The Memory Box (9 page)

There’s no point in procrastinating. Today I need to resolve the inconceivable du jour: am I or am I not the real mother of my children?

The children I think are my children.

Good
God
, I can’t believe I’m even having these thoughts. This is actually on my to-do list? I don’t want to be searching for the true maternity of my girls. I want to be planning the school fundraiser and playing Scrabble with my family. Baking brownies and doing laundry. I want to put summer clothes away and vacuum sand out of the car and pick up dry-cleaning and trim fat off chicken breasts. Plunge the upstairs toilet. Get that colonoscopy.

After the girls jump out of the car at school, I look down on the passenger seat at my schedule and check the address for Truly Scrumptious, the caterer I’m hiring for Andy’s party, with whom I have a 9:00 a.m. appointment.

The meeting is short, and just as we finish up the dessert selections, my cell phone rings from the bottom of my handbag.

My body tightens. I recognize the number.

“Hello?” I say anxiously.

“Hi, Mrs. Thompson, it’s Dee Dee from Dr. Kriete’s.” Her voice is warm but anxious.

“Hi, Dee Dee, I’m so glad it’s you—”

“I got your message. You said it’s urgent that you see Dr. Kriete, but you didn’t say why. Are you all right?”

“Oh, well, yes … I’m, well, no, not really.” I look at the caterer and excuse myself into the hall for some privacy. “I mean, it
is
urgent, however, it’s regarding a personal matter.” There is an uncomfortable silence, so I clumsily continue.

“I—okay, I’ll … tell you … uh, I guess there are a few things. First, I hit my head on the bathroom sink—”

Before I continue, she interrupts, “Did you go to the ER, have you had a CT scan?”

“Oh, no, nothing like that. I’m sure I don’t need a CT scan … Um, unless it’s causing the—uh, other problems.”

“What other problems?” Dee Dee’s impatient, like there are people standing in front of her and a couple on hold.

“Well, I prefer to not go into all of that right now. On the phone.” Dee Dee is typing; then she stops and the successive flicking of a pencil against the desktop commences. She doesn’t reply. “Um, let’s call it confusion. Memory stuff.”

People in the background are chatting. I’m not sure she’s even listening to me anymore.

“And I’m pregnant.”

“Pregnant?” Got her with that one.

I brace myself for her response, which could be
Go to the Emergency Room,
or
Go to your gynecologist.
But I’m not going anywhere. Because I’m not going to the emergency room. And I’m not going to my gynecologist. Why not? Well, I don’t even remember the last time I was there. Or who my doctor is. Which is scaring the crap out of me. I mean, I must go once a year, at least.

“Listen, Dee Dee, I’d go to my gynecologist, but I need to see Dr. Kriete for the … foggy thing. And while I’m there, she can do a blood test. I need to see her. It’s very important. I’m free the entire day, and I’m not opposed to waiting.”

Dee Dee interrupts my blathering, “Dr. Kriete leaves today at four-fifteen. She said she’d squeeze you in at four if it can’t wait. But you must be on time.”

“Oh, I will. Thank you, Dee Dee. I’ll see you then. And thank you. Thank you very much.”

This is it. Dr. Kriete will help me.

It occurs to me that Dee Dee never said “Congratulations” or “How wonderful.”

Or even “Good-bye.”

Dr. Kriete has been my internist for as long as I’ve lived in this town, and if anyone can tell me what’s going on downstairs, or upstairs, she can. She’s the voice of reason. She’s calm, in control, and confident; you can tell by the way she walks, with long, slow strides, her chin slightly higher than everyone else’s. Lipstick freshly applied (she must keep one in her lab coat). She has an ease about her, and sincere warmth. She looks you straight in the eye, giving you all the time in the world as if you’re the only patient booked the entire day. I trust her implicitly.

I’m going to tell Dr. Kriete that I’ve taken an early pregnancy test, and it’s positive. That I want a blood test to be sure. I’ll tell her that my gynecologist is unavailable, and I needed to see someone right away. For all I know, I
am
pregnant. I can’t remember the last time I had my period. Anyway, if she takes my blood, I’ll know I still have the goods
and
that the article from the
Hammond Gazette
is a sham. She’d
know
if I had a hysterectomy. I’ll know Lilly and Tessa are mine. If she won’t do a blood test, well … then … well, I don’t know what then. I’ll figure that out then.

My mind quickly shifts to finding someone to watch the girls. I can pick them up from school and bring them home. It’ll take me no time to get to Dr. Kriete’s.

Meg would watch the girls in a heartbeat. And I only need an hour—I could just drop them at her house. The girls would play with Delia, and it would be a win-win. But I’m not calling Meg. I can’t see her when I’m feeling vulnerable. I don’t trust myself.

Generally speaking, in this town, the Mommy network can be brutally judgmental. The sheer number of categories you will be judged on by other women is mind-boggling: Do you exercise, volunteer, have cleaning people; let your kids eat McDonalds, watch PG-13; do you belong to the public pool, private pool, country club; do you have a weekend house, beach house, ski house? How about your hair: do you straighten, highlight, color; do you get facials, waxed, laid?

That’s until they really get to know you.

With old friends, whether you drink Coke or Classic Coke, you can yuck it up either way. Once you’re out of college and your single days are behind you, you’re truly lucky if you’ve managed to hang on to any of those old friends—the ones you’ve handpicked by careful scrutiny and examination of their loyalty and judgment. Because if you do happen to lose those bosom buddies—due, say, to the rigorous, time-consuming, pay-your-dues career years, or the I-don’t-have-time-for-you-because-of-my-new-boyfriend-and-
his
-friends years, or the I’m-so-fat-and-depressed-I-can’t-see-anyone years—the next batch of friends you don’t get to choose. Your kids do. Because they are the parents of your children’s friends.

So good luck to you. Who you get is a crapshoot.

I’ve been truly blessed with my lot.

Mrs. Hildebrand
. That’s who I’ll get to babysit.

Mrs. H, as we affectionately call her, is a dear woman. The girls refer to her as Mrs. Halitosis. They don’t care for her for obvious reasons. If only she didn’t hug them so tightly, and for so long, I think they might like her better. As soon as I leave the house, she locks the doors and lowers the blinds. She tells the girls, “No one needs to know your parents aren’t home.” Even though she’s a bit of a fretter, I can deal with it. Better to be overly cautious. It’s her napping on the job that’s a little worrisome. When the girls first told me about the “shut-eyes,” I thought it was their attempt to get their teenage babysitters instead of Mrs. H. But I called home one day to remind Mrs. H to give Tessa cough medicine, and Tessa had to wake her up to take my call. The naps are usually quickies, the girls tell me, so I haven’t made a big deal over them. I guess I like the idea of having a grandmotherly figure around. With Andy’s mother being on the agoraphobic side of normal in the Midwest, the girls barely have contact with a real grandmother. Mrs. H means well. And thankfully, she’s nearly always available.

When I arrive at Dr. Kriete’s office, Dee Dee is on the phone at the front desk. She nods at me without interrupting her conversation.

“Are you feeling chest pains now?” she says to the caller, and I manage to feel slightly better about her reaction to me this morning. She’s busy. Dee Dee doesn’t have time to say “Congratulations” to every Tom, Dick, and Harriet who claims she’s pregnant. Anyway, I’m here to see Dr. Kriete. That’s why I’m here. And Dr. Kriete is a beam of light reaching out across a dark, foggy inlet. She’ll bring me home.

I borrow a pen from the cat cup on Dee Dee’s desk and sign in.

In the waiting room, I sink into the overstuffed chintz couch and take the middle cushion since I’m the only one there. I’ve never really noticed the details before—the sunny, yellow walls and antique botanical prints framed in gold, the plump chair cushions filled with an abundance of feathers, upholstered in colorful, blooming florals. It’s more like the setting for high tea in the English countryside. I pick up a magazine to give my hands something to do and rehearse in my mind what I’m going to say.

“Mrs. Thompson.” Dee Dee is standing in front of me with my file in her hands. She ushers me down the hall and places my file in the box hanging on the outside of the door. She turns and smiles tentatively, then lowers her eyes and gestures with her arm for me to wait inside.

“Dr. Kriete will be with you shortly.” She bows out, slowly closing the door. No eye contact. No “The nurse will be right with you.” Not a word about my weight, temperature, blood pressure, or peeing in a cup.

Two beats later, Dr. Kriete comes in. She removes my chart from the door and holds it close to her chest without looking at it. Her face is uncharacteristically solemn. I check my watch to make sure I’m not late. I roll up the cuff on my white cotton shirt and undo a few of the buttons so as not to waste any of her time. She moves pensively, then sits in the wheeled chair and rolls over to the examining table, gently resting one hand on my knee. Warmth comes from her hand. She’s wearing a plummy-colored lipstick that suits her pale skin tone and dark hair. Her white lab coat reveals the animal-print blouse and black pencil skirt she’s wearing beneath it.

Her demeanor catches me off guard. Where’s that spunky Dr. Kriete?

Before she says a word, I nervously jump in. “Dr. Kriete, I hit my head here.” I point to the little Band-Aid over my eyebrow. “On the underneath of the sink, I was on the floor, and—.”

She puts the clipboard down next to me on the table and removes the Band-Aid, placing it next to me.

“I’d usually shrug off something like this, but I guess I’ve been feeling a little odd lately.”

“What do you mean by odd?” Dr. Kriete looks back at me while her hand rests on one of my knees.

“Well, forgetful,” I gulp. It’s hard for me to get the word out. “A little unsure of myself, like, not sharp.”

She grabs an instrument from the wall and looks in my eyes, then asks me when this happened. “Did you get a headache, or vomit?” My answers lead her to suggest a CT scan at the hospital. “It’s important that we rule out internal bleeding. Even though there was external bleeding, internal bleeding could still happen. You should go to the hospital today. And I’d like you to call me with the results.” She stops talking and writes in my chart, then looks at me. And I at her. We look at each other in prolonged silence. I don’t feel so good about this anymore.

“Well, there’s another reason I’m here,” I offer. “I’m pregnant.” I wring out a smile to bring some levity.

Dr. Kriete collects her thoughts. Her words come out slowly and deliberately, like she’s been planning this conversation and what she’d say. Her whole vibe is off-putting.

“Caroline,” she starts, “when Dee Dee told me you wanted to see me because you thought you were pregnant, well, I gave it a lot of consideration. You’ve been my patient for almost six years—so I’m gonna give it to you straight.”

CHAPTER SEVEN

Monday, September 25, 2006, 4:11p.m.

D
r. Kriete doesn’t sound like her usual self. What’s she talking about, “I’m gonna give it to you straight”?

All of a sudden, I’m aware of my heartbeat.

Dr. Kriete holds her gaze on mine. “Caroline, it’s time we got another doctor involved. We’ve talked about this before …”

As she says this, I reach for the Band-Aid to put it back on my head. My fingers feel strange as they do this. Almost numb. Tingly. The sensation moves to my hands and feet. I try wiggling my toes, but I no longer feel their presence. The rest of my body feels like it’s separating into millions of minuscule particles that are all drifting apart and away from where my body should be.

Dr. Kriete’s face contorts; she becomes stern and rigid. “Caroline, you filled out a medical history form the day of your first visit, over five years ago. It’s right here in your file. You wrote that you have two daughters who were delivered vaginally. You checked “no” for C-section and “no” for hysterectomy. Yet you have a scar. And you did then. I noted it during your first exam.”

She keeps talking. Her words gently bump off my skin, against my eyelids … and cheeks … and my ears. They sneak into my mouth and fill up my lungs and throat and gag me—I start to cough spastically.

She reaches into her lab coat and pulls out a pair of frameless reading glasses. She opens the file. “June 17, 2001 …” she slides her finger down the page, “Hysterectomy scar noted—unremarkable.”

I’m submerged in her words. I’m drowning in them. They’re like bubbles in a fish tank, blub, blub, blub … I’m not sure I’m breathing, but I must be because every once in a while I hear her again. Bits and pieces of real words make their way inside my brain.

“Sometimes patients go through these medical history forms quickly and mark “no” without really thinking or reading. So I gave you the benefit of the doubt. But in November 2003,” she looks down into the folder, “you complained of abdominal pain. ‘Diagnostic laparoscopy ordered for possible adhesions,’ is what I wrote. I sent you to a gynecologist, and you later had the adhesions surgically removed. They were caused by the hysterectomy. We talked about this, Caroline.”

When? Where was
I?
I want to ask her these questions, but I can’t gather the words.

“Your uterus and ovaries have been removed. I’ve asked you about this before, and when I did I got the sense you didn’t want to talk about it. But now I get a sense that you truly don’t remember. Is that it, Caroline? Do you remember that surgery?”

Her mouth stops moving, like she’s waiting for something. Then she takes off her glasses and puts the folder to the side.

“The hysterectomy happened before your daughters were born. There’s no way it could’ve happened after they were born and before you started as my patient. The scar would never have appeared that way. Now how could that be?”

Her words stop feeling like bubbles. Now, they’re sharp and pointy and dangerous and accusatory. My head is spinning, thoughts whirl through my brain, but I’m muddled; my mind is swampy. I can’t extract anything.

“There’s one thing I can tell you beyond a shadow of a doubt: you’re not pregnant, and unfortunately you won’t be in the future.”

I’ve got to get out. She’s sitting too close—it’s suffocating me. I need air. I can’t breathe.

“Listen, Caroline, you have two beautiful girls who love you very much.”

If they’re not mine, whose are they?! I wish I could say this, but my thoughts won’t cooperate with my mouth.

“You have a wonderful husband. You know you can’t get pregnant. Stop torturing yourself this way. It’s time I recommend you talk to a psychologist about this. You deserve to sort this out and make sense of it all, and move on with your life.”

She tilts her head, “Caroline? Are you okay?”

Her mouth stops moving. Her lips meet in a restful state, silencing her. Thank God. She’s going to spare what’s left of me and let me go. I try to slide myself off the examining table by swinging my dangling feet to get momentum.

She rolls her wheeled chair closer to me and quiets my legs with her hands. “Of course, if there’s ever anything you’d like to talk about … Regardless, I strongly urge you see a psychologist. I’ll have Dee Dee prepare a list of recommended doctors, and, of course, I would be available to speak with the one you choose.”

In one move, I slide my legs to the side opposite Dr. Kriete and heave my calves with just enough strength to land my feet on the floor. But my knees give out. My legs buckle. Dr. Kriete catches me. And lowers me into a chair, which she’s dragged over with her foot. She sits across from me and holds both my hands, talking gently in a friendly, sing-song way. Tilts her head and smiles. Asks something. Someone’s age? Someone’s birth date? She picks up one of her hands and snaps her fingers in my face. I smell peroxide or something nasty under my nose. She says something about “water” and “husband.” “His number.” Something about “driving.” “Relax.” She pats my knee. She walks backward toward the door. She opens it and yells. She looks back at me behaving nicely, and ducks out of the room.

I try to get up again. I hold onto the examining table. My eyes focus briefly on the box of hypodermic needles. In long strides, I get out the door and down the hall, but stumble on the rug at the entrance to the waiting room.

Not
mine?
They’re mine!

The room is like the Tea Cup ride at Disney. There’s a pregnant lady tidying up the waiting room, organizing the magazines, dusting. She hobbles my way, bends over and extends her arm. I imagine her on a lifeboat, reaching over the side to grab my hand, in vain, while I float slowly out to sea. I reach for her and support my weight with my other hand by pushing against the floor.

“Are you okay?” she asks.

A moment later I’m out of there, in the hall, out of the building, and in my car.

The air is bracing against my face. I take in big gulps. She’s going to call Andy. I finally piece it together. I check my watch to see how long it’s been since I was sitting with her. No watch. I turn the key in the ignition for the dashboard clock to light up, but I hold the key forward too long and it grinds the engine and spews a grating, painful sound. An old man on the other side of the parking lot shoots an annoyed “Don’t you know what you’re doing?” look. How dare he judge me? I honk the horn, with all the weight of both hands so the sound wails endlessly. He hurries into his car and drives away—his tires screech around the turn.

They may not know I’m gone yet. I could be in the bathroom. It’ll take a few minutes to find Andy’s office number in my file. I dump the contents of my handbag on the passenger seat and grab my cell phone to call Dr. Kriete’s office from the parking lot. The phone slips out of my sweaty, trembling hand; I snatch it from the seat beside me and hold it with both hands to my ear.

Dee Dee answers; she’s flipped out. “Where are you, Mrs. Thompson? You shouldn’t be alone, and no way should you drive—”

I take one hand off the phone to shift into reverse, then into drive, and swerve out of the parking lot, navigating my way home. “Listen, Dee Dee,” I try to interrupt, but she’s like a wind-up toy in the fully wound position, “Listen, Dee Dee … Dee Dee! …
listen to me
—I’m going to hang up unless you listen.” Silence. “You tell Dr. Kriete not to call my husband. I can’t have her call him and discuss—any of this—with him. Do you understand?
Please—I beg of you
.
Please.
I just need a little time. Plus, I’m her
patient
. Do you get that? This stuff is between us. You tell her that. If she discusses this with anyone, well, she can kiss her license good-bye. Got it? You go tell her right now before she calls him. Are you listening?”

“Yes, Mrs. Thompson.” She then whispers to somebody.

“Besides, he’s—under a lot of stress. I just can’t—concern him with any of this—stuff right now. Are you there, Dee Dee? Did you hear me?”

In a robotic, conciliatory way, she says, “Yes, Mrs. Thompson. I understand. But that doesn’t change the fact that you’re in no condition to drive.”

“Dee Dee—”

“The cleaning lady told me you fainted in the waiting room.”

“I didn’t faint. I tripped.”

“Whatever. You’re not displaying the signs of—”

“Dee Dee! I’m hanging up. You get to Dr. Kriete before she makes a mistake.”

I press “End” and throw the phone on the passenger seat as I veer onto Brightwood Road. I swerve up our driveway without slowing and nearly take out a boxwood at the edge of the house.

None of the keys work in the lock on the front door. I don’t have the patience to wait until they do. I run around to the back of the house and try the key there. It opens. The house is remarkably quiet, except for giggling coming from upstairs. Where is Mrs. H? Smarty Pants meets me in the kitchen and cocks his head to one side. When I don’t pick him up, he follows me.

Perhaps they’ve pinned Mrs. H to the bathroom floor, brushing and flossing her teeth against her will. Or she could be sleeping.

I give a sharp tug to my shirt hem and quickly fasten the remaining buttons. Then calmly leap the stairs by two. The bathroom door is closed, and their laughter grows more animated. Something’s amiss.

I slowly push open the door.

When the girls see me in the doorway, they suddenly freeze mid-motion as if I had a gun.

They’ve rigged the shower curtain so it swoops down into one end of the bathtub, and they’re using the hand-held shower sprayer to soak the curtain to create a water slide for their old Barbies, which haven’t seen the light of day for years. Lilly is standing up on the ledge of the tub dropping the Barbies on the shower curtain from above, while Tessa is soaking the “slide.” Where the hell is Mrs. H? The entire bathroom is a water park. But I don’t concern myself with that right now. I just need to see them.

“Mom—” is all Tessa can come up with.

I take a deep breath to encourage my heart to slow. Okay. Lilly really, really looks like me. It’s not my imagination—people often say so. Our brows and the shape of our eyes, even if they’re not the same color. Our expressions. We resemble each other at the
very
least. Everyone always says Tessa looks more like Andy. I give them both a bear hug and kiss them a few hundred times. My reaction to their girl-induced disaster leaves them speechless with their mouths agape. I turn to leave the bathroom and yell, “You’ve got five minutes to make that place look like Phoenix in August! Where’s Mrs. H? Tell her I’m home.”

I need to collapse.

And I do, on my bed. Smarty jumps up and rests his chin on my stomach. I don’t know what to think anymore. What to believe.
Who
to believe.

How much more of this can I stand with no one to turn to?

My body sinks lower and lower into the bed. The mattress and my body become indistinguishable. My eyes are gently closed, and I am, for a mere second, at rest.

There’s something on the inside of my eyelids. My eyelids become miniature movie screens for an apparition that’s being sent to me. An image so faint, I strain to make it out. It’s a book. One I haven’t seen in years. There’s a photo on the book’s cover. The photo, of a newborn baby, is surrounded by pink bows that line up end to end, bordering its outer edges The baby is naked, sleeping in a nest of feathers. I’ve seen it before. My eyes burst open. It’s Lilly’s baby book! Oh my God, of course! Lilly’s baby book! Why didn’t I think of that!!

I spring off the bed. Smarty practically backflips onto the floor.

This is it—this is what I’ve been waiting for. Of course—it’s all there in black and white. Lilly’s baby book. The answers! The truth. Thank you,
thank you
—whoever sent this to me. I can’t wait to see Dr. Kriete’s face when I tell her. This ordeal may have sucked the life out of me, but it didn’t take my uterus.

At once I’m alive with hope. I
knew
I wasn’t going crazy. Of course these girls are
mine
. And now—finally—the truth is at my fingertips.

Now, where
is
that book? I dig deep to mentally retrace my steps. It should be on the bookshelf in the den—but I don’t think it is. Though it’s illogical to me, in my mind’s eye, I see it in my bedroom closet.

I tear open the closet door. The closet is oversized thanks to an addition we built onto our house a year after we moved in. Actually, we had two walk-in closets built, his and hers, side by side. Andy keeps his the way he wants. I keep mine the way I want. It’s an insurance policy on our marriage. A high percentage of divorces are due to vastly different levels of tidiness. Plus, old Colonials weren’t built with enough closet space or big enough bathrooms for happy marriages. I race to the back of the closet, passing my fall/winter wardrobe to the right, spring/summer to the left, and a section of each side is dedicated to small cubbies for stacks of sweaters and jeans. The back wall is lined with shelves; shoe boxes fill the lower ones. Something propels me to the top shelf, to a bunch of extra pillows and piles of old, faded linens. I pull a few of the pillows down and let them fall to the floor, but the shelves are extra deep so it takes a stepladder and a full torso stretch to reach behind the linens. Touching the back wall of the closet, there are two books standing up on their sides. Their bindings are facing away. They’re Lilly
and
Tessa’s baby books!

To reach the first, I need to tip my head so my arm will extend to its max. My fingertips feel the hard cover and I inch it out without seeing it. I’m finally able to yank it down.
The World Atlas.

What the heck is this doing in my closet? I drop it to the floor, and the stepladder shifts from its weight. That’s going to the den. My hand reaches back for the other book. My fingers, like a tweezers, pinch the book. An Anne Geddes photo of a fat, rippled newborn swathed in a bed of feathers is on the cover. It’s not a photo of Lilly—but I kiss it anyway—I know what this is!

It’s Lilly’s baby book, and I’m higher than the moon. I’m leaping out of my skin with hope. God, I haven’t seen this thing in too long. I fan through it quickly with my thumb, while still at the top of the stepladder. With my eyes closed, I hug it tightly and kiss it once more. I browse slower this time. I want to smell it. And breathe the air that dances from the flurry of pages. I sit down on the middle step of the ladder. From a quick glance, it looks like there are very few written entries and even fewer photos, which surprises me. I thought I did more with it. But I don’t care. It doesn’t look like anything is entered after her second birthday. Hmm, I guess that’s life. You start with gusto—all enthusiastic and excited to capture every milestone, then days and weeks trickle by and you get caught up with mundane stuff. If you have two kids, it’s even harder to keep up these sorts of things.