Beauty from Ashes

CHAPTER 19

CHAPTER 19

I sometimes wonder how Sandy did it. Took in so many of us foster kids, I mean. You’ve already heard what kind of person she is, how she’s just so good and strong and loving. I don’t think she yelled at me once the whole time I lived with her. Sure, there were the regular things, like I had to clean up my room or I couldn’t go out paintballing with the youth group, and I got grounded a couple times for talking back, but if those things got her angry at me, it never showed.

It’s funny, because I thought that in order to punish somebody you had to be mad at them. It sort of makes sense when you think about it, right? But Sandy punished me all the time, usually just for little slip-ups. Like if I didn’t finish my homework on time I couldn’t watch TV on the weekend. That kind of thing. And you might have grown up in a home where that was just the way it was, but the way I grew up, you didn’t punish somebody unless you were really ticked off at them.

Sandy was different. That’s why I feel like such a pathetic mom these days because even though Natalie hasn’t done a single thing wrong in her entire life, I’m mad at her all the time. I don’t yell or anything, and I’d never shake her or hit her. I’m not that much of a deadbeat. I’m just so upset with her for getting sick even though that’s stupid because it’s not her fault.

It’s mine. My fault entirely. I’m the one who was so scared of a simple surgery. I mean, nobody’s said it to my face, but I think it’s pretty clear by now that if they’d cut Natalie out after the first ten or twenty hours of labor, she wouldn’t have been in the birth canal long enough for her brain to start bleeding like that. The strange thing is that she was being monitored the whole time. There was no way for any of us to know there was a problem.

I’ve looked online a little bit at medical malpractice and stuff. I could probably find someone to try to sue the doctor who delivered her. But I signed the forms myself, put my signature right there on the page that said I was declining a C-section, so most likely it would just be a long, drawn-out process without any real results.

There are other reasons too, other things I’ve done that I wonder if they contributed to my daughter’s problems, but I’d never ask a doctor. I don’t want to admit it for one thing, and if it really was my fault, there’s no chance I’d want to know. I’d take a settlement, though, if someone offered me. A stinking big one. The first thing I’d do is move out of this neighborhood. I mean, we all know the jokes about trailer trash, right? Maybe I shouldn’t be so snobby after growing up in the foster system and everything, but I really don’t think I belong here.

I’ve been looking at duplexes. Nothing too outrageous. I think a place with three rooms would be perfect, one for me, one for Natalie, and an extra room I can use as my office. I don’t see myself going back to work as long as Natalie’s this fragile, so I’ve been looking into some online jobs, maybe transcription work or something. I don’t know. I’m not that great with computers, but I could figure it out if I had to.

Then again, if I got a big enough settlement, I wouldn’t have to work at all. I could stay home with Natalie or maybe even hire a nurse to take care of the suctioning and some of the tube feeds. Because God knows once I had a place in my own name I’d have Patricia out the door in ten seconds flat.

Probably less.

Speaking of Patricia, I know her hour-long nap is about to end. This is my last five minutes of quiet for the rest of the day. I check my phone to see if anyone’s commented about my picture of Natalie in her little snowsuit. Not many likes yet. I guess the photos of sick babies do a better job getting people’s attention. Just one comment. I click and see it’s from Sandy.

She’s such a precious little thing. Just like her mom.

Sandy’s not really into social media or anything, so I think it’s cute that she tries to keep in touch this way. She’s even included a few stickers with hearts and smilies and cheesy stuff like that. It was good of her to come be with me while Natalie was having her surgery. I’m not sure what I would have done otherwise. There were some days in the NICU when I was under so much stress I thought I might literally lose my head. I even thought about calling my OB back in Orchard Grove, ask her if she could prescribe something just to take the edge off my nerves. I hate the idea of taking medicine for a mental problem like that, but I was sort of desperate.

I still feel that way every once in a while. Like I need a pill or something. I took this depression screening online, and I’ve got like thirteen out of the fifteen warning signs. I’ve been telling myself it’s just baby blues. All the mommy magazines said it’s normal, and most folks don’t have to go on meds for it. But I wonder if I’m always going to feel like I’m in this fog or if it’s just going to miraculously disappear, sort of like the morning sickness did right after I made it to thirteen weeks.

What to Expect when you’re Postpartum. That would be a good book for someone to write one day.

It’s times like these I wish I were more like Sandy. So loving. So maternal. It’s like she was made to be a mom and a pastor’s wife and that’s about it. Part of me thinks I’d go crazy if my life were that boring, but part of me envies her. Wonders what it would be like to have so much love to share with others.

Of course, Sandy comes from a really good upbringing. Rich Southern folks. Family money, all that junk. From what I can tell, the only real big stresses in her life were when her parents freaked out that she married a black man and when her adopted daughter Blessing turned into such a big disappointment.

I should mention she and Carl have kids of their own, too. Bio kids, I mean. And they just keep adding to the family, like I already told you about the little boy they recently adopted. They would have adopted me, I’m sure of it, but there were paperwork issues and I guess I wasn’t legally free or whatever you call it. I should have been. I mean, I don’t remember that I’ve ever met my bio mom face to face. I’m sure I must have a couple times when I was a baby because that’s just what happens in the system, but I don’t remember any of it. I don’t know. Maybe someone just dropped the ball on my file.

Sometimes I wonder if it would have made a difference. If Sandy adopted me officially. On the one hand, there’s no way she could love me any more if I were legally her daughter. That’s just the kind of person she is. But sometimes I wonder if we would have stayed in touch better. If I would have started to call her Mom. I mean, I’m already planning to teach Natalie to call her Grandma Sandy, but that’s more like a title than an official name.

I couldn’t do it, all that fostering and adopting she does. And I wonder how she finds the patience to take care of all those kids but also how she gets over that constant fear of loss. I mean, I’m Natalie’s birth mom and I already know that I’m keeping her at a distance. At arm’s length. Like that stray puppy I wasn’t allowed to name. I know any day Natalie might leave me, and the stronger our bond, the harder that’s going to be.

So I sort of mother on autopilot, which I hate about myself. But how else do you do it, I want to ask her. How do you take these kids into your home knowing that most of them are going right through that revolving door and walking out of your life forever? How do you keep from either dying from grief or turning into a robot mom?

I sometimes think about the girl who delivered me. Wonder if she’s even alive. I know I could find her name and stuff if I dug into the records, but part of me wants to think the paperwork’s lost completely. Part of me wants to think that’s the real reason why Sandy never adopted me. Besides, I don’t have any reason to go digging too deep into my past.

It’s normal, I guess, to think about the woman who gave you birth when you become a mom yourself. Man, I had no idea how scary it must have been to drop a kid in a dirty high-school bathroom. Sure, she was stupid. Stupid but incredibly brave.

Which makes you wonder why she just left me there when all was said and done.

I still don’t know the story of my rescue. Was it another student who went in to check her makeup? Did a teacher hear a strange noise and go in to see what it was? I don’t even know if it happened during school hours or not. What if it was the night janitor who found me?

I shouldn’t wonder these things, but I do, even though knowing the answers won’t change a thing. Maybe I’m more sentimental than I like to admit.

I hear Patricia stirring in the bedroom, so I shove my phone into my pocket and grab a bottle of formula so it looks like I’m being productive. Natalie’s next feeding isn’t for a while yet, but at least I look like the doting, attentive mother I’m never going to be.