Chapter 5
For Ellie, today figuring it out took the form of talking to Angelica about moving out within the week—Angelica didn’t mind at all; the arrangement had never been intended to be long-term—and going to the store to pick up some supplies for Marjorie.
Clark wanted to go to a big-box store about a half hour away, while she wanted to visit some of the boutiques in town.
The trouble with small towns was there was no way they were going to be able to keep people from asking questions.
The main street had changed significantly in the last few years. A revival of people supporting local shops and restaurants instead of chain stores meant that there were new boutiques popping up all the time. Sometimes they didn’t last. Getting business right in a town this size was difficult.
But it also meant that a lot of the shop owners were people who were new to town, strangers to both Ellie and Clark, and honestly, that suited her just fine.
Main Street was dotted with statues. A majestic bald eagle, a pioneer woman. A shirtless cowboy who—though she was loath to admit it—reminded her a little bit of Clark. The image of him shirtless yesterday was still on her mind.
She tried to ignore that thought as they continued down the street, with Clark holding Marjorie and Ellie taking the lead.
The baby was so tiny in his arms. And she really couldn’t look at him holding her for too long, because it made a whole chain reaction go off inside her. An unsuspected hormonal response that was heretofore unknown to her, suddenly cascading through her body.
Bodies were like that. Susceptible to biological imperatives and whatever else.
She didn’t need to be a science teacher to know that.
When they walked into the first boutique, she felt as if her chest might cave in. Everything inside it was so tiny and cute. The pink, frilly little outfits sent a rush through her. Oh God. Where was all this coming from? She’d been perfectly happy to wait to have kids and …
She felt guilty. Guilty that she was having this moment when her sister wasn’t. Guilty that her sister’s baby was fulfilling something inside her when …
“Are you okay?”
Oh, now he was being nice.
“I’m fine,” she said.
“Welcome in,” said a smiling woman behind the counter. She had big blond curls and a T-shirt that was knotted up beneath her breasts, a long, high-waisted skirt with a loud geometric pattern swirling around her legs.
“Thank you,” Ellie said.
“Aren’t you just the cutest couple. And what a sweet baby.”
She and Clark looked at each other, mutually wondering if this was going to be their life. Every parent-teacher conference. Every holiday, every event. People were going to wonder what the connection between them was.
And without getting into the messy family history, there was no way to neatly explain who they were to each other.
Especially not now, when they were adopting Marjorie. They were going to be her parents. So she just smiled, and so did Clark.
“She’s a fresh one,” the lady said.
“Yes,” Ellie said, “and we need pretty much everything.”
“Really? No baby shower?”
Yes. Small-town shopping. She should have anticipated that even if she didn’t know the shopkeeper, it was going to be weird.
“We … adopted her. Or we are adopting her. She was placed with us just a couple of days ago. So it’s a surprise.”
“Oh,” the woman said, her eyes filling with tears. “That’s so lovely of you both.”
Ellie felt as if she was walking in a minefield.
“We think we’re the lucky ones,” Clark said.
Knowing the situation, the actual situation, Ellie knew that it was more complicated than that.
She also knew that Marjorie was going to grow up hearing reactions like this.
That she was lucky. And why? She wasn’t a burden.
And she and Clark weren’t saintly for taking her in.
She was a little girl who needed a home.
Clark had a home. And Ellie would have one, as well.
They had love they could give her. Why wouldn’t they do that?
But that didn’t make them special any more than it made Marjorie lucky to have them.
Clark was exactly right. Ellie felt lucky. Even though her life had been derailed, completely different today from what it had been two days ago, she felt lucky.
That feeling intensified as she looked at the clothes.
Clark put a hand on her elbow, and she tried not to flinch. “I don’t know how to say this delicately, but there’s no budget.”
She looked at him. Right. So he didn’t have any money because he’d just finished building the house. That made sense. “I don’t mind buying the clothes. I have some savings from my down payment fund, and I don’t mind pulling from it, especially not since—”
“No,” he said. “You don’t understand. There is no limit to the budget. You can get whatever you want.”
She could only stare at him. “What?”
“I’ve done very well for myself,” he said, keeping his voice low. “Between my winnings, my investments, and my endorsement deals, I’m set.”
“I don’t … I don’t fully understand that.”
“You don’t have to. Just know that I’m going to buy everything, and you don’t need to look at the price tag.”
Never in her life had that been a thing. And here she was now, on a pink shopping spree with the cutest baby she’d ever seen, and a gorgeous cowboy in tow. If it didn’t feel so unreal, she would be in awe. It was too bad there was so much going on beneath the surface.
She decided not to dwell on the complications.
She chose dresses, onesies, little jackets and socks, and a beautiful, very expensive stroller. They carried the spoils back to the truck, and then Marjorie went into the stroller as they continued down the street.
In each shop, people commented on how beautiful their family was, and Ellie started really listening to the reactions people had when they found out she and Clark had adopted Marjorie.
“This feels really complicated,” she said when they went back to the truck later.
“In what way?”
“I feel so … happy to have Marjorie. No, this isn’t what I planned.
And it’s a total direction shift. But when I think about her, having her, raising her as time goes on, I feel a sense of real joy.
But then I stop myself from feeling it because our joy is built off Melanie and Ty’s pain.
But I don’t want Marjorie to live in their world.
You’ve seen how people react when we say we adopted her.
They act like we are saints. Like she’s some kind of a burden.
And that’s just not true or fair. I don’t want her to get lost in the sadness of her birth parents’ addiction.
Because her life doesn’t need to be defined by that.
Honestly, that’s why Melanie and Ty gave her up.
To keep her from being defined by this thing they can’t escape. ”
He nodded. “I agree.”
“I want to be honest with her. I don’t want to have secrets.”
They got back into the truck after Clark secured Marjorie in her seat.
“I know you had a different experience growing up than I did. But one of the things I learned watching my sister descend into drug addiction is that secrets, and the things people are afraid to say, always make it worse. My parents suspected that she was drinking, engaging in substance abuse, having sex with Ty, but they were afraid to ask. Just like they were afraid to ask about anything to do with mental health. They acted as if it would all be better if we just covered it up. And I think if we had faced the truth head-on back then, things would’ve been better. ”
“We?”
“I include myself in that. What if I had said something to Melanie? What if I had been honest? What if I had confronted her when I started to suspect she was using? I’m her older sister.
But I was afraid the answer would be yes.
I was afraid she would already be too far gone, and because I couldn’t face what she was doing, I lost her.
I want everything out in the open now. I want Marjorie to know that we adopted her.
That we’re just a different sort of family, but a family all the same.
And I want her to know that her biological parents made a very hard, very unselfish decision. Because they did.”
“Yeah,” he said, his voice rough. “They did.”
“And I just don’t want … The idea that we did her a favor, I want that to go away as quickly as possible.”
She felt extremely protective. And angry that anyone would treat their beautiful baby like a burden.
“We’re her mom and dad,” she said, the words coming out of her mouth before she fully thought them through.
“Yeah,” he said.
“It’s a little overwhelming but it’s also amazing. Two days ago, we didn’t really have a connection at all, and now this little soul is transforming our lives.”
“No connection besides dysfunction, I guess,” he said, though there was a note in his voice that she couldn’t quite decode.
They brought their purchases back to the house, and it felt good to put everything away.
They still had to order certain things. There was just a plain dark cherry dresser in the room for now, but some cute, baby-appropriate furniture was on the way—pieces in brighter colors, that were a little bit more whimsical, and a rocking chair.
Marjorie fussed for a while, clearly filled with opinions about how strenuous the day had been.
And Ellie couldn’t blame her. She spent some time getting the baby settled for a nap with their brand-new baby monitor set out so that she could take it down the stairs and not lose touch with her tiny charge.
By the time she went into the kitchen, Clark was cooking.
“Are you making dinner?”
“Yes, I am.”
“I didn’t realize that you … cooked.”
“Funny thing. I eat. So it makes a lot of sense for me to have that skill.”
“Sure,” she said. “But you’re a rodeo cowboy who also claims to have limitless funds. I guess I thought that maybe you … I dunno, didn’t cook for yourself.”