Then Came You - Jennifer Weiner [106]
“Our guess,” said her lawyer, stepping in smoothly, “is that they would have let you know after the baby was born. Maybe they would have made you its godmother, and at that point they would have initiated a discussion about the responsibilities involved if something were to happen to them.”
“It would have been nice,” I said, “if someone had, you know, talked to me.” I sounded bratty, exactly the way Leslie and her lawyer were probably expecting I would: a poor little rich girl who’d had everything she’d ever needed, a petulant princess who didn’t want to be bothered with the lab-engineered competition.
“I should let you know that you won’t have any concerns financially,” said Jeff, flipping through a sheaf of documents he’d pulled from his briefcase. “Your father had a very generous life insurance policy, with specific bequests set aside for you, your brothers, your niece, and this, um, new addition.” He went through the specifics of what the baby would be entitled to once the will was probated, which I wrote down without really hearing. I was still stunned, sitting there in a skirt and heels and the green sweater I’d worn because it had been the first thing I’d grabbed, and bare legs, only one of which it appeared I’d remembered to shave.
From underneath the table, the baby gave a little squeak. I rocked her again, bending down to brush the top of her head with my fingertips. “Who was the egg donor?”
Leslie and her lawyer exchanged a glance “That’s confidential,” said the lawyer.
“I’m the guardian,” I shot back. “Don’t I have a right to know what I’m dealing with? Genetically speaking?”
Another glance. I exhaled loudly, letting Leslie and her lawyer know that I was getting sick of their making eyes at each other. Finally Leslie said, “India and your father chose our anonymous donation option. They never met their donor. All they had was her profile.”
“Well, I’d like to meet her.” I wasn’t sure that this was true. What I did know was that I wanted everything I could get out of the clinic, every apology, every bit of discomfort and hard work. God knew they’d made my life hard enough.
“I suppose . . .” Leslie began, “we could contact the donor, maybe give her some sense of the, um, change in arrangements. She could agree to let us give you her contact information, but it would be entirely up to her.”
“Why don’t you do that.” I paused for a moment, gathering myself. “There’s no chance . . .” I said, and snuck a guilty look down into the car seat, worried, irrationally, that the baby would overhear me and take offense. “There’s no chance that this custody arrangement was a mistake? They wanted me, not my brother?”
Without any hesitation both lawyers, plus Leslie, shook their heads. “We’re here for you,” said Leslie, managing to sound sincere. “Whatever support we can provide, in any capacity. We can be a resource, if you need a nanny, or any other kind of help . . .”
I shook my head and got to my feet, lifting the handle of the car seat and struggling to get my purse over my shoulder. “We’ll be fine,” I said, and then, with the car seat banging against my leg and the cup of coffee I’d poured myself in my free hand, I walked out the door and into my father’s office, and set the baby’s seat down on the floor. Someone had been cleaning. There were cardboard boxes on the mostly empty shelves, filled with photographs, the tin cup with the picture of the Eiffel Tower that I’d bought him from my junior-year trip to Paris, the finger paintings that Violet had done. I sat on top of the empty desk. His chair was gone, and I’m sure the place had been vacuumed and dusted since his death, but I imagined, sitting at his desk with my coffee beside me, looking out over the city, that I could still smell him, could feel his presence, here in the place where he’d spent so many intensely focused hours. “Now what?” I asked. No answer came. I missed my father terribly, felt his absence like a stitch in my side, a pain that never left me. In the car seat, Rory was sleeping,