Before I Let You Go(84)
Daisy deserves it. She deserves so much better than what I’ve given her so far. I have to promise myself and her that by the time she is old enough to understand any of this, I’ll have my life sorted out.
I already know what you would say if I let you read this, Luke. You’d tell me that dream for Daisy is just a series of small, manageable steps—steps I don’t need my mother for, particularly given where she’s ended up. You’d tell me that the first step is simply to get myself to that community meeting tomorrow.
I don’t know if that’s true, but I’m out of other options, since you issued me that fucking caution last time. So I’m going to put that photo of Daisy in my pocket and I’m going to try to make myself go in the morning.
37
LEXIE
Luke asks me to come in for a family therapy session with Annie. I pack my SUV, loading it with diapers and wipes and bottles and formula and pacifiers and every other thing I can think of, then Daisy and I set off on the journey toward her mother.
She’s unsettled on the way, and I stop four times before we even reach the highway. I give her a pacifier. I adjust her seat belt in case it’s uncomfortable. I even dangle a brightly colored toy from the straps above her, thinking it might distract her. Nothing works. And a squawking infant in the back seat is much more unsettling than I had anticipated, so I quickly become frustrated.
“Come on, Daisy Nell,” I groan, when she starts grizzling for a fifth time. “I thought babies were supposed to sleep in cars! Don’t you want to see your momma?”
The sound of my voice—frustrated though the tone may be—seems to console her a little, and a thought strikes me. I start to sing, and she falls silent.
Twinkle, twinkle, little star.
Do you know how loved you are? In the morning.
In the night.
I’ll love you with all my might.
Twinkle, twinkle, little star . . .
It’s amazing how that song takes me all the way back to when Annie came home from the hospital as a baby. It’s one of my very first memories—standing in the doorway to her bedroom, watching as Mom fed her and then sung that song as she laid her onto the cot. I remember the soft lamplight and the look of sheer adoration on Mom’s face, and how jealous I felt of Annie. I also know that I used to sing that very song to Annie once we moved to the community, and so I try to take myself back to those memories. On a scientific level, I find it fascinating that it is so much harder for me to recollect details from that period than it is to remember my happier, early childhood memories.
My voice trails off, and Daisy stirs and then bellows, so I start again. And then again, and again, until I’ve sung the same damned, maddening verse the entire hour it takes me to get to the rehab clinic. Even once she’s fallen silent, I don’t want to stop in case she cries again, so I just keep singing.
When we pull into the parking lot at the rehab clinic, I finally stop the song. Daisy doesn’t stir, and I breathe a sigh of relief. I clip her car seat into the stroller and push it carefully into the rehab center.
Last time I came, I ran to Annie. This time she runs toward me, but she ignores me altogether. Instead, she crowds over the car seat and reaches to touch her sleeping daughter’s face with visibly trembling hands. Annie doesn’t say a word. She doesn’t even cry—she simply stares, as if she’s completely awed by her daughter. I let her stand there until the minutes start to stretch, and then I touch her back gently and ask, “Are we meeting Luke somewhere?”
Annie shakes herself as if I’ve startled her, but then she takes the handles of the stroller from me. I’m delighted to see her take the initiative, but I’m somehow offended at the same time. Suddenly I start to worry that perhaps I’m getting a bit too caught up in this whole playing-Daisy’s-mother game, and does that mean I’m getting too attached? I follow Annie to a table, where she sets the stroller close to her and rocks it gently as she raises her gaze to mine. I smile at her, but she simply stares at me. I can’t read her either—is she upset?
“Annie?” I prompt gently, and she looks back to the baby. “Luke said he wanted to speak to us together. Are we supposed to meet him somewhere?”
“Not yet,” Annie says. She leans down and rests her head against the stroller’s sun visor, staring at the baby. “Let’s just take a few minutes alone. You need to bring her here more often. I need to be reminded why I have to make this work.”
“Annie, I thought we agreed you’d meet with Lexie and Daisy in my office.” Luke approaches us, and I rise and shake his hand.
“Hello, Luke.”
“Welcome back, Alexis. There’s been some confusion. Annie? Weren’t you coming straight in to see me?”
“I just want to see my baby for a minute without supervision,” Annie says flatly. She tries to stare him down, and I feel a shiver of fear run through me. I know that look on her face, the narrowing of her eyes and the pinch of her lips as she presses them together. That look has never preceded anything good.
“Maybe we can come in to you in a few minutes?” I suggest to Luke hesitantly, but he ignores me—his gaze is on Annie.
“I agreed to this visit on the condition that we conduct a family therapy session at the same time. Annie, you simply cannot change our agreement now. I’ll give you some time alone with Lexie and the baby at the end, after we talk. Okay?”