The bathroom door opens. Two students begin gossiping at the sinks. One of them has a date tonight, met someone on that app that matches people by their pheromones.
Frida texts Renee about the cancellation. She wants to call Ms. Torres the sadist that she is, but her communications must be discreet. Tomorrow is off, she writes. Second visitation = ???
There’s nowhere to speak freely. No, Renee said, she shouldn’t buy a burner phone. She shouldn’t set up new email accounts, shouldn’t do research at the library, must watch what she says to her parents or friends or coworkers. Any of them could be questioned.
“You have nothing to hide,” Renee said. “Repeat it back to me, Frida: I have nothing to hide.”
Frida hears lipstick tubes and compacts being opened and closed. The girls discuss the merits of the app that matches people by voice. The one that matches people based on their commuting patterns, mimicking the likelihood of meeting a stranger on the train.
She could laugh. The idea of a normal weekend. She blots her eyes with a piece of toilet paper and returns to her desk.
Whatever relief she felt by coming here has faded, her cubicle simply a different place to miss Harriet and consider her mistakes. If she’d been more solicitous to Ms. Torres. If they’d had several hours, not one. If she’d never gone to Will’s house. If she’d been able to convince Harriet to play. If there had been no tantrum and no bite. If it were just the two of them, without clocks or cameras or that woman telling them to act normal.
Corrected page proofs were due back to her boss this morning. She spreads the pages out on her desk, checking for errant commas and misspelled faculty names and titles. She used to pride herself on her sharp eye, but now she can barely make sense of the words, couldn’t care less about getting the files to the printer. She needs Gust to apologize on her behalf. Harriet needs to know that her mother is thinking about her every second. This isn’t Mommy’s choice. This isn’t Mommy’s fault. Ms. Torres could have canceled on that other family.
* * *
After dinner, Frida retreats to Harriet’s nursery, as she has every night since the visitation. She faces the camera and kneels in the dark, her mind roaming to the past and future, unwilling to accept the unbearable present. Renee thinks the state should see her atoning. She should work or pray or exercise. She should clean. She shouldn’t watch television or waste time on her computer or phone. She must show them that she’s wrestling with her guilt. The more she suffers, the more she cries, the more they’ll respect her.
The room smells of chemicals. Fake lemon verbena. It doesn’t smell like Harriet anymore, and for that and everything else, Frida is sorry. A few toys faded in the wash. The stuffing in one of the quilts was ruined. She’s polished the crib and rocking chair. She’s cleaned the baseboards and windowsill, washed the walls. Her hands are rough from scrubbing her bathroom and kitchen twice a week, always without gloves, her chapped palms and broken nails like a little hair shirt.
Renee is worried about how the bite will play in court. She’s worried that the social worker didn’t observe any playing. But she plans to say that Harriet was provoked, that Harriet’s response was natural under the circumstances. They’d been apart for many days. Harriet’s routine had been disrupted. She never plays with her mother at Gust and Susanna’s, never on command, never with a timer.
Frida’s legs are falling asleep. She wonders what shapes she should make with her body, whether there’s a person watching her, or only a machine, if they’re looking for certain expressions or postures. She could bow to them, press her palms and forehead to the ground three times, the way her family prayed to Buddha for protection.
Who will protect her now? She hopes the family court judge has feelings, that the judge, if he or she is childless, at least has a cat or dog, something with a soul and a face, that he or she has experienced unconditional love, knows regret. CPS should require this of their employees.
She moves so the camera is seeing her in profile. Her hips hurt. Her lower back hurts. Lately, she’s been trying to remember the beginning. Bringing Harriet to the window in their hospital room and showing her daylight for the first time. Harriet’s rosy skin, newly exposed to the air and beginning to peel. She couldn’t stop touching Harriet’s face, amazed by her daughter’s huge cheeks and Western nose. How had she made a baby with blue eyes? At the beginning, it felt like they were taking care of a benevolent creature, not yet a human. Making a new human felt so grave.