During my story, Opal falls asleep with my nipple still in her mouth. I let her stay there, suckling, gently gnawing, cracking my nipple and guaranteeing the next feeding will be more uncomfortable. I want her latched to me. It gives me the strength to tell Barb the parts that scare me, the details that can still change everything between us.
“There’s something else.” My pulse pounds as I hold Opal’s small body against my bare chest, wanting her to give me strength. But I’m too exposed. I don’t know how to be this vulnerable. Barb stiffens with worry. She has no reason to hope. “I know why Jasper recognized Regina.”
Barb’s face remains stoic as she processes what I’m telling her, her connection to my son.
“You should know—” My voice is surprisingly calm. It betrays the anxiety electrifying my system. “Regina never signed paperwork. There’s no proof that she forfeited her rights to Jasper. Legally speaking.”
I hold my breath in anticipation of how she’ll respond as I clutch Opal, who emits gastric sounds too loud for such a tiny human. Despite the tension, Barb and I laugh. It feels good to laugh, even though it hurts, too, physically as well as emotionally.
“He has her eyes,” Barb says once our laughter fades. “I always thought there was something familiar about his eyes.”
Barb’s attention glazes over, shifting inward. Her eyes are Regina’s eyes too.
“She never wanted to be a mom. I’m not sure what attachment she developed to your son, but she never would have tried to take him from you.” And I hear what she doesn’t need to say: Barb would never try to take him from me either.
Relief courses through me, a cool rush of calm.
Barb stares intently at me. “We need to go to the police. Officer Gonzales can’t ignore this.”
“Gonzales will just think I’m a jilted wife with an axe to grind against my husband. We need someone else to come forward with DNA proof. One of the other mothers.”
I hand Opal to Barb as I use my arms to pull myself up and stiffly waddle over to the bassinet. Barb puts Opal down so I can change her. Naked, she’s all wrinkled limbs, not quite ready for this world. Each day, her skin will grow a little less pruned, her eyes a little more open, her body more nourished. Still, it will be my job to protect her.
I slip a diaper beneath Opal. “I’ll start with the ones I know, keep calling until someone agrees to help us.”
“You think they’ll be open to this? It’s a lot to absorb.” Again, I hear what she doesn’t say. It’s a lot for her to absorb too. She hasn’t yet processed what I’ve told her. Still, I know she won’t take Jasper from me. I trust that conviction, the bond it’s built upon.
“I can’t keep it a secret.” And I hope she hears the words I don’t say, too, that I would never, could never have kept this from her. That’s not how this will work between us. Not with the other mothers either. Maybe some of them will hate me for it. Maybe they’ll write me off as crazy, at least until the news breaks. And it will break. Whether it’s in a year or in ten, one of the children will take a DNA test. If the mothers find out I knew ... if I keep this hidden ... then I’m no better than Gabe.
I swaddle Opal, tugging the cotton so tight I’d worry I was suffocating her if I didn’t know this is what infants like. I’ve done this before. I know I won’t harm her by binding her snugly. I know her ragged breath is just the natural rhythm of a baby’s respiration. I know that the black-tar poop in her diaper is normal, that when it becomes green it will be normal too. I have so much wisdom inside me to trust. Most of all, I know to not let anyone make me doubt myself, my instincts, again.
“I don’t think you should go back to your house,” Barb says.
During flood watches, wildfires, evacuation orders, I’ve never understood why people refuse to leave their homes. I thought Gabe was my home. I thought we sheltered each other. But Gabe’s been the worst kind of threat, the one I couldn’t see until it was too late. Even now, as I look back for signs I missed, I don’t feel there were any. I thought the house was the illusion, new disguised as old, when it had always been Gabe who was the lie. The anger starts to rise again, a prickling in my chest that wants to unleash, and sometimes that kind of fury is a force to reckon with. Right now, though, it won’t help us. I don’t know what will. I just know that I’m tired and I want to be with my children in the only place that has ever felt like home. That’s not Gabe. It’s the house itself. It was Gabe’s dream, but it’s become my harbor.
“I don’t want to go anywhere else.” I shuffle to the bed. Although I’m ready to be strong, my body craves a rest. Anywhere we go, I’ll still be waiting for the murderer to find us. At least at home, I know the dangers, the systems to keep us secure. I settle onto the firm mattress.
“I’m staying with you.” Barb doesn’t hesitate. She isn’t conflicted. It’s natural, her maternal instinct to protect me as well as my children. It’s foreign for me to accept it. I will try. Because I don’t need to keep us safe alone. We will. Me and Barb.
There are things Gabe can’t take away from me. He can’t take away the pleasure of my daughter at my breast, the sensation of being woken by her cries and remembering she’s here. He can’t take away the firsttime she curls her fingers around mine. The first time she sneezes. The first time she yawns. He can’t take away the first time my son meets my daughter.
Jasper appears in the doorway, hugging a stuffed giraffe to his chest. When a hand nudges him into the room, I expect to see Marisol inch in behind him. The plan was for Marisol to bring him to meet Opal; then the four of us would return home. If Marisol thought it strange that she was bringing Jasp instead of Gabe, she didn’t convey it over the phone. She simply repeated the time and promised to bring my son.
Only, it’s not Marisol stepping into the room after Jasper. It’s Claire. I can’t hide my surprise at the sight of her. Jasper scans the room, trying to make sense of this place, until he spots me. Right away my chest swells. Jasper. My Jasper. My son.
“Mama.” He lets go of Claire and runs to me, abandoning the giraffe mid-trot. He charges into me, resting his head against my leg. If I could bend down to lift him, I would, staples and stitches be damned. My abdomen still isn’t strong enough. So I cling to him, feeling the burn through my incision.
Opal squawks, and Jasper perks up, confused. I wasn’t sure how much he’s understood, and I’m still not, even as he stumbles toward her bassinet.
“Jasper, that’s your sister, Opal,” I say. He reaches up and bangs on the plastic, tempting me to tell him to be gentle. The bin doesn’t even shudder with his touch. I use the remote to push my bed up so I can stand. Jasper gets distracted by the sounds and movement of the mechanical bed and tries to touch the buttons.
“Bun. Bun,” he says, pressing the remote too softly to move the bed, Opal already lost to him. I wanted their first meeting to be monumental. This is better, though. More honest than the tender scene I envisioned.
Claire remains at the door.
“Thanks, Claire. Thanks for coming to get us.” She brought Jasper. It’s an opening, a crack, however small. “Thanks for bringing my son.”
My son. My son.I think it again and again, fortifying it each time.My son. My son. My daughter. My children.
