It was wildly expensive—more money than I can still say out loud—but Sylvia gave it to us.
“What’s money for if not this?” she said. And that was that.We still have no idea where it came from, but we know what it’s given us. Everything.
“Babe, did you pick up candles?”
Leo rounds the corner from the living room into the kitchen laden down with bags. Party supplies—barbecue chicken from Bludso’s and a crudités and dip board from Ralphs. OLIPOP sodas and two bottles of red wine. The house is already decorated in streamers and white and blue balloons that Damien keeps trying to pop.
It’s just us, but Leo insisted that our son’s first birthday be an event.
“Counter!” I call. I refill Marcella’s white wine, and she gives me a distracted kiss on the cheek. She’s still got him in her arms.
“My light,” she calls him, and I know that he is. I do not think I’ll ever stop being grateful for the pleasure seeing my mother with my child brings me, especially after this past year, the one where we lost Sylvia.
Sylvia Ingrid Steiner passed away in September, right here at home. She knew it was coming—had known for weeks. I’d always thought she was a little magical like that. More than once I wondered if she hadn’t created our tickets out of thin air, if there had even been a Hinda at all, if Sylvia wasn’t, well, the witch.
We were all there with her, surrounding her bedside as she took her last breath. It was exactly how she wanted it.
“A life bravely lived,” Leo said at the shiva—just us and the neighbors here at the Malibu house. It was true. No regrets.
When she began to decline she reminded me of one thing—she wanted me to know where her ticket was. Hidden in plain sight.
“It’s still yours,” she told me. “For whatever you wish to do with it.”
Unsurprisingly, and much to our relief, Damien was not gifted one at birth. Because he was a boy or because he does not share my exact DNA, we don’t know, but it felt like the breaking of something. It felt like an exhale. We’ve traveled so lightly in these past three years that it’s sometimes hard to remember that we have changed entirely. Things are heavy until they’re not.
“Lauren, have you seen my glasses?”
Dave rounds the corner, and I point to the coffee table. There they are, my father’s glasses, perched on top of an open copy of his next manuscript.
He brings a hand dramatically to his forehead, and I feel, once again, the disbelief wash over me. The unbelievable reality that we are here. That he is, still.
Life does deliver miracles, as a matter of fact. The past three years are evidence of only that. One after another. The ones we chose and the ones that found us.
Dave did the surgery. It was a grueling six months, but much to the doctors’ surprise, it was incredibly successful. His heart isn’t perfect—not by a long shot—but he’s healthy, he’shere, and we try not to focus on thehow longpart. My father knows my son. The rest will be what it will be.
Dad goes to take one of the bags out of Leo’s hand, and Leo swipes it away. “Not a chance, Pops. Have a seat. I’ll get you a water.”
“I’ll take a beer,” Dad says.
“No on that, too!”
Leo has picked up our neurosis by osmosis. I feel my heart tug once again with tenderness at this reality.
The story of Leo and I finding our way back together is grafted onto the story of us choosing donor eggs. Of us acceptingthe things we could not change and choosing to do it anyway. Of nights of rage and six months of living separately and a slow walk toward reconciliation. Of being done with IVF but not on the idea of a family, not really. Of choosing to do it differently.
Life isn’t one thing. Neither is marriage. Horrible things happen. We do terrible things to each other. But somehow, sometimes, we are able to carry on. Maybe. And that’s the magic, isn’t it? Not the ticket. Not the trick of turning back the clock. Not the spontaneous, extraordinary good luck. The magic is living with it. The magic is living through it.
To stay together despite the pain. To be parents despite the shitty eggs. We are the lucky ones. We were able to make those choices.
I kiss my dad on the head and go into the kitchen. Leo is setting up the barbecue. He pulls me toward him and plants one on my lips.
Damien runs into the kitchen squealing.Dada!
Leo scoops him up, and Marcella starts setting up the crudités board. Dave wanders in looking to pick at the barbecue. I start to smell something burning. I remember the cake I’m baking in the oven.Shit.
“Everyone out!” I call.
Marcella and Dave roll their eyes, but she takes his hand, and they head outside. Leo tosses Damien over his shoulder.
