Leap (18 page)

Sitting in hospital waiting rooms gives me the creeps. Especially when you have no idea what the hell is going on behind a set of heavy, wooden doors.

Jocelyn cries as my mom holds her. We haven’t seen or heard from Mack since we arrived here over an hour ago. You can cut the tension with a knife. Veronica’s mom sits in a chair by the window and prays aloud. Lizzie sits and holds my hand. Owen paces back and forth not sure what to do. When we got here, Mack was rushed into the maternity ward. He looked back at me when the doors shut. I wanted to tell him not to worry, but my gut is telling me another story.

A sound startles us and we look up to see a man dressed in scrubs with a mask hanging around his neck come through the door.

“Mrs. Matthews?” Veronica’s mom stands up and goes to him.

“My daughter. Is she okay? There was so much blood and vomit. I didn’t know what to do when I found her.”

The doctor motions for her to take a seat. He sits beside her and we wait.

“Mrs. Matthews, are you aware that your daughter has been using intravenous drugs?” Veronica’s mother stares in disbelief and shakes her head no.

“Mrs. Matthews, your daughter overdosed this evening which put her into labor. We had to do an emergency cesarean because she was brought in unconscious. Her heart stopped several times and our medical team brought her back; however, the lack of oxygen to her brain may have done significant damage. She’s not awake, and I’m very sorry to tell you, she may not wake up.”

The woman faints and falls off her chair. Daddy and Owen rush to pick her up off the floor. Jocelyn screams and stands up.

They wheel her away on a gurney

“The baby. Where is the baby? Where is my son?”

“Are you Mr. Cooper’s mother?” Jocelyn nods. “The baby is small, but so far she seems to be okay. We won’t know if the drugs her mother was using affected her just yet. Sometimes it could be a delayed reaction. We’re keeping a close eye on her.”

Her.

“Is Mack with her?” I ask.

The doctor turns to me. “Are you Corrine?” I nod.

“Mr. Cooper is asking for you and his mother. Are you a relative?”

Jocelyn speaks up, “She is. She’s his sister.”

“Then both of you come with me.” I grab Jocelyn’s hand and look to my parents as they cry and mouth to me they love me as I follow the doctor behind the large, heavy wooden doors. I have no idea what I’m going to see when I reach the other side. All I know is that I’m scared.

CORRINE ~ PRESENT DAY

I’
m not feeling very well today. The pain is bad. I call to my mother over Haven’s old baby monitor to come to my room.

She rushes into my room.

“What’s wrong, baby?”

“It hurts. It really hurts today.” I cry like a baby. I’m ashamed and I feel so alone.

“I’ll go get your pain pills and some juice. Be right back. Stay still.”

I look up at the ceiling and all I can make out are two old glow-in-the-dark stars. The others don’t exist anymore. I don’t know if it’s because I can’t see them fully or that over time they’ve just disappeared.

I want to wake up every day feeling normal. Not just some days. I want everything to go back to normal. But normal hasn’t been my life for a long time.

Mom comes back with my pain meds, and I know I’ll be out soon even though I just woke up. There goes another day, wasted. I’m supposed to go to lunch with Lizzie. Tonight Haven was coming over for dinner, and we were going to play games.

Stupid arms.

Stupid legs.

Stupid eyes.

Stupid fucking everything.

“I need to call Lizzie and cancel, and you and Jocelyn need to make up some kind of excuse to Haven. Tell her I had a photo shoot or something.” My frustration grows because I don’t want to miss out on the good because of the bad.

“I’m not going to do that, Corrine.”

My hand goes to my head, and I grab a fistful of my hair.

“Why the fuck not, Mae?”

My mother grabs my chin firmly and snaps me back to where I should be.

She forces me to look at her. Her voice is strong, making me pay attention to her words.

Respecting her.

“I’m not going to lie to Haven because that child is constantly being lied to. She knows you're not working. You told her you were on a long vacation. She’s not a stupid child, Corrine. We all think we’re protecting her from things. Bad things. Awful things. And we are, but with you, Corrine, I think because you have such a special bond she’ll see through all of it.”

I chase the pills back with the glass of juice she gives me. It’s so cold. I can feel it roll down my throat to my stomach. Mom grabs my ice pack from my old, college-sized refrigerator that sits in the corner of my bedroom. She gently places it behind my neck and runs her hand delicately across the top of my head. Just like a mother's touch, it eases me, and I relax a little. I close my eyes allowing a few tears to flow.

“How can you get on my nerves so much, yet make me feel so safe and loved?”

She laughs at me, leans down, and kisses my forehead.

“Corrine, can I tell you a story?”

I nod.

“It’s because I’m a mom. The day Haven was born and you held her in your arms—even if you didn’t give birth to her—you became a mom. The moment you held her, you knew you would always keep her safe. You would always protect her. I saw it in your eyes.”

I cry harder, and it’s not helping with my current condition.

“That’s all I want. To keep her safe. I don’t want her to know evil or pain.”

The creases in the corners of my mother's eyes appear as she smiles warmly at me.

“Corrine, that’s what moms do. They keep their children safe and try to keep them away from the bad and the evil. As soon as you were placed in my arms, the same exact thing happened to me.”

I wipe away the salty-stinging tears from my eyes and get a grip.

“I’m trying really hard. I don’t want to fail her. I never want to fail her. I just don’t know what I can handle anymore. I need him here. I miss him so much it hurts to breathe sometimes. I can’t handle the pain. Mentally and physically. I just . . . I just can’t.”

My mother begins straightening out my pillows behind my head and adjusting the sheets and blanket draped across my body.

“Baby, I believe God only gives us what we
can
handle. You’re the strongest person I know, Corrine. Even when you don’t think you are, you're stronger than you know.” She kisses the top of my head once again and shuts off my bedside light. Closes the curtains so my room is dark and adjusts the small fan that sits beside me so the coolness it gives off helps the way I feel.

“Now you sleep, my girl. You’ll feel better in a few hours. I’ll call Lizzie and tell her you're not up to it, but I’m not canceling on Haven. You’re going to feel better later so you can have a fun night with your daughter.” I shut my eyes and feel my pills beginning to take effect, and I think about what my mother just told me. Since our eyes met that day, Haven was mine. I was going to be her mother, and I didn’t even know it.

AUGUST 6TH, 2004

T
he doors shut behind Jocelyn and me and we follow the doctor to the NICU. We are told to wash up and put these long, paper gowns on.

We enter the room and see that Mack’s back is to us.

“Mack?” I address him softly.

He turns around; his eyes are red and tear-soaked. Mack steps aside and I see a clear, plastic box with a two holes in the side of it. And then I see her.

When he meets my eyes, he smiles and sniffs back a sob.

“Look what I made.”

Jocelyn and I make our way over to him and peek into the box.

Her face is round and soft like a cherub. Pinkish and wrinkly. Her eyes are closed and her chests rises and falls with each breath she takes. A few wires are hooked up to her chest and the sound of beeping and machines can be heard. She’s so tiny. Probably the tiniest thing I’ve ever seen, I bite my lip and wonder how something so small can survive in this gigantic world.

Jocelyn gasps and covers her mouth. “Look how beautiful she is.” She says. Then instant tears, instant love, instant devotion is seen. And I’m not only talking about Jocelyn. I look at Mack and see so much of the same in his eyes. He smiles, but there’s pain behind them. I don’t want to ask about the details of the last hour. I don’t want to ask what’s going to happen to this baby’s drug-addicted mother. I want to watch him look at all of this instant love, and I never want to forget it.

I don’t hug Mack. I don’t touch him. I just watch the tiny baby inside the clear box. Jocelyn is able to put her hands inside the two holes and touch the baby’s hand. She strokes the little fingers on her hand and Jocelyn talks to her through the hard, plastic shell.

Moments go by and Jocelyn announces she needs to use the restroom. Mack tells me he’s going to show Jocelyn where it is, so now it’s just this baby and me. So I stare.

And stare.

And stare.

I place my hands through the holes and I gently touch her face.

She looks exactly like Mack. Same nose, same mouth. Her eyes remain shut so I can’t tell if they look like Mack’s. They fluttered open a short time ago, but not long enough to get a good look at them. As Mack walks back into the room a doctor stops him and asks if he can speak to him. Mack looks to me as to say,
you good with her?
I motion my chin up towards him to go. I got this.

And now it’s just this unbelievable creature and me. Her eyes begin to flutter open and my jaw drops because it’s all I want to see. I want to see her eyes. I coax her to open them wide. I continue to rub her tiny cheek with my fingertip.

“Come on, baby girl. That’s it. Open up those eyes, precious.”

She does and she looks directly at me and I continue to talk to her and now she’s the one staring at me. I feel a tear drift down my face because they
are
Mack’s eyes. She’s him. She’s all him. And we look at each other. The moment is brief, but it happens. Then her eyes close once again.

“Hello there, little one. I’m Corrine. But you can call me Rinny. Even though your daddy says he’s the only one who is allowed to call me that, I think we can make an exception.” She squirms a little and lets out a small cry. I hush her softly.

“No, no, precious. It’s okay. Shhh . . . Rinny’s here. I’ll keep you safe. I have a lot to show you, and teach you so you have to be strong. You have to grow strong and like me and your dad, we’ll be best friends.” She’s the promise of hope and love and miracles. This tiny baby has so much to look forward to. I know deep inside—with every fiber of my being that I will love her forever. Just as much as I love her dad.

I hear a clearing of someone's throat, and I look up to see Mack, my mom, dad, and Jocelyn. They just stare at me. Staring is the name of the game today.

“What’s everyone gawking at? Hasn’t anyone ever seen someone talk to a baby before?”

Mack turns his head back and forth.

“Not like that, Rinny. Not like that.”

Love is instant; love is constant. When life is put in your arms, you know what true love is.

A few days have passed since the birth of Mack’s baby girl. I haven’t left the hospital. I haven’t left Mack’s side. I don’t plan on it either. The baby is sick. There's something wrong with her. She won’t eat. She cries all the time. She’s small and weak. And it’s all her mother's fault.