Three Black Swans (23 page)

“What are you talking about?”

“I made plans. I’m keeping them.” Missy spun around and strode away.

Claire had to run to keep up. Missy was moving so fast that Claire knew her only by her black puff of hair. High over the wide hall into which Missy hurtled were carved letters that
read
SHUTTLE
. Claire threaded desperately through the crowds. “What are you doing?” she demanded.

“I have to see Genevieve. Just the way I have to see you, Claire. If I don’t see you every week, I feel as if I’m peeling off. Friday night was torture. Right now, I’m skinless. There’s no person left to me. Only meat.”

Well, that was the most sickening analogy Claire had ever heard. But at least Claire was needed. And to the exact same degree, apparently, Genevieve was needed. Of course it’s the exact same degree, thought Claire. Because the three of us are exactly the same.

Missy bought a subway pass at the ticket machine, swiped it through a turnstile and handed the pass back to Claire so she could swipe. Missy didn’t wait. She galloped down the stairs to the brightly lit shuttle station.

I could catch a return train, thought Claire. Bail out and go home.

Missy had reached the bottom of the stairs and was hurrying toward a mostly full car. Its doors were still open, but the conductor was looking out his window, assessing departure time. In moments the doors would close. The train would leave.

Claire was as unable to detach from Missy as if they were still sharing a womb. She swiped through the stile and took the stairs two at a time, raced past subway musicians and bounded into the last car as the door was closing. The shuttle jerked out of the station and gathered speed. When they reached Times Square, Missy found the southbound #1
line, and they went one stop to Thirty-fourth Street and got off.

Claire found New York only mildly interesting, except for when she found it overwhelming. There was always too much to think about in New York. But Missy adored the city and loved navigating through the crowds. She led the way down long underground corridors lined by every fast food in world cuisine. The mixture of smells Claire normally found enticing made her gag. In no time, they were in the station for the Long Island Railroad, and Missy was buying tickets from a wall machine, and ten minutes later they were headed out of New York.

The train window was dirty and scratched. Outside, rain fell in patches. There were stops. People got on and off. Claire felt as thick and misty as the weather. The speed at which Missy and the trains were changing her life reduced Claire to a puddle.

“Next stop is ours,” said Missy. Missy was trembling, but Claire did not think it was fear. Claire didn’t know. This time Claire did not share the feeling. “I didn’t bring the map,” said Missy, eyes glued to the window, “but I memorized it. Fourteen Bayberry Lane is kind of near the train station. We’ll walk if there’s no taxi.”

“Missy, the parents flipped out at the mere thought of us. Is this wise? I mean, should we ask first?”

“Of course we’re not going to ask. They’d flip out even more or else say no. Who cares about them, Clairedy? Genevieve wants to see us or she wouldn’t have started this. And I have to see her. I am ninety-nine point nine percent sure Genevieve
is our identical sister, but I’m not one hundred percent sure. I have to know one hundred percent. The minute I see her, I will know.”

Claire had always accepted the family belief that Missy was the little one, the lightweight. But in fact, for years now, Missy had been the leader and Claire the follower. And back in the TV studio, Claire had been certain that Missy was older. What about Genevieve? What order were the girls in? Was Claire the baby of the family?

What family?

I don’t want to know, thought Claire.

Next to her, Missy expanded with joy while Claire shrank with horror, in some ghastly identical twin equation.

*  *  *

G
ENEVIEVE CIRCLED HER
chair and stood behind it, gripping the upholstery with both hands. The vision of an infant absent-mindedly left by its own mother to bake to death made her ill. “You didn’t do that to me,” she said to Allegra, unable to say “Mom.” “I didn’t cook in a backseat. Neither did Missy or Claire. We’re all three alive.”

“I did do it,” cried her mother.

Suddenly her father was glaring at his wife. “Allegra, don’t dramatize!”

Since normally Ned thrived on Allegra’s drama, his wife was
hurt and amazed that he wasn’t keeping up his supporting role. He turned his back on her. “The truth is dramatic enough, Vivi.”

“And what is the truth, Dad?”

He wavered. He looked at his wife.

“I thought it was all gone,” Allegra moaned. “And here it is on a video! Online! People will know.”

“I’d like to be one of the people who know,” said Genevieve. “Was there some crime involved? What are you afraid of? It’s just adoption!”

“It wasn’t criminal,” said her mother defensively. “People do it all the time. We both decided. Your father and I. Together.”

“I don’t care who’s to blame. I just want to know who I am.”

Allegra Candler reached for her handbag. She got out her compact and checked her face. She powdered. For Allegra, makeup was body armor. Her moment of weakness was gone. Allegra Candler was not going to tell Genevieve anything.

“Dad,” said Genevieve.

“The truth is ugly,” he said at last. “I apologize for it, Vivi. We never wanted children. When we found out we were going to have a baby, though, we decided it would be okay. We were the right age, our friends were having children, it didn’t look that hard. And then we found out we were going to have three. We couldn’t stand it. We gave two away.”

Genevieve let go of the chair. She stepped back. After a moment, she stepped farther back. Then she turned to stare
down the little front hall into the darkness. She could not tolerate these people in her field of vision.

The concept of being adopted had shocked her. The sight of two identical sisters had shocked her. But more shocking was the truth. She was not adopted. She had been born to this man and woman: married, successful, well-to-do, attractive suburbanites. Who had kept one child out of three. As if their daughters had been a litter of kittens.

That
was shock.

Her parents were not charitable. When there was no escape, they might write a tiny check to a neighbor collecting for a cause, or put a single dollar in the church offertory plate. Last spring when Genevieve sold grapefruit to raise money for new high school band uniforms—her parents had bought her a good flute, although they almost never saw her play—Ned and Allegra were grumpy about the cost even when they got grapefruit in return.

But they had given away one thing rather easily.

No.

Two things. Their children.

Genevieve moved all the way into the dark little hall. She stayed in the center, as if even touching the wall her parents had painted would infect her.

I can’t ever meet Missy and Claire now, she thought. How could I face them? I’m the one our parents kept. They’re the ones our parents—

Genevieve’s heart stopped. She walked back. Her eyes were
opening wider and wider. A cold, hideous fear was filling the back of her head.

No, she thought. No, no, no, no, no. “You didn’t charge a baby fee, did you? You didn’t get paid, did you? You didn’t get the down payment on this house by selling my sisters, did you?”

A
LLEGRA
C
ANDLER HATED
remembering the year she’d turned thirty. The brilliant career was plain old work. Eight or nine hours a day, plus a commute, and for what? Yes, she had terrific clothes and shoes. Yes, she was slender and beautiful. But she was old! One morning she found a gray hair. She yanked it out and the next day there was another.

It was no surprise that she felt sick and listless. Her body was going downhill. Her ankles grew thick and her ivory complexion became patchy. Allegra loved a mirror. She looked at herself in full-length mirrors and wall mirrors, the mirror in her compact and the mirror that pulled out from the bathroom wall. She looked at her reflection in every store window she passed. The occupation was ruined. It was not until her zippers would not zip that she realized she was pregnant. When she thought of stretch marks, she wanted to scream. She would be disfigured, and for what? For something that cried and whined and got wet and stinky and stayed up all night and cost money.

How were she and Ned supposed to keep up their lives?
What would happen to the parties and dances and season tickets?

And what if she didn’t even love this baby? Her love didn’t go as far as other people’s. It was finite. She loved Ned. There wasn’t leftover love waiting around for some baby.

The weeks passed. Allegra couldn’t bring herself to go to a doctor. She hated doctors’ examinations anyway, and pregnancy meant more of them. Ned coaxed her to make a doctor’s appointment and he went along.

Enough weeks had gone by that they could view this future baby on ultrasound. “We’ll be able to see the sex of the baby,” said the obstetrician happily.

Once Allegra knew if it was a boy or a girl, it would be real. She would have to think about its room and its clothes and its bed and its stroller. She would have to think about diapers.

“If it’s a girl,” Ned said, “we’ll name her for my grandmother. Genevieve. My grandmother will be thrilled.” (In front of the doctor, Ned did not add, “And she’ll give the baby lots of money.”)

Allegra didn’t like the name Genevieve. But she didn’t actually care what name the baby had. I should read a book about depression, she thought. I’ve heard of postpartum depression, which I’m sure I will have. It stands to reason that there’s prepartum depression, which I definitely have.

“Wow,” said the obstetrician. “Wow.”

What could be “wow” about yet another baby for a guy who saw them every day? Reluctantly, Allegra looked at the blurry black-and-white image on the screen.

The doctor was ready to high-five. “Congratulations. You’re going to have triplets.” With his finger, he traced the babies’ outlines.

It was like a horror film. Three creatures were swimming around inside her!

“Three little girls!” the doctor told them, laughing out loud, eyes fixed on the ultrasound, as if he actually loved the little swirly shapes.

“We could delete two, couldn’t we?” asked Allegra. It was arithmetic: simple subtraction.

The doctor’s face went blank. His shoulders lowered. “There is such a procedure.” His body language was clear. The doctor thought less of her.

Ned said, “Let’s think about it, Legs.”

They went home. Allegra made an error. She would pay for this error all her life. That night she left a message on her boss’s phone.
I have to take a sick day. I’m pregnant and feel awful
.

Her boss telephoned in the morning. “We’re so excited for you! We’re already planning a shower! Is it a boy or a girl?”

There was no way now to have zero babies. Allegra said, “Girl.”

Allegra became more important than she had ever been in her life. She was more important in the neighborhood. People dropped by, offered help (“We’ll paint the baby’s room for you”) and insisted on new rules (“You can’t put the baby upstairs when you sleep downstairs; you’ll never hear the baby cry”). She was more important at work. She was more
important to Ned’s grandmother. Genevieve Candler was indeed thrilled that they would name her first great-grandchild after her.

And the others, Allegra had thought. What are we supposed to name the others? I don’t want the others!

“How are you feeling?” people asked. “Has the baby started kicking yet?”

There isn’t a baby, Allegra would think. There’s a stream of them. A series.

She couldn’t drag herself to the doctor’s. Every decision, whether to have a baby or to have breakfast, was beyond her. She got nausea from pregnancy and nausea from imagining her future.

Her colleagues gave her a baby shower. Allegra forced herself to coo and clap over teensy eensy garments. She did not use the terrifying words “triplet” or “multiples.”

There would be a huge awkward stroller with three babies sticking out in a row. When the babies were old enough to walk, she’d have to put them in harnesses like sled dogs. Mealtimes would be assembly lines of whiny children and boring food. She and Ned did not prepare meals. They ate out. Children were worthless in restaurants. They never liked the food and wanted to leave before it had been served anyway.

Allegra could not imagine the expense. The diapers alone would beggar them.

The decision came about one evening when Ned admitted he didn’t want three babies either. He loved golf and parties
and sailing. He wanted expensive things, like antique cars and great watches. Now he’d have to invest every cent in babies, who would be around for eighteen years plus college.

“We have to keep one,” said Ned, “because everybody knows we’re having a baby. But let’s give the others up. Unmarried mothers do it all the time. We happen to be married, but what difference does that make? A woman has the right to choose. Let’s choose to be a mother once.”