Hands of Fate

I stepped off the plane into the chill, dry air of New Mexico, eight hours after we left that morning. Even as my husband and I made our way to baggage claim, my eyes scanned through the unread text messages and email messages from Amy.

“Call me.”

The message was cryptic and I felt a shiver down my spine portending things to come. I called Amy and got her voicemail. I mustered all the cheer I could inject and left a message.

“Hey! We landed. Will call you again once we are in the car and on the way.”

Half an hour later, we pulled into the hotel and the phone still lay mute in my hands.

“I’d like to request a crib please. We are adopting a baby tomorrow.” The words were out of my mouth before I could think. The lady at the reception gushed over us and promised a playpen. Rolling our luggage, we opened the door to a dark suite. Even as I fiddled with the light switch and my husband looked for an appropriate space for the suitcase, the phone rang.

“She changed her mind.”

I listened in a trance as Amy explained to me that she had tried to reach us before we left. The mother had changed her mind after the baby was born. There was little any of us could do.

“You don’t have to visit her or see the baby,” she said, her voice warm and sympathetic.

I hung up letting her know I would call when I had a chance to sit down and process everything she had told me.

My husband of nine years held me from behind, rocking me as I spoke, words that issued out of my mouth as if recorded. I did not break down then. If anything, I felt bereft, empty.

“We should go see the baby. We flew all the way for her. Let us go visit, hand over the gifts and go back home.” His voice was steady, a beacon of rational thought when I could not summon any. I methodically unpacked the bag of gifts, sorting, making up smaller bags and arranging them in order. One for the mom, one for each of her other children and the biggest one for baby. Stuff I had collected over six months as I vicariously experienced her pregnancy. Yellows and greens, gender neutral, self-preservation when fraught with uncertainty.

We drove in silence. Winged insects buzzed around the overhead lamp in the parking lot as we parked and got out of the car. The place was desolate, an echo of my feelings. My sandals slapped against the vinyl as we made our way to the maternity ward. Amy was the first to reach us. We hugged, an embrace that spoke more than words ever could. The baby’s grandmother held my hands, her eyes red rimmed. She apologized for her daughter’s change of mind. It felt incongruous. It hit me then how ridiculous it was, a grandmother apologizing for keeping her granddaughter.

We went inside, the baby under a heat lamp, her dark hair with tight curls defining her face. We lingered, hesitant to hold her. I met the mother and her other children. We hugged, spoke little. We left the gifts by her bed and walked out. Our visit took all of five minutes. Amy accompanied us to the parking lot. We thanked her for her services and promised to send her final check once we got home.

Night fell on the desert town, inky and oppressive. We drove around trying to find a place to eat. Silence bound us as we ate and processed what had happened. I looked for flights as soon as we reached the hotel. I broke down and wept. Animal cries that I stifled in my pillow. I sobbed until there was nothing left. The next day dawned as the rest of the world looked forward to the new year with hope and promise. We flew into the sunset into the new year knowing we had exhausted our last attempt at building a family.

I joined my MBA class that I had taken a break from. I cancelled my FMLA request at work and retreated into my shell. I wrote in my blog one night:

Ever get that feeling that you are caught on the median with vehicles flying past both ways wondering if the pace will ever let up leaving you with space to cross?

I’ve felt that way for a couple of days now. I feel like everything is flying past me and I have to catch up except I have no idea how much longer I will be waiting.

It does not help there is one more day to push myself through before the weekend. Sigh!

A few minutes after I published the post, the phone rang. It was 10:45 PM. Amy’s voice sounded tentative. I reassured her it was OK. We were both awake. I wondered if we had any dues left to pay. She dispelled my fears and explained why she had called. There was a mother looking to place her twin daughters. The agency Amy worked for required each expectant mother looking to place be shown at least three profiles. They had only two families willing and interested.

“I couldn’t get you out of my mind. There was so much grace in how you and your husband handled an extremely emotional situation. Can I please show your profile?”

I said I will check with my husband and call her back.

“Twins, white, 10 months old.”

That about summed up what I told my husband. He declared me crazy and went back to watching television. After I continued staring at him, he agreed to let me send our profile out. The next morning, he had come around. That evening, we sat at a friend’s home, the sounds of prayer filling the large family room. We sang along, giving in to the fates. The phone buzzed in my hand. I slipped out to the bathroom and heard the message.

“The mother liked your profile. She wants to talk to you and another family this Sunday. Are you available to meet the day after on Skype?”

Sunday dawned bright and early. We logged in and waited for the incoming beep. Two babies crawled around on the rug holding bottles. Amy and the babies’ mother sat across from us, miles away. We exchanged pleasantries. Most of all we just stared at each other wondering if we were going to become one huge family.

An hour later as we pulled into the parking lot of our favorite Mexican restaurant, the phone rang again.

“She picked you! You are going to be a mom this week.” Amy’s voice was jubilant. My smile stretched from ear to ear. Over lunch, my husband and I picked out names. We reached home to a voicemail from a friend of ours who knew about our intent to adopt.

“We are relocating to India. Would you like to have our child’s crib and high chair, you know for when your child finds you?”

I cried. We cried. We sat late into night assembling a crib for the first time. I sat down with my admissions officer at the MBA program filling out a class drop form for the second time in a month. I emailed yet another request for FMLA at work. I called my mother and my siblings. He called his father and brother. We waited, a collective hope that ballooned over time into something that could lift us off the earth and into space. I stood late into the night, in the room painted a pista green, motifs of elephants, hippos and monkeys along the center hoping against hope that dreams will come true. And come true they did. Four days from then, we flew into the sunset again landing in the darkness to a new life as parents to ten-month-old twins.

Often, I look back on our journey to parenthood and circle back to the one instant we walked out of our failed adoption and how it changed the course of our life. I now view life as intersecting circles. Our lives touching other lives, setting off ripples that upend and change the course of other lives. I think of our actions and the way we affect others. I hug a little longer, hold the phone a little after the conversation ends. I savor the pauses, the moments before anything happens. I give thanks as I slip into sleep and wake up knowing that life is beautiful.

And sometimes, just sometimes, I feel the hand of fate scripting my life.

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