The gravel of the driveway cuts into my feet, the same way cold air cuts into my body. I let it hurt. I keep moving until I see Amber’s head through the glass window, a fallen-forward head, eyes closed.
When she’s in my arms, I run my fingers over her hair, her cheek, my lips touch her brow. I hold my breath until I hear hers and it’s raggedy, broken up into hiccups, and her stomach rises and falls, a slight movement under the light fabric of her shirt. I breathe out.
I’ve done it.
I’ve done this.
I’ve left this baby. Left this baby alone. She could have died.
“Amber, wake up.”
She doesn’t at first, until I scream it loud, and then she startles awake. She doesn’t cry, but she opens her eyes. Then her tiny hands curl around my shirt, grabbing tight. “No,” I say. I pry her fists open and pull my shirt away. She curls her fingers pry her fists open and pull my shirt away. She curls her fingers in on themselves then, making tiny fists holding nothing.
FOURTEEN
Ed’s standing at his door in a white T-shirt and boxer shorts, his glasses tilted, his eyes trying to blink themselves awake. I come into focus and time slows down, because I’m watching so careful, because this is important, and he does what I’m hoping for, which is that he smiles. From the way the smile comes to his face, from the place underneath where it comes from, I can see that it’s not the smile of a man looking at me as a woman, and not of someone being put upon, it’s the smile of a friend, of one human being to another.
It cracks me apart. Because if he hadn’t smiled, I would have turned around, gotten in my car, and driven to the hospital and left a baby girl. Funny how such little things can change a life.
He backs up to motion me inside. Still, I stand there until he says, in the quietest, softest voice, “People have such a hard time asking. Come in.”
I nod but I am so empty inside that I don’t even know how I manage to move. I hand Amber to Ed. “I left her outside most of the night.” I can’t get my voice very loud. “I don’t know if she was crying that whole time or what. I don’t know if she’s sick or what. She was crying forever. I can’t do it. She seems okay, but I don’t know. I don’t know. You can’t just leave a baby crying by herself in a car all night.”
He holds Amber in his arms. It looks like he hasn’t held that many babies in his life, because although he looks willing enough he just doesn’t know how she should fit against his body.
“I was that way too,” I mumble. “Just a month ago.”
“What way?”
“Not sure how to hold a baby.”
We sit on his couch. He puts Amber up against him, and then shifts a few times to get her situated. I’m dead inside but still I can see: His house has regular-looking walls, but it’s so empty, so clean-looking, and he has this weaving of a bird in flight, in soft colors, and a painting of birds, only they’re not really birds, they’re brushes of paint that look like they’re in motion. I wonder where they’re going.
“But you do now. Know how to hold a baby.”
For a long time he listens, and I never felt like such a jerk in all my life, sitting in his living room and crying and talking in bits of sentences and blowing enough snot to use up half a roll of toilet paper. Everything comes out in fragments: Tess and Simon and dancing and Baxter and wanting someone and Clark, except that I leave out the important part and just say that our date didn’t work out so well.
When I’m done he knows he needs to say something and he fumbles around for some words. “Probably it was the smartest thing you could have done. I mean, putting her someplace safe and getting away. There was some wisdom there. We can get her to a doctor to get her checked out, but she looks okay.”
I look out his window because I don’t know where else my eyes should go. “I don’t want to be me anymore. Because if I was a different person, I could do this. And I want to do this. I just can’t.”
When I glance back over at him, he’s looking down at Amber. He’s got her in the crook of his arm, gingerly, and is considering something about her. He says, “Libby, teach this girl to be gentle with herself.” Then he adds, “Who do you want to be?”
For a long time, we sit in silence. I don’t have an answer to his question. I fall asleep, and when I wake up, he’s in the same spot, holding Amber. I fall asleep again. When I wake up, I see that he’s feeding her, which means that he must have gotten Amber’s diaper bag out of my car and figured out how to make up a bottle. He’s changed her diaper and her outfit. I close my eyes again because I need to think, and in that in-between of sleep and wake I try to think about different paths, and different versions of me. I get still. I hold that stillness in front of me. I ask it: What do you want? But all I can think of is: One thing about love between two people is that you should both deserve it.
When I open my eyes, Ed says quietly, “She looks fine. She was awake and now she’s asleep, and maybe she spent a night in the car, but I think she survived it, and I think you will too.”
I nod and start to cry, just the tears, and I keep the rest of myself still and quiet. He brings me tea, which he must have made with one hand, because he’s still holding Amber, and then sits down next to me.
“I have a theory,” he says in his quiet voice. “But this one I’m not so sure about, so take it with a grain of salt. Okay?”
He waits until I mumble an okay before he goes on. “The best way to handle danger is to move right toward it, before it has time to maneuver itself. Go toward things. Right at them. We’re going to go find Tess. And then we’ll find Simon. Listen to me. They’re both coming toward you. Meet them before they get there.”
“I wish Tess was moving toward me.” I shift my eyes to the window. “She’s out there somewhere.”
“No, she’s been coming toward you. Actually, she’s already here.”
Sammy’s Garage has a room in the back, a dark, cool place that has a certain feeling to it—a trace of all the humans that have ever been there, like they left outlines of bodies or remnants of dreams. Cots are lined up against one wall, piled with blankets, and there’s an old yellow fridge and some cardboard boxes with clothing spilling out over the edges. It’s a way station for the illegals, Ed’s told me, and as I stand there I think of all the hundreds of lives that have passed through, and meanwhile my eyes make out more shapes and shadows in the dark. Then Amber lets out a soft gurgle, and with the noise comes motion, and a figure jumps up from a cot, bolting up and stepping back as we step forward.
Ed pulls a string that turns on an overhead bulb and there are her eyes, Tess’s eyes, seeing me. Her eyebrows shoot up and her mouth opens in an O, and then her eyes flick from me to Amber to Ed and back to me. She says, “Libby? Libby! Jeez, what are you—?”
“Hey, Tess.”
“Shit, Libby, you really scared me.”
She’s just come out of sleep and she’s fighting to get out of that soft and confused place into the hard, real world. I see her eyes move from person to person, and they also move from fear to confusion, and then—and this is the part I’m watching for—her eyes tense and she’s trying to close herself up.
“You look beautiful,” I say . She does, too. Her hair’s pulled back into a dark, shimmery ponytail, she’s wearing a simple hemp necklace around her tan neck, and she’s in jeans and a hemp necklace around her tan neck, and she’s in jeans and a black tank top.
I pick up Amber’s little hand and make it wave up and down, and I say in a high voice, “Hi Tess, I’m Amber.” And then, because she’s looks from Amber to Ed in a worried way, I say, “And that’s Ed, and don’t worry, none of us are here to cause you trouble.”
“Well, shit,” she says, finally. “How are you here—? Why are you here—?”
“Don’t worry. All I need from you is a bit of time—signing papers, working some things out. I need to get Amber legally.”
“So you know what I’m doing?”
“About the illegals? Yes.”
“Well, I did it,” she says. “I brought them.”
“Was it Miguel’s group?”
She nods.
“Are they safe?”
She nods again. “They’re with Miguel.”
“You were driving here yesterday?”
“Yes.”
“Clark knew that?”
“Yes.”
She comes forward to give me a hug. “I’m not staying, though,” she whispers into my ear, and as she says this she tilts her head and looks at her baby girl. “I can’t.”
“You’re staying long enough to help me.”
She looks unsure, so I say it again, and then I say it another time, which is when I feel her give in.
Ed steps out of the room so that I can talk with Tess alone, and since I’ve already gone and written her a letter, the one I didn’t send, I know everything I want to tell her, and as we stand under a single bulb of light I talk fast. Tess makes snorts and occasional remarks, like, “All Kay wants is the ranch. Baxter ought to consider her motivations,” and “You and Derek were never in love, let him go,” and “Simon can go to hell,” and “Amber sounds great,” and silence when I tell her about Clark, and more silence when I tell her about leaving Amber in the car, and dark eyes that finally get serious and look a little sorry.
Finally we go outside because there’s nothing else to do, and when we walk out we’re blinded and we have to stand there, squinting and adjusting to the sunshine beating down on us. When we climb in Ed’s orange van, he turns to consider Tess. They nod to each other like they’re old friends, although Tess says, “So, you’re Ed,” and Ed says, “So, you’re Tess.”
He starts driving us home. I sit in the back of Ed’s VW bus with Amber on my lap, which is illegal but sometimes the people who make up laws are just way out of the loop on what actually occurs. Tess sits up front and looks back at me. There she is, right in front of me, and all of a sudden I have nothing I want to say. The only thing that’s tumbling around in my mind, in a lazy sort of way, is that if Amber is gentle with herself, then maybe she’ll be able to fall in love with her own self, and won’t that be nice, to grow up that way?
Tess clears her throat and says, “Clark keeps them there, at Sammy’s, till whoever pays up. Payment on delivery.”
“Who paid Clark? Miguel?”
“Yeah, he paid for them all. Man, he was pissed off at Clark, because at the last minute Clark changed the price. Clark shouldn’t have done that. They spent about an hour bartering. They almost got in a fight. Clark told him, Chinga tu madre, pinche cabrón, fuck your mother, you fucking goat. That made me laugh, but Miguel about punched him.”
“Why’d you let him?”
“Who, Clark? Change the price?” She shrugs. “Not my deal. I’m just driving.”
“Tess—”
But she holds up her hand, no. “Lib, you and I got different ideas on how this world operates. Uh-uh, I don’t want to hear it. I don’t want your lecture.”
I close my mouth and stare out the window at the fields flying by. I wonder what I’m actually seeing. At first I wasn’t seeing much. And then I saw a little: Miguel and the immigrants and the things people do for each other. And it made me brave. And then I saw other things, like Clark’s face and Tess’s lies, and then I felt small. I don’t know how the world operates, or how brave to be, or how many chances to take. But some things are coming into focus, finally. Like Tess. Like Amber. And as I stare at the pale grass flying by the car, I hold myself still so I can feel what I’m really feeling about them.
After a while, Tess clears her throat. “I want you to know that I’m staying in this business. But I guess not with Clark. Not after what you just told me.” Her voice sounds soft and tired. “I guess I’ll have to figure out some other way. I know some other people. I got other connections now. When I went south, into the reservation, to pick up these guys at a stop, I did leave food and drinks and a box of shoes. You’ll never believe this, but I even bought a bunch of those cheap plastic rosaries and I left those.” Her voice gets thick but she holds steady and says, “I do realize what’s going on, I do see how hard—” She shrugs. “What am I supposed to do about it? There’s different levels of bad, you know. I didn’t know about Clark, that he would do that to you. That he would hurt you like that. I’m sorry.”
There’s a big, long silence. I stare out the window and then my eyes flick to Ed for a second, because I wonder what he’s thinking. I never told him all about the Clark part, but he’s listening and he looks very still as he drives, like maybe he’s deep inside himself thinking about something. Tess is staring at Amber, and she’s still and thinking, too.
Finally, I look at Tess and say, “I imagine that they could do a lot worse than you.”
Tess tilts her head at me. “I hope that’s true. Big sister, I just got my own life to make.” She smiles a sad smile. “And making it isn’t so damn easy. I won’t charge them extra, I won’t take advantage.” Her eyes flicker right to mine. “I’ve done that before, and it doesn’t feel good.”
I look hard at her, so she’ll understand that what I’m about to say is next is very true. “I wish you would have told me you were leaving for good. I wish a lot of things. But maybe they don’t matter anymore. Because in the end, here’s what I wish. I wish I wasn’t so alone, but still, I wish Amber was mine. I do. So don’t feel bad any more. You gave me a gift. A life. Now help me keep her, all right?”
When I come out of the bathroom, Tess is sitting at the kitchen table, cocking her head down to hold the phone between her ear and shoulder. She’s writing and concentrating too hard to look up, but after a bit she raises her eyes and winks.
“Where’s Amber?” I mouth. I’m brushing my wet hair. I took a shower because already this seemed like a long day and all the tears and snot and life needed to be rinsed away for a minute, and now I feel like maybe I can start again.
Tess jerks her head toward the door. I look out and see Kay holding her in one arm and talking to Ed, who dropped us off and then, apparently, decided to just stick around. I can barely see Amber’s face, but I see that her eyes are open, and I see an arm flail in the air.
Finally Tess hangs up. “Holy moley, the world is complicated. I didn’t know how hard it is to live. I think that surprised us both, didn’t it?”
When I don’t answer, she says, “Amber is—It’s been hard to be without her. Harder than I thought it would be.” She jerks her head and clears her throat. I’ve got rid of tears the exact same way, so I know what she’s doing.
“Is she okay?”
“Amber? Yes. Still no fever, no nothing. Kay took her to the clinic this morning. She’s fine—”
“I was just so tired—”
“A healthy baby, just like the doctor said. She’ll be out of the colic period soon.”
“So tired and—”
“—You’re a good mom, Libby. It’s not the worst thing.”
“But it’s something.”
“It’s a one-time thing.”
“I don’t want to be Kay.”
“You’re a far cry from Kay.”
We both sit back in the kitchen chairs and look at each other. “There’s a lot of things we could talk about,” Tess says finally. “We both want you to be the mother of this baby. And Simon says he wants her. And she is half his.”
“Is that who you were talking to?”
“No. I was talking to social services. I was thinking that Simon could be involved, but then he said he wanted full custody. I talked to him right before I called social services. First thing I did was to tell him he was a fuck-head. That he was the biggest mistake of my life, except that he made me love my big sister even more. I told him that Amber wouldn’t be alive if it wasn’t for you, and that he had no right to come showing up, acting like you and this family were so low. But then I had to ease up, because I had to talk to him, you know? Because I had to play him right, so that we can get this baby.”
“And what did
he say?”
“Full custody. He said it like such a baby boy. ‘Full custody or else you’ll be hearing from our lawyer’ is what he said. He wants to take Amber on the road. He wants to quit school, join the rodeo, and lead the Cowboy Christian Coalition, and take Amber along with him. In that way, he says, she’ll learn the ways of the Lord. So you can see, I don’t really prefer that as an option. What a fucker. I can’t believe I slept with him.”
“Neither can I.”
“What a mistake.”
Kay walks in from outside, holding Amber in her arms. Amber’s facing out, looking around the kitchen, flailing her arms and making a sort of happy, buzzing noise. She looks around the room and then her eyes rest on me and she wiggles.
Kay sits down at the table and cuddles Amber next to her. “Ed just left. Funny talker, that guy. Bees, bees. He made Amber a present. Look at this.” She holds out a dreamcatcher, a circle filled with some sort of twine, and with feathers hanging from it. “He’s heading over to Miguel’s place. Apparently he’s helping out some illegals, which you girls know something about.” She stares at us hard, and we look back at her, blank.
“Social services said Simon could take us to court if he wants,” Tess finally says. “The baby’s his too. He wasn’t named on the papers, but he could ask for those tests and all.” She scans the page of her notes. “But we got some things on our side. He wasn’t there for emotional or financial support during the pregnancy, birth, or first months of Amber’s life. Basically, he abandoned her. If he takes the DNA test, he’ll have to own up, and pay for the next eighteen years of child support. If he’s going to be a part of this child’s life, he has to be there with money too.” Tess looks down and traces a zodiac sign on the table with her finger, then clears her throat and looks back at me. “He won’t do it, Libby.”
Kay hands me Amber. I hold her away from me so I can look her in the face. She looks right back at me, waving her arms. I hold her to me, her chest against mine.
“So what I should do,” says Tess, “is to put Amber up for adoption. To you, Libby. I put her up for adoption, and I name you as the adoptive parent. Okay?”
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