Ashes of Fiery Weather (36 page)

“I can't believe how much bigger you got in two weeks.”

“God knows what I'm going to look like after,” Maggie said.

“You're going to look like your mother,” Noelle said. “She's had four kids and she's grand.”

Noelle started to sit back, but Maggie took her hand and moved it to where the baby's feet were. She pressed down, releasing a flurry of kicks.

“Does it hurt?”

“No,” Maggie said. “It's impossible to describe. It feels like a baby kicking and nothing else.”

“And you're really not finding out? I couldn't stand not knowing what it is.”

“I enjoy surprises.”

“I'll be there with you, if you want,” Noelle said, withdrawing. “In the room, when you're having him. Or her. Your gran's too proper. Eileen, not after this stunt tonight. Your mam, well, you may need to remind her that you're having a baby.”

“She doesn't like talking about it.”

“More like blind denial. Before, asking you to get the plates. God, look at you.”

“What's really funny is that it's
my
birthday.”

Noelle started laughing and Maggie did too. It felt strange.

When they'd gone quiet, Noelle asked softly, “What does she say, your mam, about the adoption?”

“That I should do what I think is best. And she'll support me.”

“That's it?” Noelle said. “Nothing about, ah, if you were to change your mind?”

“Mom knows my mind is made up,” Maggie said. “Danny wants to be in the delivery room too.”

“And well he should be. There'll be room for both of us. Women bring in their whole family and the postman besides these days. But listen, don't let him talk you into doing something stupid like getting married. My parents haven't slept in the same room in years.”

“Neither have mine,” Maggie said.

Noelle put her head back and laughed. “Very good.”

Maggie was sitting up in bed, watching Aidan install the air conditioner she finally requested after surviving June and July with just a fan. Her grandmother never had air conditioning anywhere in the house, and Maggie didn't want to bother her about it. But this past week, she caved and asked if it would be okay. Sleeping was difficult enough now. The heat was making it impossible. Her grandmother said that was fine, adding that she should have asked sooner.

It was delivered late yesterday, but Aidan said he was going to a Mets game and had to get going. Delia made him promise to do it tomorrow. He'd banged on Maggie's door at eight-thirty.

Maggie called for him to come in, and he opened the door so hard it slammed against the wall. The baby stretched and kicked.

“You woke him up,” she said.

He glanced at her and then looked away, a flush creeping over his neck.

He had been angry ever since she told him. Aidan told her that their father would be furious about her giving his first grandchild away. He wouldn't have let her do it.

She didn't know where Aidan's certainty came from. Long ago, she'd lost her father's reactions to her life, except in the vaguest sense: happy, sad, angry. Maybe he would not want his grandchild living with strangers; maybe he would want his daughter to reclaim her college scholarship, deferred for a semester, and go away to school again.

For Aidan, Maggie thought, it was a matter of math. In his mind, the baby would make them a family of six, as they should have been. But it didn't compute. The baby made seven. Their family was always going to be one number off.

After Maggie skipped the memorial Mass, Aidan stopped speaking to her, except when necessary.

When he was nearly finished putting in the air conditioner, she spoke: “Gran didn't mean literally first thing in the morning.”

“I'm going to church. At St. Brendan's.”

She laughed. “What the hell for?”

Aidan looked at her, hard. “It's August 2. The anniversary of Waldbaum's.”

“You're going because you think Dad would?” Maggie said.

“He never missed it.”

Sure, in the five years longer he'd lived. The news stories about their father had all mentioned Waldbaum's. As in, “And this August will mark the fifth anniversary of the Waldbaum's fire in which six firemen were killed . . . the most ever in Brooklyn at a single fire . . .”

“That's why you woke me up at the crack of dawn? Waldbaum's?”

“It's almost nine o'clock,” Aidan said.

“I'm sorry, but I'm kind of nine months pregnant.”

“Yeah, no kidding,” Aidan said. “You wanted an air conditioner, now you got it.”

He left, slamming the door.

Late that afternoon, when she heard the knock on the bedroom door, Maggie assumed it was her grandmother.

“Come in,” she called.

Danny opened the door. “Hey.”

He closed the door and kicked off his flip-flops. He was holding a rolled-up newspaper, which he tossed on the desk.

He moved the pillow from behind her back and fit himself in the bed behind her. At least this bed was a full. Her parents had lived here when they were first married.

Maggie lay back down. He pushed her shirt up and put his hand on the side of her belly, and together they watched the baby shift beneath her skin.

Maggie was nearly asleep when Danny spoke.

“My brothers came and talked to me again yesterday. They're still not happy about this, and my dad's still not saying anything except, You're responsible for this, you take care of it. He said if Sean O were alive, he'd kick your ass and I'd let him.”

“Well, Sean O is not alive, is he?” Maggie said. “And Aidan's not going to do it.”

Danny half laughed. “Lucky for me you don't have any big brothers.”

“Even if Aidan were older, he wouldn't bother. He likes you way better than he likes me. I think he's pissed at me for screwing up your baseball career.”

Unlike her, Danny had simply dropped out of college. He'd taken a job with Brian's construction crew. Though Maggie had told him he should go back to school, he said no way was he going to leave her alone in Brooklyn.

“Yeah, sure, if not for the baby, I'd have ended up playing first base for the Mets,” Danny said.

Maggie smiled.

“Listen, my brothers. Kev wanted to take him, but my sister-in-law said no way. Conor's almost two, and they want another one soon.”

“It's not a good idea anyway,” Maggie said quietly. “Would Kevin and Nicole say they're his parents? Then someday he finds out that his uncle is his father?”

“It doesn't matter anyway. I told you, Nicole said no.” He paused. “Brian did say that maybe him and me can get an apartment together. He's got a roommate now, so we'd have to get our own place.”

“What about school?”

“I can go around here or in the city. I might not even fucking bother if you didn't need college credits to get on the job. Brian figures once he's on, he can arrange his tours around whatever my schedule is and babysit—”

“It wouldn't be babysitting! It's forever. What if Brian meets a girl and wants to get married? And you're working nights and sometimes working twenty-four, all on your own with a kid? Or would Brian's wife move in with all three of you?”

“Maggie, listen to me for a minute, will you? I told him I wouldn't lock him in like that. But I figured I should tell you—”

“In case I did think it was a good idea?”

“I guess so,” Danny said. “I don't know what to fucking think anymore.”

“We need to choose,” Maggie said.

They had narrowed the decision down to three couples from the book at the adoption agency. It worried Maggie that no matter how many times she read their profiles, it was like trying to picture what cartoon characters would look like as real people.

Maggie outlined her belly with her hands. “Soon. Look at me.”

Danny kissed her shoulder. “I'm looking.”

They lay in silence. Only the baby's constant shifting kept Maggie from falling asleep. After one particularly hard jab, Maggie flinched and opened her eyes.

“The couple with the cats?” she said.

“I hate cats. When I'm on the job, if there's one stuck up a tree, I'm fucking leaving it there. And forget the two with the poodle. I'd never get my kid a poodle.”

Maggie pushed herself up on one elbow. “We aren't choosing understudies.”

Danny got up, then set the desk chair beside the bed and sat. “I want to meet the people we give our baby to. I want them to have our names and addresses so they can find us if they have to. When the baby's eighteen, they can give him our names, or their lawyer can.”

“My aunt talked to you, didn't she?” Maggie said coldly.

“Eileen's adopted. She knows what the fuck she's talking about,” Danny said.

He took the newspaper from the desk, unfolded it and held it up for Maggie to see that it was the
Irish Eagle.

“You want to call people from an ad in a newspaper?”

He shook the paper. “They're Irish.”

“You want him with Irish parents?”

“Irish, Irish American, yeah,” Danny said defiantly. “If he finds us someday, I want to have something in common with him. This way we'll have something to talk about besides, Hey, how's your life been since we gave you away?”

Maggie looked down at the newspaper. There was an ad for Irish Dreams on the same page. Wasn't that funny.

“Let me see it.”

Danny pointed to the middle ad. Maggie read it:

An Irish-Italian couple promises a life filled with unconditional love, joy, and financial security. Large extended family. Please call Charlie and Laurel. 1-888-491-4139.

“Irish-Italian. My mom was half Italian. I want to call them,” Danny said.

Maggie felt she should be angry, but instead she was relieved.

Charlie and Laurel. Irish and Italian. Maybe Danny was right. It was a point of reference. A context. And she had already set one big rule: No couples who already had biological children. Even if they were adopting because they had all boys and wanted a girl, or the other way around.

Danny had not been pleased. He definitely did not want the baby to be an only child. If this was the condition he wanted to set, then it was okay, because Maggie owed him. She said that other adopted children would be fine, or the intention to adopt again, and Danny eventually agreed.

“Okay,” Maggie said. “Understudies it is, then.”

Two weeks later, she and Danny sat together in Buckley's restaurant on Avenue R in Flatbush. Danny had raised his eyebrows when she chose the place, but Maggie didn't want to stay in their neighborhood. Danny borrowed Brian's car, to spare her the subway and a bus in the ninety-degree heat.

Within ten minutes of their arrival, Maggie and Danny were seated in the booth Maggie chose deliberately, the one in the corner right outside the big room with the fireplace. It had been Maggie's idea to meet the McKennas for dessert. She didn't want to be trapped for an entire meal if they turned out to be awful. Danny agreed.

“You think of everything,” he said.

“No, I don't. Obviously,” she said.

The McKennas weren't going to be awful. Maggie could see that as they trailed the hostess through the restaurant.

Charlie McKenna was, Maggie saw at once, the Italian half of the couple. His brown eyes were warm, and he'd taken her hands in both of his when he introduced himself and his wife. He looked to be in his late thirties. Laurel was probably about the same age, with the kind of leanness Maggie associated with runners like Eileen. Maggie had noticed the heads turning as Laurel passed through the bar. Her dark brown hair was pulled back in a low ponytail.

They discussed traffic, the drive. The waitress took their order and left with a smile. Maggie wondered what she thought was going on. The McKennas were too young to be a set of in-laws and too old to be friends of hers and Danny's.

Laurel Rourke-McKenna spoke into the silence. “First of all, thank you for answering our ad and for being willing to meet with us.”

Both she and Danny nodded.

“Just quickly, about us,” Charlie said. “I'm a lawyer. I do a little bit of everything but a lot of clients are small businesses. Contracts, employer-employee issues, that kind of thing. I enjoy it, boring as it sounds. Laurel's the one with the big job.”

Laurel shot him a frown.

“I'm with a firm in the city that specializes in real estate,” she said. “Which in other cities might not be too exciting, but in New York it is.” She smiled hard. “It's not too big a job, though. Not too big to be a good mother.”

Maggie nodded politely. The waitress set down coffee cups and a tall glass of decaf iced tea for Maggie. They waited until she came back with the coffeepot and went slowly around the table.

“Are you going to keep working, then?” Maggie asked when the waitress had gone.

Danny shifted in his seat. Both McKennas sat up a little straighter. Charlie leaned slightly toward Laurel but she didn't glance his way.

“Yes,” Laurel said. “But my firm is generous with maternity leave.”

“Laurel's on track to making partner. The first woman. They're not going to want to lose her,” Charlie said.

Laurel quickly brushed his hand.

Maggie read the gesture to mean, Be quiet, stop making it sound like I'll never be home. “With their maternity leave, there's no difference between adopting and having a baby?” Maggie asked.

“No, that's illegal,” Laurel said. “When you adopt, it's the same as if you gave birth.”

Maggie had the urge to lift up her shirt and say to Ms. Rourke-hyphen-McKenna, “Oh yeah?”

“How come you're adopting?” Danny said.

Maggie admired his bluntness.