C Box: Three Weeks to Say Goodbye

I said, “ Ninety-nine percent . Remember when you used that figure when I asked about the birth father signing away his parental rights?”

Her face clouded. “I remember. And it’s true. It really is. I’ve been involved in nearly a thousand placements in my life, and this is the first time this has ever happened. We just didn’t think it could.”

“Didn’t you say you tried to find the birth father?” Melissa asked bitterly. “Didn’t you say he’d agreed to sign the papers?”

She nodded.

“What happened?”

“We tracked him down in the Netherlands, where he was on vacation with his mother. He was staying with his mother’s relatives, I guess. I didn’t talk with him, but a coworker did. She explained the situation to him, and she said he was surprised. He agreed to sign away custody and he gave us a fax number where he could be reached. We sent the papers over.”

“But he never signed them,” I said.

“We dropped the ball,” she said. “The woman who’d made contact left the agency. If any of us had had any inkling at all that he would refuse to sign, we would have kept you abreast of the situation. But as far as we knew, it was his wish not to be a parent. We can’t coerce him, you know. We can’t pressure. It has to be his decision.”

My anger was building to the point that I had to look away from her.

“Legally, we covered our bases,” she said sympathetically, almost apologetically to us. “We placed public notices for him and did everything we’re required to do. Not having the signed papers isn’t that unusual, because the family court judge always-and I mean always-awards full custody to the adoptive parents in a case like this. After all, we can’t let a nonresponsive birth father hold up a placement, can we?”

“Did you contact Garrett’s father?” I asked. “Is that how he got involved?”

“We normally don’t contact the parents of the birth father. That’s considered coercive.”

“But you knew about him? You knew about John Moreland?”

“No.”

“Interesting that his mother didn’t know, since she was with him overseas when your agency contacted him. How could she not know?”

Julie shrugged. “It doesn’t make sense to me, but a lot about this situation makes no sense. Maybe she knew but didn’t want to tell her husband. Why-I don’t know.”

I said, “So this Judge Moreland entered the picture after Garrett told him?”

“As far as I know, yes.”

“And that’s when Moreland’s lawyers contacted the agency?”

She looked down. “Yes. The letter came from them with less than ten days left in the public notice period. If they’d waited just two more weeks, custody would have been granted to you by the family court. It was bad timing for you.”

“It sure was,” I said sarcastically.

“If you and Melissa choose not to fight the Moreland claim, our agency will do everything in our power to make the situation right for you.”

“Meaning what?” Melissa asked.

She took a quick breath and raised her eyes to meet Melissa’s. “I’ve been a party to the meetings we’ve had with our executives and our lawyers. I know we would immediately refund all fees and arrange, free of charge, for a new placement. You would be moved to the top of the priority list for a new baby. And we’d offer a very large settlement to you and Melissa and our apologies. That’s if we can keep this whole thing out of court and out of the news. I think you’d agree with me that the last thing anyone would want to do is discourage children’s chances of future placements with loving families who might be scared out of adoption by this situation.”

“This can’t be happening,” Melissa said, as much to herself as to Julie Perala.

“Why didn’t your lawyers contact our lawyer about these meetings?” I said. “Isn’t that how it’s supposed to work?”

“I thought they had,” she said.

“We’ve heard nothing.”

She shrugged. “I’m not a lawyer.”

“Neither is ours, apparently,” I said, spitting it out.

“You don’t understand,” Melissa said. “We can’t lose our baby.”

Julie started to speak, then bit her lip and looked away.

“We can’t lose our baby,” Melissa said again, but this time her voice was close to a shout.

“Judge Moreland is a powerful man,” Julie said softly. “I get the impression he’s used to getting what he wants.”

“Tell me about him,” I asked. “Tell me what kind of man I’m up against.”

“He’s a wealthy man,” she said. “His wife has the fortune, from what I understand. Judges aren’t paid that much, I guess. He owns lots of real estate. I’m telling you this because you mentioned something about buying off Garrett. I hate to say it, but I don’t think you could. And the judge comes across as such a nice man. He’s handsome, confident. He’s the kind of man you instantly like, and you hope he likes you because you don’t want to displease him, you know?”

I said, “Julie, when I think of you all having these meetings and talking about us it makes me ill.”

She nodded, then looked away again. “We discussed what his options were. He was very concerned about doing things the right way so as not to hurt you and Melissa.”

“How kind,” Melissa said.

“Tell me, Julie,” I said, “how do you live with yourself?”

She put her face in her hands and cried. I couldn’t help it-I felt terrible for making her cry again. But I didn’t take my words back.

Finally, she grabbed a napkin and wiped the tears from her eyes, smearing eyeliner down her cheek, making it look like a faded scar.

Melissa stood up with Angelina. “I’ve got to change her diaper,” she said, and left the room. “We’ll be back.”

For a moment we just sat there not looking at each other.

“There’s one thing you can help us with,” I said.

“What?”

“If you were Melissa and me, would you fight this in court? Knowing what you know, do we have a prayer?”

She shook her head sadly, said, “The best you could hope for, I think, is some kind of joint custody that a judge would decree. But I don’t think either of you would be happy with that. And if I were you, I’d pray to God your baby is raised by John and Kellie-that Garrett is kept as far away from the baby as possible.”

I felt my skin crawl. “Why do you say that?”

She shook her head. “There’s something wrong with that boy. He scares me. And it isn’t anything I can quite put my finger on-there’s just something wrong about him.”

“Oh God,” I said.

She pursed her lips and looked down at her hands. “It’s like the temperature in the room goes down ten degrees when he enters. There’s no warmth. He seems bloodless and cunning. I wouldn’t trust him with a child-or anyone.”

I felt myself tingling. I leaned forward. “I understand what you’re saying, but do you have anything I can use? Have you heard anything about Garrett we can investigate to prove what a bad father he’d be?”

She was still, her hands mindlessly caressing her coffee mug on both sides. Thinking.

She said, “I think there’s been some trouble at school,” she said. “Once, when we were meeting with John, he got a call from someone at Garrett’s high school, and he had to cut the meeting short. I don’t know who called or what it was about, but the judge was quite upset.”

“This happened within the last month?” I asked, trying not to show my anger that the Morelands and the agency had been meeting behind our backs in secret.

“Yes.”

“Anything else?”

“One thing, but it’s no more solid than the first. When we were looking over your placement application with them…”