Some Kind of Normal (26 page)

The memory of Donna Jean in the bathroom flits
through my mind, and I let my eyes wander across the aisles until I
see her, sitting straight as an Indian next to her very expensive
and educated-looking husband. She's listening to the sermon. Not
pretending, but really listening. It means something to her,
something that is just out of reach to me.

Next to me is Travis, who would give up his own
daughter for what he thinks God tells us about the value of
life.

Last night I snuck the SAT book out of Logan's room
to read while I smoked. I got stuck up on the word "elusive." The
big black sky, the vastness of space, the stars flung there by a
God who is bigger than all of it. A God who wants to love me, if
only I'd believe. A daughter whose life hangs on the thread of
possibility. One more insulin. One more steroid. One more trial.
The answer's there, if only we could find it. Could there be a more
heart wrenching word than elusive?

At the end of the service, Ashley begs to go see her
friends, so Travis and me watch her scamper down the aisle. Most of
them gather around her, but a few avoid eye contact and slip out
the back door. Donna Jean comes to say hi as does Pastor Joel and
baby Mary Ashley, but most people look away and busy themselves
with other things. Pastor Joel presses Mary Ashley into my arms,
and I feel the warmth of her tiny body against me. My chest hurts
the way it did when I nursed my own, an ache to pour life into her
and hold her close and keep her safe. She smells of milk and baby
powder, and when I think I can't breathe anymore, I place her back
in Pastor Joel's arms and rush out the back door myself.

Travis finds me on the bench in the gardens and sits
without saying anything. The sky is so blue it hurts my eyes. I
haven't told him about the Google hits on Dr. Van Der Campen, but
now I can't keep the secret anymore and it all spills out.

His puts his arm around me, and I finally melt into
him. "Are all of them right? Are we doing the wrong thing?"

He puts his lips to my head; I can feel his breath in
my hair. "What's done is done, Babs." At first I think he talking
about us and the clinical trial, but then I realize as he talks,
he's talking about Jack. "We all make mistakes. The best we can do
is learn from them and move on. And it seems like Dr. Van Der
Campen has done that. He's not testing embryos anymore. And Ashley
isn't getting baby cells. She's getting her own."

"Everyone thinks--"

"Everyone thinks wrong. We know. That's all that
matters."

We sit in the garden, quiet together, until Donna
Jean comes looking for us and tells us the crowd is getting bigger
outside, and we should take Logan and Ashley and go.

We don't stay for cookies and punch and socializing.
By the looks of everyone not looking at us, there wouldn't be much
socializing anyway. We find Logan on the stage looking over the
drum set and talking with the praise band members, and Ashley's in
the basement with a few friends. We go through the basement walk-up
to get to the car and manage to get almost out of the parking lot
before anyone sees us.

~~~~

There's an article you should read this morning,"
Travis says, downing his orange juice before heading out to
work.

"I ain't got time to read some NASCAR update," I say,
punching cereal carbs into a calculator. "You can't have this," I
tell Ashley, handing her back the box to put away. Dr. Benton told
us no more than fifteen carbs a meal, less if we can do it. The
insulin pumped through Max into the umbilical vein is only partly
successful, and the last two days I've watched her sugars start to
go back up.

"That's okay. I'd rather have bacon."

"We don't got that. Your dad can't eat it."

"How 'bout a hot dog?"

"Fine." I stick a hot dog in the microwave, not
caring that it's not exactly a breakfast food. It's protein. It's
three carbs. It works.

"It's not NASCAR," Travis says, tossing the paper
across the counter. "It's the trial."

"Is it about me?" Ashley grabs at it, eager to see
her name in print which, if it's up to us, will be never.

"Eat your breakfast," I say, shoving the hot dog with
no bun at her and taking the paper.

"I gotta go." Travis leans over and pecks my cheek, a
new habit that's growing on me, and leaves. I sit on the stool at
the counter and open the paper. On page two, there's a picture of
Dr. Van Der Campen and a short article about the trial, although as
I read I figure out it's more about him than anything.

As I read the first paragraph, I worry I'll see all
those things from the Internet about him, and I don't want Ashley
thinking we could be sleeping with the devil here. As far as she
knows, Dr. Benton found him for us, and that alone made him all
right in my eyes. But as I skim the article, it's not just about
his embryonic research, and I realize how little I know about him
as a person and a doctor.

I scan over his credentials. They're a long list of
ivy-league sounding names, some of which are overseas, and research
grants he's been given. The article explains a little about the
trial in the Netherlands, although it fails to tell about how each
of the patients is fairing and mostly emphasizes the fact that he
did it there 'cause the U.S. wasn't too keen on letting him do it
here.

It all seems very unimportant and I'm beginning to
wonder why Travis thought I'd be interested when the last paragraph
gets me in the gut. I reread it, wondering what significance it
might have. Medically, it means nothing. Personally, it changes
everything. Despite the way the doctor hardly talks to us and comes
off like he's thinking of himself better than us, I suddenly feel
kinship with him.

"What is it, Mom?" Ashley is peering over my
shoulder, and I consider hiding the article but then decide she
might as well know.

She takes the paper and reads the article half out
loud, mumbling through parts she finds boring, but getting clearer
towards the end as she reads his personal info.

"Van Der Campen was once married with a daughter of
his own, when, at age three, his daughter developed type 1
diabetes." She stops and looks at me.

"Go on," I say.

She reads more. "Struck with a complication called
hypoglycemic unawareness, his daughter fell into a coma at the age
of eleven when her blood sugar plunged, and she died before rescue
workers could revive her." Her eyes grow wide. "Oh mom, his little
girl died!"

I don't know if she knows what hypoglycemic
unawareness is. I remember seeing it on one of the message boards,
but I can't pinpoint what it is. Something about high or low blood
sugars.

"His wife, also a diabetic, unable to cope with the
guilt of passing on the genetic DNA that caused her daughter's
diabetes, and ultimately her death, killed herself less than a year
later," she continues. "These events spurred Van Der Campen to
finding a cure, driving him out of the United States and to another
country where he could test his theories, and then back home, in
hopes of saving even one family the tragedy that has haunted his
own."

Ashley holds the paper a minute, staring at the words
before putting it down. I lay my hand on her shoulder, but she
brushes it off and leaves the room without another word.

~~~~

The great thing about the hospital was that, when we
were there, there's nothing else but Ashley and getting well. Back
home, the rest of life waits for us.

After our less-than-inspirational Sunday at church,
Monday brings one more thing I'd like to avoid: the county school
board.

We missed the end of the month meeting while Ashley
was in the hospital, but they've made a special session just for
us. The meeting room is small and ugly, too-bright fluorescent
lights covering the ceiling and a long, fake wood table that the
board members sit behind and try to look important.

I have no idea what to expect, other than a battle,
so I'm armed with a folder full of Ashley's school records: her
straight-A report card and her student-of-the-month certificates
and the bumper stickers we get year after year for her outstanding
behavior. I have her medical records from the past few months and
the 504 that Travis and I never filled out since she never went
back to school.

Turns out I don't need none of them though, 'cause
one of the board members holds out a letter from her principal
saying she believed the "incident" with Ashley was merely a lack of
information on our parts, and that it would be a shame for Ashley
to be penalized for something that clearly was not a risk to
others. Also, there's the note we sent to the nurse that day, who
was out of town and didn't get it in time. She sent in a letter of
apology for the mix up.

"Technically," a stodgy-looking man with a bushy
mustache says, "we could expel her. Zero tolerance means we don't
give exceptions to ignorance." I bite my tongue so I don't say
nothing to get us more in trouble and wait for him to finish.

"Clearly, though," a girthy woman with big hair says,
"it wouldn't serve either the school or Ashley well to expel
her."

I wait.

"Should we vote?" asks the mustache man. "All in
favor of dismissing the case against Ashley Babcock, say aye." All
five member say aye. "So dismissed," he says. I expect him to bang
a gavel or something, but he merely shoves the papers off to the
side and opens a new folder.

"Now let's deal with the case against Logan Babcock."
The others shuffle their papers, too.

My evidence in favor of Logan is much thinner. He
don't have the stellar grades Ashley's got, nor the certificates
for behavior. Ashley's case I was mad about. Logan's I'm worried
about.

"We have some witnesses, I believe?" girthy woman
says, motioning to a woman I hadn't noticed in the back of the
room. She nods and opens the door. Three people enter. One is the
baseball coach, one is the principal, and the other is a teacher, I
think.

The principal begins by explaining the charges
against Logan, emphasizing what she calls "the disparity between
his grades and his test scores." She's brought his report cards and
the standardized test scores and places them on the table in front
of the board members like she's some lawyer laying out evidence for
her case.

"This is not the first time Mr. Babcock has been in
trouble with this school, either," she adds. "He has shown a
pattern of disrespect for both the school system and authority and
is considered by almost all of the administration and staff as
rebellious."

"How so?" I charge.

"Yes," says a tiny lady behind the table. "How
so?"

"For one, his clothes and hair. Even though he has
received multiple warnings, and I have spoken to Mrs. Babcock here
about it several times, he continues to wear his hair in a Mohawk
and dye it neon colors. It's extremely distracting to the other
students and to the staff members."

The teacher I don't know, who is sitting in the
chairs behinds me, clears his throat. "I haven't found it to be at
all distracting," he says.

"And it's not against the dress code," I add. "If it
were against the dress code, I'd make him change it, but it's
not."

"Yes, well. . ." says mustache man. "If he isn't
breaking any rules, we can't exactly take that into consideration
in this case."

"But it goes to show his overall attitude towards the
school system," Mrs. Gianuzzi says, pulling herself up to her full
5'3" height.

"But this isn't about his attitude towards school or
authority," the tiny lady says. "It's about one particular
incident, with one particular test. Do you have proof that Logan
took this test, and that he used it to cheat?"

The principal starts explaining how she found the
test, and how she knows it's Logan's locker, and how she then went
to examine his test scores and that the scores shows he clearly
cheated in some way. The board members listen with no expression on
their faces. My stomach is churning.

"Can I add something," the teacher behind me says,
standing up. I've got a sinking feeling like my stomach has dropped
into my toes. The mustache man, who I now gather is the head person
here, motions him forward.

"It's true that Logan is not the best student. He
doesn't always turn in his homework, and he doodles a lot in class
instead of taking notes." He looks sideways at me and smiles. "But
he is, as a person, an outstanding individual, and smart as they
come. He's probably the smartest kid I've ever taught."

I'm sure my jaw is dropping. I clamp my teeth
together to make sure I don't look surprised that someone is
complimenting my son.

"What do you teach?" asks the girthy lady.

"Science. Chemistry and physics. Logan was in my
chemistry class this year. He didn't make A's because he didn't do
the homework all the time, but I'll tell you, he never missed one
question on a test. Not one. And I can't say that about anyone else
in class. He didn't need a cheat sheet to pass that standardized
test. He could have done it with his eyes closed."

Mrs. Gianuzzi starts to say something, but the man
raises his hand to her and she stops. "Dave, do you have something
to add?" He looks past me at the baseball coach, who comes forward
as well. I think about the fight Logan got into in the locker room
and figure this whole deal is now done. Alternative school, here we
come.

But Dave don't say anything about the fight. Instead,
he tells about his relationship with Logan over the past three
years; how he found him on the middle school baseball team and saw
such great talent, and how he feels like Logan is his second son,
and how Logan has better sportsmanship than any kid he's taught.
"He would never, ever cheat," he finishes. "It goes against
everything he is."