“Bullshit, Avis. I know you’ve thought about leaving. I would kill for a street with a bookstore and a coffee shop and something to look at. I would kill to be able to walk somewhere. To see a tree.”
“Oh my God, to live in a city with a subway system. Not to even own a car.”
“Where our kids could like go somewhere, without someone driving them? Where we could be outside in the summer?”
“Where there are schools with windows in the classrooms? And green grass? And some normal number of children?”
“What if our kids could all bike to a decent park? Or the store? What if the store wasn’t a 7-Eleven?”
“Ahhh. Bliss.”
“Yeah, but what about us? What about all of us gals? Where could we all go? We’re in this together. Ella wrote in her second-grade essay that she had four moms. I mean, yeah, I wish I had some family in town, but if we all did, we wouldn’t need each other. It wouldn’t be like this.”
“Julie, you’re a sap. We love you.”
“That calls for a drink. Let’s open the wine. Someone order pizza before the kids start collapsing.”
Julie and Cheryl and Jill and Margo and I might have had that conversation a hundred times when our children were young. Over and over. And Julie was right. Having each other was enough. What we had done was enough.
Yes, visiting some other place, some beautiful city, a beach, a forest, street life, yes, all that could make one wish for something else: for something other than asphalt and concrete and strip malls, desert dirt, stucco roofs, skinny little trees being held up by thick bands of rubber. For a day or two, one might dream of another life, a life that would make a better-looking film clip, and then get back to this one, this life that was also easy, where the money was good, the houses were cheap, the sky was always blue, and everyone was free to make a friend, to join a group, to try something new.
Boomtown.
And because it was so easy, so take-it-for-granted easy, we did take it for granted. My friends dreamed of the lives they were meant to live. As they kept on living this one. I dreamed of the childhood I didn’t have. As Nate lived it.
And it seems like we were right. Living in the picture-postcard city, in the beautiful place, wouldn’t have been everything we imagined. Because if we already had all that, would we have tried so hard to make it work here? Would we have worked so hard to keep our children friends, to put on musicals at the school, to insist that the city add a crossing guard on Pecos, to spend all our New Year’s Eves together in one chaotic champagne and Scrabble and noisemaking heap?
Because we did.
Because that was the thing about making it all work in a boomtown.
We created a community out of nothing. And we were proud of it. And maybe we didn’t look like a lot of other communities out there. We weren’t much alike. One of us had turned a trick in a casino before she finished high school. Others of us had gone to college. One of us had never been inside a church. Others of us prayed daily. One of us had never known a grandparent, an uncle, or a cousin. Others had grown up in families in which nobody had ever divorced. Some of us had relatives who were drug addicts, some of us had worked nights in casinos, some of us had grown up thinking
darn
was a curse word. Some of us were military families, some of us could barely stand to recite the Pledge of Allegiance.
We weren’t a community anyone would predict.
That’s what we were trying to say in all those conversations about wanting to leave but not wanting to leave each other. We lived in a misunderstood city, in a place that thrives only by convincing outsiders that it is something it is not, and the magic is how free it leaves those left within. That was true for Sharlene, and it was true for me, and it was true for my friends.
And what we built did matter.
Even if it didn’t last. Even if it didn’t change the world. Even if lots of families were doing the very same thing in lots of other communities. It still mattered. For a little while, a man and a woman fell in love and did the best they could for their children. For a little while, a neighborhood of families helped each other out, and loved each other’s kids, and tried to make the world better. And some of those kids will do the same thing. And some of those kids will have a hard time. And some of those marriages will last. And some won’t. And it still all mattered.
25
Roberta
THE AHMETI CHILDREN WERE
assigned to Lacey Miller, and I had known her for years. I stopped by on Tuesday, just after the staff meeting. They would have gone over all the new cases, and Lacey would have an idea what the options were for Bashkim and Tirana. The children had been placed in separate foster homes, at opposite ends of the city, and my first priority was to find out if there was any way to fix that.
Lacey’s desk was in a kind of open alcove off the stairs, and we couldn’t discuss the case in a coffee shop, so we met in the director’s office. Lacey didn’t care for him, and even though he was out of town, her body radiated a slight unease at being in his space. We sat at a small conference table near the window. Lacey’s head was silhouetted against the black lines of the window frame and the sunny panes of glass. It hurt to look directly at her, and I couldn’t see her face clearly. I kept trying to avoid the painful contrast of light and dark behind her head.
“Lacey, I have the Ahmeti case. I’m worried about the children being in different homes. Is that temporary? Is there any chance of them being placed together?”
“Roberta, no. Really, not much chance. We have twenty percent more children in the system than we had last year, and ten percent fewer families to take them in. The economy cuts both ways for us. More children need help, and some of our best families are leaving town or taking in their own family members. We’re left with the ones that do it mostly for the money, and they’re happy to cram a few more children in corners, but that’s not where we want kids.”
“Yeah, I understand. But these children are small, and there’s going to be a lot of media around this case . . .”
“Right, you mean they deserve special consideration? Because they don’t have a drug-addicted mom? Because they haven’t been in and out of the system since birth? I really don’t think that means that they should get a break from us.”
“Lacey. That’s not what I’m saying. We’ve worked together for years. You know I don’t think that.”
“Well, I can’t do anything about it. Those kids both got great foster families, and they put those families over the limit. There’s no way they are going to end up together, not for a long time, and if you push for that, you just run the risk of getting them stuck together in a bad home.”
“Okay, I get it. Thanks for telling me. Is there anyone else? Family anywhere? Friends?”
“Are you kidding? This family was totally cut off. The dad’s a piece of work. Probably beat her. Really angry. They’re Albanian, but no one in the Albanian community knows them. Catholic Refugee Services tried to set them up with some connections there, but they never followed through. I talked with Gina. She says she thinks the mom was really lonely. She wanted to go back to Albania, but, of course, they couldn’t. He’s a political refugee. But they were tight-knit. Mom never admitted anything that was going on. Dad’s paranoid. Afraid of the system. Afraid of authority.”
“What about the kids? What are they like?”
“That’s the amazing part. They’re really sweet. Both foster families rave about them. The little girl doesn’t understand that her mom is gone. She keeps asking when she gets to go home, and if her nene knows where she is. The little boy’s quiet. And smart. They like him at school. He is with Jeannette Delain. You must have worked with her before.”
“Yes, I know Jeannette. Where’s Tirana?”
“With a family that’s only been in the system a year. They’re very good, though. Mormon. Five children, teenagers and up. We place a lot of young children with them because the older kids are good with babies too. Kelly and Robin Stoddard. She’s Robin.”
“How’s the boy? What has Jeannette said?”
“Well, I don’t know. He’s very sad, very serious. I got him placed with Jeannette because she lives right across from his school. Her foster kids have been going there for years. So she knows the principal, he can stay in his same classroom. I really tried hard to place them well. Even though it’s crazy around here.”
“Yeah. Thank you, Lacey. I’m sorry I roared in with wanting them placed together. I get it. But there’s just no place for them to go outside the system? What about the dad?”
“Well, he wants them. He wants his family together. But I doubt that he knows a thing about taking care of them. And he’s a mess. They checked him into Desert Care. They don’t really have room for him, but he’s on a suicide watch right now. As I said, he’s angry. He gets violent. He’s paranoid. He’s going to be hard to deal with. And once he gets out of Desert Care, he’s going to get these kids back. He hasn’t done anything to lose them. And that’s when things are really going to get bad, because he can’t take care of them, and there’s no support system. That’s why we called you in. We really don’t expect to have them long enough to need a CASA, but we’re hoping that there’s an option we can’t see yet.”
“Hmmm. Okay. I’ll do what I can. I’ll talk to everybody. There must be someone. Somewhere. What about family in Albania? Anything?”
“That’s strange too. Nothing. They’ve only been here eight years, so she must have had some family. Maybe Sadik hasn’t notified them. Maybe they don’t even know.”
“Can I get those records? From Catholic Refugee Services?”
“I doubt it. You’ll just have to ask the dad.”
“Okay. Thanks Lacey.”
“Sure. Good luck, Roberta. Stay in touch.”
I MET SADIK AHMETI THE
next day. We met in his room at the mental health hospital, which was just a bedroom, with a sink and a bureau. There was, of course, nothing on the walls, nothing sitting on the bureau. They wouldn’t have left anything that he could use to hurt himself, and he probably came here straight from the city jail, after the traffic stop.
“Mr. Ahmeti. My name is Roberta Weiss. I am a volunteer with CASA—Court Appointed Special Advocates. My job is to make a recommendation to the judge about the placement of your children.”
“The placement of my children? What does this mean? What you mean?”
He is immediately agitated. A small man. Maybe five foot seven. Very thin. And much older than I was expecting. He’s got to be in his sixties—with a round bald spot in the middle of his crown, and long, thinning hair just above his shoulders. His explosiveness is alarming. I look around, wonder if I should suggest that we meet in the common area. It will be hard to talk to him where other people can hear us, but I am uneasy.
“Mine children are mine. They place with me. I am not going to be here much longer. You cannot say where my children place.”
“Mr. Ahmeti. Of course. Your children are yours. And you have parental rights to them. But they are in foster care now while you are here, and a judge has to remove them from foster care, even if it is back to your care.”
“I have to go to court?” he asks.
“There is a courtroom. And a judge. It’s not a trial, though. It’s just part of the system. Part of making sure that your children are somewhere safe.”
“Where are my children? You see them?” His voice breaks here, and I realize how scared he is. I’m still nervous, but I see that this case will not be simple. This is not a man who’s had a simple life.
“I haven’t seen them yet. I will. I’ll see both of them, several times.”
“Several times? They keep me here long?”
“I don’t know, Mr. Ahmeti. I don’t know anything about your situation.”
“I don’t know. I don’t know what do. My children should be with me. We are family. But no mother? Children need mother.”
As he says this, he swings his head to the side and hits his head against the edge of the bed frame. There is a loud crack when he hits, but he doesn’t even acknowledge what has happened. He just shakes his head and keeps talking. His hands are moving all the time.
“I don’t know how care for my children. But they are mine. They are mine. In Albania, someone help me. Another woman. Here, I don’t know what do.”
“Mr. Ahmeti, do you have family in Albania?”
“Yes. But we not speak. When I left Albania, I left forever. I tell Arjeta no need to keep heart open to Albania. We can never go back. We only hurt them if we stay in touch.”
“Did Arjeta have family? Do they know what happened to her?”
“I tell you! I tell you already. We not speak to family in Albania. I sorry for this now. I sorry for Arjeta, so lonely. But no choice.”
He seems even older when he says this. His voice catches, and he stops his agitated moving, and he looks like an old, tired man. It is hard to imagine him with a three-year-old. I wonder about the boy, about Bashkim. Is he ready to raise them both?
THE MEETINGS WITH THE FOSTER
mothers go well. Lacey is right. The children are lovely. Both women report that the children are easy, even in the situation. I think that Arjeta Ahmeti must have been a good mother, and perhaps even Sadik has capacities I could not see, but I’m not sure of that.
I don’t spend much time with Tirana. She’s making cookies with a teenage foster sister in the kitchen, and I watch them awhile, introduce myself, but decide I will come back another day. I don’t want to remind this child of what has happened to her, when she is so pleased with what she is doing. With Bashkim, it’s different. He’s not doing much of anything when I come to speak with Jeannette Delain, and after we’ve finished, I ask him if he would like to take a walk with me. He looks to Jeannette, and then says yes, he will.
We leave the house silently. I notice that he has a key and that he locks the door behind him, even though Jeannette and some of the other foster children are there. Then he places the key carefully in a side pocket on his pant leg. It has a button and a flap, so it will not come out easily.
We walk down the hill and past the tiny green space with benches in Jeannette’s subdivision. I suspect that we’re headed to the park, just past the school, and after I tell him who I am and why I’m meeting him, I just walk along silently. We veer off before the park and cut through a small opening in the school fence, large enough for a bike to fit through. We’re on the playground, near the swing set, and I think that this is perhaps where he is headed. But, no, we pass the swing set, and the painted lines on the ground for hopscotch and four square, and we head to the school itself, to a small addition that juts out onto the asphalt.
I’ve never been to Orson Hulet School, and I’ve never seen the addition to which he is taking me. I see that the outer walls are decorated with a long tile mural, and I see the painted words “Orson Hulet Marine Lab” above the door. Oh yes. I remember when this was built. There were articles in the paper. Bashkim goes to the school with the marine lab.
“I like this mural.”
This is the first thing he says to me, other than hello and yes. He looks at me, and he looks at the wall. I look too, and I notice that the mural appears to be an underwater scene, filled with fish.
“Do you want to see my favorite fish?”
“Yes.”
He points to a fish that looks like a bowl of rice, complete with a Japanese character on the side, and a fish head and tail sticking out either side of it. I smile.
“I’ve never seen a fish like that.”
He doesn’t say anything, but he drags a finger along the wall, and pauses at a fish that looks like a basketball, and another that looks like a trumpet. I realize that most of the fish are fanciful and that they are wonderful in their unexpectedness.
“Who made this wall?” I ask.
“Kids. When the marine lab was built. They painted the tiles in the hallway. Everybody had to paint the same kind of background, so it would look like a sea when it was done, but each student got to paint his own fish.”
“Did you paint one?”
“No. It was all done when I came.”
“They’re not signed.”
I don’t know why I say this, except that the fish are so original, and they make me wonder who painted each one. In any case, Bashkim does not respond. Perhaps he cannot think why that would interest me.
Some of the fish are quite large, over multiple tiles, and some are tiny. The mural must be a hundred feet long. It stretches around three walls.
“Do you like the marine lab?”
“Yes.”
He is still looking at the wall intently and moves away from me to the far end.
I follow him, but a ways behind.
“What do you like about it? What do you do in there?”
“There are sharks,” he says.
“Really?”
“Yes.”
“Do you like sharks?”
“Yes.”
“Are they frightening?”
“They swim. All the time. They can’t stop swimming, or they can’t breathe.”
“Hmm. I didn’t know that.”
“And they can see. They can see students. Because they look at them. And when they like you, they watch you.”
“Really? Is there a shark that likes you?”
“Yes.”
With that, he walks away from the wall and toward the park. I follow. We have to walk the length of the playground to find another opening in the fence, but he knows exactly where he is going. The park isn’t large. There’s a small baseball field, a grassy area for picnics, and several swing sets at the far end.
“Do the schoolchildren use this park? Do you use it for recess?”
“Yes. Sometimes we come here for PE, and if there are enough monitors, we can play kickball here during lunch. But there has to be a monitor here, so if someone gets hurt and has to go to the office, then we can’t play kickball.”
“Do you like kickball?”
“It’s okay.”
“Bashkim. Do you know why I want to talk to you? Do you know what my job is?”
“Mrs. Delain told me that you decide where Tirana and I live.”
“Well, sort of. I make a recommendation. The judge decides where you live.”
“I want to live with Tirana.”
“I know.”
“I have to live with Tirana because she is just a baby, and she must wonder where I am. I haven’t even seen her. My nene . . .”
He stops here, and I see that he is not ready to speak. We keep walking.
“I have to live with Tirana,” he finally says.
I don’t answer, because I know that I can’t promise this. The best thing might be to keep him in foster care as long as possible, until Sadik is somehow more capable, but Lacey has made it clear that they won’t be placed together. He hasn’t mentioned his father, and I debate whether to bring him into the conversation.