Mutual consent, she explained, of both the birth parent and the adopted child—or, in this case, the deceased child’s representative.
“If a child who was given up for adoption wants to find his birth parents,” she said, “they file a records request with me. If the birth parent also files with me, we can open the records and share their contact information. Otherwise the request sits under lock and key, often without ever seeing the light of day again. Most of the time, this is a one-way ticket into a locked drawer. Both parent and child have to want this, for obvious reasons. Otherwise, you can imagine the disruption.”
Lydia stared blankly at Irene, scratching her upper lip.
“Broken adoptions make it all more complicated,” Irene added, “but if that’s what is happening here then it will be in his records.”
“Which I can’t see.”
“Which no one can see.”
“And that’s why you’re here?” Lydia said.
“That’s why I’m here,” Irene said, then she explained that her job was to make sure the legal bases were covered and to facilitate the process with both parties.
“And if one of the parties was in prison?” Lydia said.
“There are ways,” Irene said. “With an agreeable warden and good behavior, there are ways.”
She couldn’t be sure, but the way that Irene just scraped at her mascara with her pinkie nail, not to mention her lack of surprise at the question, left Lydia sensing a tell.
There are ways.
She immediately imagined her father, at the bottom of the prison pay scale, miserable in his misbuttoned corrections uniform, passing documents through the bars to a young felon named Joey. The two of them occupied such remarkably different sectors of her mind that she felt herself wince. They made no sense together, yet there they were—if they were.
“But you can’t tell me if Joey Molina ever sat in this chair?” Lydia said, watching for Irene’s twitch.
“I can’t tell you that,” Irene said, straight-faced.
If this was a game that she played, Lydia respected how delicately she played it.
For the first time Lydia noticed the industrial-sized box of Kleenex on the corner of Irene’s desk, and it occurred to her that this was a room full of tears, both happy and sad. Irene handed Lydia a clipboard and an eight-page application, and as Lydia attempted to fill it out, she felt pained by the blanks she was leaving behind. Over and over she found herself checking the box that said Other, then explaining in tiny tight scribbles why she, of all people, should be allowed to access Joey’s adoption records despite her lack of documentation. She felt self-conscious about writing down her job history and all the places she’d hidden before returning to Denver six years ago, and felt even more self-conscious when she came to a spot in the application that asked for the names and addresses of references who had known her for more than five years. Irene tapped away at her keyboard with long painted nails. Lydia tapped her pen on the application. Finally, she leaned over and looked down the hall, where she could see Raj with his legs stretched out, audibly yawning, reading in his waiting room chair. She wrote down Raj’s name and number as her primary reference, and put David second.
“Please don’t get your hopes up,” Irene said as she skimmed the application a few minutes later. “I will tell you that it helps your case, pardon me, that Joseph is passed away. Opens up a few possibilities. Otherwise I’d probably discourage you from even applying.”
Lydia went to speak but faltered when she noticed on the corner of the desk, surrounded by Irene’s collection of tiny ceramic chickens, a glass goblet brimming with chocolates. Little spheres wrapped in shiny blue foil.
“Help yourself,” Irene said, nodding toward the treats.
Lydia quietly declined. She didn’t mention that she hadn’t had a bite of chocolate since smelling the melted knot of it in Joey’s jeans as he hanged, nor that those blue foil wrappers looked weirdly familiar.
“People sit in that chair for all kinds of reasons,” Irene said. “But in all cases what they’re really hoping for is a ticket to time travel. Usually it’s a worthwhile trip in the end, but sometimes the journey is far harsher than they could ever imagine. Sitting there, where you are, is an enormous step in a lot of people’s lives. The chocolate helps, is all.”
Irene slid the application back to Lydia.
“Use your current name,” she added in a low voice, “but also your former name.”
Lydia felt her face growing hot.
“I’m sorry,” Irene continued. “Both names need to be on there for this to be considered. I’m just trying to help.”
“How did you—?”
Irene placed her ringless hand atop Lydia’s fist, like a starfish swathing a mollusk.
“You have that kind of a face, even after twenty years. I’m very sorry about what happened to you. I’ll do everything I can to help, Lydia.”
Lydia snatched up the pen and scrawled Lydia Gladwell under “Former Legal Names,” then passed the application back across the desk.
“Like I said,” Irene said, “don’t get your hopes up, but I’ll do what I can. Lord knows you deserve it. You were a very brave little girl.”
As Lydia stepped out in the hallway, feeling raw and anxious, Raj came down the hall to meet her.
“What happened? Lydia, you look kind of . . . not well. Like somebody died.”
“I think,” she said, “that Joey was here. In that office. Right around when he died.”
“Whoa. Did she tell you that?”
“Chocolate did.”
Raj looked at her with concern, then held her forearm. As he guided her past the counter, the clerk sat up straight and stared at Lydia as if she were a statue, something he might prop in his garden.
“Oh, and guess what?” she said to Raj. “You are now officially my Primary Reference!”
“Oh baby,” Raj said loudly, throwing his arm around her shoulder. “You’re goddamned right I am!”
The clerk grumbled to himself as they left.
Three hours later, Lydia and Raj were stepping into Lydia’s apartment, warmed by the beers and bowls of noodles they’d consumed in a Colfax hole on the walk home. David was working late, wrapping up a conference in Fort Collins, so he wasn’t expected for a few more hours—or was it tomorrow? Lydia couldn’t remember. She could, however, remember that he and Raj had yet to meet.
Raj was sidled up to the coffee table, grinding his knees into the carpet, and losing his sixth game of Uno when the phone rang. As soon as Lydia heard it, she sensed that it had been ringing all day, echoing through her empty apartment. She walked to the kitchen and answered.
“That you? Christ, you’re tough to track down.”
“Who is this?” she said, cupping her mouth with her palm. “Is this—Dad?”
“It’s real good to hear you, little girl.”
Little girl. Lydia slammed down the phone.
“Was it David?” Raj asked, looking up. When she didn’t answer he went back to shuffling the cards.
Lydia ran to the bathroom and splashed cold water across her face.