Rogue

“I doubt that, and I sure wouldn't be. I rely on her more than you know. I can't do it all alone.”

“You have me now,” he said confidently, and Maxine laughed. “Great, and how are you at laundry, ironing, getting dinner on the table every night, running car pool, making play dates, getting the kids to school, making snacks, packing lunches, supervising slumber parties, and taking care of them when they're sick?”

He got the message, but he didn't agree with her and never had. “I'm sure they could be far more independent, if you'd let them be. There's no reason why they can't do most of that themselves.” And this from a man who had never had kids, and had barely ever seen one up close until hers. He had avoided them all his life. He had all the pompous, unrealistic views of people who have never had children, and could no longer remember being one themselves. “Besides, you know my solution to all that,” he reminded her. “Boarding school. You'd have none of those problems, and you wouldn't have a woman with a crack baby living in your house.”

“I don't agree with you, Charles,” she said simply. “I am never sending my children away to school until they leave for college.” She wanted to make that clear to him now. “And Zellie isn't adopting a ‘crack baby.' You don't know that for sure. ‘High risk' does not mean the baby is addicted.”

“It could be,” he insisted, and he had gotten that message loud and clear about her negative view of boarding school for her children. Maxine was not letting go of her children, or sending them away. If he didn't love her so much, he'd have put his foot down. And if she didn't love him, she wouldn't have put up with the things he said. She just figured it was one of his quirks. But he had loved the peaceful, childless weekend he had just spent with her. Maxine, on the other hand, had loved it but had missed her kids. She knew that having no children of his own, it was something he would never understand, and she let it go at that.

They were having Chinese takeout with the children in the kitchen on Sunday night, when Zellie came running in.

“Oh my God … oh my God … it's coming … it's coming!” For a minute they'd all forgotten. Zelda looked like a chicken without her head as she ran around the kitchen.

“What's coming?” Maxine asked her blankly. She truly had no idea.

“The baby! The birth mom is in labor! I have to go to Roosevelt Hospital right away.”

“Oh my God,” Maxine said, and everyone got up and exclaimed over her excitedly as though she were having it herself. Charles sat at the table, eating calmly, and shook his head.

Zelda was dressed and out the door five minutes later, and the rest of them talked about it and then went to their rooms. Maxine sat at the table and glanced at Charles.

“Thanks for being a good sport,” she said gratefully. “I know this isn't fun for you.” She was sorry it had happened at all, but she was trying to make the best of it. There was no other choice. Or only choices she didn't want, other than this one, welcoming Zellie's baby.

“It's not going to be fun for you either, when that baby is screaming the house down. If it's born drug addicted, it's going to be a nightmare for all of you. I'm glad I'm not moving in for another two months.” So was she.

And as it turned out, much to her chagrin, Charles wasn't wrong. The birth mother had done far more drugs than she admitted, and the baby was born addicted to cocaine. He spent a week in the hospital being detoxed, while Zelda sat with him every day and rocked him. And when he came home, he screamed night and day. Zellie sat with him in her room. He was a poor eater, he hardly slept, and she couldn't put him down. All he did was scream. The poor little thing had come into the world in a very hard way, but into the arms of an adoring adoptive mother.

“How's it going?” Maxine asked her one morning. Zelda looked like ten miles of bad road after another sleepless night. She was awake with the baby every night, for most of the night, holding him.

“The doctor said it could take a while for the drugs to get out of his system. I think he's a little better,” Zellie said, looking down at her son blissfully. She had totally bonded with Jimmy as though she'd given birth to him herself. The social workers had come to check on him several times, and no one could have faulted Zellie for how devoted she was to him. He just wasn't a lot of fun for anyone else. Maxine was relieved they'd be leaving on vacation in a few weeks, and with luck by the time they got back, Jimmy would have settled down. It was all she could hope for now. Zellie was a wonderful mom, and just as patient and loving as she had been with Jack and Sam when they were born. And little Jimmy was a lot harder to deal with.