Mia Like Crazy (30 page)

I knew my sister-in-law was trying to make it sound more palatable, but it still sounded crazy to me. “Maybe I did. I don’t know.” I doubted myself so much now, I wasn’t even sure when I was telling the truth and when I wasn’t.

“Mia, listen to me,” Meridith said. “When you have a real life with real people you love and you really
live
it, the unexpected is going to happen. You’re going to feel things you didn’t plan to feel. The other people in your life will sometimes shock and surprise you. You’ll take chances and live for the moment. What I’m trying to say is, just as Drew shouldn’t lock himself up alone in an apartment for weeks at a time, you shouldn’t be able to predict and prepare for every occurrence in your future. Forget your ‘five-year-plan,’ or whatever you were using to try to create the perfect, lonely life you were making for yourself.”

Meridith’s last statement startled me because she’d hit the nail on the head. I’d never told her how lonely I was in my old life. In fact, I’d blocked out those thoughts in my own mind.

I blinked at her blurry image and wondered how she could know me better than I knew myself.

“Now, remember the times you and Drew have spent with Ben and Molly,” she said. “Imagine Drew carrying his own child on his shoulders and teaching him, or her, to carve the perfect deranged jack-o-lantern. Imagine how thankful you’d be if your own child was sitting at the Thanksgiving table with us.”

I saw the images in my mind and they were so beautiful, I started to cry again. “But Meridith, I don’t know if I’m ready. I certainly don’t think he’s ready. What if he blames me, or doesn’t want children because of his horrible childhood? Can you imagine two people who are more ill-equipped to be parents?”

Much to my surprise, Meridith grasped my damp chin between her thumb and forefinger, forcing me to look into her eyes.

“Did your early environment equip you to be an ‘A’ student?” She was using my own words to convince me. “Did your parents teach you responsibility? Encourage you to go to law school?” She released my chin. “Did Drew’s childhood teach him to look at you with such tenderness in his eyes, or to make children laugh hysterically? Do you think I’m a good mother Mia?”

The last question took me by surprise. “Of course you are!”

“My father was a rich, well-respected deviant who preferred children over women,” Meridith said bluntly.

“Oh.” I didn’t know how to respond.

“I think a person can overcome what they want to overcome,” she said. “And Mia, I’ve gathered that you were, in essence, alone in the world for a long time, but you’re not alone anymore. Do you understand what I’m saying?”

“Yes. Thank you, Meri.” I reached over and gave my sister-in-law the tightest embrace I could manage in the close quarters of the car.

“Now, come on. We’re about to be late.”

I took Meridith at her word and asked her to go into the examining room with me. The staff knew her, since this was the doctor who delivered her two children. She explained that her sister-in-law was a bit nervous, and everyone treated me with kid gloves. I was glad Dr. Yung was a woman.

However, when the doctor ran down the list of medical history questions and asked what type of birth control I had been using, I felt the stress of this morning flooding back. Meekly, I said, “None.”

“Oh, so you and your husband have been
trying
?” Dr. Yung smiled.

My eyes darted toward Meridith, who kindly stepped in. “Well, my brother is very much in love with her, so I’m sure they’ve been
trying
very hard!” Meridith flipped her eyebrows mischievously.

The doctor, nurse and Meridith all laughed at her racy joke, and I relaxed a bit. At that moment, I loved Drew’s sister nearly as much as I loved him.

I left the doctor’s office with a sample bottle of prenatal vitamins, a manila envelope full of brochures and booklets, and the knowledge that I was nearly four weeks pregnant with Drew’s baby.

“Would you mind if I went to your house for a while?” I asked Meridith when we got back into the car.

“That’s where I was headed,” she replied.

Chapter Eighteen

For a long time, I sat in a big chair in Meridith’s living room, reading the brochures and trying to let the news sink in. After the shock of the morning was over, I realized I was happy to be having Drew’s baby. It was his reaction I couldn’t predict.

In my heart, I thought he’d be shocked and then happy, like I was, but I knew this could bring up all kinds of issues for him and he would doubt his ability to be a good father.

Then, another thought crossed my mind and caused my heart to sink. He was a convicted felon. How would that affect the everyday things parents were supposed to do with kids?

And we were so close to Meridith and her children. In fact, I couldn’t imagine doing this without her, so moving to another state seemed out of the question. But then I thought about how Drew, who had excelled in everything from baseball to science, probably wouldn’t be allowed to coach a little league team or spend time at our child’s school.

But he was innocent.

I found Meridith in the kitchen. We sat down at the table together, and I told her the truth about her brother.

She was thrilled about the news, but not completely shocked. Like me, she had known the facts in her head, but had never been able to get her heart to believe Drew was capable of such an extreme act.

After she finished reveling in the wonderful news, I got to the point. “Under the circumstances, do you know anyone in this town who might be helpful in getting his conviction overturned, so it won’t be on his record?”

“Well, we may be in luck. Everyone involved in prosecuting Drew’s case has moved on to greener pastures. We have a new D.A. and a new police chief.” I could see Meridith’s wheels turning. “I don’t want to get your hopes up, but, the fact is…the new district attorney is named Alexandra Brody and she’s my tennis doubles partner.”

I reached across the table and grabbed her arm tightly. “Are you kidding me?”

She shook her head. “I’ll get us a meeting, and we’ll have her look into it.”

~

We managed to get away from Drew once more before Christmas. Meridith had set up the meeting with “Alex” and since we were seeing her on Christmas Eve, I decided Alexandra Brody must be the workaholic I used to be.

Drew and I had been invited to spend the night at Meridith’s, so we’d be there for Christmas morning with the kids. Once we arrived and Molly and Ben had captured Drew’s attention, Meridith and I called to him that we were going to the grocery store and escaped.

As we left, the first flakes of snow were starting to fall. A white Christmas had never meant much to me.

No one knew I’d actually spent many Christmases alone, too proud to finagle an invitation from a classmate or co-worker because then they would know I had nowhere else to go.

We met with Alex at her home, only a few blocks from Meridith’s. She ushered us warmly into her study and seated us near the brick fireplace. Firelight reflected off her auburn hair as she listened intently to our story.

At last, she spoke. “Meridith, after we talked on the phone, I went to pull the file to familiarize myself with the details of the case. As it turned out, it was already pulled.”

“Why?” Meridith and I asked simultaneously.

“The story is breaking in the Tribune this week, so there’s no reason for you not to know. We’ve been investigating some irregularities which may have occurred over several years, including the time when Drew was convicted. It’s possible the police and the D.A., at that time, withheld and tampered with evidence.”

Meridith gasped as her hand flew to the base of her throat.

“In general, or in Drew’s case specifically?” I was excited, but I was thinking like a lawyer again.

“In Drew’s case, it appears there may have been rape kit evidence that wasn’t turned over to his lawyer. Apparently, if the evidence didn’t match the chosen defendant, it was kept under wraps.”

“Oh, my God!” Meridith exclaimed.

I sat, staring at Alex, afraid to believe Drew and I could ever be this lucky.

“I know this is important to you, but it could take a while to get it sorted out,” Alex said apologetically.

“We understand. Thank you so much for telling us.” I’d just gotten the best Christmas present I could imagine.

~

I found Drew in the back yard with the kids, stockpiling snowballs for an upcoming battle. “What took you so long?” he asked, as he often did when I went somewhere without him.

“It was only forty-five minutes,” I replied. My answer was muffled because he had swept me into his arms for one of his big bear hugs.

These enthusiastic “you’re back” embraces he’d been giving me lately were bittersweet. I suspected I got them because there was still a little part of Drew that thought I might not return to him whenever I left.

They always made me wonder how his miserable excuse for a father had explained to a seven-year-old that his mother was never coming home again.

“Wait for us!” Molly and Ben yelled in unison and ran over to throw their arms around us for a group hug.

When they released him, Drew started toward the back door. “I’m going to unload the groceries.”

I felt guilty. “No. We already took care of it. We only got a few last-minute things.”

“Like what?” he asked. I had forgotten he would be interested in anything that could be used in a kitchen.

“Like butter, and milk, and some other stuff I don’t even know what to do with. I only went along to keep Meridith company.”

He bought it. I congratulated myself on being so “culinarily challenged,” I didn’t have to lie in any great detail.

~

Later that evening, I sat by the fire in the living room reading Christmas stories to the kids. After I’d gone through
Rudolph, Frosty,
and
‘Twas the Night Before Christmas,
they seemed satisfied and ran off to make notes to leave for Santa.

I wandered toward the kitchen, where Drew and Meridith were working their magic. As I approached the swinging door, I heard my name spoken, so I stopped to eavesdrop.

“Mia is such a doll to entertain Ben and Molly,” Meridith said.

“She likes it,” he replied. “She’s like me. She always wanted to be part of one of those TV families where parents read books to the kids and everyone eats dinner together.”

“She’ll make a wonderful mother, don’t you think?” Meridith was obviously trying to get Drew thinking in the right direction and better prepare him for my news. “Won’t it be fun, when your kids come along, and Molly and Ben have some little cousins to teach the ropes to?”

“Don’t count on it,” was Drew’s reply. “I doubt I can hang on to her long enough for that to happen, and you know I couldn’t be a father, anyway.”

“I can’t believe you’re saying that!” Meridith exclaimed. “Mia loves you, and, of course, you can be a father.”

“I can’t see it, Meri. All I know is I want her in the house with me, or in the car with me, or wherever I am, right now. I can’t imagine getting old with her. I can’t imagine our kids. I can’t even believe I’m getting the
now
. There’s no way I’ll get to have the
future, too.”

My heart sank. He was still the little boy without dreams. Meridith said I’d given him hope, but I wasn’t so sure. He didn’t even dare to hope I would stay with him. How could I plan for the future and raise a child with someone who couldn’t look forward?

Then I heard Meridith’s voice again, but this time it was adamant. “Drew, you listen to me. You have to change your thinking, whatever it takes. With this attitude, you’re going to force her to leave you. You’ll make it happen like I did with Carl. You’ll keep testing her and trying to control her until she has to go. Sometimes the other person feels like they have to abandon ship and save themselves no matter how much they love you. And since you expect to be mistreated or abandoned in the first place, you let it happen. Don’t do this, Drew. Find a way to learn from my mistakes.”