Her Name Is Rose

by Christine Breen

  There had been a spark, Iris admitted, but today it was too weak to ignite. Today she felt only shame and sadness.

  What was she anyway? The collector of lost and dead souls? No. She wasn’t going to feel sorry for Hector. Julia was years ago, she thought. He should be over it by now. Isn’t that what people said? The first two years are the hardest? For her it’d been, what? Two years and two weeks and a day since Luke died. No. Absolutely not. She wasn’t going to feel sorry for him.

  But she did. She did feel sorry for him. Maybe he, too, had lost his soul mate. And for a fleeting moment she opened her heart to allow in his sadness.

  She looked into the corner of the garden where the sunlight had widened its netlike cast against the redbrick wall, catching every other leaf and flower bud in a dazzling glare, and now the tiny back garden glowed.

  * * *

  In midafternoon at Logan Airport, standing at the check-in counter, Grace hugged Iris and whispered, “Hector will be sorry you left without saying good-bye. What should I tell him?”

  “Good-bye.”

  “Good-bye?”

  Iris nodded.

  “That’s it? Nothing more?” Grace said.

  “I can’t, Grace. I’m not ready.” Iris gathered her bag and shoulder bag. “Maybe…?”

  “Maybe? Maybe what?”

  Iris’s eyes welled up.

  “Okay. Okay. It’s all right. I know what to tell him.” Grace reached her arms around Iris and held her for a moment. Iris let herself be held but had no strength to hold back. “Let me know how the appointment turns out. I’ll be anxious to know. Right?” Grace dropped her arms and took a step back. “In such a short time I feel like I know you. Will you come back? Will you bring Rose?”

  Iris couldn’t speak. To speak would bring tears.

  * * *

  After she was through security, and her face washed of tears, she looked around for an Internet station and checked her e-mails. One from Tess and garden.ie and Higgledygarden.co.uk and three with unfamiliar addresses. She read Tess’s first, which told her Rose was doing well since her “big upset.”

  Hurry up already and get home Iris! We miss you. And PS … What the hell? What are you doing? Missing your appointment? And PPS … no need to worry about Rosie. Take my word for it.

  Iris wrote back that she was coming home on Flight EI345, arriving at 6:00 a.m., and would explain everything then. But not to tell Rose. And P.S., what did you mean, Take my word for it?

  The e-mail from an R.E.B. surprised her. She hadn’t expected e-mails from blog readers so soon.

  Dear Ms. Bowen,

  I’m glad to have discovered your blog. As a landscape architect myself in the heart of NYC, your post on poppies brought a little green into my life.

  Kindest regards,

  R.E.B.

  Delighted, she read the other two. One asked if Iris had ever tried to grow meconopsis. It’s like having a bit of the blue sky in your border. And the other was a city gardener asking: Can Icelandic poppies be grown in a window box? Such simple signposts, tokens, and yet it thrilled her. She was connected. Blog readers were a link to the world. She’d reply to them all next week and would copy her replies to Arthur Simmons.

  A few hours later, she was sitting in an aisle seat in row 37 at the back of the plane near the toilets. When the beverage cart came, she ordered a gin and tonic and two of those plastic quarter bottles of wine to go with her chicken dinner. Her mind pitched back to the South End. Grace would be telling Hector that Iris had been recalled to the Breast Clinic for further tests. She pictured how his face would look. She was suddenly sorry for him. She felt like crying.

  * * *

  The next thing she knew a voice was saying, “The captain has switched on the seat belt sign. We’ll be landing in fifteen minutes. The weather in Shannon on this lovely June morning is blustery but the forecast is for sunny spells.” Iris looked out onto the clouds scattered across the blue and, below, a little green.

  She switched on her phone at the luggage carousel; half a dozen messages beeped their arrival.

  From Tess:

  Welcome Back!!! Can’t b there 2 collect u. Sorry pet. Sendin taxi tho. C u later. x T ps Rose away at music event in London. WITH friend! As promised, didn’t tell her u were comin. She’ll b back in a few days.

  A man holding a placard with her name on it smiled as she approached and he took her bag and said, “Welcome home.”

  The captain’s weather report had been right, there were sunny spells. The sun beamed down on everything, on cattle in the fields, on hawthorn hedgerows, on fuchsia in full bloom. She fell quiet, grateful the driver sensed she didn’t want to talk. A little more than half an hour later she arrived home. When she stepped from the taxi, Cicero jumped from the rooftop of the low cabin. He didn’t seem to particularly notice she’d been gone five whole days. He gave her no welcome except to jump onto the table where the food was kept. Iris put down her bag and waited until the driver pulled away.

  Neither did the garden look like it had missed her. It was in perfect order. Did anyone or anything need her?

  Getting used to this being alone required a skill she still struggled to perfect. It was on the far side of the road, as if always just over there—the place she couldn’t get to, couldn’t reach. She had traveled some distance from the initial grief-pain of Luke’s death to where she was now—standing still in her garden, listening to the barn swallows’ chideep chideep—able to somewhat appreciate how far she’d come. This is my life. But she wanted more and it was up to her to get it.

  She’d read a novel lately about a man whose wife comes back from the dead. She pops into his life in odd moments, then disappears. Something about unfinished business. One day she came and said, “It wasn’t up to you to make my life happy. It was up to me, but your loving helped.” Then poof! She was gone and returned no more.

  Iris wished Luke would appear and tell her something. Tell her how to do it. Without his loving, living was the greatest challenge of her life.

  She turned the key and went in.

  In the kitchen, the poppies had been cleared away. In their place were two empty mugs.

  * * *

  Tess arrived in the late afternoon and, after hugging Iris a few times, walking around her in a circle and hugging her again, she said, “Poor pet.” She stood back and grabbed Iris by her shoulders.

  “You ran off to Boston and missed the appointment.”

  “I know.”

  Tess shook her head, but smiled. “Here. Where’s the phone? I’ll ring and reschedule.”

  “I’ve made it for Thursday morning.” Iris paused a moment. “Will you come with me?”

  “Of course … but what about Rose?”

  “I don’t know, Tess. She already has enough on her plate.”

  “I’ll say,” Tess said.

  It was an odd thing, but Iris didn’t read into it. “Plus,” Iris said, “I don’t know what her plans are. She’s probably still upset about that wretched master class.”

  “Oh … I think she’s over that.”

  Iris narrowed her eyes.

  “You underestimate her—” Tess said.

  “Tess?”

  “I just mean, she’s more flexible than you realize. Do you think maybe, just maybe, you’re overprotective? Just a little? Just a teensy little bit? It’s only natural, but—”

  “Would you like some tea, Dr. Tess, Medicine Woman?” Iris turned and went to the kitchen. Tess smiled and followed.

  “So?”

  “So?”

  “Yes … So? Why did you disappear without a word? To America?”

  Iris didn’t look up but poured the tea.

  “Exciting undercover garden assignment?”

  Iris looked at Tess, her eyes betraying her and welling up.

  “Oh God. What? Iris? What’s wrong?”

  When Iris finally told her story, the words burst like a sudden rain shower. “I made a promise to Luke. If anything
happened to me I’d find Rose’s birth mother. I promised Luke. What if something bad happens? That’s why I went to Dublin. Then Boston. She was there, but—”

  “She was there?”

  “Yes. No … I mean she was there, but she’s not. She’s dead.”

  “Easy, pet. Hold on.”

  Iris explained about Hilary and how she’d taken the envelope at the Adoption Board and two days later flown to Boston. She told about 99 St. Botolph Street and the waiter. And the Mapparium. And Becket. “It was all for nothing. A big, fat, horrible, stupid mistake.”

  “Ohhhhh, Iris.” Tess put her arms around her.

  “I never told you, but Luke and I met her. It was a long time ago … I’m sorry she’s dead.” Iris paused. “Tess, she was the real mother of my child.” Iris pulled away and shook herself, circling the island as if to shed the whole blooming thing, like it was something she could shake off and down, like autumn leaves stubbornly holding on to a tree.

  “Stop. Iris! Don’t say that. You’re her—”

  “If it wasn’t so sad, it’d be funny.” Iris raised her hands and held her head, pressing against her temples. “It’s so weird to feel sad for someone you never knew.” She took her long hair and twisted it around and around and fashioned it into a bun at the back of her head. At the sink she turned on the tap and splashed her face. Take control. Now. With her hands on the edge of the sink she looked out the window. The blue clematis was still flowering.

  Tess was at her side and handing her a kitchen towel. “It’s all right, Iris. It’ll be all right. You’ll see. I promise.”

  Then Iris told about Grace and the odd guesthouse in the South End—“it was rather unconventional”—and she laughed a moment, and about the concert at Titus Sparrow Park, and the Berkshire Mountains.

  She left out the part about Hector.

  “I’m sorry you’ve been through all this on your own.”

  “It’s just, I’m frightened, Tess. Frightened of the future. Of death. For Rose. You know?”

  They drank tea quietly, listening as a tractor passed below the garden along the road. Iris wasn’t ready to tell any more. Cicero appeared and jumped onto the table. Iris picked him up and settled him on her lap. She knew Tess was looking at her, so she returned her gaze.

  “So what about you? What’s been going on? How are the boys? Sean?” She half listened as Tess gave a rundown of everybody’s activities. Boys were done with soccer camp. (A great success.) She’d been at a conference on abused women. (The statistics are alarming.) And Sean was busy planning. (The music festival.) “Oh, that reminds me, Iris … Sean’s wondering if you could help out, again?”

  “Um, maybe. Sure. Remind me when it is?”

  “This weekend.”

  “This weekend? Oh. Right.” She’d forgotten about it. The annual midsummer music festival. “What does he want me to do?”

  “You know. Your usual. Some flowers. But … maybe…” Tess frowned. “Forget it. What am I thinking? Listen. Never mind … you—” Tess took Iris’s hand, making Cicero jump. “Let’s wait and see what we find out at the clinic.”

  * * *

  Rose had left her mother a note telling her that she was sooooo looking forward to seeing her. And how crazy it was that Iris had disappeared off to America—of all places—and without me! Rose wrote she was gone to London because there was something she needed to take care of. Not to worry. And finally, that she’d gone with a friend. A new friend, and she would be home Thursday afternoon. And P.S. Mum … you’re going to be all right.

  Tess came at half seven on Thursday morning to take Iris down to the Limerick Regional Hospital. They came in along the corridor and Iris saw the sign for Oncology and felt a sudden chill; it was where Luke had got his diagnosis. Tess took hold of her arm. “Come on, pet.” They had arrived in plenty of time for the nine o’clock appointment, but still had to wait, which neither minded because they knew some of the women were exiting having been told I’m afraid it’s not good news.

  In the Breast Clinic ward they sat on hard, plastic chairs set out in rows in a waiting room in the public area. Tess quietly guided Iris in a breathing exercise, but she was unable to settle down. Her heart had a mind of its own and she couldn’t stop herself from fearing the worst-case scenario. She might as well have been speaking her thoughts aloud because Tess turned to her and said, “Stop it Iris. Stop thinking ahead. We’ll deal with it, whatever it is.”

  “Of course. I know. You’re right. Plenty of women recover from breast cancer.”

  “Yes. They do. A very high percentage. I know it’s because you lost Luke. And you’re afraid of the word. Cancer. Say it out loud, Iris. Cancer. If there’s cancer we’ll beat it.”

  “Mrs. Bowen? Iris Bowen?”

  Iris started. She rose and walked a step away and turned back and held out her hand. “Please come in with me.”

  “I don’t know, Iris,” Tess whispered. “They probably won’t let me.”

  “Tell them you’re a nurse. Please.”

  Iris was shown into a small anterior office with a sliding curtain and an examination table and two chairs. And standing just inside the door was L with the magenta hair.

  “Oh. It’s you,” Iris said. She’d caught the woman by surprise.

  “Yes, it’s me. I work Monday and Tuesdays in Ennis. Wednesday and Thursdays here.”

  “Nice to see you again. Can my friend come in with me?”

  “I’m afraid not, Mrs. Bowen. She has to wait outside. It won’t be long.”

  “Please! She’s a nurse, aren’t you, Tess?”

  Tess reached for Iris’s hand in solidarity. “It’ll be all right, pet. Really. I’m sure. I’ll be right here.”

  “Well, I’m not supposed to, but you know what? Go for it. You can stay,” L said to Tess, “but she has to go in to see the consultant on her own. Mrs. Bowen, if you’d take your top off and your bra and put this on.” She handed Iris the familiar blue paper cape. “I’ll be back to take you in for an ultrasound. Just a few minutes.”

  When L left the room, Tess raised her eyebrows. “Now, there’s a free-looking spirit. That hair. And the nose ring.” Iris nodded, undistracted, turned around and duly undressed and covered up in the paper cape. Then she paced the room. Back and forth, left and right. “It’s not me I’m concerned about, you know.”

  “I know.” Tess kept her eyes steadily on Iris. “It’s probably not the right time, and, please forgive me, but—”

  “I know what you’re going to say.”

  “Do you?” Tess put a hand on Iris’s back and made little circles like she was easing an ache. “Rose will be all right. She will be able to take care of herself. She has her own life to live, too.”

  “But…”

  “You can’t prepare for every eventuality.”

  “She’d have no family—”

  “Maybe…” Tess looked at the floor, acknowledging the real possibility of something happening to her friend. She looked into Iris’s eyes. “But I’d be there for her … and, eventually, she’d make a family of her own.”

  “You don’t understand. Rose is my life’s work. I can’t … leave … unfinished. I feel responsible in a way that you don’t understand. You can’t understand. I’ve disturbed the natural order of things.”

  “That’s crazy.”

  “I’m not her real mother.”

  “Iris!”

  Iris resumed pacing. “Have you read the definition of ‘mother’? I have. I know it by heart: ‘A woman in relation to a child or children to whom she has given birth.’ Why do you think they call birth parents the ‘natural parents’?” Iris’s face was flushed. She lifted her hair away from her neck. The crepe paper cape made her feel hot and cold at the same time. She had never spoken like this. Not to Tess, anyway. Not to anyone. No one except Luke ever knew how Iris felt about being an adoptive mother. She carried on like normal but in her deepest self, she knew she was not like anyone else. Every other mother she knew
was natural. She believed sometimes she was an imposter. It wasn’t organic. She’d missed out on some essential hormone or something that comes with being pregnant. Some blueprint that gets downloaded to your hard drive. An invisible guidebook. Then you know without having to ask when to hold on and when to let go. It’s a natural process. You just have to show up and do the right thing. She’d been showing up and doing the right thing all her life. But as an adoptive mother she had to go beyond that and yet she was missing the essential element—the how-to manual. She did her best to leave no stone unturned and had taken her responsibility as a parent as a matter of life and death.

  Tess was stunned. Her eyes glossed. She was usually quick to respond but not now; now she was speechless. Iris was grateful her friend didn’t rush in to fill the silence with platitudes. She’d heard so many of them down through the years. “You’re so lucky you didn’t have to go through morning sickness!” Or, “You didn’t have to go through the pain of childbirth—you don’t know how lucky you are!” To all such comments from well-meaning mothers, Iris simply and slowly nodded.

  There were tears in Tess’s eyes when she finally spoke. “Iris Bowen, you’re the most natural mother I know.”

  Just then L had returned. “This way, Mrs. Bowen. Please follow me.” The nurse held the door open. “I think you’ll be fine, Mrs. Bowen. Really. And,” she smiled, “it’s nice to see you again, too.”

  A different nurse helped her up onto the examination bed and checked her name and birth date and the file. She patted Iris on the arm. The door opened and a woman dressed in heels and a dark skirt and white coat walked in.

  “Hello, Mrs. Bowen, I’m Dr. Browne. I’ll be performing the ultrasound.” The nurse prepared Iris’s breast with gel, then stood by Iris’s side and held her hand. The light from the monitor shined on the doctor’s young face. Dr. Browne took the probe and rolled it over Iris’s left breast with one hand. She stopped and clicked with the other on the keyboard. “Don’t be alarmed, Mrs. Bowen, just taking pictures.” She stopped the probe, centering in on what Iris imagined must be the distortion, and clicked some more.