Forbidden

by R. R. Banks

  I never want you to be embarrassed or feel bad about the way that you came to be. It might not be the same way that other people are born, but it doesn’t mean that you are any less important or any less valuable. In fact, you are so very important, so very treasured, and so very loved, already, even now before you even exist, that your parents are willing to go through an unbelievable amount just to give them a chance that they will get to have you. I hope that they make you feel as special as you already are.

  I also never want you to blame your mama or feel like she did something wrong for this having to be the way that you came to be. Sometimes the people who want children the most are the ones who have the hardest time actually having them. It’s not her fault. She didn’t do anything wrong and I know that if she had the choice, this wouldn’t be what she would do. I’m sure that if she had the choice, she would be the one who got to hold you inside of her and protect you until you were ready to be born. But she is still your mother. She is just as much your mother as if she did carry you and deliver you herself. Please never forget that. If you get a chance, remember to thank her. She put aside a lot of pride and a lot of self-doubt to bring you into this world, and I’m sure that she went through a lot of people telling her that she was doing the wrong thing. Even if they acted like they were supporting her and would never actually say that they thought that she was doing something that she shouldn’t, she would be able to feel with her heart what they actually thought of her. People have a way of presenting themselves one way when they are really something different underneath. But she went through all of that, she endured all of that, for you.

  As I said, I don’t know if we’ll ever get a chance to really meet. I’ll see you the moment that you are born, of course. I’ll even get to hear your voice. But I don’t know if they will ever let me hold you. I don’t know if I’d want to. Those are moments that you should be spending with them, not with me. I’ll have the chance to cradle you, in a different way, for the first months of your existence and that’s something that I’ll always remember. I’ll be the only person who will have ever gotten to connect with you like that, and I won’t forget how significant that is. To be honest, I can’t really think of any situation when they would want for you to meet me when you are older, unless it is only because they want you to know the woman who made it possible for you to be born. That sounds so arrogant when I write it out, like I’m doing something that’s all that big of a deal and not what countless other women do every day.

  If we did get a chance to spend any time together when you were old enough to understand who I am, I would want to tell you that what I told the man interviewing me last week was totally true. I really am considering doing this for you. That might not have been the case initially, when he surprised me with the whole thing, but after a few minutes of thinking about it, I realized that as crazy as it sounded, I really did want to be a part of making you a reality. It’s almost like I can feel you waiting, like even though you don’t exist yet, I know that you’re somewhere, just hanging out and getting ready for when it’s time for you to come, and that I might be the one who is supposed to make sure that happens. Does that sound crazy?

  What I told Tessie is totally true, too. You’ll probably never have a reason to meet her, but she’s one of the two people who mean the most to me. She’s…well, she’s really hard to explain, we’ll just leave it at that. When I told her that I was thinking about helping your parents have you, her reaction wasn’t what I thought it was going to be. I thought that she would be supportive and think that it was a wonderful thing to do, considering all of the good work in the world that she does. But I suppose when she is doing a good deed for someone it doesn’t involve sacrificing her body for almost a year. I needed to tell her more than just that I wanted to do something good for the world. I needed to explain to her about Grammyma’s house.

  You’ll never get to meet my Grammyma. I don’t know, maybe you already have. She’s up there in Heaven where I’m imagining you floating around in some celestial waiting area for a nurse to come call your name and tell you it’s time. Your name. It’s funny, I didn’t even think about the fact that you wouldn’t have one of those when you came. That’ll be up to your parents to decide. It’s like I think that you’re going to show up with a little manual and a name tag, so I know who you are and which parents to give you to when you’re born. Anyway, Grammyma died about ten years back. She was the most amazing woman. Her eyes never looked old, even at the very end. As I got to be an adult, she shriveled up like a little raisin, but her eyes didn’t change. They always sparkled and looked young and full of life. That sparkle was the same one that was in my Daddy’s eyes.

  His faded a little, though. He struggled a lot in the last couple of years of his life. I know that he was sick, but I felt like it was something more than that. It was almost like he had been missing my mama for so long that his heart and body just couldn’t take it anymore. Like he had been holding on for me while I was growing up because he wanted to make sure that I had at least one of my parents, and then when he saw that I had gotten there, I was grown, all of the stress and sadness of not having Mama just took over. I wish that it had been easier for him. I wish that I had gone home to see him rather than just bringing him to my apartment. If I had, I would have found out that he had never paid off the loan that he had to take out on Grammyma’s house, the house I grew up in with the two of them, when I was a teenager and his business went bad. I would have found out that he hadn’t been taking care of the house in the years since I had been there and that it was starting to fall apart.

  I know it’s just a house, but some day you’ll understand what it is to have a home that is the one place in the whole world, no matter what other types of memories you associate with the place around it, where you feel loved and protected and safe, and as though anyone who you wanted to be was the person who belonged there. At least I hope you do. Sometimes I think that I didn’t really live up to what Daddy really would have wanted of me. Well, I know for certain I didn’t because I left Whiskey Hollow and I’m not married. That doesn’t matter, though, he would have always welcomed me right back home, right back into the kitchen that smelled like cookies and the living room that always sounded like sports or old TV shows. That’s why I have to save it. It’s my responsibility now. I’m all that’s left and I’m the only one who can make sure that my family’s legacy doesn’t disappear from the Hollow completely.

  I’m moving back there in just a few weeks. I have to move out of my apartment by the first of the year, but I might go back before that. Christmas in Whiskey Hollow is something. I don’t really know what, exactly, but it’s something. By then, I should be carrying you with me.

  I’m going to go to sleep now. I have a feeling I’m going to need all the energy I can get tomorrow. Wish me luck, Baby.

  Rue

  Chapter Five

  Rue

  What are you supposed to wear when you are going to meet with people hoping they choose you to carry their baby?

  The letter that I had written to the potential future baby was still laying on my dresser the next morning while I stood in front of the full-length mirror hanging from the back of my bedroom door and evaluated all seventeen of the outfits that I had picked out for the day’s meeting. Considering the spectacular ensemble I had worn for the first meeting, I didn’t know how I was going to make any more of an impression, but I felt that I needed to at least put some effort into it.

  The truth was that I was on the brink of obsessing over what I was going to wear, how I was going to do my hair, and which lipstick color to put on. It was like I was getting ready for the strangest and most foreshadowing-filled date that has ever been.

  I want to look super pretty so that we can chat for a bit and then I can get pregnant and not have anything to do with you or the child after the baby’s born. Sound like a plan?

  I straightened the hem of the hip-length jacket I had paired with a pencil sk
irt, twisted side to side to look at myself from all angles possible, and then tore off the jacket and tossed it aside so I could try a cardigan on instead. How formal, exactly, was a surrogacy interview? Was this executive assistant to the CEO with my own office, or was this secretary with a desk on the main floor? I tried not to think about the job that that comparison brought to mind. I had worked hard to get the position that ensured I could stay out of Whiskey Hollow and in the city where I had gone to college on a partial scholarship. I had carried the rest of the expense of school on my own back, working whatever jobs I could get to pay it knowing full well that Daddy would have helped me if he could, but it just wasn’t in the cards for him. Not a lot of people leave Whiskey Hollow at all, but they certainly don’t leave to go off to the city to go to college and start a career. So, I did it myself. I worked harder than I knew that I could, and I got through school then landed the first position I applied for.

  Now I had left that behind.

  They didn’t know it yet, since I was fully intending on continuing to collect the benefits of the extremely generous leave of absence policy that the company had until the very last moment that they were available to me, but I was never going to walk back into that office and sit behind my desk. I had even smuggled home the potted plant and framed picture of Mama and Daddy that I kept on display to perk me up during difficult days. Those had come with me on my very first day on the job. It felt like an obligation. Every movie that you ever see when a girl gets her first job in the big city, the first thing she does is sit down at her desk and put out a potted plant and a picture of her family. That was when I was just in a little cubicle squished up into a honeycomb of dozens of other cubicles where it was hard to even hear myself think over the voices of all the other people working around me.

  As I rose through the ranks of the company, though, so did they, and when I finally made it into my own tiny little office, that potted plant and picture got first dibs on the desk space even before the paperweight and my name plaque. The picture even got an upgrade to a silver frame. I felt like the pinnacle of success even though I was still only just barely able to stay comfortable paying for my apartment and bills and all of those other pesky expenses of adulting. That in itself was pretty comfortable, though. Having a lot of money was something else that people from the Hollow just didn’t do. We weren’t scraping around in the dirt, but we also weren’t driving around in the long, shimmering cars I constantly saw in the office parking lot or eating at restaurants that cost two weeks’ worth of groceries for dinner.

  Now my potted plant and picture of my parents had had to take up new real estate on the side table in my living room, never again to oversee my work. Giving up the career that I had cultivated over the years was the most difficult decision that I was having to make in this situation. I was having to give up all that I had committed myself to and all that I had accomplished so that I could return home and get this situation fixed. The money that they were offering would be plenty to carry me through for a while. I honestly didn’t know what I was going to do after that. I would figure it out when the time came.

  I took off the cardigan and tossed it over to join the rapidly growing pile of discards that were telling me that I either needed to get rid of a lot of clothing or buy more. I wasn’t sure which. I tugged a turtleneck sweater on and immediately tore it off.

  Why the hell do I have a turtleneck?

  I looked at myself in the mirror, standing in just the pencil skirt and bra.

  I’ll just go like this. Show them what they’re working with. Baby-birthing hips and ribs ripe for the kicking.

  Finally, I grabbed a pale pink shell and black wrap-around sweater and put them on. They settled into place around me and I felt like I had landed on the right look. It had a bit of a ballerina vibe going, yet still looked immeasurably more presentable than my sweat suit. It was a win-win. I checked the clock and realized that it was only twenty minutes until I was supposed to be back at the building. Swirling my hair up onto the back of my head in a bun that I hoped would continue the ballerina look and not bring back memories of my untamed bedhead, I wriggled into my shoes, grabbed my purse and keys, and ran out of the apartment.

  By the time that I reached the office building I had a greater appreciation for why ballerinas wore legwarmers. I hadn’t gotten my coat on the way out and the weather had decided that it was very determined in its downward slope, leaving me shivering as I walked into the lobby. I felt like my heels were skittering across the floor as I walked across the gleaming lobby, and the sudden appearance of Ellery from the week before did nothing to help me feel calmer or more at ease. I was hoping that I wasn’t going to have to deal with him anymore. I got bad feelings from him and really didn’t want to think that he was going to be extensively involved with this process.

  As I crossed to him, he met my eyes and by his expression I could tell that he was just as happy to see my return as I was to see his.

  At least we’re on the same page. Equal opportunity disdain going on here.

  I pasted on as big and bright a smile as I could and walked right toward him.

  “Ellery!” I gushed. “So lovely to see you this morning.”

  “Rue,” he said by way of super-abbreviated greeting. “Are you nervous?”

  I was briefly confused by the question then realized that he probably saw my shivering.

  “No,” I said. “I’m cold. It’s cold out there.”

  “Oh,” he said, apparently disappointed that I wasn’t quaking in my boots to be facing him again.

  No boots. No quaking.

  “Am I late again today?” I asked.

  He glanced down at his watch. It still took me aback a little when I saw someone wearing and actually using a watch.

  “Three minutes,” he said dryly.

  “Getting better,” I said, still forcing my smile so hard it hurt in my cheeks.

  “This way,” he said, and we started our path through the lobby, through the glass doors, and into the waiting room.

  There was a far smaller group of women in the waiting room this time and I settled into the same seat that I had the first time. We went through the same basic process as we had before, filling out questionnaires with even more invasive questions, waiting for our names, getting whisked back into the examination room. The same nurse as the week before came in and took my vitals. I wasn’t sure why she was doing it, but I figured if the couple chose me I would be undergoing a far more extensive selection of pokes, prods, and tests, so I was going to see this as my warmup.

  When I got out of the examination room I was ushered back to the waiting room.

  Hmmm. Plot twist.

  I sat back in my chair. No point in breaking the streak. There seemed to be fewer women now, even after the last one came back out of the door and settled into a seat. I didn’t know where the others could have gone and had a brief sense of doom, wondering not for the first time if I had somehow wandered into an episode of the Twilight Zone and wasn’t going to be the contract mother, but zapped down to embryo size and turned into a contract baby.

  I really needed to stop the late-night TV marathons with Christopher.

  Nearly half an hour passed before the door opened again. This time it wasn’t the nurse who peered out with her clipboard. Instead, it was Ellery. He looked out at the waiting room and scanned the remaining women. He called a name and the woman across from me hopped up and scurried toward him like she had been called to spin the big wheel. This went on for the next half an hour, with each of the women returning and leaving before the next was called back. Finally, everyone had left but me and I sat waiting, wondering if I had either been forgotten or if someone else had already been chosen and they decided that there wasn’t any real point in even talking to me. That must be it. One of those other women who had sat here in this room with me, none speaking a single word to each other, had somehow caught the attention of the couple and was going to be the one that was going to carr
y their baby for them.

  I thought of the letter that I had written the night before and felt an unexpected flutter of sadness. Which one was it?

  The one with the thicker hair?

  The bigger boobs?

  The smaller waist?

  The one who hummed the entire time that she walked into the back and then out of the room as if there was some sort of mechanical mechanism inside of her that was powering her along?

  I was about to just go ahead and leave, save myself the misery of seeing the look on Ellery’s face when he dismissed me, when the door opened and his face poked out. The sour expression in his eyes and his pursed lips told me that maybe I wasn’t done after all.

  “You can come with me,” he said, not even bothering with the formality of saying my name.

  I stood and crossed the waiting room to him with a touch of swagger.

  “Saved the best for last, did you, Ellery?” I asked as I swept past him.

  Despite my bravado and sass, my stomach did a few turns of nervousness as we made our way toward the office where we had had our interview the week before. I was about to meet the people who could very well change my life, and whose lives I could change even more. Ellery opened the door and I took a breath, stepping inside. I lifted my head from where I had been focusing on the carpet a few feet in front of me and felt my smile melt when I saw the desk.

  Instead of a smiling young couple sitting there, I saw a stern-looking man looking through papers spread across the surface of the desk in front of him.

  “Hello,” I said.

  “Hello. Please, come sit.”

  It was one of those times when saying ‘please’ actually made what the person was asking sound less polite. Ellery left the office and closed the door behind him without saying anything. I crossed the room and sat down in the same chair that I had before.

  “Good morning,” I said, not really knowing what else I could say to ease the stuffy feeling in the office.