Free Rescuing Julia Twice by Tina Traster Page A

very quiet.”
    â€œHow
noir,
” I say to Ricky.
    â€œShh,” he says. “We have our instructions.”
    Olga tiptoes up the steps. We follow her lead. Everything is done with Japanese-knife-tossing speed. Ricky pulls on a diaper, then a one-sie, and then the yellow snowsuit, but there’s no time to admire it. After she is dressed, Ricky sweeps her into his arms. There is a pacifier in her mouth. It has a plastic yellow and white daisy around it. I’m handed a tiny little cardboard box. I take a moment to lift the lid. Inside is a little gold baptismal cross. I fight back tears as I think of Julia’s young birth mother, who will never again see her child.
    Driving to the airport, I notice Julia is fascinated with the moonlight, just as she was with sunlight. What a phenomenon—a world outside the thick walls where she has lived her whole tiny life.
    It is starting to snow. Again, we will be flying through a storm.
    â€œHow many times can we defeat death?” I say to Ricky.
    â€œDon’t worry,” he says. “We’ll be back at the Moscow Marriott before you know it.”
    I hook my mind on the marble lobby and the Marriott’s serene swimming pool in an attempt to calm down. Olga leads us to the airport lounge, where we sit with Barbara, Neal, and Brandon, and Jo and her child.
    Olga is speaking in a hushed voice to the agent at the desk. Then she turns and says, “The flight is going to be delayed due to the storm.”
    â€œWhat?” I say. “We’ve flown through worse than this. I don’t understand.”
    By now Olga has become accustomed to my neurosis, but she is done with us. We have our baby. She says good-bye hastily and wishes us good luck.
    I look at Barbara, who is holding Brandon on her lap. She must have gone through hell to get to this point of acceptance. She actually seems rather peaceful. She’s probably counting down the hours until she can get back to New Jersey and her daughter. Jo doles out Cheerios to her little girl, who has thin black hair and a rash all over her face. I think to myself how brave Jo must be, a single mother, bringing home a child who looks like she’s never had a day of decent care. But Jo is chipper and upbeat.
    Ricky checks in with the desk about departure times, but he’s not getting much information. He chats with a German businessman who is in Siberia to sell machine tools. His English is perfect. Julia sits on my lap. I feed her formula from a bottle. She seems to like it. Briefly, I feel like a mother. Then, a loud pop, followed by a putrid stench.
    â€œOh, my God!” I scream, feeling the hot ooze of diarrhea cover my lap.
    Ricky leaps from his seat and grabs her. He knows what to do. He peels off the yellow jumpsuit. Barbara and Jo jump in to help, handing Ricky baby wipes and plastic bags to dispose of the soiled diaper. Barbara digs in her bag for a clean diaper. There is a veritable factory of baby care, but I am frozen solid. I can’t change a diaper. How can I be this child’s mother? Barbara’s looking at me—probably thinking,
Now who’s the crazy one?
    â€œDon’t worry,” Barbara says wryly. “Motherhood is a learning process.”
    Throughout the diaper explosion episode, Julia never cries. Come to think of it, I have yet to see her cry. Don’t all babies cry?

    Two hours later, we are called to board. I’m glad to have Novosibirsk behind me.
    The staff at the Moscow Marriott is accustomed to adoptive parents from the United States. They have made a makeshift crib out of a laundry basket for Julia. Julia sleeps through the first night. We wake on February 14, Valentine’s Day. When Ricky and I started dating two and a half years ago, he told me he hated Valentine’s Day because of his ex-wife. This woman, whom Ricky and I never mention by name, brought him to his knees financially. She spent the money he made as a criminal