by Sarah Willis
The magistrate turns to Yolanda. “Is this true, Mrs. Walker?”
“Yes, Your Honor. Mom’s visits were upsetting to the child. The child would throw fits to the point of physically harming herself a few minutes after Mom showed up, and then become silent and withdrawn. She has not spoken at all since the first visit. Not to her foster mother or the children in the foster home, nothing except for a few words to Miss Marlowe.”
“She’s just begging me to take her home. Any child would do that! Of course she’s upset! But this lady? She shouldn’t be allowed to see her!” Larissa’s mother slaps the magistrate’s desk. “Why should she see her?”
Magistrate Lucarelli places both palms down on her desk, slowly lifting herself up from her seat, regarding us with a long, slow, exasperated gaze. “All right. Everyone listen up. First, I am going to recommend Mrs. Benton get a lawyer. Mrs. Benton, I highly suggest you call the public defender’s office and make an appointment. I don’t see that you are ready to agree to the complaint, and I think you do need some legal advice. Do you agree?”
The blond head bobs up and down. “Fine. I wanna lawyer.”
“All right. Now before we make a date to meet again, I want to understand something. Miss Marlowe, how exactly are you involved here?”
I start by describing the phone call and how I went to Larissa’s apartment. The magistrate shakes her head from side to side slowly, even sighing several times as if I have just complicated her life tremendously. By the time I get halfway through, she stops writing things down, choosing instead to tap the pen on her desk, which I imagine is not a good sign. Larissa’s mother has turned around and is staring at me. It’s hard to think. I finish by explaining how I visited Larissa’s foster home, how Larissa talked to me, how she seems to like signing. When I’m done, Yolanda clears her throat.
“Your Honor, may I speak?”
“Yes. I would very much like to hear your explanation, Mrs. Walker.”
“Miss Marlowe is a trained interpreter for the deaf, and although she did make a choice none of us might have, to go to the apartment rather than calling the police, she did it out of a desire to help the child, and she did end up calling the police. She has made a connection with Larissa, who, by the way, stayed in Miss Marlowe’s arms throughout our visit to the hospital and on to the center. Miss Marlowe has applied to be a foster parent, has already attended four foster parenting classes, and has a home visit scheduled in two weeks. She has taken every step necessary to begin this process, and is quite willing to be a foster parent for Larissa while her mother goes through the process of getting her back. I believe she would make a good foster parent for Larissa at this time, and that will be in my recommendation.”
Thank you, Yolanda! I’d smile at her, but I don’t want to look smug.
Magistrate Lucarelli drops her pen on the desk. “But the child is already in a home, am I right? Mrs. Hunt, you are that foster parent, and you are here because?”
“She’s not fittin’ in with the other children, Your Honor,” Mrs. Hunt says. “It’s causing problems. She should go to a home with less children or no children at all.”
“And Miss Marlowe came to your house? To visit the child?” She glances over at Yolanda once, letting her know she doesn’t really approve of this.
“Yes, ma’am. Larissa talked to her a little. I think she like her some.”
“May I speak?” the young man in the suit says. He hasn’t opened his mouth yet. I don’t know who he is or why he’s here, just that he holds a clipboard, his hair is impeccable, and he’s thirty at the most. Everyone in this room is younger than I, with the exception of Mrs. Hunt. The place is being run by children.
“Yes, Mr. Phillips?”
“As well motivated as Mrs. Walker would like us to believe Miss Marlowe is, and as much as the foster mother approves of her, I’m not sure I can agree she is the right person for the child to live with.”
“And why is that?” the magistrate says, raising her eyebrows.
“As you know, Your Honor, there are people who want to adopt children so badly, they interfere with the family getting back together, then they apply for adoption. There are Web pages with advice on how to do this. How do we know Miss Marlowe doesn’t belong to this group? The child is a young, light-skinned African American. She fits the profile of the type of child these people want to adopt.”
These people? Who the hell is he calling these people? I want to smack him, but I sit still, hands woven tightly together in my lap. I watch Judge Judy. I know that the ones who speak out of turn lose the case. The magistrate is already upset with Larissa’s mother. I want to show that I can be calm and coolheaded.
“I understand your point, Mr. Phillips. Have you talked with the child?”
“I’ve visited her once. She wouldn’t speak with me.”
“So you have no idea how she feels toward Miss Marlowe?”
“No, Your Honor.”
“And Miss Marlowe, are you in contact with this group that helps people adopt children through foster care? Is that your plan?”
“No,” I say. “I have not been in contact with any such group, nor ever heard of such a thing. Look, it was a wrong number that I couldn’t ignore. I’ve never applied for adoption, never tried to find a child to adopt, but I would like to be a foster parent for Larissa, if she has to be in foster care.” I look over at the man in the suit. “I just want to help Larissa. I can’t imagine why you would have a problem with that.”
The young man smiles at me, as if he’s my friend. “Miss Marlowe has brought up a point, Your Honor. I suggest that Larissa be allowed to go back to her home, under protective supervision, and not be placed in foster care at all. This is Mrs. Benton’s first fall from grace, and with protective supervision, and alcohol abuse counseling—”
The magistrate interrupts him, speaking through clenched teeth. “I do not think that is appropriate at this time at all, Mr. Phillips.”
He looks back at her for a moment, their eyes locked, then nods. “As long as it’s on record.”
“It is, Mr. Phillips. Any more suggestions?”
“No, Your Honor.”
“Then I suggest we make another date to meet, say...” She looks in a small book, turns a few pages. “Three weeks from now, on September third. One-thirty?”
Yolanda Walker, the plump woman next to her, and the young man in his fancy pinstriped suit all look in similar black books and agree.
“In the meantime, Mrs. Benton, I recommend you contact a lawyer. Mrs. Hunt, you will not have to come to the next hearing. We already have your request for removal on record. And Miss Marlowe, I don’t think you will need to come, either. I’m sure Mrs. Walker will keep you informed. Thank you all.”
We all stand up—except Larissa’s mother. She just sits there, arms folded, separating herself from the people who took her daughter from her.
The hallway is narrow and crowded. Yolanda and I move to an open spot a few doorways down. “Who the hell was that man?” I whisper. “What the hell does he have against me?”
“He’s Larissa’s guardian ad litem. He’s a lawyer, not connected to CFS. He’s here to represent Larissa’s best interests.”
“Isn’t that what you do?”
Yolanda laughs, a sad laugh. “Supposedly.”
“Does he really think I’m part of some group of people who . . . what? Adopt children? What’s so bad about that? I thought children needed to be adopted.”
“Not like they’re doing it.”
Larissa’s mother comes out of the office and walks down the hall. Another group of people are filing in. God, the magistrate has to hear stories about abused children all day. “Why did she interrupt him when he mentioned Larissa going back to her mother?”
“A high-profile case in the paper a few weeks ago. In Summit County. A child was returned home on protective supervision. She was killed by her mother a few days later, beaten with a meat tenderizer.” Yolanda says this so matter
-of-factly. She is like the clothes she wears, her lacquer of makeup, her well-set hair; she wears detachment like a badge, something put on over herself. A child beaten with a meat tenderizer. The thought makes me want to crawl into bed for months.
“That’s so awful! But she doesn’t think Larissa’s mother would do that?”
“The magistrate just has to be careful, Alice.”
“How do you do this? Every day?”
She shrugs. “Sometimes it works.”
“God, I hope so. So, can I still visit Larissa? At Mrs. Hunt’s?”
“That’s between you and Mrs. Hunt.”
“Thank you, Yolanda. Thanks for everything.”
The hallway is mostly clear now except for two men in gray suits talking by the door to the waiting room.
“Yolanda, before you go, can I ask you something?”
“Sure. What?”
“Why are you doing this? Helping me? You said you could get into trouble.”
Yolanda looks down the hall at the two men, then at the papers in her hands. She shakes her head. “First, I’m doing it for Larissa. I think you might be good for her. Second, I do my job the best I can. I’m just . . . You got me thinking out of the box. This box.” She nods toward the magistrate’s room, then tries to smile but shrugs instead.
“I’m a little burnt out,” she continues. “I like the kids. Most of them. I just need to . . . trust my instincts for once. My instincts tell me to trust you.”
I don’t know what to say. I feel a huge responsibility to make everything work out right. “It’s got to be a hard job, Yolanda. For what it’s worth, I think you’re great.”
She smiles now, a slight but honest smile. “Thanks.” A door slams somewhere. “I better go. You take care. We’ll talk.”
“Could I take you out for coffee now? Lunch? Are you hungry?” I ask.
“Thanks, but I have to get back to work. Good luck with your home visit.” She looks down at her clipboard. She’s said too much.
“Thank you for everything,” I say.
She turns one way down the hall, I the other way, toward the door out into the waiting room and then down the marble stairs. I pass by the metal detector and the policeman with the gun. Outside, the sky is still blue.
Playing the whole experience through my head again like a movie, trying to figure out if I said anything wrong, I walk down Twenty-second Street to the corner, where I stand dumbly watching the signal with the flat orange hand that means wait, don’t walk. From behind, someone taps me sharply on the shoulder.
“Hey, you.”
It’s Larissa’s mother.
“I wanna talk to you,” she says.
The walk signal comes on and for a second I think I’ll do just that—walk quickly to my car and drive away. Larissa’s mother scares me. But I stay and look at her.
I don’t know her first name. I suppose the magistrate said it, but I was so surprised by the fact that she was Larissa’s mother that I hadn’t caught her name.
She’s not only white, but extremely pale, as if she hasn’t been out in the sun for a long time. She’s short, at the most five-two, and I look down on her dark roots. Through her long bangs I can hardly see her eyes, just the black smear of eyeliner. And she’s very young. She must have had Larissa when she was a teenager. She looks a lot like my brother’s ex-wife—maybe not exactly, but she has the feel of my brother’s ex-wife. Trashy. Vince loved her. I never understood why.
You wouldn’t, he says.
“You went in my place?” this girl who is Larissa’s mother says. “How could you do that? How could you just come into my place when you don’t know me? Get my child taken from me? Who the hell are you? God Almighty? Well, fuck you.”
She certainly isn’t intimated by my height, or the fact that she left her child alone in the first place. Her hands are balled into fists and she looks as if she wants to use them. Cars drive by, and less than a shout away two policemen stand chatting in front of Juvenile Court. But it isn’t a physical threat I fear, it’s her, the mere fact of her, that throws me off balance.
“Listen,” I say, holding up a hand, just like that orange don’t walk sign. “I know you’re mad at me, but your daughter was frightened and alone. She called my house by mistake. What was I supposed to do? Ignore the fact she was scared and crying? Go back to sleep and hope someone else helped her?”
A look crosses her face that says she’s momentarily unsure of her own anger. We stand on the downtown street corner staring at each other.
Finally she speaks again. “My daughter oughta be home with me. I’m a good mother. She loves me, and now she’s terrified, doesn’t know why people took her away. She thinks she did something bad. I told her it was me, not her, but she thinks they took her away ’cause she was a bad little girl. You tell them she should be home with me. You should tell them that, after what you did. Tell them that for me.”
Tears are running down her cheeks now, and I want nothing more than to be away from this woman. I don’t want to feel sorry for her.
“Look,” I say. “That’s not my job. They’re not asking me something like that.”
“I need my daughter. Don’t you or no one understand that? She needs me.”
I can’t stand this. “Listen, you left her alone for almost twenty-four hours. That wasn’t right. You’ve got to admit to that. You’ve got to be sorry you did that, otherwise nobody’s going to give your daughter back to you.”
She lifts her chin. “You don’t know,” she says. “You could never know. You got it so good, you don’t know nothing.”
Without missing a beat I tell her, “I don’t have it so good. I’m not rich. I’m not married. And I don’t have a little girl who loves me.” I can’t believe I’m explaining myself to her, saying this to a stranger, standing here on this stupid street corner. Traffic passes by. A pigeon paces back and forth along the sidewalk. Nothing seems real.
She crosses her arms, steps one step closer to me. “So you want mine now?” she says in a low, threatening tone. “Huh? You want her cuz she’s a pretty little light-skinned black girl? You wouldn’t be doing this if she was dark-skinned, not so pretty. You think you’d be trying to get my daughter, she were shiny black, pudgy, big-lipped? I don’t think so. You wouldn’t be here today if Larissa weren’t a pretty little light-skinned girl.”
“Go to hell,” I say. “You don’t know me.” I look at the walk signal. That orange hand says to wait but I hurry across the street. Run to my car. Larissa’s mother shouts at me as I run.
“Bitch!” she yells. “Baby stealer!”
Chapter Eleven
I call Polly at work and invite myself over for dinner. Tuesday night is takeout night at her house, as well as Thursdays and Sundays. Tuesdays is Chinese.
“It didn’t go well?” she asks.
“No.”
“Anything you want to tell me now?”
“Not yet.”
“Okay. We’ll talk tonight. You okay?”
“You tell me,” I ask. “I’m okay, right? I’m not so bad, am I?”
“You’re the best.”
“Tell that to the guy in the suit. And her mother.”
“She showed up?”
“She sure did.”
I can hear someone call Polly’s name, phones ringing.
“I’ll be there at six. Thanks.” I hang up. It’s only a little after noon. I have a job at the library at three. It seems like years since I left my house this morning.
I bring a bottle of white wine and a dozen large chocolate chip cookies. Fortune cookies are not going to do it for me. I want something without a proverb.
Polly’s husband, Patrick, takes the wine from me, winks at the cookies, and kisses me on the cheek. He’s a good man who teaches high school English and coaches tennis. His hands always smell of the old tennis balls he tosses to their dog, Max.
In the dining room, I stick large spoons into the containers of Chinese food as Polly carries plat
es to the table and Patrick sets out the wineglasses. All of us have to maneuver around the piles of books and paperwork that practically line the perimeter of the dining room. Max follows us back and forth, wagging his tail. When we finally sit down, Max slips his large head onto Patrick’s lap. I smile and take a breath that feels like the first good breath I’ve taken all day. We’ve done this so many times over the years—with their kids drinking Kool-Aid, then Cokes, then beer. Polly’s daughter, Rachel, and I would sign quickly in ASL, food in our mouths, a bit smug that Polly and Patrick couldn’t keep up. We shared a lot of laughter at this table.
Now we talk about the cost of college, property taxes, and the falling stock market. “Let’s sell our houses and buy a place in the Ozarks,” Patrick says. “Fill the cellar with food and line the walls with books. Your parents could come live with us, too, Alice. Your dad could fix anything that went wrong. What do you think?”
I smile. “My mom could spin wool from sheep and make all our clothes. Hell, she could sew us a cozy to go over the house and we wouldn’t have to heat it.”
“It’d be a long trip for good takeout Chinese,” Polly says.
Patrick makes a show of thinking it over, then laughs. “Point taken.” Lowering his plate to the floor for Max to clean, he adds, “Well, it was a nice idea. Guess I’ll just go watch some TV now. Let you two talk.” He takes a cookie with him, tipping his head with a nod of thanks.
“You didn’t tell him I went to court today?” I ask.
“Yeah, I did. I just told him not to mention it. So tell me. Was it awful?”
“Pretty much. Did you know the hearing is held in this little office?”
Polly nods. “Yeah. They’re cramped for space.”
“Anyway, her mother’s white.”
Polly lifts her chin, studies me. “Interesting. You weren’t expecting that?”
“No. And she’s so young. Trashy looking, but there was this . . .” I stall. I can’t think of the word. “I don’t know. Energy? Once you look at her, you can’t look away. She’s tough. She’s not afraid of anything.” I pick up the wine goblet, twirl the stem between my fingers. “I’ve been misjudging people for weeks now. I thought the social worker was too young, but she’s great, really great. Yolanda Walker. I told you about her?” Polly nods. “And then there’s the woman who taught the foster parenting classes, and she wore this awful lavender outfit and lavender shoes. I thought she was a fool until I heard her talk. She knew her stuff. And I was sure Larissa’s mother was black because black women marry black men, right? Jesus, Polly, what the hell’s the matter with me?” I look at her, wanting to see the truth in her face.