Dwight signaled Carmen with his eyes. He had to remove his wife from the scene. It was too soon after her own illness. “I love you, sweetie.” He kissed Sterling’s clenched fist over and over, then, hugging his wife’s shivering form, left the room.
“Carmen? I should tell the doctors about my drug use.” She strained to speak. “I’m worried about my son. I used so much dope.”
“They know, Sterling. Your baby is okay. He came into this world weighing almost five pounds. That’s a miracle in itself. Don’t worry, he’s a fighter just like you. Hush now.”
“Carmen? Listen to me. I’m begging you. Adopt my son. We both know Spice can’t handle a heroin-addicted baby. It’s beyond her. Let me know you’ll be his mother.”
I should tell her the truth, Carmen thought again.
“Oh, my God. Carmen, where’s Spice? Where’s my mother? Doesn’t she care about me anymore?”
That was the sign that Carmen needed. Sterling wouldn’t have to know the story. No matter what Spice said, there could be no words, no amount of tears, to undo years of love from a woman who’d substituted as her mother. It would be wrong to try to correct that now.
“Sterling?”
“It’s okay.” Sterling pressed the button for the nurse to come in. “Can you help us, please?” With Carmen’s help Sterling sat up in bed. When the nurse came in, Sterling asked for a paper and pen.
“What are you doing?” Carmen asked her.
Sterling spoke out loud as she struggled to write: “I, Sterling G. Witherspoon, hereby request that my aunt, Carmen Enriquez, adopt my son, ‘Gray Sterling Witherspoon,’ previously known as ‘Baby Witherspoon.’” Sterling signed her name.
“Spice would want—”
“No. If my son turns out to be addicted to heroin, Spice won’t want him. I want you to care for him, Carmen. I know you’ll love him like he was your own.”
Carmen couldn’t have felt more proud. They signed their names, then the nurse brought Mink and Dwight back into the room to witness the paper.
Death is the foreshadowing of life, the life of a newborn child. Carmen knew that, if it weren’t for the child, her soul would fall down, right at this tender moment. Without any forewarning, Carmen found herself in the arena where she had to play out the struggle of life versus death.
She was overwhelmed with emotion as Sterling handed her this declaration of love.
“I’ve got a half million dollars in a safety deposit box. Use it to care for my son,” Sterling told her.
“You don’t—” Carmen stopped. She didn’t care where it came from.
“Stop,” Sterling said, smiling. “I want something good to come from my life. The key is taped under the crystal panther figurine at my house. Take care of him, Carmen. Tell him how much I loved him—how much I wanted him. Tell him he was a miracle. My miracle.”
Sterling looked into Carmen’s loving brown eyes. “Before, while I was sleeping, I dreamed of peace. It was a beautiful dream of understanding, and I was loved just for me.” She paused to catch her breath. “Look, Carmen. Do you see?”
“What, honey? What is it?” Carmen’s voice broke. Tears closed her throat and she was unable to speak again.
“On the blinds, through the windows, there’s a pattern. A picture.”
Carmen looked at the windows, then back to Sterling, questioning. Then she remembered: when she was high, she always used to ask Spice if she could see the pictures, the patterns, that were there. No one could ever see them but Carmen. And now Sterling was seeing patterns of her own.
“I see it, baby.” Beyond pain, beyond emotion, Carmen couldn’t move; something was coming, and there was nothing she could do to stop it.
As she slipped into unconsciousness, Sterling asked, “Carmen, do you believe in angels?”
Closing her eyes, Carmen felt Dwight’s arms around her shoulders. Her eyes fought the tears as she, Mink, and Dwight stared down into Sterling’s angelic face. Yes. Carmen certainly believed in angels now.
At 3:00 P.M. Sterling experienced a grand mal seizure and lapsed into a coma. At approximately 3:10 P.M. Sterling Gaye Witherspoon was gone.
SPICE
It always grieves me to contemplate the initiation of chil dren into the ways of life when they are scarcely more than infants. . . . It checks their confidence and simplic ity, two of the best qualities that heaven gives them, and demands that they share our sorrows before they are ca pable of entering into our enjoyments.
—CHARLES DICKENS
G olden caught up with Spice on the way to the hospital. She had run her car off the road in her fear and hysteria. She wasn’t hurt, but it was an isolated section of highway and no one had stopped to help her. Later, she couldn’t help but wonder if the hand of God hadn’t been involved in her delay in reaching the hospital.
As soon as Golden pulled into the hospital parking lot, Spice jumped out of the car and raced inside. Golden caught up with her and led her to the elevator. When they stepped off on the fifth floor, Spice felt her heart was frozen.
Turning, she heard Carmen scream, “Spice!” Right then, at that precise moment, she knew for sure that her baby was gone.
“Where is she!” Spice screamed. “Where is my baby?”
Golden was beside her then, covering her crumpling body with his.
“Spice, baby. Hold on, baby.” Spice looked at Carmen, and all their secrets, all the pain, all their good intentions, went floating by in an instant. Carmen reached for Spice’s hand without saying a word.
“Is she really gone?” Spice asked Dwight. “What about the baby? Is it alive?”
“I’m sorry, Spice. Yes, she’s gone. The baby is in intensive care.”
With Golden’s arms around her, her shoulders shook violently. There was no gauge to measure her pain. Slipping through his arms, her body as light as the whispers of a dream, she had no feeling when her legs suddenly gave out, and she accordioned onto the cold tile floor, screaming Sterling’s name.
Her head flopped between the tops of her knees, and her boneless arms dangled on each side of her body.
Golden, off balance, was unable to hold her, and he slipped down with her. They sat there on the floor, and Golden pulled Spice close to his chest and comforted her with his lips and hands. Finally she whispered in his ear, “I need to see her.” She looked up into Golden’s loving eyes and implored him, “Please let me see her.”
Golden lifted his wife up and nodded to the nurse.
The nurse led Spice and Golden into Sterling’s room. The young woman pulled back the sheet from Sterling’s face. Spice swallowed a sob. There was a small smile still on Sterling’s face. Her soft gray eyes were half-open. Spice moved closer, and as she did so, she could hear Golden praying over her child’s soul—praying for the family, for their strength and hope.
Without taking her eyes from Sterling, Spice addressed Golden. “I am sorry I doubted you that night, Golden. I will never doubt you again. Please forgive me.”
“All is forgiven.”
Spice thought of Golden’s words, his prayers, that no one should leave this world without accepting Jesus Christ as their personal savior—Spice prayed that Sterling had.
When Sterling was born, Spice had tried to envision her as a precious, tiny angel but found it impossible. She’d been given to her secondhand. But now in death, she could.
By the grace of God, Spice felt peace when she stared down at her baby. Spice rubbed her hand lovingly over every surface of Sterling’s body. She rubbed her feet, then looked into her eyes. She smoothed both legs, touched her swollen stomach, where she could feel, through the gown, the prickly stitches from the cesarean surgery. She let her hand rest there for a while.
Smiling now, Spice moved her hand over her arms, her shoulders, the slope of her neck, then she stopped again. She outlined Sterling’s face with her thumb. With Sterling’s eyelids half-closed, Spice wasn’t frightened, but grateful to stare into her daughter’s beautiful sterling gray
eyes.
Tears touched her smile when she bent and kissed her daughter. “I love you, baby. Mother’s going to miss you so.”
“See the smile on her face. She’s with God now, baby,” Golden said to his wife.
Stepping back, Spice felt Golden’s arms encircling her shoulders, and she fell back deeper inside of them, breathing softly. She turned around, sinking her face into his chest, pulling the lapels of his jacket over her face. Unable to stop the sobs, she cried, “Hold me, Golden. I don’t know if I can make it.”
“I’m here.” He rocked her body back and forth, feeling her pain sinking deeper into his chest and into his heart. He waited until she had exhausted her tears and her body stopped trembling.
Finally she said, “I’m okay.” She turned to look back at Sterling and, brushing back her tears, smiled.
“C’mon, let’s go see the baby.”
“Wait.” Spice turned to the nurse. “Is there a chapel in this hospital?”
“Of course. Follow me.”
Spice couldn’t hold back the tears as she and Golden walked into the small room. She felt Golden’s strength building from within as he prayed. Kneeling on the altar, she closed her eyes and steepled her hands in prayer.
Golden prayed aloud. He said another prayer for Sterling. Afterward he prayed for his wife: “God, I know you have the power to heal, the power to save. Have mercy, dear Lord, on my wife. Heal our souls, dear God. Forgive our sins and stitch us more closely together, Lord.”
Spice let the tears fall.
“I kneel before your throne of God and your throne of mercy. I ask you to touch me, touch her. Because you, Lord, only you, are the author and finisher of our faith.”
If Golden can love me this much, Spice thought, knowing all the terrible things about my past, I have to trust him. Maybe there is something inside of me that will teach me more about how to love.
As Golden knelt beside Spice, she felt something stronger, lighter, like the brushing of an angel’s wing, against her shoulder as she knelt beside him. Then, as she opened her eyes, a split second of evanescent brilliance flashed before her, and she thought, Who will save the children? Who will love the children? Who will help them? Whom can they trust?
Ironically, in this instant, when Spice knew the strength of her married love, she also knew that there was something stronger, something better, than her love for Golden—and that was her love for her children, herself, and God. Reaching out, she touched his hand. When she felt his hand cover hers, she lifted her tear-streaked face to his and asked, “Can we see the baby now?”
With his arms around her shoulder, Golden guided Spice to the neonatal intensive care unit.
Death is the foreshadowing of life; we die that we may die no more. The pain Spice felt losing her child, her daughter, was unbelievable, indescribable. Carmen was right—Carmen had wished to spare Spice the pain of a child’s death. Truly, now, Spice understood what her friend had meant.
When they entered the neonatal ICU, Carmen was standing, outside the clear pane, looking inside at Baby Witherspoon. He was no longer on the respirator and weighed just under five pounds. The nurse boasted to Spice and Golden that the feisty newborn had just consumed two ounces of milk.
Spice smiled. The smile went all the way down inside her, and she could feel Sterling’s strength stirring there as well.
Carmen and Spice looked at each other, without a word between them.
Golden started to ask something when he felt Spice’s arm holding him back.
“Who’s that man?” Spice questioned, pointing with her eyes.
An elderly gentleman in a rocking chair sat holding a small infant in the half-darkened room. He appeared to be speaking to the child or singing, she couldn’t be sure.
“That’s Mr. Jamison. He’s our guardian angel.”
Mr. Jamison held a tiny infant in the palm of his hand.
“The child’s name is Joy Lee.” The nurse eased in between them, saying, “At birth she weighed just eleven and a half ounces and was just ten inches long. Joy was born more than three months early. She is the smallest premature infant to survive at Chamberlain Hospital. And now, after three months of being on a respirator, Joy is breathing on her own.”
The nurse went on to explain, as Spice, Carmen, and Golden watched the blind movements of their baby, Gray Witherspoon, who seemed to be reaching out for something, moving his hands and feet wildly into the air, but quietly, grabbing at nothing. Spice watched Carmen volleying her gaze back and forth from the angel to her baby.
They all turned at the sound of Gray’s soft cry.
“Can I touch him?” Carmen asked the nurse.
“Which of you are the grandparents?”
“I—” Spice started.
“We are,” Carmen said, her gaze boring into her friend’s eyes.
“Carmen,” Spice hugged her. Tears hot on her cheeks, she was unable to speak. “I want you to raise him. It’s what Sterling would have wanted.”
“I’ll love him, Spice. Because he’s a part of my own blood.”
“He’s yours,” Spice whispered to her.
Spice watched as Carmen placed her carefully scrubbed hands inside the incubator and touched her tiny grandbaby. She could feel his power being transferred to Carmen, and she felt Sterling coming alive inside of the newborn. When they heard him cry again, low at first and then louder, Carmen looked up, and they both realized they could hear Sterling in the newborn baby’s tears.
The baby cried louder. Cries, Spice thought, each one better than the last.
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