Our New Normal

by Colleen Faulkner

  I just sit there, staring at my plate.

  Charlie keeps swinging in her swing, asleep, having no idea what we’re talking about. Not knowing her life is about to change.

  “Hazel,” Mom says slowly. “You’re not ready to be a mother. You can’t keep her.”

  “But I love her,” I say, my voice sounding like I can’t get enough air.

  “I love her, too.” Gran pours wine into her empty water glass. She never drinks wine. “But that doesn’t mean I can be her mother, either.”

  “Gran, you . . . you thought I should keep her. When I got pregnant you said I should keep her.”

  “I was wrong.” She crosses her arms over her chest. No apology, no explanation. Which is so like her.

  “We’ve all talked about it, sweetie,” Mom says. “And we think you need to put Charlie up for adoption.”

  I chew on my bottom lip so hard that I taste blood. “You mean give her to you?”

  Mom looks at Dad and then back at me. “No.” It comes out as not much more than a whisper. “I mean put her up for adoption. She should go to a young family. Someone who can care for her the way she deserves to be cared for. The way she deserves to be loved.”

  I stare at my mother, wondering if I can die from this tightness in my chest that I know is my broken heart. I feel so betrayed by her. “I can’t believe you won’t take her,” I whimper. I look at my dad. “I thought you wanted her.”

  “It’s not that we don’t want her, Daisy.”

  Mom presses her lips together and then says, “I think that would be best for Charlie.”

  I start to come out of my chair, my fingers laced together, my hands on top of my head. I feel like my brain is going to explode. “I don’t understand . . . I thought—” I look at Dad. Then back at Mom. “I thought I came down here to—I thought we were going to talk about you and Dad adopting Charlie. Not giving her away to strangers.”

  Mom wipes her mouth with her cloth napkin. She meets my gaze. Exhales as if she’s tired beyond exhaustion. “I can’t do that, Hazel. I love Charlie. I love her so much.” Tears trickle down her cheeks and I realize she looks like she’s been crying all day. “But that’s not what’s best for Charlie. Not being raised by grandparents.”

  “I can’t believe you want me to give her to a stranger!” I scream. “I can’t believe you thought I would do that!” As I get up, I accidentally knock my chair over. It hits the wood floor with a bang and startles Charlie. She starts to cry. I go to her, unbuckle her from her swing, and lift her out of it. “I’m not doing it! You can’t make me give her away!”

  I run out of the dining room, holding my daughter in my arms. I run up the stairs and into my room and slam the door shut. Charlie screams louder. I lock the door. I put Charlie in her crib, stuff her pacifier in her mouth, and go to my closet. I come out with my suitcase.

  “If they don’t want you here, then they don’t want me here,” I tell Charlie. “We’re out of here. I don’t know where we’re going, but somewhere far away.”

  I start throwing clothes into the suitcase. Anything I grab goes in: jeans, a sweater, a pile of shorts, T-shirts. I yank out my whole drawer of underwear and bras and dump everything in, into my suitcase.

  There’s a knock at my bedroom door. “Daisy?”

  “Go away!” I scream at Dad. “Leave me alone.”

  “Hazel, let me in so we can talk. Your mother and I want to talk to you.”

  “But I don’t want to talk to you!” I throw a sneaker that’s in my hand and it bangs against the door and bounces off.

  Dad rattles the knob. But the door is locked and he’s not getting in. I turn my back on the door.

  “We’re not staying here,” I mutter, yanking shirts off hangers and throwing them into the suitcase. I toss a tray of jewelry on top. “We’re going to be fine, Charlie. We’ll figure it out.” I retrieve the sneaker I threw and wedge it in.

  Charlie is still crying.

  Dad’s gone.

  I add another pair of shoes and, realizing my suitcase is full, I drop to the floor on my knees. “We’re packed,” I tell my baby. “We’re out of here!” I start zipping it up, shoving stuff in so it will close. I’ve almost got it zipped when I sit back, pulling my hands off the suitcase like it burned them.

  I just stare at it.

  I packed a suitcase. I’m ready to go.

  But I didn’t put a single thing of Charlie’s inside.

  My whole room is full of diapers, and blankets and onesies, and leggings and tops for Charlie. And I didn’t put anything in the suitcase for her. Not one thing.

  Crying so hard, I can hardly get up, I go to the crib. I pick Charlie up so gently, and I hold her against me, rocking her. I breathe deep, trying to imprint on my brain the feel of her in my arms. “I’m sorry,” I whisper in her little ear that looks like a lima bean.

  I slide to the floor and lean against the crib. And miracle of miracles, she starts to calm down. “I can’t do it,” I tell her.

  I kiss her chubby cheek.

  “I’m sorry, Charlie,” I sob. “But I can’t take care of you.”

  I nuzzle the little red curls at the back of her neck.

  “You deserve a mom and a dad. Adults. Adults with jobs and a way to take care of you.”

  Charlie looks up at me and makes sounds like she’s talking to me.

  I pull her against me and hug her, smelling her baby smell that’s a combination of Mrs. Meyer’s lavender fabric softener, diaper rash butt paste, and formula.

  And I sob. I cry like I’ve never cried before.

  Eventually, like Charlie, I stop crying. I look down to see that she’s fallen asleep, sucking her Binky that I gave her. And she’s so beautiful.

  Being careful not to wake her, I stand up. I walk to my door and unlock it. I open it and then I lean against the wall and wait.

  Only a few minutes pass before Mom is standing in my doorway. “May I come in?” she asks.

  I nod, not trusting my voice yet.

  She looks at the suitcase, then back at me.

  It feels like a long time passes before I find my voice. But when I speak, I’m surprised by how loud it sounds. Like I’m not crumbling to pieces inside. “You’re right,” I say, holding Charlie against me. “I can’t take care of her.” I take a breath, my whole body shaking. “I want . . . I want to put her up for adoption. If . . . if you and Dad don’t want—”

  I look at Mom to see her crying. “We can’t. I can’t.” She mouths the words.

  I take another breath. “If you don’t think you can take her, then I want to put her up for adoption. I want someone to adopt her. Someone who can’t have babies.”

  “Oh, Hazel,” Mom says in what sounds like a sigh.

  She comes to me and wraps her arms around me and it’s like the two of us are holding Charlie.

  “I’m so proud of you, Hazel,” she murmurs. “So very proud of you.”

  I nod, still crying. I squeeze my eyes shut because I can’t imagine handing Charlie to someone she doesn’t know.

  “So proud of you,” Mom says again. “For being smart enough, brave enough to do this. Because you know what?”

  “What?” I ask, not taking my head off her shoulder.

  “I wasn’t mature enough to have a baby when I had Sean. I shouldn’t have gotten pregnant. But your dad wanted a baby and I wasn’t brave enough to admit I wasn’t ready. I wasn’t as brave as you are, Hazel.”

  For a long time I just stand there, letting Mom hold me and Charlie in her arms. And then she carefully takes Charlie from me and puts her in her crib while I just stand there watching her. And then she takes my hand and she leads me past my suitcase to my bed.

  “You need to sleep. We can make plans in the morning,” she whispers.

  I climb into bed in my clothes and lay my head on my pillow. Mom pulls up the sheet and kisses the top of my head the way she used to when I was little. Then she starts stroking my hair and I drift off to sleep.
/>   41

  Liv

  I wait until Hazel falls asleep; it doesn’t take long. Then I get up from her bed, careful not to jostle her, and tuck the sheet around her. I stand over her bed, watching her sleep, remembering the tiny redhead that once rested on a pillow in this same room, in the same bed. Fighting the tears that I’m afraid will never end if they start again, I check on Charlie in her crib. Indian elephants dance on the sheet. She should probably have a diaper change, but she’s so deeply asleep that I decide to let it go for now. I’ll leave our bedroom doors open and when she wakes, I’ll hear her. I’ll change her and feed her and let Hazel rest.

  Kissing my granddaughter good night, I turn off the light and walk out of the bedroom. The hallway is dark. I can hear the faint sound of the TV downstairs. My mom and Sean are watching a movie. Beth left. She had a date.

  I put my hand on the wall to steady myself, a little dizzy. I feel as if I’m being crushed inside. It’s not just my heart is being destroyed, but my internal organs. They’re shattering and piling up at my feet.

  I truly believe that adoption is what’s best for Charlie, but now that Hazel has agreed to it, I don’t know if I can do it. I just don’t know if I have it in me.

  I sit down on the floor in the dark hall, draw up my knees, and hug them to my chest. I take one shuddering breath after another as the memories of what it felt like to be an adopted child wash over me. All those insecurities, the fear Mom and Dad would “send me back” if I was bad, the fear that I would never be good enough for them, for anyone, come over me in waves.

  “Liv?”

  I hear Oscar. I don’t look up.

  “Oh, honey.” He sits down beside me on the floor and pulls me to him.

  I sob. “I don’t know if I can do it. I don’t know if I can let Charlie go,” I say, gasping for breath. “I love her so much.”

  Oscar wraps his arms around me and holds me tightly. “I love her, too. We all do.”

  He lets me cry myself out as he strokes my back, whispering in my ear that he loves me. That we’re doing the right thing.

  “She’s better off to be adopted. To be raised by younger parents,” I say into his neck.

  “I agree with you,” he murmurs. “I know I said I want to keep Charlie, but you were right. She’s better off placed in a home with parents desperate for a baby. Not old folks our age.” He kisses my wet cheek. “And the truth is, Liv, that I love Charlie, but I love you more.”

  His voice cracks and it breaks my heart.

  “I know this sounds selfish,” he goes on. “But the simple truth is that I want you more than I want her.”

  I open my eyes and look into his and realize that I should have let this last year of our life bring us closer together, not force us farther apart. I kiss him on his mouth. “It’s the right thing,” I murmur. “Even if we thought we could care for her, it would be too hard for Hazel to see her with us. To hear Charlie call me Mom.”

  He nods and pulls me against him, embarrassed by his tears, I think. “You’re right.”

  We hug each other tightly. “It’s the right thing to do for Hazel, too,” I tell him. “For our daughter. But—” My voice catches in my throat again. “It hurts so much. The thought of saying good-bye.”

  Oscar tightens his arms around me and I cling to him. I allow myself to be vulnerable, to feel my pain. To let my husband see my pain. We sit there in the hall on the floor for a very long time, in the dark, just holding each other. And then Oscar suggests we should go to bed because the next few days are going to be long and hard. He helps me to my feet and, hand in hand, we go into Hazel’s bedroom. By the glow of the elephant nightlight, we gaze into the crib at Charlie, who reminds me so much of Hazel at that age that my tears come again. But this time, they’re not just tears of sadness but of relief too.

  And then, together, Oscar and I stand over Hazel’s bed. I don’t dare touch her, for fear of waking her, but arm in arm we watch our daughter sleep and know we’re doing what’s best for her. Which, as her parents, is really who we need to put first.

  42

  Liv

  “Dad, what are you getting?” Hazel asks. Then she shoots out of her chair. “Amanda! Amanda!” she shouts across the old-fashioned ice cream parlor that is packed with graduation day celebrations like ours. She waves vigorously and the girl who was once her nemesis grins and waves back. “See you at Katy’s later?”

  Hazel looks gorgeous in the thrifted white dress and sandals we found in Amherst while visiting UMass where she’ll attend in the fall as a premed/health major. I wasn’t sure how I felt about the dress when she first tried it on. It seemed so old-fashioned and the color had yellowed with time and wear. But against her pale, freckled skin and long hair she styled in curls, she was the prettiest girl on the stage at graduation.

  “See you at Katy’s,” the friend calls.

  Hazel drops back into her chair, next to her boyfriend, Jack, who just finished his freshman year at UMass. “I’m thinking banana split,” she tells her father. “With strawberry, pistachio, and mint-chocolate-chip ice cream, and butterscotch, hot fudge, and marshmallow cream on top. Oh, and pistachio nuts and whipped cream. And a cherry.”

  Oscar makes a face at her. “You eat that and you won’t make it to Katy’s for the graduation party. You’ll be in the ED having your stomach pumped.”

  “Jack’s going to share it with me, right?”

  Jack is dressed in khakis and a teal polo shirt, seated next to her, shakes his head. “There’s no way you can get me to eat that.” He puts his menu in the middle of the table. “I’m having a black-and-white shake.”

  “What about you, Aunt Bethie?” Hazel calls across the table.

  It’s good to see Hazel so happy, so animated. A year ago, right after Charlie left us, was a dark time for Hazel. For all of us. Even after we donated all of the toys, the clothes, the car seat, all the trappings of a newborn, the house still smelled of Charlie. And when we closed our eyes we could still hear her. Sometimes crying, sometimes cooing.

  But Hazel was a trouper. She stuck with her decision to put her daughter up for adoption, never once wavering, once it was made. Even when it was time to hand her over to Tesha Crawford, at the adoption agency, Hazel stood her ground, insisting she was doing the right thing. And we supported her, emotionally, sometimes physically, like when she had to walk out of the building after Tesha passed Charlie on to the parents waiting in another room.

  That was the hardest part for me. Handing her over to people we never met. When we started the process of looking for an agency to place Charlie, I assumed it would be an open adoption. That Hazel would get updates and photos of Charlie, maybe see her a couple of times a year. That we could send gifts for holidays. I assumed Oscar and I would get to see her. When Hazel broke the news to us that she wanted a closed adoption, I almost caved. I almost told her that her dad and I would take Charlie. But in my heart that only another mother can truly understand, I knew the adoption was the right thing. For Charlie and for Hazel.

  Beth, seated across the table from us, between our mother and her fiancé, Jason, takes a sip of water. “I’m thinking I’ll have a peanut-butter-chocolate sundae. Jason’s going to get a hot-fudge sundae so I can have some of his. Right?” She looks at him and he looks back at her with a devotion most women would be jealous of. I still can’t believe after all the losers my sister has dated over the years, she’s finally found a winner. Oscar and I both like Jason and our mother seems almost as smitten with him as Beth is. Which is funny, to see my mother, at her age, all giggly with a man.

  “Oooh, that sounds good.” Hazel reaches for the menu. “Maybe I don’t want the banana split.”

  I look at Oscar. “What are you having?”

  He shrugs. “Whatever you want, honey.” He leans over and kisses my shoulder that’s bare in my sleeveless blue sundress. “I thought we’d share.”

  I turn to him and smile and we meet each other halfway between our seats to
kiss.

  “Hey, you two,” my mother says from across the table. Her comment is directed at Oscar and me. “Knock it off. No one else is doing that at this table.” She waggles her finger.

  Oscar laughs, steals another kiss, and picks up one of the ice cream menus. I watch him, smiling. After the night we sat on the floor in the hall coming to terms with losing Charlie, our relationship took a turn for the better. I’ve learned to rely on him more, and he’s gotten better at listening to me, even when I just need him to hear me and not necessarily solve my problem. Our marriage certainly isn’t perfect, but I feel like it might be stronger now than it’s ever been.

  Sean, seated at the end of the table beside his latest girlfriend, Sarina, starts telling us a story about some kid climbing into his dorm window, confused as to not only which dorm he’s in, but at which college.

  As I listen to Sean talk and to my family around the table laughing, I have to struggle not to cry. It was one of several decrees Hazel made this morning: no crying, no bragging about her being salutatorian of her senior class, and no mention of Charlie.

  It’s been almost two years since Hazel passed the positive pregnancy test through the opening of the bathroom door to me. And our family has been through hell, with the pregnancy, my dad’s death, losing Charlie. But I feel as if we’ve come out the other side with just a few smoking embers. Hazel is off to college. Beth is getting married. Sean has a girlfriend and loves school. My mom, still living with us, is in pretty good health and is actually enjoying life again. Oscar just started a new job training PAs at the hospital, which means less stress. My business is going well. So well since I was awarded the contract to restore the house for the shop here in Judith that I just hired my first part-time employee. For all those good things, I need to be grateful. I am grateful.

  “Can you take a pic of us, Aunt Bethie?” Hazel asks, passing her phone across the table.

  Jack puts his arm around Hazel’s shoulders and they grin.

  Watching my sister take the photo brings up a lump in my throat. After Charlie was placed, Hazel removed all of her daughter’s framed photos from around the house. She went around to each of us, took our phones, and removed all the photos of Charlie. I assumed she was just storing them on her computer so she wouldn’t have to see daily reminders of her daughter. Come to find out, she had put them on a computer, but she’d had her brother put them in some sort of digital vault. I didn’t even know such a thing existed. So now, none of the photos can be viewed for ten years.