Maria

SEPTEMBER 6

I WOKE EARLY, AT DAWN, while Ernest snored beside me. I made coffee in the kitchen and sat at the table, thinking about the day ahead. Barely awake, I stared into the texture of the wall, creating tiny shapes, little bodies and faces. I saw an eye, a bird. Then I opened my notebook and wrote:

Ray-Ray’s spirit channeled Wyatt. I can barely breathe, thinking about it.

I set my pen down and closed the notebook. Outside the window, a flock of sparrows was gathering in the early-morning grass. I felt anxious. I would normally look forward to the hearing and seeing a reunification of foster child with family, but this felt different. To see Wyatt leave with his grandparents, other people, felt painful.

Wyatt was already packed and ready to go an hour later. I made him waffles and orange juice, and he ate in silence. I didn’t want to bring up the hearing. Ernest came into the room, and I was surprised to see him turn down breakfast. He drank coffee and sat across the table from Wyatt. Both of them had their heads down, and I stood there awkwardly watching them.

It wasn’t any better when I drove us to the courthouse. Nobody talked in the car. In a moment of irrational thought I wanted to steal Wyatt and drive far away, separated from everyone in Quah, away from Oklahoma. To leave this place, coasting down the interstate without a care. We passed the places Ray-Ray used to love to go: the Tastee Freez, the Smokey’s BBQ. We passed the Del Rancho, old shops. Muskogee Avenue curved ahead north, and we came to a stoplight. In the rearview mirror I saw Wyatt in the back seat, staring out the window. I saw his dreamy gaze, such brilliant, drowsy eyes. A glint of sunlight illuminated his face. In that moment I saw Ray-Ray’s eyes, as I had seen him so many years before in the back seat, driving north along Muskogee, and something fluttered in my heart. The car behind me was blaring its horn, and I realized the light was green. The car jumped as I hit the pedal, but neither Wyatt nor Ernest said anything. My heart was racing. I drove in silence, both hands on the wheel.

BERNICE MET US at the courthouse in good spirits, though I could clearly see that Ernest was upset as he sat in the lobby with his arms crossed. Wyatt and Bernice and I stood by the front door, waiting for Wyatt’s grandparents to show. Ernest was looking straight ahead, irritated. The courthouse lobby was empty and pale, too quiet, with tall ceilings and photographs of elderly white men on the walls.

“I need a magazine or TV to pass the time,” Ernest said.

“It’s not a dentist’s office,” I told him. “You’ll need to try to relax, Ernest.”

“I can’t.”

“You have to try. Everything is going to be fine.”

I said this more for myself than to ease Ernest’s mind. I was trying to hold it together, but I could sense we were falling apart by the minute. I hoped Wyatt’s grandparents wouldn’t show—for Ernest’s mental health, and for some measure of my own happiness. I excused myself and went into the restroom down the hall, where I splashed cold water on my face. I hadn’t slept well, worried about the hearing. We had never fostered before. What a strange and profound effect Wyatt had had on us; I hadn’t felt anything like it. In the mirror I saw my reflection, a face marked by lines and age. A face marked by the persistence of hope, tragedy, abandonment, and grief. I reminded myself I was a woman who maintained strength through everything.

In the bathroom, at the mirror, I waited. I summoned memories of my young motherhood: they came flooding in, like a flickering slideshow, images of Sonja, Ray-Ray, and Edgar filling the silence in the room. I saw them gathered at the dinner table, laughing and eating. I saw them sleeping in their beds. I saw them playing with their toys on sunny days outside. Thinking of the sun and the sky opening into a vast blue outside, I pictured the endless fields surrounding the kids, the still and peaceful grass. If one looked closely, there were yellow butterflies, swirling gnats, crawling insects, new life forming in nature, which I envied briefly—all those short-lived forms of life void of logic or thinking, void of emotion, guilt, or pain.

Back in the lobby, the grandparents had arrived and were talking to Bernice. I thought they were a little younger than me and Ernest, closer to Bernice’s age, maybe sixty. The grandfather had white hair in a ponytail. He looked cheerful, smiling and nodding as Bernice talked. The grandmother’s hair was deep black with streaks of gray. They were both tall, large of build.

When I walked up, Bernice introduced me to them. Their names were Thomas and Viv.

“How has he been?” Viv asked me.

I glanced at her, and then at Thomas. I could see the concern in their eyes.

“He’s been a real joy. A real blessing,” I told them, looking at Wyatt as I said this.

“He can be an angel,” Viv said. “We’re glad we could make the drive down.”

“It was a six-hour drive,” Bernice said. “Are you driving straight back?”

“Thomas doesn’t like to travel anymore,” Viv said, “so we’ll stop and eat and then head back.”

I looked to Ernest, waving him over, and we all waited for him to join us. Bernice introduced Thomas and Viv to him, and he seemed hurt, almost angry, but he was polite. The awkwardness of the moment reasserted itself. Bernice talked about Wyatt’s clothes. He had dressed nicely, wearing a collared shirt and slacks. He was quiet, but he didn’t look bothered or upset, which pleased me. And his grandparents were friendly and gentle with him. It was likely that the judge would release Wyatt to them.