Beauty from Ashes

by Alana Terry

  Anyway, Jake and his sister aren’t like that at all. I mean, they’re polite when they talk, but they usually only call each other on birthdays or holidays or things. And then they chat for ten or fifteen minutes and go back to their separate lives. Abby’s so busy with school and now this boyfriend her mom hates but who sounds like a decent enough guy as far as boyfriends go. Part of me wants to find someplace private to talk, tell Abby she shouldn’t feel guilty for being with this computer whiz because he’s smart so he’ll probably make plenty of money. And if she’s a lawyer ... all I have to say is that’s a family that would never have to wait an hour on hold with Medicaid to get a seven-hundred-dollar medical bill covered by the state.

  Jake turns off the shower and steps out, and I glance down the hall at the steam following him from the bathroom. Man, he looks good today. I mean, he’s no body-builder or anything, but that’s never been my type. I want him to look up at me, give me his little cheesy grin that used to get my insides quivering like that glass of water in Jurassic Park. But instead he shoots me a questioning kind of glance, like he’s not sure if he’s going to be mad at me or not when he finds out why I’m on his mother’s phone.

  It’s your sister. I mouth the words to him before he turns around. I stare at his back as he disappears into our room and shuts the door behind him.

  CHAPTER 22

  “Did you have a good day?” Jake asks.

  I’m curled up against him, nestled beneath my electric blanket. Patricia’s out watching some cooking show, so Jake and I went to bed early.

  “It wasn’t bad.” I’ve been thinking about that granny lady in church now that everything’s quiet and there’s nothing to do. Patricia will sleep in Natalie’s room, so she’ll cover the night feeding and the suctioning, and she’ll take care of the apnea monitor if it goes off.

  “I’m opening tomorrow, so I’ve got to get up early.”

  I hate it when Jake works days.

  Jake must sense that I’m upset, because he snuggles up a little closer. “Sorry I won’t be here to help out.”

  It’s sweet of him to say, even though he never helps with the baby anyway. I swear, that boy can go three or four days without even touching his own daughter. I think he’s afraid, actually. Afraid that he’ll make a mistake. Part of me thinks he still feels guilty for what happened in the delivery room, like he should have noticed sooner something was wrong. Really, if he hadn’t been there, I probably would have gone on sleeping. I wouldn’t have woken up at all. I’ve never told him this. We haven’t ever talked about that day, truth be told. I think eventually we will, and I’ll be sure to tell him it’s not his fault. But if I were to bring it up now, it would make things worse. Open old wounds that should probably be left alone. What are adults always telling kids?

  Don’t pick your scabs.

  I like this, though, this closeness and warmth. Of course, a lot of that’s from the electric blanket, but some of it — that sense of security — comes right from him. I nestle my head into that spot between his shoulder and chin, that soft place that feels as warm and inviting as the smell of Sandy baking her famous homemade cookies. It’s warmth and security and peace all wrapped up with something else. Something I don’t necessarily want to put a name to. Because if I’m wrong ...

  “Did you and Abby have a good talk?” His voice is distant, like he’s asking me about his sister but he’s thinking about something else. Heaven knows what. Maybe what time he has to wake up tomorrow. Or how long until his mother turns off the TV and stops polluting our home with that ridiculous, canned noise. Or a pouty-lipped, busty co-worker named Charlene he slept with while I was stuck in a hospital waiting to deliver his baby.

  “Yeah,” I tell him, but my mind’s somewhere else, too. Shame in the pit of my core. Terror that one day I’ll let it slip and he’ll find out what I’ve done.

  He kisses me on the cheek. It’s soft. Friendly. Like we’re a married couple sleeping side by side in a nursing home, all romance and passion distant memories in the past.

  I hate that I’m thinking about him right now. Hate that I’m thinking about him that way. Because I’ve resigned myself to the fact that nothing’s going to happen as long as his mother is staying here. The funny thing is I feel more prudish around his non-religious mother than I ever did around Sandy, and she’s the picture-perfect pastor’s wife who probably didn’t even kiss a boy until the day she and her husband got married.

  Back when I lived with Sandy, I went to one of those girls-only lock-ins at her church. You know, the kind where they get these cute, perky college-aged women to tell you why you’ve got to save sex for marriage. The pathetic part was they acted like we were so pure to start with. Like we weren’t the kind of girls passed around from foster home to foster home where some of the guys we met were ok and some weren’t. And these abstinence cheerleaders kept going on and on about not wanting to give your husband hand-me-downs on your wedding night, and I signed the abstinence pledges, and I wore the purity rings, and all the while I was sneaking Lincoln Grant in through the bedroom window. Because those twenty-year-old virgins didn’t understand girls like me. Girls who would give up their breasts and fallopian tubes to know what it felt like to be clean. Pure.

  Whole.

  Hand-me-downs on your wedding night. It’s a dumb phrase for me to be thinking about right now, but some things are harder to forget than others.

  “What time do you have to get up in the morning?” I ask Jake, but he doesn’t answer. He’s already asleep.

  CHAPTER 23

  Well, I made it through the day with just Patricia and me. And Natalie, of course. She did well, actually. I don’t think we had to suction her quite as much as usual. I wonder if that means her swallowing is finally improving. If she’s able to swallow her saliva, then one day she might be able to handle real food ...

  I can’t get ahead of myself, though. Best to assume she’ll have that G-tube for the rest of her life. But days like this, it’s sometimes hard to remember my resolve. I held her for a while this afternoon while Patricia was out grocery shopping. That woman always complains we don’t have enough fresh fruits and veggies on hand. She doesn’t know we’re on food stamps because Jake’s too embarrassed to tell her, but the one good thing about Patricia bunking in with us is she buys most of the groceries. Otherwise, I don’t know how we’d afford the extra food. Not that she eats much. That woman is skinny as a flagpole and about as feminine.

  Anyway, while Patricia was out, I was online for a little bit, but there wasn’t much for me to say, so I took Natalie out of the crib and held her for a while. She stayed awake for a full twenty minutes or so. I wasn’t watching the clock real close, but I think it’s the longest she’s gone. And that whole time she was with me, I didn’t have to turn on the suction machine once.

  Hashtag blessed, right?

  Part of me wanted to jump online right away and tell everyone how well she was doing, but another part of me wanted to keep it to myself. Something special just between my daughter and me.

  My daughter. That’s so stinking weird.

  Jake came home from his shift around two, and I think maybe once we’re in bed tonight I’ll tell him about Natalie’s good day, but right now he’s tired and kind of grumpy. That’s ok. He gets that way when he’s hungry. He probably went the whole shift without eating. He does that to save money, which I guess is nice on the one hand because we need every penny we can scrape up. But on the other hand, I’d rather him come home in a slightly better mood, so it’s something of a lose-lose.

  Patricia’s setting lunch on the table right now, so at least I won’t have to put up with his bad attitude for long. I swear that boy gets hormonal when his blood sugar drops too low.

  It’s funny because Patricia makes this big stink about eating together, to the point where if Jake doesn’t get off work until eight or nine at night she’ll actually hold dinner until then. But it’s not like we’re this big happy family feasting around t
he table and sharing our deepest thoughts or even talking about our days. Mealtimes are quiet. Patricia will sometimes offer some sort of unsolicited advice she picked up from her heroic efforts raising twins without a living soul in the universe to help her out, but other than that we don’t really say anything.

  Now that I’ve met Patricia, I feel like I understand Jake better. Why he’s so quiet. It used to trip me out back in the NICU. We’d eat dinner together every night before he’d head back to the Ronald McDonald house and play Candy Zapper on his phone and I’d return to the NICU to talk to the night nurses as they were starting their shifts. We’d sometimes go an entire meal without saying anything more than, “You ready?” when we were done.

  I asked him about it once, asked him why he was so quiet. I had just said goodbye to Sandy the day before, and if there’s one woman who doesn’t know how to eat a meal without yakking someone’s ear off, it’s her. I think that’s why I noticed how silent Jake was in comparison.

  “Just thinking,” was all he said, and I wanted him to tell me more. Don’t ask me what I was expecting. Some sort of big share-fest where he’d reveal all the things he was afraid of and I’d tell him all the things I was sorry for but hadn’t found the guts to bring up yet. And we’d cry because we were both so relieved to get certain things out in the open, and then I’d hug him and tell him how glad I was he came to be with me in Seattle because once Sandy left, I realized even more pointedly how much it would suck to be out there totally alone.

  But I kept chomping on my fries, and he kept poking at his Jell-O, and neither of us said anything until we were finished eating and I asked, “Ready to go?”

  And that was it.

  I used to think it’d be so romantic to fall in love with a perfect stranger. To trust those emotions so well that even if you didn’t know his name you could look at him and be convinced that he was the one for you. It sounds sweet and dreamy, but what you don’t think about is how lonely it is to fall in love — or at least think you’ve fallen in love — with someone you know, only to find out months later that you’re nothing but strangers.

  CHAPTER 24

  It’s Wednesday morning, and I’m at the pediatrician’s office with Natalie. Roberto screwed up Jake’s schedule, so he’s at the store working day shift. Again. Which means I had to wake up at 4:45 to drop him off so I’d have the car. It also means I’m here with Patricia because it takes two people to haul Natalie anywhere, one to drive and one to sit in the backseat with the suction machine ready in case she chokes.

  Dr. Bell’s running late, but there’s no surprise there. She’s the only pediatrician in Orchard Grove, and unless you’re filthy rich or your kid has a complicated medical history, you have to see one of the family doctors instead. I like Dr. Bell, though. She’s pretty young. Low thirties I would guess, but she’s got nice skin, so she could easily pass as a twenty-something. She’s thorough and methodical, which is nice when you’re in the office with her but a real pain in the butt when you’re stuck in the waiting room.

  At least she keeps a lot of magazines out here. Right now, I’m skimming an article called Ten Hot Tips to Spice up your Love Life ... Even after Baby! Unfortunately, the writer doesn’t mention anything about intrusive mothers-in-law or apnea monitors prone to go off at all hours of the night.

  Patricia’s reading a food magazine, which strikes me as mildly ironic. With as many cooking experts as that woman follows, you’d think someone would have introduced her to the concept of salt by now.

  I’m still mad at Jake for rushing to the store just because Roberto needed him. I know he wants to work as many hours as he can get, but it’s been two weeks since we’ve seen Dr. Bell, and he should have known that Patricia’s the last person I’d want to tag along on a trip like this. Today’s the day I’m going to tell the doctor I’m taking Natalie off the apnea machine, and I could use Jake there to back me up.

  Jake texts me while I’m thumbing through the winners of the last month’s photo contest. One of the babies is only a month older than Natalie but can already sit up on her own in one of those funny little rubbery chairs. She’s smiling too. It’s no wonder the editors picked her. I should send them a picture of Natalie just to see what they’d do. Find them a photo from one of her first few days, when she’s got an IV in her forehead and tubes shoved down her throat. I’d like to find that printed up and put alongside all these fat Gerber babies who’ve never seen the inside of a medevac jet.

  Talked with the Dr. yet? Jake wants to know. I roll my eyes. If he expects Dr. Bell to be on time, he’s even dumber than his mother thinks he is. I don’t even bother to answer. I remind myself of all the things I want to talk to Dr. Bell about. The fact that Natalie hasn’t gained a single pound since we’ve had her home. The fact that she still hasn’t cried. The fact that the apnea monitor we’ve got is a waste of everybody’s time.

  Or is it?

  I don’t like to admit it even to myself, but I’m still thinking quite a bit about that weird thing that happened to me at church on Sunday. That hallucination or Jesus trip or whatever it was where I saw Natalie on God’s lap. Even now, I have no doubt it was her, just like I have no doubt that if it weren’t for her brain injuries she would look exactly like that image in five or six years, missing teeth and all.

  The problem is I still don’t know what it means. Is she going to be healed? Or will she die? How am I supposed to figure out anything when that’s my range of possible explanations? I can’t shake the feeling that the vision is supposed to tell me something. Am I too stupid to figure it out? Too scared? And what if I get it wrong? What if the vision means she’s going to be just fine, but I don’t have enough faith, and so I take her off the apnea monitor and something bad happens?

  But then there’s the other side of it too. Like what if the vision means she won’t be healed until she gets to heaven, but I hold on too long and make her suffer when I’m supposed to let go so she can see Jesus sooner or whatever? I’ve been thinking about Sandy too, wondering what she’d say the vision means. I should talk with her, but how do you start a conversation like that? Hi, Sandy. I’m calling because some Holy Ghost lady stood up in church, and while she was talking, I was wigging out and saw my daughter on Jesus’ lap, only now I don’t know if that means I’m supposed to take her off her apnea monitor and let her die or if it means that she’s going to be just fine and I need to have patience.

  I’m trying to guess what Sandy’s reaction would be when Dr. Bell’s middle-aged nurse calls me back. I can never remember her name. Trixie or Marge or one of those other names you’d expect to call a waitress at an old-school diner. But she’s all smiles, and she even takes the suction machine so I have both hands free to carry Natalie in her car seat.

  “How’s the little miracle baby?” she asks. I try to remember how long it’s been since I’ve had a face-to-face conversation with anyone besides Jake or his mom.

  “She had a really good day Monday,” I tell her.

  Nurse Smiles beams down at my daughter. “Good for you, little angel.”

  We get into the room, and I see her name tag now. Barb. That’s right. She flips through some pages on a clipboard. “Oh, she says. “They must have given us the wrong forms.”

  I can’t figure out why she’s fidgeting so nervously as she takes out some stapled pages and tosses them on the counter. “Never mind,” she says and holds her pen ready over a blank page. “Why don’t you tell me how she’s been since the last time you brought her in?”

  I frown. “Not too many changes, really. I’m a little worried she hasn’t gained any weight.” I go on and wonder why I bother since Dr. Bell is going to ask me the exact same questions in a few minutes. While Nurse Barb scribbles away on her pad, I steal a glance at the discarded packet on the counter.

  Four month well baby check. There are Natalie’s name and birthdate written on the top in curvy feminine handwriting where you’d almost expect to find a heart dotting the i in Natalie’s
name.

  I look at the questions on the form. Does your child sleep through the night?

  Yeah, and ninety percent of the day, too.

  Does your child transfer a toy from one hand to the other?

  She might if she had any clue what her hands were for or how to use them.

  Does your child smile and make eye contact?

  Screw this.

  Nurse Barb’s telling me what vaccinations Natalie’s due to get today. Poor thing. I have to step out of the room whenever they do it. I can’t stand to see the way she scrunches up her little face, her own silent version of crying.

  Barb wraps up all her questions, and she leaves me and Natalie alone to wait some more. There’s a mural of sunflowers and cute oversized bumblebees on the wall. Each room has a different theme. Last time we came here, our room sported an underwater setting with little orange Nemos and blue Dori fish. All the paintings are signed J. Bell at the bottom, but I don’t know if that’s the pediatrician or maybe a relative of hers or something.

  I gave Natalie her tube feeding right before we came here. I hoped it would give her a few extra ounces on the scale, except now she’s making that grimace like she’s uncomfortable, and her breathing’s gotten really noisy. I power up the suction machine, wondering if the family the next room over can hear it.

  Ever since we got out of the NICU, I’ve only met one other mom with a suction device like ours. It was when we were still in Seattle, still getting set up with specialists and making sure Natalie would be healthy enough for the drive back to Orchard Grove. We were in the waiting room at the lung doctor’s, and this boy with glasses shuffled in. He was older, maybe nine or ten, and he looked perfectly healthy except he kind of rocked side to side when he walked. Anyway, his mom was lugging a suction machine with her. Exact same make and model as mine. Even the same gray carrying case.