He Gets That from Me

by Jacqueline Friedland

  We’re just walking uphill to the giraffe enclosure when my phone lights up with Lorraine’s number. I don’t want to get into any of the details with her while Kai is standing right beside me, so I let the call go to voicemail.

  As Kai points out the giraffe’s black tongue, the phone starts buzzing again. One of Lorraine’s best qualities as a lawyer is probably the fact that she’s persistent, but right now, it’s irritating as all hell. I turn the phone completely off, reasoning that in the unlikely event an emergency comes up for Teddy, the school will call Chip too.

  As we walk the paved path at the zoo, stopping at every exhibit along the route to Jungle World, which is Kai’s favorite part of the zoo, I am overcome with so much love for this boy that it’s physically painful. I don’t know what I’ll do if Nick and Maggie decide to move forward with the lawsuit—or, worse, if they win. My mind starts to run through all the possibilities again, and I begin to wonder if we should just take the boys and leave the country. It might be illegal at this point, but if it’s the best thing for our child, maybe we should do it anyway. An image of Kai in the conference room flashes through my mind, when he was sitting beside Maggie and gasping for air. In all the time he’s struggled with anxiety, he’s never had a full-on panic attack like that before. How can I stand back and risk allowing him to land in a situation where he feels that way all the time—trapped with the wrong parents, unable to breathe?

  We could go to Sicily. Change our names. Start over. Or maybe a place where it’d be even harder to trace us, like Bali or the most remote part of New Zealand.

  Kai reaches into his pocket for his phone, and I’m about to tell him to put it away and enjoy the zoo when he shows me the screen, which is displaying an incoming call from Chip.

  “Go ahead,” I say, realizing only now that I never called my husband to let him know how the meeting went.

  “Hi Dad,” Kai says into the phone. “Yeah . . . yeah . . . We’re at the zoo.” He glances at me as he says this, like he’s unsure he was allowed to tell.

  I nod to let him know it was no secret.

  “He wants to talk to you.” Kai holds out the phone.

  “Hey. Sorry I didn’t call sooner,” I say as I put the phone up to my ear.

  “Why aren’t you answering your phone?” he cries in a near shout. “I’ve been trying to reach you like crazy!” He sounds frantic, and I’m sure he’s about to tell me that the case is back on, that we have to be in court this afternoon or tomorrow. I brace for the worst, flinching before he even says the words.

  Chapter 33

  MAGGIE

  SEPTEMBER 2018

  Why don’t you two take a moment to discuss how you’d like to proceed,” Lorraine says. “You can find me in my office, three doors down the hall, when you’re ready to talk.” She motions with a hand that we should sit back at the conference table.

  “I’m not sure we’ll be able to resolve anything in the next few minutes,” Nick says curtly. “It’s kind of a big decision.”

  “No rush,” she says, all breezy and accommodating. She picks up her notepad and leaves the room.

  After the door clicks closed, Nick looks over at me and sighs dramatically. “Well that complicates things,” he says.

  “It does? I thought it settled the matter.”

  “Yeah, I guess.” He pulls out his phone and starts swiping at the screen. “But now we probably have to stay in the city longer to get the case going again. It’s going to be a real shitshow getting more coverage at the restaurant.”

  “Get the case going?” I ask. “No—I meant settled it, like, ended it.”

  Nick’s head snaps back in surprise. “What do you mean? How can we leave our kid in a situation that’s given him some sort of anxiety disorder? How can that be in his best interest?” His face is turning redder with each question.

  “His living situation didn’t give him an anxiety disorder. He probably inherited it.”

  “Inherited it?” Nick parrots my words back to me. “We don’t have anxiety disorders. Wyatt doesn’t have it. What are you talking about?”

  “I’m talking about my mother,” I explain.

  “Again with your mother.” Nick throws his hands up in the air. “Not everything in this world has to revolve around you and your mother.”

  “Nick.”

  “What?” he barks without looking at me.

  “My mother had mental illness.”

  “I know she drove you crazy, but that doesn’t mean we would create a kid with a real problem.”

  “No,” I explain, “she was legit, diagnosable, bipolar. Like, medicated and everything.”

  He looks over at me and eyes me up and down, like he’s trying to figure out whether I’m being serious. He blinks a few times and then asks, “Why would you keep that a secret? Jesus, Maggie. You don’t keep something like that from the person you’re going to create a family with.”

  I hate the way Nick always assumes the worst of me, as though I’m out to get him, constantly ferreting away little secrets and personal infractions.

  “I only just found out.” I say it quietly, hoping my calm demeanor will highlight his own irritability, his inappropriate reaction. “The other day with my dad.”

  “Your dad didn’t think it was relevant for me to know this information when we decided to make babies together?”

  “First of all, we didn’t decide to make Wyatt, and I wasn’t even talking to my parents back then. As for all the ones we tried and failed to make, a bipolar grandparent is not generally considered a cause for concern when having children.”

  I don’t add that ever since my dad enlightened me, I’ve been tallying so many of my mother’s symptoms in myself—the impulsivity, the oversize emotions, the way I cling to anger and feel pain so deeply. As for any of my mom’s imbalances trickling down to Kai, I’ve learned enough about anxiety disorders over the years to know that while trauma or other stressful events can cause the symptoms, genetic predisposition is often a major contributing factor.

  “You say there was no cause for concern,” Nick nearly growls, “and yet we seem to have produced a child who can’t breathe when he gets worried.”

  “Yeah.” I’m nearly shouting. “And it looks like his real dad knew just how to handle it.”

  I’ve shocked Nick into silence. I’m worried I’ve finally pushed him too far.

  “Right,” he finally says, and I brace for whatever’s coming next, but the intensity of his expression starts to mellow and he asks, “So that’s it? You really want to just drop the case now?”

  He’s not going to fight me. He knows I’m right. Nobody could argue with the bond that we just saw between Kai and Donovan. To remove Kai from that security, to take an anxious child and drop him into a whole new family—that would be the very opposite of acting in his best interests. As much as it pains me to let go, I have to accept this. For Kai’s sake.

  “I want to drop it,” I confirm.

  Nick stares at me for a long moment and then runs both his hands over his face, rubbing at his eyes and swallowing hard. And then, finally, he nods.

  As we stare at each other, I keep seeing images of Kai gasping for breath in my mind’s eye—reliving the sense of helplessness I felt, the uselessness of my presence. Only when I backed away from Kai was he able to breathe, only when I gave him space was he able to get what he needed. I can’t help thinking of my mom when I consider the idea of giving a child space. I may have had my bumps along the way, but perhaps my parents’ decision to pull back and give me space is what eventually allowed me to develop the blessings I now have in life. Maybe it’s time I stop focusing on what I don’t have, and start doing a better job of appreciating those things that I do.

  I can almost feel my mom here, standing beside me and nodding, proud that I am finally, at long last, starting to get it.

  We make our way down the carpeted hallway to Lorraine’s office and tell her the news. She is gracious in her acceptance, suggest
ing that we have our attorney make a proposal about our visitation rights with Kai going forward, telling us to have our lawyer send it along to her. Based on this act of good faith by us, she says she’ll put in a good word for us with her clients.

  As we walk back to the elevator, Nick puts his arm around me, and my first instinct is to shrug it off and push him away. But I don’t. Instead, I clasp his hand and pull him a little closer.

  “What?” he asks, clearly surprised by my reaction.

  So many potential responses run through my mind. I could explain how letting go of Kai makes me think of all the other areas of life where we could try harder to be empathetic, to be generous. I could say something about wanting to do something to make our marriage stronger, about how I’m sorry for so much, about how I miss what we used to have. But I don’t want to say any of it. I just want to move forward and do the best we can. So I just shake my head and rest it sadly against Nick’s shoulder.

  “He’s my son too, you know,” Nick says with a kindness to his tone, I suppose to show me that we can suffer together, that we can lean on each other. The elevator doors open and we step inside. Nick presses the button for the lobby.

  “No.” I turn to face him as I realize the truth of what I’m saying. I hold my hand to his stubbly cheek to soften my words before I say them. “He’s not your son. He’s not my son, either. He’s been theirs all along.”

  Chapter 34

  DONOVAN

  SEPTEMBER 2018

  The crowds at the zoo disappear into a fog as all my focus goes toward whatever Chip is about to reveal from the other end of the line.

  “They’re dropping the case,” he says.

  “Wait, what?” I was certain that Maggie and Nick would be motivated to move forward at a furious pace after witnessing Kai’s panic attack. Chip must have misunderstood. “What do you mean?”

  “The Wingates. It’s over. Lorraine called me. She said she couldn’t reach you.”

  “It’s over?” I hear the words but somehow can’t grasp the concept.

  “Over,” Chip repeats. “All of it.”

  I look toward Kai, who has wandered over to a souvenir seller’s cart at the opposite side of the path and is running his hand along a brightly colored stuffed monkey. He’s studying the Velcro patches on the animal’s hands and is uninterested in my call.

  “Are you sure? Did Lorraine tell you what happened?” I prod, afraid to get my hopes up.

  “She told me. She said we couldn’t have scripted the morning better if we’d planned the panic attack. Whatever you did in there to calm him down, I guess it proved something to the Wingates.”

  It takes me a moment to digest Chip’s words, to understand that the way Kai came out of his panic was of more relevance in the meeting than the fact that he panicked in the first place. I try for a moment to imagine how I would have felt in Maggie’s shoes, or Nick’s, in a room with a child who was struggling in ways I didn’t understand. I suppose I did prove some sort of capability as a father, or as Kai’s father specifically, when I brought him out of his attack. Who knew Kai’s anxiety would end up being such a gift to our family?

  “I can’t believe it,” I pant into the phone, breathless from excitement. “So, what does it mean? Now what?”

  “Now nothing,” he says. Even though I can’t see him, I know he’s smiling all the way up to his hairline right now. “Lorraine said they might request some visitation rights, but they won’t be challenging our parental rights or custody.”

  I glance around for a bench, feeling literally weak in the knees from the relief coursing through my body. When I don’t find one, I simply lower myself onto the pavement on the side of the path. “So that’s it,” I say, still processing, as the warmth of the concrete below me seeps through my pants. “I had us halfway to Malaysia already.” I confess to my plans of taking the family on the run.

  Chip laughs. “I’m pretty sure my passport expired a few months ago.”

  “We’d have gotten you a fake if we had to,” I declare.

  “Sure.”

  “What? There must be a way.”

  “Okay, Houdini. Well, I’m glad we won’t have to put your disappearing skills to the test just yet.” This may be the longest phone call I’ve ever had with Chip while he’s at work, but it’s clearly worth the time to him.

  Kai looks over and his brow furrows when he notices me sitting on the ground.

  “Papa, what are you doing?” he asks, walking back over to me.

  I wave my hand to indicate it’s nothing, that I’m all good, as I say to Chip, “We’re at the zoo,” even though he knows that already.

  “Yeah, okay,” he answers. “See you at home.”

  “See you at home,” I say, and that word, home, fills me up, runs through my veins and makes me strong.

  I hang up as Kai reaches me and then I pull him onto my lap.

  “Pa, stop.” He tries to wriggle away from me, clearly too old to sit on his dad’s lap in public. I plant one hard kiss against the back of his head and then release him.

  “Help me up,” I say, reaching out to him and letting him pull. “Dad called to tell us that Maggie and Nick want you to stay exactly where you are. They don’t want to mess with your life.”

  “They don’t?” His eyes grow big as he looks back at me.

  “They must care about you a whole lot,” I tell him as I put a hand on his back and start walking toward all the funny little monkeys that await us in Jungle World. “They just want you to be wherever is best for you.”

  “With you is best for me.”

  “Yeah.” I scruff up his hair a little, trying not to get too sappy. He hates it when I’m all tears and emotions—but come on, if there was ever a time for it, right? “With you is best for me too.”

  I glance at the sky to prevent any happy tears from spilling out and then I open the door to Jungle World and stand back, letting Kai lead the way.

  Chapter 35

  KAI

  TEN YEARS LATER

  That bell. If Darla doesn’t stop ringing that freaking bell, I may actually call campus security on her. All I wanted was a ten-minute break to relax in front of the Celtics game before returning to my massive study guides.

  When I can’t stand it for a single second longer, I pause the game and march over to the intercom. “Jesus, Darla, give it a rest!”

  “It’s not your psycho ex-girlfriend, fucker,” my brother’s voice says through the speaker on the wall. “Let me in.”

  “Teddy? Why didn’t you call me?” I pat down my pants and realize I must have left my phone in the bedroom.

  “I did, bro. Let me in before I freeze my nuts off out here.”

  I jog down the stairwell, where I can see my brother waiting on the stoop on the other side of the glass door. He’s wearing a red puffer jacket and a black wool beanie, and he’s bouncing up and down on the balls of his feet as he blows clouds of steam into his hands. I push the door open for him and a burst of cold air follows him inside.

  “Just a little advice, man,” he says. “If you don’t want Darla to know when you’re home, maybe park your car down the block or something.”

  “Yeah, happy birthday to you, too,” I say as we give each other a quick hug, pounding each other on the back for a moment, open-handed, before turning to climb the three flights to my apartment.

  “How was dinner with Brynn?” I ask as Teddy follows behind me.

  “Good, good.” He says it noncommittally, but he’s got it bad for this girl, and I know there’s no other way he would have wanted to spend his birthday. “The pub crawl was fun?” he asks in return. The question sounds casual, but I know he’s looking for reassurance that I’m not sore at him for choosing Brynn over me.

  “There’s no other way I would have wanted to spend my birthday.” I shrug as I push open the door to the two-bedroom apartment I share with my friend Ron. “Really,” I add. “Just a few friends drinking our way through several Bostonian establis
hments of questionable repute. It was good, promise.”

  This apartment isn’t much, but compared to the Tufts University campus housing, where there was never a moment’s peace, landing in this grimy apartment after sophomore year felt like a serious upgrade. My roommate spends most of his time in the library, and I often feel like the whole place belongs to me alone.

  “Here.” Teddy reaches into his pocket and removes a small square of paper that’s been folded over itself several times. He hands it to me and then starts taking off his jacket. As he pulls off one sleeve and then the other, I see that he’s wearing only a T-shirt underneath.

  “No wonder you were freezing out there. Doesn’t the crew team have any long-sleeve shirts to give their rowers? Maybe a sweatshirt?”

  Teddy pulls at his shirt, stretching the logo of the Boston University bulldog on it into a distorted, alien shape until he releases the hem. “Will you just open the paper?” He’s got his eyes on my hands.

  “What is it?” I ask as I unfold the printout and see the words Relativity Logins written across the top.

  “Pa sent it to me last night. If I want to search for any half-siblings from the egg donor, I guess he thinks I’m of age to make that choice on my own now.”

  “And here I thought becoming legal drinkers was the best part of yesterday,” I deadpan.

  He winces slightly at my words, and I realize I’ve been too flip. “That’s what you want to do?” I ask, changing gears. “You’re sure you want to go there?” As if it wasn’t enough of a mindfuck the last time our family started investigating our roots.

  “I don’t know.” He drops down onto my sofa and starts tapping one foot against the floor at a furious, repetitive pace. “Will you just look for me? Tell me what it says? No.” He stands up again. “Don’t.”