Chapter 86

Maria checked out the front window again. Danna usually wasn't late for their weekly Frosty and chat, but it was already twenty minutes past. She called the Graysons and asked for Danna.

"Hello?" Danna said on Amanda's cell phone.

"Hi, Danna, this is Sister Anderson. Aren't we supposed to go get a Frosty tonight?"

"Oh, yeah, I guess we can. I thought you wouldn't want to talk to me after I told you I wasn't going to Church anymore."

"I would love to talk to you. We won't talk about attending Church unless you want to, but I still think we should talk. In fact, tonight I need to ask you to help me," Maria said.

"Okay. I'll be over in a few minutes," Danna said.

Danna must have dashed out the door as soon as she pressed the phone's off button, because there was a knock on Maria's door before she'd even gotten to the kitchen to put the phone back.

On the way to Wendy's, Danna chatted happily about Amanda, who was being induced tomorrow. "She's five days past her due date. Brandon keeps telling her to go jump on a trampoline, and Amanda keeps telling him that he's not funny at all. Then he massages her ankles and she forgives him. I don't think Brandon has noticed that Amanda doesn't have much of a sense of humor about being pregnant anymore."

"How are you going to get home from work when Amanda goes on maternity leave?" Maria asked.

"The bus. It will take longer, but that's always a bonus," Danna said.

After they each had their Frosty, Maria asked, "was your mom okay with you staying home from Church on Sunday?"

"She can't do anything about it. I bet she's relieved I'm not there to mess up her image anymore. Brandon said his dad was relieved when he quit trying to go to Church too," Danna said. "If you can't do everything right, it's better not to go at all. It keeps people in nice little boxes. If you aren't sure what you believe, and still go to Church, no one knows what box you fit in."

"Danna, I know people who go to Church without being sure of their beliefs. You don't have to fit in a box to go to Church," Maria said. "And I can't imagine any parent being relieved that their son or daughter doesn't want to go to Church anymore."

Danna shrugged. Maria wished she would go back to arguing about everything. At least she was talking and Maria had a chance of understanding her. Now that she'd shut down about her struggle for faith, Maria had no way to reach her. Maria waited, but Danna didn't add anything.

After a few minutes of silence, Danna said, "you said you wanted to ask my help with something."

"Yes. It has to do with Church. Is that okay?"

"As long as I don't have to go."

Maria wanted to ask Danna if there was anything anyone could have said about the law of chastity that would have helped her feel comforted instead of condemned. Rather than approaching the topic directly, she asked her, "do you remember the evening you got sick at Girls Camp last year?"

"Yeah."

"It was during a fireside."

"Yeah."

"Do you remember what the speaker was talking about?"

"Yeah." Danna wasn't going to make this easy.

"He used an object lesson that suggested there are only two categories of girls under the law of chastity. I think that gives the wrong impression," Maria started.

"No, you don't," Danna snapped. "You spoke that evening too, remember? And you didn't say one word about people like me. No one ever does. We're invisible. All of you want to pretend we don't exist, and the only girls who have been touched and gotten dirty are the ones who wanted it, and every girl who wants to be pure gets to stay pure. I spent years believing that I wanted it because no one ever told me that sometimes it doesn't matter what you want, it happens anyway."

Maria thought of her conversation with Megan. "Danna, people don't believe that assault victims wanted it. They believe that assault victims should simply know that they're as pure as any girl who has never been assaulted."

"That's even dumber," Danna said, stabbing the bottom of her cup with her spoon. "If someone throws a big glob of mud on you, you're not as clean as someone else who didn't get hit with the mud. You're as dirty as a girl who wanted someone to throw mud on her, only you're mad and hurt too. But everyone wants to pretend you don't exist because no one knows how to help you clean off the mud. So you must have wanted the mud, because the only way to clean off the mud is to say you're sorry and repent, but how do you repent when you never wanted the mud in the first place? Saying I'm just as good as any other fairy tale princess in the Church is like saying I should just ignore the mud all over me and pretend it didn't happen. And it did happen. It did. And it hurt. It still hurts." Danna started crying.

Maria slipped over to Danna's side of the booth and put her arms around her. She stroked her hair until Danna calmed down.

"I've learned a lot this past year," Maria told Danna. "If I had to talk about the law of chastity again, I would say completely different things."

"What would you say?" Danna asked.

"I'm still trying to work that out," Maria admitted. "What could I say that would help you?"

Danna straightened up and wiped her face on a napkin. "I don't know. Sometimes I feel like nothing is ever going to help me. I thought you would know something. But there isn't anything, is there?"

"There is, but I'm still trying to work it out," Maria said. She'd wanted Danna's help to write the revised law of chastity lesson for the Beehives on Sunday. It hadn't occurred to her that Danna wouldn't know what she needed to hear any more than Maria knew what she needed to say.

"It's all right," Danna said. "I'm getting used to it. It doesn't matter very much anymore anyway. We ought to get going before it gets too late."

Danna had never cared about getting home late. Maria wiped up the drips on the table as Danna threw their cups away. They went home.

Oh, Heavenly Father, she prayed that evening, I missed another chance to say something that would have helped Danna. And I still don't know how to teach the law of chastity. The Church talks about the law of chastity do assume only two categories – people who want to keep the law of chastity, and people who want to break it. The Church talks and information I've found about victims of sexual abuse don't mention the law of chastity at all. It's like abuse victims are in a completely different category from everyone else who is taught to obey the law of chastity. My lesson is on Sunday. I really, really need some inspiration before then. Please.

---

Amanda Grayson's daughter was six hours old, and Amanda had slept through half her life. Brandon thought he might have dozed off once or twice, but then his daughter would do something that made him leap to the bassinet to make sure she wasn't in mortal peril. Two times, a noisy sigh had jerked him out of his doze. One time, she'd snorted when she inhaled. Another time, she worked her arm out of the blanket and flailed it around. This time, a coo had him gazing down into the bassinet, hoping she'd do it again.

"It's kind of funny you and your mom can sleep through your breathing, but I can't," Brandon whispered to her as he touched her petal cheek.

She shifted, raising her eyebrows until her forehead wrinkled, but her eyes stayed shut.

There was a light tap on the door, and then it opened. A nurse's aide quietly entered the room with a tray, that she left on Amanda's swing-arm table. "Lunch time," she whispered to Brandon, before tiptoeing back out.

Brandon walked over to see what was on the menu. He was reaching for a cookie when Amanda spoke. "Touch that and die."

"I thought you were asleep," Brandon said, snatching his hand back.

"I am," Amanda said. "But I can sleep and eat at the same time." She carefully adjusted her position and pushed the button on the bed to bring her to a sitting position.

"I didn't get breakfast, you know," Brandon pointed out. Amanda had inhaled everything on the breakfast tray.

"You could go buy yourself something," Amanda said heartlessly, starting on the turkey sandwich.

"I'd have to leave the room," Brandon objected. "What if she does something I need to see? You could share."

"My ab muscles and I just finished a marathon a few hours ago," Amanda said, "we are resting and eating everything we can get our hands on."

The baby squirmed, gave a few grunts, and then filled her diaper with a wet, noisy gurgle.

"Looks like she did something you need to see," Amanda said, opening her apple juice.

"I changed the last one," Brandon said.

"I'll let you have a cookie," Amanda said.

Brandon unwrapped his daughter and started the diaper change. "I can't believe this hasn't killed your appetite."

"I can't see it from here," Amanda said.

Brandon finished cleaning the sticky mess off his daughter about the same time Amanda finished devouring her lunch. He washed his hands, and turned back to Amanda's lunch tray. "That's only half a cookie!"

"I'm hungry. At least I saved you half a cookie," Amanda said. "Hand her to me first, would you?"

Brandon gently picked up the baby and gave her to Amanda. He bit into the cookie while he watched Amanda's face get the same melted love expression that he felt on his own face whenever he looked at the baby. Amanda cooed at her, and the baby blinked.

"I'm going to let her nurse for a while," Amanda said, shifting her hospital gown.

Brandon's stomach, primed by the cookie fragment, let out an audible growl.

"You go get something to eat. I promise to give you a play by play report of everything she does while you're gone," Amanda said.

"I guess I should," Brandon said reluctantly. He found his wallet and headed down to the cafeteria, where he ate as fast as he could.

He came back to the room to find that Amanda had fallen back to sleep, with the baby in her arms. Brandon got the camera out and took pictures, which woke Amanda up. She smiled at him.

"You're a cute dad."

"You're a gorgeous mom."

"Can you believe we've got a baby? It's like we're adults or something," Amanda said.

"Pretty crazy stuff," Brandon said, sitting on the bed next to Amanda. She snuggled into him until he got his arms around both his wife and daughter.

Brandon sat there and savored the fresh, new feeling of wonder that had enveloped him in the delivery room. He felt like he'd been born along with his daughter, and was starting a whole new life alongside her. Already, he couldn't picture a world without her. His life had split in half with his daughter's first cry, and everything that came before became less important than everything that came after.

There was a soft tap on the door, and Amanda called permission to come in.

Lynnette peeked around the door and whispered, "is it okay to visit?"

"Yes!" Amanda gushed.

Lynnette walked in, with Clint following her, carrying a gift bag.

In that instant, Brandon's heart broke wide open for Lynnette and Clint, who didn't have this defining moment in their lives, and he understood why they kept seeking for it. Something could be so pure and life-defining that you kept looking for it no matter how many setbacks you faced. He marveled that they kept hoping. If this moment had been snatched from him, he knew he would never recover enough to try again. And with that flash of self-insight, he realized that Lynnette's faith and hope showed more strength of character than his cynicism.

Lynnette walked towards Amanda, arms held out. Amanda gave her the baby, and Lynnette's expression took on that same look of melted love and adoration. Clint set the gift bag on the floor and hung over his wife's shoulder to memorize the baby's features.

Clint too, Brandon realized. Usually, he thought of Clint as Lynnette's husband, a standard, ordinary Mormon who was nothing special; just a guy with a boring job and a receding hairline. And yet his faith kept trying, right next to his wife. Clint and Lynnette matched. He wondered if he and Amanda would ever match like that. He glanced at her, and saw tears on her cheeks.

"Oh, Amanda, she's perfect," Lynnette said, and it sounded like a prayer.

Clint stuck his hand out towards Brandon. "Congratulations, daddy."

Brandon shook his hand, with a half-smile and an awkward, "thanks."

"But aren't you supposed to still be in labor?" Lynnette asked.

"I was scheduled to be induced this morning, but my water broke late last night. She was born an hour before I would have been induced," Amanda said. "I guess she decided to come on her own schedule after all."

"What did you say you were going to name her?" Clint asked as Lynnette handed him the blanket-wrapped bundle.

"Sophie Samantha Grayson," Brandon answered.

"Sophie Samantha Grayson," Clint repeated. "That's a good name." He touched her gently on the nose. "Baby Sophie."

Lynnette handed Amanda the gift bag. "Presents for you!"

"After everything you brought to the shower, you didn't need to bring anything else," Amanda protested, looking in the bag.

"I didn't give you everything at the shower," Lynnette said.

Amanda took out a pink onesie that said "Daddy's Little Princess," exclaimed over it, and handed it to Brandon. Then she pulled a green blouse out of the bag.

"It will take her a while to grow into that," Brandon observed.

"It's for me," Amanda said. Amanda reached up to hug Lynnette and held on to her a bit longer than necessary. When she let go, Amanda was leaking tears again.

"It's a pretty emotional day, isn't it?" Lynnette asked.

Amanda took a tissue. "I don't know how you do it. I wouldn't have been offended if you hadn't been able to come visit. You look like you're doing okay, but this has to be harder than you make it look."

Lynnette and Clint swapped a significant look.

"We have good news again," Lynnette said, sitting on the bed next to Amanda.

"Really?"

"Yes. LDS Family Services called us about a month ago to tell us that another birth mother had chosen us to adopt her baby. It feels different this time around. With Sarah Louise, I was so excited and hyper that I never really stopped to consider anything. I think on some level, I knew we weren't meant to have her, but I didn't want to slow down enough to hear it. This time around, we both feel more peaceful. I don't know if that's the spirit guaranteeing that this baby is ours, or that we'll be comforted if this adoption doesn't take place either, but I feel more of Heavenly Father's presence about this baby," Lynnette said.

"And the birth mother is different," Clint added. "Sarah's birth mother never wanted to be around us or talk to us about the future or the baby. Like she was already regretting the decision to give up her baby, even as she told us she wanted us to adopt her."

"Tammy, this birth mother, is a lot more involved with us," Lynnette said. "We've been out to lunch twice, and last week she invited us to the twenty-week ultrasound."

"It's a boy," Clint informed them. "We've got his pictures on the fridge." He stood there, beaming.

Brandon stuck out his hand. "Congratulations, daddy."

Clint laughed so loud that Sophie startled before falling back to sleep. "Thanks!"

"What's the safety date?" Amanda asked. "When does it become impossible for the birth mother to ask for the baby back?"

"As soon as she signs the papers at the hospital," Lynnette said. "But we can't finalize the adoption until he's six months old. The adoption agency has to evaluate how we're doing as parents and if we're taking care of him before he will legally be ours. After the adoption is finalized, we can take him to the temple to be sealed to us, and bless him in sacrament meeting."

"We're not telling many people this time," Clint said, rocking Sophie gently. "Even though we feel better about this baby, we'd rather not go through the circus again."

"We won't tell anyone," Amanda said.

"We don't want to steal your thunder," Lynnette said. "We'll let Sophie be the center of attention for another four months until her cousin gets here."

Clint gazed down at Sophie and told her, "and then you'll have a cousin your own age to play with. You'll like that, won't you? You're such an angel. Precious baby, straight from Heavenly Father."

"You'll bless your baby boy when he's six months old?" Brandon asked.

"Yes," said Clint.

"Would you be willing to bless Sophie at the same time?" Brandon asked.

"It would be my honor," Clint said.

"Okay, we'll do it that way," Brandon said. He looked at Amanda, who smiled at him. He smiled back. All those hurt feelings connected to his mission were part of his past life, the one in which he wasn't a father. Sophie shouldn't be cut off from her clan because of something that had happened before she'd been born. It felt right to ask Clint to bless his daughter.