I was just getting ready to go,” Michele said.
The girl sat down. “I can see that. This won’t take long. You don’t even have to tell me your name.”
That sounded odd. But Michele couldn’t just get up and walk away. It would be too rude. She relaxed her grip on her purse. “What do you want to know?”
“I guess . . . well, maybe two things. Why were you crying? And why do you come here to watch little children play?”
Michele didn’t want to answer either question. Not with a complete stranger. But the girl looked right into her eyes. She seemed totally sincere. “Why do you want to know?”
The girl paused. “I get it . . . Answer a question with a question. You don’t want to tell me. It’s okay. You don’t know me.”
Tears welled up in the young girl’s eyes. She blinked them back, turned her attention to the kids on the playground.
“I’m sorry,” Michele said. “I just wasn’t prepared to talk about what you want to know. It’s deeply personal. You know that, right?”
The girl looked at her again. “I know. I forget sometimes, not everyone says what’s on their minds like me. It’s just . . . I have a big decision to make pretty soon, and I’m looking for answers.” She looked back at the children. “They’re really cute at that age. Not a care in the world.”
“I know,” Michele said. “Is your big decision about . . . the baby?”
The girl smiled. “Now look who’s getting personal.”
“I’m sorry, I didn’t mean—”
“It’s all right. Yeah, it’s about the baby. I’m actually past due.” She looked down at her belly. “I don’t mean with the baby, with this decision. The baby’s not due for two more months.”
Michele could hardly believe the girl was seven months pregnant. She would’ve guessed five. “You don’t look like you’ve gained a pound over what the baby weighs.”
“The doc agrees. He’d like me a little fatter. Not fatter, but you know what I mean. Guess it’s my genes. My girlfriends back in high school used to hate me, ’cause I never gained any weight.”
“Where are you from?”
“Long Island.”
“I guess your genes also affect your looks. You don’t look old enough to be out of high school to me.”
The girl smiled. “Just graduated last year. Came down to Florida a little after that. Long story. Not a happy one.” The smile disappeared.
She had a cute face. She looked even prettier when she smiled.
“So what did you want to ask me?”
“It’s just, I’ve been coming here off and on the last month. I’ve seen you here quite a few times.”
Michele had never noticed her until today.
“Each time I come, you’re staring at the kids, watching them play. Not in a creepy way. You always look so sad. Most of the time, I see tears in your eyes before you leave. Guess it just made me curious. I keep trying to figure out what your story is.”
Michele sighed. Strong emotions began to stir. She turned to face the kids again. “I want to be . . . like you.”
“Like me?”
Michele looked back at her. “Pregnant. I want to have a baby. But I can’t. At least not so far.”
“How long have you been trying?”
“We’ve been trying a little over a year. My husband and I. His name is Allan.” Why did she say that? They weren’t using names.
“A year’s not very long, is it?”
Michele could tell by the tone of her voice, she was trying to sound comforting. But it wasn’t comforting. Almost everyone said that. Couldn’t they see it was an annoying thing to say to someone in her situation? “It’s a long time when you want it more than anything else in the world. It’s a long time when you’re doing everything you can to get pregnant, and it doesn’t happen. When nothing you try works. Then you see it happening to everybody else but you. Even to women who don’t want to get pregnant.” Immediately, Michele regretted that. “I’m sorry. I really wasn’t thinking about you.” She actually had Jean, her sister-in-law, in mind. She’d gotten pregnant with their last baby while she was still on birth control, when Tom was still out of work.
“That’s okay. I certainly wasn’t planning on this. I was just being stupid.”
“See, that’s what I mean,” Michele said. “It’s not fair. God allows girls who don’t even want babies to get pregnant, then says no to people like me.” She couldn’t help it; the tears wouldn’t stop.
The girl pulled out some tissues from her sweatshirt pocket and handed them to Michele. “I never used them. I just brought them in case my allergies acted up.”
Michele wiped her eyes. “Thanks.”
“You’re right. It doesn’t seem fair. I don’t know what God’s thing is when it comes to babies and who gets them. Well, I mean, who gets pregnant. Who gets them is another matter. That’s kind of my problem, where I’m stuck at the moment.”
Michele suddenly wondered, was that what this girl was getting at? Was she looking for someone to adopt her baby? “I’m not really interested in adopting a baby right now.”
“What?” the girl said, looking confused.
“You said you were stuck, about who gets babies. And you said you were making a big decision. I just thought—”
“That I was asking you?”
“I guess.”
The girl smiled.
Once again, Michele was struck with how pretty she was when she smiled. With a new hairstyle and some makeup, she might even be called beautiful.
“No,” the girl said, “I wasn’t hinting at you taking my baby. My big decision is whether to become a single parent or give my baby to this adoption agency, one I found out about at this clinic that’s helping me. They gave me all these assignments to help me sort it out, and I think I know which way I’m leaning, but I’m still not 100 percent sure. It’s such a big deal. It’s my baby’s life, where she’s gonna spend the rest of it.”
Now Michele understood. “I guess the answer to your question is . . . I come here to dream. I’m dreaming of the day when I’ll have my own baby and I can bring him or her to a playground like this.” She looked back toward the children. “But I can promise you, when that day comes, I won’t be sitting on a bench ignoring them, chatting with my friends. I’m going to be right out there with them every single minute.” Michele needed to stop. She could feel a rant coming on. “So why do you come here?”
Tears appeared again in the girl’s eyes. She quickly looked away. “I guess to help me convince myself, to help me close the gap on those few remaining doubts about what to do with my baby.”
“You’re leaning toward adoption then?”
The girl nodded. “I could never give her this, a life like this. A neighborhood like this. A playground like this. Have you seen the cars in the parking lot? I parked mine in the street two blocks away. It’s complete crap. I’m not even married. I’ve got a terrible job and no future. They could film episodes of Cops in my apartment complex. A lady from the adoption agency told me that almost all of their couples have nice cars, nice houses. They’re married, and they have good jobs. They check all this out before they approve them. And they’re all Christians. They’ve all been praying, sometimes for years, for a baby just like mine, because they can’t have one on their own.”
She released a heavy sigh. “That’s what I want for my baby. What she deserves. It’s not her fault God stuck her with me.” This time, there were too many tears to blink back.
Michele reached out her hand. “What’s your name?”
The girl pulled out another tissue and dabbed her eyes. “Christina. My name’s Christina.”