“No, I don’t really know what you mean,” Olivia said. She pointed and flexed her toes. Her face was rubbed blank. She looked, if anything, bored.
“They’re supposed to pay only for your living expenses and medical costs, but I can’t imagine that anyone’s asking for receipts. Why not have them set up a college fund for you for when you get out? I mean, if you end up losing the case. This could be a way for you to guarantee yourself some kind of future. You could come out ahead in the end. Having a baby could end up being a good thing, after all.”
“It’s already a good thing,” she said, and placed her hands more firmly over her belly, as if to protect the baby from Arthur’s words.
Arthur blinked wordlessly. Then he shook his head. Before he could speak, Olivia hoisted her substantial bulk out of the chair and started up the steps to her room.
“Don’t you want the brochures?” Arthur called after her.
Elaine tamped down a flare of irritation and impatience with her soon-to-be husband.
“I just don’t think she’s ready to deal with all this,” she said. “She thinks she’s going to win the case. Considering the possibility of adoption means considering the possibility of losing and going to jail.”
“Well, she needs to consider the goddamn possibility. She’s got to be prepared. Otherwise it will be too late.”
Elaine nodded her head. “You know that, and I know that. And she’ll figure it out. She just needs time.”
Arthur gathered the papers in a neat pile. He took a yellow Post-It note and wrote Olivia’s name in large block letters. He stuck the note to the top sheet and placed the pile of papers on the counter, using an empty juice glass as a paperweight.
“I’ll leave these where she can find them.”
***
Olivia dressed carefully for her first birth-preparation class. Her midwife had given her the flyer, telling her that by now, six months into her pregnancy, it was time to start thinking about the labor. She had, however, put off calling the instructor for days. She was loath to explain that she would be coming on her own, unattended by a doting husband. But when finally she did make the call, a cheerful, friendly voice with a thick Brooklyn accent had reassured her that it was perfectly all right not to have a partner, and Olivia, relieved, had decided to go.
She pulled on her least tattered pair of black leggings, tucking the waistband under her belly—it cut into her stomach when she tried to pull it up and over. She chose a black tunic from the boxed set Elaine had given her. She shook out her curls, grown even thicker and shinier from all the hormones dancing around her body. She left her hair hanging loose down her back. She gathered up a pillow and a bottle of water, as instructed by the flyer, and headed out the door.
“Where are you off to, honey?” Elaine called from the kitchen, where she was scrubbing out the pot from the chili Arthur had prepared for their dinner. Olivia hadn’t been able to eat more than a few bites. No matter how many times Elaine told him, Arthur couldn’t seem to remember that spicy food gave Olivia heartburn.
“A birth-preparation class,” Olivia said, her hand on the doorknob. “Is it okay if I take your car?”
“Sure.” Elaine came out of the kitchen, wearing a pair of pink rubber gloves dripping in soapy water. “Is it like Lamaze or something?”
“Sort of, I guess. I don’t really know.” Olivia propped the pillow on her hip and reached into Elaine’s purse. She pulled out the key ring. “I’ll be back by nine or so.” She jangled the keys against her palm.
“Where’s the class?” Elaine asked.
“North Berkeley.”
Elaine wiped her forehead with the back of one gloved hand. “Would you like me to come?”
“What?”
“Would you like some company?”
Olivia considered the question. While she never would have expected the baby inside her to provide her with companionship, neither could she have imagined how lonely her pregnancy would make her feel. Every time she saw a pregnant woman accompanied by a solicitous husband, she felt a twisting knot of jealousy and alienation, and a nearly overwhelming need to strike out, to wipe away the smug contentment of the couple’s unity. Olivia had never considered herself a violent person, and the brutality of her loathing came as a shock. She was consumed with envy for expectant couples; she hated them. But would the companionship of her mother do anything to dissipate this despair?
“You’re not busy?”
“No.”
“You don’t have anything else to do?”
Elaine made a show of wrinkling her brow. “No, nothing that I can think of.”
“Well, okay. Sure. Come along.”
Despite the instructor’s assurances, Olivia had fully expected to be the only participant in the class without a husband or boyfriend. But she had forgotten that this was Berkeley. There were six couples in the birthing class, and only three were made up of the traditional husband and wife.
Frances, the instructor, a middle-aged woman with long gray hair who swaddled her substantial girth in an Indian print sarong, handed each pregnant woman a large paper cup full of lukewarm, bright-red tea.
“Berry Berry. For easing the travails of pregnancy and birth. Partners, feel free to help yourselves,” she said and pointed to an oversized teapot.
Olivia sipped her tea, grimacing at the sour flavor. She looked around Frances’s living room. All the furniture had been cleared out, and brightly colored pillows were scattered around the room and against the walls. The men and women in the class were leaning against the walls in a rough circle. Frances settled herself down and asked them to introduce themselves. The three “normal” couples went first. Olivia forgot their names as soon as she heard them, and almost immediately lumped them together in a category of people she would not bring herself to befriend. The next to introduce themselves were not a couple at all, but rather a triple: a husband, a wife, and the young woman they introduced, to her obvious embarrassment, as the “birth mother” of their baby. The adoptive mother gripped the birth mother’s hand with a ferocity that made Olivia wonder if she was afraid that the young woman might slip away, her baby still in the custody of her womb. There was a lesbian couple, the only one of the six with another child at home; the partner who wasn’t pregnant had given birth to their first baby two years before. When it was Olivia’s turn to speak, she told the group her name and then said, “My baby’s father is in jail on drug charges. I’ve also been indicted in the same case. Trial is set for a month before my due date.”
The room fell silent at Olivia’s words. Out of the corner of her eye she could see a red flush creep up Elaine’s neck and across her face.
Frances finally spoke, “Welcome, my dear. I can’t think of anyone who needs a supportive and supported labor more than you.”
For two hours, Olivia and Elaine took turns deep breathing while they gripped ice cubes in their hands. They learned how to do cat and cow stretches, and watched while Frances demonstrated various labor positions. Frances encouraged Elaine to share her birth experience and tsk-tsked at her admission that she really couldn’t remember much, other than that things had improved significantly once she’d been given a nice, big shot of Demerol.
Finally, Frances said, “Partners, I want to thank each and every one of you, especially, for being here. I can’t stress enough how important the role of the labor partner is to a positive and satisfying birth experience. You will be able to keep your own partners comfortable. You will be able to help them focus on their breathing, not on the discomfort of the rushes. You will be their advocate and their voice with the doctors and nurses. While a pregnant woman can certainly give birth without a loving support system, she cannot birth well. So I thank you, and your wives, spouses, partners, mothers of your children, and,” she smiled warmly at Elaine and Olivia, “your daughters, thank you.”
On their way out, she ha
nded each of them a tiny clay figure of an obese women with pendulous breasts and a swollen belly. “Your birth talismans,” she said as she pressed them into their palms.
As Olivia and Elaine walked back to the car, Olivia gently tossed the little figure up in the air. “Hey,” she said, holding it up so Elaine could see it. “It looks like Grandma.”
Elaine laughed. “But thinner.”
“Actually, it looks kind of like me,” Olivia looked down at her breasts. “I’m like a forty-two quadruple D or something.”
Elaine looked her up and down. “Well, I got huge when I was pregnant with you. And Grandma always said that she gained all her weight when she had me. So it runs in the family.”
“Great.”
“If you’re worried about it, you could exercise.”
Olivia rolled her eyes. The sensation of physical contentment that had arrived along with the second trimester had not included any desire or need for exercise. All she really wanted to do was read pregnancy books and eat. She knew she’d gotten fat. Her spreading thighs and vast rump didn’t even look like parts of her own body, and she couldn’t quite recognize her face in the mirror. Her features had grown thicker, somehow blurred, wobbly, and her double chin was so huge that it resembled nothing so much as a goiter. But strangely, she didn’t really care. She knew it bothered her mother that she was gaining so much weight, and she could see Arthur cringe every time she ate a cookie or fried herself an egg. The two of them kept pushing carrots and celery on her, as if she were some kind of enormous rabbit.
“Don’t worry. Once I have the baby, I’ll be on the prison diet. Bread and water.” Olivia grinned to show her mother that she was kidding. Elaine’s attempt to return the smile didn’t succeed particularly well, and Olivia felt guilty for having reminded her about the case. It had seemed like they’d both forgotten about it for a little while. They arrived at the car, and Olivia paused before opening the door. She wanted to say something that would make Elaine feel good, that would let her know that she loved her. Before she had time to consider what she was about to say, the words escaped her.
“So, Mom, do you want to be my birth partner?” She immediately regretted the invitation. “Your job can be to pray to the fat little birth Buddha,” she continued, as if she had been, after all, only kidding.
“Sure,” Elaine said. “I’d be happy to.”
“Are you serious?” Olivia asked.
Elaine didn’t answer for a minute; then she said, almost as if surprising herself, “I…I think so.”
She looked anxious and faintly nauseated, and something about her expression made Olivia laugh. Elaine looked up, startled, and then Olivia waved the little clay sculpture at her and said, “Ooga booga, push push push.” That started Elaine, and they stood there, in the cool air of the Berkeley night, laughing until the tears streamed down their cheeks.
***
That night Elaine lay in bed, trying to imagine the scene of her daughter giving birth. For some reason, Olivia at ten or eleven years old was the image stuck in her mind. The idea of that knobby-kneed, awkward young body birthing something not much smaller than itself was so wrong, so horrifying, that it was almost funny. Her giggles started again, and she hushed herself. She looked over at Arthur, but he hadn’t stirred. He lay next to her, his head back and his mouth gaping open, snoring softly. Not for the first time, Elaine imagined dropping something into that gaping maw, an olive, maybe, or a nickel.
Elaine had worried from the beginning that Olivia would ask her to be there at the baby’s birth. It was just like Olivia to request something from her mother that they both knew would make Elaine terribly uncomfortable—this type of intimacy was, of course, exactly what Elaine loathed most. She had not seen her daughter’s naked body since she was ten years old, had avoided even discussions of puberty and sex, dropping pamphlets on Olivia’s desk instead of making speeches and answering questions. What Elaine had not expected—and even now still could not quite believe—was how much she would want to be present at Olivia’s labor. She would never have imagined herself not only willing, but eager to help her daughter do this overwhelmingly difficult and absolutely commonplace thing—give birth to a baby. Elaine lay in bed next to Arthur’s slumbering, snoring form, running the movie of her grandchild’s birth in her mind. Olivia sweating and straining. Elaine calmly suggesting new positions, gently mopping her brow. Or perhaps, more likely, Elaine vomiting quietly in a corner of the room. And the baby. The tiny yet impossibly huge creature with its soft damp skin and slippery warmth. Elaine had dozed through Olivia’s birth in a drug-induced fog. She remembered nothing—not what the contractions felt like, not even how long they had lasted. She didn’t recall pushing her baby out into the world, or even whether they’d let her hold Olivia before they took her off to be weighed and measured. She was sure they must have; they did that, didn’t they? But she had absolutely no recollection of her daughter’s newborn face. The birth of Olivia’s baby would allow Elaine the opportunity to experience what she’d forgotten, what she’d never known.
Elaine imagined nothing beyond the birth itself. She closed her eyes and fell asleep with the happy scene playing and replaying in her head, without once asking herself who would care for her grandchild if her daughter was sent away.
***
A week before the trial, Olivia mentioned to Izaya for the first time that she had received a letter from Jorge.
“You got a letter from him?” Izaya bellowed.
They were in a conference room at the federal defender’s office. Olivia was being cross-examined by a colleague of Izaya’s, a short, red-headed woman named Giselle. They had been practicing all morning, and Olivia was exhausted. Giselle, who had been so pleasant and friendly when Olivia had shaken her hand, had, as soon as she’d assumed the role of prosecutor, asked Olivia one witheringly contemptuous question after another, giving her no time to gather her thoughts. Olivia had lost her temper more than once and found herself giving contradictory answers to Giselle’s convoluted questions. Izaya had been steadily growing more and more impatient with what Olivia could only assume was her incompetence. Olivia’s answer to Giselle’s question about her contact with Jorge since her arrest had pushed him over the edge.
“You didn’t bother to mention to me that you got a letter from him?” Izaya shouted, again.
“Whoa, take it easy, guy,” Giselle said.
He spun around to her. “You know what? We’re done. She’s as ready as she’s ever going to be. Which is not saying much, is it?” He turned back to Olivia. “Are you out of your fucking mind, you don’t tell me about this until a week before trial?”
“Why? It just never occurred to me. It’s not that important.”
“Oh really? So now you decide what’s important? That’s just great.” He slammed down the pad on which he’d been taking notes.
“You know what?” Giselle said. “Let’s take a break. We’ve been at this for four hours. We could all use something to drink.”
Izaya glared at her. “No, you know what? Fuck you. I don’t need no fucking break.”
“Okay,” Giselle said, drawing out the word and rolling her eyes. She scooped up her papers and tapped them on the desk, evening out the edges. “I’m out of here.” She turned to Olivia. “Don’t worry. He’s always like this before a trial. I wouldn’t take it personally.” She left the room.
“I’m sorry,” Olivia whispered. She wasn’t sure what she was apologizing for, her failure to tell him about Jorge’s letter, or for her dismal performance in their practice cross-examination. Her eyes burned with embarrassed tears.
“Oh, shit,” Izaya said. He walked around the table to her seat. He pulled a chair up next to her and leaned close, his elbows on his knees. “I’m the one who’s sorry. Giselle’s right. I’m always a basket case before a trial. I’m sorry I freaked out on you.”
His apology
made her tears come even faster. He reached an arm around her, and she leaned against his chest. It felt hard and warm under his crisp, pale-pink shirt. She sighed, hiccuping, and let her weight lean into his. It felt like a long time since she’d been this close to a man. He smelled good, like sawdust, with a thin overlay of some fruity soap. Her tears had made his shirt translucent, and out of the corner of her eye she could see where his brown skin darkened the fabric. Suddenly, she grew conscious that his hand was resting lightly on her hip. They both stiffened at the same time, and she sat up, wiping her nose on the back of her hand.
“Bring me the letter, okay?” Izaya said. “Maybe I can use it.”
***
Inexorably, the days tumbled over themselves until it was the night before the trial. Olivia lay in bed, her eyes open wide, staring at the ceiling. But as always, after a while, lying on her back made her uncomfortable; she couldn’t breathe. She flipped over on her side, shoved a pillow under her belly, another between her knees, and willed herself to sleep. Her mind thrummed, as though she had just drunk an entire pot of coffee. She flipped over again, rearranging her pillows afresh. The baby must have sensed her agitation, because it too began to toss and turn, rolling in the space that was starting to feel too small for its increasing size. Olivia pressed on the bulge underneath her right rib, trying to force down the sharp elbow or knee that had lodged there.
She closed her eyes and tried to calm herself by imagining not her criminal trial, but the birth of the baby. She saw herself squatting and pushing, heaving out a perfectly round head, then a tiny squirming body. For a moment the image soothed her, but then it took an unpleasant turn. She saw the baby snatched by a grim-faced Nurse Ratched in a prison uniform. Olivia groaned and flipped over again.
Olivia had done a remarkable job, for a while, of not thinking about what it would mean if she were convicted. She could not bear the thought of losing her baby, so she simply refused to consider the possibility. But, as the trial grew nearer, it had become harder to pretend that nothing was wrong, that she was just another young mother about to have her first baby. For the last few days, she had been overwhelmed by the sickening fear of never getting to hold her child, of never changing its diaper, never pushing it on a swing, not taking it to its first day of school.
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