“I’m not going to spend a lot of time talking about family and our purposes here and all that stuff we talk about all the time,” he said. Julie, who was also showing severe signs of a hangover, started to cry, and both Dr. Grind and her husband quickly leaned over to comfort her. She apologized, gathered herself, and the doctor stood up again to address the group.
“It’s a lot to process, no matter how much time you’ve spent thinking about it. I’ll let you guys move to the selected rooms and you’ll wait for the kids. Now, be prepared. As momentous as this is for you, these are five-year-olds and it will not be as momentous for them. Just remember that the important thing is not what happens today, but what happens after, for the rest of our lives, okay? You’ll have about thirty minutes, maybe a little more, and then the kids have a nature walk today, and we’ll have to round them up. Just remember, everybody,” he said, holding up his hands as if to show that there was no big secret here, nothing he was withholding from them. “Your kids are wonderful and they love you and you love them and nothing that happens today changes that.” He smiled again, now beaming with genuine affection, and then left the room. This was the power of Dr. Grind, always making meaningful speeches, always radiating kindness and capability, and then striding out of the room and leaving them alone again.
The staff met up with the adults and started leading them out of the classroom. One of the staff members, Roberto, who taught the children Spanish and was in charge of physical education classes, touched Izzy on the shoulder and gestured toward another room in the complex. She took a deep breath, took his offered hand, and stood up, ready for whatever came next.
She was in the dining hall, the big room empty and echoing. They had been instructed not to bring gifts, no pictures or candy or anything that might distract the children from the moment. But she wished she had something in her hands, something to occupy her nerves.
Of course she had seen him almost every day, had hugged him, had rocked him to sleep, but it would be different now. It would forever be different and yet, hopefully, the same as ever. She wished, not for the first time, that she had someone with her, a partner. Then, immediately, she shook off that hope; she wanted this moment just for herself, as it had always been, no one but her.
The door opened and Roberto looked in, flashed a thumbs-up sign, and Izzy nodded in response. Roberto disappeared from view and, suddenly, there he was. A little boy stood in the doorway. Her little boy. Her son.
He walked into the room, already waving, already smiling, but then stopped short when he saw her.
“Izzy?” he said, his face curious and open.
“Hi, Cap,” she said, the shock of seeing him standing before her, just the two of them, almost too much to process.
“You’re my mom?” he asked, tentative, afraid to come too close to her, which broke her heart in the places it had always been broken.
“I am, sweetie,” she said, smiling.
“You made me?” he asked, moving a little closer to her.
“We all made you,” she said, a mantra of the group, but she then added, “but I made you the most.”
“Mom,” he said, a statement of fact. He waved to her again and she waved back.
“I’m your mom,” Izzy said, another statement of fact, holding her breath.
“Good,” he finally said, smiling, and he stepped into her arms and let her hug him for what felt like the first time.
“It is good,” she said, this boy in her arms, the son she had given up and yet managed to keep, the child she had not wanted and yet could not love more than she did.
“We are a family,” he said, and she knew that he meant everyone, the other children, the other parents, Dr. Grind, but she pretended that he meant only the two of them.
“We are a family,” she responded, still hugging him so tightly, “we are the best family in the whole wide world.”
chapter one
Three hours after she had graduated from high school, Izzy sat on a park bench next to her art teacher, Mr. Jackson, and told him that she was pregnant. Despite the awkwardness of the confession, she felt a buzzing excitement that kept pushing against her dread. She had graduated from high school, had hated almost every minute of it; now she was on the other side and free, those four years simply a scar that would add character in the long run. She was wearing the best dress she owned, a thin summer dress from the Target in Murfreesboro, green and white, like the flag for some exotic African nation. It went well with her deep, crowded freckles; her light brown hair cut short for the ceremony; and her round, bright face. She looked better than she felt, and this gave her some kind of invincibility that she worried would crumble the minute it was put to the test.