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“Hey, big boy,” I cooed, holding little Jensen, a chocolate-eyed version of Lexie, his mother. “Those eyes are definitely your dad's.” I blinked back tears and looked at my profoundly proud sister, whose turned-up nose still sported light freckles. Her red hair still spiked becomingly, but recently, she'd experimented with some different color, adding brown to the hair, making it auburn and then highlighting the ends blonde.

It was actually cute on her.

Since birthing Jensen, our little athletic smart-aleck of the family flowed gracefully and displayed a splash of maternal mellowness that sat well upon her.

“I'm so happy for you,” I said. And it was true. All my angst of the past was gone.

“What a prize you are,” I said to my handsome nephew, grasping his strong little hands and letting him pull his weight into upright standing position on my lap. I laughed at his strength and determination. “My little football jock,” I called him, gurgling with pleasure.

Having caught a fresh perception of life, I now resigned myself to the fact that I would never naturally birth a child of my own, I'd begun to adapt to the idea of adoption. Actually began to get excited.

In March, everybody in the family got a virus. Mom, Dad, Dan, even Priss' family had the stomach monster. I rarely got the bugs and felt pretty smug as I typed my news for the paper column. Then suddenly, it hit me.

The virus lasted three to four days and left everybody as suddenly as it came.

Except me. The queasiness lingered. It irritated me that I couldn't bounce back. So I suggested we go out to dinner on the second week. “It's all in my head,” I insisted to Dan, who remained dubious, concerned.

“Sure you don't want to see the doc?” he asked.

“Nah. I just need a good square meal to turn me around. I'll call Priss and Earl to join us at the Red Lobster.”

Although the smell of food still tied my stomach in knots, I ordered my favorite seafood plate.

The meal turned me around all right. Right to the Ladies' Room to vomit every last vestige I'd ingested.

I returned to the table pale and shaking. Priss looked at me strangely, Then she grinned.

“Deede Stowe. You are pregnant.”

“Oh, yeah. Right!” I rolled my eyes and swallowed against the knot of queasiness.

Priss's grey eyes sparkled with glee. “You. Are. Pregnant.”

“It's not possible,” I muttered, dismissing her teasing, feeling a bit irritated with it to tell the truth. Priss knew how much I'd wanted a baby. She knew all the medical facts and that I could not get pregnant. Yet — she was insistent. A little seed of something sprouted inside me and when, on the way home, I asked Dan to stop at the drugstore to buy a pregnancy kit, he chuckled and shook his head.

“I just need to prove Priss wrong,” I insisted. “She won't shut up till I do.”

When the test turned out positive, I shook my head in bewilderment. The next morning, I bought another kit and drove over to Priss' house.

“I just did it wrong, is all,” I told her, determined to prove it to her and yet — a cluster of butterflies flapped in my stomach.

Again, the test showed positive. Puzzled, both Priss and I decided I should call Dr. Wingo. Knowing my history, he scheduled me for an ultrasound. During the screening, he began to mumble. “Well,” he said, “it seems to be in the right place.”

He peered at me through thick lens, scratching his balding head.

“What is?” I asked, alarmed.

“The baby,” he said. My heart nearly leaped from my chest as he pointed to the monitor of shadows and light. “See?”

Numbly, I nodded, suddenly weak-kneed and filled with wonder.

Dr. Wingo looked at me, shaking his head. “There's no medical way this baby should be in your uterus.” He continued shaking his head. “You must have gone to church right.” Then he laughed and patted my arm. “You need to see an ob-gyn man.”

“You mean — ” I pressed my fingers to my mouth as tears rushed to my eyes.

“You're pregnant, Deede.”

“Parents can only give good advice or put them on the right paths, but the final forming of a person's character lies in their own hands.”

— Anne Frank

 

 

On December 10, Faith Jean Stowe was born. Faith was the only name that fit and the middle name, Jean, was in honor of my mother. “She's our child of faith,” Dan insisted.

I agreed. Our little tan-haired, blue-eyed daughter was named for the time we believed God for a child. It was only after we relinquished our ungodly passion to Him that He gave her to us.

The first time I held her in my arms was the highlight of my entire life. The tiny, perfectly round blue eyes latched onto mine and I would have sworn there was an electrical surge of love that flashed between us and encompassed me until I felt I would burst with it. What I felt, holding her to my heart, was so intense that it could have burned a hole clean through me. Dan was equally beguiled.

I had expected a solid, forceful link to form, but nothing of this magnitude. This maternal love was a force of
nature, not at all what I'd expected. It was fierce and all consuming.

I was looking at a part of
me.
Never before had I had the opportunity to see a part of my genetic self. This was my
connection.

Wonder and joy gripped me as I watched one tiny fist flail about and brush rosebud lips that immediately began to suckle it.

“Ahhh,” I breathed and felt a sudden burn of tears. They trickled over.

I looked up and saw that Dan, too, was moved to tears. He sat on the bed beside me, arm around my shoulders as we adored our creation. Our miracle.

She was flesh of our flesh and bone of our bone.

I was finally someone's roots.

Faith's.

Since that moment, I've never been the same

Faith was an adorable baby. That wasn't just my opinion. Everywhere we took her, folks were drawn to her like hummingbirds to nectar. Her cornflower blue eyes seemed always alight with some undisclosed joke.

“Hi, Faith,” Priss pealed at our first family Christmas dinner when Faith was six weeks old. Faith's spontaneous eruption of belly laughter had a domino effect and soon the entire clan of twelve was laughing with her until teary-eyed. They pressed into a circle to engage her with goofy greetings and she never failed to respond with glee.

“How'd you luck up so?” Lexie pouted in jest. “Jensen took three months to find his tickle-box.”

“Hey, he's just as delightful.” I gooched him in his chunky tummy to demonstrate and his mouth spread
wide, spilling laughter, rewarding me with a deep-seated pleasure, that sense of belonging that only family provides. Jensen, already in his second year, was evolving even more into the little jock. He loved balls, any kind or size and already watched football games with Adam, his dad. Yet, his spirit was gentle and generous. He watched over Faith like a nanny.

Amazingly, when Faith would begin to cry, Jensen's lips would begin to wobble, and he, too, would cry.

Later, from toddler-hood up, those two were soul-mates. When Jensen was four, Lexie gave birth to a daughter, Chloe, a beautiful raisin-eyed minx who would later rival her cousin Faith in manipulation.

But in those young years, Faith looked up to Jensen as her Alpha. I won't say he was exactly a role model because, from early age, Faith always did her own thing. But Jensen came as close to being her iconic hero as anybody in her life. Looking back, I think this was one of the cornerstones of a vicious rivalry between cousins, Faith and Chloe: their mutual vying for Jensen's affection and alliance.

Oh, how I tried to not hover and smother Faith. So did Dan. And I think we did pretty well considering how long we had waited for her. We did discipline her when necessary, but that didn't happen often.

She was a happy little girl. Faith never met a stranger and was a real social creature. When she was six, I allowed her to visit nearby friends in the neighborhood and vice versa. One day, she was gone longer than usual.

“Tanya,” I called to her next door playmate who was swinging on her jungle-gym, “isn't Faith over there?”

“She was,” Tanya yelled. “But I haven't seen her for a while now.”

My alarm grew as I searched up and down the street. No one knew where Faith was. I called Dan at work and he rushed home. By now, neighbors were involved in the search, knowing how frantic Dan and I were.

Two hours passed, a suspenseful time that shredded my nerves to confetti. We had, by now, combed the neighborhood and night was swiftly encroaching. At a neighbor's house several blocks from ours, we were able to trace Faith's whereabouts until she got on the bicycle with a little girl named Bobbi. That's all we knew. The neighbor lady was on the phone, still trying to help locate her.

Pacing, I watched the scene through a haze. A sense of impending doom seized me.

“Call the police,” I told Dan. He nodded.

“I'm going home to wait for her,” I said weakly. My knees felt rubbery and my breath shallow. “She may come home and I want to be there.”

Dave called the police and dropped me off at the house. He left again to meet the police at the place Faith was last seen. I sat down in the den and waited, praying, begging God to please bring my baby home.

I know you didn't give her to us for something like this to happen. I cried and prayed some more.

I waited for a long time until I could sit no longer. I began to dust and shuffle things around. Anything to keep me moving …

A car door slammed outside and I froze.

I turned to face the door. Fear gripped me.

Please, God. Please don't let it be bad news.

The door slowly opened. In walked Faith, wearing a little blue housecoat and slippers. Her damp hair was freshly shampooed and neatly combed back.

“Faith,” I held out my arms and burst into tears.

She ran into them, and I sat down and pulled her on my lap. “Honey,” I sobbed. “I was so scared.”

She burst into tears and wailed. “I'm sorry, Mama. I was at Bobbi's house. They asked me to eat supper with ‘em and — and then Bobbi's Mama gave me a bath — this is Bobbi's housecoat and slippers. I didn't mean to scare you.”

We hugged for long moments and I thought how sweet she smelled, like shampoo and soap and talcum powder, and then I called Dan and told him Faith was safe.

Faith and I were still sitting there in each other's arms when he got home.