Hazel's Theory of Evolution

by Lisa Jenn Bigelow

  I clapped my hands to my mouth. My eyes blurred. My head went floaty. I wanted to cry, to laugh, to scream. I wanted to slide to the floor, my body melting into pudding. All the months of waiting and worry, after years of heartbreak, and the day had finally arrived. The baby—our baby—Dinah—was here.

  What a diff’rence a day made, and the diff’rence is you.

  “That’s great,” Rowan was saying. “What a relief. Congratulations to both of you!”

  “Is Hazel still there?” Mom sounded concerned. “Is she all right?”

  “I think she’s fallen into a delighted trance,” Rowan said. “Her eyes are sort of glazed.” That roused me enough to slap him on the arm. “Ouch! Nope, I take it back. She’s conscious.”

  “When can we see them?” I asked. “Can we come over right now? Please?”

  Mom sighed. “That’s the tough thing. Mimi’s going to need a lot of rest the next few days. Her blood pressure needs to be monitored until it returns to a normal level. After that, she’ll be discharged. As for the baby—well, it will be a few weeks before she can come home.”

  “A few weeks!” A lump lodged in my throat.

  “She’s mostly cooked,” said Mom, “but preemies need extra help. She’ll be in the NICU—neonatal intensive care unit—for as long as she needs.” Her cheery tone didn’t quite mask the strain underneath.

  “You didn’t answer my question,” I said. “When can we see them?”

  “I’m not sure about Dinah, but the doctors say Mimi could handle a visit tomorrow. Rowan or I will pick you up from school and drive over to the hospital. How does that sound?”

  I sighed. “If that’s the best we can do.”

  “I’m afraid it is, sweetie. But you hang in there—both of you. Rowan, can you handle the herd again tomorrow morning?”

  “Of course,” he said. “I was planning on it.”

  “I’ll make sure he gets up on time,” I said.

  Rowan rolled his eyes. Mom laughed. “The two of you make quite a team. When it comes to siblings, Dinah won the lottery.”

  I mostly finished my homework. I went to school the next morning, planning to ask my remaining teachers for an extension. A new baby in the family made a good excuse, right?

  At lunch, Carina and Yosh were strangely quiet, paying far more attention to their food than to each other or me. Their maybe-date must not’ve been a complete disaster, or they wouldn’t be sitting together, but it didn’t seem like it had been a roaring success, either.

  “How was the movie?” I asked, breaking the silence.

  Carina picked up a fry and drew paisleys with her ketchup. “It was good.”

  “Not bad,” Yosh agreed. “I’m still waiting for Komodo to get a movie, though.”

  As usual, everything Yosh said made zero sense to me.

  “Komodo’s a superhero,” Carina explained. “She’s Japanese American. And disabled. She lost her legs in a car crash.” She raised her eyebrows significantly.

  Yosh cleared his throat. “More to the point, she’s a badass—and for the record, I liked her long before my accident. She drank this lizard juice with regenerative properties. Now she can transform into a lizard thing with razor-sharp claws.”

  “A lizard thing with razor-sharp claws?” I said. “I can see why you’d relate to her.”

  Carina burst into giggles, and the tension was broken. “How about you?” she asked. “How was your weekend with the goats?”

  “It was . . . eventful.” The story spilled out of me in all its gory detail. Well, most of its gory detail. I left out my meltdown. It was way too humiliating to share.

  Yosh looked confused. “I didn’t even know your mom was pregnant.”

  “You didn’t?” I thought back over the fall and realized he was right. I’d never brought it up, not even when we were working on the flour baby project. “Carina never mentioned it?”

  She shook her head. “You didn’t want to talk about it. I figured I shouldn’t either.”

  “Oh. Good point. Thanks.”

  “Were you jealous?” Yosh asked. “Was that the issue?”

  “No, that wasn’t the issue,” I shot back. Then I realized maybe he wasn’t judging me. Maybe he was just curious. And how could I expect either Yosh or Carina to think differently if I didn’t open up?

  I put down my sandwich and took a deep breath. “Here’s what you don’t know. This wasn’t the first time Mimi got pregnant.”

  I stopped. Neither of them said anything. They watched and waited.

  I hugged myself. “This was the third time. The other two babies didn’t make it.”

  Kirsten would have said, So what? They weren’t real people. If at first you don’t succeed, try, try again! You can’t make a baby without breaking a few eggs. Or something awful like that.

  But Carina said, “Oh Hazel. That’s so sad.”

  And Yosh said, “No wonder you freaked when Bernadette bit the dust.”

  I sighed. “None of that matters now. Mimi’s fine, and the baby is here. Her name is Dinah. She has to stay at the hospital a few weeks, but she’s fine. Everything is fine. Probably.”

  “Wait a second,” Yosh said, “is this why you had a problem with the family tree?”

  “What family tree?” asked Carina.

  “We had to draw one in H and HD. Hazel was acting squirrelly, and, being me, I hassled her about it.” He turned to me. “Sorry, Hazel. In retrospect, I must’ve been a ginormous jerk.”

  “It’s okay,” I said. “It just got too complicated.”

  Carina looked confused. “What was complicated about it?”

  “Oh, you know. Whether to include Lena and Miles. Whether they count.”

  “Of course they count!”

  “Not everyone would agree.”

  “Those people are idiots,” Yosh said. “Why didn’t you ask Mrs. Paradisi what she thought?”

  I remembered her asking me to stay after class and asking about Lena and Miles point-blank. It seemed obvious now that she’d suspected the truth from the beginning.

  I planted my face in my hands. “I’m so stupid. I’m a traitor.”

  “Stop, please,” Carina said.

  “Yeah,” Yosh said. “Cut yourself some slack.”

  “But I told Mrs. Paradisi they were cats!” I protested, peeking up through my fingers.

  Carina and Yosh looked at each other, then back at me, their mouths hanging open. It was clear they had no idea how to react. They looked like cartoons. I started to laugh, and they started laughing, too.

  “Cats!” Carina said. “What made you say cats? You don’t even have real cats!”

  “I have no idea. I was desperate,” I said. “I feel so guilty. Those essays, where we had to talk about how the people in our family have shaped us? I completely left them out.”

  “To be fair, it’s not like you had a chance to know them,” Yosh said.

  “But that’s the thing,” I said. “Even without them being here, we felt them all the time—the fact that we’d lost them and would never get them back.”

  “You’re giving me goose bumps,” Carina said with a shiver.

  “After Lena and Miles, I hoped Mimi was done trying. I was scared all of our hearts would be broken again. I was scared our family couldn’t survive so much sadness. So when she got pregnant this time, I wouldn’t let myself be happy.”

  We were quiet a moment. Then Yosh said, “You should write about that.”

  “About what?”

  “What you just told us. You said you’re feeling guilty for leaving Lena and Miles out of your essay for H and HD. Well, put them in. Write an addendum or whatever.”

  “That unit ended long ago,” I said. “Mrs. Paradisi doesn’t care what I have to say at this point, unless it’s about drugs and alcohol.”

  “Maybe not,” Yosh said. “But you do.”

  “She’ll think I’m weird.”

  “No, she won’t,” Carina said. “She’ll think you’re a
person with feelings.”

  “And anyway, weird is underrated,” Yosh said.

  I shook my head, not sure whether to argue, laugh, or cry. “Don’t take this the wrong way,” I said, “but I need to say something I’ve never said to anyone before except for my family and my dog and our goats and our guard donkey and my friend Becca.”

  Carina tipped her head. Yosh lifted an eyebrow.

  “I love you two,” I said. Then I crumpled my lunch bag and ran out of the cafeteria.

  I dodged the hall monitor, yelling, “I’m going to vomit!” and headed for the restroom. I didn’t really think this would be the incident to break my ten-year no-vomiting streak. On the other hand, I felt like I’d taken a scalpel to my own chest, laying my beating heart bare for Carina and Yosh. One sharp poke, and it might burst.

  Kids stumbled and yanked each other out of the way to make a path for me. There was a fair chance I’d be Barf Girl for the rest of the year, but I didn’t care at the moment. All I could think was I needed to get somewhere private. I wished I were at home in the half-ton, an island floating on a sea of prairie grass, the herd its mostly benevolent—if noisy—residents.

  It wasn’t until after I’d skidded into the restroom, banging into the wheelchair stall at the end, that I registered the rubber-soled footsteps pounding behind me. “Hazel!” Carina called. “Are you in here?” Without waiting for me to answer, she moved along the line of stalls, pausing every couple of paces to check for shoes. I pressed myself into the corner of the extra-wide stall, but she wasn’t fooled. “Can I come in?” she asked.

  I thought about keeping up the game, pretending I was nothing more than a sister to Yosh’s cafeteria poltergeist. But Carina knew better, and I didn’t want her to resort to rolling under the stall door. The floor was gross. I turned the latch to let her in. “Hey.”

  “Hey.” She shut the door behind her. “What the heck was that about?”

  “I got weird. I’m sorry.”

  “About which part? Saying you loved us? Because that was sort of sweet. The running away was weird, though.”

  I forced myself to look into her face. “You thought it was sweet?”

  “I wasn’t expecting it—Yosh definitely wasn’t expecting it—but sure. Are you okay?”

  “Yeah. Thanks.” I took off my glasses and gave them a wipe with my shirttail. When I put them back on, the world seemed a little more normal. Carina, leaning against the tile wall, gave me a little elf grin. I asked, “How was Saturday night? Really?”

  She paused. “Honestly? Pretty awkward. It was different from when we’re hanging out at lunch or playing video games. For some reason, we barely thought of anything to say to each other. I was glad when the movie started so we wouldn’t have to talk. I don’t think either of us is ready to be more than friends.”

  I nodded. I never would have told her, but I was relieved. I liked the way things were.

  “We should get to class,” Carina said, “but I also need to say something.”

  “What is it?”

  “I love you too. And I’m glad you’re my best friend.” She squeezed my hand and opened the door. We went back into the world.

  Chapter 26

  Tiny specks of snow were drifting across a gray backdrop of clouds when Mom picked me up after school. It probably wouldn’t amount to anything, but I was glad it hadn’t been snowing even this much on Saturday. If I’d had to worry about the ambulance sliding off the road or getting stuck in a drift, my head probably would have exploded. I decided humans should be more like goats and have their babies once winter was over.

  We pulled into the hospital parking garage. Mom led me briskly through the pastel-carpeted halls toward the OB wing. The place still felt like a maze to me, but Mom knew where to go. She waved and said hi to the staff at the nurses’ station, and received smiles in return.

  Mom rapped lightly on the doorframe before stepping into Mimi’s room. A long curtain blocked our view of the bed. Mom pushed the edge aside. “Mikayla?” she called softly. “Honey?”

  Mimi’s response was too quiet for me to hear, but Mom beckoned to me a second later. Part of me wanted to fly across the room and tackle Mimi in a hug. Part of me was scared to hurt her. And part of me was still so ashamed of the way I’d acted on Saturday. I shuffled inside.

  As I peeked around the curtain, Mimi opened her eyes. “Hey, is that my Hazel? Get over here, and give me a kiss.” She sounded tired. Her arms dangled tubes and wires connecting her to an IV drip and at least two beeping machines. But she wasn’t so puffy anymore—or so pregnant. When she opened her arms to give me a weak hug, I knew she’d forgiven me.

  “I’m glad you and Dinah are okay,” I said, “and I’m glad you named Dinah Dinah.”

  “It’s a good name, isn’t it?” Mimi said. “Good thing your other mother didn’t get her way, or she might have been named Sycamore or Hecate.”

  We all laughed, especially Mom. Hers was more of a cackle, appropriately enough.

  “How are you feeling?” I asked, biting my lip. “Really?”

  Mimi made a face. “I’d feel better if I had my baby . . . and my case files. I was supposed to be in court tomorrow.”

  “Your colleagues will do an excellent job of defending that young man,” Mom said soothingly.

  “Not as excellent as I would,” Mimi said with a pout. But I had the feeling she wouldn’t be thinking about the case at all if she had Dinah in her arms.

  “Where is Dinah?” I asked. “Have you seen her?”

  “I have,” Mimi said. “I’ve been to see her a bunch. But I admit I didn’t expect things to go down this way. Me in a wheelchair, her hooked up to all these gadgets. I’m supposed to be holding her. And I was hoping to breastfeed, but so far that hasn’t been going too well. I’m happy things are as good as they are—overjoyed—”

  She didn’t look overjoyed, though. She blinked hard and swiped at her eyes with a knuckle. Mom rubbed her shoulder. I felt completely useless. For so long I’d feared my family’s story would never have a happy ending. Now that Dinah was here, things still didn’t feel happy, exactly. It didn’t even feel like an ending so much as the briefest hitch in breath. Everything was more complicated than I’d expected.

  “I’m going home to help Rowan with the milking,” Mom said. “He’s been working hard today.”

  “Good,” Mimi said, forcing out a little laugh. “Gotta make sure he earns his keep.”

  “I can go help, too,” I said quickly. I felt my meltdown hanging in the room like an unacknowledged bad smell. If I were left alone with Mimi, we might have to talk about it.

  “Nope,” Mom said, kissing me on the forehead. “The most helpful thing you can do is stay here and keep Mimi company. I’ll send Rowan back to pick you up. Go to the coffee cart and get yourself a muffin if you get hungry.” She pressed some money into my hand.

  Mimi and I watched the curtain swing shut behind her. Neither of us spoke for a long moment. Finally, Mimi said, “Grab the lotion from my bag, would you? It’s as dry as Death Valley in here.”

  I retrieved it and watched as she squirted some into her hands and rubbed it over her neck and arms. The bottle had a Thimbleweed Farm label: cucumber and mint. She handed it back, and I set it on the bedside cart where she could reach it if she needed it again.

  My stomach hurt, but I couldn’t wait any longer. “Mimi, I’m sorry. About Saturday.”

  “It wasn’t a good day for either of us, babe. But it turned out all right in the end, wouldn’t you say?” She smiled wanly. “We’ve got Dinah.”

  “Yes . . . but I was so scared.”

  “I know. I was, too.”

  “Mom and Rowan told me to act positive, but I couldn’t pretend,” I said. “So I tried to act like it wasn’t happening at all. But that didn’t work either.” I forced myself to look into Mimi’s dark eyes. They were soft. “Mimi, do you think you’ll ever have another baby?”

  “Wow,” Mimi said, “you don’t miss
a beat, do you? Tell you what, give me another twelve hours to think about it.” She sobered. “Why do you ask?”

  I took a deep breath. What place did I have saying what I was about to say? But I said it anyway. “I don’t want you to. It’s too scary. It’s too hard.”

  I looked away. I didn’t want to see disappointment on her face.

  Her warm hand covered mine. “When I got pregnant with Dinah, I decided it would be my last try. Either the third time was the charm, or it wasn’t meant to be. I didn’t mean that in any woo-woo, hand-of-Fate kind of way, just maybe there was something about my body that couldn’t support a baby. But more than that, the toll was too great.”

  “The toll? You mean how much the sperm cost?”

  “No,” Mimi said. “It wasn’t cheap, but I figured if a healthy baby was waiting at the end, it was totally worth it. No, the emotional toll. Like you said, this has been hard. On me. On Mom. On you and Rowan, too.”

  “So you were ready to give up?”

  “Not exactly. No more insemination, I was sure of that. But there were other options. We could have adopted or fostered. We still could. There’s more than one way to grow a family.”

  “I’m really happy about Dinah, but I still feel sad about Lena and Miles,” I blurted. “And I feel sad for you and Mom, losing them. But I also feel sad for me because I didn’t get to be their big sister, and that’s selfish. I shouldn’t be thinking about me.”

  “If us wanting Lena and Miles here makes us selfish, so be it,” Mimi said forcefully. “God knows wanting a child isn’t a selfless act. We bring children into the world knowing that despite our best efforts, they’ll suffer. We do it anyway.”

  “Instinct?” I asked. “The drive to procreate?”

  “Yes, but I think it’s even more. I think it’s love.”

  “Love?” We were veering into greeting-card territory. I felt safer with science.

  “We crave it,” Mimi said. “From family, from friends, from partners. It’s like a drug—no, it’s like food, like air. Having a baby is an attempt to get even more love in our lives.”

  “Did it work? Did you love Lena and Miles?” I was pretty sure of the answer, but I wanted to hear her say it.