This Fragile Life

“Alex could change her mind even after the baby is born, like a month after, and she’d be within her legal rights.”

“I know that, Rob.” My voice is sharp. “Look, you sound like you know everything, so why do we need to see a lawyer?”

“Because reading a couple of articles on the Internet isn’t the same thing as getting advice from a professional.”

“But there’s no advice for now, because you don’t actually sign any papers until after the baby is born. Most people don’t even approach a potential birth mother until much closer to the due date.”

“I know that,” he says, “but it might help to speak to someone who’s familiar with these kinds of situations, who can advise us on how to act now.” He takes a deep breath and lets it out slowly. “I don’t want to fuck this up, Martha.”

“I thought you didn’t care whether we had kids,” I retort, before I can think better of it, and Rob turns to me in the dark.

“I didn’t think I did. I never let myself hope. But now there’s an actual possibility that in eight months we could be holding our child…” I hear the optimism in his voice, but, instead of making me happy that he wants this as much as I do, it fills me with panic and fear. If Rob wants this as much as I do, the stakes are so much higher.

Now, if we lose out on this baby, Rob will be hurt too. And I have a horrible feeling that, just like with the IVF, it will be my fault.

In the end I agree to see a lawyer, and we go to her office in midtown one day during our lunch hour. Her name is Rebecca Stein and she’s tall and spare and sharply dressed, clearly my kind of woman, and yet I don’t like her.

“These kinds of adoption agreements between friends can be complex,” she says, which is no more than what Rob has said, what I know, but I still don’t like her saying it. “To be perfectly frank, it would be far easier on all parties if you arranged a private adoption through an agency or even an advertisement and conducted everything through a lawyer.”

Yes, I know that. I’ve seen the ads in the back of the free newspapers, I’ve watched Juno. I know there are thousands of desperate couples who will pay women to give them their babies, and that even if we put an ad in tomorrow we might never get picked. Alex is already pregnant, already willing. I could be holding my child in less than eight months.

“We’re committed to this particular situation,” I say and Rebecca Stein nods.

“Then you need to think very carefully about your relationship with the biological mother, and be very clear in the paperwork about what kind of relationship she will have with the child after he or she is born. I’m afraid I’ve seen these types of situations ruin a friendship all too often. And more than a friendship,” she finishes, her voice heavy with emphasis. A marriage. A life. Many lives.

I sit back in the chair. Am I willing to risk my friendship with Alex, for the sake of this child? And, to my shame, the answer is obvious, easy. Yes. Yes, I am.

Rebecca talks about the paperwork we’ll have to fill out closer to the time, the pre-certification, fingerprint records, child abuse checks, home study, all of it, but I tune it out. I am thinking about what she said.

What place will Alex have in our lives after the baby is born? Will this be an open adoption, so our child knows Alex was her birth mother? Have some kind of relationship with her? I reject that idea instinctively; it’s too…communal. But what’s the alternative? We all keep this huge secret, and it spills out eventually, awful and ugly? Or Alex just tiptoes quietly away and never bothers any of us again? How could that even happen, considering how our families are friends? How will we explain to our parents?

Rob touches my arm. “We should go.”

It’s ten minutes past the end of my lunch hour, and I have a meeting in fifteen minutes. An important meeting. I walk out of the office and into the sunshine in a daze. I am reeling from all the questions I don’t have answers to.

A couple of days later I phone Alex and ask her if she wants to meet for coffee. We haven’t spoken since she came to our apartment; Rob and I wanted to give her some space. She agrees, and we meet at a cute little café in the East Village. It is nearly the end of August but amazingly it doesn’t feel muggy or hot; everything feels clean, the sidewalks hosed down, the air fresh. We sit outside, and I drink coffee and Alex sips orange juice.

“How are you?” I ask. “How are you feeling?” She looks terrible.

She shrugs. “I’ve been better. This morning sickness thing pretty much sucks.”

“I’m sure.” I pause, wondering how much advice to offer. But then I think how I’ve always offered her advice; that’s been my role. It shouldn’t change now just because of this. I shouldn’t change at all. “I’ve heard protein in the mornings helps. A fried egg or bacon or something.”

Alex makes a face, as if to say gross, and shakes her head.

“Or eating lots of little meals all throughout the day,” I continue. I know all about being pregnant, even though I’ve never been. And never will be. “Never letting your stomach get completely empty.”

“Right.”

I can’t tell anything from her tone, whether she’s annoyed or not, and after just ten minutes I’m tired of feeling like I have to tiptoe. “Alex, you know I’m so excited about this, and I want to be involved in your pregnancy, but if I’m being too pushy just tell me to back off, okay?” I smile, trying not to feel so tentative, and Alex shakes her head.

“Martha, of course I want you to be involved in my pregnancy. We’re friends, after all.”

I take a breath. “Well, in that case, can I recommend a great OB? She was the one I was going to use, you know, if…” If IVF had worked. If I were pregnant instead of Alex. I swallow, smile. “She’s really good.”

“I’m sure she is.”

There is something hesitant, almost repressive about Alex’s tone, and I start to feel on edge again. There are going to be so many of these conversations, and I know we need to work through them. “What is it?” I ask and she sighs.

“Martha, you know I don’t have health insurance.”

“Dr. Cohen doesn’t take health insurance.” A lot of in-demand OBs don’t. You pay out of pocket and claim it back from your insurance company afterwards. Only in a place like New York could this happen.

Alex shakes her head. “And how much does she cost?”

I stare at her for a second, trying to figure out why it matters. Then it hits me. “Alex, I told you that Rob and I will pay your medical costs.”

She bites her lip, looks down. “Right.”

And I am wondering how she has forgotten this. I pause, feel my way through the words. “I mean, of course we would. It’s expected in these situations.” She nods, and I tense. “That’s okay with you, isn’t it?”

She looks up and her expression veils. “Yes, of course. Of course. I’m grateful.”

“You don’t need to be grateful. I mean, I’’m grateful. Rob’s grateful.”

A smile flickers across her face. “So everybody’s grateful.”

“Great.” I smile back, and even though I think we’ve both relaxed a little it still feels a bit too much like a truce. Already I miss our friendship, the jokey ease Alex always had with me. “So I’ll give you the OB’s number?” I finally say, and she nods. “What were you thinking you’d do, I mean, otherwise?” I’m just curious, honestly, because I mean, really? What…?

“I qualify for free prenatal services,” she says quietly. “My income is that low, amazingly enough. There’s a clinic in Brooklyn.”

A clinic in Brooklyn? I try, I really do, to keep my face neutral. Expressionless. Because inside I’m appalled. I’m horrified. I don’t want Alex going to some welfare clinic in Brooklyn. I don’t want my baby going there.

I swallow, say nothing, because with every second that passes between us I am realizing just how hard this is going to be.

Chapter 8

ALEX

I’m doing that not-thinking thing again. After I met with Rob and Martha at their place, I felt a huge wave of relief, followed by an almost unbearable wave of grief. I knew I was making them happy, which made me feel happy. Sort of. But I also felt as if I was losing something, even if it was my choice. I told myself it was natural to feel some sadness; this was a big deal. I touched my still-flat stomach and told myself to start thinking of this little bean inside me as Martha’s baby, Martha’s child.

The thought hurt.

In any case, the next few days I didn’t have time or energy to think much because I was feeling so sick, and work was crazy both at the café and the community center. We always run a week-long day camp at the end of August, and Julia gives me the week off at the Sunflower so I can be involved. Before all this happened I was excited about it. I always like the summer camps. Now I’m wondering how I’m going to make it through an eight-hour day without barfing or collapsing from exhaustion.

And all the while, at the back of my brain, I’m composing a to-do list Martha style. Buy prenatal vitamins. Call the OB. Think about everything, because I know there will be more conversational minefields about how everything is going to work, and I need to be prepared; I need to get myself into a mental place where I can handle all this stuff without freaking out or wanting to burst into tears.

Except I don’t want to think.