Woman on the Edge(47)
Nicole slipped Quinn in the Moby, went to the living room, and picked up her computer from the coffee table. She set it on the large mahogany dining table, now covered in burp cloths and used Kleenexes. She sat on the plush ivory chair. Flipping the computer open, she pressed the power button. She prayed Google held the answer to everything.
She clicked on postpartum depression symptoms: hypersensitivity, constant crying, anxiety, worry, hopelessness, guilt. Yes, she suffered from every one of those. Maybe Tessa was right. Maybe there was help out there for her.
When she looked at Quinn, her baby girl smiled back. “I’m fixing it, sweetheart! Mommy’s going to make it all better.” Quinn stuffed her fist in her mouth and gazed at her. Nicole clicked and clicked through PPD forums. Almost all the women who posted mentioned not bonding with their babies and how hard it was to get a moment to themselves. But these weren’t experiences she could relate to at all. She wanted Quinn with her all the time; she felt connected to her like no one else in the world.
She typed “paranoia” into the search bar. The first link to pop up was a different kind of postpartum issue: psychosis. Could it be? With a jittering hand, Nicole scrolled through the symptoms. It was possible, but also hopeless. How could she tell anyone if she was psychotic? Quinn would be taken from her. Nothing and no one could help her. She would never make it back to Breathe. She would lose everything.
She placed her finger on the power button, but before pressing it she saw a link to Maybe Mommy, a community forum for women who wanted kids and couldn’t have them. Nicole’s breath hitched. How awful to want something so much and not be able to get it. She began reading, caressing Quinn’s soft wisps of hair.
I’ve had three miscarriages. How can I go through that loss again?
I’ve tried for seven years to have a baby of my own. After four failed IVF procedures, I’m ready to give up.
Baby dust and prayers, please! Just started Clomid again and gearing up for a second round of IVF!
Will I ever get what I want?
Nicole ached for these women. It had been so easy for her to get pregnant. She didn’t even have to plan it.
There were hundreds of posts on Maybe Mommy. But one in particular stood out, from someone who called herself “Morose in Chicago.”
Will I ever get what I want?
My 43rd birthday just passed and I’m still childless. Would an adoption agency actually give a single woman a baby? I know I could give a child everything: love, warmth, and security. I want a baby so badly. Will I ever have one?
Morose in Chicago deserved a baby. Who cared if there weren’t two parents? Quinn had two parents, one who only cared about himself, and one who was not doing very well at all. Tears dripped onto the keyboard, and she wasn’t sure if they were from pity for herself or this childless woman.
She scrolled back through some of Morose’s other posts on the forum, all dated within the same three-day period, six months before. Something about her posts felt so sincere, so relatable. This woman was a widow whose husband had done something very wrong. She didn’t explain what exactly, but it was clear she felt responsible for his wrongdoings and that all she wanted in the world was a chance to share her love with a child. And she lived here, right in Chicago.
Excitement, a feeling Nicole had almost forgotten existed, ran like warm water through her cold bones.
There was an icon you could press to send private messages to those who posted.
Nicole clicked “Morose in Chicago” and started to write to her.
CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE MORGAN
I’m shocked. I’m still watching this all happen through a crack in the door. I see Greg’s clumsy embrace as Quinn cries out, and his face registers a flurry of different emotions—bewilderment, fear, and resignation. But the emotion I don’t see is love. And it breaks my heart.
I step out of the powder room, and both men turn to me.
Greg looks surprised. “Sorry. I didn’t realize you had someone here. I didn’t know you were … dating someone.”
“I’m not,” Ben says.
“Okay. So who are you?” Greg asks, his tone arch.
“I’m … a friend. Morgan Kincaid.” I reach out my hand to shake his.
He can’t shake my hand because he’s having trouble holding Quinn, as though he’s not sure how to hold a baby at all. I’m not sure he’d want to shake anyway. I watch as recognition dawns in his eyes.
“Wait. Morgan Kincaid? The woman who was the last person to speak to my wife? The woman who took Quinn from her at Grand/State?”
“I didn’t even know your wife. I don’t know how we’re connected.”
He eyes me again, looking for someone he recognizes but coming up blank.
Greg turns to face Ben. “I didn’t know Nicole could ever do something like this.” He coughs and his eyes well up. But then that look is gone in a moment. Anger suddenly crosses his face. “The detective told me about your husband and all the money he stole. That you both stole. Did you mess with my wife to get her money?”
Then, like a LEGO set, the pieces begin to click into place. Martinez had pointed out that whoever has custody of Quinn has access to her money. Nicole didn’t want that to be Greg or Ben.
I don’t respond. Greg turns back to Ben. “Thank you for watching Quinn. I’ve been a wreck, as you can imagine. I can’t believe Nicole’s really gone.”