Far from the Tree(9)

He hadn’t had that many strokes of good luck in his life, but Joaquin knew he had gotten lucky by not having any siblings. He had seen what that had done to other kids, how hard they fought to stay together and how destroyed they were when they were inevitably pulled apart. He had seen the older brothers try desperately to be adopted by families who only wanted younger sisters; he had seen older sisters wrenched away from younger brothers because there wasn’t enough room for three kids in a foster home, and social services sometimes separated siblings by gender. It was hard enough for Joaquin to keep himself together, keep his heart and mind above water in a tide that wanted only to drown him. He could never have kept someone else afloat, too. He was glad he didn’t have to, that he was untethered, even if he sometimes suspected that without that tether, he could just float away and no one would even know he was gone, that no one would ever look for him again.

Mark and Linda would probably look for him, Joaquin realized as the arts center came into view, as the sun broke through the clouds. But they would not adopt him, he had decided.

Joaquin had been adopted once before.

And he was never going to let it happen again.





GRACE


After Grace’s parents had found out that she was pregnant, they had met with Max’s parents. “It’s a discussion,” her dad had said. “We just want to discuss our options.” But at fourteen weeks pregnant, Grace knew that there weren’t a lot of options on the table to discuss.

Max’s parents didn’t want to discuss “options.” They all met in her living room, the one that Grace and her parents hardly ever used because the TV wasn’t in there; it was in the den. Nevertheless, there in the living room Max and Grace sat across from each other like they had when they’d first met in Model United Nations. To say that she and Max had united and become a single country was a joke that Grace kept thinking, but never said. She didn’t think anyone’s parents—or Max—would appreciate it. And it probably wasn’t that funny in the first place.

Max’s dad was so angry that he was shaking. Even on a Saturday afternoon, he was wearing a collared shirt and a jacket, and he never took his hand off Max’s shoulder, but not in a comforting way. More like in a “you will sit here under my command” way. Max hated his dad. He always called him an asshole behind his back.

“I don’t know what your daughter has done to my son—”

“I don’t think that blame is going—” Grace’s mom started to say, and her hand was on Grace’s shoulder now, too. It was warm, though, too warm, and Grace already felt crowded enough with Peach continuing to grow inside her. She shook her off. She didn’t want anyone touching her, not even Max.

Especially not Max.

“Max has a future,” his dad said, while his mom sat silent. “He’s going to go to UCLA. This is not a part of his plan.”

Grace’s parents didn’t say anything. She had plans to apply to Berkeley next year, but they weren’t talking about going up for a campus tour anymore. (Also, Grace knew that Max had cheated on his AP French exam, but she didn’t say anything about that, either.)

“Grace has a future, too,” her dad said instead, speaking over Max’s dad. They looked like two hockey players about to start brawling on the ice. “And she and Max are both responsible—”

“I don’t know what she said to get my son in this situation, but if you think you’re getting any of my money . . .” Max’s dad trailed off. His nostrils were flaring. Max shared that same trait when he was angry. Sometimes Grace called him Puff the Magic Dragon, but only in her head, and only when she was really mad at him.

“It’s about the baby,” her mother interrupted. “And Grace and Max.”

“There’s no Max and Grace,” Max’s dad said. His mom didn’t say anything. It was creepy. Grace guessed that you really got to know a guy’s family once you got pregnant with their son’s baby. “Max is dating a good girl now.”

A good girl. The words hung in the air as Grace looked to Max, but he was looking down at the floor. “Max?” she said.

He wouldn’t look at her. Or at Peach.

Stephanie was the good girl, of course. Grace had no idea if she was a good person or not, but Max’s dad obviously equated “good girl” with “person whose womb is currently unoccupied.” So, if they were going by his definition, then yes, Stephanie was 99.99 percent a good person. Grace was 100 percent not.

And that, in a nutshell, is how Grace and her boyfriend broke up.

Max and Grace had dated for almost a year, which, if she thought about it, was about the same amount of time that it took Grace, later on, to grow Peach. But she couldn’t think about it that way, not at all. She couldn’t think about Peach without feeling a pain that sliced through her, splitting her open just like it did in the delivery room. Grace didn’t think it could be worse than that night, her mother gripping her hand, nurses urging her to push, but it was.

Janie used to call Max Movie Guy because he was pretty much the guy in the movies: football player, white straight teeth, friend to all . . . but a better friend to some. She didn’t realize it at the time, but Grace liked him just because he liked her, and that wasn’t a strong enough tree to hang on to when the storm came. She knew that now, of course, because both Max and Peach were gone and her hands were empty, scratched from clinging too tight to something that should never have been held in the first place.