Look at You Now (25 page)

Eventually I made my way upstairs to my room. I stared for a long time at the brass bed with the white down comforter and swan mobile hanging above it. I'd thought about that bed a thousand times in the last five months. I bent down and ran my hand over the soft blue carpet. My Madame Alexander dolls sat on the shelf above my desk. On the dressing table, my puzzle ring and puka shell necklace sat untouched. I turned and saw my mom standing behind me at the door. “Laurie has called you several hundred times,” Dorothy said. “That's an exaggeration, but you get what I mean. You must call her at school. Lauryn has also called several times and so has Daniel.”

“Okay, thanks.”

“Glad you're home, sweetheart.”

“Me too.” Maybe they
had
noticed I was gone, after all.

“And, Liz?”

“Yeah?”

“Stop saying yeah, the word is
yesssss
. . .”

It was official. I was home. I unpacked, played around on the piano, ate Lay's potato chips, and read the titles of the dozens of books on the shelf in the living room. I wandered around the house, feeling the familiarity I had so longed to feel. And then I sat down on the yellow couch in the living room and thought of Papa for the first time in a while, and his tiple, and the music, and I realized how far away the years now felt since I was a little girl. Just as the sun was disappearing from the sky, I made my way out to the big wooden tree swing in the backyard. I sat on the swing for a long time and watched the willow tree branches swaying back and forth over the pond. I looked up at the star-filled sky and searched for the tiniest one of them all. I found it and quietly said, “I see you.”

• • • •

The next morning I woke up to my wet, hardened T-shirt stuck to my boobs. It stank of sour milk. I reached for my stomach, but there was nothing in there. I looked up at the ceiling, sighed, and remembered: I was home. I spent the next day and a half in a mild fog, getting used to it all.

• • • •

On my third day home, Dorothy reminded me that I needed to go to court to finalize the adoption papers.

“Today?” My heart began beating fast against my chest.

“Yes.”

“Are you coming with me?”

“No, I can't make it, I have to work.”

“Mom, I can't go
alone
, it's court.” I was nervous. “I'm a kid, you
have
to come with me.”

“No, I signed everything that needs signing; you just have to go do this last part. It's a formality, Liz. You will
literally
sign a document and come home.”

• • • •

The green VW bug was sitting in the driveway. The car I'd driven to school every day that year till my life as I knew it stopped. I'd waited forever for that car to be mine, for my older sisters to go off to college. It was once the only thing I thought about. I looked at the passenger seat next to me and saw my dirty hiking boots, a sweater, and my friend Jen's coffee mug. I tried to remember the life behind those things, but couldn't. There was a green ribbon from the last football game tied to the rearview mirror. I turned the key and pushed the stick shift into reverse. I drove past the beautiful homes on our street and was reminded just how much more than enough the people around us had.

I merged onto the interstate and headed for the courthouse. The little farms and cornfields felt almost familiar as they whooshed by. There was an undercurrent of something brewing inside me. Maybe survival mode had ended, and I needed to deal with what was now in front of me, but I didn't want to. I drove, listening to the Bee Gees on the radio, ignoring everything beckoning. An hour later, I looked down and saw my hands beginning to tremble on the wheel. I was short of breath. The more I watched my hands shake, the harder it was to breathe. I pulled over onto the shoulder of the highway and stopped the car. It was dead quiet. Something inside wanted me to listen, but I didn't want to hear it. The baby was out, I was home, I'd had enough. I stared ahead at the empty road—and then suddenly I felt the need to scream, at the top of my lungs. Again, and then again . . . bloodcurdling screams. And then I whispered, “Somebody help me.”

The image of the two tiny feet sticking up in the air flashed into my mind. Would I live with the worry and fear and wonder if the baby was safe and loved for the rest of my life? Or would I
believe that my parents, the adoption place, God, and life could all be trusted—that the baby would have a warm, loving home and be just like my adopted cousins, happy and cherished? I took a big breath and decided there in the car that I had to choose
faith
over fear. I had to believe with all that I was that the baby would be safe and loved. I seared that belief into my soul and promised myself I would never go back on it.

I closed my eyes and clutched the steering wheel. I thought about the fabricated lie, the lie with a thousand holes, the lie that was forced upon me for my own good. That would become a part of who I was, until the end of time. It had begun. The rest of my life was right now, and I couldn't fathom the amount of lies I would have to tell in the years to come. I couldn't wrap my head around the number of people I loved who would never know the truth, never know why or how I'd come to be the person I am. I was scared that over time, even I would begin to wonder what was the truth and what was a lie. I sat in the shit of it all, feeling trapped and helpless. I didn't want to
survive
life. I'd been doing that for the last five months. I needed to be able to
live
it. I knew I couldn't erase any of this or let time cloud the truth. I
wanted
to remember it. And so I told myself I would seal my truth about the baby—the girls, the facility, everything that happened to me—in a place inside where I knew it could live forever. I had to, no matter what was said, or done, or told on the outside. No one could stop me from holding that knowledge safe and alive on the inside.

I started the car back up. I had a strange, lonesome feeling—knowing it would just be me, by myself, the only person who knew the
whole
truth. I drove another long hour and a half, solidifying all the promises I'd made to myself. Finally I pulled into the underground parking structure of the court building in Indiana. I was wearing my blue cotton skirt with a white button-down sweater and my pearl necklace. I looked in the rearview mirror at my puffy eyes and tried to smile.

Room 302 was at the end of a long hall. I entered a crowded
courtroom. A bailiff told me to sit and wait for my case name to be called. I took a seat in the back. A judge sat at a high desk in the front of the room. More than an hour later the judge shouted, “Pryor baby 443671.”

My heart began to pound. I stood up and meekly raised my hand. He looked over his glasses and summoned me to his desk up front.

“Are you Elizabeth Knight Pryor?”

“Yes, sir.”

“You are here to sign off on the adoption of a child born”—he looked down at the papers—“three days ago?”

“Yes, sir.”

“You have identification?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Step over here.” I stepped around to a different desk and was handed some papers to read and sign. I made my way to my seat in the back. And then craned my neck to see what was going on up by the judge. I saw a few different people and then noticed a man and a woman with their backs to me, standing together. The woman was holding a baby wrapped in a blanket. I could see a baby's head resting on the woman's shoulder. Was that them? Was that the baby? They looked kinda nice from the back. The judge called my name again and dismissed me. I whispered
goodbye
to the little baby. I stood outside the door in the hall and etched my faith for the baby to live a safe and loving life in stone in my soul.

• • • •

I was going to wear my sister's graduation dress from a few years ago. New Trier High School didn't follow cap and gown protocol, and girls wore long white formal dresses of their choice. They also received a dozen red roses upon receipt of their diplomas. There were more than eight hundred graduates, which meant an insane amount of roses. The packet sitting on my desk said I had to arrive two hours early for a talk-through rehearsal and placement instructions.
At the bottom of the paper it gave details for the party and dance following. Five and a half months suddenly felt like five years. I couldn't believe this used to be my life.

I pulled the long white eyelet dress over my head and squeezed my boobs into the sweetheart neckline. I zipped it up and faced the mirror on my door. Dorothy shouted from the hall.

“I can loan you some makeup if you like!”

“No, thank you, Mom.” She was always trying to get me to wear makeup.

“Do you need shoes?”

“No, I have them.” I reached in the closet and found my old white Converse high-tops.

“I have beautiful white strappy heels if you'd like to try?” Dorothy said.

“No, Mom, I got it,” I shouted back. I took the brush from the dressing table and scowled at my long, curly hair. Then I took two pieces from the front on both sides, pulled them to the back, and clipped them together with a tortoiseshell barrette. I found my silver chain necklace with one single pearl in the middle and fastened it around my neck. The sapphire ring Lee gave me for Christmas sat in my ring box. I opened it up and put it on my finger. Dorothy shouted at me to get moving, I was going to be late. I threw on my high-tops and double tied them. The dress was just too long, so you couldn't see the shoes at all. Dorothy knocked, and opened the door. Her eyes went wide.

“My God, sweetheart. You are
truly stunning
.”

Dorothy's eyes started to well up. “I am proud of you, Liz.” She took a long pause. “This can't be easy,
any
of it, and I know it.” That was the first time she'd ever said anything like that. I couldn't believe she'd finally acknowledged what this might be like. I needed someone, so badly, anyone to say that out loud—that they knew it was hard. I kept my eyes wide open, hoping she wouldn't see the tears welling up. She came over and put her hands on my face. And said in her best, low, I-mean-it voice, “Now you go to
that
high school
, you keep your head high,
ignore
those brats, and
gradddduuuuatttte. . . .
” She hugged me close. Dorothy knew what I knew. The firing squad would be brutal at school. There would be gossip about the truth, and rumors, and nasty things whispered behind my back. But my mom didn't like to give attention to the bad stuff. She let go of me, headed out of the room, and then turned back around.

“I mean it, I am proud of you. I'll see you there, sweetheart.” I knew that Dorothy loved me completely. I felt the safety of that in my bones. I knew that
both
my parents, in their markedly different ways, believed and expected I would make it through all of this. They had been like two odd bookends throughout my life, leaning on either side of me, helping to hold me up with their own versions of strength, love, and encouragement. Maybe that had helped me more than I realized, because I was starting to believe I was going to be okay.

• • • •

The parking lot was crowded with kids and their fancy cars. Heads turned as my conspicuous bright green VW bug pulled in. I took a deep breath and prayed my boobs wouldn't leak. I made my way toward the gym. Kids were gathered in small groups in their graduation outfits. Many of them looked my way and whispered; several pointed and murmured. A couple girls I knew in our grade said hello. But no one asked
where
I'd been. No one asked
anything
. Everyone stayed clear, as though they might catch whatever I had if they came too close. Mom's words from three and a half years ago were echoing loudly in my head. “Mark my words, sweetheart, you will have nobody your senior year if you insist upon hanging around the girls a year older than you.” She was right.

I felt a thousand eyes watching as I made my way up the outside stairs and into the gym. The entire room had been transformed; enormous barrels of white flowers laced the aisles and podium. I gazed up at the basketball hoops and banners near the ceiling.
I made my way through the crowd to an open spot against the bleachers. I did everything I could to ignore the growing buzz and stares. I thought about the world I lived in before I left, the things that used to matter so much that didn't matter now. The whispers were turning into outright comments. Three girls I didn't know approached and then turned back around, laughing. This was bad—but bad had changed its meaning for me. I waited for myself to feel something awful, to feel the heat and shame, but somehow I was okay.

I kept my head steady, waiting for the few teachers to tell us what to do. I caught eyes with a girl across the room. It looked like she was going to wave, but instead she pointed to her stomach and made a big circle with her hands. I looked away, up at the podium where we would be receiving our diplomas. I didn't feel like crying or running. Instead I felt something strong, something that was stopping the hurt from seeping in. I didn't know until that very second that I even had that strength.

A few teachers finally began lining us up. I made my way to my section. I sat in a seat on the end of the row and began to scan the room for my parents, but didn't see either of them. Families and guests were filing in, waving and smiling to their kids. The ceremony speeches began. There was no sign of my dad, but I finally saw my mom walk in. She sat down near the back of the middle aisle. Dorothy spotted me, waved, and did her uncomfortable open-mouthed-smile thing. After a long time, the names were finally being called for diplomas. I was worried about my now incredibly sore bleeding bottom, and my boobs leaking onto my dress. I discreetly adjusted the cloth pads in my bra and then waited. Name, after applause, after name, after applause, until I heard
Elizabeth Knight Pryor
.