A Southern Girl (23 page)

The day was milder, with clear skies and no wind. The chill of the previous day had been replaced by warmth of an imminent spring, and I could almost hear the sap groaning in the desiccated trunks of hibernating hardwoods, see on the tips of branches the embryonic nubs and folds of renewal. A squirrel scampered across my path before retreating in the same direction from which it had come.

I had served on the building committee for the prayer chapel recently added to the main body of the church, and it was in this chapel that I
found Mother, the sole occupant of the tiny sanctuary, seated on a middle pew, her head bent and her eyes closed. I entered, bowed my head to the Cross, and slipped in beside her. We sat, wordless, for ten minutes. I broke the silence.

“Mother, it’s important to me that you approve of this adoption.”

She opened her eyes, but her head remained declined. “I can’t do that. I’m sorry. Your father is so against it.”

“But he’s not here, not really. It’s not his decision. How do you feel about it?”

“I’ve told you.”

“No, you told me what you think, not how you feel.”

“I feel you should honor his opposition, which he has expressed to me very strongly.”

“He expressed it to me once, in a single sentence that came as close to being a personal conversation as I ever had with the man.”

“As I said, you intimidated him.”

“Well, now he’s intimidating me, and he’s doing it from the safety of the nursing home, where he runs no risk of the kind of confrontations he dreaded. But I don’t have that luxury. I’m here, in the middle between my wife, whom I love and wish to please, and you, whom I also love and wish to please.”

“I do understand your dilemma, son. I truly do.”

“When Elizabeth and I began discussing this, my objections were the same ones you raised. In fact, it was eerie how similar they were. The more I thought about them, the more I realized how easy it is to be against something strange and unknown. For me, it seems second nature, and as I look at Dad and Grandfather, I think I come by that nature honestly. I intend to, as you phrased it, ‘honor his memory,’ but I have to do it my own way. Where this child is concerned, I think there is more honor in saying ‘yes.’ All the dire predictions may come true. We may even be underestimating them. If we are, you and Dad will get the satisfaction of a big, fat ‘I told you so.’”

“That would give us no satisfaction at all.”

“But whoever she turns out to be, you’ll be her grandparents, and it will mean an awful lot to everyone if you can accept her.”

Mother shook her head slowly from side to side. “Why does life have to be so complicated?”

I stretched my arm around her shoulder, pulling her to me. “Because death is so simple. And until you, Dad and I arrive there, we have to take risks, and this is one worth taking. Who knows? Maybe she’ll turn out to be cute and smart and healthy.”

She stared off in the direction of the altar. “This may kill him.”

In the days that followed, I helped Elizabeth put together the old crib, freshly painted. We were now less than a week from our appointment at Kennedy Airport. Elizabeth very diplomatically approached Mother about arrangements for the boys on the day we planned to be in New York, reminding her of their return from school at 3:30, the need for snacks and the allowed play time.

“But I won’t be here,” Mother said casually, as though it were a mere detail she had forgotten. We stared at her. “It is time for me to leave.”

In a somewhat guarded voice, I said, “But we assumed you would be here with the boys. We’ve been counting on it.”

“I am sorry,” said she. “I guess it’s short notice, but I just decided that I’d be in the way during what I’m sure will be a special time for your family. Besides, you need my room.”

“I told you, Sarah,” said Elizabeth, “that you were welcome for as long as you wanted to be here, and I meant it.”

“We both meant it,” I echoed.

“That’s kind, and I believe you both. But I want to go. And look at the time,” she said, checking her watch. “I’ve got to pack.” She stood, carried her plate to the kitchen, and returned to her room.

We remained seated at the table, me with my arms folded across my chest, staring at the pattern in the placemat, and Elizabeth studying my reaction to Sarah’s announcement.

“She’ll come around,” she assured me.

I shook my head. “Maybe, maybe not. I’d hate to think she’s leaving for the last time.”

Elizabeth telephoned Betsy Miller to explain our dilemma with the children. From the guest room came the muffled but discernible opening and closing of drawers, suitcases and closets.

“Well, that’s covered,” she reported. “Betsy said she’d be happy to come over tomorrow and stay with the children until we get back from New York. I warned her we expected to be late.”

When I made no response, she walked to my side of the table and placed her hand on the back of my neck in a gentle massaging motion.

“Can you think of anything else we can do?” she asked.

“No. Too many changes in too short a time. It can’t be helped. I wish I knew how much of this reflects her own feelings and how much of it comes from her new job as my father’s keeper.”

We heard the distinctive creak of the guest room hinges and then Sarah’s footsteps in the hall. She entered the dining room in her traveling clothes and walked to where she had been sitting for lunch, gripping the back of her chair. “Dear,” she said, “I just realized that I didn’t ask you if I can leave my car here.”

“Of course, but how will you get home?”

“I’m not going back to Charleston just yet. Actually, I’m going to London.” She gazed down at her hands.

“London?” I asked. “For how long?”

“Two weeks. Doesn’t that sound like a nice break?”

“Fabulous,” I replied. “Really fabulous. You got a passport?”

“Several years ago, hoping your father would loosen up a bit.” She paused. “Before I go, I’d like a word with you both on the subject of this adoption.”

“Sure,” I said as Elizabeth slipped into the chair beside me.

“I believe you’re making a mistake. I’ve told both of you as much. And Coleman, certainly your father feels strongly that an Oriental orphan should not carry the Carter name. I’m not supposed to tell you this, but a few weeks before his stroke he changed his will. Josh and Steven are in it, of course, and any child you may have that isn’t adopted. For him, it’s about blood. Not a great amount of money, mind you, but the principle was important to him. Now that he is so … incapacitated, I don’t know if it can be changed, even if he wanted to.

“But we’ve had our say, and now I think the time has come to accept what is clearly going to happen. I can’t pretend I’m excited, but you are and that’s good. I think this young girl, this baby, is very lucky to end up here.”

I studied her. Elizabeth said, “That’s very gracious of you to say, Sarah. I know it’s not easy.”

Sarah gave a short smile. “With Coles so sick, you two and my grandsons are all I have, and nothing is worth jeopardizing that. You may find,
as I have more times than I can relate, that to make a family work, someone has to give. In the end, it comes down to that. If this child doesn’t fulfill your expectations, you’ll see soon enough what I mean. Coleman, please give me a hand with my bags.”

“Give the Queen my love,” Elizabeth told Sarah as she left the house.

I’m delighted she decided to go to England. Her desire for travel has been suppressed long enough. When she announced she was leaving, we all felt it was best. She was stoic on the ride to the airport, but I sensed underlying excitement to be embarking on an adventure I knew she had dreamed about.

“What do they eat?” she asked me as we neared the terminal.

“Who?” I asked.

“Oriental babies. They must have their own diet.”

I laughed. “I don’t think so, Mother. As far as I know it’s just your basic pabulum sprinkled with a little soy sauce.” I watched her from the corner of my eye, but she seemed to nod in acceptance of my explanation.

We parked in a short-term metered space and unloaded the bags. Josh and Steven each carried one, flanking her as she walked toward the terminal. In front of the ticket counter, we paused. As I waited for the boys to deliver their farewell hugs, I gazed at her with what I hoped was undisguised affection, wondering if I could summon the same poise in defeat. Perhaps I could; it was, after all, part of my heritage.

“You know, Mother,” I said as I leaned down to embrace her, “I just thought of something. You were always a little disappointed I didn’t end up with a southern girl, and now I’m finally going to have one.”

“Going to have one …,” she mumbled as she searched for my meaning.

“She’s from South Korea—don’t you get it?”

“Yes, of course I get it,” she said, still a little dubious. “Well, I’ll pick her up a little something in England.”

We stayed to watch through the large observation window as her plane taxied down the runway, then ascended. By the time we returned, Elizabeth had completely rearranged the guest room into the nursery she had mentally decorated a dozen times in the preceding months. We were ready.

14

Hana

When Faith ordered Soo Yun back to the ward, I exploded from the infirmary’s side door and tramped two blocks through the snow. Walking into the wind, I lowered my head to protect my eyes from the sting of subfreezing gusts. Frosted breath vented from my mouth and nostrils, expelled with great thrust by adrenaline but immediately blunted, then reversed, by the headwind, sweeping over and behind me in tendrils of human vapor. Despite the frigid air, I gradually regained a rhythmic breath. My anger behaved very much like my breath; as hard as I thrust it forward at Faith, it washed back over me. It was bad enough that Faith had caught me bypassing Open Arms policy, but to have that truth revealed in the presence of Dr. Kim added humiliation. At the corner I crossed the street, without looking, to embark upon a third block until I realized I wore only a sweater and risked hypothermia. I turned back, shivering now.

This entire affair, I thought as I walked, had ceased to be about a child and had become only a matter of consequences. Faith wished to issue an Alert so she could shift the decision onto the Carters. She had become a prisoner of that photo of Sohn on her desk. The wind blew faster than I could walk, forcing me to lean back against it. I could no longer feel my ears at all.

This match was still possible if I took all responsibility. It was a simple matter of assuring Faith, Dr. Kim, and anyone else unfortunate enough to place a foot within the circle of blame. If I was wrong, what could they do? I did not see lines of nurses forming at the home to work eighty hours a week for the modest hwan they paid me. I saw only lines of children waiting to leave.

By the time I returned to the nursery, Soo Yun again lay in her crib, at the foot of which rested a plastic traveling bag stocked with diapers. I tried not to look at it as I adjusted the covers around her shoulders. From the clock on the wall I knew that the first visitors for Open House would be arriving soon. I paused, gazing down at the child’s head protruding
from the blanket. Her eyes were closed but her lips quivered in a suckling motion, either in anticipation of her next feeding or in memory of some past nourishment, recalled now only in dreams.

I knew I must act swiftly. I thought of the family in the photograph, the Carters. If the situation was to be fully and fairly explained to them, they might instruct the home to send her anyway, but I was unwilling to take such a risk. The wrong decision amounted to rejecting a bar of gold over the presence of a scuff mark. I had to overcome Faith to avoid this outcome. I turned from the crib and in a pace closer to a run than a walk I approached the elevator.

The door to Faith Stockdale’s office was closed but I entered without knocking. My walk had numbed me to whatever chill had overtaken my relationship with Faith as a result of our earlier confrontation. I determined I would speak as though nothing had happened, but my tone proved only a partial screen for my impatience. Faith, dialing the phone, looked up, startled.

“May I sit down?” I asked, seating myself in front of her desk without waiting for a response. Faith replaced the phone in its cradle.