What We Leave Behind (34 page)

“Alright, and Jess, thank you for listening,” he added.

I hung up the phone and walked to the bathroom. I needed a lot more than minutes to reduce the puffiness that marked my face. The mirror saw tired eyes, an aging reflection, and something else not easily recognizable. I opened the cabinet that housed my cosmetics and crèmes, searching for something in there that would help me to dissolve feelings.

I skipped breakfast altogether, feigning disinterest. The sight of any type of food would make me nauseous. I did have some coffee, the warm liquid flooding my bloodstream like a temporary drug, and was out the door by seven thirty.

Had I stepped from the building one minute later, we would have passed each other on the street like two random commuters. Instead, the doorman opened the stately brass door to a brisk Manhattan morning, and there was my husband getting out of a limousine in front of the hotel. My heart leaped at the sight of him. Revelation turned into fear, completely passing over joy, and headed straight to anger. I had forgotten that he had the resources and connections to maneuver about the country quickly and unconventionally. He must have hitched a ride with an artist or a friend, flying late into the night. That was typical Marty, efficient in the face of adversity. When he wanted something, he got it. Had it only been the night before that I’d seen his face on TV?

Whoever termed the phrase
carpe diem
had never stepped into my shoes. How was I supposed to seize the day when it entailed repairing my marriage and saving my young daughter, who happens not to be my husband’s, but the result of a one-night stand with the ex-love of my life? I could not seize the day, and I certainly could not seize that particular moment. John Keating was going to have to come up with something a little more manageable for people who make a habit of messing up their lives and the lives of those around them.

“What are you doing up and about so early?” he asked, cheerfully. “I was hoping I’d sneak into your bed and curl up next to you.”

My body stiffened at the thought. I wanted to throttle him with my pocketbook, even if he looked more gorgeous than he did on MTV. He had that bedhead thing going on from the plane ride. It was sexy, and I wanted to stroke it, but I held back. I was angry at his timing, and angry for what I knew was his guilt trying to work me. I mulled over the options in my head: go to my sickly daughter or bicker with Marty?

“I have an appointment. I need to be there at eight.” My words were stunted. I sounded like one of the artists we worked with who could carry a tune, but not a sentence. Which reminded me again of Stella and why I sounded so disjointed and why I wanted to beat him in the head with my pocketbook, which I clutched tightfisted in my eager hand. “I didn’t expect you so early.”

At this point, he was watching me with a doubtful, guarded expression on his face. I thought I heard him say something about how skinny I looked, which he knew would offend me because I don’t find exceptionally thin women to be appealing. I was sorry I had skipped breakfast, and I was even sorrier for the week’s worth of breakfasts I had skipped, contributing to my cadaverous figure.

“I’ll take a ride with you,” he blurted out; and it was a blurt, because I had one leg in a cab, hoping to be on my way, and in a Concorde-like movement, he was right up next to me on the torn leather seat, and we were heading to the hospital. The hotel and the idea of revenge had all but disappeared in the exhaust that streamed behind us.

“What did you want to talk to me about?” he began.

“Not now,” I said.

“Yes, now,” he said.

“Trust me, not now.”

“Jessica, tell me. There’s nothing you can’t say to me.”

“This is different. This is complicated.” I said.

“It doesn’t have to be.”

“I don’t have much time, Marty. I’d rather discuss this with you in private,” I said, glancing at the overanxious and overly friendly cab driver who kept remarking about how gorgeous the day was. “It’s too long and convoluted a story to tell in ten minutes of traffic.”

“Just say it, Jess.”

My mouth wouldn’t open. He reached for my hand.

“It’s hard.”

He squeezed. It was his way of letting me know he was there for me, that he could help if I’d let him. I could push him away, but Marty could see beyond what was in front of him. He’d witnessed me at my weakest moment and still found it in his heart to love me. That was the exceptional man he was, and the kind of woman I had wanted to become, but somewhere along the way I got lost. Misplaced, I like to call it.

“I just don’t know if I’m ready. It’s a lot to deal with, and I’d never hurt you, not purposely, but these things are complex and they’re going to change us. I’m not ready for the blame and accusations.”

“Why don’t you let me decide how I’m going to react?”

“I’m telling you all this so you know that I’ve thought it through. I know what it’ll do to you. I’m preparing you for something you could have never made up yourself. It’d be a lot easier if you did, if it were one of your twisted plots.”

“I would never make up something that would hurt the people I love.”

The taxi driver finally gave up when he realized neither of us cared about the beauty of the day. Even if there were an earthquake outside, we wouldn’t have noticed. I was sure through his silence, he was eavesdropping on our every word. I didn’t care. We’d be out of his car in a minute or two. We, Marty and I, had a lot to uncover and learn about each other.

“This is my stop,” I said.

Marty’s face changed. He seemed to understand what I needed from him. “What time will you be done?”

“I don’t know.”

“Call me and we’ll meet somewhere.”

He let go of my hand as I climbed out of the car, his fingers slipping away from mine in one determined motion. I had the driver let me off at the corner, and when the cab was no longer in sight, I walked the few streets to the hospital.

When Jonas taught me to drive his car, I’m sure he didn’t know at the time how shifting gears would be useful to me thirteen years down the road. I’ve since learned that shifting gears is not limited to driving cars and machines on life’s highways. It is an innate ability that fortunate ones are borne with and steers us through life’s other highways, the complicated issues of people and problems. I was shifting gears as I approached the floor that housed Michelle. My husband would take a backseat for now, while I dealt with the other bumps in the road.

The Sammlers were nowhere to be found, and Jonas was standing outside her door conversing with another doctor.

When he saw me approach, he gave me a nod and headed in my direction.

I don’t know if it was the apprehension of the last couple of days, or plain relief, but when he finally reached me, he stretched his arms around me, pulling me close. I willed him to stop, but he didn’t, and the shrinking space between us was almost as conspicuous as all the other things we were trying to pretend weren’t there. My mind was tired of analyzing everything. Switching gears would be virtually impossible.

“Jess,” he whispered in my ear, the voice like a visit from the past.

“Don’t,” I said.

He lingered a little longer, and then he pulled away. “You seem to be doing alright.”

“I’ve learned to hide things a lot better than you. I’ve had more practice.”

We stepped over to the side of the hallway so that other doctors and nurses and visitors could pass by, and then we peeked in on Michelle again. She was sleeping after a round of treatments, her face peaceful, remarkably unharmed.

I watched her breathe, deep breaths, and an unspeakable ache formed inside of me, a dull throbbing that made it difficult to watch someone else’s sluggish movements when your own are so hurried, so desperate. It didn’t matter that I hadn’t seen Michelle take her first few steps, and it didn’t matter that I hadn’t held her hand on the first day of nursery school. I had loved her from the day she was created, even before then, because I had loved her father so much. The promise of what she would become had always lived deep within me. To watch her in that bed was insufferable. If someone had plucked my heart out and put it there to rest, the pain would be no different.

“She really is incredible, isn’t she?” he asked.

“Like mother, like daughter,” I joked.

“I know, Jess. I was there when you were a kid.”

“Not entirely a kid,” I said.

Then I noticed Michelle’s movements. First, her hand, then her head. Her eyes fluttered open, and they caught my eyes. Her hand raised up, waving me in.

He asked, “Do you want to be alone with her?” I shook my head no, thinking it better to have him there beside me. He followed me in, checked her vitals, and asked her if she was in any pain, but our daughter was a lot smarter than either of us.

“You two sure spend a lot of time here,” she said with a smile, unaware of how astute she was, and how tired, how pale, and possibly how sick she was. We waved off the remark, attributing it to a child’s imagination, and I took a seat next to her on the bed. Jonas continued to read her charts and then took a phone call at the other end of the room.

“What time is it?” she asked me, as if in her condition it was something that mattered, but I answered her, “Eight thirty in the morning.”

“My parents won’t be here until nine. There’s bad traffic again on the bridge, and they’re running late.” She told me this directly, as if it was pertinent information I was waiting to hear.

“How are you doing?” I asked my daughter, the answer more important than her parents’ whereabouts.

I watched her face as she struggled to tell me. Her red lips and bright green eyes were a sharp contrast to her pale skin. Golden hair fell around her face. Most of it would be gone, possibly as soon as the next day. I had already seen thin strands of it on the pillow.

“I’m a little scared,” she answered. The overwhelming need to touch her resonated off my fingertips as I reached for her soft, little hand.

“You’ve already been so brave,” I told her, knowing that she never once shed a tear, never complained, never asked God
why
?

“Why do you keep coming here?” she asked. “I know you’re close with my mom, but is there any other reason?” The room became cold, and a chill slithered down my back. Her questioning eyes searched my own for answers. It was like staring into Jonas’s eyes when we were kids; they mesmerized me, making it impossible to turn away. I thought that maybe Jonas could sense that I needed him at that moment. My eyes traveled to where he stood, and I saw in one single second what our lives might have been, the family we could have had. But he was immersed in conversation with another doctor. They were discussing a little girl with an irregular heartbeat. He was focused and articulate. I didn’t have it in me to interrupt.

I had seen Michelle’s question coming. The last time I visited, I half expected her to come right out and ask me. I saw how she would watch me when I’d be in the room. The way she noticed things—how my eyes seemed to mist over when she’d call out
Mom
and I’d turn, just so, unknowingly, revealing my regret.

The silence stretched between us, like the distance and years that had eluded us.

“I know that I’m adopted,” she started. “My parents don’t want me to know, but I found out two years ago, and I waited for them to tell me, and they never did. I’ve never felt unloved or unwanted, but it’s always been this big, huge
thing
between us. It’s as if they took me away from me or a part of me. I know that sounds confusing.”

“No,” I almost shouted. “It’s not confusing at all.” Even if it wasn’t the truth, even if I doubted what she was saying, I’d never let her know it. Better to let her feel that she could trust someone, anyone.

“You’re her, aren’t you?”

“Who?”

“My birth mom.”

She said it just like that. A simple sentence with complex repercussions.

“Michelle, I don’t know if your parents…”

“Just tell me,” she said. “Tell me you’re not because I think you are, and if I’m wrong, I just want to know.”

Jonas was oblivious. I focused on my daughter and gave her the acknowledgement that would change everything. “Yes,” I said, “I’m your birth mother.”

The ten seconds that passed felt like the years since I handed her off to a stranger. This was the same girl only moments earlier I had never seen cry, the same one who never complained, nor questioned her fate. Now she was openly crying and asking me, “
Why
?” I know that I hadn’t imagined it. I know that because I wiped a tear that had rolled down her cheeks and crushed it in the palm of my hand.

Jonas’s beeper went off, and before we knew it, he had thrown the phone down and was rushing out the door. “Bye, Dr. Jonas,” she called out, and my eyes met his, and I told him I’d see him later. He didn’t notice the desperation that passed over my face, or he might have stopped to intervene. Instead, Michelle’s father was gone, out the door, leaving the two of us to again sort this out.

Michelle’s question was lingering in the air.
Why
?  Before I could answer, she continued, “A kid in my class is adopted. His parents told him when he was like five or six. They are white and he’s black, so there was some explaining to do.

“He used to walk around the classroom talking about it all the time, and we all thought he was kinda weird. I used to wonder what it must be like, until that afternoon I found out I was adopted too. Damien, that was his name, came to our house the next day after school. I thought I could learn something about this whole adoption thing if I invited him over. He was such a happy kid. He told me his birth parents were part of some royal family in Africa, and when he turned eighteen, he was going to meet them. I never told him I was adopted also. I was too ashamed of it.

“I found out I was sick a little after that. At first I felt tired all the time, and then my nose would bleed every day, and then there were the bruises, even when I didn’t fall. When they told me how sick I was, I went in my room and slammed the door, and I blamed you. I thought it was you who poisoned my blood. If what Damien said was true, that he’d one day get his parent’s palace and land because he was their son, then maybe I could get leukemia from you.”