Brooke’s decision to become a single mother had shocked me at first, but she says it’s the best thing she ever did, and knowing Lily, I have to agree. But then, Brooke has always known her own mind and been fearless about pursuing what she wants. She’s my role model that way. She’s just a couple of years older than me, but she’s always seemed a lot further ahead in life.
We met eighteen years ago at Louisiana State University when we sat beside each other in a beginning interior design course. Brooke was a computer science junior taking the class as an elective; I was an interior design freshman having trouble loading the design software on my computer. She offered to do it for me, and I, in turn, offered to help her decorate her student apartment on a shoestring budget.
We hit it off right away. We shared the same sense of humor, weliked the same novels and movies, and we were both passionate about our fields of study. We both have dark blond hair and we’re both medium height and build, so we’re often asked if we’re sisters.
“Yes,” we always reply, usually in chorus.
“We’re compensation sisters,” Brooke once said.
“What?” I asked.
“We’re each other’s compensation for losing our families.”
It’s another thing we have in common. Brooke lost both parents and her little brother in a deadly car accident when she was twelve. I lost my family when my parents divorced and I became the extra baggage in their new relationships and lifestyles.
I think Brooke’s loss is greater because it was so final, but she thinks mine is worse because it wasn’t. Sometimes I think she’s right; she, at least, always felt wanted.
Thinking about this makes my chest grow tight as I walk down the hall toward the stairs. I recall another piece of self-help instruction:Don’t allow negative thoughts to control your feelings.When you become aware of them, breathe deeply, pick a focal point, and concentrate on the present moment.
I draw in a long breath and focus my attention on the photos grouped on the wall above the staircase wainscoting. A picture of Brooke and me dressed up as bumblebees for a Halloween party at my first apartment in Atlanta makes me smile. After college, I went to work at a high-end design firm there, and Brooke went to work for an international conglomerate in New York. We stayed in close touch despite the distance, visiting each other a couple of times a year and spending the holidays together in Louisiana at her grandmother’s house in Alexandria.
I move another step down the stairs and look at a photo of Brooke’s silver-haired grandmother sitting in her front porch swing. Miss Margaret is a remarkably spry and fit septuagenarian who raised Brooke after her family’s tragic accident. She’s a true Southern lady, genteel and gracious and unfailingly polite—although from time to time, she can come out with an old-fashioned sayingthat will, as she puts it, “starch your shorts.” In the next photo, she’s holding two-year-old Lily on a carousel horse at New Orleans City Park, glowing with great-grandmotherly pride.
I descend two more steps and gaze at a photo of Brooke cuddling newborn Lily, her face shining with such love it looks like she’s sprinkled with fairy dust. I reach out and softly touch the gilt frame, wishing some of that joy would rub off. Like me, Brooke dreamed of having not only a career, but a husband and a family. Like me, she’d had a couple of serious relationships, then hit her thirties without meeting the man of her dreams. Unlike me, however, she’d had the added complication of severe endometriosis.
When Brooke was thirty-three, she learned that endometrial tissue was scarring her ovaries and uterus. “If you want to have a baby, you’d better do it soon,” her doctor had told her.
Just like that, she decided to become a single mother. And then, with her typical hyperefficiency, she created a plan and put it into action.
This is where Brooke and I are not alike—not at all. It takes me a long time to make major decisions. When I have to decide something, I’ll waffle back and forth, weighing advantages and disadvantages, reevaluating and second-guessing and stalling. Brooke minored in psychology and says I don’t really trust myself because I couldn’t trust my parents.
I suppose this is true, because I tend to look for signs. I want confirmation that something beyond my own hopefulness is informing my choices. I believe that coincidences are miracles where God chooses to remain anonymous, so I look for a coincidence—a song playing on the radio, two people mentioning the same topic, winning two consecutive games of solitaire... or getting goose bumps. I put a lot of weight on goose bumps. If I get goosy and I’m not cold, I take it as a sign.
I don’t tell many people about this, because I know it sounds idiotic. Brooke is the only person who seems to understand, and even she will tease me about it. “What’s the goose bump factor?” sheasked last week when I couldn’t decide between shrimp or chicken on my salad.
I’m getting better at trusting myself, though. A couple of years ago, I moved to New Orleans and started my own business. That was an uncharacteristically bold move—especially opening a retail home-furnishings shop, Verve!, to drive my design business. It’s turned out to be one of the best decisions of my life; I love New Orleans, I love being close to Brooke and Lily, and my business is booming. In fact, I’m giving more and more design responsibilities to my assistant, I’m trying to hire an additional part-time manager for the store, and I often have to work nights to get everything done.
Tonight is one of those evenings. I head to the kitchen, open my laptop, and settle at the kitchen table to plot out the furniture placement of a master bedroom for a client I’m meeting with tomorrow morning.
I’m engrossed in the project when a sharp rap sounds on the front door. Ruffles barks. I glance at the time on my computer screen. It’s nine thirty-seven—too late for social calls or most deliveries. My instinct is to ignore it and hope that whoever is there will go away. To my consternation, the knock sounds again, louder this time. Ruffles barks again. I rise from the chair and scoop up the little dog, hushing her.
The lights outside are on and the living room lights are off, so I step to the window and peek through the blinds. I don’t know whether to feel alarmed or reassured that a police car is parked by the curb.
The door knocker clunks, thunderous brass against brass, and Ruffles once more sounds off. I’m afraid the racket will wake Lily, so I go to the door and peer out the sidelight.
Two police officers in full uniform stand on the porch. I flip on the light to the foyer and crack the door, keeping the chain on.
“Yes?”
“Good evening, ma’am. Is this the residence of Brooke Adams?” asks the taller officer.
Alarm crawls up my spine. “Yes, but she’s not here.”
“Are you a relative?”
“I’m a good friend staying with her daughter.”
“May we come in?” asks the shorter officer, an older man with gray eyebrows. His hat sits further back on his head, and I can see that his eyes behind his wire-rimmed glasses are kind.
