The Mothers A Novel - By Jennifer Gilmore Page 0,89
our profile online. We tried to protect ourselves. Let’s be cautiously optimistic, we’d tell each other over (several) beers in front of the television (this might be our last few weeks of freedom! I mused). We thought, again, that we had been the lucky ones. And then, when the call did not come, or the call that came said we had not been chosen, when we traveled that vast terrain from almost, practically three to merely two, we grieved.
We grieved differently. Ramon railed at the agency for not vetting people, and at me for choosing this place and for screwing up with the mothers. I wept. And then, as he railed, I wept again, for being married to someone who railed instead of being supportive in times of grief. I thought of the men I knew and felt sure they would not behave this way. I thought of Anita, and her care and feeding of all those gorgeous animals.
“This hurts me too,” Ramon said, many times. “It is not just you who wants this.”
And now I see that I knew this was true but I did not care. The loss of these birthmothers was unbearable to me. They were the loss of everything.
But inevitably, after a day of chaos and misery, I got up and went to teach my classes. I met friends for drinks or coffee or dinner. I attended a colleague’s book party, a lecture. I went to a movie or to hear live music. In this way, I moved on.
Until we were fortunate enough to be contacted. And then, well, as my grandmother used to say, it was déjà vu all over again.
_______
It had been several weeks since the Cairo Incident, as we had come to call it, when Ramon and I went to meet several of his cousins who were in New York on business. (Business? I’d asked, and was brushed off.) On the train uptown, I removed Katrina’s flower icon from my phone. As I heard the swishing sound of the deletion, I thought of Katrina’s heart, as big as a cloud, and it seemed to me the bigger the cloud, the more bad weather it could hold.
We were out to dinner at their hotel, an Italian place—why must Italians always eat Italian cuisine when not in Italy? So they can say how terrible it is by comparison? Will they die without a plate of pasta?—when another call came in to the 800 number.
“Hello?” I was breathless, crazy, as I always am when I know it might be a birthmother calling.
Just from that first ring our percentages of becoming parents went from zero to a hundred.
“Hi,” the young woman said. “I’m Heather.”
I went out to the lobby, opening my purse and struggling to get my pen and a pocket-sized Moleskine as I walked. “Hi!” I said.
“I saw you and Ramon online. I’m having twins.” She said all this at once, a torrent of rain. “Are you open to twins?” Heather asked.
Am I open to twins? Not really. We live in a fourth-floor walk-up, for one. But twins, we know, is our only chance for siblings. I had, after all, checked the box for twins on our client profile form.
“Of course we’re open.” I sat down on a bench against the wall of the hotel before a window facing the street. I thought of Carolyn and her forthcoming twins and I imagined us blocking all the nonmothers (suckers!) with our double strollers on our neighborhood sidewalks. “We love twins.”
“Oh,” she breathed out, relieved. “Great.”
I wrote that down. Twins, I wrote. Great. “Thank you for reading our profile. What was it you liked about our letter?” I asked Heather.
“Your education,” she said. “And the way you and your husband spoke about each other. You have a beautiful relationship.”
I snorted, but silently, as I wrote down: Jan. 18, 2011. Heather likes our education and our relationship.
“Thank you, Heather,” I said. “We are fortunate. Can I ask your last name?” Several couples walked in and out of the shining lobby, the women’s heels click-clicking along the floor.
“Sure,” she said, and she told me. I wrote it down. We love to cook! I told her when she asked what we do together. Big meals for our friends and—I coughed—family. And go to museums! And the movies! Also, lest she think we spent our lives inside, I told her, We really love to hike!
“I’m in Westchester with my parents,” she told me. “Well, we’re in Westchester,” she giggled.