The Offering (19 page)

I couldn't help feeling concerned about other people's opinions, too, and one July morning I caught Mama Isa eyeing my belly while I rang up a woman who was buying boxes of sparklers. Mama Isa waited until I finished, then she walked over. “Mandy”—she kept her voice low—“can I talk to you? Amelia can fill in as cashier.”

A dozen warning flags in my brain snapped to attention. Mama
Isa was a pillar of the Cuban community—plus she was family, my boss, and the hostess who invited us to her home every week—but rarely did she pull me aside for private conversations. The last time we talked, I disappointed her when I couldn't agree to let Amelia have Gideon's baby cradle.

I gripped the edge of the counter. “Is something wrong?”

“No, no.” She smiled and opened the little gate of the checkout stand, now draped with red, white, and blue bunting for the upcoming holiday. “Let's get a coffee and talk.”

I cast a sideways glance at Amelia, who waited by the register with her brows raised and her eyes wide. Apparently she didn't know what was on her mother's mind, either.

The warning flags in my brain flapped like mad as I followed Mama Isa. She poured two cups of coffee at the coffee bar, then nodded toward the wooden benches on the sidewalk outside. The thought of drinking coffee in the middle of a stifling summer morning sent a drop of perspiration trickling down my spine, but I took the cup she offered and followed her to the benches. Fortunately, they lay in a narrow strip of shade.

After I'd taken a perfunctory sip, Mama Isa leaned toward me.

“I asked our priest about what you are doing,” she said, lifting a brow as she studied me. “I wondered if this thing could be a sin, and Father Jose said it could possibly be a very generous act. As long as no babies were destroyed, this procedure could work for good.”

I swallowed the lump that had risen in my throat and stared at two middle school boys who were riding skateboards in the parking lot.

“To be honest, I didn't know much about surrogacy when I began all this,” I admitted. “But I can promise you that Simone and Damien—the couple who hired me—did not want to destroy anything. They just want a baby.”

“But they created . . . how many
embriones
?”

“Six, I think.”

“What happened to the others?” Her wide forehead knit in puzzlement. “You are carrying one. Did they send five babies to heaven?”

I could barely think under her steady scrutiny. “I don't know. I mean, who can say when life actually begins?”

“Bah.” She waved the question away. “Life does not begin, it
is
. The egg is alive, the sperm is alive, the
embrión
is alive, no? Life is a gift from God, and is passed on from mama and papa to the
bebé.
”

I nodded, unable to argue with her logic.

“So I ask again, did they send five
bebés
to heaven?”

“Um . . . they froze four so they could be used later. And one of the babies was transferred into my womb, but it didn't implant. So it died.”

And I saw its blood on my underwear.

Mama Isa pressed her lips together. “Would it have died if it had been formed in its mother's womb?”

“Most likely.” I responded in a firm voice, glad I knew the answer to at least one of her questions. “Simone is unable to carry babies. She's miscarried every time she's been pregnant.”

“How can you know God would not have saved it?”

“Well . . . no one can know that, I suppose. But doesn't God use doctors to help people overcome their medical problems? He could be using me to give this woman a baby.”

Isa tilted her brow. “So this baby inside you—you saved its life?”

“I guess. Yes, I suppose we did. With the doctors' help, of course.”

Mama Isa patted my arm. “Then this is a good thing. I can tell Father Jose about this, and he will give you a blessing. I will say a prayer for you and this baby the next time I go to Mass. I will also pray for Amelia and Mario, that God would hurry to send the baby they want so much.” She gave me a teasing smile. “If you are not using that cradle, your cousin might like to borrow it for a while. But we can talk about this later.”

I exhaled the breath I'd been holding as Mama Isa stood. “Take your time, enjoy your
café.
I must go back to work.”

But as she sailed away, my mind supplied the question she had failed to ask: I may have saved this baby's life, but what about the other four? If I was carrying a son for Damien Amblour, those little ones might remain on ice indefinitely.

The hot days of summer fell into a fairly ordinary pattern of humid mornings, rainy afternoons, and sticky evenings. Gideon remained away throughout June, but I had plenty of company—Marilee, Gideon's family, and a steady stream of email messages from France. I had a feeling the Amblours had deliberately restrained their eagerness until I passed the second trimester milestone, but with that behind us, communications began to flow like a rain-swollen river. My doctor assured me that the second trimester was the easiest part of pregnancy, but she had never dealt with two hypervigilant intended parents. Simone and Damien may have decided not to pressure me about medical tests, but they weren't shy about making other requests.

Simone's emails were nearly always apologetic, but more and more often they contained “wishes” I interpreted as
demands
. Furthermore, I had a feeling that these orders didn't originate with Simone, but with Damien, who seemed far more rigid than his wife. Though Simone always cloaked the requests in apologies and gentle language, an unspoken message clearly came through:
We've hired you to do this, so mind how we want the task done.

The Amblours wanted me to steer clear of harsh cleaners with bleach and to avoid red meats, shellfish, pork, and raw eggs. To help me comply with their wishes, the couple sent cleaning supplies from France, books filled with healthy recipes, and a weekly maid service from Happy Housekeepers. When one email requested that I refrain from pumping my own gas, Amelia joked that the couple might soon deliver an electric car.

As much as I liked Simone and Damien, I was beginning to
wonder if they would ever run out of things they didn't want me to do.

My favorite request arrived via email during the first week of July. I was eighteen weeks pregnant and just easing into maternity clothes when Simone sent a digital recorder filled with Simone and Damien reading stories and poems in French. The enclosed note asked me to play the recordings for at least an hour every night, “preferably through headphones resting on your belly.”

Marilee laughed the first time she saw me trying to position a pair of headphones around my gentle baby bump, so she helped by resting her head in my lap and holding the headphones to my stomach. Unfortunately, Marilee had a four-year-old's attention span, so ten minutes later she wanted to go play. In a token effort to comply with the Amblours' request, I propped my arm on Gid's pillow and read a few chapters of
What to Expect When You're Expecting
while Simone sang a French lullaby to my belly button.

She phoned two days later to make certain I'd received the package. I assured her it had arrived safely and that I had begun to play the recordings.

“You may think we are being silly”—I could almost see her blushing—“but this is one of the things I would do if I were carrying the child.”

“Really, it's no bother,” I told her. “But I'm glad you waited to send it. I didn't have much of a belly before this month.”

She laughed. “We waited because the baby can't hear before nineteen weeks. But he's listening now, and I want him to recognize his parents' voices.”

My heart did a funny little flip-flop at her comment. I completely understood the longing she felt for someone who was miles away, the anxiety that kept her awake at night, and the helplessness that made her feel small when she realized she had absolutely no control over events that might injure someone she loved dearly. I felt all those things whenever I thought of Gideon, so my heart was also twisted in a knot of frustration and yearning.

But for some reason it felt wrong for her to say “his parents' voices.” Which meant my feelings were wrong, because this was definitely
not
my child.

This was a job, I reminded myself. A contract. I was babysitting, nothing more.

I tried to maintain a respectful distance from the Amblours, but sometimes I couldn't help thinking of Simone as a close friend. We were in nearly constant contact, and I couldn't blame her for wanting to reach out to me. If the situation were reversed and she were carrying Marilee, I'd have camped out on her doorstep.

“I understand how you feel,” I assured her. “And I'm so sorry we weren't able to learn the baby's gender at the last ultrasound. The little monkey didn't want to cooperate.”

“Children rarely do,” Simone said, a smile in her voice. “And now, sweet friend, get some rest.
Bonsoir et au revoir.
”

D
id you see the big fireworks display last night?” Dr. Hawthorn looked up from my chart and smiled. “Or were you busy cleaning up after your Fourth of July picnic?”

I slipped off the exam table and made my way toward the small dressing alcove in the obstetrician's exam room. “I took Marilee to my aunt's house, and she stayed up to watch the fireworks. I fell asleep on the sofa in the living room.”

Dr. Hawthorn chuckled and jotted something on my chart. “You should be able to feel the baby moving now. Experienced any kicks?”

I thought about it, then shook my head and closed the small curtain. “Not really. Unless what I've been calling indigestion is actually the kid practicing his judo.”

“Maybe he's one of those sleepy babies. Have you been bothered by anything in particular?”

I drew a deep breath and took my blouse from the hook I'd hung it on. “Everything's fine—except my sleep. I keep waking up in the middle of the night after having the wildest dreams.”

“Strange and unusually vivid dreams are perfectly natural,” the doctor called. “First, you're getting up during the night more than usual because you have to urinate frequently. You're waking
right after a dream, so you remember it. You probably dream just as often when you're not pregnant, but in the morning you don't remember anything about them.”

I fumbled with the buttons on my blouse. “The dreams feel so . . . unusual. And weird.”

“You're not the first to tell me about bizarre dreams, Amanda. Most of them are easily understood.”

I laughed and reached for my maternity jeans. “I didn't know you interpreted visions, too.”

“It's not as complicated as you might expect. Think of dreams as a convenient way for your subconscious to send you a message. You go through huge changes when you're pregnant, and you have a lot to think about. Your subconscious works overtime to make sure you're handling everything that comes your way. You can chalk it all up to raging hormones.”

When I opened the curtain again, she gave me a knowing smile. “Let me guess—you're in the second trimester, so you've probably been dreaming about cuddly puppies, carrying suitcases, or giving birth to your husband.”

My jaw dropped. “Are you psychic? I haven't dreamed about giving birth to my husband, but last night I gave birth to the intended father. And he's huge, so that's no small task.”

She chuckled. “I'd love to say I've been reading your mind, but these images are common. You probably dreamed of giving birth to the intended father because dealing with him seems easier than dealing with a helpless baby. You dream about cuddly puppies or some other animal when you're feeling maternal. Women who worry about their mothering skills might dream of being threatened by clinging, infantlike creatures—monkeys, for instance.” She tilted her head. “Are you dreaming of animals?”

“I dreamed about puppies a couple of nights ago,” I confessed. “I came home and found a litter of poodles behind the refrigerator. I went out on a crazed search to find families for them before Gideon got home.”

The doctor raised a brow. “Given your circumstances, you don't have to be a psychologist to figure out that one. You found poodles?
French
poodles, by chance?”

I gasped as the connection became clear. “Wow.”

“You wanted to find homes for the poodles because you're concerned about placing the baby you're carrying in its proper family. As to your hurry to get rid of them before your husband came home, does he still support your decision to be a surrogate?”

I shrugged. “He hasn't said anything negative. But he's been away, so we don't get to talk much.”

“Perhaps you're worried that he's hiding some degree of resentment. Or maybe you're just worried—about him, about the baby, about life in general. I wouldn't blame you if you were anxious.” She smiled. “But don't let yourself worry too much, Amanda. Why don't you start keeping a pregnancy journal and write out your dreams? Once you get them down on paper, you may be able to see what your subconscious was trying to tell you. Dream interpretation can be remarkably easy with a little help from hindsight.”

“I've been keeping a diary, so it'd be easy to add my dreams to my notes.”

“Write the dreams down right away, or you're likely to forget them. You might try keeping your journal on the nightstand.”

“I can do that. And let me see if I'm any good at this—if I dream of carrying suitcases, is that because I'm carrying extra weight?”

“You
are
good at this.” She closed my chart and moved toward the door. “Anything else you need from me? If not, shall we meet again in a couple of weeks? It's about time for your midterm ultrasound.”