“That’s the people who want to adopt him?” I questioned, my voice shaking and eyes frightened.
“Yes.”
“What happens after this?” Paxton asked with the same nervous shake in his tone.
“Well, we need for all parties to agree. That’s what’s best for Vander. If neither party can agree, it’ll go to court, and in my seventeen years’ experience, I’m going to say you folks would win. It’s just so unnecessary for the child. I’m not saying the Wagner’s aren’t good people, they are, I’ve just never seen a child kept from a good family who wants them. Just remember, they love him, too.”
“I’m not going to tell them they can have him,” I assured her, determination expressed in my suddenly strong voice.
She nodded and stood, admitting her findings. “I didn’t think for a second that you would.”
Paxton and I looked at each other while we waited, watching while she waved them in. He squeezed my trembling hand, and pressed down on my bouncing knee.
“I can’t help it,” I whispered.
“Hello, I’m Rick and this is my wife, June. We’ve had Vander for a couple months now. We’re totally in love with the kid. He’s brought so much joy to our lives, and we love him so much,” the guy said, spewing word vomit all over us. A well thought out speech, a sales pitch. That’s what it sounded like. We both stood and waited for it to be over.
Paxton did the talking, omitting our names. They knew who we were. “Thank you for taking care of him. We appreciate it very much.”
The female gave her spiel next, and I did feel bad for her. Not bad enough to hand over my nephew, but bad. “But you don’t even know him. He’s never met you. We know his routine, and what he likes to eat, his favorite toys, and his favorite books. Please don’t take him from us. We can’t have kids. Vander was our first foster child, and we were adamant about only taking a little boy who was available for adoption. We just had to follow procedure and he would be a Wagner. He would be ours. Please. Please, don’t take him.”
I stepped around Paxton even with the attempt to hold me back with a straight arm. “You didn’t know him either. He’s my sister’s little boy, and I promised her I would take care of him. I love him, too, and I’m sorry that it turned out this way for you. I really am, but I will fight for him until my dying breath. I have to.”
The guy placed an arm over his wife’s shoulder when she nodded, a sad smile like she knew. “We brought all of his stuff. It’s not fair to Vander to go through a custody battle that we’re not going to win. Can I stay while he meets you? He’s a little shy around strangers.”
I turned to Paxton for the answer and he nodded, but Mrs. Chadwick stepped in. “Hold up. We need to talk about this. Gabriella, you look exactly like his mommy. I mean for a second I thought you were Izzy, trying to pull a fast one. If I hadn’t checked out your story and found your records from Fort Myers, Florida; I would have never believed it. I’m not sure how he’s going to react.”
“We talked to him about it,” Rick said.
Mrs. Chadwick walked to her office door again and waved her hand while Paxton squeezed mine. One would have thought I would be used to all the damn adrenaline rushes by now, but I wasn’t. I would never get used to that, the nerves that pumped ferociously through my veins, and then—it stopped. It all went away.
Vander let go of the lady’s hand and froze. Everyone froze. The world stood still while this little boy stared right at me, motionless, contemplating whether or not I was his mommy. I knelt on one knee and opened my arms to him, holding back burning tears. The only sound was his feet scuffing along the floor as he walked slowly toward me. I brought his little hands to my lips, trying like hell not to cry. He let me pull him into a hug, and even wrapped his little arms around my neck when I squeezed him.
“My mommy has my name on her heart, and a squiggly line from when I was born. It’s my heartbeat. You don’t have that, do you?” he asked, barely above a whisper.
“No, baby, I don’t.””
You’re Gabby, but you’re really Izzy, because you traded places with my mom because you’re brave. Where’s my mommy?”
That did it. I couldn’t help it. I pulled him closer to my body, feeling something cosmic, a phenomenon that I would never be able to put into words. I felt it, a pull so forceful it couldn’t be described. The same strong energy I’d felt the day I met Rowan and Phi for the first time. Even if I didn’t remember them, I loved them. Even if I never met him, I loved him.
“We’re trying to find your mommy, buddy,” Paxton said from my side. I hadn’t even noticed that he had knelt, too. Right beside me.
“Do you want to come and stay with us for a while?” Paxton questioned.
“I want to stay with June and Rick. I have to play soccer tomorrow.”
“Maybe you can call them later,” Mrs. Chadwick said from behind her desk when nobody replied. June sort of swallowed a whimper, but that’s it. I didn’t know what to say. Not a clue. “Gabby and Paxton would like to take you to lunch.”
Vander’s eyes perked up a bit, losing a little of the sadness. “And get a lobster?”
Paxton high-fived him with a loud, “Yes! Seafood, my man.”
Even with all the sadness, we all smiled, and Vander giggled, something between a cackling chicken, and a goat. Identical to Ophelia’s laugh.
“Wait, what does this mean? We can take him? He can go home with us?” I questioned when June’s words surfaced after all the commotion.
“It’s Friday. I’ll do my best to get the custody papers signed by the judge today, if not, it’ll be Monday. Can you stay until then?”
Paxton responded, coming to his feet. “No way. We have two little girls at home.”
“I can stay. You can go home if we have to wait,” I kindly offered knowing damn well he’d never let me stay there without him.
“No, where’s the judge? I’ll personally deliver them,” he countered.
“Let’s let Rick and June say goodbye to Vander,” she suggested rather than answering Paxton’s question.
I followed her out into the hall, watching behind me. Rick scooped Vander up, saying something about his swing, and to remember to choke up on the bat a little as the door shut. We all strolled down the hall and to a coffee pot. Paxton and I both declined.
“I’ll fax you the paperwork Monday morning. Have them notarized and sent back to me as soon as you get them.”
“We’re taking him home? Today?” I questioned with a point down, like the floor was today.
“The Wagner’s don’t want to have to go through this again in a couple days, I don’t want to put him in another home for a couple days, and he’s going to be there anyway. You win. Vander’s going home with you today.”
“Oh my God. Paxton, go find us plane tickets,” I said, not even trying to hide the freak-out going on in my mind. This was real life. This was really happening. Vander was safe, where I would always take care of him.
Vander was going home.
Sixteen
I can’t even begin to explain the high that I was on. Vander filled a void I never knew I had, and I was proud of my sister for the young man he was. Polite and happy, just like I expected. And Paxton, oh my God, Vander loved Paxton. They ate their nasty lobster and I enjoyed my cream pasta with asparagus and a garden salad, feeling happier than I think I ever had in my life. We walked around a park after lunch hand in hand while Vander ran up ahead, happy and as energetic as a little boy should be.
We sat by a pond and called Mi to tell her the good news and that we couldn’t get a flight back out until the next afternoon. Mi didn’t mind at all, Nick was there and they were going to build a moat on the beach, then build a fire and roast marshmallows. Paxton tried to protest the dangerous fire, only because he needed to be there to supervise. I elbowed him to get him to stop talking over my shoulder while I FaceTimed with Mi, and then the girls.
“Did you go see that little boy?” Ophelia asked when M
i handed over her phone.
“Yes, and guess what?”
“What?”
“He looks like you.”
“No he doesn’t. He’s a boy.”
“But he has the same eyes as you, the same skin, and the same hair. Do you want to say hi to him?”
“Okay.”
Rowan popped her face in, too, causing an instant fight.
“She said me,” Ophelia whined while shoving her away.
“I want to see him, too.”
Vander looked at me with wide eyes and a grin when Mi whistled, stopping the fight as quickly as it started.
“Hi, Vander, I’m Mi. How are you?” Mi said in the phone, her face too close to the screen.
“Good,” Vander shyly replied into the phone.
“This is your cousin, Ophelia. Say hi, Phi.”
“Hi, Phi,” Ophelia said through her crackly laugh.
Van laughed, too, but didn’t say hi. I guess it was a little awkward for all of them. We didn’t really expect things to roll this fast. I thought I had a few weeks, not days. Nonetheless, they were about to be roommates, and I was about to be the mother of three. Holy smokes.
Paxton left us alone at the hotel pool later that evening, telling me he had something to do, I didn’t even care what. Vander told me more about his mommy than I would have ever known. He loved her, he missed her, and the way he kept staring at me, made me feel sad for him. I knew what his little eyes were seeing. His mommy, that wasn’t his mommy. Poor little guy.
Had I not been exhausted from lack of sleep, I could have stared at him the entire night. His little arms moved below his body, and he slept on his tummy. It was the perfect ending to a perfect day.
“Let’s go in the bathroom,” Paxton whispered from behind me.
Okay, maybe that was the perfect ending. Paxton made love to me with my ass on the sink, and his hand over my mouth. Just a quickie, no foreplay involved, not really. I lay in his arms, staring over to Vander, feeling safe and content.
“I thought Ophelia looked like me until I met this kid. She’s definitely got more Delgardo than Pierce.”
“I know. It’s crazy. I think it’s a twin thing,” I said and then shifted my focus with the shift in thoughts. “Where did you go, Paxton?” I questioned as my eyes closed, finding peace.
“When?”
“You know when. When you left. Don’t do that.”
“I went to the home Izzy grew up in. I wanted to take you there, but she said no. She said she didn’t want to be a part of Izzy’s life anymore, that she tried to help her, but she wouldn’t let her. Izzy stole a lot of money from her, and a necklace that was family heirloom. She’s not letting that go.”
“She was sick.”
“I know, but she did give me a box of her things, pictures and stuff. She said she didn’t have any need for them.”
“Where are they?”
“I dropped it off at the UPS store with Van’s things. I went by her place, too, hoping someone saved something. They didn’t. It was rented to someone else a couple months ago. They sold what she had to pay her back rent.”
I turned to Paxton and placed a hand on his cheek. “Thank you for trying. Thank you for all of this.”
“Tell me you love me.”
“What?” I asked with a frown.
“You never say it back. I tell you I love you all the time and you never say it back.”
“I do, too. I just said it today.”
“No, that was a, yeah, yeah, love you, too.”
“Same thing.”
“No it’s not, Gabriella. Tell me you love me. Look into my eyes and tell me you forgive me, and you’ll be here to keep pushing me to be a better person.”
“I don’t push you to do that.”
“You do. You make me want to be a better person. Tell me you love me, Gabriella.”
I took a deep breath and shifted my eyes to my hand on his chest, pondering the simple gesture. “I didn’t know that I did until today.”
“You didn’t know if you loved me?”
“No, I mean, I knew I did, but not enough to put it out there like you do so freely.”
“What does that mean? You think I’m bluffing?”
“Not anymore. Not since you pulled me into the men’s bathroom and let me cry all over your shirt for ten minutes without a word. I love you Pax, I am so madly in love with you, our life, and our family. I’m so stoked to make new memories.”
Paxton lifted my chin and kissed my nose, and then my lips. “I promise to make them better than the ones you forgot.”
I grinned and kissed his lips, snuggled into his chest, and slept. I’m not sure I moved the entire night. I rested better than I had in weeks with my sister’s Clyde right next to me.
~~
I knew by the time we landed back in Tampa that Paxton would no doubt love another man’s child, because he was already falling. Vander was extremely interested in the pool graphics that Paxton worked on. Paxton was more than eager to tell him about it. Vander wanted a waterslide like that with a secret tunnel. I don’t think my smile left the entire flight home, and then I cried. I literally had to get up and walk to the bathroom.
“Look what I got for you,” Paxton said when he remembered his gift from Mi.
“I already gots one. My mommy has one, too. You have one, too, Gabby. My mommy said so. A Indian with big feathers gave it to my mommy, and your mommy, and you. Like me,” Vander said as his black rock clicked with Paxton’s, creating an instant smile across his little face.
I didn’t remember that, and I wanted to. How ironic was it that my mom believed in the same magical stones that Mi believed in? I went to the bathroom and cried. Where was my stone?
Paxton never mentioned the incident, not once all the way home. He asked me if I was okay, and that was it. We never discussed it again.
Vander fit into our family like an old glove, joining Rowan and Phi like he’d been there from the beginning. Even their first encounter was like they were old cousins who’d known each other for years. Phi showed him his dinosaurs and they spent hours in the pool. Rowan and Phi even played in it more because Van loved it so much.
It wasn’t all peaches and cream though, far from it. It was either Vander and Ophelia fighting, or Rowan and Ophelia. Never Rowan and Vander. Ophelia kept calling him Mini-Van, thanks to Paxton. I swear that girl didn’t forget anything. Vander hated it. Of course that made her do it more.
I spent three full days tangled up in love. Only one thing could have made me happier, and that was my sister. If Izzy would walk through that door and claim her son, I would have been the happiest girl alive. I thought about her all the time, and I continued to search every missing profile site out there, but I never had a lead worth pursuing. She was just gone, vanished into thin air.
Everything moved along just as it should have, an entire week of getting used to Vander, of Vander getting used to us and his new surroundings. Even Paxton seemed happier, more playful, and somewhat less stressed. He didn’t even get upset the way I thought he would the next night when I decided to watch the video that Nick wanted me to watch alone. Two more, and I would never get another hint of my memory again. I guess I was grateful for having them. They weren’t the best memories to recollect, but they were all I had.
Paxton told me to go at nine when we were still trying to get the kids to settle down. He wasn’t really invited anyway, and I was sure from the sounds of the giggling, it would be a while. Why they loved wrestling him to the ground so much was beyond me. They had fun and filled the house full of laughter, so I guess that’s all that really mattered in the end.
I made myself a drink and walked up with Paxton’s laptop under my arm. Everything had pretty much been laid out there. What more could there be? I could handle it and we would get through it, just like the other times.
The air was cooler than I expected it to be, but I covered up and stayed outside. Once I was set up and ready, I hit the downloa
d link like Paxton always did.
“Hey, Nick. Thanks for hanging out with my cubs the other day. They love you. Where’s Mi? What’s wrong?”
“I feel like you’re moving in the right direction, like you’re going to be okay. We can stop now, Gabby. It’s okay to stop.”
“Is it bad?”
“Yes, it’s a game changer.”
“But I have a right to know.”
Nick nodded with a deep breath. “That’s why I’m here. I’ve been arguing with myself about this all day, trying to talk myself into getting rid of it before anyone else can see it.”
“It can’t be that bad, Nick.”
“It is, Gabby.”
“Well, I want to hear it.”
“Do you want me to stay on?”
“No, you can go.”
“Okay, I’m a phone call away.”
“I’m fine,” I said with an assuring tone. My words sounded more confident than I felt. I was strong on the outside, but felt like a bowl of Jell-O on the inside, waiting with anticipation.
“Gabby, can you hear me?”
“Yes, I can hear you Lane.”
“We’re going to pick up where we left off, and Nick is going to attempt to erase part of your memory today, but first I need to ask if you if you’ve ever been with anyone else, okay?”
“Okay.”
“Have you ever been with any other men, Gabby?”
“You mean sex? I kissed someone once. On the lips.”
“Before or after Paxton?”
“Oh, it was way after. Ophelia had just turned three.”
“You did? Who was it?”
“His name was Chip. Paxton hired him to teach me to cook because I didn’t cook a roast the way he liked it. He called them in front of me, signed me up for a cooking lesson, and made me go every Saturday for two whole months. Only the joke was on him. Chip was an amazing chef, but he was also a bartender. I had fun with him. A lot of fun. He taught me how to make so many drinks, I could run a row of shots without spilling a drop. He said I was a natural. It sort of made me wish I could get a job, be around people, and have friends.”
“You could have that, Gabby. There is a man out there that would love you like you deserve to be loved,” Lane said while clearing his throat.
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