by Kate Rorick
“I think I saw it on our way in,” Sophia said, hopping to her feet. “I’ll show you.”
“I could use something to eat, too,” Maisey said. “C’mon, Foz, you owe me a bad chicken dinner.”
“Technically, you owe me that bad chicken dinner,” Foz replied as they headed toward the door.
“No, Mom, you stay,” Lyndi said, when Kathy stood to join them. “I’ll grab you a sandwich.”
“Lynd . . .” Nathalie whispered.
“Like I said, you have to talk to her eventually,” Lyndi whispered back, as she left the room as quickly as her pregnant belly would allow.
“While everyone’s off getting food—the three-bean salad is delightful—mind if we give the baby a quick listen?” Dr. Keen said, as upbeat as a chipmunk.
Nathalie carefully handed the baby over to the nurse. As the nurse cooed over the baby, and Dr. Keen made notes on a chart, Nathalie turned back to Kathy, who had a nervous, tired smile on her face.
How to apologize? Where to begin?
“You did great, Nathalie,” Kathy said. “Just like I knew you would.”
Nathalie gazed over at her daughter. “Thank you.”
“You know that was the easy part, though.”
Nathalie looked up. “The easy part?”
“The birth. The hard part is what’s to come. The diapers, the screaming at all hours. The guessing game of whether or not she’s hungry. Don’t get me started on cracked nipples! Your sister practically bit my left one off, she’d latch on and not let go. I still have phantom pains.”
Nathalie felt a little flame of irritation rise up from her exhaustion. “I’m sure we will manage.”
“Everyone thinks that, honey,” Kathy said, patting her arm.
It was so hard to maintain her intentions to patch things up with Kathy when Kathy couldn’t go three sentences without annoying or criticizing. So hard, in fact, that she didn’t notice when the concerned nurse called Dr. Keen over to the baby.
“Why don’t you let me be a parent for five minutes before you start telling me that I can’t do it,” Nathalie said, trying to maintain a neutral tone.
“I never said you can’t do it, Nathalie,” Kathy said, her voice rising. “I said—”
“Excuse me,” Dr. Keen interjected. She was no longer chipper. And that was enough to drain any irritation from Nathalie and put her body on full alert.
Dr. Keen conferred with the nurse in low, rushed tones. The only words Nathalie could make out was “on call pediatrician,” and “pneumothorax.”
The nurse moved to the phone, talked quickly in low tones. She asked for a rapid response team. Then, everything started happening at once.
A half-dozen people—rapid response, true to their name—entered, and surrounded the baby. They started listening with stethoscopes, checking charts, saying letters and numbers in bewildering combinations . . . and those numbers and letters made them work faster.
“What? What is it?” Nathalie asked, frantic. But everyone was still focused on the baby. All except Dr. Keen, who had gotten out of the rapid response team’s way. With a nod from one of the team’s doctors, Dr. Keen came over to Nathalie, her voice calm, steady.
From Dr. Keen, that was more unnerving than anything.
“Ms. Kneller, we need to take your baby down to NICU for an assessment.”
The blood drained from Nathalie’s face, coursing down her body, out her frozen feet, and to the floor. Only to be replaced by the horrible, horrible realization that something was wrong.
“Why? What’s wrong? Is she okay?”
“Your daughter is not breathing properly.”
The words echoed through the room, through Nathalie’s head. It was as if she had heard the words, but lost the capacity to understand them. She groped blindly for something, anything to hold on to.
And that was when she found Kathy’s hand.
“What does that mean?” Kathy asked, the words Nathalie couldn’t form coming out of her stepmother’s mouth.
“At thirty-six weeks, your baby’s lungs are not fully mature. It’s possible she has a collapsed lung,” Dr. Keen explained. “We need to give her a chest X-ray.”
One of the rapid response team slipped a mask over her baby’s face—oxygen.
“And then?”
“Then if the X-ray shows a pneumothorax, we will do a simple procedure to put a tube in her chest and expand the lung.”
A procedure. Surgery.
“Okay. Okay,” Nathalie said in a rushed breath. “Let’s go to NICU. Let’s go now.”
“Honey,” Kathy said, “hold on. You can’t get out of bed yet, you just gave birth.”
A moment later proved Kathy correct. The epidural hadn’t worn off yet—she still couldn’t feel anything from the waist down. And if she could, no doubt her body would be screaming with sore muscles and pain.
But . . . “To hell with that, I need to—”
At that moment, David came back into the room, his arms loaded down with prepackaged sandwiches.
“I didn’t know what you’d want so I got one of everything. I figured . . .” It took him a second to look up and read the room. When he did, his body immediately tensed. “What’s going on?”
“Something is wrong with the baby’s lungs,” Nathalie said, choking back her tears. “Go with her!” She pointed wildly at the rapid response team who had the baby in a wheeled bassinet. “Now, now, go now!”
David dropped the sandwiches on the floor, and moved to the baby’s side, as they wheeled the bassinet out of the room.
Leaving Nathalie without her baby for the first time in nine months.
But she wasn’t alone. She was still attached to someone, gripping Kathy’s hand for dear life. And Kathy gripping her back.
“What do I do?” Nathalie’s voice cracked. “I can’t just sit here. I have to do something.”
“You are doing something,” Kathy said, soft and fierce. “You are healing. You are getting yourself ready.”
“Ready?”
“For when she needs you,” she replied. “What I was saying earlier, about the hard part being yet to come—this is it. When you want to do something, but can’t. When you have to wait, and prepare, and hope that everything is going to be okay. And it will be okay, Nathalie. You have to be as ready for that. Because she is coming out of that X-ray, out of that surgery, and she is going to need her mother.
“I know you’re scared,” Kathy continued. “And I know . . . I know you wish your mom was here instead of me. But I am here to tell you that as someone who has known you for the last twenty-five years, you can do this. You can. For that little girl? It’ll be the easiest thing in the world.”
Nathalie held tighter onto Kathy’s hand, tears sliding down her nose. She couldn’t look Kathy in the face—she couldn’t move her eyes from the door, where David and her daughter had disappeared . . . where they would come back. But Kathy’s words managed to find their way into her mind, writing themselves under her skin. And Nathalie knew, without question, that her mother was there. Both of her mothers were.
Because no one else but her mother could know exactly what she needed to hear.
They stayed like that, hands gripped together, Nathalie with her eyes locked on the door, Kathy whispering truths and hopes with equal fervor in her ear.
People came in—Lyndi and Marcus back from the cafeteria, a nurse here and there. But none were who she needed to see, so she simply did not see them. She was vaguely aware that Kathy told Lyndi in simple words what was going on, and Lyndi kept the rest of their group at bay.
Seconds ticked into minutes, while everything became focused on a single point. There was only Nathalie, Kathy, and the door.
Finally, the door admitted the one person Nathalie wanted to see. And life came roaring back.
“She’s okay,” David cried as he burst through the door.
A tingling sensation coursed through Nathalie’s body—and not just because the epidural was finally wearing o
ff.
“What happened?”
“They did the X-ray, her left lung was collapsed. They took her immediately to a treatment room, and inserted a chest tube, reinflating the lung. Nat—she gave the loudest scream, you wouldn’t believe it. She’s a fighter.”
Nathalie grabbed David ferociously. Held him tight. She barely noticed the sighs of relief in the room, her sister’s tears of joy. Nor did she notice that Kathy had let go of her hand.
“Can we see her?” Nathalie asked.
“The nurse is here with a wheelchair, she’ll take us down to the NICU.”
Then, Nathalie was wrapped up in blankets, her body sore and floppy, but every nerve pointed toward seeing her baby again. As the nurse wheeled her toward the door, Nathalie made her pause for a moment.
“Kathy,” she said. And then she stopped.
There weren’t words enough to convey what she wanted to say. How everything had become lost in those harrowing minutes, and the only thing she had to hold on to was Kathy’s hand. How much the woman who had aggravated her and raised her meant to her.
“Thank you.”
It was so little. But it was enough.
Kathy, tears in her eyes, held a hand to her heart.
“Go on, honey,” she said. “Go see your little girl.”
Epilogue: aka, Beginning
THE FIRST PROUDEST DAY OF SOPHIA’S LIFE had been when Maisey was born. The second proudest day was when she left a young, irresponsible Alan and jumped headfirst into creating a life for herself and her daughter. But jockeying for position was the day that all of the hard work paid off, and Maisey graduated high school, with honors.
“I’m so proud of you, sweetie!” Sophia said when they found each other in the milling crowds on the high school football field after the ceremony. Maisey looked like the adult she would no doubt become in her scarlet cap and gown—poised, confident. A force to be reckoned with. Sophia, already emotional, was barely able to relinquish her daughter to her father for their hugs.
“Great work, kid,” Alan said, Christy and their cute, chubby toddlers beside him. “I can take almost no credit for it. It was all your mom.”
Sophia gave Alan a surprised look. “Hey, I call it like I see it,” he said. Then his wife Christy shot him a look. “Or Christy rightly pointed out that all the work she does with our kids you did alone.”
“Wow,” Sophia said, giving Christy a soft smile.
“No kidding, wow,” Maisey added.
“Now, I can’t give you a car for your graduation, because I already gave you my car,” Alan said. “So, how about I take you and some of your friends to dinner?”
“Oh, thanks Dad,” Maisey replied. “But Foz and I already have plans for tonight.”
Alan’s face went still. “Who’s Foz?”
Maisey and Sophia pointed to where Foz was with his mom, stepdad, and grandfather, about twenty feet away through the crowd. He’d been allowed to walk with their graduating class—Ms. Kneller had made sure of it. He’d been seated in the row right behind Maisey, and Sophia had been amused watching them whisper things to each other throughout the long graduation ceremony.
“Uh-huh,” Alan deadpanned. “And what are these ‘plans’?”
“Alan, relax,” Sophia said. “He’s a good kid, and I trust our daughter.”
Alan made a noise that sounded like a car tire leaking air—which was better than it exploding from pressure, she supposed. “Okay, we are definitely having dinner with this Foz next week.”
“Deal,” Maisey said.
Then, one of the toddlers tugging at Christy’s hand made his escape, causing Christy to duck through the crowds after him, lifting the other child up and balancing him on her hip as she ran.
“Oh crap,” Alan said. “Sorry, he’s a runner. So proud of you, sweetie.” Alan pecked Maisey on the cheek before darting off after his wife and kids.
“Are you ready for that?” Maisey asked, as she watched Christy dive around graduates and their families trying to catch her runaway.
“Not yet,” Sophia admitted. “Luckily he won’t be mobile for a little bit. But, I know better what to expect this time. You were a great first kid. I learned a lot with you.”
“Not a kid anymore though,” Maisey said, smiling.
“No you are not. So . . . what are you going to do, my adult child?” Sophia said, taking her daughter’s arm. They strolled across the turf, enjoying the pleasant after-ceremony exhilaration.
“I have work tomorrow morning,” Maisey said. “And then . . . I have to send in my registration paperwork for UCLA.”
“UCLA?” Sophia pulled to a stop. “Not Berkeley?”
“UCLA.” Maisey had gotten the acceptance right before prom. While Sophia was dealing with the fallout from her zombie-makeup work at Fargone, Maisey had been making the biggest decision of her life thus far.
“Why? I thought you wanted to be in the Bay Area. And Berkeley has such an amazing literature program—”
“I made the decision on prom night,” Maisey said. “Yeah, the financial package isn’t as good as Berkeley, but if I live at home for the first couple semesters, I think I might be able to get through college debt free. I figure, with the baby, money is going to be tight, and—”
“No, don’t you dare,” Sophia interrupted. “I don’t want you worrying about me—that’s not your job. You are not going to sacrifice your future because of decisions I made. This baby and I will be fine. Trust me, I’m going to sue Sebastian for so much child support he’s going to rue the day his band ever became successful.”
“Well, I definitely approve of that.” Maisey smirked. “But that’s not why. When Foz and I were in the waiting room, and Ms. Kneller’s baby was in surgery, I realized that . . . I don’t want to miss him.”
“Who?” Sophia asked, eyes wide. “Foz?”
“No . . . my brother,” Maisey replied. “I don’t want to miss a single second of him.”
Tears welled in Sophia’s eyes, as her hand fell to her growing baby bump.
“Are you sure?” she asked.
“UCLA’s got a pretty kick-ass literature program, too, you know.”
“As long as it’s not about the money. I told you not to worry about that . . . because I got a new job.”
“You did?” Maisey perked up. “Mom that’s great! Where?”
Sophia’s new job was on a sitcom. A perfect situation for her, because as they only filmed one day a week, her work hours were much more reasonable. Ironically, she was filling in for the last ten weeks of shooting for someone who was on maternity leave. The other makeup artist had stated her intention of not coming back, so, after Sophia’s own maternity leave, the job could become permanent.
She had been thrilled to get the work . . . not to mention shocked that anyone wanted to hire her. Usually when you sabotage the lead of your show—no matter how much they deserved it—it’s considered bad form.
But it turned out that Vanessa’s form was worse.
The reporters on set that day breathlessly rushed to tell the story of her histrionics—and they had audio, too. With a judicious apology, that would have likely been the end of the scandal, but Vanessa didn’t manage an apology—not a sincere one, anyway. The public saw right through her, helped by a new leak of rumors about how she hadn’t been such a peach to work with on that indie movie they did last summer. This was accompanied by a Twitter rant where she tried to defend herself, and ended up digging the hole deeper. Vanessa had always been tabloid fodder, but lately it had gotten rabid, expecting her to explode at any minute. They always had new photographs of her ducking her head as she came out of a restaurant, or preening in a club . . . and there was Sebastian, somewhere in the background, looking strangely glum under such negative scrutiny.
They deserved each other, Sophia thought.
“I’m sorry about Sebastian,” Maisey said after Sophia’s recounting.
“Don’t be,” Sophia replied. “I am 100 percent better of
f without him. And there were plenty of problems before Vanessa. It’s like he thought a blood pressure machine and a tattoo were what I needed from him.”
“Ugh, ‘Sebastian,’” her daughter commiserated. “It’s like his parents knew he was going to be an asshole, and gave him the most pretentious rock-’n’-roll name to match.”
“Oh, Sebastian’s not his real name. He chose that—and to be that—for himself,” Sophia replied.
“It’s not?”
Sophia shook her head. “His real name is Steve.”
And then, Maisey laughed. And they didn’t stop laughing, until Foz came over, his nervousness trumped by his vague befuddlement.
“What’s the joke?” he asked.
“Nothing,” Maisey said, wiping away tears. “I wasn’t able to hear when they gave you your diploma . . . is your name really Foz?”
“Uh . . . it’s short for Alphonse,” he replied, eyeing the giggling pair like they had lost their wits.
“Close enough,” Maisey allowed, her giggles subsiding.
“Can I borrow Maisey for a second?” Foz asked Sophia. “I wanted to introduce you to my grandfather.”
Sophia shooed the pair away. As they came up to Foz’s mother and grandfather, it did not go unnoticed as Maisey slipped her hand inside his.
Sophia took a deep breath, turning her face up, letting the California sun warm her. Her hands came to her belly, felt her son kick. He was just as eager to start his journey here. And Sophia was ready to guide him.
What a wonderful, wonderful day.
NATHALIE WAS VERY sorry to miss graduation this year—she had a number of seniors that she was fond of, none more so than Maisey Alvarez. And while she might have yearned to attend the festivities, even if she was on maternity leave, Nathalie had a rather good reason for skipping the chance to wish everyone good luck and listen to what was no doubt a run-of-the-mill valedictorian speech (if you’ve heard one, you’ve heard them all). Because that day, ten days after a prom night to remember, Nathalie and David finally brought Margot Kathleen Chen home.
“There she is!” Kathy cried, throwing the door open for them. “Welcome home, Margot!”
They had named the baby after Nathalie’s mother. When she thought of it, nothing felt more right. But the middle name had been up for debate—until ten days ago, when the right name became clear as day.
