Finding Noel (6 page)

I've wondered why it is that some people come through difficult times bitter and broken while others emerge stronger and more empathetic? I've read that the same breeze that extinguishes some flames just fans others. I still don't know what kind of flame I am.

MARK SMART'S DIARY

DECEMBER 3, 1974

There was something different this time. Even at the age of seven, Macy had developed a sense about these things. In the last year she had bounced in and out of foster homes with such frequency that she had already lived with seven different families. But this time there was something about the confederacy of big people that set off warning signals inside her head as shrill as a school bell. Where was her little sister?

A squat, melon-faced woman with dyed yellow hair looked at her flatly, a cloud of smoke billowing up from the cigarette clamped between her teeth. She wore a thick black wool coat that fell to her shins and fit her body like a cover on a barbeque grill. The only color she wore was a Christmas tree broach with bright red and green faux jewels. The woman's eyes emotionlessly crawled over her while the other two adults, her father and the woman from the state, seemed to avoid looking at her at all.

It was late afternoon. Macy rocked on her heels, occasionally kicking a little at the snow with her oversized red Converse sneakers.

She had sensed that something would happen today. Yesterday was a good day, maybe the best in years, and experience had proven there was always something suspicious about that. She had spent the day with her father, just the two of them, on an all-day daddy-daughter date. She had asked where her Sissy was, but her father said this was a special day for just them. They had gone to a movie and bought popcorn and Raisinets. Afterward, they had gone down to the dollar store where there were more treats: a caramel apple, a pencil with a jack-o'-lantern eraser, a candy valentine's heart, a green shamrock: every special day of the year combined into one. Then her father had carried her home on his shoulders, a rare treat, for he still limped from his childhood bout with polio. They had chattered and played all day, blissfully ignoring the question she knew would be answered in time. Life had taught her that no good day went unpaid for.

Her father wore the same clothes as the day before: the tan down vest, the motor-oil-stained T-shirt not quite concealing the tattoos on his upper arm. Still he looked different now.

The woman from the state looked like a giant to her—taller than her father by nearly a head—gaunt in the face, her cheeks pale, her nose red from the cold. She was a caseworker and Macy had seen many of them. Most of them had been kind or sympathetic, others frantic or burned out, but to
Macy they were all the same—ushers to new unwelcome worlds, away from her family's problems.

Always there were
problems.
She didn't understand why caseworkers and foster parents had to be a part of
their family's problems.
Ever since her mother died, their problems had gotten worse. Much worse. Why didn't her father just stop using the drugs that made the problems and these people come? Why didn't the caseworkers take the drugs away instead of her?

The tall woman finished speaking to her father, then turned to Macy, crouching down on her haunches so that she was only slightly taller than the little girl. “Macy, this is Mrs. Irene Hummel. Mrs. Hummel is your new mother.”

Macy glanced furtively at Mrs. Hummel, then to her father, and his expression did not change with the caseworker's words.
Mother?
This woman didn't look like any mother she would want.

“I had a mother, thank you,” she said meekly, hoping against experience that something she said might make a difference.

Mrs. Hummel blew out a large puff of smoke, briefly obscuring her face.

“You're very lucky,” the caseworker said. Most kids over four never get
adopted.”
The caseworker stood back up and it seemed that she was even taller now. “It's time to say goodbye.”

Her father knelt down next to her. “You okay, sport?”

She tried to act brave but her stomach hurt. “What about Sissy?”

“She's not going with you.”

“Who will take care of her?”

“She'll be okay.”

Tears welled up in her eyes. “She needs me.”

“She'll be okay.”

“But I don't want to go.”

“I know.” There was futility in his eyes and Macy knew it would happen. It always happened the way the grown-ups said it would. “I have something for you. You fell asleep before I could give it to you last night.” He handed her a box containing a bright red glass Christmas ornament. Written in glitter were the words NOEL. DECEMBER 25. She looked at it, then wiped her face with her mittens.

“It's from Mom,” he said.

“Thank you.” She took the box in her hands.

He exhaled loudly, then stood. There was a quick glance between her father and the yellow-haired woman. The woman said to Macy. “C'mon.”

Macy looked at her father and the caseworker with hope, but neither would look at her. So she picked up the black plastic garbage bag filled with her clothes and followed the woman, who was already walking to her car. The car was pieced together with body panels from at least three different automobiles, all of different colors: dull metallic blue, brown and lime green. Macy opened the back door, threw her bag on the seat opposite her, then climbed into the car and fastened
her seat belt. The seats were ripped in places and the foam rubber protruded, enmeshed between springs. The car reeked of cigarette smoke in spite of the tree-shaped air freshener that hung from the rearview mirror.

The woman started the car, then reached down and turned on the radio to a country station. Macy glanced back once more at her father. The caseworker was talking to him and he looked at the ground. Then, as the car started to move, he looked into her eyes once, then looked away. And then he was gone. Macy closed her eyes tightly and tried not to cry out loud.

Ten minutes into the drive the woman turned down the radio.

“You had lunch?”

“Yes, ma'am,” she lied. She hadn't eaten since breakfast. Eating was one area of her life where she felt control.

“You're skinny as a paper clip.”

“Yes, ma'am.”

“Case you're wondering, you have a sister and two brothers.”

Macy just stared out the window in silence. Her mind reeled in ways she couldn't explain. She had developed mechanisms to cope with her fear, and she had retreated into herself, or perhaps out of herself, as she felt as if she were outside her body, watching this little girl thrown into a frightening new world. The woman just sucked on her cigarette. She had expended all the effort she would in conversation.

The ride seemed interminable.

Twenty-five minutes later the car passed a supermarket and turned down a narrow dead-end road. The second house from the end was a small, prefabricated home with green aluminum siding and a gray shingle roof. The front porch was elevated and it had an aluminum-awning covering. The picture window to the side of the porch had been broken and there was cardboard duct-taped to it on the inside. The yard was filled with weeds, and to the side of the house were cars in various stages of cannibalization. As they pulled in to the driveway, the woman said, “This is your new home.”

“It's very nice,” Macy said. She had learned to always say this because it made the big people happy. But if it affected this woman at all, she couldn't tell.

The woman shut off the car and opened the door. She threw what was left of her cigarette on the ground then climbed out. “Get your things.”

“Yes, ma'am.”

Macy followed her to the front porch. The aluminum outer door was missing a panel. There was a cardboard sign over the doorbell that read BROKE. It was stuck to the wooden frame with a flesh-colored Band-Aid. The door had been scribbled on with crayon.

The woman opened the door and shouted, “We're back,” as she walked inside.

Macy stepped in behind her onto the vinyl parquet floor entry. The front room was small, the floor covered with tan shag carpet. There was a peculiar smell to the room, like dog, though the odor was mostly obscured by the clinging stench
of cigarettes. There was a Christmas tree in the corner of the room, decorated with a red felt tree skirt, colorful ornaments and strands of popcorn, and in spite of everything else this made Macy happy. Maybe they would let her hang her new ornament on the tree as well.