I sprinted awkwardly in three-inch-high heels from the wood-paneled elevator to the modern, art-encased office of Bard & Roberts Financial Advisors. My heels clicked, clicked, clicked on the marble floors. I never wore heels except at this office. I try so hard to fit in despite my meager investment portfolio.
“Go right in, Ms. Temple,” said the receptionist. “Mr. Bard is waiting for you.”
Did she sneer? I don’t think so. I’m not sure. I fixed the part in my hair as I went.
I settled in a red leather armchair across from the greying George Bard, who had my spreadsheet on the computer screen. I knew he was familiar with it, as he had been advising me for many years.
“Hi! So, what brings you in today, Ms. Temple?”
“I understand tuition is rising above the level of inflation again this year. As you know, Maria has started at Barnard College. What if they raise tuition precipitously each year? She’s only a freshman. Am I ready?”
“You’re ready,” said George Bard. “I turned a third of your bonds into real estate holdings. The money is growing and is there for the taking. Maria will be fine.”
I felt myself tear up. Maria and I had worked so hard to get her into Barnard College — years of tutoring, crew practice, cello lessons, AP classes, SAT prep courses. Everything we could do. It was her dream. For me, I wanted her to have it easier than I did – kicked out of the house at age seventeen for being pregnant and working three jobs to raise Maria. Finally, I hit on a real talent I had — writing ads, and then I could save money. Let Maria start at a better point than I did –that was my prayer.
Two hours later, I sat at the parent-friendly bistro three blocks from Barnard College to meet Maria for our usual first-of-the-month meeting.
“Would you like a drink, Ma’am?” asked a young man with a blonde beard whom I didn’t recognize. New help, I guessed.
“Amaretto on the rocks, please,” I said.
Before the bartender could return, Maria entered the bistro carrying a jumbo, clear plastic bag with large red handles that seemed to hold every article of clothing she owned (laundry?).
“Hi, Mom,” Maria mumbled and collapsed in the wooden chair across from me.
I appraised. She stared downward, her eyes shadowed by dark rings. Her red hair and blotched skin matched in color. Her hair lay greasy and limp on her shoulders, and her white sweater bore a noticeable orange stain.
“Maria, have you been studying too hard, Sweetie?” I asked, beginning to panic.
“No,” she mumbled, sitting across from me, then looking down at her lap.
“Roommate problems?” I ventured, almost hopefully.
“No,” she said.
Then Maria jumped up from the table, grabbed her bag, and yelled, “Don’t worry about me, Mom,” and ran out of the bistro. I tried to run after her (the bartender yelling behind me about the tab) and tripped in my high-heeled shoes, crashing into the pavement. Luckily, it was just scrapes, torn clothing, and ruined shoes, no broken bones, but what about Maria?
I limped back to the bistro and paid my tab, leaving no tip to make a point about embarrassing me by running after me for money in the street. I called Maria’s cell phone…straight to voicemail.
I texted a message. “Honey, I don’t know what’s wrong, but whatever it is, come home, and we can discuss it. I can help!”
Ten minutes later, as I made my way to the subway, I got a text: “I’m on my own. I know this. You won’t help.”
I texted back, “There is nothing you can tell me that would turn me against you. Come home and get some rest. Talk when you are ready. I’ll go home and wait for you. I’ll wait night and day until you come home. Come home.”
She almost beat me to the apartment. We settled in the kitchen, drank hot chocolate, and ate some marshmallows.
“Yes?” I braced myself for a tale of falling grades that was my real fear.
“I dropped out two weeks ago and have been couch surfing.”
“What?! What?!”
“Mom, you’re yelling–”
“Do you realize you missed the refund deadline!? We have to pay for this whole semester even though you won’t get a single credit. I have not planned for an extra semester. Why? Why did you drop out? Why didn’t you talk to me?
“Mom, you’re yelling. Don’t cry, Mom.”
“What happened?” I yelled. Then, the room began to swim and swirl. I felt nauseous. Could I even listen to this right now?
“Do I have to tell you right now?” Maria asked.
“Why wouldn’t you?”
“Well, you are upset,” she mumbled.
“Are you okay, Maria?” I asked.
“I’m pregnant, Mom. I’m pregnant.”
I passed out.
I woke up lying on the kitchen floor with marshmallows in my hair and hot chocolate all over my blouse. My Maria was crying and slapping my cheeks. I pulled myself up to the chair and took deep breaths. I shook uncontrollably. I thought about asking her the circumstances that led to the pregnancy and if she wanted the baby, but I couldn’t bear to hear it all.
“I’m sorry, Mom,” said Maria.
“You’re sorry?” I yelled.
“Maybe it’s better if I stay with my friends,” she mumbled.
“Yes,” I said shakily, “maybe it’s better for a short time. I’m not myself. I’ve never felt like this in my life.”
“Okay, Mom,” she said.
I began making coffee the following morning. How could Maria get pregnant? I got her on the pill at sixteen, even though she insisted she was not sexually active. She knew how hard we had to struggle. Barnard was so important to her. Her eighth-grade teacher, whom she adored, went to Barnard. What could have happened? Could she have been raped? Did I just turn my child away after she had been raped?
I called Maria, “Baby?” I said gently.
“Mom?”
“Please come home so we can talk,” I said.
“Are you sure, Mom?”
“Yes,” I said, “please.”
An hour later, the doorbell rang. Maria had a key, so I supposed she was respecting our semi-estrangement by ringing the bell.
When I let her into the apartment, she was still wearing the stained sweater and carrying the crammed plastic tote.
“Do you want a shower?” I asked.
“I’m not sure,” she mumbled.
I hesitated and couldn’t think of what to say.
“It’s okay, Mom, I know how you feel.”
“No, you don’t!”
“But Mom, this is my pregnancy, not yours!”
Maria rarely stood up to me, so I bounced down on the couch and looked her in the eye.
“How did it happen?” I asked. “You are on the pill.”
“Studying so hard…I missed several doses… I guess that was enough,” she said.
“Who is the father?” I asked.
“Just some guy from a frat party who says he’s out of the picture.”
“That easy for him, huh?”
“Yeah.”
I motioned for Maria to sit next to me on the couch. I held my daughter in my arms. Then I whispered, “Why not an abortion? You are not in love with the father. You have a life to get on with.”
“I have to decide,” she said.
“Okay,” I said gently. I remembered what it was like to be at an innocent age and pregnant.
Maria began twirling her hair. She was silent.
I could not believe this. Maria just turned eighteen. Pregnant. She might not realize how hard a life she would be choosing if she kept the baby. She was a baby herself. She’d never held a job, much less a job for minimum wage with childcare to pay for. Everything began to melt and swirl in my mind’s eye. Years of careful saving. Living in a tiny rent-controlled apartment in a questionable part of Manhattan, all to save. All to save Maria from what I went through. But the thing I went through, the thing that nearly broke my spirit those many years ago, I suddenly realized, was being cast away by my family.
I led Maria back into her old room, took her bag, and said, “I’ll do your laundry. You will live at home no matter what you decide if that is what you want.” It almost physically hurt me to say it, but in my heart, I committed to be there for my daughter and her child if necessary. Inside, I cringed at the thought of helping with child care, diapers, and formula. I felt a wave of depression engulf me, and yet it was the right thing to do. I guess this was full circle.
“Thank you, Mom,” Maria said, hugging me, tears running from her cheeks and dripping onto my blouse.
The next day, I got up early, made Maria and me some eggs and toast, and left for work. I had been working on shampoo ads at my ad agency. Settling behind my desk, I kicked my sneakers off and began pairing everything desirable with that shampoo. I hadn’t considered pairing prosperous young adult children with shampoo, but I zipped quickly down that road. I had AI fashion a picture of a young woman on a beautiful college campus. She had shiny, bouncy hair.
Two hours later, my boss said gently, “Nora?”
“Yeah?”
“Your new ad campaign is unique. Do you seriously think we make this pairing?”
“I can.”
“Yes, if anyone can, you can.”
I plowed on with my work. I made a storyboard with the shiny-haired young person going to class, sitting with friends, and smiling as she got a grade back on a test.
Two days later, I felt calmer. My ad campaign about shampoo and happy and prosperous young adults was somehow a hit with the client, and I was promised a bonus. We had been struggling to keep this client.
“Maria?” I called out after throwing my keys in the key basket that night.
“Mom?” she called back, shuffled from her bedroom to the foyer to greet me.
“How do you feel?” I asked.
“Sick to my stomach,” she said. “I can’t keep any food down.”
“Oh, I remember those days,” I said. I was not planning on commiserating with Maria; it just happened. I hated those morning-sickness months.
I put Maria to bed, went to bed myself, and left early the following day.
An hour or two after I arrived at work, my best friend called me. As soon as our phones connected, the call was cut off, and she tried several more times. Finally, she called the ancient phone on my desk.
“Linda?” I said.
“Nora?”
“Yes! You okay?”
“Maria is not okay.”
“What has happened?”
“She’s had bleeding. I took her to Saint Luke’s Hospital. We’re here.”
“I’ll be right there.”
“No, Nora. She called me because she …she wants me right now.”
I felt a slap across the face as if it were real, but I pulled it together. “Take good care of her,” I said.
“Of course. Nora, I think she’s going to lose the baby.”
“Is Maria alright? I mean, is she healthy?”
“The doctor says she’s sound. The only thing is she feels it is somehow her fault. I’ve told her these things happen, especially in the first trimester, and it’s no one’s fault, but she says she didn’t want the baby enough. I have to go, the doctor is here. I’ll call you back.” The phone went dead.
Thirty minutes later the desk phone rang. “She lost the baby.”
“How is Maria?”
“I’ve just gotten her to calm down. See her tonight. I’m going to take her home shortly. I’ll stay with her.”
I wanted to enfold my only child in my arms.
“Alright,” I said. I trusted Linda more than anyone in my life. She was the first one I called when Nora came home pregnant. She would know what was best.
The next days passed in a blur. Maria stayed in her room like she had the flu, taking only soup. Linda visited her. I held her. Then she woke up one morning, put on her clothes, and made breakfast.
Three weeks after she lost the baby, Maria and I went for a walk in Central Park.
“It’s so weird not being pregnant,” Maria said.
“Is it?” I asked gently.
“I had feelings, you know, for the baby,” she said.
“I understand completely.”
“I’m afraid it died because I didn’t want it enough.”
“Oh, sweetie,” I cooed, pulling Nora to me. “Every young parent has mixed feelings. That is not why you lost the baby. I’m so sorry.”
“You didn’t want me to keep the baby,” she accused.
“I know. I’m sorry,” I said. “I practically acted like my own mother acted. I can’t get over it.”
Maria said, “I’ve decided to get a job until next semester starts. I’ll make money to make up for the tuition we lost.”
I thought for a while. That might be wise. It might be wise for her to understand how difficult that would be. “Alright,” I said. “We’ll just make up for the difference together. I am getting a bonus soon.”
But the following weeks were filled with Maria’s tears. At all hours of the night, I could hear her weeping. She did get a job at a coffee shop. She cut her hair short like the others at her job. She got a small tattoo on her thigh. I didn’t tell her that I couldn’t tell what it was. It was essential to the transformation she was going through. I watched as Maria became a solid young adult. She set her alarm. She opened a bank account. She rearranged her room so it looked more like an office. She was careful with money and time.
Finally, I took Maria into my financial confidence and brought her to my advisor’s office. Maria wore her work clothes: jeans and a “Give Me Coffee” T-shirt.
I wore a new set of high heels and a business suit.
“Mr. Bard, Maria lost a semester’s tuition. I got a bonus yesterday. Here is the check,” I handed it to him.
“I am working,” said Maria. “I have saved four hundred dollars,” she handed him the check.
“Will we have enough to make it through four years?” I asked.
Mr. Bard looked hard at Maria and gently at me. “I’m assuming tuition will rise as it has been,” he said.
I gulped. Maria wrung her hands.
“You may have to take out a loan,” he said, looking at me softly.
“That would be okay,” I said.
“May I ask your major?” he asked Maria.
“Computer Science,” she said.
He looked noticeably relieved, which I assumed was because her major was not Art History. “There is another option,” he said.
“What’s that?” I asked.
“Maria, you could do summer school at a public city college for the coming summers and transfer the credits into Barnard. It will make up for the lost semester. Then, you will have enough money. Probably, they will only accept electives, not core courses. I’ve been through this with other clients.”
“I’ll do that,” Maria said with certainty.
“Talk to your advisor. Make sure the credits transfer before you register for them,” he said.
“Okay, thank you,” we both said, and we reached for each other’s hand briefly.
Back at the apartment, I sat on the couch with Maria.
“You have everything invested just for me,” she said.
“When you graduate, I’ll start saving for myself.”
“Thank you, Mom. I never thanked you. I wanted to keep the baby because you kept me.”
I reached over and put my hand over my daughter’s hand.
“I wanted to be brave like you were,” she said.
“You were brave,” I said.
“Really? I feel like I am younger than when this started.” She brushed her short hair away from her face, and I noticed how chiseled her face looked.
“You’re my adult daughter, now. I can feel you have personal strength you didn’t have.”
“I do?”
“I’m proud of you.”
The next semester began. Maria moved out of the apartment and back into the dorms. She scheduled an appointment with a gynecologist and took various precautions.
The following week, on the phone she said, “I’m going to keep my coffee shop job part-time. “
“Why? You’re covered.”
“I want to start saving. You saved. I want to save.”
“There’s time for that after you graduate,” I said. “You just be a college student and enjoy that.”
“I wonder if I can? I feel like everything has changed.”
“Let me worry. Don’t worry. You can’t return to before, but you’re still just eighteen. You can enjoy your life.”
“Okay, Mom. It’s not like I have responsibilities…I guess…”
“No, you don’t,” I said, thinking, thank God.
“I love you, Mom.”
“I love you, baby.”
“I’m going to join the hiking club, then.”
“Excellent.”
“And maybe I’ll try to code and sell an app.”
“If it doesn’t interfere with school.”
“I’ve got it covered, Mom.”
“I know you do.”
Things were not full circle, I knew. I had to reach out to my parents. I passed out when Maria told me she was pregnant. I sent her out of the house. I saw all my hard work go down the drain. Is that part of what they felt? I had our old address and took an Uber to their home in suburban Riverdale, Bronx.
I rang the bell. A long time passed, and I was about to leave, but a woman I recognized answered the door – my mother. She stood behind a screen door.
“Nora?” she said.
“Mom.”
“You’re not welcome here,” she said, her mouth turned down at both sides.
Her eyes and cheeks were lined, and her hair was salt and pepper. She was a bit hunched.
I looked around. The house looked just like all the other row houses in that area of Riverdale. I could smell the wall-to-wall carpet and room freshener, even from the stoop. An empty fireplace and a large gold cross stood where they always did, on the far wall, as did the family bible on the mantle.
“I had a girl,” I said gently.
“Oh?” said my mother.
“Where’s Dad?” I asked.
“He is visiting Uncle Bob,” she said.
“So, as I say, I had a girl, and she’s a student at Barnard College now.”
My mother examined my face and my clothing. She dwelled on my white sneakers.
“You were supposed to go to Georgetown,” she said.
“I know,” I said, laying my hand gently on the screen door.
“Well, I made something of myself anyway. I’m an ad executive. I pay for Maria’s tuition myself.”
“Well, I hope she doesn’t break your heart. Goodbye, Nora,” she said.
“Mom, I understand how you must have felt all those years ago. I’m sorry it’s taken so long to reach out to you. You wanted so much for me and felt I threw it all away.”
“No, I felt you were a slut,” said my mother, her hard eyes fixing mine. You were a disgrace. Now leave,” she said, closing the door.
In shock, I barely held myself up.
The whole thing was too much for me. How different times are now, I guessed. I tried to justify my mom’s statements. She wanted a different thing for me. She wanted a “good girl” for all her trouble. I wanted a happy and successful kid. What difference does it make? It was all about her. It was all about me.
But I came around. I was there for Maria, and my mother couldn’t accept me. It was different, and I knew it. It felt like I had come full circle, but to a new height.
About the Author
June Wolfman is an attorney and an educator. She has published eight short stories, most recently in Fiction on the Web, Down in the Dirt, and CommuterLit. She is in her last semester in a Master’s program in Creative Writing/English. One of her short stories was nominated for a Pushcart prize. She lives in Miami with her husband and her two troublesome cats.
About the Author
This is typical June Wolfman, in that it is an atypical, fiercely real and poignant fiction. I was gripped by the mutual misgivings of both the narrator and her daughter and by the spectrum of emotions which raced through their mind. The ice-cold manner of the narrator’s own mother left me breathless. Another great ride, June; thank you!
Thank you!