Cathy Glass - A Long Way from Home

Unsurprisingly, Elaine had little appetite that morning and only managed half a croissant and a cup of coffee. Ian, who showed his anxiety in different ways, had scrambled eggs on toast, but kept checking his phone and nervously straightening the napkin on his lap. Neither of them spoke. Not only were they exhausted from the emotion of the day before and too little sleep, but there was also nothing left to say. Either they still had a chance of adopting or they’d return home as they’d arrived – a couple and not a family.

During breakfast an email came through to Ian’s phone from one of the families they’d got to know online who were also going through the process of adopting. They were eager to know how the meeting with Lana had gone. ‘I’ll reply later,’ Ian said. ‘I can’t face it now.’

After breakfast, they returned to their hotel room and tried to read the books they’d brought with them, but concentrating was near impossible. At 10.20 they were in the lobby waiting for the cab. They knew that little happened on time in this country – sometimes it happened earlier but more often late. The cab arrived at 10.40; not the same driver as the day before but he knew why they were there. Elaine and Ian would have liked to be left to their thoughts during the journey, but the driver was chatty and direct.

‘You going to adopt?’ he asked almost as soon as they got in.

‘We’re not sure,’ Ian replied.

‘Why not?’ He glanced in the rear-view mirror, puzzled. Elaine moved out of his line of vision so she didn’t have to talk.

‘Our baby was very sick and died,’ Ian said.

‘Oh. I’m sorry. They find you another one?’

‘Possibly.’

‘Boy or girl?’

‘Girl,’ Ian said.

‘I have children, a boy and a girl,’ the driver continued amicably as he drove. ‘You meet your child today?’

‘Maybe, we don’t know yet,’ Ian replied. Elaine gazed out of her side window. Although international adoption was well known in this country, it was still a source of interest to the locals, possibly because adoption wasn’t part of their culture, hence all the state-run orphanages. They didn’t adopt or foster and didn’t really understand why anyone would.

‘Many couples adopt from here,’ the driver said as he drove.

‘Yes, I know,’ Ian agreed.

‘This is your first trip here?’

‘Yes.’

‘Some couples come back two, three times to adopt. They must like our children a lot.’ He grinned and Ian met his gaze in the mirror with a polite smile. ‘I take one couple three times to orphanages,’ he continued. ‘They from America. They adopt brothers and sisters. Six in all! Very good people with lots of money.’

Ian nodded. ‘But we don’t have lots of money. We saved up to make this trip.’

‘You good people too.’

Yet while it was a strain having to make conversation, hearing about successful adoptions was heartening and proof that the system did work. Perhaps they had just been very unlucky and it would work out in the end. Perhaps.

It was 11.15 when the cab pulled up in the lane outside the orphanage. Ian opened the door to get out. ‘You wait here?’ he asked the driver.

‘Yes. No rush. Very important you spend time with your child.’

There wasn’t a meter running – cab journeys were quoted in advance and included any waiting time. Elaine joined Ian in front of the high metal gate as the driver wound down his window and lit up a cigarette. A wire-netting fence ran all around the perimeter of the orphanage, with a patch of land separating it from the building. This strip of land would have made a good outside children’s play area had it not been so badly overgrown. Ian rattled the metal gate – the only way of attracting attention, as there wasn’t a bell – and they waited. There’d been some rain in the night, and although the sun wasn’t out the humidity had risen. Elaine knocked away a fly.

‘They come soon,’ the driver said, and sounded his car horn.

The door to the orphanage opened and the care worker who’d dealt with them the day before came out, keys on the short chain at her waist. Elaine took a deep breath. She really didn’t like the woman. Without acknowledging them, the care worker nodded to the driver and unlocked the gate. ‘Thank you,’ Ian said, and they waited just inside while she locked the gate. They then followed her up the cracked cement path and in through the main door, which again she locked behind them.

‘You wait here,’ she said brusquely, and disappeared down the corridor, her shoes clipping heavily on the hard, tiled floor. A solitary child screamed in the distance and Ian threw Elaine a reassuring smile.

A few minutes later Dr Ciobanu appeared from the corridor. Although they’d never met him, they recognized him from his photograph online. In his mid-forties, of average height and build, he was wearing a dark suit with an open-neck shirt.

‘Pleased to meet you,’ he said pleasantly and, smiling, shook Elaine’s hand, then Ian’s. ‘So you decided to give me another chance?’ Ian nodded awkwardly. ‘No worries,’ he said, clapping Ian on the arm. ‘Come through to my office and we can talk.’

His office overlooked the front of the orphanage, and through the window they could see their cab waiting in the lane. Dr Ciobanu motioned for them to sit down. The room was small and cramped, with an old wooden table acting as a desk in the centre, and three chairs. Filing cabinets lined one wall and a fan stood on top of one beside an open bottle of water. ‘Would you like a drink?’ the doctor offered, going to the bottle.

‘No, thank you,’ they both said politely. The bottle would very likely have been refilled with tap water, and while this was safe for locals to drink – they’d built up a resistance to its bacteria – it upset foreigners’ stomachs.

Placing his tumbler of water on the table, Dr Ciobanu opened the top drawer of a filing cabinet and removed a folder. ‘Your paperwork,’ he said, returning to sit behind the table. He carefully opened the file before him. Elaine and Ian saw the top page was their initial application sent a year ago, with passport-sized photographs of both of them.

‘I have the rest of the paperwork you need in my briefcase,’ Ian said.

Dr Ciobanu nodded and then, folding his arms, leaned forward in earnest. ‘I am sorry you were disappointed yesterday. It is not good practice to have a couple arrive and find the child is no longer with us. It is a pity I could not be here to tell you personally. We are very short-staffed and my two care workers have no time for breaking bad news gently.’ He threw them a knowing smile and Ian, at least, started to relax.

‘As I said last night on the phone,’ the doctor continued, ‘Lana was a very sick baby. We did our best to save her but it wasn’t enough. She died peacefully in her sleep.’

‘What was the matter with her?’ Elaine asked, her voice slight.

‘She wouldn’t feed, something wrong in her gut, but you needn’t worry about that. We have to look to your future.’ His gaze went from one to the other, gauging their reaction, and Ian nodded. ‘I do not have a photograph yet of Anastasia. She has only just been given up for adoption. But she is healthy and you can see her shortly. Her mother works abroad a lot, as many single women here have to. She has been leaving her with us since she was a baby. Now the mother has met a man who is going to marry her, so she will be leaving this country for good for a better life.’

‘And she can’t take her child with her?’ Elaine asked, horrified.

‘No. It happens,’ Dr Ciobanu said matter-of-factly. ‘The man may not even know she has a child. The mother believes her daughter will be better off here in the orphanage, as many parents in this country do.’ He sighed with exasperation, as though he didn’t agree with this. ‘I will explain to the mother that her daughter will have a better life being adopted by you, rather than being left here.’