Beauty from Ashes

by Alana Terry

  It’s funny, because I thought that in order to punish somebody you had to be mad at them. It sort of makes sense when you think about it, right? But Sandy punished me all the time, usually just for little slip-ups. Like if I didn’t finish my homework on time I couldn’t watch TV on the weekend. That kind of thing. And you might have grown up in a home where that was just the way it was, but the way I grew up, you didn’t punish somebody unless you were really ticked off at them.

  Sandy was different. That’s why I feel like such a pathetic mom these days because even though Natalie hasn’t done a single thing wrong in her entire life, I’m mad at her all the time. I don’t yell or anything, and I’d never shake her or hit her. I’m not that much of a deadbeat. I’m just so upset with her for getting sick even though that’s stupid because it’s not her fault.

  It’s mine. My fault entirely. I’m the one who was so scared of a simple surgery. I mean, nobody’s said it to my face, but I think it’s pretty clear by now that if they’d cut Natalie out after the first ten or twenty hours of labor, she wouldn’t have been in the birth canal long enough for her brain to start bleeding like that. The strange thing is that she was being monitored the whole time. There was no way for any of us to know there was a problem.

  I’ve looked online a little bit at medical malpractice and stuff. I could probably find someone to try to sue the doctor who delivered her. But I signed the forms myself, put my signature right there on the page that said I was declining a C-section, so most likely it would just be a long, drawn-out process without any real results.

  There are other reasons too, other things I’ve done that I wonder if they contributed to my daughter’s problems, but I’d never ask a doctor. I don’t want to admit it for one thing, and if it really was my fault, there’s no chance I’d want to know. I’d take a settlement, though, if someone offered me. A stinking big one. The first thing I’d do is move out of this neighborhood. I mean, we all know the jokes about trailer trash, right? Maybe I shouldn’t be so snobby after growing up in the foster system and everything, but I really don’t think I belong here.

  I’ve been looking at duplexes. Nothing too outrageous. I think a place with three rooms would be perfect, one for me, one for Natalie, and an extra room I can use as my office. I don’t see myself going back to work as long as Natalie’s this fragile, so I’ve been looking into some online jobs, maybe transcription work or something. I don’t know. I’m not that great with computers, but I could figure it out if I had to.

  Then again, if I got a big enough settlement, I wouldn’t have to work at all. I could stay home with Natalie or maybe even hire a nurse to take care of the suctioning and some of the tube feeds. Because God knows once I had a place in my own name I’d have Patricia out the door in ten seconds flat.

  Probably less.

  Speaking of Patricia, I know her hour-long nap is about to end. This is my last five minutes of quiet for the rest of the day. I check my phone to see if anyone’s commented about my picture of Natalie in her little snowsuit. Not many likes yet. I guess the photos of sick babies do a better job getting people’s attention. Just one comment. I click and see it’s from Sandy.

  She’s such a precious little thing. Just like her mom.

  Sandy’s not really into social media or anything, so I think it’s cute that she tries to keep in touch this way. She’s even included a few stickers with hearts and smilies and cheesy stuff like that. It was good of her to come be with me while Natalie was having her surgery. I’m not sure what I would have done otherwise. There were some days in the NICU when I was under so much stress I thought I might literally lose my head. I even thought about calling my OB back in Orchard Grove, ask her if she could prescribe something just to take the edge off my nerves. I hate the idea of taking medicine for a mental problem like that, but I was sort of desperate.

  I still feel that way every once in a while. Like I need a pill or something. I took this depression screening online, and I’ve got like thirteen out of the fifteen warning signs. I’ve been telling myself it’s just baby blues. All the mommy magazines said it’s normal, and most folks don’t have to go on meds for it. But I wonder if I’m always going to feel like I’m in this fog or if it’s just going to miraculously disappear, sort of like the morning sickness did right after I made it to thirteen weeks.

  What to Expect when you’re Postpartum. That would be a good book for someone to write one day.

  It’s times like these I wish I were more like Sandy. So loving. So maternal. It’s like she was made to be a mom and a pastor’s wife and that’s about it. Part of me thinks I’d go crazy if my life were that boring, but part of me envies her. Wonders what it would be like to have so much love to share with others.

  Of course, Sandy comes from a really good upbringing. Rich Southern folks. Family money, all that junk. From what I can tell, the only real big stresses in her life were when her parents freaked out that she married a black man and when her adopted daughter Blessing turned into such a big disappointment.

  I should mention she and Carl have kids of their own, too. Bio kids, I mean. And they just keep adding to the family, like I already told you about the little boy they recently adopted. They would have adopted me, I’m sure of it, but there were paperwork issues and I guess I wasn’t legally free or whatever you call it. I should have been. I mean, I don’t remember that I’ve ever met my bio mom face to face. I’m sure I must have a couple times when I was a baby because that’s just what happens in the system, but I don’t remember any of it. I don’t know. Maybe someone just dropped the ball on my file.

  Sometimes I wonder if it would have made a difference. If Sandy adopted me officially. On the one hand, there’s no way she could love me any more if I were legally her daughter. That’s just the kind of person she is. But sometimes I wonder if we would have stayed in touch better. If I would have started to call her Mom. I mean, I’m already planning to teach Natalie to call her Grandma Sandy, but that’s more like a title than an official name.

  I couldn’t do it, all that fostering and adopting she does. And I wonder how she finds the patience to take care of all those kids but also how she gets over that constant fear of loss. I mean, I’m Natalie’s birth mom and I already know that I’m keeping her at a distance. At arm’s length. Like that stray puppy I wasn’t allowed to name. I know any day Natalie might leave me, and the stronger our bond, the harder that’s going to be.

  So I sort of mother on autopilot, which I hate about myself. But how else do you do it, I want to ask her. How do you take these kids into your home knowing that most of them are going right through that revolving door and walking out of your life forever? How do you keep from either dying from grief or turning into a robot mom?

  I sometimes think about the girl who delivered me. Wonder if she’s even alive. I know I could find her name and stuff if I dug into the records, but part of me wants to think the paperwork’s lost completely. Part of me wants to think that’s the real reason why Sandy never adopted me. Besides, I don’t have any reason to go digging too deep into my past.

  It’s normal, I guess, to think about the woman who gave you birth when you become a mom yourself. Man, I had no idea how scary it must have been to drop a kid in a dirty high-school bathroom. Sure, she was stupid. Stupid but incredibly brave.

  Which makes you wonder why she just left me there when all was said and done.

  I still don’t know the story of my rescue. Was it another student who went in to check her makeup? Did a teacher hear a strange noise and go in to see what it was? I don’t even know if it happened during school hours or not. What if it was the night janitor who found me?

  I shouldn’t wonder these things, but I do, even though knowing the answers won’t change a thing. Maybe I’m more sentimental than I like to admit.

  I hear Patricia stirring in the bedroom, so I shove my phone into my pocket and grab a bottle of formula so it looks like I’m being productive. Natalie’s next feeding isn
’t for a while yet, but at least I look like the doting, attentive mother I’m never going to be.

  CHAPTER 20

  Patricia comes out of her room with a cross sleepiness hanging on her face. I offer a smile. Every once in a while, I try to be friendly just to keep her on her toes or to prove to Jake that I’m not the witch she claims I am behind my back.

  Patricia doesn’t return my smile. “I already fed her,” she says.

  “I know.” I stare at the bottle in my hand. I turn it around and squint at the fine print on the label. “I was just checking the ingredients.”

  Patricia comes over and picks Natalie out of the bouncy chair. “And how’s Grandma’s little precious?” she asks in that sing-songy voice people use when they want to make a fool out of themselves. The funny thing is Patricia’s not the adoring grandmother she tries to sound like. She only uses that tone of voice with Natalie when she’s upset with me and wants me to know that she’s grand enough to love my child even though she can’t stand the fact that her son chose me for his baby mommy.

  “Did you have a nice nap?” I ask.

  Patricia’s making cooing faces at the baby, which is pointless because Natalie’s eyes aren’t even all the way open. She’s tired. I wonder why Patricia won’t leave her alone.

  “Oh, it was fine.” Patricia sits down with Natalie in a dining room chair with a dramatic sigh. I wonder if she ever took acting classes. Probably not. She doesn’t strike me as the type to put much stock in theater or the arts. “Did you have a nice afternoon?” she asks, staring down her nose at me and then glancing around the living room, probably to see what chores I could have been doing if I hadn’t been so lazy.

  “Not bad,” I reply and wonder when Jake will wake up. It’s bad enough he leaves me alone with her for six hours a shift when he goes in to work. Thankfully, he’s been working nights lately, so most of the time he’s gone I can be in my room and at least pretend to be asleep. It’s harder during the day, when there’s nowhere for me to go, nowhere for Patricia to go, and an entire afternoon and evening stretched out before us until we can part company and shut ourselves up in our rooms. Maybe I should learn from her and go take a nap.

  “Is Jake asleep?” she asks.

  I nod, wondering what biting remark she’ll make next. She smiles a little. The expression looks so unpracticed on her wrinkle-free face. I know I’m not going to look that good when I’m her age. But hopefully I won’t be as mean-spirited either.

  “That boy would never nap for me when he was little.” This is one of Patricia’s favorite subjects, how she raised the twins without any outside help. But she doesn’t go there. Not this time. “I remember putting him in his crib one day and letting him cry for half an hour. I just needed time to myself.”

  We’re in new territory now, territory where Patricia’s not setting herself up as the monument of ideal motherhood. I’m nervous, like I felt the time that one foster dad came into my room except he wasn’t drunk.

  “Yeah.” I try to offer a little chuckle. It’s as unpracticed on my vocal chords as that smile was on her face. “I bet that was hard.”

  “You have no idea.” Her features are soft, but I’m still waiting for the claws to come out. The barbs to poke through that gentle exterior. “I begged Jake’s dad to spend more time at home, but even on his day off, he was behind that computer screen of his ten or twelve hours.”

  “I would have gone batty.” I don’t know why I tell her this. Warning bells clank and clatter in the back of my brain. I’m not supposed to open up. Not supposed to let my guard down. Not with her.

  “Yeah, well, I suppose that’s the upside of Jake’s not working more hours, isn’t it?” The haughty look is back in her eyes now. I think I imagine her straightening her spine. Throwing back her shoulders. This is the Patricia I know. This is the Patricia I’ve grown to despise.

  “I guess not,” I say, hating myself for that thirty seconds of almost-closeness.

  She’s got the point for this round, but I know it’s nothing but a single battle. A single battle in a war that will go on raging as long as the two of us have to coexist under the same roof.

  CHAPTER 21

  “Well, I didn’t mean it like that. All I’m saying is you’ve got your schoolwork to focus on.” Patricia’s on the phone with her daughter, Jake’s twin. I’ve never met Abby, but at this point, I’m not sure how well we’d get along. I mean, I can only imagine all the junk Patricia’s told her about me, and heaven knows I’ve heard enough about her to fill a whole two-page spread in a tabloid.

  “He’s a distraction. And you and I both know you don’t need another one of those in your life. Not after Ian.”

  I don’t know all of Abby’s history, but I’ve put enough pieces together to understand that she was engaged to this Ian dude, but something happened and the wedding was called off, and not even Jake can come up with a satisfactory explanation about what went wrong.

  I’m bored listening in to this phone call, but Patricia’s cleaning up the kitchen after making us all chicken pot pie for dinner, and I’m stuck here watching Natalie in case she needs to be suctioned. Believe me, you can’t talk on the phone and handle a suction tube at the same time. Once I had to spend an hour on hold with Medicaid. There was some problem with Natalie’s paperwork. One of the therapists wrote down her number wrong, and the state was threatening to make us foot the entire bill.

  As if.

  I was on hold so long, and Patricia went out to pick up Jake from work, and Natalie started to choke so I turned on the machine to slurp all her gunk out, and that’s when the service rep picked up the line. Of course.

  Anyway, now Jake’s in the shower, and Patricia’s been yakking at Abby for half an hour. The kitchen’s perfectly spotless, cleaner than it was the day Jake and I moved in to this trailer park, but she’ll be going at it for another sixty minutes, I’m sure. Jake might be in the shower that long, too. I swear, out of all the things Patricia picks to gripe about, I wish one of them was my husband wasting so much of our hot water.

  “Oh, she’s as good as you could expect, all things considered.” Patricia lowers her voice and slips her back to me. Subtle, lady. I wonder if they’re talking about me or the baby. “No, she’ll probably have that tube her whole life.”

  The baby.

  It’s funny. In theory, I agree with Patricia completely. Even if we end up finding that miracle cure for Natalie, I still act like she’ll have that feeding tube until the day she dies, and that way I’ll never end up disappointed. So it’s not the words Patricia’s using, it’s the way she’s saying them. Like she actually believes that since she was an LPN working at a plastic surgeon’s office back in the nineties, it makes her an expert on newborns with brain injuries. I wish there was somewhere I could take Natalie, but my bedroom is so messy there’s nowhere to sit, and she’s asleep anyway, so I don’t want to bother her.

  “Ok, well, I need both hands now. You want to talk to your brother?” Patricia yells for Jake, as if she couldn’t hear the shower water running for the past twenty minutes. “Jake!” she shouts again, and I wince at the grating sound. “I think he stepped out.”

  She catches my eye, and I feel a groan about to escape from the pit of my gut, still uneasy from that saltless pot-pie dinner and unseasoned rice. Before I can grab the suction tube and look like I’m in the middle of something, Patricia thrusts her cell in my face. “Here’s Tiffany,” she shouts to her daughter.

  I stare at the phone as if she’s just handed me a fat, hairy tarantula. Why does Jake have to spend so stinking long in the shower?

  “Hi, Abby.” We’ve talked once before, a day or two after the wedding. She called Jake up to congratulate him, told him she was happy for us both, then actually asked to talk to me. It wasn’t an awkward conversation at all. Maybe if it weren’t for the way Patricia insists on poisoning us against each other, the two of us could be on good terms.

  “Hey, Tiffany. How are you?” She doesn�
�t know that everyone calls me Tiff, and I don’t bother correcting her. It’s not like we’re going to turn into the kind of sisters-in-law that talk regularly or anything.

  “Pretty good. Tired.” I laugh. For a second, I feel somewhat normal. Aren’t all new moms sleep-deprived?

  “How’s the baby?” she asks, and her voice is hushed and sort of pitying, the same tone you’d use at a funeral home.

  Still alive. That’s what I feel like telling her. But even though Patricia’s got her back to me and is scrubbing the inside of my microwave, I can almost see her ears sticking out from the sides of her head, straining to hear what I’m saying.

  “She’s doing well,” I lie. “Getting a little stronger bit by bit.” What else am I supposed to tell her? Natalie hasn’t changed since the day we brought her home, and that was two months ago. She hasn’t gained weight, hasn’t cried, hasn’t met any of those baby milestones the mommy magazines tell you to watch out for.

  “I’m glad to hear it.” Abby’s voice is stuffed with false cheer, and I wonder if she hates her mom as much as I do for forcing us to chat like this.

  There’s an awkward pause, like Abby doesn’t know what else to talk about with someone whose baby is as fragile as mine. I feel sorry for her and ask how school’s going.

  “Busy,” she says, just the way she’s supposed to. Like I’m supposed to say I’m tired when she asks me how I feel.

  Another pause. I wonder what she’s thinking. You know, I heard all these things growing up about how twins are supposed to be so close. Like you hear these stories where two twin sisters marry two twin brothers and they all live together in the same house? Someone should turn that into a sitcom. I think it has potential. But even in real life, stuff like that happens. Or you hear stories about one twin who maybe lives a thousand miles away from his sister, but the day she gets into a really bad car accident is the day he coincidentally decides to show up for a surprise visit, and he ends up donating his kidney to save her life or something dramatic like that.