Necessary Lies

  “I want my baby!” I shouted.

  “Now, now,” the policeman said, and he must of loosened his hold on me because I suddenly got one arm free. I flung my elbow into his face and heard the crack of his nose. He yelped and let go of me, and I ran out the door and flew down the stairs, hanging on to the railing and jumping over half the steps. Nobody was in the big hallway, but I heard car doors slamming and voices shouting in the front yard and I just kept running and running.

  I needed to get to my Mary.

  55

  Jane

  The older officer had pushed me into the backseat of the police car parked in my driveway and he was now getting in the front.

  “If you let me go to her, I can persuade her to cooperate,” I said, trying to sound reasonable and rational when I felt anything but. The younger policeman and Paula were still inside my house with Ivy and the baby, and I had no idea what was going on. “She’s terrified,” I said. “She’s just a child herself. Please.” The officer acted as though he didn’t hear me, and I wondered if he was deaf. “You can keep me handcuffed if you have to, but just let me talk to her.” The police car parked at the curb made me nervous. “You’ll let them ride with me, won’t you?” I fought hard to keep my voice from breaking. He wouldn’t even turn to look at me, much less answer me.

  But then he said something I didn’t understand.

  “What?” I leaned forward to hear better, but realized he wasn’t speaking to me but to his radio. I kicked the back of his seat. “Damn it!” I shouted. “Listen to me! We have a lawyer. You have to let us speak to—”

  A third police car pulled up to the curb, and I suddenly spotted Paula rushing across the yard toward it, Mary in her arms. The policeman in the third car got out and opened the rear door for her.

  “No!” I shouted as Paula climbed into the car with the baby. I turned in my seat to look back at my house through the rear window. “Where’s Ivy?” I shouted. “Let them ride with me!”

  The officer sitting in front of me started the car.

  “What are you doing!” I kicked his seat one more time. “Wait for Ivy!”

  I turned to look out the rear window again and saw Ivy running down my porch steps. “Please wait!” I said to my deaf driver. “She’s right there. Please let her come with us!”

  But as the car her baby was in drove away from the curb, and the car I was in pulled out of my driveway, Ivy stood alone in my front yard in my blue robe, her hands pressed to her pale cheeks. Not screaming. Maybe not even crying. She turned her head toward the car I was in, and I pressed my cuffed hands to the window. Be strong, I wanted to shout to her, though I’d never felt so weak and powerless myself. I watched her standing there, looking small and dazed, until I couldn’t see her anymore.

  56

  Jane

  I was sitting on the cot in my small, wretched cell, leaning against the cold concrete wall and hugging my knees, when the guard appeared on the other side of the bars. “Your lawyer’s back,” he said. “They’re checking him in, so he’ll be here in a minute.”

  Finally! I jumped up from my cot and held on to the bars of my cell, trying to see the heavy door at the end of the hall, just out of my sight. I’d been cut off from everyone and everything for the last twenty-four hours. I had no idea what was happening, and I’d spent a sleepless night, imagining the worst.

  They’d allowed me a few phone calls when they first brought me in the day before. I’d called Gavin first, of course, then tried unsuccessfully to reach Robert at his parents’ and my mother at the library. Gavin came over right away and I nearly attacked him when he walked into my cell, trying to tell him everything as quickly as I could because I needed him to find Ivy and prevent them from sterilizing her. After all she’d been through, after all I’d done to try to prevent the worst from happening, I couldn’t bear the thought that we’d lost the battle. I cried every time I thought about it.

  Once Gavin got over the shock of what I’d done, he was agonizingly methodical, taking notes as he sat on the chair in my cell while I paced. He talked about trying to get me out on bail, explaining why it was going to be difficult, and I had to stop him. “I don’t care about that right now!” I said. “Find Ivy first!” I’m sure I sounded hysterical to him. He asked so many questions, and I rushed through my answers. The only time I slowed down was when he asked me about the baby’s birth. I hesitated before telling him about my mother. It would come out eventually, I knew, and I needed him to be able to trust me and my word.

  When he’d gathered as much information as I was willing to take the time to give, I literally pushed him out of my cell. “Go!” I said, pushing his arm. The guard holding the door open eyed me like I was a crazy woman. “Hurry, Gavin, please!” I said.

  Then he was gone, and I’d spent the loneliest night of my life, my overactive imagination my only company.

  Now, I heard the door at the end of the hall creak open and fall shut with a thud, and in a moment the guard appeared again, Gavin two steps behind him. I tried to read his face, but it was impassive. He looked at the back of the guard’s head rather than at me, and I clutched the bars tighter. Please, I thought. Please let her be all right.

  “Morning, Jane,” he said, as the guard unlocked my cell door.

  I didn’t answer. I wasn’t interested in niceties. I waited until he was locked inside with me and then grabbed his arm. “Is she okay?”

  He motioned toward the cot. “Sit,” he said, sitting down himself on the small wooden chair.

  I sat on the edge of the cot, leaning forward, my hands locked around my knees and my feet jiggling impatiently on the floor. “Tell me,” I pleaded.

  “Ivy and the baby were taken into custody by DPW and placed in two separate foster homes,” he said. “They—”

  “Oh, that’s crazy!” I stood up again. “They need to be together. Ivy adores her. She’s responsible. That baby’s in no danger from—”

  “Please sit, Jane,” Gavin said again, and I did so, reluctantly. “They had to do it that way while they evaluate the situation. You worked for the department. You must understand they have to determine what’s in the best interest of the child. Or in this case, two children.”

  “Yes, but—”

  “They planned to have Ivy examined by a physician today, but—”

  “Oh no. I’m afraid once they—”

  “Jane!” he said. “Let me finish. This is a quickly changing picture, all right? Ivy’s gone.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “She took off from the foster home in the middle of the night.”

  “Took off? She ran away?”

  He nodded.

  I sat down on the cot again, taking that in. She’d given birth only a few days ago and had nothing with her but one of my nightgowns and my robe and whatever clothes DPW had given her.

  “Is there any way she could have found out where Mary … where her baby was?” I asked.

  “The baby’s still safe in another foster home,” he said, “but someone else is missing.” He looked at his notes. “The son of the farmer who owns the place where she used to live. Henry Allen Gardiner.”

  Both my hands flew to my mouth. “Oh my God, Gavin!” I said. “He must be the baby’s father!”

  “You know him?”

  “Not well, but I’ve met him. I had no idea.” No wonder Davison Gardiner was so anxious to have Ivy sterilized. “I know Ivy loved him … she loved the baby’s father. I don’t know his feelings … although if he took off with her last night, they must be mutual.” I hoped he could keep her safe. Maybe, just maybe, we didn’t need to find her. Maybe her life would be better at this point if no one ever did. But her baby, I thought. Ivy would die without her Mary.

  “So, of course they’re looking for her,” Gavin said, “and I’ll see what I can do about getting a hold put on that sterilization order for when they find her, but it’ll be hard with her gone. Meanwhile, we need to focus on getting you out of here.
I managed to reach Robert. He’s on his way home from Atlanta.”

  I cringed. “Was he furious? This was supposed to be his time away from me.”

  Gavin smiled for the first time since walking in my cell. “He honestly didn’t sound all that shocked,” he said.

  “What did he say when you told him I was in jail?”

  “Nothing right away. He didn’t say anything for so long, in fact, that I thought we’d lost the connection. Then he said, ‘Why couldn’t she take up knitting, like normal wives?’”

  I groaned. “That sounds like Robert,” I said.

  “Well, I don’t think he’ll have to worry about you being a working girl any longer,” Gavin said. “It’s not easy to find a job when you have a record.”

  “A record,” I repeated. They were words I’d never expected to hear in relation to myself.

  “You’ll have to do some time,” he said, “but I’ll do my best to make sure it’s as little as possible.”

  I nodded. He’d warned me about that yesterday, so it wasn’t a surprise.

  “My mother?” I asked. “Were you able to speak to her?”

  “Yes, and she’s understandably very upset. I’m trying to work it out so she can see you. Be careful what you say when she’s here.”

  “Will she”—I lowered my voice to a whisper—“is she in trouble?”

  He shook his head. “Not yet, anyway. I think she’ll be all right. I’m going to talk to her after I leave here.” He stood up.

  “Thank you, Gavin,” I said, shaking his hand. Looking into his blue eyes made me remember Lois’s funeral, not even a month ago. “I’m sorry to drag you into this,” I said. “I know this has been a hard month for you. How is Brenna doing?”

  “Adjusting.” His smile was sad. “She’s more resilient than I am.” He looked through the bars thoughtfully, then back at me. “I’ll never forget how she went to you after Lois’s funeral that day,” he said. “She’s a very intuitive little girl, and that moment told me something about you.”

  “It did?” I asked.

  He nodded. “It told me you’re someone worth fighting for,” he said.

  * * *

  After Gavin left, I lay down on my cot, my imagination once more on fire. Ivy and Henry Allen Gardiner. My God. I pictured their faces on my ceiling and smiled to myself.

  Run, Ivy! I thought. Just keep going.

  I remembered her dream of living in California with her baby’s father. They’d looked at picture books. I would imagine them there, sitting on a palm-tree-lined beach, holding hands. They would long for the baby they had to leave behind, but they would have more children, and grandchildren, and great-grandchildren.

  I smiled at the ceiling, tears running from the corners of my eyes.

  I’d hold on to that dream for her as long as I lived.

  JUNE 22, 2011

  57

  Brenna

  The last time I’d felt this crazed had been three years ago, when I’d planned the surprise party for Mom’s seventieth birthday. Driving back to the hotel after visiting her old house in Hayes Barton, I reminded myself that the birthday party had come off without a hitch. This was different, though. Until two days ago, I wasn’t sure if my plan for this morning was going to happen at all, but now it looked good. Very good.

  I parked in the front lot of the hotel, since I wouldn’t be long. We had to get to the Eaddy Building for the hearing by nine-thirty. I stopped in my own room to run a comb through my hair, then crossed the hall and knocked on my parents’ door.

  My mother opened the door, and I could tell by the lines between her eyebrows that I wasn’t the only anxious one this morning. “Was it still there?” she asked, instead of saying hello.

  “It is,” I said, walking into the room, “but wow! Let me get a good look at you! It’s been a while since I’ve seen you in your power suit.” I took a step back to check her out. My mother lived in yoga pants and T-shirts. I learned early on that buying her clothes or jewelry was pointless. She’d prefer a good book or a new smartphone or dinner out at one of the ethnic restaurants she and Daddy could walk to in their Washington, D.C., neighborhood.

  “You’re right,” she said. “I haven’t worn this suit in years. How does it look?” She turned to give me a three-hundred-sixty-degree view of the awesomely tailored pantsuit. With the blond bob she’d worn her whole life, she always had a sort of timeless look about her.

  “You look seriously amazing, Mom,” I said, and I meant it. I was a size fourteen and I sometimes wished I had her genes. “How do you stay that skinny, the way you eat?”

  “Tell me about the house!” She was getting impatient.

  “Were you able to see the closet?” Daddy walked into the room from the bathroom, straightening his tie. At eighty-three, he had the slightest limp from a knee replacement that hadn’t gone according to plan and that had scared Mom and me into a stupor, but other than that, he was as fit as my mother and I was glad. So many of my friends had lost their parents already or were busy investigating nursing homes. Mom and Dad claimed they were just lucky, but I knew it was more than that. It was their marriage. It was the way they took care of each other.

  “I have a picture,” I said, pulling my phone from my purse.

  “Oh.” Mom sat down on the edge of one of the queen-sized beds. “I’m not sure I want to see it,” she said. “Gavin, you look.”

  Daddy took the phone from me. “That’s something,” he said. “Amazing no one ever painted over it.”

  “Every owner told the next one not to,” I said.

  “We should get a print of this, Jane, don’t you think?” He handed the phone to my mother, and she looked at the picture, gnawing her lower lip.

  “My,” she said quietly. “My.” She stared at the phone, shaking her head, and I wondered what she was remembering. “That poor girl,” she said after a moment. “What ever happened to her?” She handed the phone back to me. “I wonder if she has any idea about the hearing today.”

  Daddy sat down and put his arm around her. “Maybe it’s time we searched for her again,” he said. “It’s so much easier to find people these days.”

  “Oh, I Google her name at least once a month,” Mom admitted. “Ivy Hart, or Ivy Gardiner, in case she did marry the boy she ran off with. I don’t think, if she’s still alive, that she’d be the Internet type, though. I can’t see it.”

  “Yeah, well, she probably wouldn’t guess you’re the Internet type, either.” I laughed. My mother was so on top of things. She’d been a freelance journalist for decades. She’d covered every type of story imaginable and even wrote about the Eugenics Program way before it was on the public radar. No one paid much attention to the program, though, until the Winston-Salem Journal ran a series of articles about it in 2002. Then, all hell broke loose, and at the hearing today, the victims would finally get to tell their side of the story.

  I straightened the collar on my mother’s blouse. “We should get going,” I said.

  “Let’s stop at the concierge desk and see if they can make a print from the picture on your phone,” Daddy suggested.

  I looked at my watch. “If they can do it quickly,” I said.

  “Why are you so insistent we leave this early?” Mom asked. “It’s not like you.”

  She was right. I ran late for everything. My poli-sci students at Georgetown were ever hopeful I wouldn’t show up for class so they could leave. They’d groan when I’d walk in the door twenty minutes late.

  “The hearing’s going to be a media circus,” I said. “We want to be sure to get a seat.”

  “We have reserved seats, honey,” my father reminded me. “Mom’s already on that sign-up sheet to testify.”

  “Oh, I know. But I need my latte first or I won’t last the morning.”

  They exchanged a “what’s with Brenna?” look, but got to their feet.

  We took the elevator to the first floor. The guy at the concierge desk was not only quick printing the
picture from my phone, but he also put it in a manila folder so it wouldn’t bend. Then we walked out to my car.

  “You two sit in the backseat,” I said. Driving down from D.C., Daddy’d sat in the front with me so he’d have more legroom, but this morning I thought he should sit next to Mom. Give her some moral support.

  They didn’t fight me. They got in the backseat and I started the car and headed out of the parking lot, thinking that I was not only the driver this morning. I was the master of ceremonies.

  58

  Jane

  I slipped my arm through Gavin’s as we waited in line at Starbucks. I’d never known Brenna to be a big Starbucks fan, but on the drive to Raleigh yesterday, she told us she knew she’d need a latte this morning, so here we were. I thought Gavin would have preferred bacon and eggs, but really, it didn’t matter. Brenna was usually unflappable and I was surprised my plan to testify at the hearing today seemed to have shaken her up so much. I’d been speaking in public most of my life. I still did whenever some women’s club or Rotary wanted to dust me off and trot me out. Give me almost any topic and I could find plenty to say about it. But I wasn’t crazy about revisiting my own past, which was why, when I woke up this morning, I decided not to go over to my old Hayes Barton house with Brenna. It wasn’t the closet, though that was certainly part of it. It was the reminders of a time I’d tried to forget. My marriage to Robert that never should have been. A job I had not been cut out for. Just coming back to Raleigh after living happily—I could even say joyously—in Washington, D.C., for forty years was hard enough. So my trepidation made sense. Maybe Brenna picked up on it.

  “Oh, that’s cool,” she said now, pointing to a room at the side of the Starbucks. It had a glass wall, so we could see inside to ten comfortable-looking upholstered chairs. “Let’s take our coffee in there.”