Jodi Picoult: Handle with Care

Copyright © 2009 by Jodi Picoult

It may be a cliché to say I didn’t do this alone, but it’s also true. First and foremost, I want to thank the parents of kids with OI who invited me into their lives for a little while-and the kids themselves, who made me laugh and reminded me daily that strength is far more than a physical measure of stamina: Laurie Blaisdell and Rachel, Taryn Macliver and Matthew, Tony and Stacey Moss and Hope, Amy Phelps and Jonathan. Thanks to my crackerjack medical team: Mark Brezinski, David Toub, John Femino, E. Rebecca Schirrer, Emily Baker, Michele Lauria, Karen George, Steve Sargent; and my legal eagles: Jen Sternick, Lise Iwon, Chris Keating, Jennifer Sargent. I owe Debbie Bernstein for sharing her story about being adopted (and letting me steal huge parts of it). I am likewise indebted to Donna Branca, for revisiting memories that are painful and for being gracious and honest when I asked questions. Thanks to Jeff Fleury, Nick Giaccone, and Frank Moran for helping me create Sean’s life as a police officer. For other expertise in their fields, thanks to Michael Goldman (who also let me use his fantastic T-shirt slogan), Steve Alspach, Stefanie Ryan, Kathy Hemenway, Jan Scheiner, Fonsaca Malyan, Kevin Lavigne, Ellen Wilber, Sindy Buzzell, and Fred Clow. It would be a gross oversight not to highlight the involvement that Atria Books has in making my books such successes; I am grateful to Carolyn Reidy, Judith Curr, David Brown, Kathleen Schmidt, Mellony Torres, Sarah Branham, Laura Stern, Gary Urda, Lisa Keim, Christine Duplessis, Michael Selleck, the whole of the fabulous sales force, and everyone else who has worked so hard to make my books leap off the shelves into the arms and hearts of readers. A special thanks goes to Camille McDuffie, my secret weapon/publicist extraordinaire. Thanks to Emily Bestler, who always makes me feel like a star (and makes sure everyone else seems to think I’m one, too). Thanks to Laura Gross, with whom I celebrated my twentieth anniversary this year-and who is the other half of a partnership I rank right up there with my marriage. And to Jane Picoult, my mom, thanks for believing I could do this long before anyone else did, and for laughing and crying in all the right places.

In the interests of accuracy, I should state that although there was an OI convention in Omaha, I’ve changed the date. Also, I’ve slightly amended the way juries are picked in New Hampshire-it’s not by individual, as I’ve written, but it’s a lot more interesting to read that way!

I have two special thank-yous. The first is to Katie Desmond, the sister I never had, who created the recipes I’ve attributed here to Charlotte O’Keefe. If you’re ever lucky enough to be invited to her house for dinner: don’t walk, run. The second is to Kara Sheridan, who is one of the most inspirational women I’ve ever met: she’s a scholar studying body image and self-esteem for disabled teens. She’s an athlete-a swimmer who’s broken records. She’s about to get married to a wonderful, adorable guy. And oh, by the way, she also has Type III osteogenesis imperfecta. Thanks, Kara, for showing the world that barriers were meant to be broken, that no one can be defined by a disability, and that nothing’s ever impossible.

Finally, I have to thank once again Kyle, Jake, and Sammy, for giving me something wonderful to come home to; and Tim, who is my happy ending.

February 14, 2002

Things break all the time. Glass, and dishes, and fingernails. Cars and contracts and potato chips. You can break a record, a horse, a dollar. You can break the ice. There are coffee breaks and lunch breaks and prison breaks. Day breaks, waves break, voices break. Chains can be broken. So can silence, and fever.

For the last two months of my pregnancy, I made lists of these things, in the hopes that it would make your birth easier.

Promises break.

Hearts break.

On the night before you were born, I sat up in bed with something to add to my list. I rummaged in my nightstand for a pencil and paper, but Sean put his warm hand on my leg. Charlotte? he asked. Is everything okay?

Before I could answer, he pulled me into his arms, flush against him, and I fell asleep feeling safe, forgetting to write down what I had dreamed.

It wasn’t until weeks later, when you were here, that I remembered what had awakened me that night: fault lines. These are the places where the earth breaks apart. These are the spots where earthquakes originate, where volcanoes are born. Or in other words: the world is crumbling under us; it’s the solid ground beneath our feet that’s an illusion.

You arrived during a storm that nobody had predicted. A nor’easter, the weathermen said later, a blizzard that was supposed to blow north into Canada instead of working its way into a frenzy and battering the coast of New England. The news broadcasts tossed aside their features on high school sweethearts who met up again in a nursing home and got remarried, on the celebrated history behind the candy heart, and instead began to run constant weather bulletins about the strength of the storm and the communities where ice had knocked out the power. Amelia was sitting at the kitchen table, cutting folded paper into valentines as I watched the snow blow in six-foot drifts against the glass slider. The television showed footage of cars sliding off the roads.

I squinted at the screen, at the flashing blues of the police cruiser that had pulled in behind the overturned vehicle, trying to see whether the officer in the driver’s seat was Sean.

A sharp rap on the slider made me jump. “Mommy!” Amelia cried, startled, too.

I turned just in time to see a volley of hail strike a second time, creating a crack in the plate glass no bigger than my fingernail. As we watched, it spread into a web of splintered glass as big as my fist. “Daddy will fix it later,” I said.

That was the moment when my water broke.

Amelia glanced down between my feet. “You had an accident.”

I waddled to the phone, and when Sean didn’t answer his cell, I called Dispatch. “This is Sean O’Keefe’s wife,” I said. “I’m in labor.” The dispatcher said that he could send out an ambulance, but that it would probably take a while-they were maxed out with motor vehicle accidents.

“That’s okay,” I said, remembering the long labor I’d had with your sister. “I’ve probably got a while.”

Suddenly I doubled over with a contraction so strong that the phone fell out of my hand. I saw Amelia watching, her eyes wide. “I’m fine,” I lied, smiling until my cheeks hurt. “The phone slipped.” I reached for the receiver, and this time I called Piper, whom I trusted more than anyone in the world to rescue me.

“You can’t be in labor,” she said, even though she knew better-she was not only my best friend but also my initial obstetrician. “The C-section’s scheduled for Monday.”