Page 48 of Counting Backwards

“Look,” Fern said, “I can talk to the women. Try to get a few of them to reach out to you on their own. Can’t make any promises though. They’ll need real assurance that you can protect them from sudden transfers or deportation. None of them will like the idea of putting themselves in further jeopardy. And like I said, some of them don’t even speak English.”

“That’s fine. I have someone who can join me to interpret. At least for Spanish. I can find other interpreters as needed.” I prayed that Dustin’s conscience would keep him amenable to helping me, at least for a little bit longer.

“Give me your number again,” Fern said, taking her cell phone from her pocket. “I’ll see what I can do.”

***

When I walked into the lobby of our apartment building, I caught sight of Vance already waiting at the elevator bank. His back was to me, and he wore a sleeveless t-shirt and a pair of baggy gray sweatpants. His arms and neck were slick with sweat. Earbuds peeked out of his ears, and he didn’t notice me approaching. I paused, taking a moment to study him. He was apparently still energized from his Saturday morning run as he bopped his head along to the music playing in his ears. A few months ago, I would have wrapped my arms around him from behind and kissed his cheek, not minding the dampness of his skin. Now, I felt awkward and unsure. There had been so much fighting and stress lately. Everything between us felt changed.

He turned slightly and noticed me. His lips began to spread in a smile as he reached up to remove one of his earbuds.

“Hey. How’d it go with the nurse?” he asked as I reached him.

The elevator doors opened, and we stepped in together. The routine of it, the sameness, shook something loose inside my heart, sending a wave of melancholy through my whole body. In a different version of reality, in the world before our “fertility journey,” I’d have already called Vance to fill him in on my meeting, eager to talk through every nuance with this beautiful man who’d given me so much emotional support over the years. For a long time I couldn’t have imagined making a major decision without his input. But things had changed between us. Somewhere between all the foiled, unpleasant attempts at baby-making, or maybe because of his constant doubts about my judgment, the magic between us had been steadily evaporating, like shallow puddles after a summertime storm.Soon there might be nothing left at all, I thought, and the realization made me profoundly sad. I wasn’t prepared to let him slip away from me, not yet. I had to protect our closeness, all past mistakes and omissions aside.I knew keeping secrets from him was only making things worse. But with the growing chasm between us, I saw no other choice.

Even if I couldn’t reveal the horrible story of my family’s past, I could still make sure to be immensely, excessively forthright going forward.No new secrets, I promised myself, and maybe with enough honesty, I could push the old secrets further and further away.

“The meeting was kind of great.” I smiled tentatively as Vance nodded. Maybe he was warming to the idea of me pursuing this case. “She’s going to try to get me a few more names, women who might be willing to talk. I also found another party we have to name as defendant. Turns out, the facility isn’t even run by the government. They hire private companies to run these places. She said this one was called DeMarke.”

“DeMarke? You mean DeMarke Corrections?” Vance asked.

“Yeah, how—?”

“They’re a client. Not of mine. Arjun manages the account. I think they’ve been with our bank for a long time, like more than a decade. They run Hydeford?”

I nodded, stunned by the coincidence. The elevator doors reopened, and we stepped out in tandem.

“You can’t bring a suit against DeMarke,” Vance said as he continued toward the apartment door. “So I guess that’s that.”

The flippancy with which he said it stopped me in my tracks. “What the fuck are you talking about? You just said it’s not your account.”

“Still,” he started, turning back to where I stood, but I interrupted.

“You and Arjun aren’t even in the same group. How could this matter at a company as enormous as yours?”

“Jessa, are you kidding? They’re an important client of the bank. I can’t have my wife dragging them into court on some witch hunt. Do you know how that would look for me?”

“Witch hunt?” I snapped back, and the accord I’d been hoping for was gone in an instant. I was once again brimming with rage. “If you can’t respect what I’m doing, then maybe we have a bigger problem than who’s getting named in the complaint.”

“Yeah,” Vance nearly spat back. “Maybe we do.” He reached into his pocket for his keys, turning his back and marching down the hallway. I stayed rooted to my spot. I couldn’t bring myself to follow him after what he’d just said, and I wasn’t fool enough to miss the metaphor in that. There was a small bench opposite the elevator, and I lowered myself onto the faux leather to collect my thoughts. I felt like I was seeing Vance in a whole new light. I’d always thought he trusted my choices, but now I was wondering if those choices had actually been his, not mine, all along. Maybe every single time. I had let him direct me in so many ways, professionally, socially, romantically, because it felt safe. How easy it had been to fall in line because I generally agreed with his suggestions, but now it seemed we no longer saw eye to eye on anything at all.

Witch hunt. Fuck him. Suddenly it was all just too much—having to fight Vance, knowing what had happened to Denise and Jacinta and Isobel, discovering what had been taken from them. Their whole futures, worlds of possibilities, had been ripped away, literally yanked from their bodies. A sudden sob escaped me as I thought of them now, young women who would never get pregnant, never birth more children of their own, no matter how desperately they wished.

I wiped at my eyes. A neighbor could step off the elevator at any moment and find me weeping in the hallway, but I didn’t care. I needed this moment to simply let myself feel. I replayed everything in my mind again, how the women had been cuffed in the exam room, how they’d been forced to sign unclear paperwork, pressured to submit.

I wondered then if I’d told any of those details to Vance. I’d pulled so far back from him that I couldn’t even remember what I’d shared.

Reminding myself that I was partially at fault for our current discord, I tamped down the fierce anger in which I’d been stewing. I could do better too.

When I stepped into the apartment, I heard Vance already in the bathroom with the shower running. I went straight to the kitchen, reaching for the bag of sliced sourdough bread on the counter. I had skipped breakfast in my rush to meet Fern earlier. As I pulled two slices of bread from the bag, I tried to think dispassionately about the conflict of interest with DeMarke. It was unfortunate that Vance might have a difficult situation at work because of the case, but if anyone was to blame for it, that would be the people at DeMarke, the people at Hydeford, or Dr. Choudry. And yet, Vance probably wouldn’t see it that way.

But this was just too big. I wasn’t going to drop this case simply because it might cause a problem for my husband at work. Besides, everyone loved Vance at his bank. Whatever happened, they’d figure things out. And not for nothing, maybe Vance should encourage the bank to drop DeMarke as a client. Unless he liked working with people who supported discrimination and abuse. He couldn’t possibly be okay with that, given his lifelong feeling about what his grandparents had experienced.

We’d had so many conversations over the years about what his grandparents had been through, how they’d never really recovered, how he and his brothers had tried so hard to heal their grandparents’ pain. Yet now, amid a situation where people were suffering in real time, their pain didn’t matter to him?

I pushed the bread into the toaster, trying to keep my mind blank. I needed a few minutes of rest from my turbulent emotions. Taking a container of hummus from the fridge, I crossed the smallkitchen for a butter knife, relieved by the mundanity of these tasks. As I removed the cover from the spread, the tangy, garlicky smell of the chickpea paste instantly turned my stomach and I raced to the sink, ready to vomit. The feeling passed almost as suddenly as it had arrived, but it left me reeling nonetheless.

Could it be?I remembered my distaste for Fern’s coffee earlier. So many women said that nausea was their first sign, the symptom that tipped them off about their pregnancies. I tried not to get excited. It was probably just the beginning of a stomach bug. I pulled my phone from my back pocket anyway, then opened the period tracking app.