Checking in, I hand over my personal items before being buzzed inside another room. There, I’m patted down after walking through a metal detector. I wait some more. Finally, my name is called and I follow a uniformed officer back to a room with rows of metal seats. Each is bolted to the floor and facing a wall, the top half framed in glass. I take a seat and nerves take over. My knee bounces and I tap my finger on the side of my pant leg, calming my racing pulse.
A few minutes go by and there’s movement from the other side of the glass. The abrasive slam of metal doors as they open and close causes me to jump. My eyes find Emily’s. She’s so much the same and totally different from the memory in my mind. Her dark hair is pulled back into a tight low ponytail, and her features are hard. She’s still beautiful, but there’s an edge to her walk, and for the first time since being approved for visitation, I wonder if she’ll refuse to help me.
The officer leading her to the cubicle waits for Emily to sit and then heads back out to the corridor they came from.
Emily doesn’t drop her gaze the entire time, and neither do I.
Anger surges in my chest as her chin juts up in defiance. I reach for the phone, and wait for her to do the same.
“Hey,” she says. Not, How’s our son? Or, Are you okay? No I’m sorry for messing up or, Thank you for doing the right thing when you could have walked away. Maybe I don’t need to hear those words, though. Her recognition or validation doesn’t change who I am or how much I love David. Still. Her lack of empathy hurts on behalf of our child.
I should probably ask how she is, but I don’t. We only have a few minutes, so I get to the point. “I have some questions.” I clear my throat. “If you could answer them honestly, it would be a big help.”
“Isaac.” My name is pained on her tongue.
“I need some answers.”
“Isaac,” she says again, this time dropping whatever front she walked in with. Her eyes are full of so much torment, it’s difficult to hold her stare. “I’m sorry, okay? I never should have kept him from you. I really messed up. I messed up with a lot of things.”
“I’m not here for that.” I swallow back the urge to be angry. It’s a wasted emotion. What’s done is done. It only matters how we move forward. “I have some questions.” I unfold the paper in my hands. The one I cleared with the guards before coming in. I made a list so I wouldn’t forget, and so I’d never have to come back. “They’re about David, when he was little.”
“Okay.”
“How was he as a baby?” I swallow hard. “Did he smile a lot?”
“What is this about?” Her gaze narrows. “You already have full custody. What are you trying to pull?”
“Nothing. Damn it, Emily.” I curl my hands into a fist, crushing the paper. “I missed everything. All of those moments. You can at least fill me in.”
She shrinks back, almost as if she feels guilty, and I wonder if she does. I can’t imagine there’s much to do inside these walls but think. A long moment passes before she speaks. “He was a good baby. Of course, he smiled.” Her gaze settles on the floor. “I wasn’t a good mother, or person, after he was born. Something—it changed inside me and I didn’t love him like I should. The entire pregnancy I was good, you know? I was going to raise him on my own. Do the right thing, but it was so hard. I don’t expect you to understand. But I resented him. For the future he took from me. For always needing me. I wasn’t right in the head.”
Postpartum depression. I don’t say it aloud, but it’s something my tía went through with her youngest. I wonder if that affected Emily, or if she’s making excuses. Either way, my anger toward her dampens and I see her for exactly who she is. A human, flawed and paying the price for her transgressions.
“I met Jake and started hanging with his crew. They made me feel young and wanted again. Important. It helped me forget, and the drugs helped too.”
“You took David there?” I can’t mask the bitterness in my tone. My baby boy, at some drug dealer’s house? Jesus. No wonder CPS took him after her arrest.
She shakes her head. “I left him with friends a lot. Anyway, I’m not using anymore.”
I hope she doesn’t expect— “I won’t bring him here. I won’t give up custody, either. Not when you get out.”
“Lucky for you, I got ten to twenty.” She tries for a smile but it falls short. “Is he okay?”
I think of the night terrors. Of everything he might have witnessed. Of how resilient and strong he is in spite of it. “He’s good. The best.” I consider telling her about his autism diagnosis, but decide against it. She has to serve her sentence and make things right in her life. To win my trust before she’s earned the right to those details.
“I’m glad he’s yours. Take care of my baby, okay? You’ll give him what I never could.”
“Yeah.” And I will. I open my mouth to ask more questions. About his milestones and toddler years, but a loud buzz sounds from across the glass. The metal door opens and the guard comes to take Emily away. She lifts her hand in one single wave, then turns her back.
Today is a lot to process and I’m conflicted about how I feel. I don’t want to feel sorry for Emily. I didn’t expect to. I walk outside with answers, but most aren’t to the questions listed on my paper. After everything she did, I can’t imagine facing down a future like hers. I will never forgive her for keeping my son from me, but now I have a better understanding of how it happened.
Forty-Eight
Cora
I head down to San Diego to spend a few days with my sister and mom. It’s been years since I visited for more than a day, and I’m using this time to reconnect with the two women I love most in the world. That and I’m totally avoiding Isaac.
It’s not mature. Or even enjoyable. I just can’t be around him while I debate my next move. If I think about him and David, all I want to do is stay. But throwing away a career I’ve spent years chasing seems stupid. Reckless, even. I swore I’d never be a woman who gives up everything for a man, but for the first time, I’m tempted.
My mom and I are finishing up dinner at her condo after spending the day at my sister’s place. The takeout is delicious, but I find myself pushing it around my plate with the fork, my restless energy all consuming. Turns out running away from problems doesn’t actually help solve them.
“You don’t like the shrimp?” My mom pushes her container of food toward my plate. “Try the beef. It’s good.”
“It’s not that.” I shake my head and pop a bite of food in my mouth to erase the worry from her frown. I have so many questions. All this stuff with Isaac is dredging up old insecurities. “Did you ever regret it?”
“What’s that?”
“Marrying Dad. Us. Giving up your dreams. Didn’t you want to be a reporter?” I remember her telling me something like that when I was younger.
“Sure, but bookkeeping paid the bills.” She shrugs, her smile growing as if she sees through my muddled questions. “Cora, what’s really on your mind?” Her brows raise and she levels me with one of her stares, the kind that used to make me confess to spilling makeup on the couch or cheating on an algebra test. “I know you didn’t come all the way down here to sleep in my spare room.”