Little Fires Everywhere(81)

“It’s not a requirement,” she insisted now. “It’s not a requirement that we be experts in Chinese culture. The only requirement is that we love Mirabelle. And we do. We want to give her a better life.” She continued to cry, and the judge dismissed her.

“It’s all right,” Mr. Richardson said as she took her place beside him. “You did just fine.” Inside, however, even he was beginning to feel a faint tremor of doubt. Of course Mirabelle would have a good life with Mark and Linda. There was no question about that. But would there be something—something—missing from her life if she were to grow up with them? Mr. Richardson was suddenly keenly conscious of Mirabelle, of the immense weight of the complicated world on this one tiny, vulnerable person.

On the courthouse steps, when the reporters stopped them, he made a brief, anodyne statement about having faith in the process. “I have complete confidence in Judge Rheinbeck, that he’ll weigh all the issues and make a fair decision,” he said.

The McCulloughs did not appear to notice this subtle shift in his tone—in earlier statements he’d spoken with some force about how clear it was that they should receive custody, how obvious it was they would raise her best, how completely evident it was that Mirabelle belonged with the McCulloughs (she is a McCullough, he’d insisted). Nor did the newspapers, which ran stories titled LAWYER FOR ADOPTIVE PARENTS CERTAIN OF WIN. Mr. Richardson, however, was far less certain than the news stories made it sound.

At dinner that evening, when Mrs. Richardson asked how the day’s hearing had gone, he said little. “Linda testified today,” he said. “Ed Lim was pretty hard on her. It didn’t look good.” He meant for Mrs. McCullough, but as the words left his mouth an idea occurred to him, a way to spin this, and later that evening he would call his contacts at the paper. The following morning, the Plain Dealer would publish a story mentioning Ed Lim’s “aggressive” tactics, how he had badgered poor Mrs. McCullough to the point of tears. Men like him, the article would suggest, weren’t supposed to lose their cool—though it was never specified whether “like him” meant lawyers or something else entirely. But the truth was—as Mr. Richardson recognized—that an angry Asian man didn’t fit the public’s expectations, and was therefore unnerving. Asian men could be socially inept and incompetent and ridiculous, like a Long Duk Dong, or at best unthreatening and slightly buffoonish, like a Jackie Chan. They were not allowed to be angry and articulate and powerful. And possibly right, Mr. Richardson thought uneasily. Once the article came out, a number of people who had been neutral threw their support behind the McCulloughs; some who had been on Bebe’s side found their passions cooling.

For now, the idea still forming in his mind, he said only, “We’ll see how things shake out.”

“I feel bad for her,” Lexie said suddenly from the far end of the table. “Bebe, I mean. She must feel so awful.”

“I’m sorry,” said Izzy, “is this the same Bebe that you referred to last month as a negligent mother?”

Lexie flushed. “She should’ve taken better care of the baby,” she admitted. “But I dunno. I wonder if she just got in over her head. If she didn’t know what she was getting into.”

“And that’s why pregnancy is not something to be taken lightly,” Mrs. Richardson cut in. “You hear me, Alexandra Grace? Isabelle Marie?” She lifted the dish of green beans and helped herself to an almond-sprinkled spoonful. “Of course having a baby is difficult. It’s life changing. Clearly Bebe wasn’t ready for it, practically or emotionally. And that might be the best argument for giving the baby to Linda and Mark.”

“So one mistake, and that’s it?” Lexie said. “I’m not ready to have a baby. But if I—” She hesitated. “If I got pregnant, you’d make me give it up, too?”

“Lexie, that would never happen. We raised you to have more sense than that.” Her mother set the dish back in the center of the table and speared a green bean with her fork.

“Well, somebody’s heart grew three sizes today,” Izzy said to Lexie. “What’s with you?”

“Nothing,” Lexie said. “I’m just saying. It’s a complicated situation, that’s all.” She cleared her throat. “Brian was saying that even his parents don’t agree about it.”

Moody rolled his eyes. “The case that tore families all over Cleveland apart.”

“John and Deborah are entitled to their own opinions,” Mr. Richardson said. “As is everyone at this table.” His gaze swept around the room. “Trip, what’s this I hear about a hat trick in yesterday’s game?”

After dinner, however, Mr. Richardson’s thoughts were still clouded. “Do you think,” he asked Mrs. Richardson as they cleared the table, “that Mark and Linda really know how to raise a Chinese child?”

Mrs. Richardson stared at him. “It’s just like raising any other child, I should think,” she said stiffly, stacking the plates in the dishwasher. “Why on earth would it be any different?”

Mr. Richardson scraped the remnants of egg noodles from the next plate into the disposal and handed it over. “Of course everything important is the same,” he conceded. “But I mean, when that little girl gets older, she’s going to have a lot of questions. About who she is, where she came from. She’s going to want to know about her heritage. Will they be able to teach her that?”