“Why are you and Daddy forcing Clara to give up her baby?” I could hear my voice going up in volume. “It’s so mean! Clara wants to keep her baby!”
I was still angry about Christopher Feeney, but I felt like taking it out on Mom. She was such a target, sitting in the dark. The outrageous words had tumbled out of my mouth, and now I was like a speeding train with no brakes. “Mother,” I said, pushing the knife in, “did Daddy make you give up your February, 1944 baby, like he’s making Clara give up hers?” I felt cruel and powerful, and I knew this would get her. She raised her voice, a tone I recognized from just before getting spanked. This time, I wasn’t scared at all. She stood up.
“You have no idea what you’re talking about!”
But I knew the photograph was the only clue left about that baby. She and Daddy had hidden the whole thing, like the baby didn’t even exist.
“You’re trying to hide Clara’s baby, just like you covered up your disappeared baby. It’s a real baby! You can’t make it just go away forever!”
“This is none of your business, Annie,” she said, pushing herself up from the bed.
“You say a new baby means there is more love to go around? How can that be? When that baby gets given away to a stranger, where’s the love in that?”
“Annie!” she snapped at me, her voice even louder. “That baby could ruin Clara’s life. She hasn’t even graduated from high school! She can’t afford to raise it.”
“Why should she have to? Why can’t she just move in with us? That baby is just one more tiny mouth to feed. You were going to have another baby yourself, until the miscarriage—you weren’t worried about how big its mouth was.”
I stood in the doorway, waiting for another touché phrase to leap into my mind. Mother came right up to me, gathering strength into her body. I could almost see her straighten up from inside. I was just about as tall as she was. I pushed my shoulders back and tried to grow.
“Get out of here, Annie,” she said firmly. “Before you say something you’re going to regret.”
“You just pump ’em out so Daddy can brag about how great he is to have so many kids!” I blurted. Instantly, her hand flew at me; I felt a sharp pain across my cheek.
“Don’t you ever talk to me this way!” she said, and pushed past me out of the room.
I stomped out of her bedroom like a two-year-old, slobbering and sobbing, my face beet red, my chest heaving. Mother had never slapped me before, but at least she heard what I said. The fight had given me power; I walked as fast as I could down the block to the corner and turned right, up Orange Grove Boulevard. Finally, I was running away from home! I walked quickly so as not to lose my nerve.
It took about a half hour to get to the Greyhound bus station at the pace I was going, and all the way, I stared down at my feet on the sidewalk, having imaginary conversations with Mother where I just shut her down with cutting phrases and witty retorts. I was the poster kid for the debating team, until a creeping feeling of remorse seeped into my consciousness for what I had said. Suddenly small things, like how pale Mother looked and the tone of her desperate sigh, came back to me. You have no idea what you’re talking about, rang in my head. Why wouldn’t she tell me about that disappeared baby? Maybe it wasn’t hers after all. Or maybe it died.
But by that time I had already bought my ticket and boarded the bus. I sat in my high-backed seat by the large window for a long time as the bus went on the freeways and stopped in the towns on the way to Ventura. For some reason I noticed the small creatures hanging around the stations, like birds, hopping around. A lady walked up the aisle holding a box with a handle, and there was an animal in it. She sat across from me. Once the bus started up again, she took a dog out of its cage. It was the strangest looking creature, really small and skinny and shaved to within an inch of its life, with grey and pink skin and bangs that hung over its face between its pointed ears. It sat on the lady’s lap, shivering, and I instantly liked it even though it was making a small rumbling sound in its throat like it was going to erupt into a sharp bark. I saw a couple of mangy kittens at one stop, hanging out in the weeds and prancing on things. In Ventura, big, white seagulls dipped on the breeze and that’s when I had the thought that before each being comes into the world, its number one job is to get born. A lot of people and creatures seem extremely desperate to get born. We’re all pretty desperate in our family, and our Mother was willing. So birth is probably something that’s not super complicated, when you have those two factors lined up—desperation and willingness—because a lot of people and creatures have gotten through it.
In order for us to be here, millions of years later.
Chapter 32
the bus
Dear God the Father, Who’s left up there? I can’t seem to reach anyone.
When I stepped off the bus in Ventura, the air was cooler and I could smell the salt from the ocean. There was a big white wall clock over the door. 4:00. It was Friday, December 6th, the beginning of the weekend. I walked to the Mission and went directly to the reception desk. One of the nuns told me that Clara was probably at the library. So I got directions, left the convent, and walked a couple blocks over there.
Clara was surprised to see me, and I was exceptionally glad to see her. We hugged each other like I was going to the electric chair and this was our last embrace.
“How’s the baby, Clara?”
“Shhhh,” she shushed me, motioning around her, “We’re in a library.”
“Sorry,” I said, lowering my voice. “Is it coming soon?” I put my hands on her big belly. It was very firm.
“I’m feeling some contractions,” she whispered. “I’ve had them off and on for about five days.”
“Has anyone tried to get you to sign the papers yet?”
“Here, I’m having one now!” She grabbed my hand and put it on her belly. It felt like her belly was vibrating under the skin. She took a breath in and exhaled. We both stood there, listening with our hands, until it stopped.
“Did you find any one of the girls at the Mission who is going to keep her baby?”
“Annie, it’s the strangest thing. It was staring me in the face. Everyone is here because they are giving up their baby.”
“Oh, right.”
“They’re here so no one will know back home. Otherwise, why be separated from your family at a time like this?”
“That’s what I keep thinking.” But really, I was thinking how everyone back home knows all about Clara now, because I blabbed to Christopher Feeney.
“They talk to me about adoption every day,” she said. “I just nod and ignore them.”
“But what are you going to do?”
“I’m not sure. I’m just glad you’re here.”
“I brought you some money. So you can go to the Y afterwards.” I reached into my pocket and pulled out $33. “Sorry, I had to use some of it for the bus.”
“Annie,” she said, “This is so sweet of you. Really. But I can’t take it,” she said, pressing the bills into my palm. How are you going to get back home in time?”
“I’m not going back.”
“Where are you going to stay?”
“I came here to be with you when you have the baby. So they can’t take it away from you.”
“They won’t let anyone in the labor room except the doctors and nurses. Annie, does anyone know you’re here?”
“I got kicked out of school.”
“What happened?” she said, sounding like Mother does when I can’t thread the sewing machine needle. I started to cry right away. Clara put her arms around me and patted my head. That made it worse. I couldn’t stop blubbering. Of course I had to think about why I got kicked out of school, namely, the fight between me and Wanda, which was caused by the fact that Christopher Feeney told his sister Teresa that Clara was pregnant, which was caused by the fact that I told Christopher Feeney that he was the father of Clara’s baby. Which Clara made me promise I’d never do. Even though I meant
well. The road to hell really is paved with good intentions.
Clara had no idea, but she kept being understanding. It felt so good to have someone hold me and sympathize with me.
“You’re such a good student,” she said, curling my hair around my ear, like Mother does.
“I was planning on coming up here anyway, ever since your second letter.” I tried to stop sobbing, but sucked in the air, three gulps in a row, like the little kids do when they are pathetically inconsolable.
“How could you, of all people, get kicked out of school?”
“I got into a fight with Wanda.” When I said that, I could feel a resolve that straightened me right out. It was like the hot feeling when Daddy belted me in front of everyone. I was so angry about what Wanda was doing to Clara’s reputation, and how she betrayed all of us, that I got steely. I stopped crying.
“She’s your best friend, isn’t she?” Clara remembered.
“She used to be.”
“Annie, what if I don’t have the baby right away? How can you stay here?” She stopped me in my tracks with that question. I hadn’t even thought about it.
“Can I stay in your room? There was an extra bed in there.”
“The nuns won’t let you. I’m pretty sure. They’ll call Mother and Daddy. Besides, I have a new roommate.”
“Maybe the Y?”
“Oh, here feel this. It’s happening again.” I held her belly with both hands. This time I could feel movement under her skin all over the big beach ball. She stared straight ahead, almost like I wasn’t there. Her mouth was slightly open and she was sort of panting, like she was a dog.
“Wow, that one was stronger!” she enthused, after it was over.
“It’s pretty amazing how we all get born, isn’t it?” I said, sounding like I could give a lecture on it. Even though the only experience I had was being born.
“These early contractions are called Braxton Hicks contractions.”
“What does it feel like?”
“When it gets stronger, it’s like a cramp, but right now it’s just like a muscle moving. They help prepare the body for labor. Look at this,” she said, pointing to a black and white drawing in a book with a lot of words. “That’s the uterus. It’s the strongest muscle in the whole body. Isn’t that amazing? But it makes sense. That’s what pushes the baby out. This big muscle just squeezing until the baby gets expelled.” She started gathering her books and pens.
We took a walk over to the hospital a few blocks away. I’m not sure if we were headed there on purpose, or if we just ended up there. We strolled through the cemetery with a view of the Pacific Ocean. The bright green grass stretched for an entire city block and sloped down the hill, dappled by the shade of sprawling oak trees. We stepped around the occasional plaques here and there on the lawn. It seemed odd that Clara, who was bringing a new baby into the world, was walking over the tops of the graves of people long turned to dust. Every few minutes or so we stopped, and she let another one of these Hicks contractions go through her. We came to a bus stop and she sat down for one of them. By the time we got to the hospital, she was breathing very deliberately, with her mouth open.
“I think the baby is coming,” she said. She squeezed my hand. I squeezed back. I looked at her. She smiled at me and winked.
“How long do you think it will take?” I asked her.
“It’s going to take as long as it’s going to take. Sometimes it goes on for like, 24 hours, or even more.”
“I wonder if we should check into the hospital, now that we’re here?” I said, “We don’t have to worry about the priest making you sign the papers, do we? That would have already happened back at the Mission, right?”
“Some of the mothers are forced to sign the papers right after the baby is born.”
“Right.”
“I can’t pay for the hospital myself, and it’s all been arranged through the Sisters of Saint Isabella. So if I check into the hospital, they’ll be notified.”
“If I’m there, they can’t force you.”
“They won’t let you in the labor room.”
“Well, I’ll be right outside the door. Just remember that.” We were in the lobby of the hospital. Clara sat down on a soft chair. I could see she was having another contraction.
“Tell them you have to ask your sister first.”
“I don’t want to sign in,” Clara said, almost like she was mad at me. “If I can get through this birth without letting them drug me to sleep, I won’t let them take my baby.”
“Tell them you don’t want any drugs.”
“Bee Bee said you’re lying on your back with your legs up and nothing on your bottom.”
“Don’t worry about nothing on your bottom,” I reassured her. “Bitty didn’t have anything on her bottom. You have to let the baby out, and it can’t come out if there are underpants in the way.”
“I’m not worried about nothing on my bottom. Bee Bee said they tied her arms to the bed. And they covered her face and she had to breathe into a mask.”
“Oh.”
“The next thing she knew, she was waking up and they were putting drops in her baby’s eyes across the room. Then a nurse took her baby away.”
“And she never saw her again,” I said.
“Well, just once, in the nursery,” Clara reminded me. I didn’t say anything. I couldn’t tell her, even now, that I was the only one who saw Lily.
“Why are we even here right now?” I said. “This is a hospital.”
“Good question,” she said. “Let’s get out of here.”
“Where to?”
“We could sit in the park,” she suggested.
“It’s almost dark, and there’s no one around,” it occurred to me. “We need people around.”
“What for?”
“In case we need help. Isn’t that why you go to the hospital?” I didn’t know much about birth, and that was my back-up plan: other people who knew more than I did.
“Listen Annie, I’m not going to the hospital. Women never used to go to the hospital. A hundred years ago, no one went. Women had their babies in the fields.”
“Yeah, even nowadays, babies are born in cars by accident. For instance.”
“For thousands of years,” she said, her voice louder than I would have preferred, “every single baby was not born in a hospital. Birth is a force. That’s how come we’re all here today, every single person on the earth. Not because of hospitals.”
I couldn’t figure it out. Cats don’t go to the hospital, and they have seven kittens at a time. But humans? They only have one at a time, unless there’s twins. Maybe they’re afraid the baby might get stuck. Even though I saw Bitty do it, it was still hard to imagine a human baby’s head coming out the third hole. I didn’t know what to say. I just stared at her.
“I’m not going to the hospital, Annie. We have to find another plan.”
“Could we at least be in a place where there’s people around?”
“The library?”
“It closes.”
Clara got up. I followed her to the sidewalk. Something splashed on my leg. I looked down. The entire sidewalk around us was wet. It was almost a puddle.
“My water broke,” she said. She sounded excited.
“What water?”
“Now the baby can come out.” We were standing in front of the bus stop and a stinker wheezed up in front of us and stopped right in front of Clara. The doors flapped open and we were enveloped with the diesel that poured out of the pipe at the back.
“C’mon, she said, there are people on the bus! We could ride the bus.” She hoisted herself up the steep bus steps and stood at the top, face to face with the driver. Behind her, I dug into my bag. Clara reached into her pocket and produced a one-dollar bill. The driver, sitting in his cage of shiny steel poles said,
“You look like you’re just about ready to burst.”
Clara shrugged, smiling. “Any minute, now, I guess. But not yet!” Sh
e smiled up at the bus driver and he threw his head back in a gesture which said, Get on the bus.
“It’s on me,” he said. “Where are you going?”
“I’m going where this bus goes,” Clara announced.
“This is just a local sputterer,” he said, “we take the high roads of Ventura. Up Foothill all the way out to Kimball. And back.”
“Perfect!” Clara squealed. “We’ll just go for a ride, then.”
I had a good look at the bus driver as I ascended the steep bus stairs. (Usually ascend would be a big vocabulary word, but since I’m Catholic, I know words like ascension and conception and immaculate like I know the back of my hand.) He had deep brown eyes and black hair and his skin was as tan as the shell of a coconut. His badge read Santiago. He had a friendly paunch, but it was his voice that sounded reasonable and kind.
“You can sit right up front if you want, in the handicapped seats, Ma’am.”
A couple of passengers stood and offered Clara their seat. But Clara waddled in front of me, holding onto the metal backs of the seats as she made her way to the back of the bus. Passengers overflowed out of the seats, and of course their eyes popped at Clara. On a bus, it’s forced staring when someone comes up the aisle. There’s nothing else to look at. Santiago kept idling the bus until Clara reached the bench over the motor and sat down. I was behind her and I could see her dress was drenched from the water just broken on the sidewalk. At the back, she sat right on that wet dress, smack dab in the middle of the cushions with her legs slightly apart, and her arms holding the two metal bars on the seats in front on either side. I positioned myself in one of those seats where I had a good view of the bus if I looked to my left, and a good view of Clara if I looked to my right.
“Clara,” I said. But she was in the middle of a contraction, breathing out through her mouth.
“Annie,” she said after she came out of that one. “I could be in labor right now.”
I looked at Santiago. Our eyes met in the rearview mirror.
“I’m excited.”
“Me, too,” I said.
A Theory of Expanded Love Page 24
