One Foot in Eden

The narrative flashes back to Billy’s perspective before the murder. Billy remembers how he found out that Amy was pregnant with another man’s child. He had suspicions about Amy and Holland, but he tried not to think about it because he was afraid of losing her. Now, when Billy asks Amy whose child she carries, Amy tells him that it can be their child if he wants it to be. Amy promises Billy that she will not leave him for Holland because she is Billy’s wife. She also promises that she will never see Holland again.

That night, Billy thinks about the time when he had polio as a child. Doctor Griffin treated him at home and told Billy’s parents to watch his breathing night and day. After he recovered, his right leg never fully healed, causing him to walk with a limp for the rest of his life. Billy loves how Amy never makes him feel self-conscious about his leg. He remembers how humiliated he felt when Amy told the valley that he could not get her pregnant. He knows that his infertility is yet another symptom of the polio, even though the doctor never admitted this aloud.