Fly Away Home

by Vanessa Del Fabbro

  “Okay, give your friend a call,” she said.

  When she went home that afternoon, an hour earlier than usual, Mandla wanted to know why she was dressed like a fisherwoman.

  “My clothes got wet,” she said, and he nodded because this was something that happened to him all the time—or had before he’d started wearing American blue jeans and taking obsessive care of them.

  Francina raised her eyebrows. “Is everything all right?”

  “It will be,” said Monica, and she went off to change into her own clothes.

  When Zak got home from work, he did not notice that she was wearing a different outfit than the one he’d seen her in at lunchtime. He put his arm around her waist as she stood at the stove, stirring the fish soup, and asked if she was okay.

  The intimacy that had been absent between them for so long made her too emotional to speak, so she merely nodded.

  “I’m sorry,” he said.

  “No, I’m sorry.”

  He put his fingers to her lips to stop her from speaking further, but she pushed his hand away.

  “You were right. I need help. And I’m going to find it.”

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  An hour inland from Cape Town, surrounded by vineyard-covered hills, the small university town of Stellenbosch was filled with buses bringing tourists to taste the country’s famous wines and picnic on the grounds of gabled farmhouses.

  Monica was already late for the workshop. She couldn’t find a parking spot near the hotel, an old converted pump house, but she wasn’t distressed. What was fifteen minutes, anyway, when she was going to be here for the whole day and night? She had expected to attend a meeting that might last one or two hours at the most. Then she’d learned that this was a two-day conference and she’d have to stay overnight. At least it was in a beautiful location, she told herself, finally finding a parking spot. If she grew bored with the workshop agenda, she could take a walk around town. It had been more than two years since she’d visited Stellenbosch.

  A lady with long gray hair and sandals greeted Monica at the door to the conference room, presenting her with a box of tissues.

  She shook her head. “I won’t need those,” she said.

  “Yes, you will,” the lady replied.

  As she held out the box, Monica was tempted to turn around and leave. Instead, she took a few tissues.

  “You’ve missed the introductions,” said the lady.

  Monica mumbled her regret but, in truth, she was relieved, because now she could slip in anonymously.

  “Shirley will give you some time to introduce yourself, though.”

  “Oh, that’s good,” said Monica, forcing a smile.

  “Go on in, then,” said the lady. “You don’t want to miss any more.” She opened one of the double doors into the conference room.

  Twenty heads turned in Monica’s direction. She gave a small smile and a wave.

  “Welcome,” said the woman at the front of the room. Monica presumed she was Shirley. “There’s space on the left.” She indicated an empty seat in the second row.

  Monica walked down the outside aisle and sat.

  “Would you like to introduce yourself?” asked Shirley, smiling warmly.

  Monica wished she had the courage to say no. But her trip here would be a waste if she did not participate fully.

  Shirley had shoulder-length gray hair and a surprisingly unlined face. Monica wondered if she was one of the childless, or merely a sympathizer. “You can stand up or stay seated,” the woman said. “We’re casual here.”

  Here goes, thought Monica, getting to her feet. “My name is Monica. I live in Lady Helen, although I’m originally from Johannesburg. I’m a newspaper editor.”

  “And you’re here because?” prompted Shirley.

  “My husband and I have been trying for a few years to have a baby.”

  There were nods of sympathy from the women in the chairs, most of whom looked to be in their late thirties or early forties. But some of whom, Monica was surprised to note, were younger than she was.

  Shirley thanked her and Monica sat down.

  “After this weekend, some of you will continue to try to have a baby, but others will be able to let go and follow different paths. Either way, I hope that this time we have together will fill you with the strength to make the right decision for yourself, and the strength to see it through.”

  Monica noticed a few women dab their eyes with tissues.

  Then Shirley announced that it was time to break into groups of four. Monica was put with two of the younger-looking women and one who appeared to be in her early forties. They were directed to an adjoining room, while the other groups were also assigned private meeting spaces. Shirley, it appeared, was going to lead Monica’s group. When she handed around more tissues, Monica began to feel nervous.

  Shirley suggested each of the women introduce herself again. “This time I want you to tell us more about what motivated you to come to this conference.” She pointed at one of the younger women to go first.

  “Hi, I’m Anelle,” she said. The tiny blonde had the fairest skin Monica had ever seen. “I live in Stellenbosch, so at least I didn’t have to fight with the tour buses to get here.” She gave a little laugh. “I live on my in-laws’ wine farm, which my husband runs.”

  “You’ll have to give us a tour later,” said Shirley.

  “With pleasure,” said Anelle. “Our farm is not as big as some other nearby wineries, but I think it has the best views.” She laughed again. “I’m from Johannesburg, where I had no view. Views are important to me.”

  Shirley pressed Anelle to tell the group why she had come to the workshop.

  “My husband and I have had more fertility treatments than I can count, but now our doctor says we will not be able to conceive.” Anelle began to cry. “He thinks that both my husband and I are infertile because of the pesticides used for the grape crop, which have been contaminating our drinking water for many years.” She blew her nose into a tissue. “At first, my husband refused to consider adoption. I was devastated that he could be so stubborn. I almost left him, but my mother persuaded me to stay. Now he says he’ll adopt, but only if the child is of—” she gave a sheepish smile “—of our own race.”

  The one black woman in the group nodded, out of contempt or agreement, Monica could not tell.

  “And how do you feel about that?” Shirley asked Anelle.

  “I want a child, any child. I’m tired of waiting. But the lady at the adoption organization said we may have to wait years for a white child.”

  “Are you worried what might happen to your marriage in that time?”

  Anelle nodded.

  Shirley thanked her for sharing and then turned to the older woman in the group. “What about you, Jo? Why did you come here?”

  Jo said that she and her husband had never sought fertility treatment, believing that if it was God’s will for them to conceive, they would. Recently, at age forty-two, she had paid a secret visit to a fertility doctor and had been told that her ovarian reserve was depleted. She’d left it too late.

  “All developments in the field of fertility treatment came about through the grace of God,” she said. “And I did not even think to go to a doctor to find out what was wrong with me till I was past childbearing age.” The worst, she said, was not knowing if her problem had been treatable or not.

  Anelle was still crying and now Jo, too, began to cry. Shirley handed around more tissues.

  “And what do you hope to gain from this workshop?” asked Shirley.

  Jo looked at each one of them. “I don’t know. I suppose I just needed to feel that I wasn’t alone.”

  Anelle reached across and squeezed Jo’s hand. Monica was thankful that Shirley chose the other younger woman to go next.

  “My name is Kholeka. I’m originally from Port Elizabeth, but now I work in a bank in Cape Town.” She looked at each of the women in the group. “I have a son. He’s twelve. His fa
ther and I did not marry. Now I am married to a wonderful man. I have been to the doctor. He says there’s no reason why I cannot have another child and that maybe my husband has the problem. But my husband refuses to come with me to the doctor. He says there’s nothing wrong with him and he’s not going to have a doctor checking his private business.” She began to cry. “I have to choose between my husband and having a baby.”

  “Count yourself blessed because you already have a child,” said Anelle.

  Jo nodded emphatically.

  “That’s the problem,” said Kholeka. “People think that because you already have one child you won’t suffer when you can’t have another. I love my husband and I want us to have a child together.”

  Shirley asked Kholeka what she hoped to gain from the workshop.

  She attempted a smile. “I’d like it if someone could think of a way to change my husband’s mind.” Then she grew serious. “I need to know how to switch this part of myself off, this part that makes me long to hold a baby in my arms again. I was hoping someone would be able to tell me how to do that.”

  This was exactly what Monica had hoped to gain from the workshop.

  “And now you, Monica,” said Shirley.

  “My story is like Kholeka’s, I suppose. My husband and I have tried without success to have a baby, and the strain on me, on my family, is too much.” She looked at Anelle. “I have two adopted boys. They are the sons of a good friend who died of AIDS.” She saw the question in Anelle’s eyes. “Their mother, Ella Nkhoma, was a returned exile.”

  As Monica had expected, Anelle looked surprised.

  “I want to have a baby, not because I need a child that looks like me, but because my husband and I want a new life to come from our love. It’s as Kholeka says—there’s a part of you that yearns to hold a baby, and it’s hard to switch that off.”

  “Is that what you wish to gain from this workshop?” asked Shirley. “To be able to get past that yearning?”

  Monica looked at the women who had each shared her intimate details with the group. She saw the anguish in their eyes and, without knowing why, she began to sob.

  “My life is a mess. My marriage is falling apart. I can’t do anything except think about the baby I won’t have.”

  Shirley offered her another tissue, which she took gratefully. Kholeka patted her gently on the back.

  “Ladies, you have just taken an important first step,” said Shirley. “You have opened up to strangers and shared your pain. This is the first step toward surrender. For years, you have tried to control your bodies, without success. At this workshop, we are going to teach you to surrender yourselves, as though you had adopted or stopped trying to conceive—even if this is not the case. And to do this we are going to concentrate on our minds and our bodies.”

  Monica imagined the scornful look on Zak’s face if he were here at this moment. In the absence of any published research to confirm a treatment’s legitimacy, to him such treatment was a waste of time and money. Still, he had said he would support her in getting the help she needed, and coming to this workshop had been her choice.

  A short while later, tea was served in the courtyard of the hotel, next to the original sluice that had once provided irrigation for all of Stellenbosch’s crops. Anelle cornered Monica as she was helping herself to a plate of sliced guavas and pineapple.

  “How did you get your husband to agree to adopting your late friend’s boys?” she asked.

  Monica wished that she could provide an easy solution to the younger woman’s problem with her husband, but all she could do was tell the truth. “I wasn’t married when I adopted them.”

  Anelle sighed. “But he’s okay with it?”

  Monica nodded. “It was never an issue. But, Anelle, you can’t force your husband to do something he doesn’t want to.”

  “But there are hardly any white babies to adopt.”

  Monica did not know how to console Anelle, and was grateful when Kholeka came to stand with them.

  Kholeka sighed. “So here we are, three women desperate for a baby, and the country has more than a million orphans.”

  Anelle burst into tears.

  “I’m sorry if I upset you,” she said. “But it’s the truth.”

  “It’s complicated,” said Anelle, sniffing.

  “I know. If I told my husband I wanted to adopt a child, he’d say I’d lost my mind.”

  “Monica did it the right way,” said Anelle. “She did it on her own.”

  “That was just the way things worked out,” said Monica quietly. She did not like being held up as an example.

  “But she still wants a child of her own,” added Kholeka.

  “I never had my boys as babies,” said Monica. Why, she wondered, was she being defensive?

  Jo had refilled her teacup and joined the discussion. “You’re fortunate,” she told Monica. “You’ve already been through the adoption process. My husband and I were told to be prepared to wait ages for our paperwork and background checks to be completed.”

  The sound of a bell announcing the next session interrupted their conversation. Monica quickly poured herself a cup of tea and took it to the classroom where a lesson on how to take care of your body by changing your diet was to be held.

  The instructor, a tall, slim, middle-aged woman, started by saying that she was sure all of the attendees would never think of putting anything other than state-tested and regulated gas in their cars. Why then would they put junk in their bodies?

  By the end of the session, Monica had realized that whether she decided to continue trying to conceive or whether she gave up, she had to take better care of herself, not in the way her mother would suggest by going for manicures and massages and buying designer clothes, but by watching what kind of food she ate. There would be no more preservatives and additives in her house. From now on, there would be less meat and more fruit and vegetables. The whole family would benefit.

  At the end of the day, after a session on how to manage stress, one of the largest obstacles to conceiving, Monica asked the other ladies in her group to join her for dinner at the restaurant next to the hotel.

  Anelle, Jo and Kholeka all accepted her invitation. Anelle wanted to know about Sipho and Mandla: what language they spoke to Monica, how she helped preserve their cultural identity, any problems they’d had at school with other children, whether they ever talked about their mother. Monica answered as best she could, all the while thinking that it was a pointless conversation if Anelle’s husband wouldn’t agree to adopt nonwhite children. Over dessert of fresh pears and ice cream, she came to a heart-sinking realization. Anelle planned to follow her example and do it alone.

  “You’re not going to leave your husband, are you?” Monica asked.

  Anelle put down her spoon and looked her in the eye. “If you can do it by yourself, so can I.”

  Monica glanced at Kholeka, then at Jo for assistance. When neither reacted, Monica understood the depth of desperation in these three women. One was prepared to leave her husband so she could adopt children, and the others didn’t see a problem with that. Monica knew Zak was right; she was depressed. But she had never considered anything as drastic as what Anelle proposed and Kholeka and Jo tacitly supported.

  Anelle was prepared to give up her husband and the life she had known for years for what Monica already had. How could Monica have been so blind? She had what other women dreamed of: two adopted sons and a husband who loved her and her boys as much as he loved his own daughter. And yet Monica had taken her family for granted, and lately even neglected them. God had blessed her, and she had believed He didn’t care about her. Tears filled her eyes.

  “What did I say?” asked Anelle in a panicked voice.

  “Thank you,” said Monica.

  “For what?”

  “For making me realize what a fool I’ve been.” She looked at Kholeka and then Jo. “You all have.” Then she turned back to Anelle. “Don’t leave your husband. You can work
it out. The two of you should come to Lady Helen for a weekend. Spend time with my family. My son Sipho is still in the United States, but if anyone can bring your husband round, it will be my boy Mandla. He’s quite the little actor.”

  Anelle looked uncertain. She had worked up the courage to tell strangers of a tentative plan she had probably been wrestling with for many months, but now Monica was advising her not to follow through on it.

  Jo shrugged. “It’s worth a try. You can still leave your husband later, if you feel you have to, Anelle.”

  “She won’t have to,” said Monica emphatically. “Mandla will make sure of that. Now, if you ladies will excuse me, I’m going to turn in for the night. Tomorrow I want to be on the road early so I can go to church with my family.” She handed one of her business cards to each of them. “My family and I will be happy to welcome you to our home anytime you want to come to Lady Helen.”

  Anelle started to cry. “I’ll miss you,” she said.

  Kholeka put an arm around Anelle’s shoulder. “What did you learn today about how to manage stress?”

  Anelle began to breathe deeply.

  “That’s right,” said Kholeka. “In and out.”

  “I mean it about bringing your husband to see us, Anelle,” said Monica. Then she looked at Kholeka and Jo. “Let’s all stay in touch.”

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  Zak, Yolanda and Mandla were having breakfast in the garden when Monica arrived home.

  “What are you doing back so early?” asked Zak, rising to greet her.

  “I didn’t want to miss going to church with you,” she responded, kissing him on the cheek. She felt guilty when she saw the surprise on his face. It had been so long since she’d been affectionate with him. “What’s for breakfast?”

  “French toast,” said Mandla. “Yolanda made it.”

  “I’m sure it’s delicious,” Monica exclaimed.

  Mandla looked at her quizzically. He was not used to seeing her so cheerful.

  During breakfast, Monica felt Zak’s eyes on her and knew that as soon as the meal was finished, he would corner her for a private talk. Their chance came when it was time to do the dishes and the children quickly disappeared.