Chapter Text
She checked the cake on the counter with the image in the cookbook: perfection. She’d followed the recipe like a devout, and here was enough cream frosting and green piping to make this day a day to remember.
Sara turned a quick 180 and grinned at the baby in the highchair. “What do you think?” she asked of the infant, who gurgled and raised a hand in response. “I’ll take that as ‘well done mommy, it’s wonderful.” She giggled at Marlo, who raised the other hand and bounced, demanding to be lifted free of the strappings of the chair. Sara obeyed, scooping her daughter up and waltzing across the grande kitchen, throwing the cake one last admiring look as she went. “Think Billy will like it?”
Marlo chuckled. Sara kissed her head. She and Jack had often joked that their life had done an about turn when Billy entered their life, but for Sara it went beyond the laughing. She’d been running Bill to the clinic late one night for a fever, to find the clinic in uproar about an abandoned newborn baby. Days later she’d contacted the local police, and the local adoption agency, and one thing had led to another, as they often did, and that was all the information she had to tell Marlo, if Marlo ever asked for the story of her birth. One thing often led to another where Billy was concerned. He’d cried on his first day of preschool, and the next day the place had become infested with rats and closed for two months. He often cried at the attention Marlo received, so Jack had brought him a little freshwater aquarium, and a small goldfish he named Emily. Things tended to happen when Billy was around.
Sara reached the pantry, grabbed a pack of candles from the highest shelf, and padded back to the kitchen. “Three candles for your big brother,” she informed Marlo as she aligned them in the frosting. She worked slowly; dutifully making it perfect, weeping a little inside that next year there would be four candles on his cake, then five, then double digits, then the teenage years where she would not be permitted to bake him a cake… She couldn’t help but cast a throwaway thought to his other mother, the one who came before. It wasn’t a habit she enjoyed, thinking about the women who brought her children into the world, but on birthdays it was nigh impossible. At the mommy and baby group, Sara’s friends spoke about their experiences of labour, and of agony, and the heart-stopping joy of it all, and Sara could only gaze at Marlo blankly. Sara’s friends – bitter, hated friends, purveyors of birth stories and ultrasound pictures and cradling their babies who had matching hair and eyes and DNA. Billy had red hair, Marlo had blond; Sara and Jack were dark.
Three years to this day… What could Sara say? On this day three years ago, she was perfectly childless, running about and cleaning the house and not fit to burst with a bundle of joy. Three years to the day, somewhere in the world, a woman with no name had bent with labour, to push and nurture a red-headed baby into the world. As she twiddled the candles through her fingers, breathing in the scent of Marlo’s fresh washed hair, her mind was lost in the questions that surrounded Billy’s first eight months of life, before Sara had ever known him, held him, loved him.
He’d arrived like clockwork, not a few minutes later than the social worker had said on the phone. They’d handed him over, and that was the first time that Sara had faith in the love at first sight principle. His birth mother, that woman so nameless and yet so deserving of Sara’s acknowledgements, had packed him a small travel bag of things: a hat with bunny ears, which was now nestled on Marlo’s head; a pillow with his name embroidered, which the boy still treasured now; a Moby Dick picture book, which Billy could not sleep without; and a soft toy, a little grey plush alien, which had come with a note attached, bearing a small inked ‘X’. Sara had framed this note above Billy’s bed, and told him it was a kiss that he could see whenever he liked.
Marlo launched forward, eyes on the cake, and Sara swept her out of reach. No such bag had Marlo’s birth mother left her with. Not even a date of birth; on the certificate that Sara and Jack had registered, they’d given the day that she had been found in the clinic, the day that Billy topped his fever, as Marlo’s birthday. No one had loved Marlo to miss her, to call for her, to want her back, to write a note to be opened on her eighteenth birthday. Marlo was all Sara and Jack, while Billy and his plush alien came with unanswered questions.
Sara jumped: Jack stood at the doorway, leaning in gracelessly, a goofy grin spread like butter all over his face, lighting him up. “How about that cake?”
Sara gestured, “It’s done. All done. Marlo was just telling me how she admires the little touch of almonds around the edges.”
“I bet she was,” Jack ticked his daughter’s bare feet and hoisted the cake into his arms, pausing to allow Sara to light the candles with the matches they kept in a drawer.
They walked in single file, like a procession to meet a stranger, the cake and Marlo held like precious gifts, as they crossed through to the living room, where Puck the dog was keeping all of Billy’s friends laughing.
“Happy birthday to you,” sang Jack as they entered the room, and the parents from the mommy and baby class picked up the verse, clapping and cheering as Billy went an uncomfortable shade of red and hid behind Puck’s massive bulk. Sara deposited Marlo with Blonde-haired-blue-eyed-perfect-housewife-Jenny and moved to cover her son’s face with kisses. He sat amidst a layer of popped blue balloons and one of those spiteful hated friends from the mommy and baby class had tied ribbons in his red hair. Sara smoothed down his cowlick, and stared about at them, sizing up the potential threats. Jenny, who cradled Marlo as if she were a delicate vase, was quick to please, but too new to the group to partake in the teasing like the others. But the others… Sara didn’t doubt they’d filled Billy’s head with doubting questions about the origin of his fiery hair. As she scanned the group, she was only certain of one that she could rule out: Monica who, though reserved and cool, was the closest thing to a friend that the mommy and baby class had ever given Sara.
“Deep thoughts my love?” Jack chided from across the room, where he and Billy’s friends were piling the gifts high. She laughed him down and gently pushed Bill towards the presents, and Puck baled like a moorhound when the little boy treaded his tail into the carpet.
“Monica,” Sara regained her trail of thought, half watching her son and half turning to her friend. “How is the little one?”
“Oh,” Monica slipped from her chair to sit beside Sara on the carpet. “He’s fine. Still got the fever, but the rash has gone down. Doctor says he should be out and about in no time.”
“That’s good. I mean, it’s strange having you here with no little one. It’ll be nice to meet him.”
“I’ll admit,” Monica smiled, “it’s been awkward coming to these meetings every week without a baby. Makes me feel a bit like a fraud.”
“Nonsense,” Sara slapped Monica’s arm gently, “it’s nice having you here.” In truth, Sara sought Monica’s company because her story of motherhood was stranger than her own. Monica’s son had been born with meningitis, he’d spent his first three months on earth in a glass incubator, like a test subject in one of Jack’s horror novels. And now, when he was almost Marlo’s age and Monica had dared to join mommy and baby classes, the poor pet had been struck with a fever and a rash once again. Poor thing… Sara stared over to Marlo, dreading to see her baby in the same way Monica saw her son.
“He’ll be fighting fit in no time,” Sara grinned, “if he’s anything like you.” This was mostly guesswork on Sara’s part; for all Monica’s reservations and quietness, she carried a collected sense of toughness with her, an inimitable impression of hardiness and intelligence that Sara couldn’t quite place. What had Monica said she did? Crime writing?
“He sure will. He’d get on fantastic with William.”
“Oh.” Hardly anyone used Billy’s full name these days. It had been tradition when he was younger, and quieter, but as he aged Sara and Jack had felt it necessary to press their own label of identification on him, their own marker of parenthood, and he had been Billy or Bill ever since. “He would. Billy’s a rough playmate though.”
Jack called for silence as Billy leaned in over the cake, his red side locks sweeping over his eyes as usual, and closed his eyes tight in a wish. He exhaled, and the candlelight danced before disappearing.
“What did you wish for baby?”
Billy looked up at her, smiling strangely. “It’s a secret mom.”
Monica laughed. “Duh, mom.”
On that note, Jack turned on the stereo player and the party games began, with the entire troupe of mommy and baby goers getting involved, aside from Monica, who sat on the sidelines in silence, cradling Marlo as if it were a sad occasion. Poor dear, Sara sighed inside, the pain she must be feeling, to be almost losing her little boy.
Hours dripped by like the singsong patter of a broken tap, games were won and lost in fits of tears, presents handed out, cake smeared over the dog, and in pairs of moms and children, the guest slipped through the doors with sleepy goodbyes.
Monica was the last to leave. She and Billy had been chatting back and forth over a pack of baseball cards, which some astute and ridiculous member of the group had gifted him. Billy had no liking at all for baseball, beyond the knowledge that he could hit a ball as hard as he liked. Monica seemed knowledgeable enough, chirping away at the boy about this player or that.
“The hidden sports jock,” Jack chuckled as he cleared away the popped balloons from Puck’s eager gaze.
“Hardly,” Monica parried, “but a friend or two of mine knows a thing or two about baseball, and it’s a good conversation starter.”
As she transferred the last of the cake from the plate into her mouth, Sara fondly wondered if it had been Monica who’d bought the cards.
“Baby, tell Monica what you want to be when you’re grown up.”
“A cowboy,” Billy proudly said, big grin lighting up the room as he stared up at Monica. “Or James Bond.”
“An undercover cowboy,” Jack ruffled his hair as he departed the room. “Honey, I’ll put Marlo to bed, then clean up the kitchen.”
“You’re a superstar.” Happy with the weight of the cake and the sight of her happy son, Sara leaned back against the sofa, listening to his back-and-forth chatter with Monica about secret agents and cattle ranches.
As Sara had hoped, it wasn’t long before Bill fell asleep, sprawled over the open pack of baseball cards. “Today was a success,” she giggled nervously. She’d never planned a third birthday party before. As far as Billy was concerned, this was his first ever party, his debut in the world of toddler social gatherings. Sara was quite pleased that he had no memory of last year’s: no one had turned up, and Marlo had ruined the proceedings with her newborn wails.
“Sure was,” Monica said gently. “He’s gorgeous.” She rested a hand on his head, flicking aside the hair from his forehead, staring down to that androgynous beauty that could only have reminded her of her own sweet boy, so far away.
“Missing your baby?”
“Something like that,” she replied dreamily.
“Did you and your husband ever think of having another one?” Sara said lazily, feeling herself falling closer to sleep. She couldn’t rightly remember much about Monica’s husband, or indeed even if there was a Mr Reyes out there.
“Not husband. Partner.”
“Oh. Sorry. Go on.”
“Well, no. With all the trouble with our first, I guess we were too nervous. Y’know. We may do. In the future. Who knows?”
“Who knows indeed?” She waited a while, breathing calmly, watching Monica staring at Bill, feeling that overwhelming pride when someone complimented her son’s inherent beauty, for which Sara herself could take no credit, but treasured in her boy much more than she had first thought. “You know. With Billy, I was so nervous that he’d be taken off of me. That I’d slip up and he’d be taken away. That something was wrong with him, or with me, that someone wanted him back so badly that they’d do anything.”
“Yeah?”
“Yeah. I guess I didn’t really stop panicking until Marlo came along. It was as if the universe were saying to me ‘you’re doing a good job, here’s another one’. Like karma, I guess. Do you believe in karma?”
“Sure.” Monica grinned, “I’m open to the idea.”
“I just wish… I don’t know. I just wish I could understand what in the world could make someone hand over their baby. Don’t get me wrong, I’m grateful every day for Billy, but I can’t help but feel guilty.”
“Sara you mustn’t. There are some things we can’t question. Like how William and Marlo came to you, like how my baby boy is sick, like how some balloons pop before we can blow them up.” They shared a laugh.
“I wonder what they’re like?”
“Who?”
“The women. The women who brought my babies into the world. I know so much about Marlo, but so little about Billy. The most I can figure is… they were driven to something so desperate, so painful, they must have been backed into a corner. Poor dears.”
Monica nodded, eyes on Billy. “We’ve been friends a while now, haven’t we?”
Sara thought back, fondly. “Since Marlo came to us. Little over a year now. Seems like such a long time,” with this she gestured to Billy, who was a stranger to his two year old past.
“Yeah. And you trust me, right?”
“Of course. Lord, I’m drained.” She laid her head back against the sofa, seeing stars on the ceiling as she yawned and attempted to stretch.
“I know the feeling,” she was distracted, tracing her hand down Billy’s pyjama-clad back. “Listen – Sara. I’m sorry about this.”
“’Bout what?” Her voice was thick with the yawns, her throat almost too tired to let the words come tumbling out.
“The way this is going to happen. I thought about how best to work things out, you know, because we’re friends. I wondered how I was going to tell you.”
“Tell me what?” But an idea occurred to her like a lightning bolt. “Oh Monica, honey. It’s not your baby is it? He is doing ok, right?”
“Sure. He’s fine. It’s not my baby. It’s yours.”
“What?” She sat bolt upright, and the stiffness of her neck sent pain radiating down her spine. “Marlo?”
“No. William.”
“Billy? How do you mean?”
“When he came to you, he had a small bag of things, didn’t he? Little soft toy, cute hat, and a small piece of paper?”
“I remember. A little kiss. We still have it; he likes to look at it before he goes to sleep.”
“No. It’s not a kiss. It’s an ‘x’.” She crossed her fingers in front of her chest to make the letter. “A call for help.”
“Monica, are you sure that punch wasn’t alcoholic?”
Monica laughed as she breathed out deeply. “Believe me; I’m as shocked as you are. I wasn’t certain that she’d written anything at first.”
“She? She who?”
“His mother. His birth mother, I mean. The one who gave him up.”
“Monica… what the hell is this?”
“Believe me Sara, I’m on your side.”
Sara had a sinking feeling that perhaps Monica was not the member of the mommy and baby group that she could trust. “Oh god. You’re not from the agency are you? You’re not here to take him off me?” The way she’d looked at him, at her, at Marlo, so sad and slow and collected, the way she had touched his hair as though he were breakable… oh god.
“No! Not at all. You’re his mom. I want to protect him. And you.”
This was all too surreal. “You’re not a crime writer?”
“Well… I am. I mean, I tried a novel once. It tanked, of course. Apparently it was too ‘spooky’.” She stood up sternly, gave a sort of salute to Sara and grinned cheerily. “I’m an FBI agent. Was. Used to be.”
“You quit, when you had your baby?”
Monica raised an eyebrow. “I was fired.”
“Well. You kept your hidden past secret,” Sara grinned. As much as Monica being an ex-FBI agent wasn’t something she had ever contemplated, one thing had a knack of leading to another when Billy was involved.
“So what does that have to do with my boy?”
“Hard to say right now. She was an FBI agent too, his mother – we worked together.”
“You knew her?” This pricked all the senses of motherhood that Sara possessed, she’d had questions in her mind about Billy since the beginning.
“Yeah, long time ago now though. A lot has changed.”
“Is she after him – does she want him back?”
“No. Well, I mean, yes, but that isn’t the problem here. Scu – she isn’t the one placing William in danger.”
“Then who is?”
“Not here,” Monica looked furtively at the ceiling, as though afraid that God was listening into their conversation. “There’s someplace we can go. Not far from here. And we can talk.”
Sara nodded curtly, Monica’s anxiety passing to her like a translucent emotional handkerchief, and looked sadly at Billy. “I’d better call Jack down.”
“No,” Monica blurted, “bring him. I’ve a car out front. He needs to stay where we can see him. And as for Jack – you can’t tell him. At all. Tell him and you make him an accomplice. Just… trust me.”
Sara wanted to, oh so badly wanted to trust the only member of mommy and baby to hold a proper conversation with her, but Monica was frightening her. She shrugged, moving to hoist her son into her arms. One thing tended to lead to another with Bill. She figured they’d only be gone a few hours. Back in time for the 10pm news, and Marlo’s night-time wake up, regular as clockwork.
Monica moved quietly, gathering up Billy’s things at Sara’s instruction. The hat, the plush alien, the embroidered pillow, and the framed ‘x’ – all of which Monica insisted that they needed. She lingered over the pillow, tracing the boy’s name, eyes closed as if imagining Billy much younger, having memories of Sara’s son that Sara herself did not possess.
“What’s her name?”
Monica looked up, angrily, and wiped the tears from her eyes. She stroked Billy’s sleepworn hair on the back of his neck. “Dana. Dana Scully.” She stared at the boy, two years and four months since his mother gave him up. Sara stared too, eyes looking in new directions, over the red-haired son of two dark-haired southerners. William Scully. That was not her baby’s name.