The Year My Mother Came Back by Alice Eve Cohen Read Free Book Online Page A

down?”
    â€œYes.”
    â€œI found Zoe!”
    â€œWhat?”
    â€œI looked her up on the Internet, and she has a website, so I—”
    â€œWait. WHAT? You. Go back. You
found
Zoe?”
    â€œYes.”
    â€œWhat do you mean
found
? How did you—”
    â€œI just got off the phone with her a minute ago! She has—”
    â€œYou
called
her?”
    â€œHer phone number is on her website. She wants to see Julia. She has two baby girls, she’s married—”
    â€œBut what about Zoe’s—”
    â€œHer husband knows all about the adoption. Zoe wants to see Julia! I’d like to tell Julia myself.”
    â€œSure. Um. Would you mind waiting till tomorrow to tell her?”
    â€œOkay. Absolutely. Isn’t this great news?”
    â€œYes . . . wow. She wants to see . . . That’s . . . that’s fantastic news.”
    So why am I so angry?
    After Brad hangs up, I slam down the receiver, put my face in my hands and groan. In my roiling tumult and turmoil about mothers and birth mothers—about Julia looking for her birth mother, about Brad preemptively finding Zoe, about mothers lost and found—I want to find
my
mother. Where’s the National Registry that will facilitate my search? Sign me up. Heck, I’ll just Google her. Maybe she has a website with her phone number on it. Ha!
    With my face in my hands, I say her name out loud—Mom . . . Mommy . . . Louise.
    â€œWhy are you so angry, Alice,” she asks, inside my head.
(This time, it’s just my mother’s voice. Not a visitation. That’s okay.)
    â€œBecause, in one move, Brad has (1) usurped Julia’s quest to find her birth mother; (2) violated Zoe’s privacy. Zoe wanted anonymity. We weren’t even supposed to know her last name. And, oh, for example, what if Zoe had
not
told her husband, and what if she did
not
want him to know she’d given up a baby for adoption eighteen years ago? And (3) he left me out of the process. I wanted to help Julia with her search.”
    â€œOf course you did.”
    â€œAnd now—Anyway, it’s done.”
    â€œTrue. Brad can’t un-find Zoe.”
    â€œI know that this is great news. I’m being petulant and petty. And that’s the worst thing, Mom. I’m ashamed. I want to be a better mother than that.”
    â€œYour feelings are completely understandable, especially in context.”
    â€œWhat context?”
    â€œJulia leaving home on Saturday.”
    â€œOuch, don’t remind me.”
    â€œAnd your surgery is tomorrow.”
    â€œRight. Ugh. I’m really scared, Mom. Mommy, I am. I’m really, really scared.”
    â€œYou’ll be fine.”
    â€œHow do you know?”
    â€œI don’t.”
    â€œThen why’d you say I’d be fine?”
    â€œThat’s what we mothers say.”
    â€œWhether or not it’s true?”
    â€œWe comfort our children. It’s part of the job. Anyway, your surgery isn’t such a big deal.”
    â€œNot like yours, you mean?”
    â€œGood luck tomorrow, Alice—
tuh, tuh, tuh!
Be sure to throw salt over your left shoulder.”

SIX
    Michael is there when I awaken from the anesthesia, my left breast smaller by a peach-sized lump of flesh than it was when I woke up that morning. I insist on walking the fifteen blocks home, even though I stumble out of the hospital in a groggy daze. Michael puts his arm around my shoulder and helps me to navigate the sidewalks and traffic lights on the steamy day. I zigzag drunkenly, hugging an ice pack under my shirt to reduce the swelling. I’m sore from the procedure, but I no longer have shooting pains. I’m infinitely grateful that the metal marker was removed, as promised. I desperately want coffee. Michael ushers me into a Starbucks, buys me a monumental cup of dark brew, and walks me home.
    I look at myself in the bedroom mirror. The asymmetry of my