Even Now

by Karen Kingsbury

  Well, now Angela knew.

  And the worst was yet to come.

  Lauren didn’t move from her chair for the next six hours. She slid it up against Emily’s little bed and watched as one person or another came in to work on her. She watched them monitor Emily and place a plastic mask over her face to help her breathe, and she watched the medicine drip into her daughter’s veins.

  The whole time she begged God for one thing: that He might find it in His heart to let Emily live.

  Through two o’clock and three in the morning, things still seemed horribly grim. The doctor checked on her and shook his head. “I’m not sure she’ll make it, Miss Anderson. Babies this sick usually don’t go home.”

  In between his visits, she looked at Emily, afraid to touch her. Once in a while she’d put her fingers against her daughter’s forehead and run them down her tiny arm. “I’m sorry, Emily. Mommy’s sorry.”

  Most of the night her eyes were dry. She was too scared to cry, too worried that she might lose a minute of praying and willing life back into her little girl.

  Then, at four o’clock, the doctor came in with the best news of the night, the best news of the past two days. “Her white count is better. It looks like she’s responding to the antibiotics.”

  “Really?” Lauren didn’t usually say much when the doctor came in. She was too afraid of the answers. But this time she felt a surge of hope so great she couldn’t keep quiet. “You mean she might pull out of it?”

  “I can’t say.” He studied Emily, placing his stethoscope to her chest and listening. When he straightened, he looked at Lauren. “I hear an improvement. I’m amazed, really. If things continue in this direction, she might get better quickly. Once babies make a turn for the better they can be eating in twelve hours.” He paused and lowered his brow. “But don’t get too excited, Miss Anderson. Your baby is still very sick.”

  When the doctor left, Lauren felt an absolute certainty. Emily was going to pull through! God had heard her cry and He’d reached down from heaven and given them a miracle. She thought about what the doctor said. Emily could be awake and wanting food in twelve hours. If that were true, she’d need to be rested enough to take care of her. Especially because she didn’t want to spend any more time than necessary in Chicago.

  She considered her options. What she really needed was sleep. She could take the car and go home, get eight hours of sleep, and then come back. If she stayed at the hospital it wouldn’t help Emily, and if she didn’t get sleep she’d be no use at all to her daughter. But first she needed to talk to her mother. Lauren wasn’t any less angry, but she needed to tell her that Emily was doing better. She deserved to know at least that much.

  Emily’s breathing sounded better, much better. Lauren hesitated. She hated leaving, hated being apart from her daughter for even a few hours. But she had no choice, not if she was going to be well enough to care for Emily when she woke up. Lauren stood and leaned overhear baby. “Keep fighting, Emily.” She kissed her daughter’s feathery soft cheek. “I love you, sweetheart. I’ll be here in the morning.”

  With one last look at Emily, she left the room and went to the waiting area. Her mother was awake, sitting in a chair at the far end of the room. Their eyes met, and Lauren moved toward her, refusing further eye contact until the last moment.

  “Emily’s doing better. The doctor says he can’t believe it.” She sat down in a chair opposite her mother. “I want to be strong for her when she wakes up. I thought I’d go home and get some sleep.”

  Her mother nodded. “I’ll stay here.”

  Lauren hadn’t considered that. She figured her mother would go home, since she might need sleep too. “Are you sure?”

  “Yes. I’m fine. I’ll go in and sit with her while you’re gone.”

  For a moment Lauren considered telling her mother she was sorry about the scene earlier. But things between them were still a twisted ball of knots. It would take months to unravel all the hurt and resentment. For now she stood and her mother did the same. And even though it went against everything she felt, Lauren hugged her.

  It was a short hug, but it was a start.

  She drove home, slipped in through the front door, and crawled up the stairs. She was asleep before her head hit the pillow. By the time she woke up, it was two in the afternoon, and the house was silent. She sat straight up and looked at the crib.

  Where was Emily?

  It took her a few minutes to remember that she’d come home not quite halfway to Los Angeles, and that Emily was sick. And then it all rushed back.

  She jumped from the bed. She needed to know how Emily was more than she needed her next breath. She called information and got the number for the hospital, and a minute later she was talking to a nurse.

  “Hi.” Lauren swallowed. The fear from the night before was back. “My little girl is a patient there. I need to check on her.”

  “What’s her name?” The woman seemed kind, not rushed the way nurses sometimes seemed.

  “Emily Anderson.”

  “Okay, let me check. I’ll be right back.”

  Please, God . . . please.

  The seconds passed like hours, and finally the woman came back. “I’m sorry, you’re the baby’s mother?”

  Lauren’s heart tripped over itself. “Yes, I need to know . . . how is she?”

  “Well . . . I don’t know how to tell you this, but she’s gone. Just a few hours ago. I’m sorry someone didn’t call you and — ”

  The woman’s words grew too dim to hear. Gone? Emily, her baby girl, was gone? Lauren dropped her head in her hand, and the phone slid down her cheek. She could hear the woman speaking, but it didn’t matter, it didn’t make a bit of difference. Her baby was gone. Just a few hours ago . . . a few hours ago.

  God . . . God where were You?

  She was the worst mother ever.

  Her feet and hands and heart felt numb, and she eased off the bed to her knees. I begged you, God. You let us down. My baby is dead and I wasn’t even there to hold her or tell her it would be okay. You knew . . . You had to know it was going to happen and You didn’t make me stay there . . .

  She gripped the edge of the bed and strained for a single breath, but it wouldn’t come. The room was spinning, tilting hard to one side. In the distance a tinny voice was saying, “If you’d like to make a call, please hang up and try again . . . If you’d like to make a call . . . ”

  God, why? Why didn’t You let her live? She was everything I had, all that mattered. Her tears came then, delayed only by the shock racking her being. Waves of tears shook her, tearing at her soul. Emily was gone, and Shane never even had a chance to meet her. Is that fair to him, Lord? He wanted to be a father and now he’ll never even know her! She squeezed her eyes shut and remembered a few months back, when she was pregnant and sitting beside Shane in his car. He’d put his hand on her belly and felt Emily kick. The wonder and awe on his face . . .

  He would’ve made the most wonderful father, but now . . .

  Now he would never have the chance.

  Everyone had failed her. Her parents and Shane’s parents. And now even God. “Will the punishment never end?” She whispered the words, but as she did the anger came back fast and furious and her voice rose. “Will it never end?” She pounded the bed and opened her eyes, staring out the window. “How could You let her die, God? Why did You take her from me? She never . . . never even got to live.”

  She sobbed out her anger, her grief, letting her forehead fall against the bed. “Emily . . . baby girl . . . ” The fight left her, and all she could do was picture her precious daughter, the way she’d looked in the hospital bed. The doctor said she was doing better, right? So what went wrong? The tears came harder now, and Lauren wondered if they’d fill the room and drown her. “Emily . . . baby, Mommy’s sorry.” Her words were muffled, spoken into a bunched up section of blankets. “I should’ve stayed with you, sweetheart.” She gasped for whatever air she could get. “Emily . . . I
love you, baby. I’m sorry.”

  It took time, but finally her tears slowed. As they did she was left with an emptiness that knew no bounds, a hollow place that was chilling cold and pitch dark. She could still hear chatter coming from the phone, but she blocked it out. There was only one person she wanted now, one who could hold her and make sense of the nightmare that her life had become.

  Shane Galanter.

  She wanted him now more than ever before. Lauren stood, slowly and carefully, because the room was still spinning. After a minute she found her balance, drew a slow breath, and walked out of her room. No need to stop and look around, to think of the memories she was leaving behind. Memories of her little girl would live forever in her heart, a single bright light in a place that would be dark until she found Shane.

  Emily was gone, and with her every hope for the life the two of them could’ve lived with Shane. But Shane was still out there. Somewhere. As she drove out of the suburbs toward the freeway, she passed the hospital and thought about going inside. She could at least hold her baby one more time. Certainly her body would still be there. Or maybe not. Maybe they’d already taken her to the morgue. Yes, that would be it. There was no way she could go into the hospital now.

  She had a handful of photographs and a month full of memories of Emily Sue Anderson. She was too late even to see her daughter’s lifeless body, and beyond that, to see her mother. Not when all of this — every bit of it — could’ve been prevented if only their parents hadn’t separated them.

  She and Shane should’ve been together, at home with Emily in their arms. Gripped with emotion, Lauren pulled off the road and stared at the hospital. She wouldn’t forget her last day with Emily. Watching her breathe, and believing with everything in her that God was going to give them a miracle.

  Her lips pressed tight together.

  But You didn’t do that, did You? You summed up my abilities as a mother, and You chose to take Emily home with You. I’ll never forgive You for that, God. Not ever.

  She cradled her empty arms against her chest and imagined the feel of Emily against her, warm and alive and fully dependent on her. “I let you down, baby . . . Mommy’s sorry.” The tears in her heart became sobs, and Lauren let her head fall against the steering wheel. “Emily . . . if I could hold you one more time.” But she couldn’t, because everyone had worked against her and Shane. Even God. What good was it that Emily was in heaven? Didn’t You have enough babies up there? Did you have to take mine? As angry and scared and empty as she felt, even that one truth — that Emily was in a better place — meant nothing to her.

  Not when all she wanted was one more chance to hold her daughter.

  She blinked until she could see. Then she pulled the car onto the road and headed toward the first freeway onramp. She was finished with Chicago, with her parents, with their God . . . with every piece of her past. She would find Shane. They’d make a way to be together. Then later, when they were married and more stable, they could return to Chicago and talk to her parents. They could see about mending ties. Nothing would ever be the same again, but she could always go back home. Always pick up her things.

  But she could never have her little Emily again.

  Grief filled every breath as she pulled out of town and headed for her new life in Los Angeles. The drive would take six full days, and on the third day she sold her sports car to a dealer in Texas. She used that money to pay cash for another car, a sensible four-door sedan with low mileage.

  Not only was the new car more economical, but her parents couldn’t trace her license plate. They wouldn’t expect her to have a new car, and by the time she registered it in California, she’d think of someway to keep her parents from knowing about it.

  By her fifth day on the road, she began to worry about money. She had forty-five hundred dollars left, but it was going fast. Before she could look for Shane she had to have a plan, a place to live, a job.

  She settled in a town called Northridge, and on her second day there she drove to the California State University, located in the center of the town. On a bulletin board she found three sets of girls looking for a roommate. One sounded more serious than the others, and the rent was only a couple hundred dollars a month. Perfect for her budget.

  She made the call, and by that afternoon she had a place to stay and roommates who seemed nice enough. One of them asked about her age, but she brushed off the comment.

  “I look young. Everyone always says so.” She smiled, though it felt foreign on her lips. A smile hadn’t touched her face since she left Chicago, since she drove away from the place where her daughter had died. But she wouldn’t share any of that, not with strangers. Not with anyone except Shane.

  One of them, a petite Chinese-American girl, raised a curious eyebrow. “Are you a student at Cal State Northridge?”

  “Not yet.” Lauren swung her purse over her shoulder. “I need to earn money this semester.”

  “What was your name again?” A tall, thin brunette leaned against the wall. Her eyes sparkled, and Lauren guessed that a lifetime ago if she’d met the girl, the two might’ve become friends.

  “Lauren.”

  “Got a last name?”

  The cool facade cracked down the middle, but just for a minute. She smoothed her hand over her button-down blouse and grinned. “Sorry. Lauren Gibbs.”

  “Lauren Gibbs?” The Chinese-American girl made a curious face. “I’ve seen that some where before.”

  Lauren shrugged. “It’s a common name.” She kept her breathing even, unwilling to give herself away. “What about you?”

  Their names were Kathy, Song, and Debbie. They talked about the campus and classes, and then they all fell silent. Kathy, the girl who seemed most in charge, held out her hand. “Welcome. The first rent is due when you move your stuff in.”

  “Would now work?” Lauren took out her wallet and pulled out two hundred dollars.

  They all laughed, and Lauren went back out to the car for her things. She ached inside. So this was her life now. Lies and making do and pretending she was someone she wasn’t. The pain she carried buried deep within her. She blinked tears away.

  So be it.

  All that mattered was surviving long enough to find Shane.

  Her room was small and she shared it with Song. It took thirty minutes to unpack and get her area set up. She placed the photo of Shane and her on the windowsill. The pictures of Emily she would keep in the drawer. She’d buy a photo album, so she could look at them often.

  The next day she found a job waiting table sat Marie Callender’s, a restaurant across the street from her apartment. On the application, she wrote Lauren Gibbs, and all her contact information came from the new life she’d started the day before.

  By then, she had a plan. When she got her first paycheck, she’d get identification and a driver’s license with her new name. It was possible. Especially since she didn’t have a Social Security card yet. One of the girls at the restaurant had given her some information, a way to start the process. Once she had her new identity firmly in place, she’d register her car and get on with life.

  There was a community college not far from Northridge. She would contact the school and take her GED. Then she’d enroll in classes on that campus for the first two years. After that she’d transfer to Cal State Northridge and earn a degree in journalism. Life would be the way it should have been. At least on the surface.

  That afternoon Lauren went back to the apartment and found the single phone on a desk in the living room. She grabbed a pad of paper from the counter and a pen from the drawer. August was too soon for school to be in progress, but by now Shane would be enrolled somewhere. Office staff started earlier than teachers, didn’t they? She tapped the pad of paper with her pen. A phone book sat not far away, and she reached for it. A section in the front had the names and numbers of all the local high schools. She started at the beginning

  Canoga Park High School.

  She picked up the pho
ne and dialed the number.

  “Canoga Park High School.”

  “Yes, hello.” She did her best to sound old. After all she’d been through it wasn’t a stretch. “I need to verify that our son’s enrolled for the coming semester.”

  “Very well. Is he a new student?”

  It was working! Lauren swallowed hard. “Yes. We just moved here from Chicago.”

  “Okay, let me get the list of incoming students.” She hesitated. “What was the name?”

  She closed her eyes and pictured him, his dark hair and damp eyes, the way he’d looked that last day when he told her good-bye. The woman was waiting. “Shane Galanter.”

  “Shane Galanter.” The woman repeated his name slowly, and the rustling of papers sounded in the background. “Nope. He’s not registered yet. Would you like me to start the paperwork?”

  Lauren opened her eyes and wrote a tiny NO next to the name Canoga Park. “That’s okay.” She uttered a polite laugh. “I’ll talk with my husband. We’ll come in later this week. Thank you.”

  Next on the list was Taft High School.

  By three o’clock she’d tried every school in the San Fernando Valley. Shane wasn’t enrolled at any of them. But that was okay. She had a room and a job and a plan for the future. And she had a new identity. Lauren Anderson was no more. Her death date was the same as her daughter’s. She died the moment the nurse told her that Emily was gone. From that moment on, Lauren had no family, no daughter, no desire to do anything but move on and fulfill her single goal in life: to find Shane. She would look as often as she had a chance, every day, every hour.

  Even if it took the rest of her life.