Keeping Faith

by Picoult, Jodi

  Look–I watched her fall into some fit and start bleeding for no reason. I have insurance. Don’t you tell me you’ve got no medical explanation for this. Order a frigging CT scan or do bloodwork or something. You’re a doctor. You’re supposed to figure it out, and I want my daughter here until you do. Because if you release her again and she has another episode, I’m going to sue you for malpractice.”

  I think of a piece of research Dr.

  Blumberg told me about–of doctors at the turn of the century who hospitalized a stigmatic and welded an iron boot over his bleeding foot to make sure that the man was not producing the wound himself. I wonder how Colin can accuse me of ruining Faith’s life.

  Dr. Blumberg hesitates. “I can’t run tests without her mother’s consent.”

  “You have her father’s,” Colin says coldly.

  “I’ll admit her,” the doctor concedes.

  “But I don’t expect to find anything new.”

  Satisfied, Colin stands. “Can we see her now?”

  “Faith will be up on the pedi ward in a few minutes. She’ll be groggy; I gave her a sedative.” He looks from me to Colin.

  “I’ll check on her again in the morning.

  Hospital policy says that one of you can remain overnight in her room.” With a nod, he walks off.

  I straighten my shoulders, gearing for a fight,

  but to my surprise Colin announces that he’ll leave. “Faith will expect you. You stay.”

  We walk in silence to the elevator and take it to the pediatric floor. The desk nurse tells us which room is Faith’s, although she hasn’t yet returned from radiology. Colin and I enter the room, where he takes the only chair and I stand by the window with a view of the hospital’s helicopter landing pad.

  After a few minutes a nurse wheels Faith inside and helps her stumble into the bed. Her hands are wound in white bandages. “Mommy?”

  “I’m here.” I sit on the edge of the bed and touch Faith’s cheek. “How are you feeling?”

  She turns away. “I want to go home.”

  I brush her bangs back from her face. “The doctor wants you to sleep here overnight.”

  Colin leans down on the other side of the bed.

  “Hi, cookie.”

  “Daddy.”

  He gently takes her bandaged hand and strokes the skin above the gauze. “How did this happen,

  honey?” he asks. “You can tell me, and I won’t get mad. Did you hurt yourself? Did someone else hurt you? Grandma, maybe? Or that priest who visits?”

  “Oh, for God’s sake–” I interject.

  Colin narrows his eyes. “You’re not there every minute. You never know, Mariah.”

  “Next you’re going to be saying that I did it to her,” I spit out.

  Colin simply raises his brows.

  After Faith falls asleep, Colin gets to his feet. “Look, I’m sorry. It’s just eating me up inside to see her like this and not know how to fix it.”

  “You know, apologies don’t count when you qualify them.”

  Colin looks at me for a long moment. “Do we have to do it like this?”

  “No,” I whisper. “We don’t.”

  And then I am in Colin’s arms, my face pressed against his neck. He touches his forehead to my brow in a gesture that brings a stream of memories. This man I was supposed to spend my life with, I will instead be meeting in a courtroom tomorrow. “I’ll be back in the morning. I’m sure the judge can give us a continuance.”

  “I’m sure,” I repeat against his chest.

  “For what it’s worth,” he says, so quietly that I may be dreaming it, “I know it’s not you.”

  With that assurance, Colin leaves me once again.

  Kenzie microwaves a box of Pizza Bites and pours a big glass of red wine before she sits down to finish writing her recommendation to Judge Rothbottam. She imagines eating the entire box of hors d’oeuvres and maybe another and then methodically working her way through the refrigerator and freezer, stuffing herself until she cannot move. Cannot lift a finger. Cannot write this report of a guardian ad litem.

  Judge Rothbottam is expecting this report on his desk tomorrow morning, before the custody hearing is in session. Kenzie–the objective observer, the eye in the storm–is supposed to lay a foundation upon which he can balance the arguments of the plaintiff and the defendant.

  Kenzie takes a long, slow sip of wine.

  The White case is so filled with shades of gray that sometimes Kenzie doubts her ability to see clearly.

  On the one hand, she has Colin and Jessica White, a new family anchored by a father who clearly loves Faith. But Kenzie can barely stomach giving custody to a man who was so grievously unfaithful. On the other hand, there’s Mariah White, carting her emotional baggage from the past and even now–Kenzie’s sure of it!–lying, either to herself, or to Faith, or to Kenzie herself. If she leaves Faith in her mother’s custody, she does so without knowing the whole story. Yet she cannot help but notice that Mariah White, self-professed poster child for insecurity, has truly begun to turn her life around. It’s clear, too, that Faith feels very attached to her mother. But is it a healthy connection,

  or does Faith simply feel the need to take care of a mother who isn’t strong enough to take care of her?

  Kenzie sets down her wine and waits for the cursor on the computer screen to focus at the top of the document. Then she turns it off, wishing for a miracle.

  A pair of grieving relatives stand around the bed of Mamie Richardson, age eighty-two.

  After last week’s stroke, she’s been comatose.

  The doctors have explained the extent of the massive brain damage. The family has come together to pull the plug.

  Mamie’s daughter sits on one side of the bed in the ICU; Mamie’s husband of sixty years sits on the other. He strokes her leopard-spotted hand as if it were a good-luck charm, oblivious to the tears that have made a small wet spot in the waffle-weave blanket that covers Mamie’s thin legs.

  The daughter looks to the resident beside the heart-lung machine, then at her father. “All right, Daddy?” The elderly man just bows his head.

  She nods to the doctor and is suddenly stopped by the strident sound of her mother’s voice.

  “Isabelle Louise!” Mamie shouts, sitting up in bed. “What in the name of the good Lord do you think you’re doing?”

  “Mother?” the woman breathes.

  “Mamie!” her husband yells. “Oh,

  God. God! Mamie!”

  The old woman yanks the breathing tube out of her nose. “What kind of contraption have you got me hooked up to, Albert?”

  “Lie down, Mother. You had a stroke.” The daughter looks at the doctor, who first steps away in shock and then falls to checking Mamie.

  “Get a nurse,” the doctor orders Albert. But it takes a moment, because Albert cannot tear his eyes away from the woman who has defined him for half a century, the woman whose passing would have made a major part of him die, too. Then he rushes into the corridor with the energy of a man half his age, waving his arms and shouting for medical personnel to come quickly,

  to converge on the ICU room that happens to be one floor directly above that of Faith White’s.

  In the middle of the night Faith’s arm shifts and strikes me across the face. The pediatric ICU offers a cot for the parent who’s sleeping in, but I preferred to crawl into the narrow bed with Faith. This way, I could protect her, be there if she was in pain.

  Faith tosses and turns, and I press my lips to her forehead. Immediately, I draw back–

  she is burning up, hotter than I can ever remember her being. I lunge toward the headboard and push the call button.

  “Yes?”

  “My daughter’s got a fever.”

  “We’ll be right in.”

  When the nurses come, poking and prodding with thermometers and sponges of alcohol, Faith doesn’t even stir. There is a strange soundtrack accompanying their movements; it takes me a moment to re
cognize it as a rhythmic,

  tiny moan coming from deep inside Faith.

  “Can’t you page Dr. Blumberg?”

  “Mrs. White,” says one nurse, “just let us do our job, all right?”

  But I am her mother, I want to say. Won’t you let me do mine?

  “She’s a hundred and five point five,”

  I hear one nurse murmur.

  A hundred and five? I start thinking of infections of the blood, spinal meningitis,

  spreading cancers. If it was serious, wouldn’t the tests this evening have picked it up–a high white-blood-cell count? But if it wasn’t serious, why would she have such a high fever?

  I do not want to leave her, but I know I have an obligation. Stepping into the hallway, I ask to borrow the phone at the nurses’ station. There are too many people crowded into Faith’s room to let me use the one beside the bed. I rummage in my purse and unfold a small green sheet of paper with a phone number on it. “Jessica, this is Mariah White,” I manage to say. “Can you tell Colin that Faith’s taken a turn for the worse?”

  When Malcolm Metz gets to the ofice,

  called by an extremely apologetic Elkland –who was pulling an all-nighter when Colin White stormed into the lobby like an unconfined tiger–his head is still wet from his shower and his eyes are bloodshot. It pisses him off,

  particularly because he likes to look his best on days he litigates, yet he’s due in court in less than five hours, and he’s going to look as if he’s been out carousing the whole night before.

  He draws up short at the sight of his client –hair standing in tufts around his head, jacket looking slept in … and is that blood on the sleeve?

  “Christ,” Metz says. “You look worse than I do.”

  “Okay,” Colin begins, not even bothering to look at his attorney. “This is the thing.

  She’s in pain. She’s in the goddamned hospital. And I don’t care what you say, people listen to TV, and it’s going to sway what the judge thinks. Look at that nanny trial in Boston! I’m paying you a shitload of money to get a winning verdict. And I’m telling you,

  it’s happening to her in the house, Malcolm. I saw it with my own eyes. Someone or something in there is making her sick.”

  “Hang on,” Metz says. “Who’s sick?

  Who’s in the hospital?”

  Colin looks at him as if he is crazy.

  “Faith.”

  Metz’s eyes widen. “Faith’s in the hospital?”

  “She started bleeding last night. It happened right in front of me. She was just standing there and all of a sudden …” He shakes his head. “Christ,

  I’ve got to believe they can do more than give her drugs to take the edge off. I mean … something has to happen to make you bleed.”

  Metz holds up a hand. “Your daughter is in the hospital,” he clarifies.

  “Yeah.”

  “She’s under observation.”

  “That’s right.”

  A smile breaks across Metz’s face.

  “Oh, God, how perfect.” At Colin’s glare he hastens to explain himself.

  “We’ve been working up an angle for your case,

  Colin, and strangely enough, this corroborates it.” As Elkland outlines Munchausen Syndrome by Proxy for Colin, Metz thinks back to his original ex parte motion, lobbed at the judge for the hell of it, but clearly now an unconscious stroke of genius. “Picture this:

  We walk into chambers this morning and file an emergency motion, begging Rothbottam to separate Faith from her mother because her life is in serious jeopardy. The first time we did it, he thought we were bluffing, and he let her stay with her mother. But thanks to his faulty judgment, the kid’s now in the hospital. I explain Munchausen’s and tell him that our expert will prove why we need this emergency provision. Then I ask for a court order keeping Mariah away from Faith. The judge will feel so guilty about throwing out the first motion that this time he’ll jump right through my hoop.”

  Colin stares at him, scowling. “I’ve never heard of this Munchausen thing.”

  Metz grins. “Me neither. But by the time the hearing’s over, we’ll be pros.”

  He shakes his head. “I don’t know,

  Malcolm. Mariah … well, she may be a little preoccupied with herself sometimes, but she’d never intentionally hurt Faith.”

  Elkland bites her lip. “Mr. White, from what I’ve read, that’s part of the psychological disorder–looking like the ideal, concerned parent while you lie about what you’ve done.”

  “I stood two feet away from Faith last night and watched her just start to bleed,” Colin says slowly. “She didn’t prick herself on anything; she didn’t touch anything at all, in fact … and Mariah was even farther away than I was. But you’re saying that you think … you think–“

  Metz shakes his head. “The question isn’t what I think, or what you think, Colin,” he says, “but rather, what do you want the judge to think?”

  Kenzie is asleep beside her laptop when the phone rings. “Ms. van der Hoven,” says a silky voice when she lifts the receiver.

  It would be impossible, even in her state of muzzy confusion, to not recognize Malcolm Metz. “You’re up early.”

  “Five A.m. is the best part of the day.”

  “I wouldn’t know.”

  Metz chuckles. “I guess you’ve already sent in your report.”

  With a sinking sensation, Kenzie looks at the computer screen, blank as a wall.

  “I assume you faxed it to His Honor last night so the judge could read it before today’s trial.

  But I felt honor-bound to let you know something before court began.”

  “Which is what, Mr. Metz?”

  “Faith White was hospitalized last night.”

  At that, Kenzie snaps upright. “She what?”

  “As I understand from my client, she started bleeding from her hands again, and that escalated into a more serious condition.”

  “Oh, my God. Who’s with her now?”

  “Her mother, I assume.” There is a hesitation on the line. “But I wanted you to know that I plan to amend that. I’m asking the judge for a restraining order to keep Mariah away from the child.

  I have reason to believe that Mariah’s the one who’s harming Faith.”

  “You have evidence?” she asks.

  “I’ve come to the conclusion that Mrs. White suffers from a certain psychological disorder. I have an expert who’s reviewed the case, and who agrees with me.”

  “I see.”

  “Well, you will anyway. I just thought you might like to know in advance,” Metz says, and then he hangs up.

  Kenzie turns on her computer and waits for the screen to spring to life. It makes her wince–

  too much energy all at once. She begins to type furiously, hoping that she will have a chance to visit Faith before court is in session, hoping that if there is indeed a heavenly being watching over Faith, it can follow her into an ambulance, a hospital, a new and safer home.

  “I recommend that custody of Faith White,” she types, “be awarded to her father.”

  KEEPING FAITH

  Keeping Faith

  FOURTEEN

  He saved others; himself he cannot save.

  –Matthew 2742 December 3, 1999–Morning There had been times, when Faith was an infant and Mariah was still slightly amazed to find a baby sleeping beside her or nursing at her own breast, that she’d be overwhelmed with terror. Years stretched out in front of her like red roads on a map,

  filled with hazards and errors. Faith’s life,

  at that point, was unmarked and unscarred. It was up to Mariah to keep it that way.

  It became clear to her quickly that this was a job she could never adequately fill, not without feeling deficient. How could she even be considered remotely qualified to be a mother, knowing that she was every bit as fallible as this baby was perfect? In the stitch of a moment, anything could go wrong–an earthquake, a viral flu, a pacifier dro
pped into the gutter. She would look into her daughter’s face and see accidents waiting to happen. And then her vision would clear and she would see only love, a well so deep that you could try and try and never know its bottom, but only suck in your breath at its frightening depth.

  Faith stirs in her sleep, and immediately Mariah turns. Of its own volition, Faith’s bandaged hand twitches across the covers of the hospital bed and burrows beneath Mariah’s. At the contact, Faith stops moving and relaxes again.

  Suddenly Mariah wonders if moments like this are what qualify you as a good parent: realizing that no matter how you try, you will not be able to protect a child from the tragedies or the missteps or the nightmares. Maybe the job of a mother is not to shelter but to bear witness as a child hits full force … and then to cushion the fall when it’s over.

  Mariah’s hands are pressed tight against her mouth. She has to keep them that way, because if she doesn’t she will surely break into loud, hoarse sobs or shout at one of the well-meaning nurses to get away from her daughter.

  “I don’t understand,” Millie says quietly, standing with Mariah a few feet from Faith’s bed. “She’s never been sick like this before. Maybe it’s a bug, something she caught on top of the bleeding.”

  “It’s not a bug,” Mariah whispers.

  “She’s dying.”

  Millie looks up, startled. “What on earth makes you say that?”

  “Look at her.”

  Faith is pale against the hospital sheets.

  Her hands, still oozing blood, are matted with bandages that have not yet been changed. Her fever has fluctuated from 104 to 106 degrees, no matter how many tepid baths and alcohol washes and grams of Tylenol and Advil she’s been given intravenously. Watching her makes Mariah nervous. She finds herself staring at the slight flare of Faith’s nostrils, counting the subtle rhythms of her chest.

  Millie purses her mouth and walks from Faith’s room to the comparative quiet of the front desk. “Has Colin White called?”

  she asks, knowing that the phones in Faith’s room have been diverted to allow her to sleep.

  “No, Mrs. Epstein,” the nurse says.

  “I’ll come in the minute he does.”