Daughter's Keeper (36 page)

“But you might not have to go to jail. I mean, the judge might decide to let you go. Or he might just say that you have to wear one of those ankle bracelet things.”

Olivia shook her head, wondering at her mother's transformation. Elaine had always been so practical, and her own optimism had, she knew, always struck her mother as a particularly frustrating sort of naïveté. As a child, when Olivia had expressed a belief that something—a test, a problem, a conflict—would somehow work itself out, Elaine had always admonished her. Far better to prepare for the worst than to wish helplessly that the best might happen. Yet now, when pragmatism seemed most called for, her mother was hanging on to pipe dreams of home detention and ankle bracelets.

“Mom, he can't sentence me to anything other than what the sentencing guidelines call for. You know that.”

“But there's always a downward departure. He could grant you a downward departure, couldn't he?”

“Maybe. I mean, I hope so. But I have to be prepared in case he doesn't. I have to make sure my baby is going to be okay. I need you to agree to take it to Mexico.”

“Of course. Of course I'll take it. I mean, that's allowed, right? To take a baby out of the country?”

“I'll get a passport for it after it's born. I don't think it will be a problem.”

“Oh. Okay.”

“And something else.”

“Yes?”

“Money.”

“Money?”

“Jorge's parents are poor. Having an extra mouth to feed is going to be hard on them. But even what seems like a little bit to us will help them out. I was hoping you'd send them a ­hundred dollars a month. I'll pay you back as soon as I get out. With interest.”

“Don't be silly, Olivia. You don't need to pay me back. I'll send them the money every month.”

“Thank you.”

Elaine came up behind Olivia and rested her hands lightly on her shoulders. Olivia sat absolutely still at the unfamiliar touch.

“I wish…” Elaine began.

Olivia was afraid to breathe.

“I just wish things were different. I wish Arthur…No. I wish
I
was different.”

Olivia felt her mother's weight more heavily against her shoulders. “It's okay, Mom. I understand.”

“Do you? Do you really? Because I'm not sure
I
do.” Her voice trailed off.

“It's okay, Mom.” But was it, really? Olivia understood that it was impossible for Elaine to take the baby; the necessary sacrifice—of losing Arthur—would simply be too great. But it seemed to her that her mother was asking for something more than understanding. Elaine sought, rather, absolution, and the reassurance that this failure was not an ultimate betrayal. That, Olivia could not give her.

Elaine suddenly left Olivia's side, pulled out a dining room chair, and sat down. She stared out the window, smoothing her hair behind her ear over and over again. Olivia turned away and looked back at her letter.

Olivia finished writing and then dug through her address book for the telephone number of the hotel where Jorge's older sister worked as a desk clerk. She called the hotel and asked to speak to Aida. She told her nothing, just let her know that she was sending a fax for her parents, and that Aida should pull it out of the machine before anyone else at the hotel saw it.

“What is this about, Olivia? We received a letter from Jorge saying that he is in jail. What is going on? My parents are hysterical.”

“The fax will explain everything. I have to go now.” Olivia hung up the telephone before her tears could overwhelm her.

She stood over the machine watching the paper feed through, feeling like she was sending her baby farther away with every inch that slipped beneath the roller. Elaine came up behind her and stroked her hair. Olivia shrugged away her mother's hand.

“Honey, I promise I won't just drop the baby off. I'll make sure everything is okay. And I won't just send money. I'll go visit the baby. I'll make Arthur swap years with me, and instead of taking that trip to Morocco we put off until the fall, we'll go to Mexico instead. I promise. I'll write them, and call, and go see the baby. I promise.”

“You can't call. They don't have a phone.”

“I'll get them a phone. How much could a phone cost? How about that? I'll get them a telephone when I go to Mexico, and I'll even pay their phone bills. That way you can call them yourself. How about that?”

“It takes years to get a phone installed.”

“What about a cell phone? They must have those in Mexico. They've got them all over. I'll get one of those international cell phones and give it to Jorge's parents.”

“Okay.” Olivia tried to feel the gratitude she knew her mother deserved. Instead she felt numb, blank. She let her mother hug her.

***

“It was a compromise verdict,” Arthur said. “It has to have been. Some of them probably wanted to convict her. And the others wanted an acquittal. So they settled on the telephone count.”

Arthur had a way of making Elaine believe he knew what he was talking about even when the chance of that was relatively slim.

They were lying in bed, neither of them able to sleep after the tumultuous and devastating day in court.

“It was that woman with the pink bag,” Elaine said. “The one who looked so mean. I never liked her. And Izaya didn't either. Remember, he wanted to throw her off the jury?”

“Did he?”

She nodded vigorously. “It was a mistake. He had used up all his challenges. It was her. I just know it was.”

“It could have been any of them.”

Arthur punched his pillow a few times, fluffing it. Elaine flinched at the dull thuds.

“I'm not really surprised,” he said.

“What?”

“Well, she was technically guilty, Elaine. We all know that.”

Elaine sat up. “What do you mean?”

He reached under the bed for the specially fabricated neck-­support pillow he used when his head was hurting him. He tucked it under his head. “She took that phone message and passed it on to Jorge. She was guilty of
that
.”

Elaine felt her face begin to burn. “Are you saying she deserves this? That Olivia deserves to be convicted?”

“No, of course not. I'm as outraged about it as you are. The whole prosecution was a farce. It's ridiculous that that telephone count thing is even a crime. But you know what they say.”

Elaine gritted her teeth. “No, Arthur. I don't know. What is it that
they
say?”

“Ignorance of the law is no excuse.”

And so saying, he closed his eyes, and without another word, fell soundly asleep.

Elaine slipped out from under the blankets and padded in her bare feet into the dining room. She had wanted to get online, to tell her friends on the FAMM list what had happened to Olivia, as soon as she had returned from court. She had been desperate to spill her story, to howl her anguish to people who would understand, but she had been afraid that Arthur would have gotten angry. He hadn't grown any more understanding of her need to participate in the online community. On the contrary, he seemed more resentful of it than ever. She felt better getting on the computer when he was asleep, although the truth was that at this moment she was so furious with him that she might have logged on even were he not snoring in the bedroom.

Elaine posted to the group. She had been giving daily updates since the trial began, and there were already messages waiting, asking her how the closing arguments had gone and whether the jury had reached a verdict. She didn't bother with the good news about Olivia's acquittal. The joy she had felt at hearing the words “not guilty” had by now been almost entirely overwhelmed by the misery of the single count of conviction. After she had posted a short and bitter message, she clicked over to the chat room, hoping there would be someone to talk to. There usually was, even late in the night. The wives, mothers, husbands, and children of convicted drug offenders had a hard time sleeping. When the bustle of the day's business gave way to the familiar loneliness of the dark hours, they congregated online, anxious for any contact, no matter how virtual. An imaginary room full of recognizable voices was a significant improvement over a forlorn bed.

Once again, Elaine posted her story, and this time the responses were immediate. She was congratulated on the counts of acquittal, as if she, and not Izaya Feingold-Upchurch, had engineered what felt to her to be a terribly minor victory. More importantly, she was inundated with messages of support for the conviction. Elaine didn't need to explain what the telephone count meant. These truck drivers, librarians, ministers, teachers, waitresses, and others were all experts in the intricacies of the federal laws, drug offenses, and sentencing guidelines. They knew just how long a term Olivia was facing.

Dear Elaine, wrote a woman, also the mother of a daughter who had followed a boyfriend to prison. This is so hard for you. The night of Brittany's conviction I thought I would die. Really I did. Hugs to you.

Brittany, Elaine knew, had just finished the fifth year of a twenty-year sentence for the importation of ecstasy; her boyfriend, and the father of the three small boys she had left behind in her mother's care, had served two years in a Danish prison and been released. Some of Brittany's mother's postings were expressions of rage at the inequity of her daughter's sentence, especially when compared to that of the man who, as even the prosecutor agreed, was the kingpin of the smuggling operation. Most, however, were about how difficult it was to care for children who both missed their mother terribly and could barely remember her face.

At least you'll have your grandbaby, Brittany's mother wrote.

After weeks of silence on the subject, Elaine had finally confided to the group about Olivia's pregnancy. She wasn't sure what had made her tell them at last. Perhaps it was something as selfish as wanting to become the focus of their outpourings of support once again: within a week or two of her first post, other voices had joined the Internet support group, and Elaine was no longer the only new person to whom everyone sent messages of encouragement. It was at this point that she had told them about the baby, and for another week or so had basked in a flood of sympathetic emails so plentiful that it took her hours to reply to them all.

Elaine's fingers hovered over the keyboard for a moment, and then she typed a few words about Olivia's plans to send her baby to Mexico. Just then, another line of chat tumbled across the screen.

Honestly, if it weren't for Brittany's three boys, I don't know how I'd get through the days.

Amen to that, someone else wrote. Jack Jr. is my heart and soul.

Before she even realized what she was doing, Elaine deleted her unsent line and typed out another. Yes, thank God for the baby. For Olivia's sake, but especially for mine. It will be a true comfort to me.

Elaine sat looking at the words she had written. She knew she had, in fact, absolutely no intention of keeping the child. She wanted it no more than she had before Olivia had been convicted, no more than before she had gone online. And God knew that Arthur wasn't going to let her keep it.

She hit send.

A rush of solicitous chat followed, messages filled with advice on raising a baby whose mother was incarcerated, which she graciously accepted, pretending to jot down the visiting rules at different women's prisons. She stayed up long into the night, lying.

It was only after the others had all gone to bed, and she was the last member of a now-empty chat room, that she understood what her dishonesty had wrought. She would never be able to face these people when she sent Olivia's baby away. Neither could she lie for the next however many years, pretending to be caring for a child who was in an entirely different country. She had cost herself the only support she had left.

She stared at the screen, her back hunched, and her fingers twisted on the keyboard. And then she sent another message, this time to the list manager, asking him to unsubscribe her from the list.

***

The next morning, Aida called.

Olivia's fingers trembled while she held the telephone receiver. Her voice caught in her throat, and her greeting sounded to her own ears like the croak of someone very ill.

“We have been so worried about Jorge, and about you,” Jorge's sister said.

“I know,” Olivia answered. “I'm so sorry.”

“It's okay, Olivia. You need not apologize.”

“Will they take the baby?” she whispered.

“Yes. Yes, of course. We are all so grateful to you for allowing us this chance, for letting us do this for you, and for Jorge.”

“They understand that it will only be for a few years, that I'm going to want the baby back as soon as I get out of jail?” Olivia said.

“Yes, Olivia. They know. They promise they will give the baby to you.”

“And what if Jorge comes back? What if
he
wants the baby? What will happen then?”

“We promise to you on the blessed Virgin that we will give the baby back to you. My father is a man of his word.”

“Thank you,” Olivia said. She hung up the telephone and wished that she felt reassured. She knew that Juan Carlos and Araceli meant what they said, that they were not lying to her. And yet, what guarantee was there that they would feel the same after four years? After they had raised her child, cared for it, and watched it grow, would they still be so willing to give it back? And what if Jorge was released? What if he came home before she did? Would he take her baby away from her?

Olivia hugged herself, covering her belly with her arms.

Olivia was trapped. There was no other way she could keep her baby, no other person who would care for it. She determined, at that moment, to believe that Araceli and Juan Carlos would return the child to her. It would take all of her energy to survive the years of her incarceration; she could not face them weighed down by the anticipation of Jorge's family's betrayal. She had to muster every ounce of hopefulness and optimism of which she was capable.