. Glen would think she got what she deserved.

Becca? Sandy leaned forward and yanked back the cloth separating them. Becca twisted from side to side. Sandy hated seeing her roommate in such distress. Becca might have been a princess-like creature in her former life, but Sandy admired her rebellious streak. How many other white girls had the guts to fall in love with a Negro?

Becca broke the silence. I cannot believe our babies are in the nursery down the hall, and they won’t let us see them, she whispered. Maybe we can sneak down there.

Don’t. It may make things worse. Sandy wanted to avoid all maternal feelings and didn’t want to see a child who might look like her or Carlos.

I can barely walk to the bathroom. Faith’s voice trembled. Her pixie haircut, unwashed and dishwater blond, was in spikes and her eyes seemed too large for their sockets.

Hey, Nurse Carter. If you let me go to the nursery, I won’t bother you anymore.

You know that’s not allowed. The nurse frowned at Becca.

I promise to stand behind the window. I just want to see my baby. One time. I promise.

The nurse’s response was to leave the room.

Becca whispered to Sandy. I just want to see the skin color. I want to see if the adoptive parents will know it’s a mixed-race baby.

Most of all, Sandy knew she longed to hold her child. Becca still declared love for her baby’s father. Sandy was still in love with her child’s father, too, but he would be no help to her from behind prison bars.

I’ll go on a hunger strike. Do you want me to barricade myself in the nursery? Becca made her announcements in a loud voice.

Hush. You’re disturbing the entire home. Nurse Carter poked her head back in the doorway and spoke harshly.

Perspiration beaded in the hollows of Becca’s cheeks, and Sandy watched as she swiped it away with her palm. Her beauty dulled only slightly with her auburn hair in a messy knot on the top of her head and her freckles dominant on her ivory skin. Becca’s startling blue eyes were now the color of a very stormy sea—gunmetal and glinting.

Everything’s gonna be all right, Sandy cooed. She feared Becca would spring from the bed and run toward the nursery.

Sandy watched Faith with her hands clasped as if in prayer.

Faith, are you okay? She always spoke to Faith as if she were a child. They were all about the same age, eighteen, but Faith’s innocence made her seem so much younger.

I’m miserable, Faith said.

Me, too. I feel like a medieval torture device stretched my limbs, Sandy said.

Faith chanted prayers for her baby. Please, Lord. Please let my baby have the very best parents. I know you’ll take care of him—or her. She hummed the lyrics of Jesus Loves the Little Children. Red and yellow, black and white, they are precious in his sight.

How are we expected to walk away and pretend nothing happened? They knocked us out before we had our babies and won’t let us see them? We don’t even know if we had a boy or a girl, Becca blurted out.

Sandy did not turn to Becca. Instead, she watched Faith twist her hands. Faith’s frame disappeared from view under the sheet. Sandy was afraid her tiny limbs, awkward and knobby, would vanish altogether without the bed to contain her. Every time Sandy looked at Faith, she remembered Faith’s description of her assault.

Now, a living reminder of it existed. Faith had said she didn’t want this baby carrying the blame for its conception. Suddenly, Faith began gulping breaths like drinking water with a cupped hand from a bucket.

Sandy tried not to look at her own reflection in the mirror. Her hair, not dyed since entering the home, showed roots black and wide like the stripe of paint against a hot asphalt roadway, only in reverse—her platinum locks clung to the dark center.

Towering above Faith, she saw how sallow her skin was and how lackluster. She needed her eyebrows plucked and her nails painted—no time to worry about all that. Sandy required all her strength for her own recovery and assisting her friends. She tucked Faith and Becca’s blankets around them, raised their hospital bed rails, and crawled back into her bed.

Tomorrow, they had plans to make.

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Chapter 1

Sandra Reynolds

Morton, Illinois, 1964

Sandra always sauntered through her house as though she were on a stage. Even as a young child, she pretended she was an actress like Elizabeth Taylor or a dancer like Ginger Rogers.

Quit sashaying around this house, her mother would say. And wipe that lipstick off your mouth.

Leave her alone, Mama. She’s learning to be a girl. Her daddy always took her side. She remembered when his strong arms tossed her into the air; she could not stop giggling. He taught her how to set a catfish line in the river and to plant tomatoes.

Remember, there’s no shame in hard work, whatever it is, he’d say when she’d complained about sweating and wiped her dirty hands on a tattered plaid shirt. She was fifteen when he died, and her world tumbled end over end, as his tractor did when it tipped over the bluff on a tenant farm in Illinois.

Her father was in the rocky grave only a few days before Glen, a hired hand for the neighbor next door, approached her mother, Peggy. Glen smoothly talked Peggy into letting him move into their house. He told her not to worry about paying the bills they owed or buying groceries. Sandra fumed at her mother for allowing someone else to take her daddy’s place so soon, but she realized her mother was desperate. They had no money, and neither of them had a job.

Soon after Glen moved into their home, Sandra stood on the porch’s edge and watched as he dragged a kitten from under the house. A stray cat had given birth to three babies under the steps and died before she could nurse them. Two of the kittens had already perished. The remaining one twisted in Glen’s enormous hands.

Glen was a gangly man, like his body parts were stolen by grave robbers and stitched together like a Frankenstein’s monster. He had large hands and feet, but skinny legs and a tiny head. A dome of jet black hair was hidden under an old straw cowboy hat, but a strand seemed to always hang in his eyes.

What’re you doing with that kitten? Sandra knew that most stray cats ended up in burlap sacks in the creek.

I need you keeping him alive. He can live in the barn when he’s strong enough. Glen whispered to the form in his grasp. You’re a fighter. You can do this.

Sandra had not seen this gentleness from Glen. The night before, she screamed when he twisted Peggy’s arm behind her back. He had tossed his plate on the floor and stalked from the house.

Was this an apology for the way he treated them? She stumbled forward and swept the tiny gray creature from him. The pitiful mewing from the little thing encouraged her. In the kitchen, she poured milk into a dish and dipped a cloth, dampening it. Holding it to the cat’s mouth, she grinned as it sucked on the fabric.

I’ll get an eyedropper to make it easier, Glen said.

Sandra nodded. What had come over Glen? Sandra didn’t think he had a nice bone in his body. Maybe he just needed help with the rats in the barn, where he spent most of his time.

Every night since he moved in, Glen drank clear hard liquor he made behind the barn. He was a mean drunk. Neither she nor her mother could please him.

A week later, Sandra arrived home from school and found a purple bruise glowing on her mother’s cheek.

If he hits you again tonight, I’ll kill him! Sandra’s words held a false bravado. She feared him, too.

Hush. He don’t mean it. I burnt his supper last night.

Glen stayed outside later and later. It was difficult for her mama to keep supper warm without getting it overcooked. Glen was mad when the food was cold and madder if she burned it.

That’s no excuse. Let’s get away from here, Sandra pleaded.

Where would we go? her mother said, eyes downcast. We ain’t got nothing.

As if to confirm her mother’s statement, a breeze blew through cracks around the windows and stirred the blue cotton cloth that divided their one-room house. The fabric hung from ropes separating the kitchen from corners where cotton mattresses lay on the floor. After her father’s death, Sandra had slept with her mother until Glen arrived. Then, she dragged her bedding near the back door.

At midnight, Sandra lay on her mattress, trying to sleep. She placed her hands over her ears and a pillow over her head. The house was too small, and she heard every conversation.

Why’re you here if you don’t want to help us?

You and that brat of yours are lucky I take care of you.

Take care of us? You’re just another mouth to feed.

Sandra heard a slap and a whimper.

The image of Peggy blocking her face from Glen’s smack played the rest of the night in Sandra’s head. Peggy’s pitiful smashed fingers raised in defense against a bully.

Earlier that afternoon, Sandra was hanging wet clothes on the wire line behind the house when she heard her mother cry out. Their washing machine was one of the old crank types on the back screened porch. Her mother often caught her hand in the rollers as she pressed clothes through the device and smashed fingers or broke her nails.

Ohhhh. Get me a cloth. Her mother’s cry and rusty metal grinding to a halt signaled another accident.

Sandra grabbed a flour sack towel from the sink and ran to the back porch. Her mother was seated on the floor, clutching her hand and rocking back and forth.

Here. Let me wrap your hand. Sandra’s stomach curdled like buttermilk. Peggy’s index and middle fingers looked like ground beef. We’re going to take you to the hospital.

Poor people don’t go to the hospital. Her mother’s face was pinched and pale with pain. Sandra’s own face felt like it matched her mother’s grimace.

Sandra awoke early and tiptoed out of the house. She didn’t care if she waited two hours for the bus; she wouldn’t be around when Glen woke up. When the bus finally arrived, Sandra jumped down from the rail fence and climbed aboard. She heaved herself into a seat next to a boy who smiled when she sat down. Sandra basked in the boys’ admiration when they told her she was beautiful. Stan Gentry was seated behind her and pulled a copy of his favorite motorcycle magazine out of his jacket. His excitement was unmistakable as he pointed to the photo.

Look. This girl looks exactly like you.

Well, I guess she does. Sandra nodded and examined the photo.

A woman with long legs in ragged jean shorts and a tight white T-shirt waxed a Harley-Davidson. She was the favorite calendar girl for all the service station mechanics in town. The model could have been her twin. Should she feel ashamed for boys liking her body? Sandra tossed her head and sat a little straighter. She didn’t do anything to get her looks, but she might as well use what she had.

The school was an escape for her. But time passed too quickly, and that afternoon she was back at home listening to yet another argument. While sitting in the porch swing, Sandra eavesdropped on her mama and Glen fighting about tenant payments on the farm. The walls of her house were as thin as paper, and their voices were loud and angry.

Before moving into their house, Glen had labored for Mr. Jenkins on the farm next to theirs. Mr. Jenkins owned the land where they lived, too. But Glen became lazy when he took over planting corn on their place. He produced scarcely enough for the liquor he made. Glen made money handing out mason jars to the men who drove their pickups behind the barn, but Sandra noticed he kept it for himself. She learned from her mother’s raised voice that Glen had not paid Mr. Jenkins the amount owed from tenants.

Instead, Glen had offered Sandra’s mother, Peggy, as Mr. Jenkins’ cook because Mr. Jenkins’ wife had run away with one of his hired men. Peggy would prepare dumplings or a stew each week, something that would last Mr. Jenkins a few days. Her mother was not happy about the arrangement but had no choice since their house was tied to delinquent payments.

Once a week, Sandra watched as Glen counted out money into her mother’s hand.

You buy what you need to cook for Jenkins. The slop you’re feeding me is not worth the dough I give you.

Sandra’s eyes narrowed as she watched her mother cringe.

One night during the hot summer before her senior year, Sandra carried an oak basket with a chicken pie and baked sweet potatoes across the furrowed, red dirt field to deliver Mr. Jenkins’ supper. When she returned home, Glen eyed a five-dollar bill in her hand.

What’s that? Glen said.

Five dollars, Sandra mumbled, trying to stuff the money into her jeans pocket.

What’s he giving you money for?

He’s just trying to be nice.

He’s trying to get into your pants. Glen grabbed her arm and twisted it. When she squealed, he let her go. You’re not going over there again.

Glen made Sandra feel shaky inside. She wondered if anyone noticed when she was around him that her face flushed as if she held it over the teakettle.

The only attention she received at home was the wrong kind. She searched for what she assumed was the right kind with clumsy, pimple-

faced boys in their cars’ back seats.

All the high school boys knew Glen was vicious, so they picked up Sandra on the county road at her mailbox. She resisted their pawing and panting at first. But they were so easily thrilled; she learned how far she could allow them before she stopped their explorations.

Later that fall, Sandra passed Glen on the porch.

You’re not wearing that blouse. You look like a tramp. That’s all boys need is to see you like that.

Glen snatched at her arm and tore the sleeve. Fiery anger blossomed inside her, as red as the blouse itself. Seething, she’d run back into the house. Glen made the hair on her arms stand on end.

The churches in town brought care boxes regularly, and a stack of cardboard boxes filled with hand-me-down clothes slumped against the wall near the door. The musty cartons filled the house with the smell of rotting trees. Sandra’s mother hunched over the boxes and dug through the garments. She tossed a couple of bras, grayed from too many washes, to Sandra.

These bras don’t fit, Sandra said, handing them back. Check in the other box and see if there’re any others.

Her mother moved her head slowly from side to side. I don’t think any of the ladies at Central Methodist Church are built like you, Sandra.

Well, see if you can repair this tear.

Good Lord. You’re grown. How did that happen?

Her mother scanned the child-woman standing in front of her. Sandra stood six inches above her mother’s five feet, four inches, and her mother stood on a stool to stitch her torn red blouse. Sandy let her mother think a limb had ripped it, not Glen’s hands snatching at her.

If the donated blouses were too tight or the skirts too short, that didn’t bother Sandra. She saw an appreciation in boys’ eyes when she strolled down the aisle between the school desks.

The girls gave Sandra sideways glances and turned their noses up at her. They made rude comments about her, whispered behind her back, and rejected any attempt she made at friendship. They all thought she was after their boyfriends.

When did she stop caring about having girlfriends? She had once played with little girls on the neighboring farms, but after her father died, she lost contact with the other sharecroppers’ daughters.

It didn’t bother Sandra. Boys were much more interesting, anyway.

But Glen always seemed jealous of the boys Sandra dated. One night after a football game at the high school stadium, he was waiting for Sandra on the porch steps.

It’s not right for you to be giving it away, he growled at her. He considered her wrinkled dress and smeared lipstick.

Sandra scowled at him. I know what you are thinking, but I don’t go all the way with anyone.

I’ll teach you a lesson you won’t forget.

Glen pushed her roughly against the rusty-screened window and kissed her. She twisted her head one way and then the other. His lips left sticky drool with the sourness of liquor on her face and neck. The more she resisted him, the madder he got.

Get off me! What’s the matter with you?

Glen caught Sandra off-guard when he grabbed her throat and strangled her. She had seen him handle her mother the same way and almost choke the life out of her. Sandra was too quick for his drunken moves and more vital than her mother. She slammed her knee into his groin.

You worthless—

As Glen leaned over in pain, Sandra jumped off the high porch and fell onto the dusty yard, skinning her knees. She sprinted away from the house, and did not stop running until she was totally out of breath. Sandra leaned over, gasping, and steadied herself against a splintered fence.

Following the light from Mr. Jenkins’ barn lanterns, she sneaked into a stall. Sandra’s heart stopped sounding like a jackhammer in her chest, and she squatted in a corner, hiding. She wondered if Glen had followed her. When her legs cramped from her crouch, she scattered stale hay, making a place she could lie down. A horse in the next stall whinnied with a high pitch and bumped the boards between them.

You’ll never touch me again, Glen. Papa, please help me. Sandra whispered to herself as she squinted and peered between the barn’s slats into the darkness. She did not see Glen, so she lay down. The scratchy straw needled her skin through her clothes. Still sweating, she drifted off.

Sandra did not realize she’d slept until the sunrise cast pink light through the cobweb-crusted barn windows. She brushed herself off, walked to the house door, and knocked.

Sandra could hear someone scurrying around. The screen door squeaked as Mr. Jenkins pushed it open.

Sandra? What are you doing here so early? he asked.

She saw he wore pajamas but had pulled khaki pants over them. Mr. Jenkins seemed ancient to Sandra, although she knew he was probably about fifty years old. He was bald with just a fringe of pale brown hair around the back of his head, and his face was sunburned, which caused his blue eyes to be more prominent.

Will you drive me to Peoria? she asked, hoping he wouldn’t demand to know why.

He regarded her. She knew hay marks still marred her cheeks.

Come in and have a cup of coffee. I’ll get dressed.

Peoria was twenty miles away. They rode in silence, for which Sandra was grateful. She rolled down the truck window and stared at the landscape. Dried cornstalks shivered in the wind for miles and made a rustling sound soothing to Sandra’s ears.

When they stopped downtown, Mr. Jenkins said, Here we are. How’ll you get back home?

Don’t worry. Thanks for the ride. He reached into his pocket and handed her some folded bills. Her eyes misted as she accepted the money.

Mr. Jenkins turned the corner in his battered pickup, and Sandra saw him glancing back at her on the sidewalk. Sandra knew he hesitated about leaving her alone in the city. She wondered if there was anyone else she could ask for help, but she did not have girlfriends in whom to confide or boyfriends who truly cared about her.

Sandra searched all the retail stores on Front Street for jobs. The shop windows contained posed mannequins in narrow skirts, wide belts, and sheer blouses. High-heeled shoes and lace-up boots accompanied fashionable outfits.

One day, I’ll dress like you, she said to the lifeless forms and poked out her tongue. She stuck her head in every door and asked if they were hiring. Women who worked in the shops took one look at her and told her there were no tasks available.

Sandra felt her stomach rumble, and blisters on her heels oozed and stung.

She reached into her pocket and pulled out the dollars Mr. Jenkins had placed in her palm. Aromas of onions and bell peppers sizzling on a griddle led her toward the corner. She bought a hot dog and a bottled strawberry drink from a food cart and devoured the meal. She did not have a napkin, so she wiped mustard off her chin with her sleeve.

It would be dark soon. Nearly desperate, Sandra walked through a row of warehouses by the river where she noticed a Help Wanted sign in a window. She heard music playing through an open door and someone laughing. Sandra peered into the dim space.

Hey, girlie, a deep voice boomed. Come over here.

Sandra saw a short man sitting on a barstool. His feet were dangling above the footrest and he was wearing dark sunglasses, even though the room had little light. He had wavy and thick hair. She would later discover it was a hairpiece. His skin looked like a scratched leather purse, and he wore a pinkie ring with a square-cut diamond. A Hawaiian shirt barely stretched over his bulging belly and hung outside his pants. When she investigated the design more closely, she could see hula dancers with hot-pink bikini tops and turquoise grass skirts. She wondered where a man in Peoria, Illinois, could buy a shirt from Hawaii.

He explored her up and down. Are you here for a job? He winked at her.

Yes. She wondered what the job was, but it didn’t matter. She wanted enough cash to buy a bus ticket and escape the farm and Glen forever.

How old are you?

Eighteen, she lied, adding a year to her age.

As her eyes adjusted, she saw a large stage with a cluster of tables circling it. Sandra realized what kind of establishment she stood inside and understood what she’d just agreed to do.

Chapter 2

Rebecca (Becca) Gordon

Randolph County, North Carolina, 1964

The red cardinals, which everyone knows are the dearly departed, showed themselves along the worn path where she rode her horse.

Hello again, Mama Tea, Becca whispered toward the cardinal. Every time she thought of departed souls visiting her in bird