You Were Meant For Me

by Yona Zeldis McDonough

  The officer was only too glad to fill her in. She got the address of family court and the name of the judge assigned to the case. The building, at 330 Jay Street, was not all that far from her office in downtown Manhattan. The next day, she made the trip and, after a few inquiries, found the courtroom she’d been looking for. The metal benches just outside were packed, and the waiting sea of faces looked sad, angry, embittered, or a ravaged combination of all three. Miranda stepped inside the courtroom and slid into a seat at the back. Up front, Judge Deborah Waxman was presiding. She looked to be in her sixties, with frosted blond hair, frosted pink lip gloss, and frosted white nails—it was like she was sugarcoated. But nothing about her manner or voice was even remotely sweet. She cut through the whiny excuses, the meandering stories, the bluster and the rationalizations made by deadbeat dads and criminally negligent moms with the same brisk, impartial efficiency in a way that Miranda found intimidating but admirable. When she called a ten-minute recess, Miranda asked a court officer if she could approach the bench. The officer looked at the judge who looked at Miranda. She felt herself being intensely scrutinized and was relieved when the judge inclined her head in a small nod. She had passed.

  “What can I do for you?” asked the judge.

  Miranda knew she did not have much time. “I’ve come about the baby,” she said. “The one who was found in the subway at Stillwell Avenue.”

  “Stable condition at a city hospital,” the judge said succinctly. “When she’s been thoroughly checked out, she’ll be released.”

  “Where to?”

  “Family services is arranging for a foster care placement. No one has claimed her, so she’ll be put up for adoption.” Judge Waxman looked down as if assessing the condition of her iridescent manicure. “Why do you want to know?”

  “I’m the one who found her that night,” Miranda said. “I brought her to the police.”

  “You did.” It was a statement, not a question.

  “Yes, Your Honor.”

  “That was a very kind thing to do.” The judge brought her gaze up from her nails. Her small but intensely blue eyes seemed to be taking Miranda’s measure.

  “No, it wasn’t,” said Miranda, meeting that gaze full-on.

  “You think it was unkind?” Judge Waxman sounded surprised.

  “It was no more than decent,” Miranda said. “And decent is not the same as kind. Decent is what anyone would have done.”

  “Not her mother,” said the judge.

  “No, well, I’m sure there’s a story behind that. . . .”

  “Isn’t there always?” The judge glanced at her watch. “Recess is over,” she said. “Thank you for coming, Ms. . . .”

  “Berenzweig.”

  “Ms. Berenzweig. I’ll see that the mayor’s office sends you a citation or something.”

  “I don’t want a citation,” Miranda said.

  “No? Then what do you want?” It was a challenge.

  Miranda felt flustered. Did she even know? “Just to know that she’s all right,” she said.

  As it turned out, that was not enough. Now that she knew the baby was being cared for, Miranda craved more information. She was such a thirsty baby. Would someone make sure she drank enough? What about a name? Names were so important; Miranda hoped she wasn’t given one that was silly or demeaning.

  Over the next week, Miranda returned to Judge Waxman’s courtroom three more times. Each time, she waited patiently for a recess or a break and would listen to the update that Judge Waxman delivered in the same clipped tone. The baby was drinking formula. The baby had gained an ounce. There was some evidence of drugs—she would not specify—in her system, but they were minimal; it did not appear that her mother had been an addict. Miranda warmed to the woman, frosting and all. How would the judge have known these details unless she too had taken a special interest in the baby?

  Then Judge Waxman told her that a foster care placement had been found for the baby; she would be leaving the hospital shortly.

  “Would I be able to see her before they let her go?” Miranda asked.

  “Whatever for?” Judge Waxman’s brows, two thin, penciled arcs, rose high on her forehead.

  “Just because. Maybe I could hold her. The nurses must be so busy; they might not have time.”

  “I’ve never had a request like that,” said the judge. Miranda did not say anything; she just waited while those shrewd blue eyes did their work. “But I see no reason why you couldn’t. Come back tomorrow; I’ll give you the name of the facility and a letter allowing you to visit with her at the discretion of the nurses.”

  “Oh, thank you!” Miranda said. “Thank you so much!”

  She walked out of the courthouse buoyant with anticipation, and after work spent an hour in Lolli’s on Seventh Avenue, considering the relative merits of tiny sweaters, caps, dresses, and leggings. She spent way too much money, but rationalized her purchases as charitable contributions.

  The baby was being held at Kings County Hospital, on Clarkson Avenue; Miranda took the subway to the 627-bed facility (she had looked it up online) after she left work the next day. The two nurses on the neonatal ward were only too happy to indulge her. “Honey, you can hold her all night long if you want to,” said one, her Caribbean accent giving the words a musical lilt.

  “Do you know that someone found her in the subway?” said the other one.

  “I know,” Miranda said. “I was that someone.”

  “Lord, no!” said the nurse.

  Miranda nodded and looked down at the baby. She was definitely heavier; Miranda felt she had her weight imprinted somewhere in her sense memory and she could discern the difference. Her skin tone had evened out and her dark eyes were open and fixed on Miranda’s face. Did she remember the time they had spent together? Could she in some inchoate way recognize her?

  Miranda spent the next two hours walking, rocking, and talking to the baby. She took scads of photos that she would later post to her Facebook page. The baby guzzled the bottle of formula that the nurses prepared, and she dozed peacefully as Miranda toted her up and down the hospital corridor. During a diaper change, which the nurse showed Miranda how to execute, she blinked several times and kicked her tiny feet. As her hand closed around Miranda’s extended finger, the force of her grip was a revelation.

  When visiting hours ended, Miranda pulled herself away with the greatest reluctance. She went back the next night, this time with butterscotch blondies she had baked from an office recipe; the nurses tore into them eagerly. “For someone who had such a start, she’s doing all right,” said the one with the island accent. She bit into her blondie with evident delight.

  “She’s lucky you’re the one who found her,” said the other.

  “Maybe I’m the lucky one,” Miranda said, gazing down at the baby who was now wearing a knit dress adorned with rosebuds; Miranda had rubbed the cotton against her own cheek to test for softness when selecting it.

  The following day, Miranda was back in Judge Waxman’s courtroom. “The family that adopts her—they’ll be thoroughly checked out, right?” she asked.

  “Of course,” said Judge Waxman. “We have our protocols, and they are strictly adhered to.”

  “Will they love her, though? How can your protocols determine that?”

  Judge Waxman pursed her shiny lips in what looked like irritation. But when she spoke, it was with more gentleness than she had previously displayed. “What about you, Ms. Berenzweig?” she asked.

  “Excuse me?”

  “What about you as a prospective foster parent? With the goal of adoption?”

  “Me?” Miranda’s hopes lifted briefly at the thought before they came plummeting down again. How could she even consider adopting a baby? She had no husband, no boyfriend even, and an already-demanding job that was about to become even more demanding.

 
“Yes, you,” Judge Waxman was saying. “I think you’ve demonstrated a remarkable attachment to this infant already. How many times have you been to see me about her? And how many times have you been to see her?”

  “Well, she’s such a darling little thing, and of course I was concerned about her, having found her and everything—” She was babbling, babbling like an incoherent fool. She took a deep, centering breath and began again. “Doesn’t it all take time?” she said. “Aren’t there protocols?”

  Again that shrewd, raking look from the judge. “Of course there are. But in cases of urgent need, and this certainly qualifies, I have ways of . . . expediting things when I need to. We could conduct a home visit, and if everything is found to be in order, we could place her with you and begin the adoption proceedings. It would take a few months, but in the meantime you’d be fostering her and getting to know her better.”

  I already know her, Miranda wanted to say. But that seemed, well, crazy. So she kept quiet.

  “Why don’t you sleep on it?” Judge Waxman asked. “Think it over. Talk to your family. Your friends. And give me your answer in the next few days.”

  Miranda nodded and left. Isn’t this what she’d been hoping for, wishing for, in some way scheming for since the first time she’d shown up in front of Judge Waxman? Now that the offer was actually on the table, though, she was petrified, and she walked out of the building bathed in a pure, icy panic. Rather than take the subway, she decided to walk for a while; she needed to clear her head.

  The day was sunny and not too cold; there were lots of people on the pedestrian path of the Brooklyn Bridge. Miranda had to maneuver past power walkers, joggers, women with strollers, old couples with thick-soled shoes and Polar fleece jackets, and an excited, noisy bunch of school kids, all wearing identical neon orange vests. Below, the water shifted and sparkled; a flight of birds—she had not a clue as to what they were—sliced the sky above.

  The new Web site about to launch at Domestic Goddess meant that in addition to her current workload, Miranda would now be overseeing all the online food content—more recipes that needed testing, more features that needed assigning, more deadline-averse writers. It was a step-up in responsibility, prestige, and scope. It would also mean a lot more work, especially in the beginning. How would she manage all that, on her own, with a brand-new baby? And the baby looked to be black. Maybe she would be better off with a different sort of family—a family with two parents, or a family in which at least one of them had skin her color.

  Once across the bridge, Miranda walked west until she reached Greenwich Street and started heading uptown. Assuming she could clear the racial hurdle—Judge Waxman, after all, had not even raised the issue—could she afford to hire a sitter? Or would she need to resort to daycare? What would her father say? Her landlady and her colleagues at work? Her friends? She had a hunch that Courtney was going to rain right down all over her parade. What was it with her lately anyway? Was it just the engagement, or was it something deeper, more systemic?

  Her father. She realized she hadn’t talked to him for more than a week. But given the fog of dementia that enveloped him, it didn’t seem to matter how often they spoke because he was not there when they did. Still, she had to try, and she took her phone from her purse. His caretaker, Eunice, answered, and after giving Miranda a brief update, she handed over the phone. “Nate, it’s your daughter,” Eunice was saying in the background. “Your daughter, Miranda—you remember?”

  “Miranda?” her father said uncertainly. “Do I know you?”

  “Of course you know me, Dad.” She closed her eyes, just for a second, as if her sorrow were a visible thing she deliberately chose not to see. “I’m your daughter. Your girl.”

  “There are no girls here. No girls.” His voice quavered. “I like girls—little girls, big girls. Girls are very, very nice. I think I used to have a girl once. What happened to her?” Now he sounded ready to cry.

  “Dad! You still do! I’m that girl—it’s me, Miranda.”

  “You’re not a girl,” he chided. “No, no, no. And Miranda—that’s not a girl’s name. I would have called a girl Rosie or Posy. Maybe Polly. But never Miranda.”

  There was a silence during which Miranda swiped at her tear-filled eyes. She had come to the mini-freeway that was Canal Street and did not answer until she’d crossed safely to the other side. But when she attempted to prod her father’s ruined memory again, it was Eunice who replied. “He’s having a bad day.”

  “I can tell.”

  “Some days he knows your name and everything. He remembers where you live and when you’re coming to visit.”

  “But not today.”

  “Not today,” Eunice said. “Why don’t you try again tomorrow?”

  “I will.” She put the phone back in her purse and descended the stairs to the subway station. While on the train, Miranda took unsentimental stock of her life: eight years at a good job and a recent promotion, a nice apartment, money from both her salary and a small inheritance from her grandmother, a father sinking deeper into the oblivion of his disease. Good friends, no boyfriend, and apart from a date with a man she’d never actually met, none on the horizon either.

  She had not been thinking about having a child when she first happened on the abandoned baby on the platform. But once she’d seen her, held her, everything changed. The very act of finding her seemed significant, so by extension, all the events leading up to it—falling asleep and missing her stop, waking up in that particular station, passing by that spot at exactly that moment—glowed with significance too. She’d found a baby. How not to believe that in some way that baby was meant—even fated—for her?

  But was she equal to the job? Growing up, Miranda had not been especially close to her own mother. Her strongest bond had been with her father. Then she’d gone through that typical rebellious phase in her teen years, and before she’d ever had a chance to circle back and know or understand her in any more adult way, her mother had gotten sick. And died. Yet these last few weeks had opened new possibilities, new horizons. Maybe she did have it in her to do it all differently, to form the kind of attachment that she had longed for in her own childhood. At the very least, she wanted to try.

  Suddenly she felt energized and, when she reached the Domestic Goddess office on West Fourteenth Street, Miranda bypassed the elevator and took the stairs to the fifth floor. She wasn’t even winded when she arrived. No, she was pumped, primed, and ready for the biggest challenge she’d ever faced. She’d sleep on it, of course. And then if she felt like this—so certain, so committed, so excited—tomorrow, she would contact Judge Waxman to tell her the answer was yes.

  THREE

  Bea and Lauren showed up the following Sunday morning to help her prepare for the upcoming inspection from Child Welfare Services. Bea was organized and unsentimental, ruthlessly jettisoning yellowed plastic containers, wire hangers, and the broken sewing machine Miranda had lugged in from the street a decade ago and never had fixed. Lauren, by virtue of the fact that she had kids, could be counted on to spot hazards that posed a threat to child safety. Courtney was ring shopping with the insufferable Harris but said she would try to stop by later. As Miranda had intuited, she was the only one who seemed less than enthusiastic about the plan. Miranda brushed her concerns away; Bea and Lauren were right there with her.

  By the end of the day, Miranda’s sunny top-floor apartment was in peak condition. Unworn clothes were bagged and prepped for the Goodwill truck, and weeded-out books for the library. Clutter and old papers had been tossed, filed, or recycled. And the place was squeaky clean, from top to bottom, inside and out. When Miranda had tried to shove some of her knitting supplies into a closet—everyone at Domestic Goddess, even Martin, had taken a knitting pledge—Bea had nixed the idea. “They’re going to look in the closets,” she said. “And in the medicine chest, kitchen cabinets—everywhere.”

  “
Does that mean I have to give up knitting?” Miranda said. She had hardly gotten started.

  “No. We just have to turn your stuff”—she gestured to the skeins of yarn—“into decor.” To that end, she repurposed a basket Miranda had been planning to dump and artfully arranged the yarn into a display of pleasing textures and colors. The needles she gave to Miranda. “High up for these. Top shelf.”

  “But it makes more sense to keep them with the yarn.”

  “Are you kidding?” Lauren said. “She’s right—knitting needles could be lethal weapons. Get them out of sight. Now.”

  Miranda meekly complied. Then she ordered pizza and opened a bottle of wine while they waited for it to arrive. Glass in hand, she looked around at her reconfigured apartment. The desk had been moved into the living room; she’d been persuaded to part with a poorly made bookcase, as well as many of the books in it, to make more room. “But not these; these are special.” Miranda stood protectively in front of a pile she’d saved from the discards.

  “They look like kids’ books anyway,” said Lauren.

  “They are.” Miranda picked up a copy of The Poky Little Puppy, which had been published in 1942. “They’re all old, though. Some were mine when I was little; my mother had saved them. After she died, I couldn’t bring myself to get rid of them. And when I’d see an old book I liked at a sale or a flea market, I’d buy it. I didn’t really think of it as collecting until about five years in.”

  Lauren knelt in front of the pile. “Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland. The Velveteen Rabbit. A Child’s Book of Fairy Tales—look at these illustrations; they’re wonderful.”

  “Those are by Arthur Rackham. He’s one of my favorites.”

  “You’ll have such fun reading these together.” Bea was looking at Noël for Jeanne-Marie; one of the central characters was a sheep named Patapon. “She’ll have a ready-made library when she gets here.”

  “You mean if she gets here.” Miranda sneezed; some of those books hadn’t been touched in a long while and were dusty. “It’s not a sure thing yet.” She reached for a cloth and dusted off Joan Walsh Anglund’s A Child’s Year. This was one of the books she had owned and loved; her name, written in red crayon, was still on the inside cover. Maybe there would be another name added to this book one day—the name of the little girl she hoped would come to live with her.