Chapter 1 Molly #5
Then I pivot and open the door again. Georgia hasn’t moved from the position she was in just a moment ago.
“I spent so long trying not to forget you that I don’t know if it’s possible for me to forgive you,” I say.
“I really don’t expect you to forgive me,” Georgia answers. “I just hope that one day, you’ll understand.”
For the next four weeks, I ignore increasingly desperate voicemails from Evie and my father, and watch the text thread between me and Georgia Gilligan.
She has not written me since Boxing Day.
I am angry that she hasn’t reached out. I’m angry that I can’t bring myself to reach out to her. I am angry that I’m angry.
I don’t like being in a holding pattern, even though I’m the one who’s maintaining it.
When there’s an outbreak of meningitis B at Providence College, I’m grateful for the distraction.
In Rhode Island, college students must be vaccinated for meningitis if they’re going to live in a dorm.
The usual vaccine protects against four strains of the disease, but meningitis B is not one of those four strains, and it’s the strain that most often becomes a danger on college campuses.
Everyone’s sharing drinks, making out, passing joints, sneezing or coughing in close spaces.
And although it initially presents innocently, like the flu, it progresses quickly if not treated and can lead to disability and death.
A freshman wakes up with a stiff neck and is dead by dinnertime.
By the time I enter the school gym, where Toby’s set up a vaccination clinic, dozens of bleary--eyed college students are already there—-some in shorts, despite the snow; some sleeping on the floor as they wait their turn. I scan for Toby, and when I find him, I pull him aside. “How’s it going?”
“Peachy.” Toby walks me through his plan. He has members of our team going dorm to dorm and knocking on doors, dragging students down here one building at a time.
I wrinkle my nose. “What’s that smell?”
“Unshowered Gen Z,” Toby replies.
“Where do you want me?”
He narrows his eyes. “I got this, Molly. You should go home.”
“If you’re saying that because I’m pregnant—-”
“I’m saying that because I’m afraid of being punched out by your husband.”
“Consent forms it is, then,” I announce, as if Toby hasn’t spoken.
I park myself behind a table with another volunteer, and for the next four hours I answer questions about side effects and whether the vaccine was formulated using fetal cells (thanks to inaccurate Google AI searches while they are all waiting in line).
I am so tired that I’m nearly seeing double when a student says, “I can’t get a shot. ”
I launch into my spiel, the one that explains the risk versus the reward, but with every sentence the girl shrinks deeper into her puffy winter coat.
“Maybe I didn’t make clear how incredibly contagious this disease is,” I say evenly.
“I know, it’s just—-”
“Maybe you would rather take a field trip to the hospital to see one of your classmates, who’s now an amputee after contracting meningitis B!”
A hand falls on my shoulder. “Molly,” Toby says, his voice a guillotine.
The girl is sobbing. “I’m terrified of needles,” she hiccups.
Toby looks to the volunteer beside me, who comes from behind the desk to wrap an arm around the girl. Then he looks at me. “I think we need to talk.”
He leads me out of the gymnasium, into a locker room. I sit on a bench and he perches beside me. “What’s going on?”
“I . . . lost it. I’ll go back and apologize, and—-”
“You’ve been on a hair trigger for weeks now, Molly.”
I take a deep breath. “I found out some stuff about my mother. Most notably—-she’s not dead.”
Toby blinks. “What?”
“She disappeared on 9/11 and she’s been living in Atlanta until a few months ago.” I fill him in on the past four weeks. “So yeah,” I say. “Basically, everyone’s been lying to me my whole life.”
“Not me.” Toby gently bumps my shoulder with his own. “You were being a bitch and I told you that you were being a bitch.”
A teary laugh bubbles out of my throat. “Thanks.”
“Your mother’s alive. That’s a lot to digest, Molly,” he muses.
“I don’t know who I am anymore, Toby,” I admit.
“Well, I do. You’re the badass boss who just shored up the immunity of five thousand college kids.”
“Turns out I’m much better at handling other people’s emergencies,” I say.
Toby hesitates. “Did you want me to just listen, or do you want advice?”
I would trust Toby with my life; I have trusted him with the lives of others. “Advice.”
“You know how we set up an exercise?”
“I am familiar with that, yes,” I say.
“We have evaluators, right?” I nod at him. “Not an evaluator. Why?”
“Because different people notice different things.”
“Right, even when they’re all watching the same scenario unfold,” Toby replies. “You need all those points of view to really understand what went down.”
One person watching the news on 9/11 might have witnessed an act of terrorism. Georgia might have glimpsed a way to save me from her worst intentions.
Toby watches the wheels turning in my mind.
What looks like devastation from one angle might, from another, be salvation. What looks like a lie might be someone else’s truth.
He meets my gaze. “You know why this is rattling you, right? Because you can’t plan for something like this, Molly.”
I wonder if the reason I have pushed everyone away is because I am still trying to reverse--engineer a solution to an unsolvable problem.
I glance at Toby. “The person who hired you was clearly a genius.”
“Eh,” Toby jokes. “She’s okay.”
I am nervous going to my thirty--second--week ob--gyn checkup, and not just because Jesse is deep in a polygraph and can’t come with me. It’s been weeks since I saw Georgia, but I haven’t texted her.
And there she is, on the other side of Dr. Mantillard’s office reception desk. “Molly,” she says, my name a prayer.
Our eyes meet. For a moment, we are trapped in amber. The baby rolls inside me, a tug on the chain link of generations.
It is clear to me in that moment: she hadn’t contacted me because she was giving me time—-to clear my head, to digest. She is offering me the choice I didn’t have twenty--five years ago, about whether or not I want her in my life.
But what comes out of my mouth is: “Is she running late?”
Georgia blinks. For a moment, she looks so sad, but then a mask settles over her features. She smiles politely. All right, not yet then. “The doctor’s about ten minutes behind.”
I take a seat in the waiting room and watch Georgia. The night she brought me to the ER, she told the docs that I was twenty--three weeks pregnant. But no receptionist memorizes the gestational age of every patient. She must have been paying singular attention to me, to my file.
I feel a tender ache in my chest at the thought of Georgia trying to get to know me through lab results, blood pressure readings, and chart notes.
When my name is called, I follow a nurse into one of the examination rooms. She takes my vitals, then Dr. Mantillard knocks and opens the door. “Home stretch,” she says, smiling at me. “Third trimester. How are you feeling?”
“Fine,” I tell her, as she washes her hands and then measures my belly and puts the Doppler stethoscope against my skin so I can lose myself in the baby’s heartbeat.
“Have you found a pediatrician yet?” the doctor asks.
Shit, that was our homework from the last visit. I completely forgot with everything that’s happened. “Working on it,” I say cheerfully.
“Any trouble sleeping? Pain with intercourse? Other concerns?” I shake my head. “Great. At the next visit, we’ll do a pelvic exam to check the baby’s position . . . That will be in four weeks. You can schedule with Georgia on your way out.”
I’m assuming Dr. Mantillard has no idea about our relationship. “There is one thing,” I say, clearing my throat. “I recently found out that my mother, um, had some problems after she gave birth.”
Dr. Mantillard frowns. “You mean physical complications, after delivery?” She flips through my file, which I know says that my mother is deceased.
“She was . . . unstable,” I add. “Mentally,” I say. “Postpartum psychosis.”
“Ah.” The doctor makes a note in my file.
“There is evidence that heredity can play a part in postpartum psychosis. We can be hypervigilant about the signs, should they occur. And if they do, Molly, with the right diagnosis and medication, a mother with PPP can be healthy and safe. Women can even go on to have more children without the condition presenting again. But just in case,” she adds, “it’s good to know in advance. ”
After Dr. Mantillard leaves, I return to the reception desk. “I need to schedule for four weeks.”
Georgia starts typing. “How’s one p.m. on March eighteenth?”
“Sounds good.” I put it in my phone calendar but don’t walk away. “Georgia . . . I’ve been really busy.”
“I understand,” Georgia replies, with a small smile. “I’m not going anywhere.”
We realize simultaneously that it’s a poor choice of words.
“Molly,” she says, “your father stopped by. He wants to talk to me. But I wouldn’t, not unless you tell me that you’re okay with it.”
“It’s your life.” I shrug.
“Well,” Georgia points out. “It’s yours, too.”
Over dinner one night, Jesse tells me about a 9/11 victim he’s been reading about. “Sneha Anne Philip was her name,” he says. “She was a resident in her third year at St. Vincent’s on Staten Island. She lived two blocks away from the World Trade Center. And she never came home the night of 9/11.”
I look up at him over my lo mein. “She died in the attacks?”