“SO THAT’S POINT TWO FOR US,” I say to Person, after I finish telling her about the newest theory.
Person is sitting on a low beach chair. Her white cover-up spreads across her bigger belly, and she rests a magazine on it and stretches her legs in front of her into the sand. She isn’t actually reading the magazine though. She’s talking to me.
I’m sitting near her feet, burying my legs in the sand, letting my hands and arms and chest get a dusting of sand too. Person says she couldn’t stand to have all that sand on her but to me it feels warm and the right sort of scratchy. Julian is playing by the shore a few feet away.
We went to the beach in the morning today because we don’t have any appointments until the afternoon.
“Uh-uh,” Person says. “No way. You can’t just make up a new theory and use it as a point for you guys. That’s not how it works.”
I squint at her. “But why?” I say. “It didn’t make sense?”
It felt like all the words were there when I was explaining it to Person. It even felt like they almost all came out in the right order. I only stumbled a few times.
Person smiles. “Actually, it made perfect sense. Except why is it number 742? Wasn’t the one before it number 1046?”
“Because,” I say, watching a stream of sand fall out of my hand and onto my thigh, “numbers don’t always go in order.”
“They don’t?” Person asks.
I know why she sounds surprised. She knows I’m good at math.
“Sometimes things don’t make sense. Like Julian and me. Anyway, you can’t stop us from making new theories because we do it all the time and it’s one of the only things I know we’ve always been doing,” I say.
Then I think, Whoa. Those were important words. And they all came out.
I’m happy but I start to shake anyway. Happy and Scared are so close together inside me. They press up against each other like two people sharing a bed that’s too small. I can’t wake up Happy without Scared being a little bit disturbed.
I reach over and dribble a handful of sand onto Person’s foot so that I don’t have to look at her face and see her reaction to all those real words.
But she says, “OK.”
“OK?” I say. “So we get another point for the crab theory?”
“Yup, sure,” Person says.
I jump to my feet, spraying sand everywhere, but Person doesn’t yelp or complain. “Yes!” I say.
“But you know what else that means?” Person asks. She sounds almost serious, but she’s smiling.
“No,” I say. “What?”
“Well, if you’re a crab . . . I just might have to eat you!”
In a flash, Person reaches out over her belly and latches on to my arm. She pulls me toward her mouth and opens it and closes it going “num num num num num.” With her other hand, she reaches up and tickles me in the side.
I yelp and twist and squeal and try to get my arm back.
She keep num-ing.
I keep trying to get away but I’m laughing too hard to do it.
I don’t know why I’m even resisting.
I have never enjoyed being touched so much as I do in this moment.
That afternoon is our second visit. After we clean up from the beach, we eat lunch and pile into the car. A little while later, we pull in a driveway next to the biggest house I’ve ever seen. It’s the biggest house ever built. Before we get out of the car, I count the windows.
Twenty-two.
Just in the front of the house.
“We lived here?” Julian says.
“How did we even know our way around?” I ask.
I’m getting better at this joking thing.
But Person doesn’t laugh. She shifts in the front seat in a way that makes my heart race. “I don’t know,” she says. “This is the address our old agency gave me and . . . well. Here we are.”
Julian looks at me. We both swallow. The shiver in Person’s voice reminds us of that bad thing: we’re here because we asked for it. Person doesn’t actually want to see where we used to live. Person doesn’t actually want to know about foster care.
But this house does not look like foster care.
“This is the woman who should have your files. She might have baby pictures. Or she should at least have some information about your biological family.”
Biological family. First mother. Those are the things that come with being born. I don’t want to think about them.
A white woman opens the door with two packages in her hands, one wrapped in blue, the other wrapped in pink. Her face is familiar: skinny nose, gray eyes, pale skin. I’d recognize her anywhere, but I wouldn’t know why until now. She used to be my mom.
“Isn’t it lovely to see you two again?” she says.
She’s shorter and skinnier than Person. Skinnier than Person ever was, even before the baby. She looks younger too.
“Are those for us?” Julian says, sounding excited.
“Of course,” she says. She hands over the packages and opens the door.
“Thank you,” I say. I squeeze my pink package. I don’t think I want a present from this woman but I’m not sure why. And it makes Person happy when I say thank you.
The woman freezes and turns. “You’re welcome, Flora.” She seems surprised to see me, even though she must have known we were coming because she bought us gifts. “Follow me to the dining room,” she says.
We walk through a big room full of brown wood with a large staircase at the front, then we walk through a living room with a white sofa and a cream carpet, then we walk into a beige room with a long dining room table. Everything is shiny and fancy. I’m nervous to touch any of it.
It seems like everything in this house is made for a different kind of kid. A not-foster-kid kind of kid.
Julian turns to Person and says, “This isn’t the white house. We were somewhere else.”
“Yeah,” I confirm.
Person nods and waves her hands, urging us to sit at the dining room table with the woman. There are glasses of lemonade at four of the twelve chairs at the big table. Julian and I sit together on one side. Person sits across from us. The woman sits at the head of the table.
“Thank you for having us, Marta,” Person says. “We thought it was very important to gather as much information about the past as we can.”
Marta looks confused. “Well . . . I’ll help . . . if I can . . .”
“There’s a lot my children don’t remember,” Person says.
“I don’t remember living here at all!” Julian says.
“Me neither,” I say. “The house is big enough to get lost in.”
Marta looks at me like she’s surprised to see me sitting here next to Julian, again. Then she laughs, but it’s a fake one. Not mean but strained. “You two didn’t live here with me. I bought this house only about a year ago. We lived a bit closer to the shore. And yes, that house was a little smaller.”
“Was it the white house?” I ask, but I’m too quiet. I don’t think it was anyway. That white house was full of kids: they’re in both our memories. This woman doesn’t look like she likes kids at all.
“Do you have pictures of it?” Person asks. “The house you all lived in together?”
“I, um . . . ,” Marta says.
“And you must have some pictures of them, right?”
“I, well . . . ,” Marta says. “You see, they are two children. They had acquired a lot of stuff. I’m afraid I’m not sure. I donated most of it.”
“You donated their pictures?” Person asks. She sounds more confused than angry.
“Of course I still have some pictures of their time with me. But, well, the Lifebooks were mixed in with the rest of their books so—”
“Lifebooks?” I interrupt.
“We had Lifebooks? Who made us Lifebooks?” Julian asks.
“I’m not sure but—”
“Did they say where we come from?” Julian asks.
“I don’t exactly know,” the woman says. “They were mostly pictures. I never got any information about your biological family, though I did ask for it.” She says this like she deserves applause just for asking the same question that Person is taking us all around to try to answer.
I raise my eyebrows at Julian. Here’s another one. One more person from our past who thinks we were born but doesn’t know anything about how or why or where or who else was there.
“Wait,” Person says. “Wait. Someone made books of these children, of my children. Someone made them books. And you lost them?”
“Most of their things were donated and—”
“Why would you do that?” Person asks. “I’m not . . . I know there’s so many hard things to learn but . . . you donated them? Why? How could they have any value to anyone except these children here at this table?”
“That’s enough,” Marta says calmly. It seems extra mean to be calm when Person is on the verge of tears.
“Enough? What do you mean?”
“I will not be lectured in my own home,” Marta says. “It’s hard on me to have to relive any of this.”
“Hard on you?” Person asks. “What about—”
“I’ll be happy to email you pictures. I do have some of those. It’s just, I was so sad when Julian was—”
“Hold on, hold on,” Person interrupts Marta. “We want to hear that. We want the story of how they came to live with you and why they left. But first, please, tell me what you know. Where were they before they were with you? Who were they with? What information do you have?”
“I don’t have too much but—”
Person interrupts her again, and not so politely this time. “Apparently their files were lost with you and their Lifebooks were donated . . . can you tell us anything? We can’t let this be the end of the road.”
Person sounds determined. It’s like she wants to know what we want to know. It’s like she’ll say our words for us even if she doesn’t want them said.
Julian chugs half his lemonade. I follow his lead.
“Hold on,” Marta says. She doesn’t look happy. Her face is pinched. I wonder if she ever smiled. I wonder if I used to try to make her smile like I do with Person. “The worker who placed them with me left the agency soon after, but I believe I may still have her personal phone number from all those years ago. Let me go see if I can find it.”
Marta leaves the room and Julian and I look at Person. Now is usually a moment when Person would tell us something to make us feel good. It’s a moment when she would translate what’s happening. But instead she takes a deep breath and stares at her folded hands, not looking at us. Her lips move but the words don’t come out. I’ve never seen Person pray. I don’t even know if she believes in God. But it looks like she’s praying.
Marta returns with a pitcher of lemonade and refills Julian’s glass. “I found it,” she says. She refills my glass, puts the pitcher down, and hands a slip of paper to Person.
Person grabs at it. It’s like Marta is trying to act like whatever this paper is is no big deal, but to Person it’s as important as medicine.
“Thank you,” she says. I watch her put it carefully in her wallet.
“Of course,” Marta says. It’s mean how she’s acting like something is no big deal when it clearly matters to someone else. It’s like Marta is one of Elena’s recess friends. “I’ll certainly email you some pictures of the old house and of Julian and Flora during their time with me as well,” Marta says. “Will that be all?”
All? I think No, that can’t be all.
I don’t want to sit here and hear about the awful thing I did that meant Marta didn’t adopt us. I don’t want Person to endure any more of this sixth-grade mean-girl-ness. But we need to know what happened. We need our story.
And it started bad but then it got so good with Gloria.
Maybe it can get better here too.
“I want to know it,” I say.
Marta turns to me and says, “Know what, dear?”
“She means why we left. Why we came. When we were here. All of it,” Julian says. I didn’t need him to be my voice this time, but he’s used to it.
“Well, you arrived when you were six, Julian. Flora was seven.” Marta is looking at Julian, only, while she talks. Like she doesn’t realize I’m the one who asked the question. “And you were here for a little more than a year,” she says.
“More than a year?” I say.
Marta gives me that surprised look again.
“I tried, Flora. I really did,” Marta says. “So yes, you were with me for a while. I can’t believe you don’t remember anything I did for—well, anyway, we did the proper slow transition that the experts recommend. So first you came for a weekend. Then a week.”
“Where were they in the meantime?” Person asks.
“With their foster mothers,” Marta says.
“Mothers?” says Person.
Julian smiles at me. I smile back. We sort of remember. Two moms. Two good moms.
“And you don’t have their information?” Person asks. “Their address? Their emails?”
“I’m afraid I don’t anymore,” Marta says. “You have to understand, this was all painful for me. Saying good-bye to Julian.”
I wait for her to say my name. She doesn’t.
Person opens her mouth to object. She’s getting angry. I’m not used to seeing her angry. But then she closes it because if she says anything we won’t hear whatever else Marta is going to say and now I sort of want to hear it even if I don’t want Person to hear it.
“I took you guys to the museums,” Marta is saying. “We visited Kings Dominion and Hersheypark. We went shopping and got you outfitted for school. I got you toys galore. But . . . you never seemed . . . happy.”
“Happy?” Julian asks.
Happy is impossible. We’ve never been happy.
“There were tantrums almost daily. Julian would put on this smile and then the next minute he’d be destroying one of my potted plants or throwing his toys out the window.”
Marta looks at all of us, even Person, like we should be shocked. Like we should feel sorry for her. But this is the part we do remember. Being sad. Being bad. Being so scared we didn’t even know what we were doing.
“And Flora . . . Flora wouldn’t . . . she couldn’t . . . She only watched television. She would for hours a day. I tried and tried to coach her on how to be more lovable.”
“Lovable?” Person says. “All children are lovable. Flora is incredibly lovable.”
“She—” Marta starts, but Person interrupts her. She leans across the table to grab my hand and looks in my eyes. “I love you, Flora,” she says.
I’m startled by it almost. Not by the fact that Person loves me, but by how important it is that she loves me. How important it is to her.
Julian grabs my other hand. “I love you too, Florey,” he mumbles.
Person lets go and sits down. Julian holds tighter.
“Well, anyway,” Marta says, “she didn’t . . . she couldn’t . . . Well, you see, I didn’t realize I would be adopting a disabled child. In fact, I specifically requested healthy children.”
“Flora’s not disabled,” Julian says.
“Requested healthy children?” Person says, too angry.
“I’m afraid . . . ,” Marta says. “I mean, she didn’t speak . . . it was only the television . . . she made noises, but . . . I’m afraid . . .”
“Flora is not disabled,” Julian says, loudly this time.
“You did always claim she spoke to you,” Marta says. “But I wasn’t so sure . . .”
Of course now I can’t speak. My words are stuck.
Finally, Person takes a deep breath and speaks more calmly. “Marta, Flora is not disabled. She has some side effects of trauma, as all foster kids do, and some of hers are very pronounced. But she doesn’t have a disability. But that’s not actually important. I think the main point here is that when you become a parent you do not get to design your kids like you designed this house. We all have strengths and weaknesses. You cannot pick your child’s abilities and disabilities. You commit to—”
“I was committed. I had committed to . . . healthy . . . children. I was . . . I did my best . . . they had everything—”
Person cuts her off again.
“Are you telling me that you pushed kids back into foster care because you thought one of them needed extra help? Is foster care where you thought they would get it?”
“No, I . . . I tried . . . I . . .”
“Stop,” Person says. “Later tonight you can sit in this big empty house and tell yourself how you did the best you could, but I won’t let you say it in front of my kids. They needed better than you gave them. They cannot be made to feel guilty in any way for what happened under your roof. I need to point out the ways you failed them. And giving up on an adoption without planning for the children’s future—”
“I didn’t give up,” Marta says. “I wanted to adopt Julian but—”
“And NOT FLORA?” Julian shouts.
“I gave you everything,” Marta says to him. “I gave you everything you could want and you just never seemed . . . grateful.”
I’m shaking. Julian’s face is red. I’m 100 percent positive that Marta’s potted plants are about to end up on the floor again.
“Flora was such a . . . different child . . . and I’m afraid I couldn’t handle her. I thought Julian would be better off—”
“ELEPHANT!” The word is huge and loud and it comes from Person.
Julian and I both jump.
“I’m sorry,” Person says. She’s fake-polite now, like Marta was before. “My children and I need to go see about an elephant.”
“What?” Marta says. “What are you talking about?”
But Person gets out of her seat and walks behind Marta to grab Julian and me by the wrists. She’s holding my wrist a little too hard but it still feels like love.
“I didn’t mean to—” Marta is saying.
“I told you,” Person says. “We need to go see an elephant. Thank you for emailing me the pictures. Please know that I’ll be back here if you don’t.”
Marta says, “I don’t see—”
“There’s an elephant,” Person says, and then we’re out the door.
We collapse into the car, breathless. Person turns to look at us as we buckle ourselves into the backseat.
“You guys OK?”
“Yeah,” Julian says, but he’s smiling so I don’t know what to believe.
I shrug. My words are gone. Marta stole them when she said she tried to steal Julian.
We still have the presents in our hands. I push the paper together on mine. I try to make it explode with my brain.
Person sees me looking at the pink paper.
“I have an idea,” she says. She backs out of the driveway and a few minutes later pulls into a grocery store parking lot, but she stays at the back of it, away from the grocery store. She rolls down the car window. “There,” she says, pointing at the big blue garbage Dumpster. “That should be big enough, right?”
“Yes!” Julian says. He’s not smiling anymore.
We jump out of the car and throw the presents on the ground. We jump on them. We kick them. We pound and break and trample them. We throw them into the Dumpster.
The next day Person says we get to spend the whole day on the beach, no visits, no tough stuff except what’s already inside our heads. That’s good. But my words are still gone, which is bad. I’m tired. Bone tired. The way I used to be when we first came to live with Person.
I lie in the sand at the place where the ocean laps at my ankles and stare at the clouds.
I listen behind me as Person texts and texts and texts. When her phone rings, she jumps up and runs a little bit away from us to answer it so we can’t hear her. But I know what’s happening. I know what she’s doing.
Part of me wants to see where we lived before Marta. Part of me wants to know everything about what happened to us.
And part of me is afraid that if every house keeps getting worse and worse like that, my words will leave for good and never come back. That version of Forever is too easy for me to believe in.
Julian splashes in the water a few feet away from me. He’s upset that I’m not talking.
But he’s smiling crazy.