I plunged deeper and deeper into the forest, my thoughts circling in on themselves, swooping down upon me like birds of prey. Who was I to think that I’d make a good mother? Me, who had never even given having children much thought at all. Pretty much anyone would’ve made a better parent. Tiffany and Kyle would’ve made better parents, easily, but having them as a support wasn’t the same.
Tripping over a stick and coming face-to-face with a mossy log brought me the answer: Tiffany and Kyle would make better parents. Tiffany and Kyle could be their parents. That way, I could visit them all I wanted, watch them grow up, give them a good home, good, reliable parents.
I marched out of the forest and back to Tiffany’s with the answer on my lips. And yet, when I told her, she didn’t react with the jubilant smile I’d imagined she would. Instead, she looked worried, uncomfortable.
“This is a very big decision you’re making,” she said in a small voice. “And thank you, Alex, for thinking of me. It’s a very generous offer you’re making, but I can’t take it. Not yet. Can you think about it for a week and then tell me?”
“But, Tiffany—”
She shook her head.
“One week, Combs. You have that long.”
So, with a sigh, I agreed and trudged to my room.
That night I awoke empty.
It was dark, everything was dark, made up of sensations and not sights. The quiet was oppressive, and my belly, my once-rounded belly, was shrunken and shriveled like a prune.
My babies were gone. I could feel it.
I got up and raced into a wall. Then I went the other way and hit another wall, invisible in the blackness.
I cried out, screamed, clutched at my horrible, empty sack of skin where they had been.
My babies. My three little darlings—gone, unattainable, forever. A part of me ripped away and lost.
“Please!” I cried into the dark. “Please, give them back to me! Please, I’m begging you! I’ll do anything! Please give them back to me. I can’t bear it!”
But the dark only echoed back my hopeless cries until I collapsed to my knees and then onto my back, thrashing back and forth, incoherent moans drifting out of my lips.
I awoke crying.
I clutched at my stomach and breathed a sigh of relief. Full. It was still full. My babies were still there.
It had only been a dream, thank God.
And yet, lying there in the dark, the tears continued rolling down, and the breathless fear still clutched my heart.
If that was what it was like not having my babies with me, being separated from my children, how would I be able to bear adoption even if it were with Tiffany and Kyle? What was I supposed to do?
Staring into the dark, I whispered, “Please, show me a sign. Please. I don’t know what to do. Please, show me what to do.”
Then I fell back asleep.
I awoke to tapping, a sharp “tut-tut-tut, tut-tut-tut” coming from my window.
I drew aside the curtains and found myself face-to-face with a chickadee. It cocked its head at me, blinked, and then flew off.
It looked like I’d just gotten my answer. In a daze, I flopped back onto the bed, surprised by how relieved I was at the sign I’d just seen, at Brock’s and my bird tapping on my window for my attention.
There was no denying it; I had asked for a sign, and a sign was what I’d gotten. It had revealed what I had secretly wanted anyway: to keep my children. No matter the difficulty, no matter the hardships, I needed my children to be mine. I needed to be there for them. I couldn’t take it any other way.
Tiffany was supportive and unsurprised by my change of heart.
Hugging me, she said, “I know you, Combs. I think you’re making the right decision.”
“Thank you,” I said. “Thank you.”
The next eight months passed better than expected. Tiffany and Kyle kept me busy, got me picking out baby names and hauled me around Ikea in a baby-furniture-buying flurry. I found out I was having two daughters and a son. I moved back into my apartment, cramming as much baby furniture into the small space as it could handle. I even got a few jobs, locating a missing wallet and a long-lost son.
And then there was Brock. Funny, that his absence was the biggest presence in my life. And yet I kept seeing him—on street corners, in malls, on passing buses just out of reach. His face haunted me, and yet whenever I approached him, he turned out not to be him at all, but strangers who were politely surprised by my interest. No matter how I searched, Brock had disappeared. Russell Snow wasn’t happy either.