Instead, he gives me a helpless look as two cabs materialize, one after the other, a coincidence to which I ascribe all sorts of meaning. I flag the first and force a tight-lipped smile. “Let’s just talk tomorrow. Okay?” I say, trying to salvage what’s left of my image as a strong, independent woman and wondering if it’s only an image.
He nods as I accept a staccato kiss on the cheek. Then I slide in the cab and close my door, careful not to slam it, yet equally careful not to make eye contact with him as we pull away from the curb, headed toward my apartment on the Upper East Side.
Thirty minutes later, I’m changed into my oldest, coziest pair of flannel pajamas, feeling completely sorry for myself, when my apartment intercom buzzes.
Peter.
My heart leaps with shameful, giddy relief as I nearly run to my foyer. I take a deep breath and buzz him up, staring at the door like my namesake Champ waiting for the mailman. I imagine that Peter and I will make up, make love, maybe even make plans. I don’t need a ring or a promise of a baby, I will say, as long as I know that he feels the way I do. That he sees us sharing a life together. That he can’t imagine us apart. I tell myself it isn’t settling—it’s the opposite—it’s what you do for love.
But a few seconds later, I round the corner to find not Peter at my door, but a young girl with angular features, a narrow face, and small, pointed chin. She is slight, pale, and almost pretty—at least I think she will be in a few years. She is dressed like a typical teenager down to her oversized backpack and peace sign necklace, but she has a composed air, something telling me that she is not a follower.
“Hello,” I say, wondering if she is lost or has the wrong apartment or is peddling something. “Can I help you?”
She clears her throat, shifts her weight from side to side, and asks in a small, raspy voice, “Are you Marian Caldwell?”
“Yes,” I say, waiting.
“My name is Kirby Rose,” she finally says, tucking her long, dirty-blond hair behind her ears, which are a little on the big side or at least at an unfortunate angle to her head, a trait I understand too well, then glances down at her scuffed black boots. When her eyes meet mine again, I notice their distinctive color—bluish-gray and banded by black—and in that instant, I know exactly who she is and why she has come here.
“Are you?…” I try to finish my sentence, but can’t inhale or exhale, let alone speak.
Her chin trembles as she nods the smallest of nods, then wipes her palms on her jeans, threadbare at the left knee.
I stand frozen, anticipating the words I have imagined and feared, dreaded and dreamt about, for the last eighteen years. Then, just as I think my racing heart will explode, I finally hear her say them: “I think you’re my mother.”
2
July 14, 1995
It was the hottest day ever recorded in Chicago history, the mercury hitting 106 and the heat index topping out at 120 degrees, a record that still stands today, nearly two decades later. The heat wave was all anyone could talk about, eventually killing seven hundred fifty people, making bigger headlines than the Iran Disarmament Crisis, the Bosnian war, and the Grateful Dead’s final performance at Soldier Field—at least on B96, my sole source of news at eighteen.
That blistering morning, as I lounged by our pool in the white string bikini I had ordered from the Victoria’s Secret catalogue, I tuned in to the Kevin and JoBo show, listening to their banter about how the heat makes people do crazy things: fall in love, commit crimes, run naked through the streets. They were obviously joking, the way DJs do, but looking back, I actually believe that the temperature was at least partly to blame for what happened later that night at my best friend Janie’s house. That it would have been a different story during any other season or even on an ordinarily hot summer’s day.