Year of the Monsoon (3 page)

Maddie Oxendine had come to St. Joseph’s when she and Nan moved to Baltimore right after grad school in North Carolina – “we will complete our doctorates, come hell or high water,” they had promised each other. Maddie stayed through her doctorate – “which felt like hell and high water,” she would have added; through cuts in funding and cuts in staff; she stayed when Social Services began calling, desperate for placement of some of their more difficult cases – kids who had gone through foster home after foster home. Five years ago, she became the director, reporting to the Superior General of the Sisters of Our Charitable Lady, but now with only a few of the nuns working at the Home. “Anyone who sticks around here long enough will eventually become director,” she shrugged.

Maddie joked a lot – “It’s the only way to stay sane,” she often said – but her jokes hid a heart big enough for all the children who came her way; for eleven-year-old Allison, who had silently let her step-father use her every night for years to keep him from turning to her younger sister and who had watched in disbelief as her mother told the judge she would give up the girls so she could join the step-father who had fled to Florida; for Marco, an eight-year-old product of a rape whose mother had committed suicide when she could no longer cope with her family’s shame; for all the others, abandoned, orphaned, deprived of any sense of self-worth. No matter how busy she was, Maddie made time every afternoon to go and sit with the children. Leisa often watched as Maddie sat on the floor, her arms and lap filled with little ones who had crawled up, the older ones gathered around, eager to tell her about their day at school.

“How do you protect yourself?”

“Find someone to build a life with,” Maddie counseled Leisa when she first asked that question. “Thank God for her every day. And leave this place here when you go home to her. Give all you can when you’re here, but let it go when you leave. Or it won’t be long until you have nothing left to give. Believe me, this will still be here waiting for you tomorrow.”

But “find someone to build a life with” sounded easier than it was, Leisa thought back then. She kept telling herself that things with Sarah were really over this time. And mostly she believed it. But she knew how easily Sarah had wormed her way back into Leisa’s heart before. One look from those eyes, one kiss from those lips, and Leisa was hooked again. “Maybe she’ll stay this time,” Leisa would always tell herself. But she never did. And then she met Nan, and Maddie’s advice didn’t seem so impossible anymore.

Leisa’s telephone rang, startling her from her reverie. “Someone from the coroner’s office is here to see you,” Sadie, the receptionist, announced.

“Be right there.”

Leisa stood and stretched. She made her way upstairs from her basement office, climbing the wide marble stairs worn smooth from decades of children’s feet running up and down them. When she got to the main floor, she could see a young man sitting on one of the wooden chairs in Sadie’s office. He was holding an aluminum paint can which he almost dropped as he stood to greet Leisa.

“Miss Yeats?” he asked.

“Yes?” Behind her, Leisa could hear the soft clicks of Sadie’s beaded cornrows and knew she was craning her neck, trying to see, even as her fingers tapped rapidly on the keyboard of her computer.

“I’m David Anderson. I’m interning with the medical examiner’s office. I was asked to bring these to you,” he said, holding out the paint can.

At Leisa’s confused look, he said, “They’re the ashes of the Gonzalez woman. It was pretty straight forward – a heroin overdose, but Dr. Bledsoe, the medical examiner, said it was probably a good thing. She had full-blown AIDS and was already dying. Maybe she even did it on purpose. All her other needle marks looked old, and this overdose was huge.” He handed her the can. “I just need you to sign here,” he added, handing Leisa a form acknowledging receipt of the ashes. “Good-bye,” he said as he pocketed the signed form.

Sadie was watching her and eyeing the can with a repulsed expression. “What are you going to do with that?”

Leisa looked at the plain paint can in her hands, adorned only with a label printed with a name, case number and date of cremation. “I’m going to deliver it.”

Florida Gonzalez’ body had been identified by her fingerprints. She had an extensive police record – prostitution, petty theft, dealing drugs. Leisa had stared transfixed at the mug shots taken at each arrest. She had been a beautiful woman, but her face had transformed, becoming harder and more gaunt with each photo. A few photos showed her with blackened eyes and facial bruises. There was no mention of a child or pregnancy. Evidently, Mariela had been born between incarcerations, perhaps not even in Maryland since there was no record of her birth. The most recent arrest had brought a one-month sentence last year for prostitution. Leisa wondered who had taken care of Mariela during that time.

She found Mariela in the elementary common room, sitting by herself in a small rocking chair she had pulled into a corner. Even after two weeks, she hadn’t made any friends, wouldn’t talk to anyone. With her black hair washed and pulled back in a ponytail and wearing clean clothes, Mariela was a beautiful child. Her face looked fuller with a few good meals inside her.

Leisa pulled another chair up close and sat. “Hello, Mariela,” she said. “Do you remember I told you they had to do some tests on your mother to be sure how she died? It was drugs.”

“Never lie to them,” Maddie always insisted. “Most of these kids have never heard anything but lies from adults.”

Mariela said nothing, just rocked.

“These are your mother’s ashes,” Leisa said gently, holding out the can.

Mariela stopped rocking and looked up at Leisa. After a long moment, Mariela reached over and took the can into her lap and began rocking again.

“You are her family,” Leisa said. “You can decide what to do with the ashes. Sometimes people keep them. Sometimes they have a funeral and bury them. You can think about it and let us know what you want to do.”

She left Mariela rocking in her chair, hugging the can tightly and humming to herself.

Leisa hurried home later that day, anxious to get home to Nan. All afternoon, she’d tried unsuccessfully to shake the image of Mariela, sitting in her rocking chair, holding tight to her mother’s ashes. A mother who hadn’t taken care of her, hadn’t protected her. None of that mattered to Mariela. Sitting in her car, stuck in rush-hour traffic, Leisa felt her throat suddenly tighten and tears sting her eyes. She reached for her cell phone and dialed her mother’s house before she remembered she wasn’t home. She and Aunt Jo were in New York all week.

“Mom, you really need to start doing things for yourself, taking it a little easier,” Leisa had started telling her mother about six months ago.

Daniel Yeats had fought a brave but brief battle with prostate cancer five years ago. He had tried to keep working in his drugstore during his chemo and radiation, but it hadn’t been long before Leisa’s mother, Rose, had taken over the books. Luckily, Daniel’s assistant, Ed, was able to handle the pharmacy counter by himself. Reluctantly, Daniel and Rose had decided to sell the store to Ed. Bruce Gallagher, Jo Ann’s husband, drafted the legal agreement and the store changed hands, but Rose was the one who knew all the customers, so she stayed on, helping Ed through the transition. After Daniel was gone, she kept working because it gave her something to do, a schedule she had to keep. But this past Christmas, Leisa and Nan had conspired with Bruce to give Rose and Jo a gift of a train trip to New York City so that the two sisters could enjoy a week together, shopping, going to Radio City Music Hall and seeing some Broadway shows. They weren’t due back until late Saturday night.

Leisa considered calling her mother’s cell, but put her telephone down. “This is stupid. You don’t need to talk to your mother,” she muttered as traffic started to move.

When she got home, the message light was blinking on the answering machine.

“Hi, hon,” came Nan’s voice out of the speaker, “I’m sorry, but I had to re-schedule a late client. I should be home by ten. Love you.”

Sighing, Leisa turned to Bronwyn who wagged her stump of a tail. “Looks like it’s just you and me tonight, then,” she said as she opened the refrigerator. She fed them both, and took Bron for a frosty walk in the winter darkness, remembering when it wasn’t like this.

“I don’t want to work evenings anymore,” Nan had said ten years ago when Leisa moved in with her. “I want to spend my evenings at home with you.” Despite the advice from her accountant that it would negatively impact her income to lose after-work hours, Nan cut her schedule back to one evening a week.

Those days had been magical. They each rushed home to be together, cooking dinner, often with Lyn and Maddie invited over. Later, they would snuggle together on Nan’s sofa to watch television.

“I’ve never seen you this happy,” Maddie said to Nan one evening as she helped carry dishes into the kitchen.

Nan glanced back out to where Leisa sat at the table talking to Lyn. “I’ve honestly never been this happy,” she agreed.

“It took you two long enough to figure it out,” Maddie teased. “It’s been what, eight months since we introduced you?”

Nan shook her head. “It wasn’t me. I knew what I wanted almost as soon as I met her. She had… things she needed to work through.” She lowered her eyes and smiled, embarrassed. “And she wouldn’t sleep with me until she was sure she’d worked through them.”

Maddie’s eyebrows raised in surprise. “I knew I liked her, but morals, too?” She leaned closer and whispered, “Was she worth waiting for?”

Nan blushed and Maddie laughed loudly.

Leisa and Lyn both turned at the sound.

“What are you two saying in there?” Lyn asked suspiciously.

“Nothing,” Maddie answered most unconvincingly, still laughing.

One of the biggest challenges for Nan in the beginning was meeting Leisa’s family. “I’ve never… no one has ever wanted me to meet her family before,” Nan protested weakly.

Leisa tilted her head and smiled. “A lot of things are going to be different from the way they were before,” she said. It had not escaped her notice that Nan almost never talked about her family.

“Don’t you do a lot of family therapy?” Leisa had asked, puzzled. “How can you do that if you can’t talk to your own family?”

“Just because you’re born into a family doesn’t mean you’re part of it,” Nan countered. “Anyway, do you have any idea how many substance abuse counselors are alcoholics, from alcoholic families?”

“Well, you’re invited to dinner on Sunday,” Leisa said. “I’ve talked about you so much, they’re starting to think I made you up.”

“Isn’t this what you always wanted?” Maddie asked when Nan called her in a panic. “Someone to build a life with? Someone who wants to include you in everything as her partner?”

“But what do I do when she wants the same from me?” Nan asked.

Her fears were allayed almost as soon as she met Leisa’s family. The Yeatses and Gallaghers all welcomed her warmly, and soon began expecting her every time Leisa came home.

Leisa spent so much time at Nan’s apartment, it seemed silly for her to keep her own. “I’ve never had anyone live with me before,” Nan fretted, but Leisa blended into her life seamlessly and “I can’t remember what it used to be like for her not to be here,” Nan admitted to Maddie. For months, they enjoyed the newness of their life together – a first for both of them, until “Don’t you think it’s time we started thinking about buying our own home together?” Leisa suggested.