5-7-20
K- came over for a drink around 5 pm yesterday, and when she came through the door, she said, “That neighbor you told me about? The police are there. They’re taking the baby.”
Bob and I had walked down to get the mail about 20 minutes earlier. We passed B-, her car parked by the curb. Bob said he could hear the baby crying. “Why is she parked there?” I asked. “What is she doing?” She was a couple feet, at least, from her own driveway. I waved, but she seemed too distraught to acknowledge me.
Bob said, “You’re asking me these things, and I don’t know the answers. Maybe she was trying to get the baby to sleep. Her place must be hot.” We haven’t seen the air conditioner on the side of her house operate in years. In the driveway the rusted decomposing Mustang she drove 15 years ago sits with low tires. In the rear window is the name M- in fancy script stencils.
It had crossed my mind that B- kidnapped the baby. K-, who had seen the transaction between B- and social services, said, “That is one teeny tiny baby. It has to be newborn.”
As K- was leaving, B- came over, and I had to take her into the house, plop her on my sofa, and sit there for an hour and a half listening to her whispery voice go on and on with one horror after another, the kind of horror that sounded familiar, the horror of a mentally ill adult child.
Some of it I already knew about M- from Facebook. The sex work, the porn. The rest was news, but predictable. Meth. Homelessness. Suicide attempts. Check, check, and check. Diagnosis of bipolar disorder and schizophrenia.
And of course the added horror of the pregnancy and trying to figure out what to do for the baby, her granddaughter, the unfortunately named O-.
B- said it was a neighbor who called child services. The neighbor reported that B- left the baby alone in the house while she walked around the neighborhood. Once social workers saw the house it was all over.
I had trouble hearing B-, but she said something about having set up guardianship before she left Colorado with the baby-doubtful-that she just signed a lease on an apartment to stay in while she fixes the house up-sounded made up-and she was very interested in how Bob and I managed to adopt C all those years ago.
“We got the parents to relinquish her,” I said. “Legally.”
Bob said, “Otherwise it’s hard to do.” He paused. “How old are you?”
B-smiled. “I’m 59.”
“B-,” I said. “You killed yourself for M-. I saw it. The private school, the university, the support. You have health issues. Shouldn’t you focus on yourself?”
What I didn’t say, and I was thinking, is that M- will likely have more than one child. Look at H-.
So B- had to go to court today to fight for her granddaughter. This brought all sorts of bad memories back, including the time H- lost custody of C-, and I had to creatively use my ‘grandparent rights’ to gain visitation, a yearlong nightmare with lawyers and H-showing up zonked out on pills wearing a nose ring.
I am never sure if B-’s lack of social skills are the result of , or the cause of, the deep distrust society has of single mothers. Single fathers are heroes, but single mothers are seen as sluts, drug addicts, welfare recipients. B- wasn’t any of those things, she was a successful career woman, a model single mom. But on a social level something was, and is, seriously amiss. Perhaps B- is autistic. Maybe Asperger’s. Not much eye contact, oblivious to social cues, facial expressions. Talks at people not with them, talks in streaming monologues, usually about very dull subjects like the bylaws in the neighborhood homeowners covenant.
But she was not dull last night, and her raspy voice washed over me, and my pity for her was profound.
This is just the sort of fucked up thing that seems to always happen to B-. She can never catch a break.
Later K- texted me: “What’s up? Totally want the skinny. Is the baby ok?”
“Yes. I’ll fill you in later,” I texted. “Heartbreaking.”
I could have texted: B-’s life could be my life, with no happy ending.
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